I think people forget, for example, that we have to rebuild the LRT in 25 or 30 years, just like we have to with the Scarborough RT. With a subway we won’t have to do that. The Yonge Street subway just celebrated its 60th anniversary and it’s still in good shape.
[John Tory in an interview for Metro News, April 7, 2014, courtesy of Matt Elliott]
The false comparison of long-lasting subway with a comparatively short-lived LRT is the sort of comment I expect to hear from (former TTC Chair and Mayoral candidate) Karen Stintz, or from the subway-loving Brothers Ford. The number “100” is often bandied about as the longevity of a subway investment by analogy to the much older networks found in cities like New York, London and Paris.
I have written before about this and won’t belabour the details here, but now that a major candidate for the office of Mayor has taken up the line, it’s worth revisiting the topic.
“We have to rebuild the LRT in 25 or 30 years …”
There is no way to say this nicely: that statement is not true and John Tory should know better.
The seemingly unending reconstruction of the streetcar network in Toronto has annoyed transit riders and motorists alike, but what we have been through is a combination of the “100 year rebuild” and an unusually high failure rate of the previous generation of infrastructure thanks to shoddy construction by the TTC.
With the completion of the Harbourfront line this summer, all of the “main line” tangent (straight) track on the system will be at the new standard completing a process begun two decades ago. The new standard for intersections is more recent, and almost all of the construction work for 2014 is for the “special work” there and at carhouses.
Track, regardless of the vehicles running on it, has to be replaced every 25 years, more often in areas of high wear. The roadbed lasts much longer be it in the subway, on an open right-of-way such as the middle of an expressway, or on a streetcar line.
Vehicles last about 30 years. “Under the covers” there is not much difference between a subway car and a streetcar. They have similar propulsion systems, although these will be optimised for the environments where the cars run. The Yonge subway is now on its third generation of trains, not the original red “Gloucester” cars, and the Bloor subway is on its second.
“… just like we have to with the Scarborough RT …”
No, we don’t “have to” with the SRT either. It’s worn out, but it does not need to be rebuilt from scratch. What would be needed to keep it running in its present form are new cars, and a new signal system. The original SRT control system is far less reliable than the old signal system on the subway, and that’s why the latter has worked tolerably well for at least five decades while the SRT routinely encounters problems.
The cars are overdue for retirement (the line has its original fleet from 1985), but the TTC plans to keep them running for almost a decade while we await the opening of a new Scarborough subway. The big problem is that we don’t have enough of them, a direct result of their very high cost. When they were new, one RT car cost more than a subway car does today.
The SRT structures would not have to be rebuilt if the line were going to operate with compatible vehicles, but it won’t. If it remained an “RT” line with vehicles such as Vancouver’s Mark II Skytrain cars, the tunnel between Ellesmere and Midland Stations would have to be rebuilt so that they would fit.
This small tunnel is a direct legacy of the forced implementation of the RT technology by Queen’s Park years ago. They wanted to ensure that only their trains would fit, and they forced the TTC to downsize the tunnel.
The station at Kennedy complete with its multi-level transfer would also be rebuilt both to eliminate the tight curve and to simplify the connection. This is a correction of a bad original design, not an inherent requirement of RT or LRT technology.
The power distribution system for the SRT is a non-standard voltage, and it uses side-running rails that have major problems with snow and ice. This system must be replaced by conventional power distribution and made compatible with standard transit vehicles if the line is converted to LRT. That standardization would allow the “SRT” to share its fleet and maintenance facilities with other lines rather than being an orphan line.
In summary, much of the work of upgrading the SRT flows from the poor choice of technology three decades ago when the Queen’s Park cared more about a showcase than about building good transit for Scarborough.
“The Yonge Street subway just celebrated its 60th anniversary and it’s still in good shape.”
If a line runs in a tunnel, it does not matter what type of vehicle is on the tracks because the infrastructure requirements — signals, power distribution, ventillation, drainage, lighting, escalators, elevators — are identical. An escalator does not attain magical long-life by having a subway car rather than an LRV serving the passengers. All of these subsystems require ongoing maintenence and replacement, and the tunnels themself must constantly be repaired to deal with leaks and other structural problems such as the “out of round” condition on the Yonge line north of Eglinton.
The big difference for LRT is that it does not have to be underground all of the time. Proportionately, the things that “only” last three decades make up more of an LRT line’s infrastructure because LRT does not require the much more heroic construction, cost and longevity of an underground structure. Certainly, some parts will need to be rebuilt within three decades. However, the requirement would be the same even if the line were underground, and we would have spent a pot load more money to put it there.
Subways much older than Toronto’s are still in “good shape” although they show their age, but keeping them in that condition has an ongoing cost. When we build a subway, we are not just committing the capital dollars and the debt service that will result, we are committing to unending maintenance of the infrastructure whether we actually needed it or not.
A Businesslike Approach to Transit?
John Tory likes to present himself as a responsible, experienced businessman, someone who will bring his experience at large corporations to City Hall.
Good business includes having the good sense to be well-informed and to make decisions based on reliable data, not on the shifting winds of political favour.
There are three possibilities here. One is that Tory is genuinely misinformed, in which case one wonders how he chose his advisors, and how long he will take to change his position. One is that Tory genuinely believes that bilge about the comparative lifespans of subways and LRT, in which case I wish him well as reality intrudes on his budget-making. The most cynical option is that Tory simply tells people what they want to hear — that the subway decision is beyond reconsideration and that somehow it will not waste a fortune that could be put to better use elsewhere on the transit system, even within Scarborough.
None of this makes for good business, although there are plenty of examples of misguided companies that foundered thanks to the blinkered views of their CEOs. Toronto does not need four more years of that, even without the Ford circus.
If Tory or any other candidate really believes that the extra investment in a subway for Scarborough has a worth based on development prospects, on improving the economic and social environment of Scarborough, then make that argument. Lies and misrepresentation about transit options serve nobody, except possibly the candidates.
Steve Munro 
Not to be outdone in the bad transit planning department, Rob Ford once again wants to eliminate streetcars.
I wonder if someone has explained to him that there would probably be at least half a century of subway construction needed in the old city of Toronto alone to allow buses to replace streetcars in Toronto.
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Let’s think about this for a moment. The Stouffville Markham train already runs through Danforth, no new station required. It no longer stops there or at Scarborough because it was being overloaded by people who wanted off on the way home.
When you leave there what route do you follow? There is no easy path to follow to go up to Eglinton or do you end there, if so the line is fairly useless. Transferring on to it inbound is a non starter because there is no capacity on GO or in Union Station. Also how are you planning on getting there? There is no easy route to there unless you use the rail corridor and there is not any room unless you tunnel under it.
The connection from Main subway to GO is about 700 to 800 feet, longer than a subway station and not convenient. The purpose of the line is to intercept people who are heading to Yonge and provide them with an alternative way of getting downtown. The farther east it goes the fewer people it intercepts and too close to Yonge and it is less useful to people from farther east. The Don Mills route is a good compromise and services the under served and lower income areas of Flemingdon and Thorncliffe park.
Your route will lose the opportunity to serve more residents, especially in Flemingdon and Thorncliffe Park.
True but Toronto’s area was 34 square miles, what is Scarborough’s area? The denser population in Toronto made the subway viable in Toronto. Even with all the feeder buses in Scarborough there is no way that a subway will carry enough passengers not to be a sink hole for money. Extending subways trains to all the outer suburbs is the ultimate “Gray Train.”
You have obviously never travelled much in the US. There are lots of areas with that many people and totally atrocious service, every hour or half hour in the rush hour for 12 hours a day and no Sunday or Holiday service. Mississauga has more people and has worse service. Check your facts before engaging in hyperbole.
But Jamie, Metrolinx will plant mature trees, plant grass in the right of way and magically find a way for 2 lanes to carry the traffic formerly carried by 3 lanes. They will also pave the streets with gold to make it, finally, “The Golden Mile.” The only way the right of way will be green is if they use green concrete. The trees are actually futuristic light stands and cell phone antennae. I agree with you this crap is not useful.
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I think you need to compare apples to apples when you look at proposed service levels to Scarborough. You need to look at the total LRT total package, which needs to include the Morningside hook, along with the total length of the Scarborough LRT. Also you need to look at what else could be paid for in Scarborough, which would likely be the entire Transit City package for this area, including a couple of BRTs. Going the non-subway route and spending this money would mean all of Scarborough would be serviced at a high level. You are comparing projects where the subway one is $1.7 billion more expensive; look at the alternate proposal as to where all that money would be spent in Scarborough. I would agree that there may be improvement to LRT design that should be considered, but, fundamentally, Scarborough would be better served with LRT than subway. I think Calgary makes a good reference for both large parts of Scarborough and Markham.
Also we need to look at whether the BDL line can support this subway further west, and whether this would be supportable at Yonge. You also talk about connecting Markham more closely to the subway. While this may sound really good, the subway cannot support it. We should build something that serves all of Scarborough and connects it well to itself and the rest of the city, which the original complete Transit City proposal did. We need to look at an appropriate GO service for the core bound people that the balance of the network can support, at least until a DRL is built.
Steve: Another point about Markham. If one has to justify a Scarborough subway by talking about riders from Markham, then effectively this admits that Scarborough, on its own, would not generate the traffic. If those Markhamites travel via much improved all day service on the GO Stouffville line, then their contribution to the Scarborough subway demand evaporates.
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Please don’t even try to get into an argument over your commute with someone from East Scarborough. My commute is almost 2 hours most days. We use the same fish bowl subways stations once we finally get there from our fish bowl buses.
I will gladly accept a politically chopped up 3-4 stop (it will likely be 4) subway to Sheppard than a patch work LRT system which requires more transfers. I’ll appreciate the convenience even more the older I get.
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That’s only half of the problem. The other half is the extremely high fares that GO charges for short distances. People already take TTC instead of GO because GO’s fares for even the shortest ride are double the TTC’s. The TTC co-fare will only be attractive if the GO fare is reduced to something approaching TTC base fare levels.
In other words, while the GO fare remains $5.20 from Exhibition to Union, it does not matter if there’s a 60¢ co-fare or a $3.00 co-fare, the GO fare is unrealistically high to begin with.
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Dwight – Not to be too critical, but Andrew clearly said “tram” systems and “sharing the road with cars” and in my response to Andrew way above, I said I assumed he meant trains with traffic-light controlled interesections, not railway crossing arms. No one anywhere is calling the Calgary and Edmonton systems “tram” systems so you are bringing up a somewhat off-topic examples that everyone else probably knows about and could have brought up but did not because we all know those are higher speed LRTs that are not being contemplated in the middle of Toronto’s streets. The discussion was about what surfaces that LRTs/trams in the middle of Toronto’s streets with traffic light intersection control need to have or could have, not what surface a grade-separated LRTs or ones with railway-crossing barriers at intersections (and physical barriers such as fencing along the rest of their route) need to or could have.
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Perhaps I am not describing the transit options for Scarberians clearly. There is only one highway through Scarborough (the 401). There are only two subway stops in the south west corner. Mississauga residents are served by the QEW, 403, 401, and 407. Plans for the BRT and Hurontario LRT will improve public transit there. When compared with US cities, if there is one thing Americans are good at it is building highways. I stand by comment that the 650,000 people in Scarborough are very poorly served by transit when compared with other cities in Canada and the US. My point is that Scarborough residents do not have many good options to move around this city. BTW, the lack of options for travel makes them excellent candidates to use effective public transit. That is another reason to get it right.
Steve: You cannot compare Scarborough and Mississauga for a count of highways. Mississauga lies in the middle of the industrial belt of the GTA while Scarborough is on the eastern edge. Much of the highway building to the west supports both business and population travel demands that do not have an equivalent within Scarborough.
As others have said, there was a plan to build a network of LRT lines in Scarborough, but you will now have to wait a decade for one subway. You’re getting what you asked for (or what the politicians claim you asked for). Mississauga has no subway, but I look forward to their anguished cries pointing at Scarborough and claiming that they are so hard done by.
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I see the 60 year old subway that’s in great shape will be undergoing an emergency closure on Saturday to tamp down ballast and investigate switches and signals that are causing delays. I’m guessing there will still be a ‘slow’ order on that section after the weekend though.
Steve: An intriguing comment in the Star’s article is that this is work that should have been 20 years ago, but was delayed due to budget constraints. I find this very hard to believe, but if true, it begs the question of how much more work has languished unbudgeted while our “hundred year subway” quietly disintegrates around us.
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I’m with you on the need for more information on the source and destination of travelers from Scarborough and the impact a subway extension would have. Please direct me to more information if it is online. In the 1950’s most of Toronto’s population was spread along the waterfront south of Eglinton. Don Mills, Canada’s first suburb was built in the late 1950’s, on farmland. Taking note of the architecture in the Yonge & Eglinton area, there certainly wouldn’t have been the density at Eglinton or north to justify a subway in the 1950’s.
Steve: What there was at Eglinton was a very frequent streetcar service that was fed by bus routes from what was then the inner suburbs of Toronto. There is a fundamental problem where people expect the density to be on the subway line, and ignore density in places that feed the subway. That’s where the BD and YUS get their ridership from, but they have a common function of taking all these people to the core (which is bigger now than it was fifty years ago) as a common destination. Scarborough does not have an equivalent pattern of origins and destinations. It may have the same number of people, but their travel is completely different.
There are diagrams of the 2006 demand flows in Scarborough that were done by Eric Miller at the UofT and which have appeared in various presentations. I will put together an article with this info. (More recent data are just now being collated.)
I imagine there are many more riders in Scarborough north of the 401 that need to get downtown than existed when the Eglinton Subway opened. It was vision that got the Yonge subway up to Eglinton.
Steve: No, not vision. The Yonge streetcar went to Glen Echo at the top of Hogg’s Hollow, but the demand north of Eglinton didn’t warrant taking the subway that far north. The TTC needed a yard for the trains, and the property at Davisville was used. (The reason the portal south of Davisville is called Muir Portal is in honour of Alexander Muir Gardens which formerly was on this site. A new park was built south of Yonge and Lawrence to replace it as part of the subway project.) Davisville doesn’t make sense as a terminal given that Eglinton was already a hub for buses and would grow, and so that’s where the subway ends.
I didn’t overlook UofT Scarborough or Centennial college. The proposed SRT replacement that goes past Centennial College and into Malvern misses a huge number of riders. Centennial College has 12,000 full time students, roughly half (6000) are at the Progress campus. UTSC has 10,000 full-time students. Centennial College at Morningside has 2000-3000 full time students (?). These folks will not be well serviced by the proposed Scarborough LRT. I don’t know if the plans for the Sheppard LRT make it to UTSC.
Steve: Metrolinx was all set to announce that the northern end of the “Scarborough Malvern LRT” (the one that went from Kennedy Station to Malvern via Eglinton, Kingston Road and Morningside) would be built as part of the Sheppard line. This was waiting for the 2011 budget announcement, but then Rob Ford was elected and, with no authority from Council, he cancelled Transit City. RIP LRT to UTSC.
Ellesmere, east of McCowan is an ideal road to support BRT. Both Centennial and UTSC could be very well serviced by BRT that would connect students to a subway station at STC. It would be very cost effective.
As a point of comparison, York University has 55,000 full time students. The distance from the nearest subway stop is 5km. UTSC would 5.5km from a subway stop near the STC. Centennial College, Progress campus would be 3km.
Steve: You may have noticed that York U is getting a subway station, and so their distance from rapid transit will be 0km. Yet another thing for Scarborough to be jealous of.
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Steve I beg to differ. Since by the time Scarborough actually manages to stop playing politics, Mississauga (if it continues in the way of Mayor Hazel after she is gone) will likely have its proposed LRT up and running and working on a second (if it is not complete) asking themselves: Why would you want to sit in a tunnel? I would expect Mississauga to greatly enjoy showing up Scarborough, as to how much more progressive they are.
Steve: Presuming, of course, that Hazel’s successor does not arbitrarily cancel the LRT plans, and the Tories don’t wind up in power at Queen’s Park.
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He might have been outdone by a letter writer in yesterday’s Star, who claimed that “the completion of the Presto card fare collection system will also help” defer the need for a DRL. (Because, magic!)
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And considering the urban decay they cause, they can keep that title.
On that note, one thing that I have always wondered about Scarborough is why did they never really push to get the East Metro Freeway built when they had the chance and wasted their time trying to get the Scarborough Expressway built after the cancellation of the Spadina Expressway?
Assuming the impact on the Rouge Valley could have been minimized, it would have provided a needed link to the 407 and put Scarborough in a good position to benefit from the economic shift to the 905.
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@ Kevin – yes, but in the case of the Queensway & other areas the trams/streetcars are essentially behaving as “LRT lite”. Really we’re talking about different implementations/forms of the same technology – in the TTC’s case if it wasn’t for the unique track gauge of the “legacy” streetcar system, the vehicles themselves would be essentially interchangeable.
Steve: No, actually. The TTC LFLRVs are designed to fit on the tight curves on our streetcar system, and they have more propulsion power to deal with steeper grades.
The LRT on Calgart’s 7th ave transitway runs in-street like a tram/streetcar, sharing the ROW with buses & city/emergency vehicles & stopping every couple blocks. The soon-to-be-built Valley Line in Edmonton will run bi-directionally on the northmost 2 lanes of 102nd Ave. Both are encased in concrete streets. The manner in which both cities LRT lines changes along their lines, generally more subway/GO-like into suburban areas (& tunnelled portions), & more streetcar/tram-like downtown & other dense areas.
Regardless the point of my post above was to mention that there are other places within *Canada* than the Queensway that open track exists in street medians & do so safely (& have for over 30 years), generally in more “thru” sections of lines in which LRV vehicles operate (streetcars or LRT, application depending).
Steve: I like to start off citing The Queensway because it has already been here for over 50 years. Some people (including professionals) have a “not invented here” mentality when it comes to LRT in any form.
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The last time I was in Scarborough, and I lived there for 10 years at Lawrence and Warden, there were three subway stops not two, Victoria Park, Warden and Kennedy. Also the 401 is not a transit service but a highway and your statement was “Scarborough residents are among the most poorly served transit consumers in our city and likely in North America.” Nowhere in that did you mention highways so please excuse me if I did not consider your lack of highways.
Yes we have fewer highways than in the US but we still have a habitable city centre and not one that has acres of expressway interchanges and parking lots. If you want to complain about a lack of highways then how about Brampton. Its population is close to 600,000 and growing by nearly 50,000 per year and we have only the 410 which is only 3 lanes in each direction. True the 407 runs along the southern boundary and the 427 intrudes a little bit into the far east side but we have anywhere near the Highway capacity that Scarborough does but I don’t feel left out.
What about Brampton? I demand a subway now. Run it up the Weston Sub to Bramalea then put it in a tunnel under something. I don’t care what but I want a subway as it is our turn now. If I don’t get it I will lie down in the middle of the road and throw a temper tantrum.
You have half hourly GO service on Lakeshore all day with 4 stations and Stouffville with 3 stations. We get rush hour service and 3 stations so don’t complain. We can’t demand unwarranted service for one area unless we are willing to pay for it everywhere so grow up and think like an adult. I will not throw a temper tantrum but will fight for sane responsible transit.
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As is mine and I don’t leave North York. You insist that you deserve less transfers. But most people who take transit even when using the current subway system have the same amount of transfers you will have. Your sense of outrage at having what others will only be replaced with a feeling of this isn’t all that much better then before.
But tub thumping about who has a worse commute is a bad way to develop transit system priorities. Its not about you and me. Its about developing a system for everybody. Which requires political decisions. Now, the subway to a Canadian Tire parking lot is politically motivated in the most base way – some voters want that particular upgrade and they are yelling if they don’t get it. The LRT is politically motivated by something else. Some voters want it but many many others would rather not pay for the subway as it’s a fiscal disaster.
That and given the majority of transit users in Scarborough do not go downtown, maybe it’s time we built a system for most people in Scarborough who use transit, rather then for those people who don’t use transit at all but like the idea of others doing so and getting out of their way (not you).
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Moaz: Funny thing is that Mississauga council unanimously approved the proposal to support LRT as the mode of choice for the Hurontario-Main corridor … and no one mentioned the possibility of extending the subway from Kipling along Dundas and up Hurontario.
I’m confident that the 2014-18 council and Hazel’s successor will very likely continue with the plan … unless they decide that the city cannot afford the 1.6 billion for LRT (not sure how much would be Mississauga’s share) and should therefore wait until the province and feds arrive with an oversized cheque.
As for Brampton … with its obvious east-west built for along Queen St the best choice is a westwards extension of the TTC subway from Vaughan Metropolitan Centre. And if that sounds strange … Metrolinx included “closing the Yonge-University-Spadina-York loop as one Option on their list of “all options on the table” for Yonge Corridor Relief.
Cheers, Moaz
Steve: Be very careful of that “all options on the table” list. It contains literally every suggestion (and in the version I saw, a huge amount of duplication) that anyone has made. Just because something is on the list doesn’t mean that it is considered reasonable. I think Metrolinx is trying to deal with all of the schemes — crazy and otherwise — so that they can put to bed the more outlandish ones.
One criticism I had of Metrolinx when they presented this to the Stakeholders’ meeting was that the list should have had some editing (at least to remove duplicates) and preliminary analysis before it went to the broader public. As things stand, the impression is as if neither Metrolinx nor the City/TTC folks have gotten beyond the most basic preliminary steps, but will speed to a conclusion so quickly that nobody will be able to have meaningful input.
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Seriously? We both agree politicians can’t built proper transit. But you make it seem like there is an alternative coming? And you also think you understand the commute of someone from East Scarborough who needs to get downtown. You clearly don’t & there are a lot of us. You can’t compare East Scarborough to anywhere in North York or Etobicoke.
Also you only see a Canadian Tire at McCowan & Sheppard. You don’t see the parcel of land it sits on which will become condos in the same way condos are being built around every other transit line. I highly doubt there were many 40 story skyscrapers near the existing subway lines at the time they were built.
If they can’t provide Scarborough a fully funded LRT network without the politics or just give us the 3-4 stop Subway that will at least get built. We don’t need partial lines which stub out from transit of a different technology. It’s a major inconvenience & won’t connect Scarborough.
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The funding for the subway more than covers all possible LRT. This money appeared because of Scarborough politics. The concern the rest of the city should have is 2 fold:
1. That a very lightly used subway will make it very harder for Toronto as a whole to go back and get more for the rest of the city, (why nothing has been built since the 1990s).
2. Should it actually attract the ridership numbers by stealing GO ridership, it will not relieve the need for transit in the bulk of Scaborough but will overwhelm the rest of the subway. It will become a nightmare (much more so) to get through Yonge, one that cannot be resolved for a decade of more. It will take this long as the upper levels of government will need a reset prior to giving Toronto billions more to recover from the fact the last money induced such a predictable transit meltdown, and where the only possible solution is yet more subway money.
Voters from beyond Toronto (beyond the city in the GTHA, the rest of the province and country) will not be lining up to spend more money when the outcome was so predictable! You think Ford is bad PR? When the media outside Toronto links 20 minutes transfers at Yonge and dropping ridership on the subway to spending money on the subway… ? You think your commute is bad now.
It will be far easier to send that money a couple of hundred million at a time to Mississauga and Brampton, where it will clearly have a positive impact, than to Toronto. If Toronto wants to spend subway money it had better do it somewhere where the rest of the country cannot see it as a disaster or waste of money. If it must be subway, at least build a DRL first, so that at least it is not a certain problem.
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You mean the property that will be used for the McCowan bus terminal?
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Quite frankly I don’t have much energy left for arguing about the Scarborough subway. Either project can be made to work, and at the end of the day I just want to move on and get Waterfront East and the DRL moving. For everything I’m about to say I really would prefer to reopen nothing and move on, accepting whatever comes out of the current studies as acceptable to the ministry and Metrolinx.
The point about the Scarborough subway budget covering ALL possible let is very salient. While not the best decision from a pure governance standpoint I really would like to see the (more or less) zero budget change option that builds the SRT and the Malvern line. No, keeping the money in Scarborough this way doesn’t necessarily make as much sense as putting it into the DRL, but it is likely to be much more politically viable, and makes for one of the most dramatic examples possible or the opportunity cost of subway construction. If we need another round of public debate the subway or the SRT PLUS Malvern should really be the options presented.
Similarly I think it really should be made explicit that the Scarborough subway means the Malvern LRT (other than the UTSC hook and possibly a Malvern branch off Sheppard) is for all intents and purposes permanently canceled.
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I am reviewing the update on changes to real estate prices now in the Globe & Mail.
There aren’t any million dollar neighbourhoods in Scarborough. There are only a couple neighbourhoods that exceed a half million dollars. Scarborough real estate values are the lowest when compared with other areas of our city. Steve, you recently posted a map from an essential study called 3 Cities that depicts changes in average income across Toronto. Almost all of Scarborough struggled. A recent article in the G&M Scarborough General Hospital has not updated some Operating rooms since the late 50’s. Scarborough is being left behind. There is likely a glaring correlation between availability of direct transit to the core and the value of real-estate, changes in income and quality of public services.
Transit into Scarborough is a bigger issue than what might work today and will meet the needs of users today. It is more than likely that the reason so few people commute to the core from Scarborough is because it takes far too long, by public transit or car (note my earlier comment about the lack of highways). We are creating a ghetto by making it so difficult for residents to commute to where the good jobs exist.
Joe M is right. It is a major inconvenience that mostly low income earners will put up with.
Steve: This is a change in the tenor from previous arguments which portrayed an LRT in the Scarborough corridor as somehow demeaning to folks in that part of the world and a huge imposition of extra travel time. Nobody is planning to cut off Scarborough without transit, but the basic questions is how to provide the most/best coverage. The biggest change in travel time for someone heading downtown will arise from having (a) a reliable service in the SRT corridor (or wherever the line winds up being), (b) a service that goes further north and east thereby reducing the access time to transit. Those are the big items affecting downtown travel, not whether we specifically build the McCowan subway.
As for problems with funding at Scarborough General, that has absolutely nothing to do with transit decisions. One may argue that it’s another example of Scarborough getting the short straw, but there are other hospitals that are not on a subway line.
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When the Scarborough expressway debate was happening one of the nails in its coffin was that the residents of Guildwood came out against it. Their rationale was that it would be overloaded by people from Durham and all they would get was the noise.
There are not many 40 storey condos around most subway stations. I haven’t done a count but I bet that there are more subway stations without 40 storey condos than with. A lot more 40 storey condos are going up around street car lines in Toronto than around subway stations. The condos at Bathurst and St. Clair didn’t start until the street car line was rebuilt.
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An interesting position to have since the East Metro wasn’t going to be a northern extension of the Scarborough Expressway and people from Durham were going to flood the Scarborough Expressway regardless. But that still doesn’t really explain the lack of effort between the early 70’s and the mid 90’s when it was clear that bulldozing Toronto homes for Scarborough cars was a non-starter and development along the Morningside corridor north of the 401 was still light enough that it could have been built.
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I hope so! I actually forgot to complete my comment by pointing out how some of the proposals added to the list (Yonge Express, closing the Yonge-University-Spadina-York loop, the Wellington GO tunnel) were really not logical, sensible or feasible … Although I did say this at the meeting on April 5th.
My concerns expressed then were that we’ve waited 30 years for the Relief Line to be taken seriously, so why are they (Metrolinx and the TTC and City) wasting time on the opportunity by looking at plainly wrong projects and limiting the scope of the Relief Line Assessment Study itself? Especially when it wasn’t too long ago that Metrolinx was talking about a relief line running as far to the Northeast as Don Mills and Eglinton.
I expect that from the public meetings so far the majority of comments are essentially saying:
1. Are the TTC, City and Metrolinx really cooperating? Because we aren’t confident that this is happening.
2. How can we speed up the assessment process so we can get shovels in the ground sooner?
Cheers, Moaz
Steve: I’m sad to hear that the giant list did make it to the public meetings. At the Stakeholders’ session, I made the point that putting it out unedited and without any comments would give the impression that Metrolinx has been totally inactive. Obviously they are more wedded to their list than it appeared at the time.
On another point, I am glad that the general public had the impression the two parties are not co-operating. That was the way things seemed at the Stakeholders’ session, as well as at the Press Conference, and I got some pushback from the project teams suggesting I was just a troublemaker for suggesting that this “joint” project was more show than substance.
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Developers are salivating to build near any transit line. It’s a matter of obtaining the parcel of land and gaining City zoning approval. Subway land holds ever greater value to them than streetcars.
If you want to compare the developement & landcape changes between all the proposed LRT stops vs 3-4 Subway stops. I can understand the debate. But when the argument against a subway stop is that a Canadian Tire currently occupies a large portion of corner land I can’t accept that. If anything that’s a positve because it’s much easier to re-design around one large parcel of land rather than having to purchase from multiple owners which is the case for many current subway lines which were built in areas of lower densities.
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I hate to break it to you but a few 40 storey condos around the station won’t support a subway appendage into Scarborough.
You’re looking at around 400 units in such a building and it’s a good chance that a large number of them work in places that the subway won’t go to, e.g. the numerous office parks Mississauga or Markham.
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Show me the applications and developments; even show me proposals. Where are the developments happening now, mainly in downtown. There are pockets around Yonge and Eglinton, Davisville, High Park, Crescent Town and Sheppard between Yonge and Don Mills but I bet most of those people like access to the 401 and DVP more than the Sheppard Subway.
Look at the development, or lack thereof along the Bloor Danforth line or the Spadina line. I found it amusing that the development at St. Clair and Bathurst featured the St. Clair Car as much as the subway. The development near Spadina on Front also featured streetcars in their billboards, but the car had left side doors as they flipped the image.
The three most important items in real estate are location, location and location and not the fact that they are on a subway line. If there are two identical locations and one is on a subway and one is not, then the subway location would probably be preferred. Many people want to live downtown where they work and play. They don’t want to be stuck in the far reaches of nowhere, even if it has a subway.
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Steve, why didn’t you tell us that someone had built a subway under Lakeshore Boulevard in Mimico?
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What is truth? That was the subject of today’s sermon at my church. Toronto’s half-mayor Rob Ford was held up as an example of a politician who says what people want to hear. Sometimes it is true, sometimes it is sort-of true, sometimes it is not at all true. That’s why he has his constituency. People are happy to hear nice things, but rarely follow through to check it out. But Ford is not the only one guilty, because many or most politicians cannot help but speak to the masses.
Looking at this thread on this blog, the main theme has been transit inequality, particularly to Scarborough. The politicians from all levels of government have played to this. That is why we have the so-called Scarborough subway, which trumps all other sensible transit options.
To put things into perspective, perhaps it is best to look at a satellite photo of the Golden Horseshoe. Scarborough sits near the tip of the eastern wing, most definitely not the centre of things. In economic terms, it does not have the hinterland of, say, Mississauga or Oakville or Burlington. But, Scarborough has three subway stations, while the other three municipalities have zero, combined. Is that fair? Fair is NOT the right question! Scarborough has greatly benefitted from being with Metropolitan Toronto, and now, as a part of the City of Toronto.
I doubt that there are many people in government that hate Scarborough. It is a neighbourhood. Why would some one hate a neighbourhood for being itself? You do not have to live there, no one is forcing you.
In my opinion, objective and not subjective solutions should be our guidance. In other words, the best bang for our buck. No matter how it is calculated – not the federal government, nor provincial government, nor the municipality – it is the taxpayer that is really paying for it.
Therefore, while political rhetoric is misleading us, the citizens need to see the truth. If the citizens are unable to see the truth for themselves, perhaps they need a little help. Therefore, we need to reduce the influence of political promises and non-truths. The Toronto Transit Commission and Metrolinx need to become more independent of the politicians, so that they can spend taxpayers’ money more efficiently.
Bang for the buck means not wasting $3 billion on the mis-named Scarborough subway, but re-allocating the taxpayers’ money to the DRL, aka Don Mills Line. Please refer to the gist of this blog as to why, as I am not going to repeat all of the discussion.
The SRT needs to be upgraded and extended. Plus, the other LRT and BRT lines that were planned at one time. That would serve Scarborough the best.
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Recovery efforts, 11.04., in Valenciennes, France, after CITIDIS tram derails after splitting points:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/D%C3%A9raillement_de_la_rame_de_tramway_n%C2%B0_17_%C3%A0_la_sortie_du_d%C3%A9p%C3%B4t_de_Saint-Waast_le_11_avril_2014_%C3%A0_Valenciennes_et_Anzin
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I would dare say, that at best look at the travel patterns, perhaps you would add a North south BRT to the proposed Transit City routes.
Victoria Park, Markham, Morningside and Scarborough bus routes each look quite busy. Given the LRT original plan including the Morningside loop etc, that the background ridership information was used in developing LRT routes, and should be used along with other travel information as the best way to improve transit. Models need to be used, but need not be to driven by politics. Better serve travel that we know people want to make, by the most appropriate mode possible.
This does include core bound, but is not only core bound.
Steve: Don’t forget about the Transit City Bus Plan. It was proposed but was blocked at Council because of a jurisdictional tiff between the TTC and Budget Committee.
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Steve I wonder can we get politicians and the public to look at the construction of the transit lines and networks in more the way that private companies look at industrial buildings. It is possible to build a building, so that the ability to easily extend the length of a structure is preserved. To the extent that it is possible it would make sense to do the same in terms of building out the network.
Build BRT with the possibility of extending the platforms and stations to handle additional busses. When you are building what you already know will be a very busy BRT design it with conversion in mind.
Design an LRT with the idea of leaving room around stations to expand them to add walkways, and room between or beside tracks to allow stations to be extended.
Basically build for today leave room for the future. Plan for where the next couple of increments of capacity could come from, but don’t build it on a whim, or notion. Be realistic about what can be achieved in terms of capacity when you do implement.
On GO, what is required to get from 6 to 7 or 8 trains per hour. After that what else would have to be done. The politicians and public need to remember in terms of capacity 2 trains per hour, is like 2 additional lanes of highway. If you can get to 8 make sure doing so does not cut-off too many future choices, but don’t “invest” in capacity too long before you need it.
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