Board of trade wants to tackle Toronto's congestion crisis with these 5 solutions

More than five kilometres of the Gardiner Expressway suffer from severe congestion that doubles travel times in Toronto during rush hour periods.

The highway is one of a dozen major downtown corridors facing at least a kilometre's worth of congestion that's bad enough to make a trip take one and a half to two times longer at peak times, according to a travel time analysis commissioned by the Toronto Region Board of Trade.

The new traffic data, billed as the most comprehensive portrait to date of the city's gridlock, serves as the backbone to the board's congestion action plan, which it released this morning.

For more than a year, the board's task force has been digging into the problem of congestion, which it considers a top regional and economic challenge that could be costing the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA) $44.7 billion a year in economic and social value.

"What we're trying to do is push harder, faster," said Giles Gherson, the board's president.

"Making a significant dent in our traffic gridlock would be the single most powerful thing city hall can do to unleash our economic strength."

Today's report both quantifies parts of the problem — like travel time and the cost of lane closures — and offers five areas of action the task force argues can help alleviate congestion. The city is considering the report as it looks to update its own plans to fight congestion.

"We're putting forward a new version of the congestion management plan in the spring and looking at these recommendations very closely to see how we'll incorporate them," said Deputy Mayor Ausma Malik.

CBC Toronto explored many of the potential solutions highlighted by the task force in a three-part series, Gridlocked: The Way Out, last month.

Here's a look at the five key areas of action the task force is suggesting for Toronto.

This year, roughly 10 per cent of all Toronto streets, or 550 kilometres of roadway, will be occupied by construction work zones at some point, according to the report.

Given existing demands on the road, the task force argues there needs to be a higher bar for lane closures and the city needs to actively manage how long they last.

The board hired infrastructure consultant Steer to assess the cost of lane closures in the city. Toronto charges a maximum of $37,000 per month to close a lane of traffic for construction, and determines the price based on lost revenue from nearby parking meters, according to the report.

But the report argues that pricing scheme grossly underestimates the actual cost. Steer's analysis found the social and economic costs (like increased travel times, vehicle operating costs and pollution from congestion) of closing a major arterial lane amount to $1.7 million per month.