Day: September 18, 2020

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TTC Covid Service Recovery Plans

At its September 24, 2020 meeting, the TTC Board will consider a report from management on the current status of the “Restart and Recovery” program.

This report contains a variety of information including:

  • A review of the physical changes the TTC has been implementing and investigating to improve health and safety on its system.
  • Demand and service plans for the coming months.
  • Financial projections
  • A current survey of rider attitudes to travel on the TTC

This article deals only with the service plans. I will turn to the other components after the TTC meeting.

Conventional System Service

Ridership on the main part of the transit system (excluding Wheel-Trans which I will discuss later) has been growing slowly from the low point in April 2020.

The return of demand varies by mode and this is strongly influenced by the higher proportion of trips to downtown jobs and academic institutions that have been replaced by work-from-home arrangements.

The bus system is back at about half of its normal demand although the subway is at only about a third. The TTC does not plan to restore full service until the system as a whole reaches 50%, but is running extra unscheduled buses on routes where crowding is a problem. As I have previously reported, the TTC does not list where and when these extras are used, nor does it routinely publish crowding statistics.

A big problem with the 49% level for bus boardings compared to pre-covid conditions is that this is an average. It blends data from all routes, all times of day, and all parts of the city. There will be places and times of lower demand and places where routes are as crowded as pre-covid. This is borne out by photos posted on social media by riders.

Certain types of trips, indeed even the potential for some trips, will not return to the system until “normal” times especially for special events and entertainment. School travel at all levels will run below “normal” while classes are provided via distance learning for the safety of students.

This will dilute the returning numbers of workers who continue to use the TTC and bring down the overall percentages even though some routes will see demand well over the 50% level, but with less than 100% of the pre-covid service.

Overall crowding levels are shown in the chart below which is driven by Automatic Passenger Counter (APC) data. As ridership grows, the proportion of trips running above 30% or 50% of capacity (reference points for acceptable crowding in stages of the recovery plan) have also grown. Note that this includes the benefits of whatever unscheduled extra service the TTC has operated.

What is badly needed is a better public understanding of where crowding is a problem at the route and time of day level, not simply on an average basis across the system. Only in this context can the addition or redeployment of resources — drivers and buses, not to mention funding — make sense.

The TTC plans some service improvements in coming months:

  • Starting in September, the TTC is dispatching extra buses to deal with the rise in school trips as elementary and secondary schools re-open and some of their population returns as TTC riders.
  • In October, the TTC will make improvements on Eglinton East to take advantage of the recently installed bus lanes. This will include restoration of 905 Eglinton East and 986 Scarborough express services.
  • In November, more express services will return and local services will be improved by using some of the buses and drivers now operating on demand-based standby service.

The October changes will be accomplished by reallocating service from poor-performing routes, and it will be interesting to see which routes are on the chopping block. Indeed, it would be useful to see a full list of routes and service periods that are under threat of service cuts considering that full funding for 2021 is far from certain. For 2021, any new services will have to compete with existing routes for resources.

An important distinction in service design that will be with us for some time will be the spreading of the “peak” period, or more accurately a lower demand at the height of the peaks resulting in more uniform demand and service levels. This has been part of the schedule design for recent months when “trippers” that ordinarily would be in service for only a few hours in each peak operated for 6-7 hours/day with only a brief mid-day window between the “AM” and “PM” peak service levels.

Another issue related to core area demand will be the degree to which non-core oriented trips take a proportionately larger role on the TTC and how network and service designs react to this.

Travel between suburbs has always been more difficult than travel to and from downtown because so much service is oriented to feeding the subway network. Coming months provide a chance to address this problem with a stronger focus on the surface network and the areas it serves.

For 2021, various options are part of TTC planning:

  • Continuation of some demand-responsive service to allow quick adjustments as travel patterns evolve.
  • The potential effect of a “second wave” that could affect both ridership and the level of distancing required on transit vehicles.
  • Adjusting service patterns and network structure, as discussed above, to react to and support new patterns of demand.
  • Improve service reliability (a subject of several recent articles on this site).
  • Continue the RapidTO plan of creating more exclusive bus lanes.
  • Cross-border service and fare integration with systems in the 905.
  • Micro-transit and automated shuttle services (*).

(*) The last bullet is quite clearly a sop to the political forces at Queen’s Park where there are assumptions that large savings can be had by using self-driving mini-buses and/or some form of alternate transit to replace lightly used routes. The big problems on the TTC are on routes where these options are hopelessly inadequate, and yet there will be pressure to focus on them as some sort of magic bullet for transit budget problems.

Public consultation regarding the 2021 Service Plan is now in progress with the intent of reporting to the Board late in 2020. The big unknown for next year is the state of the TTC Budget and the possibility that the system will face arbitrary cutbacks to fit within a City and Provincial budget envelope.

Wheel-Trans

Although Wheel-Trans is a much smaller operation than the “conventional” system, ridership has been returning to it roughly in line with the rest of the surface system. Demand is expected to be close to 50% of pre-covid levels by the end of 2020.

As demand rises, the ability to distance on WT services will begin to be difficult and some ride-sharing will have to occur starting in late September.

WT ridership is a particular challenge for the TTC on three counts:

  • The ratio of a fully-loaded vehicle to one operating at covid-based distancing and capacity is much higher for WT than for regular TTC vehicles. This means that distancing problems kick in much sooner as demand grows on the WT network compared with the “conventional” one.
  • The TTC has attempted to shift WT riders to its “family of services” model where trips are taken part by a WT ride and partly on the conventional system. However, crowding issues, already challenging for some WT users under “normal” circumstances, are more of a problem with limited capacity on buses.
  • The WT user community has a higher proportion of riders with risk factors for covid exposure and their concerns about behaviour by other riders are heightened.

Coming Soon …

I will update this article with additional information, if any, from the TTC Board meeting.

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Ontario Line Draft Environmental Conditions Report Released

October 6, 2020: This article has been updated with information on the north section of the Ontario Line between Danforth and Eglinton (Pape to Science Centre).

September 29, 2020: This article has been updated with information on the east section of the Ontario Line between the Don River and Danforth.

September 23, 2020: This article has been updated with information on the central section of the Ontario Line between Osgoode Station and the west side of the Don River.

I asked Metrolinx a series of questions about information released in the two “neighbourhood updates”:

1. The station boxes that are shown are barely 100m long. What provision will the stations include for ventilation shafts? Will they be within the platform area or will they be beyond the end of the platforms as on, for example, the Crosstown line?

2. There is only minimal discussion of entrance locations. Will the stations include two separate paths from platform to surface as per fire code?

3. Will there be emergency service buildings between the more widely spaced stations to provide egress in case of a tunnel fire?

4. There is reference to using the space for lower Queen station as part of the design, but this area is (a) fairly small and (b) already used for a variety of purposes. Is the intent to have the OL go beneath all of the existing structure with the actual track and platform below lower Queen and with the “ghost” station space (which is already used in part as a pedestrian underpass between northbound and southbound platforms) only used for circulation space between the two lines? That would make a lot more sense than actually trying to take OL trains through the existing lower Queen Station.

5. The diagram of the Don Yard shows a direct conflict between the structure for the westbound OL portal and the Richmond Hill GO corridor. What is happening here?

In response, Metrolinx issued the following rather opaque reply:

Metrolinx will factor in all necessary safety and accessibility requirements into the Ontario Line designs. The most recent update is a more detailed vision of the project, but more details are still to come.

Metrolinx will be closely coordinating any Ontario Line work alongside our existing rail operations to minimize or avoid service impacts, while also respecting concurrent GO Expansion work.

Email from Scott Money, Metrolinx Media Relations

The original article begins here:

On September 17, 2020, Metrolinx released the Draft Environmental Conditions Report [Draft ECR] for the Ontario Line.

A huge volume of material is included, thousands of pages, but the vast majority of this only documents existing conditions and gives little indication of the actual “environmental impact” that building and operating the Ontario Line will have.

For convenience, here are links to source materials. The Draft ECR link leads to a page with many documents, some of which are very large PDFs.

Jump to section-specific discussions:

It is self-evident that the actual impact of any project cannot be known without the details of what will be built. This information is not yet public and only sample area maps which are drafts “for illustrative purposes only” have been released for a portion of the route. More will follow in coming weeks, but one must ask why they are not all available now if Metrolinx expects informed comment on their proposal.

Even on the supplied maps, many key features are missing including:

  • Vertical and horizontal alignment including property requirements for construction
  • Station sites, access and circulation plans including redundant paths between platforms and the surface for fire safety
  • Emergency service buildings and access structures to tunnels
  • Utility buildings such as substations

During the public consultation process and as recently as the April 2020 report summarizing this work, the project timeline was illustrated as below. This clearly shows that only one set of “Environmental Reports” were to be published and this was expected in Fall 2020, that is to say, now.

Source: Engagement Summary Report, April 2020, p. 43

Ontario changed the legislation relating to Environmental Assessments with the effect that the item of most interest — the actual design and effect of the project — will not be known until later in the process than the public originally expected.

As required under O. Reg. 341/20, Metrolinx is preparing an environmental conditions report, which will be published for public review and input prior to finalization. The report will characterize the environmental setting in the vicinity of the Ontario Line, including existing noise and vibration levels, air quality, natural environment features, built heritage and archaeological resources, socio-economic and land use features, and traffic conditions.

Metrolinx is also planning to publish early works reports for components of the Ontario Line project that are planned to proceed to implementation ahead of completion of the Ontario Line assessment process.The early works reports will assess the environmental impacts of the early works and describe associated mitigation measures. The early works reports will be published for public review and input prior to finalization.

Following finalization of early works reports, Metrolinx will publish an environmental impact assessment report, which will assess the environmental impacts of the Ontario Line and describe associated mitigation measures. The environmental impact assessment report will be published for public review and input prior to finalization,as part of Metrolinx’s effort to meet the best practices and community consultation principles that are part of the Environmental Assessment Act with all projects. This will be followed by early works reports and the Environmental Impact Assessment Report environmental impact evaluation results, mitigation measures, monitoring activities, potentially required permits and approvals and other components.

Source: Metrolinx Update to City of Toronto, p. 13

There are now three streams of reports and consultation. First up is the ECR which has just been issued, but separately there are reports on “Early Works” (design and construction that can get underway to advance the project before the full design is locked down) and then the “Environmental Impact Assessment Report”. It is only in the last report that the details of design and effects on neighbourhoods will be revealed, and this is planned for winter-spring 2021.

Source: Ontario Line Environment Page

On a parallel track, the procurement process is already underway with teams short-listed to bid on two major contracts:

  • Rolling Stock, Systems, Operations and Maintenance (RSSOM)
  • Southern Civil, Stations and Tunnel (Exhibition to Don Yard Portal)

The Northern Civil, Stations and Tunnel package (Don Yard Portal to Eglinton) will be tendered separately in 2022.

The ECR contains material reviewing conditions in a wide study area shown in the map below.

The study area is relatively wide in some areas, but narrower in others implying that a range of options was reviewed for parts of the route. Notable by its absence is the original Eastern-Pape corridor for the Relief Line showing that there was never any intention of entertaining this as an option, if only for comparative purposes.

The study area in Thorncliffe/Flemingdon is fairly large in part because this includes the proposed maintenance yard, but also because alternative routes through this area were under consideration.

Source: Draft Environmental Conditions Report, page i

Alignment plans are shown only for the western segment between Exhibition and Queen/Spadina at this point. Metrolinx plans to unveil details of additional segments on a weekly basis for other parts of the line:

  • Osgoode Station to Don Yard
  • East Harbour to Pape South
  • Pape North to Science Centre (Eglinton)

They have published details for the first segment in a blog article as well as on the West Neighbourhood page (both linked above). I will update this article as information on these segments is revealed.

One burning issue in the third segment is the alignment through and effects on the South Riverdale and Leslieville area between East Harbour and Gerrard Stations. Although details on this have not been published, there is a note in a recent Metrolinx report to City Council (linked above) about the area just north of Queen Street where a recreation centre stood in the line’s path.

The Ontario Line team is working with City staff to ensure the project is delivered with minimal impacts to sensitive community areas and properties, such as parks and community centres. For example, following significant design and engineering effort, the station at Riverside/Leslieville has been positioned to avoid impacting Jimmie Simpson Community Centre. Efforts are underway to minimize impacts to other key community assets, including, Pape Avenue Middle School, Valley Park Middle School, Bruce Mackey Park, the future Ordnance Park, places of worship and other locations. Where an impact cannot be avoided the team will continue to work with City staff to address continuity of programming.

Source: Metrolinx Update to City of Toronto, p. 13
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