Nielsen equivalence in mapping tori over the torus

Abstract

We use the geometry of the Farey graph to give an alternative proof of the fact that if $A \in GL_2\mathbb Z$ and $G_A=\mathbb Z^2 \rtimes_A \mathbb Z$ is generated by two elements, there is a single Nielsen equivalence class of $2$-element generating sets for $G_A$ unless $A$ is conjugate to $\pm \left(\begin {smallmatrix} 2 & 1 \\ 1 & 1 \end {smallmatrix}\right )$, in which case there are two.