This post contains the text of three deputations I am making at today’s TTC meeting. Regular readers will recognize the arguments from earlier writings, but I am posting them here for the convenience of those who want a copy of my remarks.
Ridership Growth Strategy and TTC Budget Planning
July 19, 2006
We have come some distance since March 2003 when the Ridership Growth Strategy was approved, in that, at least, the TTC recognizes its primary function is to provide transit service and get more riders. However, we still have a long way to go just to get back to the heights of the late 1980s let alone having a system that is praised across all of the City.
The most important points in today’s report appear in the section on “Continued Implementation of the RGS”.
- A firm commitment is required from Council and other levels of government to make transit more attractive and competitive.
- The easy changes – some improvements in off peak service, a more attractive pricing structure for passes – are behind us. Now we must turn to service improvements that cost money.
- Transit rights-of-way rarely exist where they are needed, and there is only so much road space to go around. True transit priority does not mean a “balanced” system, but one in which transit and transit riders come first.
Earlier this year, service improvements that were planned as part of the RGS rollout were blocked by the Budget Advisory Committee. This group has the naïve idea that we can have something for nothing, that transit improvements and subsidy costs can be held to the rate of inflation. This is impossible. Almost every new rider you carry increases your operating deficit, and if your goal is to provide more service for more riders, the deficit will rise faster than inflation even without pressures such as fuel costs or legislated changes in work hours or benefits for your staff.
Mayor Miller’s 100 new buses enter service in the fall of 2007. Let’s hope there is actually money in the budget to operate them. We will need to hire and train operators and maintenance staff for the new Mt. Dennis garage. Money needs to be available in the budget early enough in the year to staff up for this.
This is only the beginning, service improvements for future years will consistently drive up TTC subsidy costs faster than the rate of inflation. Get used to the idea and be prepared to fight for it at Council. On the capital side of the ledger, recognize that the system needs new streetcars and buses if it is to expand to fill the goals of the Official Plan.
Finally, we need to rebalance our transportation thinking in favour of riders. This means that transit vehicles get true priority and roadspace, not whatever crumbs are left over. Commissioners and Council must set this as an overall policy and direct the Works Department to comply. Critics can still point to the lack of priority on Spadina and the indifferent priority on Harbourfront nine years after the Spadina line opened. This does not serve the cause of transit advocacy. Rather it tells people that transit still comes second to cars.
I have often spoken of the need for Commissioners and pro-transit members of Council to be advocates for transit. We are in an era where transit must grow to support our City’s goals, and this takes sustained, deep commitment. Spending $2-billion on a subway to Vaughan may serve some strategic, long-range goal difficult though it may be for me to see it, but it will do nothing to aid the overall needs of the transit network for the next ten years.
Toronto Council must be ready to spend serious money on less glamourous but far more useful projects and be real advocates for the growth of our transit system.
New Subway Train – Seating Configuration
TTC Report No. 12
July 19, 2006
Once again the Commission is asked by staff to approve a seating arrangement with all-perimeter seats. This report prejudges the customer evaluation still in progress with a mock-up train, and it attempts to reinforce management’s previously futile arguments for this layout.
I believe that the premise of this report is faulty, and that management has taken advantage of recent events in an attempt to scare us into accepting an inferior design. Would we have a recommendation to prejudge public feedback if there had been no terrorism charges on June 2? If there has been significant public support for management’s preference already, why don’t we have preliminary statistics and comments from those who have reviewed the mockup?
Management cites the United States Federal Transit Administration’s 2004 paper on design considerations. Note the word. This is a consideration, not a standard. The text quoted by TTC management says that a vehicle should be designed to reduce sheltered spaces. It is silent on the placement of seats and says only that the design should reduce the ability to hide things. The full standard does not speak at all of seat placement, but only of concerns that in an explosion, the various components of a car not shatter into shrapnel that would further injure passengers.
The TTC’s Safety Plan requires that management “understand, assess and control risk”. I do not agree that elimination of transverse seats will, in its own right, achieve this goal. As a counter-example, I offer the newly approved design for the Montréal Métro cars in which the transverse seating option has been retained by public demand. This option was preferred over two other layouts that used only perimeter seats. All seats in the new Métro cars are boxed in underneath to minimize blind space.
These cars will be built by Bombardier, the TTC’s preferred supplier, and clearly if there were an industry standard that demanded all perimeter seating, Bombardier and hence the Montréal transit system would know about it.
TTC management is not content to attack transverse seats purely on system security grounds, but also raises the issue that passengers trapped in the inner seat (against the wall) cannot evade a threat. This has nothing to do with terrorism issues. If someone really wishes to evade this possibility, they have only to sit in one of the “open” seats. More to the point, how do we square this concern for passenger safety with the layout of seats on buses and streetcars where double transverse seats are common, and on the commuter rail system?
TTC management speaks of choke points that make evacuation of trains difficult in an emergency. Anyone can see that the choke point for evacuation will be the ramp at the end of the train. You could have cars with no seats at all, but the passengers would still have to stream single-file down that ramp. In any event, the aisle between the pairs of transverse seats on T1 cars is quite wide enough for passengers to move through the train assuming that nobody is standing in their way.
Finally, it turns out that we are going to save money with this design. Isn’t that the sort of factor we take into account after we get public feedback? Don’t we weigh the pros and cons of each design and say, yes, this costs more, but its better. A train with no seats at all would be cheaper I am sure. Taking that argument to its logical conclusion, I suppose that we should just let passengers walk through the tunnels, or not build subways at all.
This report, while claiming to show management’s concern for their professional responsibilities instead unmasks their contempt for the public participation process and for the already-stated preferences of at least some of the Commission.
It should be rejected.
Motion of No Confidence in Chair Howard Moscoe
TTC Meeting July 19, 2006
I appear to support Councillor Moscoe in retaining his position as Chair of the TTC.
The motion by Councillors Saundercook and Grimes comes in the wider context of claims that Chair Moscoe is abusing his position and thereby harming the interests of the TTC. Certainly, the resignations of Chief General Managers Ducharme and Gunn did not turn on labour matters, the only issue cited in the preamble to the motion.
Clearly the Amalgamated Transit Union is unhappy and on a variety of subjects. To what degree they are justified and to what degree this is posturing, I don’t know, but I cannot help thinking that they bear some responsibility for the present situation.
I do agree that it is essential that management be able to conduct labour negotiations with the full backing of the Commission. The moment that a separate negotiating path opens at the political level, management are wasting their breath in meetings. However, I do not agree that the current situation should be cause for Chair Moscoe to resign. Frankly, we would have been far worse off had there been a lengthy strike and a fire-breathing Commission that refused to budge on any issue. The problem here is between the Commission and its management and the trust that must exist for them to function together.
The preamble states that David Gunn and Rick Ducharme resigned due to political interference from Chair Moscoe. For those whose memories are shorter than mine, may I remind you that a major contributing factor in David Gunn’s resignation was the abuse he received at the hands of the Budget Advisory Committee, abuse which I believe was not strongly challenged by Commission members. The Councillor primarily involved reaped the just reward for his career in the court of public opinion.
As for Al Leach, he left the TTC when Howard Moscoe was only a member, and he left to run as an MPP. Any CGM who cannot stomach the political environment brought by any one member of the Commission has no business applying for the job. If Moscoe brought about Leach’s resignation, then his skin is much thinner than it appeared.
Councillor Moscoe is, indeed, a passionate advocate for the TTC, something I cannot say for every member of the Commission or of Council. If anything, TTC members have been short on advocacy, preferring to pass motions that they know will never get through Budget Advisory Committee, let alone Council. Being pro-transit costs nothing, but little ever gets done.
I strongly urge the defeat of this motion.
Steve Munro 
On the issue of the proposed subway seating configuration, why can’t the TTC modify one older train and run it during rush hour only to see how riders respond to the proposed seating configuration? I think you may see that people prefer this configuration during peak travel times.
Steve: It appears that this may happen over the next month or so. However, the Commission strongly came out today in favour of retaining the seating layout used on the T1 cars modified with boxed-in underfloor areas for security reasons. The matter will be back on the agenda in late September.
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Perimeter does not really lower the risks of terrorist attacks. All of the Tokyo metro vehicles uses perimeter seating. Yet on March 20, 1995, the Chiyoda, Marunouchi and Hibya metro lines were hit at the same time by Aum Shinrikyo with Sarin gas. It was nothing elobrate. Just plastic bag wrapped with newspaper with Sarin gas left on the floor, it was released with umbrellas poking through the bag. Given the number of used newspaper on the TTC metro vehicles, it is more of a danger than seating arrangement.
As for the funding for the Spadina line and other transportation initiatives, the city council and provincial government should just write the checks. $30 billion over 10 years would buy us at least 20 km of metro, 20 km of ICTS, 50 km of tramlines and probably another 100 km of Guilded Light Transit network. This will create a good foundation for Toronto’s transportation network.
$30 billion is a lot of money. However, it buys us energy independence from middle east oil producers. It reduce the number of people going to the hospitals for pollution related illness. It will also reduce the stress for Torontonians. Finally, it will bring at least 20 years of prosperity to Bombardier Transportation. Given all these benefits, it is a bargain. Even if the city has to borrow the money, future generations will benefit from it. Canada almost went bankrupt building the CP railroad and Grand Trunk Railroad, yet no one today questions the wisdom of Prime Minister Sir John MacDonald.
If the TTC needs money, I will be happy to purchase a bond or even a lottery to help fund these priorities. When peak oil arrives, it is not a question whether it will cost $1 billion or $2 billion to build an ICTS line. At any price, there will not be enough oil to build it. After all, money is only an accounting unit. If there is not enough oil, no amount of money can create oil.
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There appears to be nothing wrong with the present seating arrangements. Areas under the seats (in whatever configuration) can simply be boxed in to prevent things being left under the seats. The whole security concern is quite a red herring. I hope the July 19 decision will stand and we will continue with seating arrangements similar to those we have now.
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I am always amazed (no, not really :->) at how transit organizations place huge orders for vehicles without properly testing them out with real live users. I used to live in Montreal and about 8 years ago the MUCTC bought a fleet of low-floor buses. The new seating arrangement was ghastly and after lots of complaints they finally modified the many buses that had already been delivered.
As Clide Rockwell suggests in an earlier comment why not set up an existing train-set with whatever new seating the engineers at the TTC think best and test it out for a few months. It is fairly easy to do this in a subway car as their BASIC design will not change, doing it with the proposed new streetcars would be more complex as they will be low-floor and possibly with multiple exists/entrances. Buying new subway cars is a huge expense so we had better get it right!
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Steve, you obviously have an enormous amount of knowledge about the TTC and its best interests at heart. Do you think it would be useful for Toronto to give ‘main’ street priority to transit, cabs and high occupancy vehciles during rush hours? Would it make a difference for the TTC’s bottom line by increasing ridership on existing lines? Would it get us to work quickly? Someitmes I think organizations like the TTC think in silos when they might consider there are requests they can make to the city and province. Do you agree?
Steve: I have problems with HOVs because enforcement is very difficult. The underlying issue is that there is only so much road space to go around, especially on the narrower streets. Once you take out a lane for transit, everybody else gets what’s left over. Now we hit a chicken-and-egg situation: on many routes, the optics of having a reserved lane for a comparatively infrequent transit service just don’t work. At a minimum, you get resentment, or worse, you get people flagrantly ignoring the arrangement. Just look at King Street where the reserved lane has never been observed and is rarely enforced.
The TTC needs to look at improving the frequency of service to reduce wait times, and needs to speed loading to reduce delays at stops. Yes, reserved lanes will help, but they will only address one part of the total travel time. Riders must walk to a stop, wait for a vehicle, board (possibly with difficulty) and finally ride to their destination. Only the part where a vehicle is actually moving is addressed by reserved lanes. Yes, faster transit service can be scheduled more frequently, but the TTC rarely improves headways if running times are reduced.
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If we go back 80 years, we can look at the TTC’s first new vehicles — the Peter Witts. They were designed with perimeter seating in the front and forward facing in the rear (no rearward facing seats!). You had a choice of paying the conductor at the rear doors and going to the back or riding in the front on the perimeter seating or standing and paying as you left. It seems that they considered perimeter seating an incentive for early fare payment.
Steve: Hmmm … conductors and fare collection on subway cars … pay as you pass … now I understand why the new trains will be one continuous space! We will all get on at the front and off at the back! Some minor station redesign may be required.
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I just returned from Chicago, where the seating arrangement is – the horror! – mostly transverse, with “theatre row” seating on each side, facing either forwards or backwards. Even the newest cars, which are used on the Orange and Blue Lines, have this arrangement, with a few seats only one across for more standing room and accomodation luggage for the airports.
If you read on Chicago-L.org, they explain that the current seating arrangement is popular with the customers, and that previous attempts by the CTA to go with a perimeter seating arrangement have been soundly rejected.
The few inward-facing seats are near the doors and are mostly reserved for passengers with reduced mobility. Keep in mind as well that CTA L cars are narrower and shorter than TTC cars. And this it with recent terrorist threats – real and supposed – against Chicago landmarks, and security is noticable, but reasonable (i.e. they don’t go after tourists taking pictures, unlike in some US cities, and don’t take issue with the large bags brought aboard by passengers to and from O’Hare or Midway).
There are a few things that interested me about CTA operations, but I won’t go into them here.
It is good to know the Commission stayed firm about the seating arrangement, and I appreciate you remaining vigilant on this issue.
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Hi Steve: On the TTC, cab, bike and HOV combined lanes, say for King Street or Queen Street, etc., during rush hours only, we could borrow Highway 407 technology to provide TTC, cabs and HOVs with passes, and take snapshots to ticket violators. Cars could still be allowed to travel north-south and some east-west sections could be exempted to help them manoeuvre downtown during the two rush hours in the morning and again at night. Dedicated drivers could work around rush hours.
Steve: I’m not sure the forest of camera heads we will need to cover all of the various entry points will add to the look of the street. The real problem is that the level of service on these streets is low enough that politically justifying reserved lanes will be a stretch.
Could travel time be cut by having full vehicles avoid stopping to pick up more passengers? Is it possible to get riders from Roncesvalles to Yonge, via Queen, in less time that it takes the Go to travel to Oakville? Less than 20 minutes? I’m optimistic.
Steve: There shouldn’t be full vehicles if there is enough service, except when there is a screw up. Also, Queen and King are routes with lots of local demand, and assuming that the whole car is going to Yonge won’t work. In theory, Ronces to Yonge is about 25 minutes.
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Wow, the old threads you’ll find with Google. A few things, first off perimeter seating doesn’t work with passengers. Maybe if the bus is crowded and you are traveling a short distance it is alright, but most passengers will seek out the transverse seats as quickly as possible. Even today I was riding in an old Orion VI I believe in York Region (I believe it was an Orion VI, not 100% sure), and the transverse seats filled up while only a couple of people were sitting in the perimeter seats.
If the TTC does expand this ludicrous design on to subways, they are going to see ridership and customer satisfaction levels drop to record low levels. Even transit supporters will take a car if necessary. Also saying that it will make the trains “safer” is basically doing what the terrorists want – to change and affect our lives any way possible.
Finally, can the TTC PLEASE consider transverse seating on the RT??? Of all things wrong with that line, they could at least make the trip more comfortable for its passengers.
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Re Ben’s recent comment… I don’t know how they would go about fitting transverse seats on the RT cars, the aisle is narrow enough already with the perimeter seating.
Not sure I buy some of the arguments about perimeter seating driving away riders either… I was on one of the low-floors on the 104 Faywood route this morning, and passengers were sitting in the perimeter seats in the front before moving into the transverse seats in the back… the exception of course being the transverse ‘singles’ on the left hand side. But who wouldn’t go for those, to avoid having to possibly sit beside a ‘dirty’ transit rider? In particular for riders with mobility problems (and there are a lot of elderly folks in the area served by route 104), the perimeter seating seems much easier to get into and out of.
Steve: When the RT cars were new, they had 2+2 transverse seating at the outer ends of the cars. This produced a very narrow aisle. 1+2 would have allowed for better movement, but the TTC made a unilateral decision to change to perimeter seating when the cars went through their mid-life overhaul.
I will be intrigued to see what layout is proposed for the Mark II cars when that contract comes up for approval in September.
As for seniors and seating, some people have big problems sitting on perimeter seats especially on buses because they cannot support their backs properly against the swaying motion. Such riders prefer forward facing seats. There is always the trade off between taking a seat near the door (less distance to walk in a moving bus) and getting the most comfortable seat.
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