Finishing with the Old Regime, 1921-24

• Author: C. Ian Kyer
• Pages: 149-161



Chapter

FINISHINGWITH

THEOLDREGIME



 was being put in place, there had been much dis cus

sion of the takeover of the Toronto Railway Company’s (TRC) transit oper

ationsinandtheaccompanyingarbitrationT heCityhadthenb eenin

the midst of a similar arbitration with t he old Toronto Street Railway Com

panyTSRandit wantedtobe surethat thearbitrationwouldbe dif

ferent. It had sought to make it clear that the franchisee would not be able

to make any claim for intangibles li kelost f uture prots or goodwill All

that the City would be required to buy from the T RC would be hard assets,

and even then, only those that were needed to operate the tran sit system

goingforward In Septemberthe Toronto Star had reminded its re ad

ersofthesefavourableconditionsthatwereexpec tedtoresultint heCity

being able to acquire the streetcar operation at a substant ial discount from

fair market value. The City intended to take fu ll advantage of these terms

— every dollar that they ended up paying to the TRC was a dollar that they

would not have available for the rebuilding of the transit system.

TheTRCwas equallycomm iedtogeing fullva lueforitsoperations

notwithstanding t hese terms. Freed of their operational responsibilities, the

arbitration was now the sole focus of TRC’s management. These divergent

goalsmeantthatvirtuallyeverythingaboutthearbitrationbecameamaerof

controversy, starting with the number of arbitrators and the statutory regime

under which the arbitration was to be conducted. The TRC said that a single,

neutral arbitrator ought to be appointed under the Municipal Arbitration Act.