Snow: um, not really. Examples? The big problem with snow is the *cars* running off the road or sliding around. Streetcars (and the new LRT cars) are heavy, go in a controlled direction because of the rails, and include traction-improving sand for use throughout their route.

Most people's problems with streetcars are really problems with how Toronto has screwed up traffic light timings, how they screwed up the previous streetcar design (and therefore destroyed roads), or because they somehow imagine that streetcars are equivalent to buses, which they're not. (capacity is 2x a bus, and new LRTs will be 3x)

If you're interested in learning more, check out this LONG post which gets into a lot of the history: http://stevemunro.ca/?p=2380

As for the plans, looks pretty nice! I'm looking forward to the potential for faster access to the airport for *all* transit riders, not just the small number of downtown people coming from Union.