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TTC’s October Supplementary Agenda

The supplementary agenda for this month has now been posted, and it contains some reports of interest.

At this point, I am only posting links here for information, but will comment on these after the meeting on October 23.

Queen Car Update:  No route changes at this time.  Continue attempts to improve line management.

Transit City Update

Yonge Subway Richmond Hill Extension

10 thoughts on “TTC’s October Supplementary Agenda”

  1. There looks like there is still hope to get rid of the SRT and replace it was an LRT:

    “The project team is currently re-visiting the option of converting the Scarborough RT from its current vehicle technology to light rail technology, when the current fleet of vehicles reaches the end of its service life. Such a conversion is being investigated as a means of providing more routing flexibility, and in order to take advantage of possible benefits of a vehicle technology which would be common to the other Transit City lines. In support of this option, a structural analysis is underway of the existing Scarborough RT infrastructure. The project team is continuing its work on the development of conceptual designs for a new maintenance facility.”

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  2. I don’t have the perspectives of Steve and others in trying to influence the TTC, but it seems almost designed to deflect public scrutiny and comment to post/release important materials a day before a meeting with a deadline of registering for a deputation in two hours time.

    eg. why bother; go away.

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  3. “The project team is currently re-visiting the option of converting the Scarborough RT from its current vehicle technology to light rail technology, when the current fleet of vehicles reaches the end of its service life.”

    Interesting – let’s hope it’s not just a face saving exercise and is a real commitment to examining the synergies of a larger LRT network in Scarborough.

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  4. It’s nice to see in the Transit City Update that conversion of the SRT to LRT is still being considered.

    On the other hand, the Yonge Subway report is recommending that the commission should officially support this initiative. I would have liked to make a deputation opposing this, but only found out the process involved five minutes before the deadline. Is there a way to provide a non-spoken deputation? The TTC’s website mentions this but does not give details. There is the implication that one can e-mail to gso@ttc.ca, but I’m wondering if they require it in hardcopy.

    Steve: They will accept email.

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  5. Does the RH extension give the possibility of putting a car yard up there instead of Davisville, or is it just too darn far? Freeing up the land around Davisville (for the new land agency) would net the City a fortune in future.

    Steve: There is a separate study of yard capacity, but Davisville isn’t going anywhere. It’s not quite the fortune you think when the cost of replacing the existing yard and carhouse is included in the calculations.

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  6. I read the report on the Yonge extension and I thought the idea of adding a platform at the Yonge/Bloor station is a fantastic idea to shorten the dwell times at that particular stop. I have my own ideas as to tightening up the headways on the Yonge line to help ease the overcrowding and I was wondering where I could submit my ideas.

    Steve: The proposed changes at Bloor-Yonge outlined in the report have been studied before. They are extremely complex and will cost a fortune to build. The real question is whether this demand (and all of the associated subway changes it requires) would even materialize if other projects such as the Richmond Hill Regional Express line and the east leg of the Downtown Relief line were built. Metrolinx’ own demand model shows that these would divert considerable traffic off of the subway.

    I think the idea of trying to shoehorn a third platform in Bloor-Yonge is a hopeless proposal, but going into that in detail is a long post in its own right. The original study is not available in electronic form, and it would be a big job for me to scan the whole thing in.

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  7. If any poster can clarify, I didn’t understand this comment in the Transit City update: “The process to choose one of these two options has become somewhat more complicated because the Metrolinx Regional Transportation Plan calls for a continuous Sheppard-Finch corridor service…”

    What do they mean by continuous corridor in this context?

    Steve: A one-seat ride crossing Yonge Street. One proposed way to do this is to extend the Finch LRT east to Don Mills, and the subway west on Sheppard to Downsview. Another version that appeared in the White Paper was to convert the subway to LRT and run a continuous line all the way from Morningside to Downsview using the subway tunnel from Don Mills to Yonge.

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  8. According to the first four comments, no one is paying attention to the fiasco that is the Yonge subway extension. How much will this waste of money set me back as a tax payer? LRT can handle the growth easily and won’t kill our wallets. The only way you extend the subway north, is to Steeles and you connect LRT and all the York buses, and Steeles buses into the single terminal. I guess we will wait and see for tomorrow.

    Steve: Please refer to my post coming soon about “A Less Grand Plan”.

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  9. I wonder what the cost of another Bloor-Yonge renovation would be compared to just building the Downtown Relief Line and getting that over and done with. At least that option would have the effect of attracting new riders in the TTC’s current mandated service area.

    Steve: I am working on a post that comments on this among other issues.

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  10. There’s a lack of understanding, even among some consultants, of the as-built form of Bloor-Yonge station, most notably about its exact underground location and angle (the station is not parallel to the grid… you might have guessed by the turns in the tunnels on both sides of Yonge station on the Bloor line).

    This is a disastrous idea, which should be obvious after the other week when service was shut down between Bloor and Lawrence during the afternoon rush hour. If they are going to widen the space between the tracks, that means there will be months of construction on at least one platform, allowing only one track/direction of service to reach the platform (the opposite direction would have to skip Bloor), and that’s only a best-case scenario, which assumes that the Bloor station portion on the Yonge Line would be left open at all.

    What are they going to do? Re-instate the University Wye and put Bay Lower back into service? Sorry, but I’d have to doubt that.

    Building a connection from any new central Bloor platform to the Yonge platform is also hideously complex, and would likely make certain doors on certain cars on the Bloor line required to remain closed when stopping at Yonge Station while construction takes place – and even when finished, it would be absurdly cramped on the Yonge station island platform.

    Knowing a few things about construction, I can assure anybody that this idea is not smart. System-wide ridership will most likely plummet. This should not even be considered before Jane and Don Mills LRTs are operating, and even then, I wouldn’t recommend it.

    Build the DRL. It’s the smartest solution… albeit the most expensive.

    Steve: I am suspicious that when we net out the extra cost of all the otherwise unneeded capacity improvements on Yonge, the net extra cost of the DRL will be a lot less than people think. Moreover, going up to Eglinton will improve the line’s reach, and that part of the LRT proposal has to be underground anyhow.

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