This is the final article in a series reviewing the effects of diversions around various construction and road repair project downtown during the month of October 2023, and especially the period from October 18 to 25.
Previous articles are:
In the third installment, I look at the effect of the route changes and congestion on the quality of service on affected major routes: 501 Queen, 503 Kingston Road and 504 King.
Service was badly disrupted not just downtown, but on other parts of these routes which already suffered from erratic headways (the interval between vehicles) in “normal” TTC operations. A major problem with TTC service quality reporting is that it does not consider the fine-grained detail, and yet that is the level at which riders experience the system.
“Congestion” is something the City talks about in the abstract, but does not really address especially in acknowledging that some roads are full.
There are many detailed charts in this article, more than I would usually publish. They show how the view of data changes as one moves down from broad averages to specifics, and how seriously unreliable service was on routes affected by the sinkhole diversion even without that extra layer of problems.
Equally importantly, these charts show that problems are not occasional, but a chronic feature of TTC operations.
Data here goes only to the end of October, although the effects of the diversion carried over into early November. Even after service returned to “normal”, regular congestion effects remained on parts of King Street showing the underlying issue that was compounded by the diversion and its delays. I will turn to that in early December when I have all of November’s data.
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Steve Munro 