Day: August 1, 2008

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Harbourfront Tunnel Slow Order

In a spectacular piece of bad timing, the TTC has instituted a slow order in the tunnel between Union and Queen’s Quay Stations for track repairs due to problems with the concrete.

One can’t help wondering why they didn’t find and fix whatever was wrong earlier this year when the line was closed down elsewhere.  Were they hoping to save this for next winter, but lost the gamble?

Meanwhile, operators have been directed as follows:

To all operators on the 509 and 510 routes, the following announcement should be read to your customers when entering the tunnel on the Harbourfront route and when leaving Union Station.  The announcement may help the customers understand the slow speeds required.

YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE:

SLOW VEHICLE OPERATION IS IN EFFECT WITHIN THE TUNNEL.  THEREFORE, IT WILL TAKE A FEW EXTRA MINUTES TO REACH

UNION STATION (INBOUND) (or)

QUEEN’S QUAY (OUTBOUND)

YOUR PATIENCE IS APPRECIATED.

The TTC’s website is silent on this situation.  Any added information would be appreciated.

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A Scourge of Scratchitti

My daily commute gives me a chance to look at the SRT in all its glory.  Lately, I have noticed that there is either an explosive growth in scratchitti on SRT cars, or that the TTC has simply stopped replacing the glass.

I can’t remember the last time I was on a car that had none at all, and things have now developed to the point where there are layers with one tagger overwriting another.  This problem is also starting to show up on the subway and in some stations.

The TTC embarked on a station cleanliness program last year and it has shown some results (with notable exceptions), but my sense is that scratchitti is getting out of hand.

I would be interested in hearing reports from other parts of the system.  This sort of problem is symptomatic of an organization that may have given up trying, and the real worry is what other invisible maintenance is also left for another day.

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Coming Soon

We’re in a slow news period for the next few weeks, and this is a good time to catch up on some unfinished business.

Way back when I started working on route analyses, I obtained data for several routes that have languished on my hard drive waiting to be transformed into beautiful charts.  Over the past few days, I have been working on 35 Finch East and expect to publish some of the results over the weekend.

Other routes for which I have unpublished data are Finch West, Don Mills, Victoria Park, Bathurst Bus, Carlton and Dundas.  Although this is for December 2006, TTC operations have not changed all that much, and it’s still worth looking at these routes.  I don’t expect to get through them all in August, but I’ll publish what I can.

Some of you may ask “doesn’t he have anything else to do now that it’s stopped raining?”  Well, yes, I wonder that too, but my sense of public duty [you can groan here] calls me back.  There’s another trip to Stratford coming up, concerts in Toronto, and planning for the Film Festival.  Don’t worry.  I will get out into the world now and then!