Service Analysis

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510 Spadina: Buses vs Streetcars Jan-July 2024

In a previous article, I reviewed travel times for the bus and streetcar operations on 510 Spadina Avenue at the north and south ends of the route where severe traffic congestion made bus operation extremely difficult. The north end problem resolved itself first with a diversion, then at least partly with completion of construction on Bloor Street, but the south end required a reserved bus lane to bypass the traffic queue for the Gardiner Expressway on ramp.

With all the attention on these areas, a separate factor is often overlooked in comparing the services: when and where there is little or no congestion, the buses are faster than the streetcars in spite of the “transit priority” treatment with dedicated lanes. The problem lies in a combination of different stopping patterns, traffic signals that do not favour streetcars, and operational practices requiring streetcars to creep through intersections.

This is the daily experience of regular riders on Spadina, and it is a “dirty little secret” that factors conspire to undermine the quality and speed of streetcar service. This is both a City and TTC problem because responsibility for road design and streetcar operations rest with the two organizations.

Updated August 11 at 2:20 pm: Charts have been added at the end comparing streetcar travel times over the central portion of the Spadina route in September 2014 and May 2024. The differences reflect both loading times, acceleration and operating practices of the former CLRVs compared to the current Flexitys,

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Analysis of 510 Spadina Bus: July 2024

In a previous article, I reviewed the transition from streetcar to bus operation on 510 Spadina in mid-June. Since then, the route saw other changes:

The reserved lane has greatly reduced delays at the south end of the route, albeit at the expense of road capacity.

This article presents travel times over various segments of Spadina from Bloor Street to Queens Quay during July 2024 to show the effect of the changing route configuration.

A key factor evident in the tracking data is that congestion occurs outside of the peak periods, and not necessarily in the same way each day. It can be tempting to cherry pick the afternoon peak as a worst case target, but that does not solve all problems. The extent of congestion also varies, and transit priority must be on a sufficient scale to deal with the bad days, not simply to improve conditions a bit over a short distance.

What is quite clear is that the City and TTC reaction to congestion problems gave the impression of surprise rather than preparedness, and that weeks of delays for riders could have been avoided or at least reduced in severity at both ends of the route.

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TTC Board Meeting: July 17, 2024

The July 17 Board meeting was extraordinarily long thanks to three in camera items, plus extended discussions of the CEO’s Report and of use of buses as homeless shelters during the winter.

The confidential session dealt with:

  • A collective bargaining update for two small groups of customer service and operations supervisor employees.
  • An update on advice from External Counsel. On a recorded vote, this was adopted with all Board members except Councillor Saxe in favour. As of the publication of this article (July 28), there have been no leaks about the subject of this report.
  • An update on the fare modernization program including the status of the Presto contract. The report was also discussed briefly in the public session later in the meeting.

The public meeting included:

  • The July 16 storm, flooding and hardening of infrastructure against climate change.
  • New subway trains and federal funding announced earlier the same day (July 17).
  • Prioritization of State of Good Repair projects. This item received scant attention although the report contains much interesting background on capital plans.
  • Safety on the TTC.
  • Use of shelter buses.
  • Transit network expansion update.
  • Fare Compliance Action Plan: See the updated version of my previous article on this report which includes the debate at the Board meeting.

Not discussed was the issue of hydraulic fluid leaks from subway work cars of which one quarter are still out of service. A report is supposed to be coming to the Board soon. It is not clear how much this situation is affecting the TTC’s ability to stay on top of track maintenance issues and the growing list of slow orders for track that cannot be safely operated at full speed.

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Queen & York Update: July 28, 2024

At long last, the new curve for a 501 Queen eastbound diversion via York Street south to Adelaide is being installed. Of course the entire diversion should have been operational before Metrolinx shut down Queen Street for the Ontario Line, but such careful planning is not what we expect from the agencies involved.

Indeed, the City took over the trackwork on Adelaide Street as part of other works in progress because Metrolinx was dragging its feet. Why they didn’t take the full project up to Queen & York is a mystery. With luck, the west and east ends of 501 Queen will be reunited before year-end 2024, but I am not making any bets.

Road and utility works for this project are contracted by the City and Metrolinx. Track installation is by the TTC.

Three weeks ago, on Sunday, July 7, the new switch was sitting at Queen and University ready for installation, but work on excavation and a new track foundation took some days afterward to begin.

Looking E on Queen to York
Looking W on Queen to University
Looking S on York to Richmond

Here is the state of installation as of Sunday, July 28.

Looking E to York on Queen
Looking W on Queen at York
Looking S on York from Queen
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Bus Service to the Eastern Waterfront

For many, many years, there has been talk of expansion of the streetcar system into the eastern waterfront. The “Waterfront East LRT” would branch off of the Bay Street tunnel at Queens Quay and running east initially to Villiers Island and eventually link with a southern extension of Broadview via the new GO/Ontario Line station at East Harbour.

Anyone waiting for this service will age considerably before it opens at the now tentative date of 2036. This was supposed to be a “Transit First” neighbourhood, but the history mocks all the fine talk of “Transit Oriented Communities” we hear today. Meanwhile, any attempt to actually use transit to reach this area is, putting it mildly, challenging. A collection of overlapping bus routes with infrequent and irregular service fight their way through chronic traffic congestion.

The route structure changed on May 12, 2024 as shown in the TTC maps below from 2023 and June 2024.

2023
June 2024
  • 19 Bay
    • 2023: From the central business district south on Bay and east on Queens Quay to loop at George Brown College near Sherbourne Street.
    • May 2024: Route shortened to loop via east on King, south on Yonge, west on Front and north on Bay.
  • 72 Pape
    • 2023:
      • 72A service from Pape Station to Eastern.
      • 72B service to Union Station from Pape via Commissioners, Cherry, Lake Shore, Queens Quay and Bay. The route changed from time to time as the area was rebuilt to create Villiers Island.
      • 72C service from Pape Station to Commissioners Street peak periods only.
    • May 2024:
      • 72A service to Eastern peak periods only.
      • 72B replaced by 114 Queens Quay East.
      • 72C extended west from Pape to Saulter Street and operated as the all day route.
  • 114 Queens Quay East
    • May 2024: New route from Union Station to Carlaw replacing the south end of 19 Bay and the west end of 72 Pape.

Two routes were not changed:

  • 65 Parliament:
    • From Castle Frank Station south via Parliament and west on Queens Quay to George Brown College.
  • 75 Sherbourne:
    • From Sherbourne Station south via Sherbourne and west on Queens Quay to Jarvis returning north via Jarvis and The Esplanade.

There is also the seasonal 202 Cherry from Union Station to Cherry Beach. Like the 72 Pape bus, its route has changed from time to time due to construction in the Villiers Island area.

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Spadina Replacement Bus Shifts to St. George Station

The City of Toronto will be closing the intersection of Spadina and Bloor to all traffic from 5am Monday, July 15 to 5am Monday, July 22 for complete reconstruction. This is the west end of a project that has been working its way along Bloor Street for months.

TTC bus service will divert to St. George Station. Whether this will alleviate the bus congestion at the north end of the route remains to be seen.

Because this is a non-standard route, transit prediction apps will not work for locations off of Spadina, and southbound predictions will only work for stops and buses that are south of Harbord.

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Yet Another Streetcar Diversion

The TTC will be making repairs to the track at Church & King, a location that has needed serious tender loving care for some years. This project will run from 11pm Friday July 12 to 4am Wednesday July 17.

This event and the confusion it will add for downtown travellers is a direct result of delays in complete replacement of the intersection, compounded by the Queen Street closure for the Ontario Line and the still-incomplete work on the Richmond/Adelaide diversion around Queen and Yonge that limps along with a vague “fall” completion date.

501/301 Queen:

  • Streetcars in the east end will operate only to Parliament Street and will loop back via Dundas and Broadview.
  • The 501B shuttle buses will operate westbound via Richmond and eastbound via King between Church and University.
  • Night service will be provided via streetcars diverting onto Dundas as shown in the map below, and night service on the 301 bus covering the central part of the route on the same path as the 501B daytime service.

503 Kingston Road:

  • 503 Kingston Road cars will operate as far west as King & Sumach, and then turn south to Distillery Loop.

504 King:

  • 504A King Dundas West to Distillery: Cars will divert both ways via Spadina, Queen, McCaul, Dundas, Broadview, Queen, King and Sumach/Cherry to Distillery Loop.
  • 504B King Humber to Broadview Station: Cars will divert on the same route as 504A to Broadview, then run north to Broadview Station.
  • 504 buses will operate from Broadview Station to Bathurst over the regular King route.

508 Lake Shore:

  • 508 Lake Shore cars will divert via the same route as the 504B King cars.

How well any of these services will operate remains to be seen especially the 504A route that will be much longer than normal.

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Reserved Bus Lanes for Spadina?

Updated July 11 at 4:20 pm: The TTC has confirmed that planned overhead replacement on Bathurst shown on TOInview will not occur. They also confirmed that 2025 work on the west half of 506 Carlton will be done in stages, but have no further details at this point.

In response to the snafu with Spadina bus operations and traffic backlogs for the Gardiner Expressway, Toronto & East York Council has approved a proposal to implement a reserved bus lane between Queen Street and Queens Quay southbound. This must go to the full Toronto Council at its meeting of July 24.

The west curb lane would have all parking and cabstand space removed south of Queen. It would be reserved for transit vehicle and bicycles except for areas 30.5 metres north of King Street, Front Street and Fort York Boulevard which would be south-to-west right turn lanes. Between Richmond and Queen, stopping would be permitted outside of peak periods.

Speaking on CBC’s Metro Morning, Deputy Mayor Malik, sponsor of the motion, noted that planning for this type of event must substantially improve. The TTC was clearly caught out by the level of congestion on Spadina, something anyone who ventures downtown would know about. This did not appear overnight. A further question about the reserved lane proposal, which will be in effect at all hours, not just for the PM peak period, is how it will be enforced and what effect it will have on traffic feeding into this area.

A larger problem remains with the TTC’s planning for construction projects, and especially for streetcar replacements. In recent years, they have seemed quite willing to suspend service for extended periods in the interest of getting a lot of work done with a single closure. In practice, some of these have gone on far longer than they should have, and there have lengthy periods without any visible work.

The work on Spadina between King and Queens Quay, and later between College and Bloor, involves rebuilding the streetcar overhead to be fully pantograph compliant, as opposed to a hybrid pole/panto system. Some streetcar track repairs are likely during the streetcar replacement. This work should not take six months, the planned Spadina closure. This was originally announced as running only to October, but now to December. At Spadina Station the first stage of streetcar platform extension will occur taking advantage of excavation for a nearby condo project.

The City’s infrastructure plan viewer, TOInview, shows two other pending overhead replacement projects.

  • In 2024, Bathurst Street from Fleet to St. Clair
  • In 2025, College Street from Dundas to Yonge

Updated July 11 at 4:20 pm:

I asked the TTC if/when these projects will occur, and they advised that Bathurst will not be done in 2024. TOinview will be updated. College will be done in sections in 2025, but no further details are available yet.

It is not clear why at least the north end of Bathurst was not rebuilt while the St. Clair line was shut down for its own conversion and other projects along that route. This would have allowed streetcars to be based at Hillcrest as they were during previous roadworks on Bathurst. Do riders on St. Clair face another round of bus substitution?

College Street went through its own gyrations with substitute bus service during track replacement not long ago.

Many years have passed since the TTC streetcar system was entirely operating with streetcars, and the TTC seems to be happy to have some part of the network out of service almost all of the time. It certainly is not a question of vehicle availability, although their staffing is probably at a level where they could not field full streetcar service. This has implications for streetcar service levels generally, and for the resources more-or-less permanently “borrowed” from the bus network.

Consultation for the TTC’s 2025 Service Plan is about to get underway, and one topic planned for this is “construction”. Indeed, “doing diversions differently” is one goal of the current plan. On Spadina, that looks like an “own goal”.

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510 Spadina Bus Modified Diversion Tracking

Southbound 510 Spadina bus operations changed on July 8. Between 3 and 7pm on weekdays, buses do not operate south to Queens Quay, but instead loop east on Front, then south and west on Blue Jays Way to Spadina.

The charts presented here were generated by Darwin O’Connor’s TransSee website. Basic functions of that site are available free, and some chargeable features are free for Toronto streetcar routes. O’Connor uses the NextBus data feed as his source on a real time basis whereas the analyses I publish here use a monthly data extract provided to me by the TTC from their Vision system.

This article will be updated from time to time to show the evolution of travel times on the 510 Spadina replacement bus operation.

There are two locations of interest where congestion occurs:

  • Southbound approaching Front Street
  • Northbound approaching Bloor Street

Updated July 16 at 6:50am: Data for July 15 added.

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512 St. Clair Streetcars vs Buses: June 2024

With the June 23, 2024 schedule change, buses were replaced with streetcars running from St. Clair Station at Yonge to Gunn’s Loop west of Keele Street. Buses operated mostly in the regular traffic lanes, not on the streetcar right-of-way.

This article reviews the travel times on the 512 St. Clair bus and streetcar services to compare travel times over the route.

Although the streetcars in week 4 of June (beginning on June 23) are overall faster than the buses they replaced, the degree of this advantage varies by location and direction.

This is a companion piece to my review of the streetcar-to-bus change on 510 Spadina that happened at the same time.

The overall observation here is that although travel times are now shorter for many riders, headway reliability is very poor and gaps can undo the benefit of a faster trip.

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