“We are fixing this”: Mayor Olivia Chow wants to speed up Toronto’s newest LRT

Users browsing Toronto’s Reddit page on Tuesday evening would have come across a post by an unusual account: Mayor Olivia Chow herself.

Her topic was Line 6, the newly opened Finch West LRT, which, despite having been open for only a handful of days, had already drawn complaints for being slower than the bus route it replaced.

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On Reddit, Chow came with a solution: transit signal priority, which gives trains the right of way at intersections and adjusts traffic lights to reduce the time trains spend waiting. While the technology has already been installed on lights along Finch Avenue West, experts say it is only partially activated along the route, forcing trains to occasionally stop at red lights and wait for left-turning traffic at intersections.

Advocacy group TTC Riders has urged city council to wholly activate signal priority on the Finch line, and the mayor has signalled her support. On Reddit, she wrote, “After riding Line 6 myself during the opening, it became immediately clear that the Finch West LRT is too slow. We are fixing this.”

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Speaking to reporters that same day, Chow pledged to ask city council to approve full signal priority on the Finch line and the long-delayed Eglinton Crosstown—another major project where faster, more reliable service is now top of mind as the city awaits its opening in 2026.

The 11-kilometre Finch line, which opened on December 7 after six years of construction and a two-year delay, runs from Finch West station at Keele Street to Humber College near Highway 427, with 18 stops along Finch Avenue West. It is the city’s first new rapid transit line since 2002. Trains are scheduled to arrive every six and a half minutes during peak hours, with service every 10 to 12 minutes off-peak.

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Metrolinx says a full end-to-end trip should take 33 to 34 minutes. But, according to TTC timing, the journey currently takes about 46 minutes, and some riders have even reported trip times closer to 55 minutes on social media. By comparison, driving the same distance can take as little as 20 minutes in light traffic, while cycling takes roughly 45.

The line replaces the 36 Finch West bus, which was the TTC’s sixth-busiest route in 2024, carrying some 40,000 riders on an average weekday. Several commuters have said the former bus service was faster and easier to use, with more stops and fewer delays.

The TTC has defended the line’s early performance, describing the first days as a soft opening. A spokesperson said travel times are expected to improve as the agency fine-tunes passenger loading and off-loading at stops, with some time savings anticipated by spring. With luck, Mayor Chow’s motion should get things moving even faster.