Lessons Learned

AuthorC. Ian Kyer
Pages163-173

Epilogue
LESSONSLEARNED
ba lesb et ween the City ofTor onto andi tspr ivat ese c
tor transit provider were fought more than a century ago, there are various
parallels with more recent public/private partnerships. Even today we must
grapplewiththeirrepres sibleconictthatDelos FWilcoxthewidelyac
ceptedexperton municipalutility franchiseswrote ofinAshe noted
acenturyagothereisaf undamentalconictofmot ivesbetweenthepublic
andthe privatesectorNoa mountofregulationandnop ossibledevelop
ment of good will and the spirit of cooperation can ch ange the fact that pri
vatecorp orations operating municipal utilities do so for prot and for as
muchprotas theycan getwhilet heconsu mersandt hepublicstr ivetoget
asmuchserviceastheycanattheleastp ossiblecost
As is typical of private partners, the pe ople behind the Toronto Railway
Company TRC saw the  tendering process as an i mportant high
proleopportun itytog rowabusinessandmake ahandsome protThey
knew, however, that to be successful and achieve thei r goals, they had to
impose discipline on the project a nd upon their public sector partner. That
meant carefully ana lyzing the City’s conditions, and developing and adher
ingto abusines splant hatwouldmeet thoseconditionsand turna prot
They needed to know how much money would be needed to build the sys
tem, when it would be required, how much revenue could reasonably be
expected, what contingencies needed to be built into the plan, how long the
projectwouldtakebeforeitwasprotablequestionsonwhichanycareful

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