The recent TTC meeting saw Commissioner Minnan-Wong digging into questions about rising costs on two TTC projects, the design of Finch West Station and the resignalling of the south end of the Yonge subway.
Reports asking for increased spending authorization come through the Commission quite regularly, and Minnan-Wong has raised the question of “out of control spending” at Council on past occasions. Just to declare my political leanings, I have never been a fan of the Councillor, even though there are certainly legitimate questions to be asked when project costs rise unexpectedly.
Unfortunately, Minnan-Wong tends to approach these issues as if someone is trying to pull the wool over his eyes and implies outright incompetence as the starting point for discussion. This approach brings more confrontation than information. Let’s have a look at the two projects in question and consider how information about them (and their many kin in the overall budget) might be better presented.
Finch West Station Design
Finch West Station lies under Keele Street north of Finch. Fitting the station and its associated surface buildings in has not been easy, and included the planned relocation of a fire hall to make room for the bus interchange.
In this round, the approved cost of the design contract is going up by $4.5-million to $23.6m for a variety of reasons:
- HST: Although the TTC, like other municipal agencies, gets much of the HST back as a rebate (about 78%), there is an increase of about $220k net on this contract.
- Finch West LRT Delay/Cancellation: The bus terminal was originally sized on the presumption that bus service would have been removed from Finch Avenue before the LRT opened, and no provision was included either for bus bays or for traffic access to/from the loop for Finch buses. Metrolinx’ delay in the project, and its possible cancellation in Mayor Ford’s transit plans, requires a different bus loop at a cost of $1.45m in added design fees.
- Flammable liquids transportation: A Bylaw of the former Metropolitan Toronto government prohibited transportation of flammable liquids over subway structures. With the Spadina Subway running directly under Keele Street, this would have required rerouting of traffic from the tank farm located northeast of the station. City Council passed an amending Bylaw to remove the constraint, but this required redesign of the local roads to reflect the needs of tanker traffic. This added $330k to the design costs.
- Additional design support during construction: A variety of factors including mismatches between “as built” utility drawings in the area, the design changes mentioned above, and co-ordination with adjacent tunneling contracts add to the amount of on-the-fly design required while the station is built. A provision of $950k has been added to cover this work.
- Addition complexity of traffic management: The design consultant is responsible for the traffic management plan covering 1.3km of Keele Street through the construction zone. Requirements for this plan have grown more complex, although it is unclear how much of this is due to additional demands by the City, local businesses and the community. This adds $687k to the work.
- Additional requirements for elevators, ventilation and fire fighters: Changes in the fire ventilation scheme and better air conditioning for the elevators add $313k to the cost.
- Scope changes for City requirements: Various changes requested by the City and others add $259k to the cost.
One could argue about the degree to which the need for these changes should have been foreseen, or who should bear the costs, but one way or another, the station has to be designed (and then built) without leaving many elements that are unsatisfactory or unworkable. That approach, a typical response to budget crunches, inevitably leads to separate “fixup” contracts later.
This is the second major group of cost changes for this project. The first, approved in June 2010, raised the original design cost estimate from $12m to $19m taking into account extensive changes in the proposed design arising both from feedback on the original design, attempts to simplify the station and reduce its total cost, and from site conditions requiring changes to the structure. (Details in the report.)
Yonge Subway Resignalling Project
The Yonge-University-Spadina subway will be converted to Automatic Train Control through a project now in progress. Funding for the complete conversion of YUS to ATC is not yet in place, notably in the budget for the Spadina extension to Vaughan. Also, contrary to what I had thought originally, the TTC intends to maintain parallel ATC and wayside signalling over the line.
To allow trains and workcars not equipped with ATC equipment to operate over the YUS Line and to mitigate against delay in the event of an ATC system failure, a new conventional auxiliary wayside signalling system is required to be installed.
In practice, the new wayside system (AWS) won’t be installed in one go, but will likely be retrofitted to the line as the various generations of existing signals wear out. The first contract, for the original Yonge-University line, has already been let.
There are actually three overlapping projects for this route:
- Automatic Train Control (ATC): This project will, eventually, equip the entire line with ATC and a “moving block” system of train monitoring and control. This approach allows train spacing to be based on a fine-grained knowledge of train location and speed rather than on a coarse, fixed block division of a line into segments. The project also includes installation of complementary ATC equipment on the new TR trains so that they can be directly controlled by the signal system.
- Auxiliary Wayside System (AWS): At this point, this project covers only the replacement of the signal system for the original south end of the Yonge-University subway. Oddly enough, the Spadina extension budget includes a new conventional AWS, but does not yet include provision for ATC.
- Speed Control System (SCS): Separate from the signal system, the SCS provides speed limit indications to trains. The technology is passive, in the sense that the information transmitted is static, very much like the station announcement transponders.
When the AWS contract was awarded, the presumption was that the SCS would handle the speed control for grades and curves where trains should not run at full speed. However, SCS may not be in place in time, and more importantly would not have any effect on trains or work cars that were not SCS-equipped. Therefore, the AWS contract is to be modified to include grade timing control comparable to what exists on the current system. This physically limits train speeds by keeping signals red (and automatic train stop arms “up”) so that trains cannot run through a section faster than the posted speed.
Are you getting the impression that there is a confusing overlap of designs and contracts here? I certainly am.
Indeed, the brand new ATC system will depend on the old-style AWS to “see” trains that are not ATC capable to prevent collisions. Funding for a full rollout of ATC is not yet available, and yet the operation of very short headways and the use of platform edge doors (a billion dollar TTC pet project) both depend on a control system that can precisely position trains.
At this point, the TTC has a large number of overlapping projects either in progress or in various stages of planning that all address capacity problems on the Yonge subway, or are spinoffs of the core projects. These include:
- Automatic train control
- Speed control
- New wayside signals
- New TR trains (base order, ATC equipment budgetted as part of the ATC project)
- More new TR trains (to correct for the 2010 Fleet Plan) (plus ATC for same)
- Carhouse modifications to handle TR unit 6-car trains
- Additional carhouse space for increased fleet
- Additional online storage for increased fleet
- Proposed Yonge Station expansion
- Platform edge door proposal
- Richmond Hill extension
- New carhouse in York Region
Also lurking in the background is the idea of adding a short seventh car to the TR sets. However, it is unclear how this would fit with the modifications already done at carhouses for the TRs, or with the spacing of platform doors that would have to accommodate a seventh short car within a train.
At no time has the Commission ever seen (at least publicly) a consolidated plan showing all of the projects needed to deliver the claimed additional capacity that is required on the Yonge line as it exists today, and as it will develop should the Richmond Hill extension go ahead. Moreover, some of the projects now in progress (signalling) and some requiring funding in the near future (additional trains and associated storage space) are not fully funded. If they proceed on the basis that they are essential work, they will crowd other deserving capital works off of the table.
Concluding Thoughts
There is a major problem in TTC capital planning, and I will turn to this in my next article. For decades, projects have come forward on the assumption that the money would be found, and the need both for an integrated view of how each project fits into a larger system plan, a true sense of prioritization and cost containment, have not been part of budget discussions. All we know is that we need more money.
If members of the Commission or Council want to dive into the details of contract changes, it would be useful to have a summary of the design changes and what drove them. In the case of Finch West Station, the estimated design cost has almost doubled, but many of the changes are driven by external requirements or events (which may save money in another agency’s budget), and some additional design work is intended to yield an offsetting reduction in construction cost.
This type of detail may reveal patterns in the shortcomings of preliminary design done as part of the Environmental Assessment, or of a lack of attention to details of third-party requirements in early stags of a project. For example, many station designs on the Spadina line have been revised to deal with a higher-than-expected water table. This could be viewed as a foul-up, or simply the byproduct of a process that leaves detailed site investigation until after a project is approved thereby exposing preliminary work to criticism for missing important factors.
In the case of the signalling projects, the problem is that each component has evolved with its own rationale, and it is hard to understand how much more must be spent just to reach an end state that will deliver on the project goals. This is a classic case where a Board does not ask questions about, or indeed fully understand system plans, and winds up as hostage to whatever management recommends. When the budget crunch arrives, a Board can flail about looking for savings or gravy, but they will drown in a sea of poorly understood details.
A review may improve the design and cost estimation process, develop valid “lessons learned”, and yield better understanding the workings of the overall budget. If so, then digging into the details is worthwhile if only to reassure the Commission and the public that the TTC’s engineers are doing their jobs properly.
If Commissioners and Councillors really want to address budget problems, then they must first understand what they are trying to manage and direct. If, however, the intent is simply to paint the TTC and its consultants as bumbling fools, then the exercise is little more than cheap political theatre.
Steve Munro 
I’ve tried to draw some attention to this before, although not aggressively. I’m glad to see you raising this, too. It’s a very big and serious problem, in my opinion, that EAs are approved and budget requests made when detailed design is only at 10%. I strongly believe that detailed design should be funded separately and completed (100%) as a prerequisite to submitting requests for full project funding. This would avoid projects being engineered to fit the budget, and allow projects to focus on getting the best product.
This exposes, quite clearly I’d argue, the inherent disadvantage of a transit commission whose board is composed entirely of politicians. Councillors cannot reasonably be expected to come from a background that would equip them with the understanding and skills necessary to understand the details of plans and projects well enough to ask the tough questions that often need to be asked, but seldom are, through no fault of their own. Councillors are at least constantly, and for some it is continuously, in a position where they can only take staff’s word for it because of their own lack of comfort with the subject matter. This makes a governance framework effectively toothless; ineffective. You and I have seen the consequences of this play out many times. This is the principle reason I would be interested in seeing a mixed-model board (I am not in favour, for the record, of a board that has no politicians, for accountability concerns). I find it unrealistic to expect politicians alone to effectively oversee something as complex as the TTC; they need help in this.
Steve: And when, say, a transit advocate shows up trying to explain to this marvellous board how they are being led down the garden path by their staff, will they listen, or shush the deputation for having the temerity to question their ever-perfect managers?
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Denzil Minnan Wong rarely does more than a superficial investigation before jumping to a populist conclusion. This is not the kind of supervision we need for our expenditures and projects. Unfortunately simplistic populist nonsense is the new standard at City Hall to the detriment of our City.
Steve: Yes, sadly, Minnan-Wong scents that something is not quite right, but is more interested in scoring political points than it getting to the heart of the problem. That said, Chair Stintz gave him a rather sour look for having the nerve to wash the TTC’s dirty laundry in public, and she does not seem to want to have this sort of problem discussed openly. She, like many chairs before her, appears to have caught the “chair’s disease”, a need to defend the organization no matter what.
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That’s a different problem (which you’ve referred to as “chair’s disease”) that could exist with any board composition (there is no “cure,” per se, for that one). The point was that the grasp of the subject matter should be substantially higher in a mixed model, and through that an expectation can and should be that tougher questions will materialize through that higher grasp of the subject matter. As you know, only the board can question staff on the public record.
Steve: And we can only hope that the procedures are not changed to a Metrolinx-like environment where deputations are simply not allowed.
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Probably a question that has already been addressed, but will the Finch West station still have a provisions for a “roughed in” future LRT station, Ford or no Ford?
Steve: Hard to say. Much depends on whether Metrolinx is giving up on Finch, and they still have not produced a new plan. Early March came and, more or less, is gone, and this means that there still is no agreement on a new plan and funding. Of course, it would be unseemly for Metrolinx to say something like “Ford won’t be here by the time we build Finch”, and the rest of us can only cross our fingers.
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“Flammable liquids transportation: A Bylaw of the former Metropolitan Toronto government prohibited transportation of flammable liquids over subway structures. With the Spadina Subway running directly under Keele Street, this would have required rerouting of traffic from the tank farm located northeast of the station.”
I never thought about this before: how do gasoline tanker trucks (or in the olden days, home heating-oil trucks) cross Yonge Street or University Avenue? Even getting on or off the Allen to Eglinton could be problematic for southbound-to-eastbound or eastbound-to-northbound trucks.
Steve: I suspect they are allowed to cross, but not drive along subway routes.
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The trouble with politicians running things is that they need to qualifications to do so, other than getting lots of votes. There should be a compulsory training course for any commission (or other committee) members explaining all the various issues associated with their job.
I noticed that in the minutes of the first DRT Executive Committee meeting (the rough equivalent of the commission) since the election, staff gave a “DRT 101” presentation to get members up to speed. There’s no shame in a politician ending up in a committee through passion rather than knowledge, but once on the committee they need to acquire the knowledge, and fast.
Looking at the whole YUS signalling debacle, I find it hard to believe that installing a whole brand new parallel signalling system on 30km of subway is cheaper than equipping maintenance vehicles with ATC. If they have a low max speed, then the maintenance vehicles wouldn’t even need all the features of regular subway cars.
Wider safety point: having a system where signals stay red and then go green when a train gets sufficiently close as way of limiting speed is bad. (This is known as “approach release”). The reason is that drivers get used to red signals clearing to green, and expect it happen all the time at certain locations… which presents obvious risks when they don’t clear. (Wasn’t that part of the cause for Russell Hill?).
I’m not quite sure why speed control isn’t built into the ATC system, like every other subway with ATC that I know about…
Steve: After Russell Hill, the timed signals were changed so that if they are going to clear, they flash red when a train approaches. This distinguishes a timed red from a full stop indication. As for ATC, it will have speed control. The problem is with the parallel wayside signal system which does not have grade timing because a third system, the Speed Control System, was supposed to provide this effect. Of course, if you don’t equip all of your trains with sensors and controls that can react to SCS, it can’t do much about how fast such equipment travels. This has all the earmarks of a complete cock-up.
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Hi Steve:-
Well, well ,well, an added cost to the design of Finch Station W and then ultimately to the cost of the construction itself when it occurs merely because the enlightened ones decided that LRT is hurtful to our City’s needs. Hummmmmm?
But we’ve got buses eh?
Dennis
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The way Toronto operates is as if nothing that occurs in Toronto has ever occurred before, anywhere. With many millions of dollars at stake for even small projects, the first question should always be, have we dealt with this before, how did we handle it, and was that a good solution or not. Every city project, should have an analysis done at the very end, to determine how it could be done faster, cheaper, better the next time.
If it’s not something the city has done before, is it something that someone else has dealt with before. How did they handle it, was it a good solution and how can we do it faster, cheaper, better.
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I’m confused – if the timing/speed constraints are a physical constant, why would they need to remove grade timing capability from the replacement wayside signal system and have it ‘re-born’ as a completely isolated system? This forces complicated and one-off installations to make all the work trains SCS-compatible when the existing technology could have accomplished this if replaced much as it is now. I gather that the physical signal system will now become an ‘interlocking hybrid’ as on Sheppard where essentially the entire line is one giant computer-controlled interlocking and capable of holds and reverse-running operation at most locations.
I’ll assume the TTC’s engineers decided that removing grade timing from the physical signal system with trip-stops and allowing the trains to do their own on-board speed enforcement was going to be simpler to set up and maintain in the long run. Why it had to be a completely isolated system that didn’t talk directly to the ATC hardware is beyond me. In a sense we are now ending up with THREE parallel systems. SCS will be required as a fall-back in the event of ATC failure which means even the TR trains will need both systems installed.
On a possibly related note, I’ve noticed a large hardware cabinet added under the operators’ cab on some T1 cars. Does anyone know if this is part of the signalling upgrade experiments? Also, will SCS use RFID marker tags much like the stop announcement system and are the new speed limit signs before curves related?
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Having sat through a couple of TTC Commissioners meetings and been at some Council committee meetings I must say I have admiration for people, like you, Steve, who go to the trouble of being there to make a deputation. Most Commissioners (or committee members) are busily checking email, getting coffee (in the days when they got it!) and chatting with staff and others. Frankly, most of them are just RUDE. This lack of rspect for “the taxpayer” does not appear to be restricted to one side of the political spectrum, Adam G was particularly tied to his Blackberry!
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When the budget crunch arrives, a Board can flail about looking for savings or gravy, but they will drown in a sea of poorly understood details.
This is pretty much it, Steve. The TTC commission is made up of politicians. They have neither the time nor the expertise, nor in most cases the inclination, to look at details such as the ones you’ve presented here. It is easier and more rewarding — especially in the current political climate — to accuse people of incompetence and score political points.
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Seems incredibly complicated to have a conventional fixed block wayside signal system and a moving block ATC system working together at the same time. I suppose if only one system were active at any given time (ie. fixed block turns on if ATC breaks down and paralyzes the entire system) it would make sense, but I wonder if this is also being done so that BD non-ATC trains can still use the wye to enter YUS at Museum for non-revenue moves. Can’t think of any other good reason. How often does the SRT’s signal system completely fail?
Steve: I presume that your question about the SRT is rhetorical. When the weather is bad, “daily” would be an understatement from my experience.
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@Wogster: You mean you want common sense at City Hall? Novel approach. Unfortunately, common sense is not very common! World Class City. “gag”
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@Wogster: Sadly, lack of good project planning and prioritization is not unique to the TTC. It would be nice if they made some stabs in that direction, though.
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Project planning and screwups because they think every problem has never occurred before anywhere, is a city problem, not a TTC one, because the TTC is a city agency, it inherits the problems with poor planning.
Steve: This depends on the project. St. Clair was largely a City problem, but some of the issues with subway planning sit squarely in the TTC’s lap.
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Why can’t they get this through their heads…all these projects costs will add more crap to the already huge pile of shit that it is called MAINTENANCE.
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Steve: This depends on the project. St. Clair was largely a City problem, but some of the issues with subway planning sit squarely in the TTC’s lap.
I think Wogster was referring to the definite tendency of all agencies connected to Toronto (the city rather than it’s municipal government as an entity) to ignore any precedent on the basis that Toronto is somehow completely unique. See, for a fairly recent example, just how reluctant Metrolinx has been to admit that anyone else’s rail project could be relevant to GO electrification, or even how long the city took to acknowledge that LRT COULD be anything more than a streetcar.
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I am beginning to wonder if over the next few months and years, councillors who are in the right wing block will develop subtle fault lines based on whether they trust what staff say.
Minnan-Wong is definitely one of the rant at staff types. He is not going to change. Nor, I suspect is somebody like Giorgio Mammoliti, who seems more concerned about status then anything else. But, quite a few of the others could be, with the right wording, persuaded and led by staff into making decisions they maybe would not have made without staff giving them a lead. We might be seeing this already with Stintz.
Unlike the Federal Tories, and Mike Harris, the Ford types don’t seem to be wanting to make an enemy of the civil service. Yes, the unions are hated; but, the city civil service mangement is not seen as an enemy, like the PMO sees it in Ottawa. For example, I’m intrigued by how much of the heavy lifting is being done by the city manager Joe Pennachetti right now. He may be following the good civil servant dictum of implementing what the politicians want. But, he’s being seen to be out front doing, and that only is happening because he is being asked to do that – if Ford didn’t want him there, he wouldn’t be.
It will be interesting to see if the bureaucrats slowly but surely begin to influence the Ford administration. I don’t think they will be able to tone down the bluster and the rhetoric; nor do I think Ford and others will be ideologically changed by being involved in actually managing the city. But, we seem to already be seeing some signs that city managers will have some influence.
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I am beginning to wonder if over the next few months and years, councillors who are in the right wing block will develop subtle fault lines based on whether they trust what staff say.
Raymond Cho is already being described by the comedy writer Sue Ann Levy as a “lefty”. Bit of news to we fellow travelers.
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Construction costs have skyrocketed across Ontario in the last 15 years. In the last 5 years the ‘Construction Price Index’ has risen by 14.7%. Unless the consultants remembered to put everything into future dollars (or until the politians lean the difference between 2000 and 2011 dollar costs), we’ll have more rheotic like this that everyone that actually knows something about a particular project will know is the cost of doing business.
A subway priced today will cost at least a third more in a decade from now. I don’t expect the Sheppard Extension to come in at less than $5 billion, if it happens at all.
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