An Indigenous-led coalition is resurfacing calls to bury a 1.5 kilometre stretch of the long-anticipated Eglinton Crosstown West Extension (ECWE) to protect local green space.

The ENAGB Indigenous Youth Agency, along with community and park associations, will stop construction with a blockade that could last “days or months” if demands aren’t met, a press release from the coalition reads.

“This is serious. And I personally don’t want to start blockades, but if we have to then we might have to,” said executive director of the ENAGB Indigenous Youth Agency Cynthia Bell.

“Today, we want to just prove to Metrolinx that we do have an impact on their construction if they don’t come to the table.”

Indigenous advisors, elders and youth joined Stop the Trains in Our Parks and Mount Dennis Community Association Saturday for a protest in the Eglinton Flats — an area in the Humber River Floodplain that houses parks and green space Metrolinx is planning to build over for the ECWE.

The ECWE, an extension by Metrolinx to bring the Eglinton Crosstown LRT another 9.2 kilometres farther west, is billed as a continuous rapid transit line from the east end of Toronto into Mississauga, projected to give 37,000 daily rides.

The groups raised alarm at the potential impact to nearby youth programs and the removal of “thousands” of trees to make way for the elevated track between Scarlett Road and Jane Street as soon as this spring, the release reads. 

It’s the latest movement aimed at convincing the transit agency to backtrack on its plan to tunnel under the land instead of through it. This past summer, residents implored Metrolinx to rethink the elevated track due to its impact on park use and vulnerable species in the area.

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