Recent discussion about the Downtown Relief Line study and its Terms of Reference sent me back to the TTC’s Downtown Rapid Transit Expansion Study (DTRES) published last year for a look at the demand projections.
What I found there was rather troubling.
The TTC looked at three scenarios to model future shortfall in network capacity by 2031:
- The existing TTC and GO networks
- An enhanced “reference network” with improved subway and GO service
- The reference network plus the Yonge extension north from Finch to Richmond Hill
The demand model outputs appear in three separate tables within that study, but it is not until we consolidate the information that some anomalies really jump out.
There are four sets of numbers in this table with columns corresponding to the three model networks.
- Capacity: This gives the capacity of each route based on service levels and train lengths.
- Inbound demand: This is the modeled demand on the network.
- V/C: This is the ratio of demand to capacity. A value near to or greater than 1.0 indicates that the line will be over capacity during at least part of the peak period.
- Inbound deficiency: Where the capacity is lower than the demand, this is the magnitude of the shortfall.
The capacity of the reference network is about 50% greater than the existing one. Note that for the northern GO services, ten-car trains are assumed although 20% could be added to the capacity with 12-car trains on the same presumed schedules. (The model also considered the east-west GO services and their effect in draining trips off of the BD subway that would otherwise contribute to demand south of Bloor Station.)
The modeled demand is also about 50% greater than the demand that the model assigns to the “existing” network configuration. This shows the modeled effect of increased transit service on network demand. However, this also begs the question of where those trips would be if the TTC and GO improvements did not take place. An obvious useful addition to the discussion would be the added road trips, or the trips simply not taken because there was no network capacity to handle them.
The big surprise is that there is almost no difference between the total demand with or without the Richmond Hill extension. Indeed, most changes are re-assignments of trips from GO lines and the University subway in the “reference” network to the Yonge subway in the “reference + YSE” network.
Route Without YSE With YSE University Subway 25,100 23,500 Yonge S of Bloor 35,800 39,400 Barrie GO 7,500 7,400 Richmond Hill GO 2,500 2,200 Stouffville GO 8,600 8,000 Total 79,500 80,500
Why would we spend billions of dollars building a subway to Richmond Hill to carry no more total riders on the network than we do without it?
There are two obvious responses to this question:
- Some of the new trips have destinations at or north of Bloor Street and therefore they do not contribute to the count of riders into the core area.
- In the model’s world, the subway extension does not attract any net new trips beyond what would occur simply with better service on the subway to Finch and enhanced GO services (i.e. with the reference network).
This is a rather strange situation considering that the holdup on building the Richmond Hill extension arose from the claim that it would overload the Yonge line. However, in the model, it does this primarily by attracting trips that would otherwise have been on GO or on the extended University subway.
(At this point, I have to wonder whether a similar methodology produced the inflated ridership projections for the Scarborough Subway, but that is another matter.)
The model shows very low ridership on the Richmond Hill line. Indeed, the greatest number of riders (2,900) is obtained with the “existing” network and the value falls even though GO service is improved in the “reference” and “reference + YSE” networks. This implies that the model prefers to assign trips to the “faster” Yonge subway especially when it goes all the way north to Richmond Hill.
On the BD line, although an increased capacity is included in the model (about 27%), ridership only goes up in the section east of Yonge. This implies either that demand from the west is static (difficult to believe) or that it is going somewhere else in the model. Where? Is growth assigned mainly to GO because it competes well with the subway for traffic in Mississauga while to the east Scarborough is poorly served by GO?
There is no question that Toronto needs more capacity into the core area, but the modeled numbers in the DTRES are suspect. If anything, they may understate the problem and the potential benefits of alternatives to stuffing more riders onto the Yonge subway.
The TTC has a long history of downplaying the need for anything beyond Yonge subway capacity expansion (more trains, new signals, bigger stations) to the detriment of long-term planning for better GO service and new TTC subway or LRT services. For many years, all we heard about from TTC was the need for a Richmond Hill subway. Any other project was cold-shouldered because it threatened that favoured scheme. Only when capacity problems could not be ignored did the TTC turn to the “DRL” as a possible solution.
Toronto has been ill-served by this blinkered planning, and coming studies on the future of the transit network (without regard to the paint scheme on the vehicles) must be based on a fair and accurate assessment of how new and improved services will contribute to moving passengers and limiting the growth of congestion in Toronto.
Steve Munro 
I can certainly believe that a Richmond Hill extension would pull some service off of GO.
I rode Yonge through York Region for years, but I would never do it now, because the car and alternative GO bus services are now much, much faster, at least to downtown. Since the RHE would chop about 6 minutes off the trip (probably more in future), the tipping point for GO vs YRT+TTC would move north.
I suspect the models have a lot of flaws, since it’s hard to believe that they’re be no network growth with that subway extension. But even if it were true, the project has potential merit, since it reduces travel times. More important than travel times though is overall network health or resiliency, and concentrating ridership on the Yonge Subway, as this project does, moves us in the wrong direction.
Which is another way of saying that, at the very least, we need a Don Mills Subway first. And preferably, as far north as can be justified. Eglinton at a minimum, with a design for Finch, please.
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In your PDF, the “Ref+YSE” case shows “Yonge Subway S of Bloor” with a capacity of 38,000, and ridership of 39,400. That’s just 1,400 over capacity. A subway seems a very expensive way of providing enough capacity for 1,400 people/hour…
(Time for a Bay St streetcar, perhaps?)
Steve: That’s in 2031 with more growth to follow. Far more than will fit on a Bay streetcar. What’s more, there are other types of demand that a relief line will serve beyond offloading Yonge. The whole problem with past debates is that they only looked at the Yonge line south of Bloor.
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Steve, this just reiterates my long-held humble opinion that you need to be a professor/chief wizard at a Hogtown Transit Academy.
I don’t think any of the urban planning professors at Ryerson, U of T or York, or any of the professionals at City Planning, Metrolinx or the TTC have your ability to make this subject understandable, nor your experience with the subject. That needs to be shared with more people.
Ed Levy gathered 250 people and Jarrett Walker about 150 for short talks about transit. A short course about the basics of planning and transit modelling would be very much demanded.
Please do consider it.
Cheers, Moaz
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I agree! This whole project should be considered as “new subway line serving downtown Toronto”, and we should aim to maximise the benefits accordingly. (E.g. serve new additional employment areas)
The “relieve the Yonge line south of Bloor” aspect is an incidental benefit.
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One thing jumped out at me in the TTC DRL study from last year, and that’s people boarding the DRL at Eglinton/Don Mills was lower than I expected. And then I noticed that the network assumes that you can board the GO Richmond Hill line where it intersects the Eglinton Line, and then take non-stop to the new DRL station at River street.
Surely the model would be assigning a lot of trips from Eglinton to downtown as taking GO Richmond Hill and then changing to the DRL at River … rather than the more likely Eglinton line to DRL at Eglinton/Don Mills.
I’m assuming that a future express GO Train from Eglinton/Don River to River Street is unlikely.
I’m also wondering how they treated the fares between TTC and GO in this study.
Steve: I think that there are many flaws in the way the demand was modeled judging by the nonsensical results produced in some cases. We really must demand more background detail of this sort of exercise because the model outputs are used to justify all sorts of things.
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When was this table done? The capacity and demand values for the current system do not seem to reflect reality. Kitchener (Georgetown) which I sometimes ride supposedly has a demand of 4700 and a capacity 6400. When I ride these trains inbound they always have standing room only by the time they reach Union on all but 1 train. They run 5 trains of 10 cars between 7:00 and 9:00 a.m. which means the capacity and demand are both over 8000. If we are already exceeding their base levels then how can we trust their projections?
Also all 4 subway lines have a capacity of 26,000 inbound but I thought YUS ran a shorter headway than BD in the morning rush hour. Also are these figures for peak hour, which the subway seems to be, or for the whole rush hour, which the GO values seem to be? If these numbers are going to be useful then they need to be accurate and consistent. I don’t know it the TTC is exhibiting purposeful deceit or incompetence.
Steve: They are supposed to be peak hour in all cases, but the “existing” network for the Georgetown line shows a capacity of 6,400 which translates to 4 trains. The demand is the 2031 projection in all cases. Quite obviously, the model and reality are out of sync and this is a general problem with a lot of the material.
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Sounds like a bad assumption to begin with. I know there can be an issue in the fall with GO trains getting over the bridge on the Barrie Line (the bridge that goes over the York Subdivision.) This is why GO uses two locomotives (one at each end) to get the trains over as the York University station is right at the south end of the bridge. They sometimes use two F59PH locomotives, which can only support HEP for 10 cars, but surely they could run a 12 car train with an F59PH at both ends – each locomotive could provide HEP to 6 cars each.
As for the GO taking rides off the Bloor-Danforth (B-D) line – this really isn’t going to happen for two reasons:
a) Cost. I can take the TTC from Kipling Station for $2.65/$2.70 (token/PRESTO cost) vs. $4.95 ($5.30 as of February) on GO. The TTC is certainly cheaper, especially if you are a commuter and need to use the service everyday. Plus, if I need the subway once I get to Union, then it’s really $7.60/$8.00
b) GO’s attitude. GO’s attitude up to now has always been ‘Who?’ when it comes to Toronto residents. Anytime there has been an issue on the GO line, Toronto residents are always told to “Take the TTC with your GO fare.” GO will put on a bus, or try to do something for residents outside of Toronto, but once the bus hits the border to Toronto, it’s an express bus to Union and who cares about anyone willing to pay the higher fare for a faster trip.
Steve, what is the ‘YSE’? Yonge Street Expansion? You use the term without first indicating what it stands for.
Steve: Yes, it’s the Yonge extension to Richmond Hill. The term is used in the TTC study, and I thought it would be self-evident from the context in the article where the three modeled networks are described.
What I would like to see is the Yonge Line built to Steeles Ave. only (some trains could short turn at Finch), with the DRL also built up to the city limits in the east end. If Richmond Hill has such demand for going downtown, then put on some more GO trains. This is far cheaper to build (i.e. the infrastructure is essentially already there) and to operate (i.e. reduced maintenance costs on not having to maintain a tunnel or to run trains every couple of minutes vs. the occasional GO train.)
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It’s a shame they didn’t take a look at a few other options. For example, what would happen if the Yonge subway was extended just to Steeles, and the Viva Bus lanes started from Steeles instead of RHC? Or what if the subway was extended north to Steeles and YRT moved to Phase 3 (LRTs) on Yonge Street right away? What would happen if that were combined with improvements to the Richmond hill line? I find it odd that the options for Yonge street north of Steeles are limited to “subway or nothing”.
Steve: The options north of Steeles that the TTC looked at were dictated by what York Region wants. Metrolinx may have better luck proposing alternatives, but the “York Region needs a subway” drum has been beating for quite a while. The big question will be the pricetag. Most of the extension would be north of Steeles and so the municipal portion (if it’s financed the same way as the Spadina extension) would fall mainly on York Region to the tune of roughly $1B. Then there is the question of operating costs. The TTC was screwed on the Spadina line where York makes almost no contribution to operations in return for the TTC taking the fare revenue. The problem is that the fare revenue they will receive does not come close to paying the marginal cost of operating the line, let alone capital repairs in the future.
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Joshua Tossavainen wrote:
If that were to happen, then with the money that building the subway from Steeles to Richmond Hill Centre, York could build an LRT line all the way up to Elgin Mills Road (including a 1 km tunnel from just south of Major Mac to just north of Crosby) and a branch along Highway 7 as far as Woodbine.
This would place far more York Region residents closer to a higher order transit, give most of them a faster trip to downtown (because of an underground across-the-platform type of change to the subway at Steeles, instead of a bus-to-subway transfer going down two or three levels at RHC), and create an infrastructure for which expansion possibilities are far more paletable from a financial point of view.
Of course, this is not what York Region wants. They want the Jones Express. This is one of the issues I have been trying to attack for sometime.
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Not to mention that only half the trains will be capable of going north of Finch. Basically this is a $3.1 billion+ project to build an extension that can only use half of its capacity on a subway line that is already full.
The problem is that York Region residents have never been told what the implications of extending the subway would actually mean. All we’ve been hearing for decades is that a subway is “just around the corner” if only the province and Toronto were willing to pay their share. It’s kind of like the Scarborough situation, the only difference being that the capacity constraints have actually stopped the extension from being built. The cynic in me suspects that our politicians are well aware of this yet promote the subway anyways – after all, it’s not like they’ll have to actually do anything.
For comparison’s sake, how much would it cost to upgrade the Barrie, Richmond Hill and Stouffville lines to all day service? I’ve been told that the Richmond Hill line is eventually planned to run every 10 minutes or so… could the Barrie and Stouffville lines be designed so that they can eventually reach this as well when needed? Or would the capacity constraints at Union Station prevent that from happening?
Steve: GO has already talked about double-tracking the Richmond Hill line so that it can support more frequent service. Stouffville will have to wait for the RT tracks to get out of the way in that corridor, not to mention pinch points a bit further north. The Barrie train may wind up coming into the new Union West Station if that is ever built. Yes, Union Station is a capacity constraint together with the operating practices for GO trains generally. As to cost, I cannot imagine how GO could spend anywhere near the price of the subway extension even on all three corridors.
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When it comes to the Spadina Extension I hope the TTC will run trains according to rider demand/revenue. In other words, turn back trains before they cross the boundary. Don’t do like the Sheppard Stubway, run short trains that are not cost effective.
Steve: The current plans have a short turn at Downsview.
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Here’s a crazy idea. Steve, I’m curious just how crazy it is. Extend the Northbound Yonge line track North, curve East, curve North, curve West, cross Yonge Street parallel to and just South of Steeles. Continue to curve South, East, and South, joining up with the Southbound Yonge line track at Finch. So Northbound Yonge trains would loop around the end of the line at Steeles, avoiding the time penalty of reversing.
Now, have a two-level station at Yonge and Steeles. On one level, the Yonge subway uses the South side of the platform, and York Region Yonge LRT uses the North side, with a similar looping arrangement to that suggested above for the subway. On the other level, Steeles LRT has a centre platform. This gives a cross-platform transfer between the end of the Yonge subway and the end of the Yonge LRT, and a convenient one-level transfer between both of those and Steeles LRT. Steeles LRT could be a future project, which would suggest pre-building its platform as the lower level but building nothing beyond the station box for it.
When suggesting a loop the first thing I worry about is the curve radius. A quick glance at the map near Yonge and Steeles and near Museum/St. George/Bay suggests that the curves wouldn’t need to be anything like as sharp as those downtown. The tunnel would however have to go under all sorts of stuff. Overall it’s not obvious to me how practical this would be. If practical it would nicely end the subway right at the border of the City of Toronto. The only extra funding complexity would be for that one interchange station (and possibly for Steeles LRT, which perhaps could be considered a joint York Region/TTC project).
Steve: Yes, the amount of space needed for such a loop is substantial, and you have managed to demolish a few buildings in your travels. Note that the curves at the wye are below the standard radius the TTC prefers for speed and maintainability.
As for other problems, the biggest will be the egos of York Region pols who sell “subways, subways, subways” although they have yet to belly up to the bar with a significant amount of funding. I think they are hoping that the new Metrolinx funding strategy will pay 100%.
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I am a big supporter of the Downtown Relief Line but I think that Pape would be a very bad choice for it for a number of reasons: Pape being low density and Pape station being a small capacity station with very poor transfer to the buses and all just to name a few. Broadview is no better. I think that Victoria Park would be best as it is a high capacity station with easy transfers to buses and all. It is also a high density area with lots of major shopping destinations unlike Pape. Broadview is not much better either. I think Victoria Park would be best. I was told by my Councillor that they would be considering a lot of alternatives to the presumed Don Mills Pape route for the DRL.
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I think a Victoria Park Line could exist well in it’s own right but it is too far east to offer the “relief” function that will still be an important part of the DRL even after the ‘D’ and the ‘R’ disappear from the name. Hence, we should build both lines but not both subways.
The key here is to move for a push to build lots of lines … subways, LRT and express buses … as a network of rapid transit rather than individual lines … building (dare I say it?) a transit city.
Not *the* Transit City of course …
Cheers, Moaz
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How about you stop telling us what York Region should or should not get? York Region does not interfere in Toronto matters, so one would hope that Torontonians would give us the same courtesy. Unless you are willing to pay 100% for putting in more GO trains in York Region, don’t tell us what we should or should not get. I am sure that you will not like it if as a York Region resident, I tell you that instead of the Downtown Relief Line (DRL) subway just put in streetcars or buses and I won’t tell you that because it’s none of my business what you do or not do in your municipality. Kindly leave the Regional Municipality of York alone and let us decide what we want to build or not build.
Once again, unless Torontonians want to pay 100% for building and operating LRT in York Region, they should keep their suggestions to themselves and let York residents decide what we want or not want. We respect the autonomy of Toronto and don’t interfere in your business, so how about you extend us the same respect and courtesy?
Steve: I will only interject one note here: York Region got a sweetheart deal on the Spadina Subway extension with all of the operating cost falling to the TTC in return for the new revenue, such as it will be. Toronto will lose money on every rider on that extension, and this will translate directly to either service cuts elsewhere or higher taxes in the 416. It is worrisome to watch York Region make cutbacks on its bus service at the same time as it contemplates a multi-billion dollar subway extension that will strain the capacity of the Toronto network. If York was bringing money to the table, I, and others, I suspect, would be more sympathetic.
At this point, we have no idea of how much money and what level of capital subsidy the new “revenue tools” will bring to Toronto. If, as on the Spadina extension, Toronto is expected to pick up 1/3 of the cost of works within its borders, we will be on the hook for substantial improvements intended to serve demand caused by extra riders from the 905.
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I agree build both lines. Build Victoria Park one as subway and Don Mills one an LRT.
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If we’re going to argue density there’s a lot more of it from top to bottom along the entire Pape/Don Mills from Eastern to Eglinton corridor than the entire VP corridor. The east Danforth already has two subway stations covering the biggest nodes in the area. VP falls off sharply before you get to St. Clair.
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At “Born, raised, and living in York Region”:
To be more explicit than Steve, I’d be mostly OK not telling York what to do if York would pay it’s own way, but all precedent is that when York wants a subway it ends up in Toronto’s lap one way or another. If we are going to talk in these terms of municipal autonomy fine, but I now expect a significant contribution to the DRL to come from York’s budget for a Yonge extension since it’s your “autonomous” demand for a subway that’s driving a good chunk of the congestion growth and Yonge and Bloor.
In the real world we are a single interconnected urbanized area, and higher order transit of all sorts does a lot more than provide a purely local service. Even setting aside the involvement of other levels of government these projects are not purely local and it’s just not reasonable for York to tell Toronto to shut up and let it do what it wants, or vice versa. The last couple of times we had this sort of showdown York ended up building roads or shopping malls largely feeding into Toronto with no infrastructure to support them on the logic that Steeles and roads south of it were entirely Toronto’s responsibility and York didn’t owe us anything for what was done north of Steeles (in the case of Pacific Mall ON Steeles itself, but on York’s side). We are multiple municipalities but in any real world there is a single city we are all working with and to demand complete non interference in each others affairs is a nonstarter. Frankly this is what Metrolinx was created to try and untangle, and I don’t see York decrying Metrolinx and an undue interference in their desires.
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Although I have reservations about this concept, I do find it interesting. What I would like to know is what the development potential would be valued at on the section south of Bloor from Victoria Park to St Andrews Station. My gut feeling is that this type of alignment would provide the highest economic return and the highest quality of life for the affected region. Not to mention the potential to stimulate the waterfront.
Personally I feel that subways should be used for the purpose of growth, and not purely for “relief”. Regarding the question of “relief” GO transit improvements (both rail and bus) coupled with increased carrying capacity of the Don Valley corridor are likely to achieve a substantial level of relief for a fraction of the interest payments that would be paid on the money needed to pay for the DRL.
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@ Born, raised, and living in York Region
I too was born, raised, and living in York Region… and I am against both the Spadina and Yonge extension projects. I fail to see why spending billions just for the privilege of having every other train on an overcrowded line cross Steeles is worth it. We could have probably upgraded the ENTIRE GO train network operating in York Region to frequent all day service for a fraction of the cost of Spadina.
And btw, Torontonians have EVERY right to discuss what happens with their subway network. It’s the TTC that will be running the subways, not York Region Transit.
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Thanks to everyone who stepped in and responded to “Born, raised, and living in York Region.”
I too would like to respond harshly. Toronto is already paying for York Region residents: Toronto has to operate the Spadina subway into York Region once it opens; Toronto has to pay for the costs of the subways; and Toronto has to pay for the current subway system south of Finch, the costs of which far exceed the revenues it receives from York Region’s residents.
So to Born, raised, and living in York Region: If you do not want me to tell you what type of transit system you get, go out and pay 100% of the capital and operating costs of a subway out of your own pockets then. Do not ask Toronto, nor the Provincial or Federal Governments (both receive tax dollars from me) to pay for your transportation system. If you want to use the TTC’s system and/or use tax dollars from Toronto, Queen’s Park, or Ottawa then you better accept my opinions if you want my tax dollars.
Broadview is better than Pape. About low density – this will likely change in the future. The last time I heard, Queen’s Park issued rules, which the Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) follows that allows for ‘higher density’ near ‘transit hubs’ (i.e. GO and subway stations. I might have my information wrong, but this generally means that within x metres of a station, the developer can put in a large residential building (‘large’ defined as ‘high density’ – or a lot of homes.)
Plus a connection between the DRL and the B-D line, at Pape or Broadview, is likely to create a lot more people changing subways at that stop, which is another part of the problem. It’s not just the number of people who get on/off at a particular station, but whether or not the platforms and station are large enough to handle a lot of people moving between the current B-D platform(s) and the platform(s) for the DRL. So a station that sees few people getting on/off trains currently may benefit from the connection being placed there simply because the station will see ‘more’ passengers, even if they are connecting from one subway to another one and not a ‘new’ customer who just paid their fare at the booth.
Steve: While I generally support the concept of using stations at centres of higher density, this alone will not make-or-break a specific DRL alignment. As I have pointed out many times, the BD subway manages to be full even though it travels through some rather low density areas and this comes from feeder traffic accumulating along the route. This shows up strikingly at Pape and Broadview Stations where people living beyond walking distance of the subway pour into it via bus routes from the north.
As for internal traffic within stations, an important difference between terminating at Danforth and running through to, say, Eglinton, is that there will be no transfer traffic for the through trips where people will just stay on trains to continue downtown. Those who are bound for midtown locations along the BD line will transfer, but they do this today from bus to subway.
Development near Broadview Station is starting to appear in midrise format, not towers. There are five towers dating back to the late 60s in walking distance (I live in one of them), and a cluster near Mortimer and Broadview that are well served by bus routes. Further afield, the FLemingdon Park and Cosburn routes serve their own high density areas. Similarly at Pape, the high rises are not immediately nearby (there is only one), but the Don Mills and Thorncliffe Park buses bring riders from further afield into the subway. (This layout is a relic of the former political boundaries where Toronto blocked high-rise development from the early 70s, but East York encouraged it.)
Something that various planning studies have noted is that employment and academic areas are better generators of subway traffic because they concentrate locations riders are going TO. High density residential produces many origins, but they are going to many destinations, especially if these can easily be reached by the road network.
We have to be careful not to make assumptions about the value of routes based on existing land use along a route provided that it will make a useful contribution to the network as a whole. It is self evident that any route from, say, Flemingdon Park to downtown must pass through some areas that are not as densely developed as we might like, but this does not eliminate the need for those trips nor for a network link.
To those who mutter about the lack of potential development on a DRL south of Danforth, I would point out that a very large piece of land, Gerrard Square, would make a tasty morsel as a new building site near a Gerrard Station. The Lever Bros. site at Eastern on the east bank of the Don and all of the new buildings in the West Donlands and Distillery District add to what is already there or on the books for the near term.
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I re-read piece and comments, thanks, prior to commenting.
The relief line is a mix of apples (N/S demand) and oranges (E/W) in my view, and needs a better, more true name than the DRL – and the overall result may well be yet another costly drain of a stubway, but in the core this time.
We are sooo messed up as a region with our transport/transick shytstem and allegedly so short of money to fix it all, that we really need to thoroughly scrutinize the Big Fixes since the Toronto tradition has been for Big Fixes that drain cash whilst lots of concrete and cost occurs. Eg. Spadina, Sheppard, UPX, Spadina extension, and now the Scarborough subway extension.
Having a good look at what GO can do is imperative, eg. trains and Don Valley buses etc. I’m sure there are things like some express roues at no extra cost that the TTC is could also add on to assist, and there are other things too.
One eg.: if the Spadina line is under-used incoming, why not have a reduced fare on the morning incoming rides – see if that is a help?
Steve: The Spadina line is not under-used, at least not downtown where it matters. The last thing we need is to encourage more riders from further north who will then leave no room for folks from Bloor south, just as on Yonge.
And speaking of fares, would having a fare-by-distance switch mean that overall press and demand might wither a bit at Bloor/Yonge? Sure, it’s a third rail, but the core where transit does make money is subsidizing the suburbs and isn’t getting that good a service, so….
Steve: We keep hearing how important is to make folks out in the suburbs feel part of Toronto and to give them “downtown” quality of transit service. That’s what the Scarborough line is all about (whether the claim is valid or not). If we go to fare by distance, folks like me who live a short hop to downtown will see lower fares, but people in Malvern and Rexdale will pay at least twice their current fare to get downtown. They will pay more even to travel part way across the city. Just because someone lives in a suburb does not mean that they have a big house with a three-car garage and can “afford” to pay more for transit, or deserve to.
While there’s no doubt that biking doesn’t work for everyone in all situations, Pape to the urban core is very cyclable right now, even ahead of putting in good, linked bike lanes and ensuring maintenance in winter.
And just recently, there’s a hint that the bank building at Bloor/Yonge may be up for grabs, and while the alignment of the subways, and of course all the underground tangle of services might preclude putting in another exit/platform, heck, at least look at taking over the corner for another platform relief. We also need to get to the point that transit patrons can exit more directly instead of having to traipse through all the malls etc. to boost the revenues to the landowners.
Steve: Exactly what are you speaking about? There is more involved on that northeast corner than the bank tower and the subway is physically “inside” the structure of The Bay.
As for the York Region commenter, one blind spot in all the transit debate is just how many hundred thousand cars come into Caronto from beyond, and how they are a Big Cause of congestion, and maybe let’s toll them? There’s definitely subsidy going on to the suburbs and their mobility; though that’s another third rail most politicians etc. won’t touch, preferring to just drain the core instead, which is readily outvoted. Like there’s not a single city core rep on the TTC; and scant if any politicians are talking about getting a Vehicle Registration Tax going again, even if it was limited to the zone around the Scarborough subway extension and the proceeds go directly and wholly into a subway reserve fund.
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Born, raised, and living in York Region wrote:
Why should Toronto pay for something being built in York Region?
Aside from that, the above comment was in response to my suggestion of an LRT network in York Region instead of extending the subway north of Steeles. As a resident and tax payer of Richmond Hill, and thus York Region, I will not be keeping my suggestions for transit development in York Region to myself.
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George wrote:
This seems backwards, from a physical and geographical point of view. The Don Mills line from the Don Valley down to the Danforth will have to be underground as there is no room for anything on the surface. Its depth will allow a lower-cost low level bridge over the DVP and some if its route heading north could use part of the valley. Building this as LRT has costs that are somewhat close to a full subway. Victoria Park heading north from the Danforth has the space for surface options that would be more suited to LRT.
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The City of Toronto businesses where the York Region residents work and shop pay business property taxes, which surely cover their use of our transit system.
Steve: That’s a nice idea, but when municipal charges fall on the property tax base (as the debt for the Scarborough subway does), that hits residents directly. Oddly enough, due to rebalancing of commercial and residential taxes, the businesses pay only 1/4 of the total increase. Even if Queen’s Park pays 100% for the Richmond Hill line, this will still put pressure on other parts of the system where the cost and congestion effects will fall to Toronto to solve.
Maybe if Queen’s Park were contributing more than $91-million to the annual cost of running the TTC (not even enough to pay for Wheel Trans), I might be a tad more sympathetic to arguments about cross-boundary tax flows.
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I hate it when arguments become like this.
Maybe it’s a futile effort, but no one pays their own way and everyone gets a subsidy.
How you split it and find out winner and losers is complex to say the least.
Everything from planning, to fares, to taxes, to where government buildings are located, to the interest rate, to immigration, to where lines were located decades ago… can be considered a subsidy.
People in the suburbs do not want ‘downtown level’ of service. They want transit that will take there where they need to be in a timely fashion. People from all over the burbs are happy to take GO to downtown Toronto. Go needs to be improved (more stops, more travel times, better reliability, better integration with transit systems…).
LRT gets a bad rap in the suburbs not because of the technology, but because the urban planners want to give the suburbs ‘downtown’ like transit. I don’t say that sarcastically. People in the suburbs literally look at the urban planners and think they want to put street cars everywhere like downtown and raise density everywhere… when none of the suburban traffic patterns match downtown. They want everyone to increase density and build condos in the hopes that in 50 years when they’re long dead, then they will be worthy of proper transit.
The easiest is stop spacing. Even the supposed rapid transit Eglinton Crosstown has stop spacing of < 500 M on the surface. Almost every other transit system on this planet has 'larger' stop spacing when you get less dense. It’s not uncommon for rapid transit to have 1 km or more stop spacing.
But of course you have people trying to implement Downtown like transit everywhere. Live and work communities. Walkable streets… not that these are good goals. They just don't match the reality of the city we live in. If you want to know why transit city failed for the suburbs… it's not because people in the suburbs hate LRT or only want to drive… it's because transit city and other LRT proposals didn't address getting people where they need to go in a timely manner.
So yes, when people see Rob Ford talking about subways… they do associate subways with fast timely travel and they support it, but I should emphasize, they support it OVER street car like LRT.
There weren't given an option of rapid LRT access to downtown.
They weren't given an option of enhanced Go Transit.
They weren't given many options.
They were only given a choice of street-car like LRT or subways.
And maybe like political parties, it all boils down to picking your team even if a reasonable alternatives are actually there.
The last thing people in Scarborough wanted was a slow LRT. Yes, you can rig it with stats like 'people in walking distance of a stop' instead of using time to travel, but that's like picking the outcome by choosing the metric used to measure, which is what almost all these 'studies' are about anyways.
In any case, I just don't know a lot of people in York Region who are against GO or rail or other forms of transit. About the main reason to bring the subway up there would be for connectivity. Highway 7 is their core transit line. It's a good idea to foster connectivity in the region. But I really don't think they'd mind good alternatives from Go or other that provided good connected service.
Steve: Note that I said “quality”, not “level”. I think we are talking about the same thing here. Unfortunately, “subways” have become the only way some politicians and their supporters expect to get that, although that’s a mixture of misrepresentation, misunderstanding and the sad truth that the surface network is definitely treated as second class by the TTC everywhere.
I am not entirely sure what kind of LRT you want to see. On one hand, you talk of “streetcar like LRT” but decry the wider stop spacing planned on the LRT lines, something that has been a matter of great concern to people who will no longer have a bus stop at the end of their street. Meanwhile, the Scarborough LRT line, which would have had the kind of spacing you want, and would have been completely off-street, is dumped on the trash heap so we can spend $1-billion more on a subway that won’t open for a decade.
Rapid LRT access to downtown? How? Where? Almost by definition, any line that is going to travel that far from the suburbs will need its own right-of-way especially for downtown access. That’s what the Relief Line is for, if only the TTC would get its head out of its corporate ass, and start thinking of it as route to serve the Don Mills corridor. The projected demand for 2031 is at the upper range of what LRT could handle, and given the nature of the route, we may as well build it as a subway anyhow.
As for GO, when Transit City was proposed, GO/Metrolinx had not yet discovered the possibilities of frequent, all-day service, and GO was (and to some extent still is) completely against providing service to inside-416 riders. Scarborough could have three GO services (Lake Shore East, Stouffville, and the CP line through Agincourt and Malvern), but Queen’s Park prefers to spend as little as possible and keep the farebox recovery for GO higher even than the TTC.
Transit City was explicitly NOT designed for downtown commuting, but for trips between suburban areas where the demand could not justify a subway. You cannot criticize a plan for something it was never intended to do.
I agree that there should be much better GO service and proper fare integration with the TTC to take away the artificial demand for cheaper rides and the skew this produces in political demand for subways. Metrolinx is finally studying this in the context of the Yonge Corridor, and more generally as part of their fare and service integration study for the GTA, but the idea has taken a long time to get established in an organization that prefers the 416 riders to go anywhere else but their trains.
And finally, as to density. The population of Toronto and the GTA is growing whether people like it or not, and the newcomers must be accommodated somewhere. The Official Plan and the “Avenues” scheme was predicated on medium rise, not high rise buildings, although the development industry does not seem to favour the latter. Proposals for very high density come from subway plans, not LRT plans, where the amount of demand needed to justify the investment is huge. There seems to be a disconnect in the desires of suburban politicians. On one hand, they want stable low-rise neighbourhoods more or less “left alone” by planners who would prefer to see higher densities. On the other hand, those same politicians complain any time someone will listen about all the development (and revenue) flowing to downtown. They cannot have it both ways.
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Of course, the costs of operating the subways exceed the revenues from York Region riders because the vast majority of the riders are Torontonians.
So, you think Torontonians are the only ones that pay provincial and federal taxes? By your logic, every single subway station that was ever built in Toronto was built using provincial and federal tax dollars (not one station did Toronto pay 100% for) and therefore, I as a York Region Resident should be able to dictate what happens with the subway network and what to build and what to not build. In particular according to your own logic, I should be able to deny you the Downtown Relief Line unless Toronto plans to pay 100% of the costs of building and operating the DRL on account of the DRL using MY provincial and MY federal tax dollars. York Region residents pay more than their fair share of using the TTC and we paid for the extension of the subway to York Region and we never begged Toronto for a cent nor are any Torontonians generous enough to offer a cent to build subways or anything else for that matter in York Region. Forget about Toronto paying for anything for York Region, Toronto would not even pay to build subways in Scarborough or Etobicoke (2 big parts of Toronto) as everything has to be in Downtown Toronto as evident by the push for an unnecessary and expensive Downtown Relief Line that will waste MY provincial and MY federal tax dollars.
Steve: Please be so good as to explain why the DRL is “unnecessary” and what you would offer as an alternative.
By the way, the original subway from Eglinton to Union was paid for completely by the old City of Toronto, and a goodly chunk of the University and BD subways was paid for by Metro. There were probably cows grazing in much of what is now the 905 at the time, and their tax dollars had nothing to do with Toronto subway construction.
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Steve – I was wondering, if the Havelock/Seaton GO lines are ever built, then where would any planned station be between Yonge Street and where it crosses over into the 905?
In other words, is it a “given” that the Leaside area would bet a station, or would a station be built just north of Eglinton, as well as one maybe in Scarborough.
Steve: I don’t think anyone has gone that far down the path on planning this line. GO Transit’s typical approach would be to have all of the stations outside of the 416, but now that Metrolinx has recognized the worth of “in town” stations as subway alternatives, then definitely somewhere in Malvern/Agincourt and then Don Mills. I don’t hold much hope for Leaside as it is very close to Union and would serve the same market as a DRL through Thorncliffe Park.
I ask in part because the “feeling congested” is unclear as to whether the Don Mills part of the DRL will ever be built, or if the Don Mills LRT will just be extended south to Danforth, as it was previously supposed to do.
Steve: The staff working on “Feeling Congested” don’t have a lot of the details, but the basic arguments for taking the subway to Eglinton are this: (a) the route is impossible to cover as a surface, on-street LRT despite some of the harebrained ideas put forward by the TTC, (b) creating a transfer at Danforth between the BD, DRL and DM lines will add complexity and capacity requirements that it would not otherwise require if the subway continues north. Don Mills and Eglinton is a much better place to build a transfer station because this will be done from scratch, and the junction can be optimized.
During the Transit City planning, we were very poorly served by the TTC planners who kept looking for ways to get, essentially, a streetcar line down to the Danforth. Just one of the many ways in which the TTC sabotaged Transit City.
We have debated this before, but for the foreseeable future, Don Mills and Eglinton is in decline as an employment area, though there is room for development … might the city ever designate this as an urban growth centre? What is being proposed as part of the Eglinton study for the Crosstown?
Brian
Steve: Look at the Eglinton planning study now underway. Specifics about Don Mills are in the Focus Areas background paper. The issue is not just what can be built at this intersection, but how this can become a major feeder point for a DRL.
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I think something I wrote were not conveyed properly, because it seems what you heard was the opposite of what I wrote.
No, I am heavily in favor of wider stop spacing in suburban locations. I was complaining about the relatively small stop spacing proposed by Transit City and LRT in Toronto. Yes, some people will complain about not having a stop, but you can’t have transit run by every little complaint. Some thought has to be given to the system as a whole. And most of the big traffic concerns are from work. People who are generally able to walk. I’m not discounting the elderly here. We have wheel trans. We can run buses… Anyways, just my two cents.
Steve: The elderly and those with mobility problems should not be so easily dismissed. Wheel Trans is for the severely disabled who could not use even a bus route. As for how the TTC treats streets that also have rapid transit on them, just look at Sheppard or Yonge where bus service is extremely infrequent. Just waiting for a bus to show up is a major hardship especially in bad weather.
I didn’t say it was. But the vision of Transit city in my view was about trying to get the suburbs to be more like downtown in terms of transit, instead of dealing with the traffic patterns that people in the suburbs actually care about. As I said, the easiest way to see this is in terms of stop spacing where most of the LRT lines had very small stop spacing. Great for walkable communities and streets and live and work communities. Not so good for the person who has to travel 20-30km across the city for work.
I’ll contrast this a bit with say the Mississauga BRT. It solves exactly the kind of problem most people in the suburbs have. They want a way to quickly get to work and major locations. Now, Mississauga is far from perfect and it was horribly planned in many ways. Right now, I’m specifically talking about the BRT. It knows East-West travel on the 401 is hell. It is beyond hell actually 😛 It makes it fast. Stop distances are about 1 km apart. It stops at major locations and work areas. It aims to connect rapidly with the TTC and Go. It is totally grade separated and will never be affected by traffic or traffic lights. All for the cost of around 300 million as far as I recall.
Steve: And it can work, such as it will, in Mississauga because of the way that city is designed. Closely spaced stops don’t work unless there is something there for them to serve.
Much like in say Richmond Hill, people have no problem with Go. They don’t mind driving to the Go Station and then taking it downtown. Or wherever else they need to go, which is mainly work.
Steve: And GO cannot support having every commuter arrive by car, especially for trips later in the day or counter-peak. The cost of a space in a parking structure, reported just last week by GO, is about $35,000, and they give them away free of charge. This may change one day, but the big issue is that GO will never be a truly all-day system until it is well-served by local transit routes acting as collector/distributor to the train service.
Yes, transforming communities and all the other good stuff is great. I’m not dismissing it. But when you have people traveling an hour or two in GTA traffic, their main concern is finding something to just go to work, school, or whatever.
Transit City was not designed for people to commute across the city to work.
I really don’t see how you think Transit City was meant to address the big commuting issues in Toronto. It was never designed for it. It was never pitched that way. It was never advertised that way.
Steve: I didn’t write the text above, and I happen to think that if we build our transit system entirely around people making immensely long commutes, we will lose out on a lot of the shorter trips even within the suburbs (some of which are feeder trips to subway lines). Nobody has explained yet how a linked Finch-Sheppard LRT would work, and the closest we have seen is a subway extension east from Don Mills and west from Yonge. This would do very little for people now packed onto the Finch East and Finch West buses.
Maybe it was more a promotional problem 😛 But one would think if you’re trying to sell a transit plan to those in the suburbs, you might want to actually target the advertising for them (speed, reliability, commuting across the GTA, unobstructed by cars…) instead of ‘walkable streets, live and work communities, transforming the city…’ Because that is largely what was heard. And this is all in a positive light. I’m not even addressing the negative comments to the suburbs here 😛
Like I said, I think we agree on many things.
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With your commenting back, thanks Steve – I don’t know the full details of how full or used the Spadina line – and maybe it’s available somewheres – but my sense is that the newer extension of Spadina is not too well used, but stats are buried within the YUS data, in part maybe to disguise a poor performance. Yes, the University line may be more full in the morning periods, but is it the same degree of crowding as Yonge?
The downtowners are NOT getting good value for transit service right? Sure, in some ways we want to make sure there’s equity of access and good service in the less-dense areas, but it costs money, but transit has been making money in the core for awhile, though the service is arguably Not Good, and declining, with fare increases too.
With the bank building at Yonge/Bloor NE, there was a post on Torontoist suggesting it might be surplused, and if there is any way of alleviating crowding pressures at that station by having the TTC get access to the site/space, recognizing that I may not know what I’m talking about with the location of the transit, and the degree of below-ground complexity, it seems like good value, or at least it should be explored.
Steve: That bank is a small pavilion on the front of the HBC building. The pavilion may be up for grabs, but not the rest of the site. The mall underneath and its parking lot come right out to the Bloor-Yonge corner, and it’s that level you need to get into for any station expansion.
Also, don’t forget that Bloor Station is well east of Yonge Street (roughly under the Xerox building), and the west end of Yonge Station is just south of the old Britnell’s book shop (now Starbucks). The whole station is physically surrounded by the mall and garage. The TTC looked at adding an eastbound platform to Yonge Station (much like the 2nd platform project at Union), but even this will have to dodge structural pillars of the building above. This is one option they are considering for additional capacity.
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In my experience, the people who argue in favour of extending the Yonge subway while being against the DRL tend to fall into two groups. The first group are the people who have been brainwashed by politicians into thinking “Yonge subway = good!” without understanding any of the mechanics involved. They simply don’t know any better. I admit that I fell into this category until I started using the Yonge Line extensively. And even then I still bought the hype that the improvements on Yonge would be sufficient until I actually started doing a bit of research. The politicians have done a very good job in convincing people that a subway is “just around the corner” if only Toronto would pay up.
The 2nd group of people who want the Yonge subway but not the DRL are those who do not actually take public transit themselves. While the former group is simply misinformed and will usually understand the necessity of building the DRL (and upgrading GO first) once it’s explained to them, this group cannot be bargained, reasoned or negotiated with. For them, the Yonge subway isn’t about improving transit so much as it is getting those nasty, smelly buses out of the way of their SUVs … as well as increasing their property values if they happen to live close to where the subway would be. They don’t care how infeasible it is without the DRL, they want a subway and they want it NOW … preferably with Toronto and the Province footing most of the bill.
I hope Torontonians realise just how ingrained subway culture has become in York Region. If you think Scarborough is bad …
Are there any suggestions on how to start convincing York Region residents otherwise? I’ve been trying for a while now with the media, but with limited success … any ideas would be helpful.
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George wrote:
Build Victoria Park one as subway and Don Mills one an LRT.
One beautiful side-effect of this would be a subway all the way to the Beaches, replacing the 501.
Steve: Probably with one beautiful station that few would use because it would be too long a walk from most potential riders.
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Perhaps … But if the primary objective of the plan is to address the secondary and in most cases tertiary objectives of the communities it is supposed to help then we find that there is a severe misalignment of priorities.
A successful plan must respect the values of the respective communities and the historic covenants that define their expectations for the future, with out this a plan can not succeed.
Steve: One big complaint heard from “the suburbs” was that the TTC system was strongly oriented to downtown commuting, not to trips within and between the suburban areas. If this is a “secondary” objective in your mind, you have missed the basic point of the exercise.
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I could not think of a better place for well designed growth. This place is walking distance to the beach, minutes by subway to the downtown, it has wonderful shops, theaters, museums; this place has got it all. Why are we not supporting it with a subway???
The province of Ontario has been struggling with poor productivity growth for the past thirty years the best way to solve this problem is to put people in places where they will have the highest quality of life possible with access to economic regions that provide the highest potential.
Steve: You are kidding, I hope.
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As with the Danforth line most of the station traffic will come form feeder routes.
Steve: Based on the spacing of stations on Danforth, I presume you would give The Beach stations at Coxwell, Woodbine, Wineva (standing in for Main Street) and Victoria Park, complete with a network of feeder bus routes (or ferries and swan boats as need be).
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The Beaches a place for well designed growth? Have you been paying attention to what’s been happening at the old Lick’s site?
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