Service Analysis

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Shelters on St. Clair (Updated)

The TTC will install new shelters on St. Clair starting in late July.  They are currently at the stage of approving drawings for the manufacture of the shelters, then there will be a prototype, then the installation.

I can’t help wondering why on a project that has seen so many delays we are only just now getting around to the preliminary stages of building the shelters.  This is one more example of a project with equal measures of bad luck and bad planning.

On a brighter note, I was at a community meeting tonight regarding the detailed plans for this year’s construction between Westmount and McRoberts, and things went much more smoothly than the raucous gatherings of earlier times. 

Update May 9:  The presentation materials are available online.

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Jane’s Walk 2: My Home Streetcar Lines — Mt. Pleasant & St. Clair

Back in the days when goodly chunks of “the suburbs” were still farms, I grew up in North Toronto near Mt. Pleasant and Eglinton.  This neighbourhood dates from the building boom of the 1920s, although our house was older, 1906, the third one built in our block.  The old farmhouse up the road was replaced by two monster homes a few years ago, and now ours is number 2 in seniority.

When I was young, I spent a lot of time down at Mt. Pleasant Loop watching the streetcars.  This was a typical old style TTC loop with trees and benches, a house to the north and a BA gas station to the south right on the corner.  All of that’s gone now, and the loop is simply a hole in the front of seniors’ building where, infrequently, one can find a Mt. Pleasant bus.

The other corners held Ted’s Restaurant (gone — replaced like other stores around it with an ugly midrise office block), Eglinton Public School (replaced by a new building that turns its back on the intersection with a dead wall where once there was a playground), and the Bank of Commerce (now a Second Cup, but at least the original building).

Tracks ran west on Eglinton to Yonge, but these were never used for revenue service.  These had been installed in 1930 to allow operation of the St. Clair line from Eglinton Carhouse, but this never happened.  The junction at Mt. Pleasant came out in 1959, but the track to Yonge, buried under pavement, remained years longer until Eglinton was repaved. Continue reading →

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Travels in The Beach

The following is a combination of two comments sent in recently by Renee Knight, and I’m putting them in their own thread.

The 501 Queen Car in the Beach is doing a terribly pathetic job of serving this neighbourhood. Even in the midst of summer and with tourists flocking to the neighbourhood, there seems to be no consideration to the people that live here and need to get out of the beach for work, doctors, medical appointments…

In the last 5 years the state of service on the streetcar has become so abysmal that people buy houses in the Beach thinking they can take the Streetcar to their offices downtown, and to often end up either driving to work or selling their homes and moving downtown where they can walk to work.

Today alone, I waited 20 minutes for a streetcar that’s supposed to go every 6 minutes, and then got turfed off at Connaught, and then again at McCaul, just to go to Trinity and Strachan from Queen and Wineva, and this at 10:00 a.m. on a Thursday. We’re not talking rush hour, no traffic problems, it’s a great sunny day.

The problem is that the people who decide on the short turns the drivers make aren’t anywhere near the route, and could care less if the schedule is being met, as in picking up passengers along the route. The focus is on the downtown core. TTC doesn’t get it that we also need to get downtown from the beach and back home again. Three streetcars and an hour an a half for a 40 minute trip is really pathetic, and it does not have to be this way.

I don’t believe that traffic congestion is the problem. I believe the problem is a negligent management so out of touch with its ridership that they just don’t care. And as far as that goes, this creates staff that doesn’t care either, if they can’t meet schedules, and are constantly being yelled at; after a while you give up and stop listening. That’s what we are finding on our route. Drivers have given up, their supervisors are not listening to them or us. What are we to do? It’s only going to get worse if no-one is looking at solutions!

For many years, the streetcar was very enjoyable to take, not so anymore!

I have called in to customer service, written letters that go unanswered… What can we do in the Beach to improve the service? Petition?

Any suggestions, Steve?

[2nd part]

Yes, this used to be the TTC’s motto before, The Better Way. What happened to the better way? It’s not better anymore.

I’ve taken the transit in this city for over 20 years, and the surface routes are painfully deteriorting in service. Particularly the Queen Car (501 – Neville Park – serving the Beach) I have never been more disappointed at the level of service on this route. My 64 Main bus does not disappoint, but anytime I have to take the Queen car, I am concerned, as 9/10 times, I will not get a streetcar for at least 20 minutes, often 30 or more minutes.

We always give ourselves around 15 minutes leeway to get to our desinations, assuming we should not have to wait to long for a streetcar that is scheduled to come to the stop (Queen & Wineva) every 6 minutes, so it isn’t a matter of people leaving late and blaming transit. It’s a matter of transit short turning 1/2 of the streetcars that are scheduled to come into the Beach, and that’s before any problems start on the line.

It’s just not an acceptable level of service.

I long for the days when I could see a car that wasn’t headed to Neville in a 20-30 minute wait, and trusting I’d see a car come my way before the one that just went down to Neville.

It used to take 30 minutes to get to Yonge & Queen from Wineva, now it takes an hour, trip time is still the same, what’s changed is the wait time. Very rarely are the traffic issues so bad that the neglect of not serving the Beach at least reasonably close to the schedule is actually neccesary.

What happens now, is that car returning from Neville Park will have one or two cars within minutes behind it, leaving terrible gaps in service that no-one seems to care about. The “we’re sorry for your inconvencience” from a Customer Service staffer just does nothing to remove the problem! In fact it’s like a slap in the face for bothering to call in!

The schedule, as we say in the Beach is “Published Fiction”. It’s a joke, and should be an embarrasment to the TTC, and those who supervise the line. I do not blame the drivers, they simply follow directions of their superiors, no matter how daft.

Steve:  I really am getting tired of the TTC’s lame excuses that all their problems would go away if there were no traffic congestion.  First off, the congestion is not anywhere near as bad all of the time on all of the routes as the TTC claims.  Second, there are ongoing problems with mismanagement of the service as described in Renee’s comments above.

For decades, the TTC has forgotten that many of the people who actually use the routes downtown live on the outer part of the line.  Screw up the service there and you drive away ridership.

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Streetcar Track Construction Update

The TTC agenda for April 18 includes a report recommending award of a three-year contract for “rubber encapsulation” for special trackwork.  This technique, technically called “elastomeric isolation”, extends the mechanical isolation of track from regular tangent rails to the intersections where there is much more vibration and potential for roadbed damage.

The TTC pioneered this design for special work installation with three test sites:  King & Queen (Don Bridge), Main Station Loop, and finally a large-scale project at King & Dufferin.  The impending work on St. Clair at Robina and at Oakwood, as well as intersections along the Dundas line will all be encapsulated.

Other design changes are in the works according to the TTC’s Jim Teeple:

Not only have we been evaluating the polymer used for the isolation, we have also been reviewing fastener and tie technologies as well. Our primary objectives are: life-cycle (including future vehicle fleets) , in-street construction timelines (panalisation to minimise disruption), reduced preventative maintenance, ongoing maintenance costs, capital costs, in roughly that order.

The St. Clair project this year will see Hydro working between Vaughan Road and Westmount Avenue (one block east of Dufferin Street) to underground its services, while the TTC rebuilds the streetcar right-of-way from Westmount to Caledonia (where Hydro services are already underground).  St. Clair West Station Loop will also be rebuilt this summer, and the work will include repair of expansion joints in the station structure.

The remainder of the line’s reconstruction (Vaughan to Westmount, Caledonia to Gunn’s Loop) will take place in 2008.  There is no word on the proposed extension westward, but this is included as part of the Transit City scheme.

In a previous post about the overall plans for special work replacement, I raised the question of why some intersections on Spadina were listed even though they are comparatively new.  It turns out that budget estimates are done based on formulas including service intensity and the time projected for special work to deteriorate to the point of needing replacement.  The Spadina intersections were built long before the move to mechanically isolate the track and this, combined with the extremely frequent service, will bring them up for replacement sooner rather than later.  However, the actual timing of the project will be based on actual conditions on site, not simply on a formula.  The TTC’s track construction plans change every year, and we may see the Spadina intersections move further out if they remain in better condition than expected.

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Meanwhile in the Beach

In case everyone thought that this had turned into a blog about the Spadina Subway and intercity rail travel, let’s come back to the real world of the Queen Car with the following note.

Hi Steve
This is not really a comment, but rather a follow-up to my earlier comments re: service in the Beach.  It’s not getting any better.

Let’s start with a math quiz . What’s the next number in this sequence?

18,33,1,14,2,10,11 ______(??? )

Give up? Well the answer is “who knows, could be any number”.  It’s the 501 from Neville.

These were the 501 headways departing Neville westbound on a normal, dry road, no traffic, no accidents type middle of the weekday when all a person wanted to do was spend $10 on a streetcar going to Queen & Lee etc to do local errands. Can you believe it? Is anyone in charge of supervising this major streetcar route???

Walked down to the loop from Fallingbrook at 12:30 and saw 42xx departing westbound. 12:48 (run#7) finally came 18 minutes later. Thought I would hang around and see what followed:

  • The next car, 4244 departed at 1:21-33 minute gap!!!!
  • Then in a brilliant move, car 4250 left one whole minute later at 1:22 (came empty, left empty).
  • 4210 left 14 min later at 1:36.
  • Then run 14, 4230 left 2 minutes later at 1:38 (again empty)
  • 4225 left at 1:48, and finally
  • 4225 left at 1:57.

This is a very common situation, not unusual at all. What happens with this mess down the line? Where do the supervisors supervise from?  Do they know what is going on here????

This is sad and funny at the same time. Is anyone in control of this route??

Thought you may find this interesting Steve.
Pete

Yes, it is interesting and far, far too common.  The service at Neville Loop is supposed to run every 5’30”.

I am still mired in detailed analysis of the King route (which I hope to finish over Easter weekend) and have not had the heart to look at Queen Street yet.  The bottom line, however, is that service is quite irregular even on days, like Christmas, when it should run like a clock.

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Southern Etobicoke and The Queensway

Mark Dowling sent in the following note in response to the item on Park Lawn Loop:

Where do you stand on a Queensway ROW west of Humber Loop?  I know ridership on 80 is dismal but so is the service.  The street is wide and to my mind screams for LRVs or Citadis 302s bombing along between Roncesvalles and Sherway at 2x bus stop lengths with all the toys – next-car displays, signal priority and the like – giving a real “subway-like” service as opposed to the joke our Mayor cracked in relation to St Clair.

The residential developments at Sherway and along the Queensway would, I believe, generate a decent ridership if decent service was offered. Who knows, it might even pull in some park and ride traffic from the Gardiner?

Steve:  First off, The Queensway as far as Kipling is an “Avenue” in the Official Plan, and it is also shown as a Transit Priority corridor all the way to Brown’s Line (as is Lake Shore).  You would never know this from the sort of service offered in that part of the world or the total absence of planning for improvements as part of the TTC’s LRT studies.

Southern Etobicoke has a huge amount of redevelopable land — old industrial property, strip malls, parking lots — and there are also big possibilities up at the Six Points.  However, if we keep pumping out the message that this part of the world won’t be developed soon, if ever, from our own Planning Department, transit will continue to ignore this part of the world as well.

To answer your question, yes, an LRT service along The Queensway would be a great addition to the network, assuming redevelopment to support it.

What effect this would have on the Gardiner is another matter.  I think that the car traffic comes from further afield in the 905, and the benefit of new transit services will be to allow growth in population without overwhelming the road system.  However, we must have the will to “invest” in the future of this part of the city just as we hope to do in the eastern waterfront.

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Western Waterfront and Park Lawn Loop

This post is extremely long and most of it will be in the “more” section.  I received a copy of a letter addressed to Mike Olivier from David Nagler, the public consultation co-ordinator for the Western Waterfront LRT project.  The discussion is all about “why Park Lawn and not somewhere else” with a few other bits thrown in for spice.  My own comments are sprinkled through the post.

I have edited this slightly to eliminate duplicate information. Continue reading →

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Meanwhile on the Queen Car

The following comments came in response to my post about travels on St. Clair.  It’s big enough and has enough material to warrant its own thread, so here it is:

This week has been an interesting one.  My morning commute is from Brown’s Line/Lakeshore to Queen/Spadina.  One seat ride on 501 is nice when the cars are running on schedule….

I’m getting a depressing kind of entertainment checking the time ahead/behind when boarding (and leaving if the car isn’t too crowded).

This week, it seems that 501 operators are not trying very hard to keep to schedule.

Tuesday: I go out to catch the regular 8:40 AM eastbound from Long Branch.  It’s signed as run 08/18, and there was one operator who was on this for a couple of board periods who was very good about leaving the loop consistently and arriving at Queen and Spadina no later than 9:35.  On Tuesday, it was a different operator, who arrived at the loop after the scheduled departure time.  She then took her backpack and vanished in the TTC building at the north-west corner of the loop.  Two other 501 ALRVs showed up while she was in there.  Three ALRVs stacked around the loop is a pretty unusual sight!  When she finally came out and pulled up to the loop, CIS was reporting -16 (which was about right); at Queen and Spadina it was still around -15.

Wednesday: after 9AM, waiting for a eastbound 501 streetcar at the 39/40th Streets stop.  And waiting.  A streetcar finally goes past westbound, and does not reappear eastbound for at least ten minutes.  This means it laid over for at least five minutes.  This is run 17; CIS is saying -20 as I board and of course it stops at every stop because people have been waiting for close to half an hour for a streetcar.  At Palmerston and Queen he turns on the four-way flashers and goes off to Starbucks for a coffee.  I think it was -19 at Queen and Spadina.

Today: same operator on the same run 17 goes past westbound; this time it returns eastbound in about five minutes.  CIS is saying -9 when I board.  There’s another ALRV on his tail westbound (run 02); and it stays on his tail eastbound.  We don’t move very quickly across Queen Street (slow bicyclists are keeping up or passing us).  The car is too crowded for me to check the CIS when I leave but I figure we were probably an additional few minutes behind, for a -14 or -15.  Run 02, which was right behind him westbound at Brown’s Line, is right behind him eastbound at Spadina.  As I leave the streetcar, run 17’s rollsigns are being changed to 501 KINGSTON RD & QUEEN.

Now I have been on other 501 runs where the operator is on schedule, or catching up to schedule.  I know it can be done. I ’ve been on other runs where we’re behind, and there’s no effort on the part of the operator to pick things up.  Combine the two, and you get huge gaps and multiple TTC vehicles showing up at the same time.

Steve:  Just think!  The TTC wants to put an LRT service out to the western waterfront.  This shows the sort of marvellous job they are doing of running attractive service now to build ridership.

Once again, I have to ask two questions of both the TTC and the ATU:  Why is it that situations where service runs at the whim of the operator are becoming more and more common, and what is the TTC going to do about it?  Do they even know or care?

There are a lot of wonderful operators out there, and it only takes a minority of bad apples to create havoc for riders and for other operators stuck in the mess.  This has nothing to do with the TTC’s favourite complaint, operation in mixed traffic, and everything to do with an abdication of the need to properly manage the service.

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St. Clair Update – Almost, But Not Quite

I wandered up to St. Clair West Station today to check out the current signage situation.  On the bus/streetcar platform level, I found a forest of signs pointing me to the eastbound bus stop inside of the station.  Hurrah!  Hurrah!  An indoor connection.  I was amazed at how few people got on with me, but all was soon revealed.

The bus took a circuitous route to get itself eastbound on St. Clair:  Leave by the west ramp (the east one is still closed for construction), south on Bathurst, northwest on Vaughan, east on St. Clair (bypassing the hordes waiting at the eastbound stop at least some of whom probably wanted to go to Yonge Street), and thence to the south entrance to the station.  That’s where the big crowd of eastbound passengers was waiting.

Didn’t they see all the signs?

Well, no, they didn’t.  People getting off a train come up to the mezzanine where there are NO signs telling them that the bus is back inside the station, and they trudge out to the south entrance as they have for months.

Maybe when they finally get the east ramp open, someone will think to put up signs telling people NOT to go out the south exit because the next bus along will be the night bus.

Meanwhile, the beginnings of overhead construction are underway.  How they will get the work done by February 18th in this weather I do not know.  But the real kicker is that the overhead hangers are incompatible with pantograph power collection.  At least on Spadina we got modern overhead, but on our new, premier example of LRT, we get overhead that would be at home in the 1920s.

Maybe we could save the expense and just run horsecars.

StClairOverhead

Photo courtesy of Harold McMann.