A Grand Plan

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The Future of Transit: Swan Boats!

Back in the early days of this board, I posted an item co-authored with my good friend Sarah concerning the use of Swan Boats as a solution to transport technology in the Don Valley corridor.

You laughed!  You scoffed!  You doubted our pride and professionalism! From that day forward, only movie reviews and endless arguments for LRT graced these pages.

Until today!

Now all will be revealed!  The future of Toronto’s transit is canals and swan boats!

He’s gone mad, you say!  He must be drunk, or worse, you say!  But, no, it is true!

First the canals:  CNN today reported that Panama citizens will vote on a $5-billion project to widen the Panama Canal, while Nicaragua is thinking of building its own canal at a price of only $18-billion.  Let’s put this in context.  The canal is 51 miles (81.6 km) long, and that translates to a cost/km of a mere $221-million.

That’s for a whacking great canal to handle huge ocean freighters and take them across the continental divide.  Looking at the proposed Spadina extension’s cost, this is a competitive technology!

Now we turn to the vehicles.  Swan  boats are available (On sale now!  Two week delivery!) for a mere $28,997 (US).  Just go to this site if you don’t believe me. [The URL no longer works.]

People are so fond of making comparisons on vehicle cost — let’s look at a swan boat.  It holds 12 people, hence a cost per seat of about $2,400.

The design load of a bus is around 50 and the current products seat around 30.  At a capital cost of roughly $600K, this is $12,000 per passenger or $20,000 per seat.

Subway cars have a design load of about 200 and seat about 75.  They cost roughly $3-million, for a cost per passenger of $15,000 and a cost per seat of $40,000.

It’s no contest!  Toronto must immediately abandon all plans for unproven technologies and start building canals for swan boats.  Only with this visionary plan will the future of Toronto’s transportation system be safe!

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A Rose By Any Other Name (Updated)

Profound thanks to the many readers who commented on this item!  Based on all this feedback, not to mention my own preferences, the list of new station names is almost complete.  Here’s what it looks like now:

Bloor-Danforth East:

Scarborough Junction, Massey Creek, Dentonia Park, East Toronto, North Beach, East York, Linsmore, [Donlands], Ελλας, Riverdale, Playter, [Castle Frank, Sherbourne]

Bloor-Danforth West: 

Roy’s Square, Yorkville, Rochdale, Lowther, The Annex, Willowvale, [Ossington], Brockton, [Lansdowne], West Toronto, Parkside, [High Park], Swansea, Baby Point, [Old Mill], Kingsway, Montgomery, Six Points

Yonge:

Finch’s, Willowdale, Lansing, Hogg’s Hollow, Muir Gardens, Rebellion, Belt Line, Avoca, North Toronto, Crescent, Roy’s Square, Rainbow, Carlton, O’Keefe’s Lane, City Hall, Melinda, Royal York

University/Spadina: 

[St. Andrew], Osgoode Hall, [St. Patrick], Taddle Creek, Planetarium, Rochdale, Lowther, Casa Loma, Wells Hill, York, Viewmount, [Lawrence West], Arc en Ciel, Downsview, Wilson Heights.

I am amused that we have two “rainbows” one in each official language.  Moreover, the one formerly known as Wellesley has the most boring decor on the system.  Just imagine what a few inspired decorators could do! 

The original post and comments follow below. Continue reading →

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To Toll or Not To Toll

Today’s Metro Morning included a discussion of road tolls as a way to fund public transit.  Let’s put this in perspective.

The Gardiner Expressway report talks about a toll equivalent to a transit fare, and it would generate $130-million annually.  What can we get for $130-million?

  • Over 150 new buses per year, or
  • 15 to 20 percent improvement in TTC service, or
  • A 3 year project to build all of the eastern waterfront transit improvements, or
  • A 10 year project to rebuild and expand Scarborough’s transit network, or
  • A 20 year project to build the Spadina Subway to Vaughan

There is an unfortunate tendency to talk about funding sources such as tolls without putting them in context.  We know that the TTC’s own Capital Budget projections require about $1-billion annually for the next 10 years.  This includes about $3-billion worth of subway construction.

We keep talking about better transit, but we need to be honest about the amount of money involved.  $130-million a year is small change beside the Board of Trade’s estimate that congestion costs the GTA $1.8-billion.  Tolls might raise some money, but they are not going to solve all of our funding problems by a long shot, especially if we add major road projects like the Gardiner to our project list.

Any government thinking of funding transit has to face up to one basic fact:  tax revenue (whatever you call it) has to go up.  The only question is which pocket you pick.

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All Night Subway Service?

The Transit Commissioners have forwarded a letter from another of Toronto’s long-time transit advocates, Philip Webb, to their staff for study.  The nub of Webb’s proposal is that the TTC should stop trying to conduct maintenance a few hours at a time in the middle of the night and simply close down sections of the subway for a day or two on weekends when necessary.  Continue reading →

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No More Subways? It Must Be Something In The Air

No sooner do I write about the TTC’s capital budget woes, but former Chief General Manager Rick Ducharme is quoted in today’s Star saying we shouldn’t build more subways.

“We can talk about plans, we can talk about co-ordination.  You can talk about smart cards.  All that to me is irrelevant.  You need big investments.  That stopped over 20 years ago.  I don’t really see any political visionary that really would take on the fight to do it.”

Ducharme’s not campaigning for the job.  But if he had his way, Toronto wouldn’t build another subway.  To him, it’s a waste of money to spend $2 billion on a few kilometres with a handful of stops.

The better, cheaper, faster choice is to hand over lanes of roads to buses and streetcars.  With $2 billion, the city and the region could be covered with fast-moving transit vehicles that won’t get caught in traffic and would have a predictable and reliable schedule.

… “Give me a dedicated rights-of-way, and it will work.” …

“You need a political visionary who’s got guts to say: `I’m doing it. I’m not going to listen to the complaints of car drivers.”

For the full story, click here.

Is this the same Rick Ducharme who allowed the Ridership Growth Strategy to be amended to include the Spadina and Sheppard Subway extensions?  If he feels that they are such a waste of money, why did he bring forward these schemes and recommend that the TTC endorse them as its top priority for expansion rather than an alternative proposal?

When the Toronto Star, the former CGM at TTC, and the chief transit rabble-rouser are all singing the same tune, something very strange is going on.  Now we need politicians in all regions and at all levels of government who will fight for transit.

David Miller:  It’s time you recognized that your constituency is the transit riders of the City of Toronto and started fighting for things that will benefit all of us.  Indeed a move away from subway-dominated planning will benefit everyone in the GTA by showing what can be done over a much larger area for far less money.  Toronto could lead the way in a transit renaissance, if only the Mayor would actually embrace the role.

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TTC Capital Budget: Where Will The Money Come From?

In between many screenings at the Film Festival, I took the opportunity to write up the TTC’s Capital Budget presentation from August 30.  The information here is a combination of the TTC staff presentation, remarks by Ted Tyndorf, Chief Planner for Toronto, and my own opinions.  This is intended mainly as a view of the most recent TTC thoughts on the subject. 

Here are the high points:

  • Expenditures on transit have been deferred over and over again, with most big-ticket attention going to a handful of subway lines.  This is not sustainable.
  • Population and ridership growth is happening faster than predicted, and significant investment in new and improved service is essential.
  • The goals of the Official Plan and Building a Transit City are not worth a penny if we are not going to invest in transit.
  • The TTC budget projections push some projects further into the future than is reasonable if we are going to lead population growth with transit, for example, the Transit First policy for the eastern waterfront. 
  • There is no provision for many new lines including the proposed LRT/BRT network in Scarborough or anything in the Don Mills corridor.

I will take up the issue of where we should go next with transit planning in a future post, likely over the weekend.  Meanwhile, the gory details. Continue reading →

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The RT and Scarborough’s Future

The Final Report of the Scarborough RT Strategic Plan came up for discussion nearly at the end of a very long Commission meeting on August 30.  This was preceded by a long presentation on the Capital Budget, approval of the Bombardier subway car order and a moving deputation by the wives of two workmen seriously injured by on-the-job carbon monoxide poisoning.  Lengthy debate was unlikely. Continue reading →

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Scarborough RT Final Report — Remarks for August 30, 2006

The following is the text of the deputation I will be presenting on August 30 at the TTC meeting.  Note that the length and complexity are dictated by the context of public deputations with a finite limit on both time and attention by the Commission.

The text of this presentation has been edited to indicate changes made when it was delivered. 

Continue reading →

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SRT Final Report — RT Or LRT?

The SRT study is to be considered at the TTC meeting on August 30.  There are three documents in all:

I am not going to attempt to duplicate this material here and recommend that readers review the documents for detailed background to this issue. Continue reading →