The Star’s Ben Spurr reports that the Glen Andrews Community Association in Scarborough has proposed yet another variant on the Scarborough Subway, and that this is supported by Councillor Glenn De Baeremaeker and provincial Minister (and former Councillor) Brad Duguid. City Planning staff are already engaged in reviewing this proposal without any direction to do so from Council, according to Spurr’s article.
The scheme, nicknamed the “Big Bend” would enter Scarborough Town Centre on an east-west axis rather than the north-south route proposed by the TTC. It would veer east at Ellesmere and then make a wide turn bringing the route under the existing RT through the STC station area and continue to vacant space on the east side of Brimley. This open area would be used as the staging area for the tunnel construction akin to the sites on the Crosstown project at Black Creek and at Brentcliffe.
This would avoid creation of a staging area for the subway tunnel near Ellesmere and McCowan and limit the need to expropriate lands for the subway and a new station, but it would also leave the subway aligned in a way that would allow eventual westward extension to link with the Sheppard line.
Although this has been reported simply as a revised alignment, much more is involved in this proposal. Instead of twin tunnels, the TTC’s typical construction method, a single 12m to 13m bore would be used, one that could accommodate station structures within the tunnel and eliminate (or at least reduce) the need for surface excavation such as we have seen on the TYSSE station projects. The technical side of this scheme was put forward by Michael Schatz, Managing Director of engineering company Hatch (a portion of the former Hatch Mott Macdonald) which shows up from time to time as a consultant to the TTC and GO Transit. Whether this is an official company proposal, or a personal scheme, or some sort of “business development”, is hard to say. There is no reference to this proposal on the company’s website.
As for the politicians, De Baeremaeker in Council and Duguid behind the scenes at Queen’s Park have been meddling in the LRT/subway debate for some time. De Baeremaeker’s initial motivation appeared to be avoiding an election attack by a Ford stand-in challenging his dedication to Scarborough’s manifest subway destiny. Duguid’s role raises questions about who sets transportation policy in Kathleen Wynne’s government and just how much real commitment there is to any of the LRT schemes in Toronto beyond the Crosstown project now under construction.
At yesterday’s TTC Board meeting, De Baeremaeker was noticeably silent on this proposal, but instead focused on the need to get construction underway and end the delays which push up the project’s cost. (For a $3.6 billion project, inflation at 4%, the rate used by the TTC, adds $144m/year, or $12m per month plus the sunk cost of having the project team sit around working on alternative designs until Council makes a decision.)
This is not simply a case of looking at an alternative design for the STC area, but of reviewing the entire line. The larger tunnel would be dug at a different elevation, and the manner in which it would link to the existing structure at Kennedy, not to mention how it will co-exist with the planned eastern extension of the Crosstown LRT, must be worked out. Terminal operations for a pair of stacked platforms at STC also need to be designed if the TTC intends to run all service through to that point.
This represents a considerable delay. It was intriguing that GDB did not mention this proposal at today’s TTC meeting and in fact held to the idea of getting politics out of the way and letting the project proceed.
The Community Association appears to have conflicting goals for their proposal:
And at the end of all this we have a ‘dead end’ subway.
- A subway that can never be extended to the east if/when demand justified an extension to Centennial College or Malvern or U of T.
- A subway that City Planners say ‘should not’ be extended north to the Sheppard.
- A subway that cannot be turned north west toward the huge concentrations of potential TTC riders in the Kennedy-Sheppard area. [p. 2]
And if we are really into city building, true long term thinking, here’s a huge advantage: building The Big Curve means that the subway is not ‘dead ended’ at Scarborough Centre. It turns northwest. The ‘tail track’ points toward the huge concentration of potential TTC riders already in place and with more on the way in the Kennedy-Sheppard area. It points toward the Agincourt GO-Smart Track Station. It is in the approved alignment of the Sheppard Subway to our Centre. It has a future! [pp. 6-7]
It is self evident that if the subway is going to Agincourt and Don Mills, it is most certainly not going to Centennial College, Malvern or UofT. There may be Scarborough Subway Champions now at Queen’s Park (the Liberal’s Mitzie Hunter and the Tory’s Raymond Cho), but the proposed Big Bend line will never come near their ridings in eastern Scarborough.
The Sheppard connection proposal has been around for years, and is a leftover from Rob Ford’s mayoral campaign. De Baeremaeker’s recent comments disparaging the Relief Line take on a new meaning in the context of a politician looking to plunder the capital budget to suit his own ends. It is quite clear that with this outlook, the Sheppard LRT will never be built even though it still appears on official provincial maps. So much for Queen’s Park’s “commitment” to eastern Scarborough.
The single bore tunnel will be quite deep both for structural reasons related to its size and to stay out of the way of utilities. At STC station, the idea is that a deep station would be built within the tunnel under the existing bus loop thereby avoiding the need for a completely new terminal. However, the vertical difference would pose a transfer time penalty, an amusing situation when one considers the scorn heaped on the design of Kennedy Station’s SRT to subway link.
The tunnel option is presented as one that could proceed without the surface disruptions of conventional subway construction as practiced by the TTC. This is not entirely true.
At STC, it will be necessary to build large vertical shafts, at least two, linking from the surface down to the station itself. These must be long and wide enough to house emergency ventillation, stairs, escalators and elevators, and their surface footprint will be considerable. Whether such links can be built while the bus terminal remains in operation is hard to say, and more detailed design of this interface is needed
Similarly, if Lawrence East Station reappears, as the Community Association proposes, it will require access shafts from the surface down to the station. This is a difficult location because Highland Creek crosses McCowan here, but stations below the water table are not unheard of even in Toronto (see York Mills and Queens Quay for examples, although the latter is comparatively shallow). The press release argues that a Lawrence East Station would be cheaper with the single tunnel scheme than with a standard TTC cut-and-cover structure, but the real question is how much this station would add to the cost of a project which does not now include it.
Emergency exit shafts are required roughly between stations. Construction activity for one of these can be seen along Eglinton such as at Petman (east of Mt. Pleasant) where the access is dug down from the surface to tunnels that have already been built below the street. Just because there are no stations from Kennedy to STC does not mean that the space between them will be free of construction effects.
At STC, assuming that the existing bus terminal can remain in operation, there would be a saving on building its replacement. However, this is only one part of a more complex comparison that must be performed between the current TTC proposal’s design and whatever might develop from the Big Bend option. One cannot assume a “saving” until the relative cost and components of the two schemes are worked out.
The Community Association proposes that the tunnel launch site use existing green space on the west side of STC beside Brimley Road. By comparison with the sites on Eglinton at Black Creek and at Brentcliffe, this may not be large enough (especially considering its “long” dimension runs north-south), but that could be dealt with by temporarily closing an adjacent road and expanding into the existing parking lot.
The proposal includes a long list of items that could be avoided by the Big Bend option compared to what the TTC is likely to do, including ”
- No need for a temporary bus terminal.
- No need to buy a fleet of buses to carry SRT passengers.
Whether a temporary terminal can be avoided while construction of the links to a new station below it is underway remains to be seen. As for a fleet of buses for SRT passengers, that has nothing to do with the subway plan at all, unless the subway is built in the SRT corridor, an alignment the TTC has already rejected for other reasons.
It is ironic that this scheme only became possible once the City decided it could not afford to take the subway to Sheppard and cut the line back to STC. If there really were a desire to serve the area north of Highway 401 and east of STC, the subway would have gone there. Instead we are back to the Sheppard hookup proposal.
If Council really wants to reopen the entire debate, they need to be honest about what this will cost in time and dollars. Unless there is a change in funding from Ottawa and Queen’s Park, their contributions are fixed and any new costs are entirely on the City’s account. How many more years of the 1.6% Scarborough Subway Tax will be needed to pay for this? How will the return of the Sheppard Subway Extensions to the political field affect priorities for spending elsewhere in the City? How many more Councillors will cry that their wards “deserve” a subway?
Muddled into all of this is the status of SmartTrack which even though the brand name remains in use is really nothing more than a few local stops added to GO’s RER plans. Toronto will have to decide before the end of November (a Metrolinx imposed deadline) just how much it will shell out for additional “SmartTrack” infrastructure.
Councillors are quick to complain that transit project costs rise uncontrollably, but faced with the need to settle on a design so that it can be costed to a reliable level for budgets and construction, continue to pursue alternatives. No doubt the Big Bend proponents will want a cost estimate for their scheme in months so that a formal decision can be made.
If De Baeremaeker, Duguid and Tory have already decided that the Big Bend is the only scheme that will be acceptable, then the whole process of past years has been a sham. It is entirely possible that the Eglinton East LRT, the sweetener added to the Scarborough transit plan to make the subway more palatable, will simply fall off of the map and the money will all go to the subway project. This would be a brutal “bait and switch” for eastern Scarborough, but it would show the true colours of their “subway champions”.
Steve Munro 
Quick question: The route shown on Google Maps goes under SRT route. Wil tunneling be deep enough so SRT pillars are not impacted? I also notice that it doesn’t follow the SRT route exactly. Is that just some bad tracing by the person who did the map?
Steve: I only know what’s in the press release. They obviously intend it to go under the SRT so that there can be a vertical connection between the bus terminal and the new station, although strictly speaking this could be done with an offset arrangement. I do not think there was an attempt to get engineering-level accuracy in that drawing. One of the things they’re asking for at the end is a study to validate that the proposed tunnel would not affect existing STC structures.
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The original east-west Queen subway (which would have used streetcars in the 1950’s) were planned by the then City of Toronto. However, with Metropolitan Toronto forming in 1954 and taking over the Toronto Transportation Commission (renaming it Toronto Transit Commission), the thinking for the east-west rapid transit was shifted north to Bloor and Danforth to satisfy suburban influence.
The suburban influence is still there today with the Line 2 extension into “suburban” Scarborough.
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Another bad plan just getting worse of course,
But I do recall that the current plans for the Subway showed a single bore tunnel, however not one large enough to build stations inside of. Would only the increase in tunnel diameter cause that much of a change for the rest of the line south of Ellesmere?
Steve: I have corrected your spelling of “boar” to “boar”, although the concept of a subway drawn by swine has a certain romantic sense (as long as you ignore the smell).
If the tunnel gets bigger, it must also be deeper. Larger tunnels require more earth to provide a stable roof and walls to adjacent structures, if any. The situation is different for rock tunnels like Crossrail in London as opposed to tunnels through earth, sand, and other things with varying degrees of inherent strength. Metrolinx considered this idea for Eglinton (you can see drawings of it in the EA), but rejected it because it would have made the stations even deeper than they already are. Another point is that the tunnel cost goes up as the square of the diameter because more earth has to be removed.
If you want it built on the cheap, then a box cut-and-cover structure close to the surface (like the original Yonge and BD subways) would be needed, but McCowan, Danforth and Eglinton would be disrupted for years.
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Why don’t they don’t just dig the tunnel to Sheppard and put in a station when needed. Putting in bends or spurs means that there won’t be any further extensions of line 2 past STC.
Steve: Because the lure of a Sheppard Subway overwhelms the idea that northeastern Scarborough deserves a subway.
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So when do we expect the review of the new proposed alignment to be completed? Did I read somewhere it would be done by January 2017 or am I mistaken?
Steve: The report coming to Council soon (the one that never showed up at Exec recently) was supposed to deal with most of the outstanding items, or December at the outside. With John Tory’s perennial ability to delay actually making a decision, who knows when we will see something. If staff say we need to do a detailed review because of the scope of the changes this proposal actually represents, they will be accused of foot-dragging.
What would really be ridiculous would be if Hatch were given a contract to review their own proposal. It would be a huge conflict of interest, but Tory has already establish a “tradition” of this sort with the work he sent to consultants who had been part of his campaign and SmartTrack.
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Steve, you are wrong in one respect with regard to CrossRail: it is excavated in London Clay, which whilst geologically is a Lower Eocene Mudstone behaves as a soil and not as a rock. In general, though, unless heroic (i.e. expensive) engineering is utilised, as tunnel diameter increases so must the depth of burial. As a rule of thumb, between 5 and 10 diameters is required. It’s all to do with the arching effect of soil and distribution of stress in the ground, but we don’t need to go into the detailed mechanics of this!
Steve: My mistake, I must be thinking of another project. From the Crossrail website:
An intriguing point, Crossrail used twin tunnels claiming that they had advantages over a single large bore.
I think your multiplier is wrong, however, as diagrams I have seen in the Eglinton Crosstown project show a typical spacing of one diameter. Five to 10 would require a 6m tunnel to be at least 30m deep. Crossrail is described as being “up to 40m” deep, and this has a lot to do with dodging around existing utilities and structures including other tube lines.
But regarding the Big Bend, in my career as a design engineer I’ve learned that de Saint-Exupéry’s maxim, “in anything at all, perfection is finally attained not when there is no longer anything left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away”, holds true. A corollary of this is that when more and more has to be added to a design to make it work, it’s an indication the design is flawed and should be scrapped. This addition of the Big Bend is just such a case: it suggests that the design of the entire extension is so wrong that it needs scrapping, and an alternative economic scheme that offers an elegant solution developed. However, this is public transit in Toronto…
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Hello,
During her Q and A during the transit debate this summer, Keesmaat suggested that in the fullness of time the most likely northern extension of the subway would be toward the Northwest, connecting with an extended Sheppard line. Although the mode on sheppard wasn’t spelled out, I suspect that there is renewed interest, in the very long term, in getting that line extended to Agincourt. This new alignment could facilitate that objective.
To that point, during the ConsumersNext consults, it was tweeted by a participant that she was supportive of an extension of the Sheppard line through to at least Victoria Park. So it’s not difficult to imagine that the long term goal of the city planning department and the TTC is an ultimate connection between the two lines.
Finally, I’m curious why Byford gets a free pass from the anti-subway crowd? If it wasn’t for him, this proposal would have most likely been DOA. A lot of your most searing criticism and nasty rejoinders are directed at the usual suspects, but Byford was instrumental in all of this. Having said that, I don’t hate the subway plan, which places a greater emphasis on fast, intra-city and regional connectivity vs. the more local orientation of the lrt.
Thanks
Steve: I am not sure about others, by I don’t give Byford a free pass. He has made misleading statements, and repeated them as recently as yesterday (Oct 27), that the cost of the subway and LRT alternatives are roughly equal. This ignores the fact that the subway number is for the shortened, one stop version ending at STC while the LRT number is for a line to Sheppard east of Progress. Moreover, the LRT number presumes a delay in construction which is artificial and adds inflation to the LRT cost.
Byford is also on record as saying that the DRL should come before the BD extension, but if Council wants to build in Scarborough, he’ll do it.
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Politics aside I think this a better idea than having the station run alongside the mall at McCowan.
You are right though about the air shafts and other related equipment. If this was the mid 80s it would not have been a big deal as where the condos are now across from the federal building was all grass and the area around the STC was much different than it is now. Right now there is so much development, I am not sure where all this equipment would go.
Personally I just want to see something built. At this point I will be 50 (I am now 28) before this stupid thing is complete.
The new alignment in my opinion is a bit better overall but then again.. as I said earlier alot can change in the time it takes to build this thing and who knows if the mall will even exist at that time.
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Wait a second. Does City Planning now take orders from community associations? If so I’d form one and ask them to reconsider their planning for the Relief Line and Smarttrack. This is obviously an attempt to revive Sheppard and it has Duguid’s hands all over it.
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I am amazed at the political games being played here. The province has committed funding to the Scarborough Subway extension. If that is cancelled, they are off the hook, and the City has to start asking for funding for an alternative.
Some City Councillors, and some journalists seem to think the province has a commitment for the Scarborough LRT alternative, but that was legally cancelled in 2013 by the City when City Council cancelled the LRT plan.
David Miller had negotiated hard to get provincial funding for LRT lines in Toronto. Subsequent mayors and City Council meetings went and altered the commitments, and seem oblivious to the consequences.
If the Scarborough Subway extension is cancelled, and the SRT line dies, as is happening now, transit in Scarborough gets way worse. Who wins, other that the provincial government?
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I doubt that the City Council will approve the “big bend” scheme if it result in any cost increase over the previous version of the plan.
However, the new preferred location of the STC terminal near Brimley kind of suggests that the Brimley subway route should be evaluated again. It would be about 500 m shorter than the route that goes up McCowan and then back to Brimley.
Steve: The station would still be at STC more or less under the existing bus terminal. Going up Brimley and turning east into STC does not fit with the scheme to continue west and hook in to the Sheppard Subway.
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In the original plan, the TTC was thinking of demolishing a few houses near the south-west corner of McCowan and Ellesmere along with the wooded area at the north-west corner. The parking lot on the east side of STC seems smaller for a staging area compared with the lot at Brimley proposed for the Big Bend. So were the demolished areas originally to be part of the staging area? Council voted in July against demolishing the wooded area. Did that doom the original plan for the STC station?
Steve: Frankly I don’t understand why the staging area could not be in the northeast corner of STC. We are dealing with multiple “plans” that are little more than crayon drawings.
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I have to give Duguid and the Liberal Party credit. This SSE plan appears to be a perfect plan:
1) Back in 2012, Rob Ford, along with the entire Conservative movement, was flying high with the agreement to built the combined SRT/ECLRT. With the Liberals back room dealings, they managed to kill this and create chaos in the City transit planning.
2) That was a major blow to Ford and was the beginning of his downfall.
3) This eventually had a ripple effect, killing the Conservative movement that appeared to be heading towards Toronto.
4) Liberals got Stintz, DeBaermaker, etc. to bring in the B-D subway extension, absolving the Liberals of any responsibility for cost over-runs.
5) They got themselves a by-election win.
6) They got themselves a majority in the provincial election.
7) They got a federal Liberal election victory when Trudeau was floundering in 3rd place.
8) They got to defer the major spending on this line to delay financial commitments and improve the appearance of their budget.
9) All blame from anti-subway activists falls to John Tory.
Considering that the 5 seats (Oakville and Mississauga) cost $1.1B in gas plant cancellations in 2011, the amount of success the Provincial Liberals have achieved with this SSE plan is worth orders of magnitude more, but has cost them comparatively little. Even including the extra cost borne by the City of Toronto, the SSE is a bargain compared to any other vote buying scheme that I have seen. Based on any type of political measurement, the SSE has been a brilliant plan. If you think transit should be about moving people, elect someone else.
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This route is much more intelligent in many ways than any other tunneled option proposed. Although at this point I would be OK with SRT corridor if the savings would be significant and the plan would to connect Sheppard. My feeling was this was the only plan to compromise between Scarborough subway boosters and the Outsider transfer LRT gang.
The stretch north of Ellesmere in this new proposal seems like it could be elevated above ground when they expropriate the plaza. If that’s the case its hard to imagine any extra cost compared to the original McCowan proposal.
Steve: It is not intended to be elevated anywhere. Deep bore tunnel from west of Brimley all the way to Kennedy Stn.
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We are at 0% design and as you mention it nothing more than a napkin concept. Although I’ll say this napkin plan actually has a fair bit of intelligence above all other subway proposals.
The SRT corridor would be the only hope as an alternative it could go to Markham/Progress. But if the savings are not there and Sheppard is not an option then this option makes perfect sense to move forward with.
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You would think that what has been happening with Bertha on the Alaskan Way Viaduct replacement project in Seattle would kill any notion that a single bore tunnel is a good idea.
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Thanks again Steve and commenters for this and much else. It’s good news that it’s getting tinkered with and there’s a further tilt not just in the numbers, but in the ‘design’ as it lets us bring out the whole ????? of how terrible this really is. And with the ’tilt’ (to be polite and not sued), we can get to another tilting of options, where the TTC/staff tilted something off the table, which of course the EAs won’t catch, because it’s ‘any type of subway as long as it’s here’ option list.
The ‘Smart Spur’ option was dismissed for cost reasons as the TTC wanted to keep the SRT operating and not inconvenience existing riders; admirable. But if it is a billion or two, sorry, let’s explore this one that doesn’t involve expropriation for a new RofWay etc. and doesn’t have the whiff of make it too costly/bad to even think about it further. Option: We beef up the bus service from end of existing subway at SRT, and those buses either go to their routes in a direct way or they go to Scarborough Town Centre first, perhaps using a part of the Gatineau Hydro corridor to really speed up the transit trip, and remove it from other roads.
And keep the SRT creaking and squealing along for as much of existing service as possible until that Smart Spur east-west rail line territory. QUICKLY demolish the east-west SRT, and make the Smart Spur link in to the STC; squeeze the billions; and have something done in the near-future, possibly ahead of the next election, which seems the real interest of most of the crew that has the majority, or recent election/buy-election wins. It’s not squeezing the billions to provide an East Waterfront line, or further LRTs in Scarborough, or housing repairs, or spending $25k on a bit of painted bike lane on Bloor St. between Sherbourne and Church in the 2001 Bike Plan, or sealing the leaking Viaduct.
And heck, along with new ideas, let’s expropriate some of the STC for a bus garage instead of the McCowan proposal on good land. The sprawl of Caronto/Moronto is deepressing, and if we have some relatively untouched land, despite real operational needs, what’s already been trashed (in an ecological way)?
Steve: There is no proposal for a bus garage at STC or on McCowan. The land taking is proposed for the access shaft for construction, and when that’s no longer needed, there will likely be a residual presence of an emergency exit building.
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My personal opinions on the subway to Scarborough are still the same: they should have extended the Sheppard Line instead of line 2 (although it would have been more expensive, more stations would have been built, the line would become useful, and getting to downtown would probably be faster (connections at Don Mills (if DRL gets extended up there), or Sheppard-Yonge instead of Bloor)). 3.2 billion is an absurd amount, and to think that they are not including a station at Lawrence East, or at Brimley … Nevertheless, this debate is depressing and needs to end.
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This just makes me sick. The wasted money on a project servicing a part of the city which has seen little growth in the last 20 years, when compared to the stagering growth of the downtown. Where it seems a new tower is going up every other week. Yet we have a subway built in the 50’s and 60’s which are over capacity, and streetcars which are over capacity and lacking enough rolling stock. Logic says intensify subway infrastructure where you need it. And we most certainly need it downtown.
I wonder if anyone who advocates for this grossly expensive subway to STC has tried to use the subway downtown in the last 4 years. If people in Scarborough gave a flying f$#@ about the betterment of their city (The city of Toronto) they would drop this selfish attitude and find a better solution then a subway they don’t need. We could retain the existing RT, modernize it with the newest generation of the ICTS technology and extend it. Then add new trains and we would have a great system. Vancouver seems to do well with theirs and it’s just the next generation of our RT. Why will no one consider this? Why are these people so keen to waste money on a project when the core of the city is being strangled by over capacity trains and streetcars, and lack of new investment.
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The plot by one of the factions to build SSE in a way that facilitates a future connection to Sheppard Subway is pretty transparent. However, the majority of the Council a) is not very interested in Sheppard Subway, and b) will not want to advance any more funding for SSE beyond the necessary minimum.
Looking from that angle, I can’t help noticing that the area bounded by the nice red circle on the De Baeremaeker’s map is just as suitable for the N-S subway alignment along Brimley as it is for the E-W alignment of the “big bend” scheme.
Both the subway station and the new bus terminal can fit in that area. The new bus terminal will cost some money, but probably a lot less than what is saved by making the subway tunnel 500 m shorter.
Quite a few buildings are actually closer to Brimley than to the current STC. The station relocation will inconvenience one group of riders, but another group will benefit from it. Moreover, since the subway will be entirely underground, a Progress-Malvern LRT will remain a possibility. If the said LRT is added to the picture, it can have a stop at the present STC location.
Steve: One problem with your scheme is that planning for the “STC Precinct” stretches over well east of McCowan. In fact no north-south line actually serves this area well because it is an east-west rectangle. That’s why the LRT schemes generally score better on access because they could have at least three stops across the precinct.
As for a lack of interest in Sheppard, there are a few councillors, notably James Pasternak, whose love for the Sheppard West connection to Downsview (the “North York Relief Line” as he calls it) will bring them onside.
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Some things do not quite add up. St Clair was initially estimated $32m for track replacement and $64m for right of way. The final price came in over $100m mostly because of project creep.
There is a vast difference between $100m and $1,800m for SRT replacement, yet the SRT is about the same length as St Clair, and both were/would be built on an existing right-of-way. Why is there so great a discrepancy?
Steve: Many differences:
I am sure that there is more, but I hope you can see that the scope of work in Scarborough would be vastly greater than what was done on St. Clair.
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Has anyone pointed out that the subway extension with one (new) station is just a bit shorter than the original Yonge line? Imagine living at Bloor and having to hike to St Clair or Union for a ride.
How much of STC will have to be demolished for additional commuter parking?
Steve: Ah but you forget that SmartTrack at Lawrence will provide the replacement link. If you believe that, I have several slightly used bridges for sale. Sadly for Scarborough, Tory’s SmartTrack scheme is an integral part of the idea that a one stop subway is adequate.
As for parking at STC, that’s going to be interesting because the mall does not want their parking lot used by commuters, just shoppers.
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Yes and this is exactly why its important to stop the hacking of transit into SCC. Integration counts. It’s a great starting point. Such a shame it’s taken so long to get here.
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That’s true, but the “big bend” scheme is not any better in that respect as it includes just one station, too. In fact, if we are building just one subway station within the “STC Precinct”, then it does not even matter if the subway is routed north-south, east-west, or diagonally, as long as that single station is roughly in the middle.
Futhermore, the city can temporarily limit the “Precinct” development to the areas west of McCowan, and make the involvement of the eastern lands conditional on the Progress – Malvern LRT that can be built at some point in future.
Steve: A nice idea, but planning work now underway is specifically focused on the area east of McCowan.
Well, let’s see what happens once the matter is before the Council. My gut feeling is that many councillors are sympathetic enough to the Scarborough transit situation to give them one subway line into the core, even at the cost of other city’s priorities; but they will not be equally open to fund the fancier elements of the plan. But I may be wrong.
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If the BD-SSE was taken up to Sheppard I could see the subway support soften enough for a LRT loop. If they go with the SSE on the RT alignment and extend the subway to Markham/Milner than LRT on Sheppard would certainly be possible. Otherwise if they continue with McCowan to SCC its a foregone conclusion that Sheppard will loop and the Eglinton crosstown will hook up to Malvern TC.
Those Councillors who are sympathetic to Scarborough already are. Those who aren’t have proven to be incapable of looking at any details aside from cost for their own personal benefit.
Steve: You were fine right up to “personal benefit”. The main benefits flowing to some SSE supporters is ego and electability.
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One thing that seems to have dropped off the table is the requirement for storage track at the end of the line. This was originally planned for Sheppard to accommodate a fleet expansion of seven trains. I don’t see the requirement mentioned in either the Glen Andrew Community Association scheme or the city’s more recent proposals. If not at Scarborough Centre, then where?
Steve: I don’t know about the Glen Andrew proposal, and they probably didn’t take that into account.
As for the TTC, the original plan for the SSE was to turn back every second train at Kennedy. With this arrangement, the existing fleet is big enough to run the line. If they buy more cars, there will be a new carhouse near Kipling Station and the storage problem goes away. This would actually save money on the SSE budget by transferring the cost of the added storage to the new carhouse project.
With all of the delays in getting the SSE alignment approved and work actually underway, the timing of the replacement BD fleet and the new carhouse may work out ok. The original earlier opening date for SSE would have been a problem.
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Steve: I was being ironic there. Of course ST will not replace the function of Lawrence East Station, but if enough City Bureaucrats kissing John Tory’s but say it will, who am I to argue?
In December 2015, Hilary Holden, head planner for the SSE and Duguid struck a deal to drop the Lawrence subway station to “save money” that would be diverted to the extended Eglinton LRT.
I asked,
City planning replied.
In layman terms, no SmartTrack is not adequate to replace the SRT at Lawrence. More people will spend time on longer bus routes and more time waiting to make transfers to get to the subway. A Lawrence subway station shortens many bus routes (especially the Kingston Road/Lawrence/Morningside triangle) and the coming boom in apartment buildings at Birchmount and Midland and Lawrence.
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Question for those who understand the workings of City Council.
Item EX 16.1 was debated at Executive Committee June 28 and amended. It was presented at City Council July 12. The text of the item before the Executive Committee is what you see in the initial page however the item that went before Council is considerably different. To read it you must go down to the purple bar at the bottom of the page and click on the + sign to the left of the purple bar.
Steve: Actually, you have it backwards. What is at the start of the item is the Council decision. The text down at the end is what Exec passed, but as you can see from the voting info, a lot changed along the way at Council.
I found two interesting recommendations in the Council item.
Recommendation 6
This is interesting because, the Sheppard East LRT is fully funded and the SSE is funded to $3.2 billion per the 2013 vote. There is no city funding for the extended Eglinton LRT (EELRT) project.
Steve: This is recommendation 6 in the Executive Committee version with identical text as recommendation 9 at Council. The items were renumbered due to amendments.
Recommendation 5 is also interesting.
Steve: This is recommendation 5 in the Exec version, and 8 in the Council version. The reference to recommendation 4 is updated in the Council version to “7” because of the renumbered sections.
I remember in a town hall meeting in June 2016 that City Planning promised the business case for the SSE and EELRT for early fall. I think these reports are due for the November City Council meeting. Jennifer Pagliaro of the the Star has produced a MetroLinx draft report.
In her article she says
What will the City Planners conclude?
Can anyone explain how an item at the Executive Committee can look so different at City Council?
Steve: As I said you got the sequence backward. It is the first version (top of the report) at Council that is the final version. It is not unusual on the transit file to see substantial amendments at Council and this is perfectly legitimate because Council is, after all, the senior body.
As for the planners, their report should have been at the recent Exec meeting, but it has been held back allegedly for discussions with Queen’s Park. Whether these relate to requests for more funding, for some sort of accommodation on the cost of SmartTrack being added to GO RER’s construction, or the Duguid gambit to reroute the subway, we don’t know.
There is also the question of what sort of cock-and-bull story the planners will cook up to justify whatever they are recommending this time out.
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Right. That goes for all Politicians.
The difference here is we have a relentless one sided political media assault on Scarborough. At this point and for quite some time the bias has just added fuel to divide the City further. But they clear this select group of councilors and media have no intention in changing or working together to advance progress.
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Richard White says he’ll be 50 before this thing is completed. Steve and I will be 90!
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The reasoning behind this alignment seems logical but has a fatal flaw: an emergency exit building will likely be needed at the intersection of McCowan and Ellesmere.
While the construction of an emergency exit is simpler than a station, area residents and businesses can look forward to 2-3 years of construction and probable expropriation of the Petro Canada station at the southeast corner.
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John Norton – I wasn’t going to chime in on this, but your comments frustrated me and I felt a need to add my 2 cents. As someone who grew up relatively close to downtown (walking distance to Jane Station) and who now lives & works in Scarborough, I feel that I’m qualified to speak, as I see both sides of the overly drawn out debate. Your comments imply 2 things:
– that 100% of the residents of Scarborough have had a sip of the Tory lemonade and want an overpriced subway
– that city councillors actually listen to their constituents and would reconsider their politically motivated stance on the subway
I work within steps of where the proposed SRT extension would have terminated (Progress/Sheppard), and every day I see the masses waiting for 102, 134, or 132 buses. I know what difference an extended SRT (OK…..I’ll do my best to appease Andy Byford….line 3) would make.
Oh…and John….people of Scarborough do give a, as you put it, flying f$#@ about the city. You really should drop the “Toronto Life” mentality – that life doesn’t exist beyond The Beach.
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So, now you are complaining that since the Scarborough subway is not going to Centennial College, Malvern, or U of T that it should not be built at all but you whose blood boils at any subway being built in Scarborough at all and even so bitterly oppose a small subway extension to the Scarborough Centre, how could you bear to see subway in Scarborough going as far as Centennial College, Malvern, or U of T?
Steve: Listen, you twit, I am simply pointing out that the Glen Andrew folks talk about the one-stop subway not going to the northeast as a detriment of that proposal, but then put forward an alternative that does not either, and moreover that precludes further extension in that direction. No, I don’t think a subway should go out to UTSC, but it shouldn’t be going to STC either.
That’s a good endorsement for the said Scarborough subway champions because your comment shows that they are not playing politics by insisting on a pet subway to or near their ridings but instead are concerned with the welfare of Scarborough overall which is in stark contrast to the Downtown Relief Line supporters where everyone wants a pet subway station in their riding.
Steve: But they didn’t make that distinction when running for election, and that’s what counts.
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You mention several engineering challenges which arise from the using a large single bore TBM compared to the TTC’s conventional twin 6 m TBM technique, including:
• marrying a single tunnel into the tail track at Kennedy,
• depth below ground
• conflict with Crosstown LRT at Kennedy;
If the Big Bend proposal were the source of using a large diameter TBM then your conclusions could well be correct that:
1. “This is not simply a case of looking at an alternative design for the STC area, but of reviewing the entire line.” ; and
2. “This represents a considerable delay.”
Since it is in fact a TTC proposal they’ve had at least the last 5 months to study and resolve the concerns you list.
Here’s what we’re saying:
Hey if you’re going with a large diameter single bore tunnel, go for the 12 or 13m model because it has the potential to release the efficiencies of in-tunnel station construction according to world renowned tunneling experts like Hatch and AECOM. We believe that the possibility of “cheaper and less disruptive” should be of interest to Toronto Council and their funding partners.
Steve: Your press release does not make this clear, and frankly, the TTC does not from anything I’ve seen been looking at a single bore tunnel beyond the point of discarding it as an option. Also considering that only one (possibly two) stations are involved over the length of the route, the relative saving on station construction versus the cost of the larger bore might not be as favourable as you present it.
On a more general note, I have a big problem with external consultants being cited in this regard because at this point the line is a drawing on a map, little more. There are other factors affecting the viability of a single tunnel option that could rule it out. You give the impression that if we move to a large, single bore, then like magic our problems are solved.
Size of the Work Site
You write that:
Could well be. But at 1.8 ha, the Big Grassy Field is twice the size of what the TTC have been studying for 5 months.
You’re right to suggest that for subway construction purposes the leg of Borough Drive adjacent to the east of the Big Grassy Field could well be closed. From personal observation there is very little traffic and zero pedestrian traffic on it. No adjacent properties take access from it. Adding it would bring the work site up to +|- 2.4 hectares.
The work site the TTC have been ‘studying’ since May on the south side of Ellesmere, if they expropriate the plaza and gas station, would be +\- 0.88 hectares…and it’s oriented east west. [See page 9 of June 8th TTC power point.] If they expropriate the gas station and 10 home on Stanwell for the work site it’s oriented north south but still only 0.95 hectares.
A further observation we’ve made is there are several large pieces of vacant, never been used, land within easy shuttle distance of the Big Grassy Field work site we propose. If the site we propose is ‘small’ compared to Brentcliffe et al, it’s not difficult to lease any/all of these vacant sites for equipment and material storage, employee parking, whatever. No expropriation. No demolition of homes and businesses. Direct trucking access to 401. Not difficult or expensive to restore to present conditions following construction of the subway.
Steve: These details are worth mentioning in support of your proposal rather than giving the impression that only the BGF is required, which is how I read your paper.
The work site is perhaps the single largest source of concern in the community. We have been challenging the TTC since early June to tell us just how they expect to construct a 6 kilometer subway from such a small work site, located within the neighbourhood without creating horrendous conditions for themselves and for us. They have not replied.
You write:
We agree totally. That is exactly what we are asking our Federal, Provincial and City representatives to do:
Do not approve the TTC plan until you have an engineering feasibility and cost comparison of the Big Bend subway alignment and use of a 13m TBM.
Lorne Ross
For the Glen Andrew and North Bendale Community Associations.
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As lead author of the Big Bend Subway our point is that as proposed by the TTC the subway could not make a 90 degree turn to the east toward Centennial or anywhere else from a station in the east mall parking lot. Even at the tightest turning radius it would run smack into the deep underground parking garages and foundations of very tall apartments on the north side of Corporate Drive.
City Planning Staff advised Council they did not want it extended north to Sheppard because that would take potential office development away from Scarborough Centre.
So it’s a dead end subway unless it is turned through the Big Bend to point north west in the approved alignment of the Sheppard Subway.
Lorne Ross
Steve: Thanks for the clarification. Now as to diverting development, you only have to find out how much the supposed concentrations at Lawrence East and other GO/Smart Track stations will affect STC.
As for Planning and Sheppard, it’s amusing that part of their inflated ridership estimate for the subway was based on the line crossing the 401 and being more attractive to commuters (at least in the model) from Markham. Of course they will now be on Smart Track, or so it is claimed.
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Re Use of a Large Diameter Single Bore TBM
We are not the source of the large diameter single bore tunnel proposal.
1. On June 6th at the TTC-City Planning SAG meeting, Gary Carr, TTC’s Project Manager for the Scarborough Subway Extension advised the community they would be using a 10.7m single bore TBM.
2. On June 8th Stephanie Rice, TTC Director, Third Party, Planning and Property released a power point presentation to area residents. Text on page 2 is:
3. I wrote to Stephanie on June 17 reiterating what she had told us:
4. We have had no communication from the TTC contradicting this belief.
Lorne Ross.
Steve: Thank you for the info. This at least explains where you’re coming from on single bore, but does not address the fact that a tunnel about 20% greater in diameter will involve excavation of about 45-50% more material with associated cost. Whether this will be offset against station construction is quite another matter.
Can you make the TTC’s Power Point deck public? It would be useful to know what the community has been told/shown.
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There was a time when I was tangentially working on locating the SSE EEBs, before it was dropped to 1-stop. The design we had at the time was for a single bore tunnel, with offset platforms at each station. That is to say, basically inline platforms. For example, at Lawrence, the northbound platform was south of the intersection, while the southbound platform was north of it. I’m sure this was all preliminary (less than 10% design?), but there was some study done at some point by somebody relating to a single bore tunnel anyways.
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TransoPlanner:
Can you tell us if they used the 13m TBM and only built the one station at Scarborough Centre, could the powers that be come back a couple years hence and build additional stations within the tunnel? Like at our hospital/nursing home/medical office concentration at Lawrence or perhaps on Eglinton?
Steve: This depends on keeping the tunnel level in anticipation of future station sites and aligned so that vertical accesses would be easy to add later considering utilities, groundwater, etc. North York Centre Station was called Park Home when provision for it was built into the Finch extension.
I know an issue TTC had with Lawrence was that it would be substantially more expensive to align in anticipation, although this was probably based on the box tunnel/station model, not the 13m variant. Still, a challenging location due to groundwater.
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How much contact has this so-called Glen Andrews Community Association had with MPP Duguid and is this group being directed or nudged by local area members at QP?
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I find that choice of wording to be somewhat disconcerting since a Sheppard subway extension to STC is viewed as an inevitability and thus development will always favour Scarborough Centre over a station at McCowan and Sheppard. Office development would only start drifting north after costs become too high in the Scarborough Centre area.
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