Wednesday, December 9 was the first “snow day” for the TTC of the 2009-10 season. Although I’m now retired and should have stayed in bed listening with glee to the traffic reports, I bundled up and rode over to Bloor-Yonge Station to watch the morning rush hour with the new crowd control setup.
It was not pretty.
The crowd control actually achieved its purpose in spreading out the load on the southbound platform, but the service was a complete mess. The TTC had signal problems, service interruptions due to smoke at track level (more about this later) and a number of passenger assistance alarms (PAAs) brought on by people feeling unwell or fainting in crowded trains.
A log of my observations shows the wide gaps in service with headways rarely below 4 minutes. During the two-hour period from 0800 to 1000, the TTC managed to get only 26 trains through the station, slightly fewer than they would normally operate in the peak hour.
Traffic was heavier than usual with trains arriving southbound quite full of passengers. However given the gaps in service, it was impossible to know if this was due to heavier demand on a snow day or simply the backlog of riders. Passengers transferring from Bloor-Danforth made their way well down the platform, and the south end was often more crowded than the north end. Even when the crowd was backed up on the platform beyond the pillars (roughly half of the platform depth), transfer passengers from BD flowed fairly freely behind them.
TTC staff adjusted their tactics to suit the changing situation and on one occasion sent passengers transferring from the Yonge to the Bloor line the “wrong way” through the passageway to the north concourse to avoid the congestion on the main part of the platform they would normally use. This sort of flexibility and “on the spot” judgement about routing pedestrians is vital to the scheme, and will be part of the design considerations for any sort of “permanent” installation of barriers.
A sharp-eyed trainspotter can keep track of the approaching service using the “next train” time indications. When these change infrequently, the next train is spending a lot of time at stations or crawling between them. Given that signal problems slowed trains, and passenger congestion extended the dwell times, it’s hard to know which condition had the greater effect.
Dwell times at Bloor were appallingly long, and few trains achieved under one minute dwells. The TTC has cut back on platform assistants, and this really showed because several trains had problems getting doors closed on the first attempt. Moreover, some of the PAs held back from the crowd rather than being trapped between them and the platform edge.
A delay at Pape caused by a smoke observation shut down the entire BD line from about 0824 to 0841. This choked off transfer traffic, and the YUS caught up with a “gap train” (empty train arriving express from Davisville) clearing the platform at 0830. However, once the BD delay cleared, things on the YUS level became congested, and the platform was not cleared again until after 1000. If the BD line had run normally, the platform at Yonge would likely have been overwhelmed.
These smoke delays are becoming quite common, although you would never know it from the TTC’s eAlerts. Far more info is available on the TTC’s Facebook page. According to that page, there have been three smoke delays so far today (1020), three yesterday, three Wednesday. I am still waiting for the TTC to provide information on what is happening and why these delays are so frequent.
TTC’s eAlert system has been more or less missing in action. The only alert on Wednesday was for a derailed streetcar at College and Ossignton, and it has been completely silent otherwise.
Overall, my impression of Wednesday’s operation was that the crowd control system together with the 20-minute shutdown of the BD line kept the situation at Bloor Station from completely falling apart. This shows the importance of everything working as one system, and how badly things can go awry if any part of that system is unreliable.
A related issue is headroom, the spare capacity needed to absorb unexpected problems and surges in demand. We hear a lot about the demand the YUS might carry, but that only works if the line is much, much more reliable. All the signals and automatic train operation are worthless if there are regular delays caused by smoke or door problems or ill passengers from overcrowding.
We are trying to jam more and more people onto a system that was not designed for these loads, and whose maintenance philosophy appears to tolerate random service disruptions as a normal part of operations. The more important any one component in the network becomes, the more important that it work reliably regardless of the weather.
The coming TTC operating budget debates will no doubt include the usual calls for belt-tightening, but we can already see that the TTC is falling behind in system reliability. The debacle of the mid-90s must not be repeated, and the TTC must operate good, reliable service rather than falling back on “snow” as a catch-all excuse.
Steve Munro 
TTC’s twitter account posts all smoke disruptions
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Adding to the congestion was a trainset that had to go out of service at about 9:15 at Broadview westbound due to faulty doors. This put an entire train onto the platform, which took at least 6 trains before the platform started to clear.
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I had the misfortune of just missing the 141 to go downtown on Wednesday (Of all the days for it to actually show up on time!) Stranded with a horde of people at Mt. Pleasant and Davisville, we waited 20 minutes without a 28 or 11 showing. A 74 came barreling down Mt. Pleasant and a mad scramble of humanity to the stop across the street ensued. We were all happy to have escaped the misery outside and be on a bus bound for the subway, until we actually got to St. Clair Stn.
The platform was packed like I have never seen. The first train arrived crush loaded and the only space available was made from the few people who got off. Then we waited. “Next Train arriving in 6 minutes”… 5 minutes later… “Next Train arriving in 3 minutes”….5 minutes later the next train did arrive, but it was the gap train you mentioned, and blew right through the station. 8 minutes later the next train actually came and it was crush loaded again. No way to get on.
I considered going north to Eglinton or Lawrence and trying to get on a southbound train from there, but opted instead to brave the 512 across to St. Clair West. That was a good decision! It took only a few minutes to get to St. Clair West and the next train that pulled into the station even had a few empty seats! I’m sure I got to work at Union before most of the people at St. Clair were still trying to get on a southbound train.
I am mad there was no information from the TTC on the OneStop screens. Wouldn’t this be one of those occasions where they could take over the whole screen? As I was waiting at St. Clair, that actually happened, but for CP24’s banal news notes. If CP24 can be expanded to the whole screen for 10 seconds to let us know there is “Exclusive coverage of the storm on CP24” (I guess they assumed, no else was covering it?) why can’t Transit control let people know what is going on? Why not tell people at St. Clair to get on the 512 and go west?
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From listening to the scanner a lot of the smoke seems to come from garbage that catches fire or from smoking brake shoes. There were a lot of reports of passengers fainting or swooning also. Are we becoming a weaker society or did we just prop them up in a corner of the car before and carry on?
Steve: If garbage is catching fire in the morning rush hour, then the track sweeping crews have not been around as much as they used to be. This simply should not be happening. As for fainting, the service used to be more reliable and less crowded, hence fewer fainters.
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Given the smoke alerts cause the shutdown of an entire subway, TTC should broadcast it by every available medium. The good news is that TTC were able to clear it quickly, and it even had a positive impact on congestion at Bloor-Yonge.
One way of reducing congestion at Bloor-Yonge (without shutting down the BD): Bay Street streetcar. It would serve a lot of people currently transferring to the YUS to get downtown, would require only about 2km of track (College to Dundas is still in use), and it could be looped via the existing track on Wellington/York/King. Think of it as the DRL, Mark 1…
Steve: I want to see thousands of people per hour pouring out of Bay Station and queueing up for the streetcar southbound at Bloor!
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I’ve been noticing the amount of smoke disruptions as well, it makes you wonder why that has been happening lately. It’s not a good sign, and frankly all these delays are adding insult to injury with the recent fare hikes. Why are we paying so much and the system is in such state of disrepair? Oh I know why! Those stupid new streetcars (we need them, but they are useless if they divert funds to keep the rest of the system maintained). TTC is such a farce, and I’m a transit nut and prefer using the system rather than driving downtown. It’s still cheaper (for me anyway).
Steve: The new streetcars have nothing to do with it, and the cost of them comes out of a completely separate budget from fares or routine maintenance. If anything, maintenance is usually affected by attempts to keep fares and/or subsidies down.
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Reliability is essential for a public transit system. Employers expect their employees to show up for work on time. It should not be a surprise that it snows in Toronto in the winter. This wasn’t even a very bad storm.
Failure to plan for and manage totally predictable and foreseeable events is nothing but incompetence.
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Something is making me think that people are just overreacting to certain situations. I mean I can see one PLAN B (fire/smoke at track level) per day but not 3 or 4 within a few hours. I am starting to think that the Glycol the TTC uses to coat the third rail in order to prevent it from freezing is causing issues and starting to smoke. This would explain why all of a sudden we are seeing an increase in PLAN B’s.
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Steve: “I want to see thousands of people per hour pouring out of Bay Station and queueing up for the streetcar southbound at Bloor!”
Fair point… it would never be anything more than a partial solution, moving only around 3000-4000 people per hour, but that would still help things at B-Y. (Alternative view: how much would you have to spend to add the same capacity at B-Y, and how much would such a streetcar service cost?)
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I regularly take the Yonge train southbound from Eglinton to Union, leaving Eglinton at about 7:30am. I’m usually able to get a seat; this time, by the time we left Davisville, we were packed like sardines (all the way down to King). I have never seen the Yonge train as crowded at that hour as I did this past Wednesday morning.
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Steve’s observations about missing track sweeping crews is dead on, as I have no doubt that the lack of cleaning is the reason behind these fires (garbage on the tracks being set ablaze when they blow onto the third rail). Just take a peek under the platforms at most stations and you’ll see a disgusting amount of junk accumulating under the lips of the platforms and along the trackbed itself. It’s appalling and is being systematically ignored by TTC staff with inevitable results. All you need to do in order to see how bad things are now is to look at old pictures of the subway at Transit Toronto, where you see absolutely immaculate trackbeds and ROWs. Different city back then, let me tell you…
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The excessive “smoke” calls are actually a result of a ministry of labour order to the TTC; where previously they could have been investigated without stopping service, the TTC has now been ordered to stop service at the first report of a burning odour, rather than allowing someone to attend the scene and investigate first – which used to result in a fast “all-clear” resulting in no delay to service.
So, it’s not an increase in smoke incidents “per se”, nor is it glycol-related.
The majority of the smoke calls are generated from off-property sources (residential fireplaces, bonfires, barbeques, etc) wafting into vent shafts or open cuts.
Steve: Thanks for the info. This is happening with great frequency now that it’s cold and fireplaces are in use, but it is a major threat to the TTC’s ability to operate the system. There are times I wonder about Queen’s Park, but the TTC has had just enough serious workplace incidents that I can understand them being more strict than in the past. The problem is how to prevent people from having barbeques and shutting down the subway?
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I’m guessing that the Ministry of Labour order is due to that transit fire that occurred at Donlands a while back.
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I’m honestly beginning to think that the B-D and Yonge lines need supplementary bus services to relieve the seemingly daily problems the subways seem to have. A bus service like every 10 minutes. I know it would take a lot a buses to do this but honestly any time it’s -10 or if it snows, the TTC always uses this as an excuse to delay and slow service. People get fed up but they have no alternative but to wait for the train. Personally this happened to me yesterday at the B-D line waiting for the train for 11 minutes (I know this because it said on the one stop screen) and when the train finally arrived we waited at the station for another 4-5 minutes.
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About a Bay streetcar line: The TTC has reported that Bay station is underused. This was a factor in the approval of the new condos south of Bay station.
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“[Streetcars on Bay] would never be anything more than a partial solution, moving only around 3000-4000 people per hour, but that would still help things at B-Y. (Alternative view: how much would you have to spend to add the same capacity at B-Y, and how much would such a streetcar service cost?)”
And that has been MY argument for either a return to traditional streetcar service on Bay or for supplemental bus service on Yonge and Bloor as is also suggested by many above, but I get shot down. I never for once believed you could replace subway service in the downtown (how ridiculous), but, hey, anything to alleviate the problem without extra expense (especially since a DRL is a pipe dream).
So, why not rush hour service down Yonge, between St. Clair Stn and Front, in fact, send it up University to St. George Stn. Why not extra service on Bay? Why not re-introduce 19 Church as a rush hour run from Front St. to Rosedale Stn? And finally, why not a rush-hour AND shoppers’ service along Bloor/Danforth between, say, Ossington and Pape Stns?
Rant over.
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Steve: “I want to see thousands of people per hour pouring out of Bay Station and queueing up for the streetcar southbound at Bloor!”
I believe I read that this intersection is up for redevelopement to put in new all direction pedestrian crossing (and rework the sidewalks) … so I would imagine that with an escalator and two sets of stairs coming up on to Bloor and then removing the bus shelter and allowing people to walk to the south side of Bloor by the Tim Hortons there would be ample waiting room for a good number of people (maybe enough to stave off a complete new subway line for a few years).
Steve: There is no “redevelopment” involved, simply a rearrangement of the traffic signals. For the volume of people needed to make a Bay streetcar worthwhile, you don’t want all of the transfer passengers walking south across the intersection as pedestrians.
I would imagine it might even be possible to dig a tunnel to the southside of Bloor from the tunnel that currently runs under Bay and have some stairs on that side.
Steve: The level of the tunnel under Bay Street is, I believe, high enough that a southerly extension would run into a lot of utilities to get across Bloor Street.
There are a bunch of new appartment buildings going in around this area (Cumberland terrace, Balmuto St, eventually 1 Bloor) so it’s possible that while not everyone would make a transfer that some of the new residents would use the streetcar instead.
Steve: I’m not so sure, especially for 1 Bloor that will sit right on top of Bloor Station.
The whole problem with proposals for multiple surface routes is that passengers will tend to stay on the subway because it is (mostly) convenient and indoors, and usually trains show up reliably. An outdoor transfer means deciding which unreliable service one wants to stand in the rain or snow while awaiting its arrival.
If we were going to to anything, it should be a single frequent route with proper transit priority. This would be difficult on Bay (although enforcement of the existing “clearway” wouldn’t hurt), and impossible on Yonge which is regularly closed for various events.
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Today the TTC had signal problems fro St. Andrew to King, I am not sure which direction, and had to manually dispatch trains between stations. A supervisor would call on his radio when his station was clear then the dispatcher at the previous station would let a train go. I am so glad that the TTC can still work on a train order manual dispatch system. Many automated line in the US would be completely shut down or would crash into the train in front at 50 mph.
Steve: This seems to be part of the continuing problem with signals on the Yonge line. Let’s hope they get it fixed before Monday’s rush hour.
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“If we were going to to anything, it should be a single frequent route with proper transit priority.”
Church Street fits the bill! Buses only, during rush hours. Or, how about being really inventive and turning Church St. into a pedestrian/transit mall. It’s a people-friendly Street (although the Westboro Baptist Church would disagree, so all the more reason!) that would be perfect to operate a Heritage Tram service that could be augmented by rush hour streetcars (or Heritage Trams in the Summer, other vehicles otherwise). It’s not much of a stretch, or a cost, to close off Church between Bloor and Dundas (or Queen), and help revitalize a much-ignored street. A heritage tram service could operate between the Esplanade (maybe looping via Church, Esplanade, Scott, and Front and–why not–into Rosedale Stn. via Church and Yonge. I know such thinking is utter blasphemy to TTC thought. I would be burned at the stake (or the streetcar pole) for even suggesting the possibility of buying used heritage vehicles from Rome or elsewhere in Europe and the United States to operate as both tourist and local service. I mean, really, WHAT transit company, or city, in their right mind would EVER consider doing something like that? How silly of me to even think it (heavy sarcasm implied).
Steve: I think you have been drinking, smoking or otherwise ingesting something “interesting” today.
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ExLibris wrote, “Just take a peek under the platforms at most stations and you’ll see a disgusting amount of junk accumulating under the lips of the platforms and along the trackbed itself.”
Pretty soon, it just might look something like this!
That photo is in Buenos Aires on their pre-metro LRT line – their subway system is not nearly so bad.
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“Steve: I think you have been drinking, smoking or otherwise ingesting something “interesting” today.”
Yes, chocolate. It’s Christmas, you know.
Steve: Strange. It doesn’t seem to have the same effect on me.
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Are you using the wrong brownie recipe, by chance?
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Chocolate–the right kind of chocolate, the good stuff like Ghirardelli’s–has an intoxicating power. But I still stand behind my comment. If other cities can invest in a heritage route, why can’t Toronto, or is that too rhetorical a question?
Steve: The distinction here is between an historic route and one which is intended to make a significant dent in subway demand.
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“The distinction here is between an historic route and one which is intended to make a significant dent in subway demand.”
Agreed. And the historic route is a fantasy, no doubt. However, Bay and Church are close enough to Yonge St. to be potentially useful dent-makers.
On the other hand, I guess the TTC tried to do just that when it initially extended 97 Yonge south of Davisville Stn. to replace 27 Downtown. Service was not bad, but not the greatest either. However, downtown bus service to north of St. Clair did not score many converts.
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Still we’re talking about 2km of surface route vs a huge underground subway relief line…if the goal is building a network, it seems that little extensions that can add additional capacity and add additional connections would be worth at least doing a study on.
Likewise sherbourne subway to gerard, or castle frank to gerard via parliament, or church st lines would be quick wins that could be built to siphon enough traffic off bloor to prevent a big dig type project.
None of the problems that have been stated with these little projects compare to building a new bridge across the don, or underground stations, or tunneling through downtown…
Any decision to build a DRL should study alternates first, and I feel like these are some good possibilities for study.
I understand your “people want to stay on one mode” comment, but my comeback to that is that some people prefer to take the less crowded way, and given that the cars would start at the stations empty it would be a lot nicer than fighting to get on the bloor platform…and to be honest I can’t think of very many streetcar lines in toronto that run empty during rush-hour…and if studies show that enough would take that line to clear up even 5 or 6% of the demand from bloor, then it may be worth doing…
Steve: When there were north-south streetcar routes parallel to Yonge Street, they were not free-standing but included rush hour services that through routed with major east-west lines. Church, for example, had cars from Danforth on it. Bay was fed from the northwest by the Dupont and Bay routes. Bathurst was fed at St. Clair and came into downtown via Adelaide. The Harbord car was fed by the Keele bus in the west, and buses at what is now Pape station in the east, as well as the dense residential neighbourhoods in between. Some King cars ran via Parliament just to avoid streetcar traffic congestion at Broadview and Queen.
The whole point is that none of these routes depended on transfers from the Bloor streetcar. 6% of the peak demand southbound at Bloor is about 1,800 passengers or 1.5 subway trains. There’s a catch-22 here in that to have any hope of attracting riders, a new service would have to be frequent and fast, and would need a convenient connection to the subway. Sherbourne Station is singularly inappropriate because it has only one exit and that’s on the wrong side of the street for inbound riders. Church Street doesn’t even have a subway connection. Getting the sort of transit priority needed to make for fast streetcar service would take a huge fight (just look at the battle over Jarvis Street), and in the end we would have built routes that really address a problem lasting a few hours a day.
The DRL, by contrast, especially if it goes north of the BD subway, would provide a new fast route into the core for all-day riders. We have to look at the benefits not just for peak point relief, but for overall network design.
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