AODA Alliance
ACCESSIBILITY FOR ONTARIANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT ALLIANCE
NEWS RELEASE – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Disability Advocates’ New Online Video Reveals that the Ontario Government Built the “Stupidest Accessibility Ramp in the World” at the Finch West Station
July 20, 2026 Toronto: “The Stupidest Ramp in the World,” built by the Ontario Government’s Metrolinx, is slammed in a new online video just unveiled by the non-partisan grassroots disability coalition, the AODA Alliance. This 5-minute video reveals that in the newly expanded Finch West subway station, Metrolinx inexplicably and inexcusably decided to include no elevator whatsoever for transit riders with disabilities to transfer from the new Line 5 (Finch West) to Line 1 (Yonge-University-Spadina)
Instead, riders must go up one full floor (11 feet vertical height) on an exhausting 261-foot ramp that only has two landings to rest on the way. This creates the illusion of accessibility but certainly not the reality of accessibility for people using wheelchairs or walkers, people with chronic fatigue or chronic pain, or parents pushing strollers. View the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nr67d5bJMLk The media is free to include any part of this video in broadcasts.
“A person in a wheelchair could well need a Paralympian’s upper body strength to power their wheelchair up this ridiculous ramp, which is the latest accessibility bungle from Metrolinx,” said AODA Alliance Chair David Lepofsky, who reveals this new disability barrier in the video. “Metrolinx committed in 2022 that Line 5 (Eglinton Crosstown) and Line 6 (Finch West) stations would be disability accessible, and TTC now claims that they are accessible, but the Finch West station ramp makes a mockery of accessibility.”
The Ontario Government knows an elevator is needed when transferring between lines whose platforms are on different floors. For example, at the recently renovated Cedarvale station, Metrolinx correctly installed an elevator for riders to transfer between Line 1 and Line 5. There is no excuse for failing to do the same at the Finch West station.
Last month, the AODA Alliance released an 8-minute video revealing a different accessibility blunder on Line 5 facing blind passengers like Lepofsky. Those stations commendably include tactile wayfinding floor tiles to guide blind riders through those labyrinthian stations. However, they absurdly enable blind riders to use only TTC elevators, which are notoriously unreliable, rather than stairs or escalators to get from street level to train platforms. As a result of that earlier video, Toronto City Council unanimously passed a motion on June 23, 2026 calling on Metrolinx to fix that wayfinding problem for blind transit riders.
Media coverage about that earlier video led Metrolinx CEO Michael Lindsay to meet last month with leadership of the AODA Alliance and the Alliance for Equality of Blind Canadians.
“We’ve urged Metrolinx to have an independent accessibility audit conducted of Line 5, and today’s new video shows the same is needed for Line 6,” said Lepofsky. “At our meeting last month, Metrolinx CEO Michael Lindsay sought our input about how things could go so wrong. We’re eager to share our grassroots expertise with him about accessibility problems at Line 6 stations as well.”
The Eglinton Crosstown line is just the latest in Ontario Government accessibility bungling in Toronto area transit station construction. In May 2019, the AODA Alliance released a video that revealed serious accessibility problems at other new and recently renovated Toronto-area public transit stations. For years, the AODA Alliance has been calling on the Ontario Government to substantially reform how it designs and builds its many massive infrastructure projects. Public money should never be used to create new disability barriers.
Contact: AODA Alliance Chair David Lepofsky, aodafeedback@gmail.com
Twitter: @aodaalliance
For more background read the AODA Alliance June 8, 2026 letter and the and June 23, 2026 letter to Metrolinx CEO Michael Lindsay. Visit the AODA Alliancewebsite’s public transportation page.