said by ErrorError : Provincial highways are the responsibilities of the province, and expressways serving major cities like the GTA is solely the responsibility of the city it serves. I.E. Why should tax money from BC be used to fix the mess in Toronto?
A very---forgive the pun---provincial attitude.
The expressways in the GTA are carrying a great deal of national traffic, not just local commuters.
You might argue differently about the specific case of the Gardiner, but you made the more general statement: [expressways serving major cities like the GTA is solely the responsibility of the city it serves]. That's not what having a country is all about.
There is a national interest in supporting the flow of people and goods.
It's also important in coping with natural disasters, and in national defence.
That's why the US Interstates---which have been very successful overall for my country---were originally 90 percent funded with Federal gasoline tax revenues. And BTW the system is officially called National System of Interstate and Defense Highways.
Low population states like Wyoming, and low population provinces like Saskatchewan, should not have to bear the total cost of carrying NATIONAL traffic through their borders.
You can't get from one side of Canada to the other without going through Saskatchewan. But Saskatchewan has only 3 percent of the population. It is NOT an Ontario. Yet how is it to support good roads to carry national traffic east and west? Some burdens have to be shared.
--------------------------------
Now, I would agree that The Gardiner should not be considered a National highway.
But it is only an accident of history, and a stubborn failure to correct a mistake, that left it out of the Ontario provincial system.