Upper Beaches residents are pleading for Metrolinx to add noise-reducing barriers
Around 400 Woodbine-Gerrard residents put together a petition
Frustration toward Metrolinx is growing in the Upper Beaches, amid major GO line construction that will add a fourth rail to the Lakeshore East corridor.
A group of around 400 Woodbine-Gerrard residents put together a petition requesting that Metrolinx add noise-reducing barriers and vibration-mitigating technology to its project.
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As CBC reports, a 2017 Metrolinx environmental assessment said that noise and vibration will increase sevenfold or more when the new rail line reaches completion in the 2030s. Earlier this month, at a community meeting, Metrolinx informed residents that their requests would not be accommodated.
“It feels like it really is condemning the whole area,” Rafael Pascual-Leone, a resident, told CBC Toronto. “Not only us, but generations to come are being left by the wayside.”
Another neighbour, Rula Altoumah, who also spoke to CBC, agreed that adding new tracks should come with noise barriers.
“I feel a sense of helplessness because it seems the issue of mitigating the noise for the community, preserving the quality of life for the community is not an issue on Metrolinx’s radar at all,” she said. “That’s my frustration.”
Responding to CBC’s inquiry, a Metrolinx spokesperson said, “Metrolinx follows regulatory requirements on noise mitigation and continues to explore all options to help mitigate these factors with our maintenance teams on new projects.”
Residents emphasized to CBC that they understand the need for transit. “It’s not a NIMBY situation,” MPP Mary-Margaret McMahon said. “They’re just asking for Metrolinx to cooperate and collaborate with them.”
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Carly Lewis is a journalist whose work has appeared in the New York Times and the New York Times Magazine, Vanity Fair, Wired, Interview Magazine, Pitchfork, Elle, and Maclean’s, where she is a contributing editor. Her work has been recognized by the National Magazine Awards and the Digital Publishing Awards. She reports on city life, culture—including what people do online—politics, art and crime. She received the Dave Greber Freelance Writers Award for “The Murder of Ashley Wadsworth,” an investigative feature about a Canadian teenager who was killed by a man she met on social media, published by Maclean’s.
