Most Torontonians know we have a lake and its better-known attractions such as Harbourfront, the stadium, Exhibition Place, and of course the wall of condos stretching from Yonge to beyond Bathurst. However, the Eastern Waterfront isn’t part of the “mental map” many people in Toronto carry around.
For the past century, the lands east of Yonge, and particularly those south of Lake Shore and east of the Don River, have been industrial properties known only to those who work there, the neighbouring communities, intrepid explorers, and visitors to a few clubs and supermarkets. The size and potential of the space — as big as the existing downtown — simply don’t register as part of “Toronto”.
Waterfront Toronto has plans to change all of that and, in the process, to undo some of the disastrous choices of the past century. Developments proceed along Queen’s Quay, and there is much more to come, but even these get us only to the Don River. The big prize is the Don River mouth and the port lands to the southeast.
Plans to redesign Queen’s Quay, reducing it to a two-lane road with cycling and pedestrians replacing cars where the eastbound roadway now lies, are threatened. Mayor Ford’s desire to maximize capacity for road users may sabotage a scheme many years in the making.
There was a time when “transit first” was the defining call for waterfront development, and the eastern branch of the Harbourfront streetcar was planned as an integral element in the build-out east from downtown. As with so many great schemes, this has run aground on funding limitations at Waterfront Toronto and substantial growth in TTC cost estimates.
The proposed line on Cherry Street that was to serve development in the West Don Lands, may not be built for several years because of concern that it might impede Pan Am Games related development, the very development it was intended to serve.
The worst knot in the transit scheme lies at the tangle of roads where Cherry, Lake Shore, Queen’s Quay and Parliament all meet around the mouth of the Don. Sorting this out was to be part of the plan for creation of parkland and flood control at the Don, but this project has no funding, and no burning interest from any level of government.
From a transit perspective, it’s as if the Spadina car ended at King Street, and there were no Harbourfront car on Queen’s Quay. This is no way to develop a transit-oriented neighbourhood.
Waterfront Toronto is under attack from some in Mayor Ford’s circle. Yesterday, John Campbell, president and CEO, appeared on Metro Morning commenting on some criticisms. He was rather diplomatic in saying that the debate is simply a matter of a new government finding its legs and learning what’s really going on. The problem with this outlook is that many in Ford’s inner circle have been on Council for some time. Whether they actually paid attention to Waterfront Toronto, or saw it only as one more Miller legacy to be dismantled, is hard to say.
The real agenda becomes much clearer when one reads Councillor Doug Ford’s musings about waterfront development. That prize I mentioned earlier, a piece of land roughly equivalent to the block bounded by Yonge, Bathurst, Bloor and Queen, is lusted over by many public agencies and not a few developers. This is an ideal time, after all, to hope for a municipal fire sale. The city wants to liquidate its assets, and developers would love to get a free hand to build on the eastern lake shore in the same unfettered manner we have already seen west of Yonge Street.
Ford thinks the city should not be in the development business, but fails to understand that the whole Waterfront Toronto scheme was to provide the infrastructure and the overall design that would increase land values and build the foundation of a new downtown neighbourhood. That’s not something any private developer, concerned only for the land he develops and the immediate neighbourhood, cares about or will invest in. A beautiful park would make him money, but he wants the public sector to pay for it.
Another wrinkle comes from the competing agendas of agencies such as Infrastructure Ontario and the Port Lands corporation who would love to elbow Waterfront Toronto aside and develop their lands without the overburden of regional planning and design goals. The idea of a waterfront park, of wetlands, cycling and pedestrian realms, isn’t embraced by those who see only acreage and more development. Indeed, some would simply channel the river and build over it rather than exploit what it could be as the focus of public open space.
Worst of all is the City of Toronto’s appetite for money. Much of the improvement in the waterfront was to be funded from proceeds of development, but if this is scooped by the City to pay down debt, or to fund pet projects like the Sheppard Subway, the ugly, inaccessible waterfront will remain, and the land will be lost to public hands forever. If we sell quick and cheap, we gain a short term pile of cash, but leave the bulk of future appreciation in private hands. (I cannot help thinking of another cash-strapped, right-wing government that sold Highway 407 in similar circumstances, a sale many have regretted ever since.)
The waterfront is on the edge of the city, and to many it’s as out of sight as Malvern or Rexdale are to downtowners. Voters want slogans and quick fixes, and only care about the details when they are personally affected. Do we want a beautiful waterfront? Do people even care? Will we wake up in ten years asking “how did this happen”?
Steve Munro 
There’s an assumption that developers have no interest in transit oriented development. Shouldn’t Waterfront Toronto and the TTC be engaging them since they are the only interest group the Fords might listen to? I’m serious here. Developers get a free ride on the backs of transit advocates, since TOD means less expensive underground parking / higher densities on the same footprint. It’s time they stepped up and asked the Fordistas on council when decent levels of transit are coming to the east Waterfront, even if that means buses in the short term.
Steve: Part of the problem is that the Fordistas really don’t care much about Waterfront Toronto and the TTC. Also, developers are not the most altruistic lot, and there will be enough of them who just want to buy property cheap, if only to hold onto it as an investment.
Meanwhile, the Fords will blow the proceeds either on a subway we don’t need, or a tax cut we can’t afford. Bribe people with their own money. It works every time.
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An important aim should to promote the waterfont plans as something that will benefit everyone in Toronto, not just thosse people who end up living there. Otherwise, it will look like we’re paying for a streetcar line that will serve some yuppy over-priced apartments. The benefits to non-waterfront residents need to trumpeted loud and clear. (And not just hazy things like fewer cars, but the point that you will end up with an area that is a worthy destination in its own right).
Steve: Considering that Ford himself claimed the city could not grow because it doesn’t have the transportation network to support more people, good transit to the waterfront development should be a no-brainer.
Selling off lands for easy money will be very tempting, not least because of Doug Ford’s notion that the city shouldn’t be a developer. (Side note: if a developer can make squillions from land bought from the City, why can’t the City make squillions instead?) Oddly, he seems to think the City can simply tell the developers what to do. As I sarcastically commented elsewhere: “municipalities have a fantastic track record of getting developers to do exactly as commanded, without the developers complaining one little bit.”
There are two good options: (1) sell off the lands to developers to do what they want, and use the money for Waterfront infrastructure, or (2) sell off the lands with the condition the developer (partly) pay for Waterfront infrastructure (e.g. “you tend developers all get some land, but you must each pay for 10% of the streetcar line), and use the money as general revenue.
Nominally, these two options should both leave the city with the same amount of the money at the end of the day. However, (1) is more prone to abuse by the City, whereas (2) may put off developers. Personally, I’d prefer (2).
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The root cause, I suspect, of the East Bayfront line is one that has come up in previous discussions here. Estimates for such projects are provided at far too early a stage in the design process, and then the budget envelope gets fixed and all kinds of nips and tucks and other corner-cutting ultimately ends up being the all-consuming goal of the project to ensure it stays within that fixed budget envelope, at the expense of designing a good project that gives the best bang for the buck (which is far different from delivering the cheapest project, but all too often this is forgotten).
The complexity of issues involving Union Loop, something that should reach 70% design before estimates start being disclosed given the obscene complexity of that site, has caused a lot of budget grief. The ill-thought plan to not have a station at Yonge, and also annoy Redpath needlessly, all due to being wedded prematurely to a fixed budget envelope before enough design work had been completed, resulted in a lost opportunity to gain potential local champions for the project. That approach costs more, but the value it brings through smoother project flow and project support form the locals can be hard to come by.
This wouldn’t have changed the outcome of the municipal election, obviously, but there would have been more pressure supportive of and vested local interest in the project. It is actually quite embarrassing for the City and TTC that opposition from two major property owners between Yonge and Jarvis materialized considering how little exists along QQE that could spark opposition at all. With such little support, largely self-inflicted by designs hampered from premature budgeting, it’s not surprising, however unfortunate, that we see what’s happening now. The consultative process, arguably a misnomer, is almost as big a threat as funding cuts are to transit improvements.
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“The problem with this outlook is that many in Ford’s inner circle have been on Council for some time. Whether they actually paid attention to Waterfront Toronto, or saw it only as one more Miller legacy to be dismantled, is hard to say.”
I’m very glad to see you mention this. It’s sad to see how many are changing their tune to follow a path of personal gain. To hell with their constituents or what is best for TO, some councillors know no shame.
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Which reminds me: whatever happend to the idea of turning the Leslie Street Spit into some grand aquatic park? Heck, you can’t even take a bus out there anymore! (that was an odd TTC run to begin with. I can’t think of any other route, anywhere, in which you were required to sign a waiver absolving the TTC or the City from any blame should you get hurt, or worse, while on the Spit).
Steve: There is still a plan, but little money.
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“Plans to redesign Queen’s Quay, reducing it to a two-lane road with cycling and pedestrians replacing cars where the eastbound roadway now lies, are threatened. Mayor Ford’s desire to maximize capacity for road users may sabotage a scheme many years in the making.”
Steve, can you expand on this? Phase 1 is funded and slated to begin construction this year I believe. But of course it is hard to imagine the Fords are supporters. Are they working actively against it?
Steve: There are rumblings, and the serious road work won’t get underway until next year. This fall it’s the streetcar track. Plenty of time to rip up the designs, especially for phases 2 and 3 (York to Jarvis, Jarvis to Parliament) which are unfunded.
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Steve: “Considering that Ford himself claimed the city could not grow because it doesn’t have the transportation network to support more people, good transit to the waterfront development should be a no-brainer.”
Though brains are clearly in short supply at City Hall I fear that you are correct in your pessimism – it’s REALLY so stupid. Do the Brothers Ford really want to replicate QQW on QQE?? However, to try to be optimistic I do wonder if the developers of Bayside and Parkdide and George Brown and Corus will be happy. (I doubt it as what attracted them to QQE was presumably the transit links and at least the Bayside development (Hines) specifically notes that transit must be provided, preferably an LRT.)
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It just puzzles me why this city has its priorities in the wrong places. They have “enough” money to contribute for an overbuilt and unneeded subway extension to the suburban wasteland of Vaughan, but no money for the Queens Quay East streetcar which is designed as a transit-first approach with good density planned to support ridership.
I can just picture the gravy-lovin’ Robbie drooling over the fact that this plan for the waterfront is in jeopardy….
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At numerous public meetings, there was clear public support for the Queens Quay makeover. Would Ford go against them?
Steve: “Clear public support” depends on which “public”. Ford has a “mandate”, it seems, to do whatever he wants, although the waterfront wasn’t even something he knew much about during the campaign. Ford’s “public” includes people who don’t like the idea of losing road space to pedestrians, cyclists and transit.
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Toronto is over. I hate to put it that bluntly, but it is done. All of the stupidity and shortsightedness is not going to change for so far into the future that it doesn’t bear anticipating. People will continue to vote against their own interests, and vote only to spite their neighbour. The province is never going to give the power to the city that it needs, and neither the province nor Ottawa is going to give back Toronto a reasonable portion of the money it generates. Toronto will go the way of Detroit.
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I think that you are being overly pessimistic with regards to Ford’s ability to influence Waterfront Toronto. With the examples of Corus/GBC/Hines/Safdie’s condo, I think Campbell has much more influence Ford expects. Moreover, we’ve already seen Council starting to push back — really early in a Mayor’s term to start losing Council moderates. Given the fact he’ll get City Centre airport (the tunnel) and Cherry Street streetcar cancellation ‘wins’, and the fact that Hines is a huge developer with much experience in lobbying governments, I expect this is just another sop to their constituents that will disappear as they take credit for hurrying along the condos in WDL as soon as there are photo ops.
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I’m curious, regarding the east bayfront development. I think no matter what this will go ahead as planned given it’s already been sold to a developer and a plan created ?
A similar argument can be made regarding part of the west donlands that is meant for the Pan Am games ?
But even in these areas what can be cut is the transportation (streetcar) and the design of QQ.
Steve: Yes, we will get the development, but not the transit to serve it properly, or the parks that were to make the Don mouth such an attractive centrepiece for the neighbourhood.
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Phase 1 of the “Queens Quay Boulevard” project is scheduled to begin construction on May 1st. I hope that this construction includes the Bicycle Path and Promenade construction as well.
I don’t see how Mr. Ford has enough time to stop this.
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What the Ford Brothers don’t seem to understand is how contaminated the land is down there and the high risk of investing. Developers keep turning out generic monster homes because it’s what they know and are good at selling, and they claim it’s all the market wants. The fact is that a new development that doesn’t rely on a car will not sell unless good transit is there first. Add the significant cost of soil remediation to many sites and the risks are huge. Some land carries negative value because it’s so toxic.
If they give it to the private sector nothing will happen except, possibly, big box retail and we will be back where we started in another generation.
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I think it’s quite amazing how sherbourne park and sugar beach turned out, if any of you haven’t checked it out yet I very much encourage you too.
So what I mean by this is simply the quality and attention to detail; It’s vastly superior to just about all developments driven by the city (H2O comes to mind here, which isn’t bad in it self) and even a good majority of private developments.
Maybe once the east bayfront neighborhood really takes off and development starts it will encourage the general population and result in a strong desire to see it continued throughout the waterfront and over time that will force things to change.
Unfortunately transportation will play a big role here but probably not in the way you think. For the first while I’m sure buses while not ideal will in all honesty suffice and this first little while is probably many years (5-10). The key issue though is the developer of the parcel of land here does not need to build any of the commercial properties if no mass transit is available, and unfortunately I think there was direct mention to ‘LRT’ in the contract. Like the rest of Toronto, it’s generally more profitable to build residential in the city due to the high commercial property tax rates. In other words they’d likely be more then happy not to due this and this will jeopardize the health / feel of this new neighborhood as really commercial / residential mix is the key to any successfully area.
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What bothers me about development in this city is that it focuses on condos and shopping. The idea is let’s put in the condos, stores and roads but nothing else. What about the services?
Where’s the transit infrastructure (i.e. light rail or streetcars, NOT buses)? Newly developed neighbourhoods often don’t get any transit infrastructure until 4 or 5 years after they’re complete and even then they get unreliable, infrequent buses.
Where are the libraries, community centres, parks, public art? The city needs to be more than just condos, houses and strip malls.
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I’m fearful that perhaps Toronto is “done”. I mean when in our civic history has this level of short-sighted backwards mentality been so wide spread in our own municipal government? I think it was just dumb luck we got Miller 2 times in a row, because the people who live in the pre-amalgamated metro resent being forced into becoming “Toronto” they never liked Toronto before they merged and they sure as hell don’t like Toronto now. Their way of thinking is based on how the cities they lived in and knew were built and run, and they continue to have that idea of 2 cars in the driveway in a nice quiet suburb a stone’s throw away from the big dirty city. These people have no interest in ensuring Toronto’s prosperity, they could care less about what we have built here or what it means to be a Torontonian.
Again thank you and keep up the awesome work.
John Norton
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Marcus Gee now tells of Doug Ford’s waterfront vision that includes a monorail from the old Hearn plant to downtown, built by the private sector at no expense to taxpayers.
Steve: My favourite part is the bit where Ford claims that his friends from south of the border say there is “nothing to do” in Toronto, and that’s why we need a stadium. And Doug Ford is the brains of the outfit.
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My suspicion’s that the eastern waterfront’s going to get very high density condo development as developers try to maximize the revenue from their land purchases, and the city will be absent apart from providing roads and utility connections. It’ll likely be a forest of huge condo buildings like the area around Spadina between Front St. and Queen’s Quay but minus the streetcar line.
Interestingly enough, according to the Globe and Mail, developers who are already invested or about to invest in developing properties are not happy with Rob Ford and company because their carefully laid plans are being thrown into disarray by extension of the city’s waterfront plans being tossed up in the air.
The eastern waterfront does have a number of industrial business that still operate, eg. most of Unwin Ave, the cement plant, the Redpath sugar refinery, the Toronto Hydro training facility and others. How will these businesses co-exist with intensive condo development? The Redpath sugar refinery already had to give up their railway connection due to one of the condos nearby and now everything they make has to be shipped out by truck. What’s left of the industry along the eastern waterfront will probably be forced out by the condo dwellers once they move in because Torontonians have one heck of a snobbish aversion to any kind of job that doesn’t involve sitting in a nice, clean office or $10.25/hr service industry. What happens to the people working down there now?
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A monorail along the waterfront? Bad idea, we don’t want a repeat of the ICTS boondoggle in this city. If Ford is seriously talking about waterfront redevelopment on this sort of massive scale, we should be thinking instead about building phase 1 of the Downtown Relief Line via the portlands between Union and the Danforth.
Of course, without funding, this is just another “privately financed” pipe dream…
Steve: And a subway/DRL would be tricky to route so that it served all of the developments without taking a roundabout trip to downtown. There is also the small matter of the high water table.
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If a private sector monorail couldn’t even work in Las Vegas (now in bankruptcy protection), how could one ever succeed here? At least Doug Ford spoke positively about bicycles…
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Well, a monorail might work if they ditched the expensive elevated guideway, put it on the ground, and maybe used regular tracks and stuff and put it on a private right-of-way. And electrical power could come from an overhead wire…
…oh, wait…
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A monorail is rubber tires running on concrete, usually electrically powered by wire. Sounds more like a trolley bus to me. Damn, we’ve been down that road before too…
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Has he read the plans? Has he read the newspapers? Like 2 weeks ago they approved building a giant yard for streetcars right across the street. Has he even been to the area? There is an elevated road there already…the QEW…how is the monorail going to get over an elevated 6 lane highway? That would look amazing…while we’re at it let’s build a hydrogen maglev train over that and finish it off with an elevated swan boat flume over that, fill it with gravy and have it all terminate at city hall….then when the mayor and his brother invite their friends from the USA they can stop bad-mouthing the city and show them the toronto museum of transit mistakes and pork barrels…
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(They can also marvel at the genious of building a football stadium next to the portlands energy center, and on the site of a formal coal power plant)….we’re sorry Saturday Night Football has been delayed due to natural gas fumes, please wait while we wait for the wind to shift…although I guess in a way it would make tailgate parties a little bit easier…just grab some coal from the parking lot and start cooking!
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Kristian said: “If a private sector monorail couldn’t even work in Las Vegas (now in bankruptcy protection), how could one ever succeed here?”
Well, when you consider the clearance issues around the Redpath plant due to ships needing to dock there, it would probably be successful due to its secondary role as a roller coaster.
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Hey, monorails worked fine in Springfield!
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On a note about Toronto politics
John Norton stated about people who live in the inner suburbs “These people have no interest in ensuring Toronto’s prosperity, they could care less about what we have built here or what it means to be a Torontonian.”
As a person who lives and works among the apartment dwelling working poor in the inner suburbs, I find this line of discussion troubling.
We who are engaged in community matters on this site know the importance of every issue of city building, the vast majority of city residents, regardless of neighbourhood, only engage in city thinking either when directly affected or when they consider the large question of “are they getting value for money.”
I live and work among people who are articulate thoughtful individuals who care about the city, as a whole. Yes, they do resent certain aspects of a downtown centred Toronto vision, often seen in such things as Now Magazine labelling Bloor Street as the North of the city. (Note to NOW – Rosedale is not the suburbs). They want to see something go beyond the us vs. them debate. Like it or not the gravy train idea did transcend that, in a crude way.
The inner suburbs dweller wants the city as a whole to be better. They want buses that get to them on time between work and home. They want to be able to use the waterfront and get there. They want to see value for taxes and fees paid.
The inner suburbs voted for Rob Ford because they did not feel included in Miller’s vision, nor did they feel included in the vision of what the people running against Ford had to offer. Doug Ford’s vision of a football stadium with a monorail on the waterfront is not what they voted for and they are smart enough to wait to see if anything actually happens (like they treat the idea of the Sheppard extension).
I would caution against assuming the inner suburbs are supportive of all that Ford is doing. The largest segment of the population, across the city, is awaiting the budget discussions of next year to see if real financial realities, both in terms of revenue and spending are put into place. That is how Ford will be judged. Otherwise, they are not really engaged in what is going on in the city beyond a vague reading of the headlines.
Yes, in the meantime, a lot of damage can and is being done. But, assuming the inner suburbs people don’t care about the city is going too far.
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Speaking of monorails, I am working this week in a room on the second floor of a building on Pitt Street in Sydney. All day long, the monorail passes right by the windows I see out of.
While it seems to function well and its infrastructure does not eclipse the daylight on the street scape, there is something intrusive looking about a steel I-beam snaking its way down the street about six metres in the air. Not only that, but it just does not seem to be a ‘serious’ mode of transit around the CBD, but more of a tourist ride.
Steve: How are stations handled? Over the street, or integrated in conveniently nearby buildings? How is accessibility handled?
The route map and accompanying photo imply single track operation. It’s easy to take up little room when you only have one track. By the way, only the red loop on that map. The blue route runs with some sort of foreign technology unknown in Toronto.
And then there’s this informative page about trams. A shame the TTC was incapable of being as positive about the technology as our friends down under, but they were so busy slagging conventional streetcars at every opportunity, they undermined the plans for LRT.
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You’ve mentioned to a monorail advocate that monorails don’t have high capacity. Is this because of their size?
I’ve looked online to find an explanation as to why monorails have low capacity (one site claims that LRT can produce more capacity than monorail). But why can’t an LRT-size vehicle be used for monorail?
Are there any other factors that affect its capacity?
Steve: Typical monorails are designed for low volume operation. This translates to small cars, light structures and relatively small stations. There is a more general issue about elevated structures: rapid transit, regardless of the technology, involves a lot of people, and the moment the stations are not at grade, there is a need for vertical circulation. Platform size is driven both by train length and by the volume of pedestrian traffic that must be handled.
There are arguments that if a line is completely automated such as Skytrain in Vancouver, one can offer frequent service of shorter trains. This can cut down on station size, but it won’t eliminate the total passenger volume, only smooth it out somewhat.
However, total automation leads to a need for complete grade separation, and one aspect of LRT, almost by definition, is that it does not require complete separation from other traffic.
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Jacob Louy says:
April 20, 2011 at 3:00 pm
“You’ve mentioned to a monorail advocate that monorails don’t have high capacity. Is this because of their size?
“I’ve looked online to find an explanation as to why monorails have low capacity (one site claims that LRT can produce more capacity than monorail). But why can’t an LRT-size vehicle be used for monorail?
“Are there any other factors that affect its capacity?”
A major problem with most monorail systems is that they are not really a single rail system. They have a top surface on which the load bearing wheels run plus side rails upon which there are horizontal wheels to provide anti sway stabilization On top of this you need two power rails. This makes for extremely complicated switches. The rail is bulky and you usually need to slide out a straight section and slide in a curved section. This makes for very slow switching speed which increases the minimum headway that can be run on any line that is not a continuous loop.
Ask your self this question: If monorails are so damn good then how come there are only a few systems outside of amusement parks and why are they not carrying large loads?”
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I believe the number of countries using monorails as a real and successful part of their public transit systems can be counted on one hand. These are Japan, China, Russia, and a low-capacity example in a very linear German city many people probably haven’t heard of that’s over 100 years old, are the only credible monorail examples anywhere in the world that haven’t ended in failure. Of that list, I believe only Japan has multiple examples (Tama, Chiba, Shounan, Tokyo, and Osaka). It should be noted that some of the Japanese monorails have ticket prices substantially higher compared to other lines for proportional distances (I felt so ripped off that one time I needed the Tama monorail for part of my trip).
Bear in mind as well, that with Toronto’s climate, a suspended type of monorail would be preferred if any kind of monorail were to be implemented at all here, and those cast far more shadow than the straddle-beam type and tend to have larger structural supports (i.e. more eye-sore).
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Just to add, Mumbai in India (pop 20.4 million) is building monorail as a feeder route to a new metro system and an existing suburban train/bus system.
Other cities in India are considering monorail as well.
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I did some thinking about the Wuppertal monorail. It carries more people a day than the Sheppard subway (~75,000 vs ~47,000). It’s even with the whole TTC subway system for the total number of fatal train accidents at one each, but has operated for almost twice as long as the Toronto subway. And they still manage to bring out the 111 year old Kaiserwagen train for passenger carrying runs on the line without having to bracket it with an empty train in front and behind.
Can I draw the conclusions that 1) the monorail’s credible; and, 2) the TTC isn’t?
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I noticed this in the City’s budget analysis for the Waterfront. Yet another example where the initial estimates are grossly underestimated.
Steve: What is particularly galling about this statement is that the evolving complexity of the project is not recent news, but the project estimates went unchanged for so long.
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Though I agree that it would be far better to have the QQE LRT going to Union Station directly, would an interim possibility to be to extend the existing line eastwards on the surface with those wanting to go to Union changing LRTs at the “portal”? Some of the southbound 509s and 510s would go to, say, Parliament some to Union. (Possibly even to Cherry to link to the LRT there?) Certainly not a perfect nor a long-term solution but it would get the LRT along QQE.
When $$ (or demand) was there the funds could be found to improve the portal and the Union loop (which are, I think, the most expensive parts of the current non-funded) proposal. Sometimes an incremental approach is best.
Steve: Having people change at the portal is a non-starter for several reasons. First, this would add quite significantly to the travel time. Second, Queen’s Quay Station is only marginally accessible with a small, single elevator on the southbound platform that works now and then. Third, the biggest problem is the capacity of the loop and platform at Union. If we add more passengers for QQ East, regardless of how they would actually get there, it will be even worse down there than it is today.
An “incremental approach”, by the way, is what brought is the dog’s breakfast of the Waterfront West line, such as it is, being built in short sections that don’t quite make a real line, and create all sorts of future problems.
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Steve wrote (about the monorail in Sydney), “How are stations handled? Over the street, or integrated in conveniently nearby buildings? How is accessibility handled?”
Stations are integrated into buildings. On my site’s Sydney page (which covers that ‘blue’ line of foreign technology, built by Bombardier, unfamiliar to Toroonto) has one photo that shows the Paddy’s Market monorail station.
Steve: It’s also worth noting that the monorail you show is a single track, and that’s not the most enormous station I have ever seen. Hardly a fair example of a replacement for anything we have in Toronto. The “foreign technology” on the other hand obviously won’t work here because of our climate (political, not meteorological).
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Steve wrote, “It’s also worth noting that the monorail you show is a single track, and that’s not the most enormous station I have ever seen.”
That takes me back to my original comment, “…it just does not seem to be a ‘serious’ mode of transit around the CBD, but more of a tourist ride.” It is just a uni-directional loop that is a couple of kilometres long.
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Exactly what did the TTC do during the Queens Quay streetcar closure for that happened a few weeks ago?
I had thought that actual track replacement would be starting then, but Queens Quay is open again (and I later found out that actual track reconstruction is scheduled for this fall).
Steve: A section of the track suffers from foundation problems and it was not safe to leave in operation over the summer. This was a temporary repair pending the main job in the fall.
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