The provincial budget announced last week is, if nothing else, ambitious. The McGuinty government, faced with a deficit of over $21 billion, says its plan will result in a balanced budget by the end of the 2017/2018 fiscal year.

Finance Minister Dwight Duncan said he expects revenue to increase and 600,000 jobs to be created as the economy recovers. The new employment opportunities are in large part made possible by recent income tax revisions and the introduction of Harmonized Sales Tax. Still, a large part of the budget balancing will have to come from funding cuts.

Perhaps the biggest shock in the budget is the cut of $4 billion from the money promised to Toronto for public transit. The city’s economic growth depends on the efficient movement of people and the infrastructure required to do this has been sorely neglected. The $9.6 billion promised by the provincial government last spring to support the Transit City light-rail rapid transit plan had given Torontonians a glimpse of a future with adequate public transit.

The Liberals have said the light rail routes most crucial to Toronto’s bid for the Pan-Am Games will get funding, including a line connecting Pearson International Airport to Kipling subway station. The remainder will be funded later. That includes a Brampton-servicing route along Eglinton west to the airport, an eastbound route from Don Mills station into Scarborough and – most importantly for Humber students and staff – a Finch west route.

Humber is a commuter school. Our parking lots are already packed and buses arrive from every direction brief minutes apart, often full to capacity.

Our provincial government’s plans to increase post-secondary enrolment and create jobs will be crippled if it is impossible to reach schools and places of business reliably.

A study released Monday by the Toronto Board of Trade has revealed that Torontonians face the longest daily commutes of the 19 cities studied. Torontonians spend an average of 80 minutes a day just travelling to work. That’s longer than New York, Chicago, Berlin and even 24 minutes longer than commuting in Los Angeles – a city renowned for its gridlocks.

Torontonians have waited years for senior levels of government to recognize public transit as a crucial piece of the economic engine. Dalton McGuinty’s promised $9.6 billion seemed to say the province had learned you have to spend money to make money.

Now it appears we have returned to the status quo of insufficient, underfunded transit and the economy-strangling gridlock that brings.