Urban Affairs

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Ed Levy Writes About Rapid Transit in Toronto

Being around long enough to see the way things really work is a huge advantage both for a blogger like me, and for professionals who have a long, if somewhat jaundiced, view of the evolution of transit plans in Toronto.

Ed Levy has just released “Rapid Transit in Toronto”, a webbook tracing the history of a century of transit schemes for our city.  This was produced with the support of the Neptis Foundation.

The online version of the book covers a wide range of topics and is filled with maps, history and observations about the evolution of transit plans (much more so than actual construction) in Toronto.  The book is downloadable in chapters sized either for email circulation or full resolution (see the PDF page).

I have only quickly browsed the chapter outlines so far, but there is a lot of material here, and it is so good, finally to see all of this in one place.  If nothing else, it will save those of us with shelves full of studies having to actually pull out the hard copies whenever we need to check something!

Congratulations to Ed, a fellow advocate for better public transit, on publishing such a major overview of our history.

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New Stop Poles and Maps for TTC Surface Routes

The TTC is experimenting with changes to its signage for surface stops with trial installations on the 94 Wellesley bus route.

TTC’s Chris Upfold presented the new designs at the February 25th Commission meeting using a short PowerPoint which I have excerpted here.

The rationale for the new design is that existing stop poles are inconsistent in their display of information and format.  This is no surprise given the evolution of stop treatment over the years, and the application of overlay stickers as needed to reflect changing services.

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Step Right Up for the Miracle Cure! (Updated)

For those readers here who do not follow the Torontoist website, I have an article there commenting on the City of Toronto’s outreach program for the new Official Plan.

Toronto seeks the opinion of its residents on the purpose and priorities of a transportation network, and on how we might pay for this in coming years.  The City’s heart is in the right place, but the planned consultation has its problems.

Updated February 3, 2013 at 8:00 am:

Toronto City Planning’s website seeking feedback on priorities and revenue tools has been live for a few days now.  It operates in a somewhat different fashion than I had assumed from the presentation by Jennifer Keesmaat at a recent Planning & Growth Management Committee meeting.

The site allows participants to select among a set of priorities, choose their favourite revenue tools and build a budget showing how each tool would contribute to a $2b/year target.

The priorities are a bit wooly and don’t necessarily reflect the linkage between the options and the type of spending that might occur.  For example, the “affordable” priority is described as relating to the cost of using transit, not to the cost of building it.

On the budgetary side, the potential revenue from various sources is given (this was missing from the PGM presentation), but there is no discussion of the ease with which any of the tools could be implemented nor of issues such as fairness in who would pay the new revenue.  A few examples:

  • Congestion charges are aimed at downtown where, ironically, the level of road traffic relative to total travel is very small.
  • A payroll tax charges businesses based on the size and cost of their labour force, not on the level of economic activity they represent.
  • Charges assigned per unit (e.g. utility levies) fall disproportionately on those with the smallest units and low usage (typically poorer family units).
  • Charges related to property value are keyed to notional value (CVA) rather than ability to pay.  Value capture schemes, like CVA, would tax an asset that the owner could not monetize unless the property were sold.  The effect is completely different for residential and commercial uses.

I will examine the various revenue tools in a separate article consolidating the discussion with the recent proposals from the RCCAO (Residential & Commercial Construction Association of Ontario).

Finally, there is no discussion of how the money would be used.  From the Metrolinx “Next Wave” proposal, we know that 25% ($500m/yr) would come to the municipal sector, roads and active transportation options.  This is actually small change beside the ongoing needs for local transportation funding and the backlog of infrastructure repairs.

The consultation does not include any discussion of what, at a local level, the new revenue might fund although this could affect the selection of tools.  Responses do include the selection of where broadly speaking money should go (transit, roads, etc) but with no examples of the implications or needs for each sector.

As I write this, the ranking of responses so far places highway tolls, congestion levies and development charges at the top of the list although even the first ranked gets a score of only 2.46 suggesting that many respondents ranked it in 3rd place or lower.  Some scores are tightly clustered indicating that responses are picking a variety of options.  It is unclear whether the ranking system assigns a value to “not selected” and is assigning scores only to the five items which each participant selected.  No value of “n”, the number of people selecting an item, is given.

How useful this survey will prove in the next stage of the consultation remains to be seen.

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Looking Back: Toronto By Night I

As a holiday present for my faithful readers, a selection of photos taken at nights on the streets of Toronto.

This set begins in 1967 and runs through to early 1972.  During this period, a friend and I spent a lot of time chasing works equipment to various track projects around town.  Standard M.O.: sit opposite Hillcrest gate waiting for the work cars to depart, follow them on their way, and set up for photos when they stayed put long enough.

Many of the PCC photos are from all-night charters, yes, I admit it, “fantrips” where a bunch of rail buffs of dubious sanity would not only stay up all night riding a streetcar and photographing it, but would charter a car for the purpose.  Professionals have words for such people, and these tend to be dismissive at best suggesting that the “foamers” are unfit to comment on transit policy.  I won’t say anything about the competence of those making such remarks beyond noting that I have a blog now, four decades on, and they don’t.

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The 501 — Toronto in Transit

At Theatre Passe Muraille from December 4-8, 2012

The Queen car, known since the advent of the “new” streetcars by its route number 501, is almost 25km from Long Branch to Neville.  It runs through many neighbourhoods each with its own history, quirks and stories.  Some of these are very much part of the evolving city, others exist only in the memory of those who lived in Toronto through the gains and losses of decades.

Justin Many Fingers, Bob Nasmith and Donna-Michelle St. Bernard spent half a year collecting stories from their travels on the 501.  Some are humourous events we will all recognize (a teacher shepherding a class of children), some are vignettes from a long-vanished youth (bathing cars to Sunnyside), some are the trying and at times dangerous effects of service riders can’t count on when they need it.

Each of the three actors/creators brings their own style and background.  Many Fingers is a First Nations actor/dancer from Alberta, and physical movement is part of his stories.  St. Bernard’s work in spoken word and hip-hop translate her experiences on the 501 to song.  Nasmith, long associated with Theatre Passe Muraille, is a story-teller.  He provides the thread linking episodes as we travel from Long Branch far in the west to Neville Loop in the now so-trendy Beach.

The three styles don’t completely gel into one work, but that’s the nature of Toronto — many people whose lives reflect different origins and experiences of the city.  There is no attempt at plot here beyond the journey across town as, in cinema terms, we fade in and out on each passing neighbourhood.

This is a Backspace production at TPM, and the set is rudimentary — four TTC seats and a pole — all the better because we are left to conjure each scene as it is told without a lot of stage business to get in the way.  That’s the magic of storytelling — we each bring our own knowledge of Queen Street, chuckle at familiar sights in our mind’s eye, and share in the pain of the inevitable short turn.

I saw the November 29th performance, a preview, and this bodes well for the opening on December 4.

The 501 — Toronto in Transit is part of TPM’s fall 2012 season Theatre Beyond Walls with plays by and about the community around the theatre.  More information is available at the TPM website.

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Jerry Waese Street Scenes

On display at R.A.D., 899 Dundas Street West (just east of Bellwoods, south side).

Jerry’s illustrations of Toronto, frequently including streetcars, appear regularly on Spacing’s website.  You can pull up all of his Spacing posts (open each article individually to see the illustration) or go to his flickr page (look under “art by category” for the street scenes).

The gallery will generally be open on weekends from noon onward.  Other days, by arrangement.  If you like Jerry’s work, the pictures are worth seeing as originals, not just online.

The Facebook event page will be updated from time to time with current info.

Image Copyright © by Jerry Waese, 2012.

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Tim Hudak Has A Plan (Updated)

Updated October 16, 2012 at 8:30 pm:

The Toronto Star reports that Tim Hudak has pledged to redirect all of the money earmarked for a Toronto LRT network to subway construction if he is elected Premier.  This is a truly bizarre stance for someone who claims to be trying to save Ontario money when we consider that almost none of the pledged $8-billion plus has actually been spent or committed, and this is all net new money, new borrowing Ontario will have to undertake.

Hudak was playing to his audience of Ford-friendly councillors who do not have control of Council on the transit file, but who seem to be attempting an end run around Council by having Queen’s Park support his position unilaterally.  Anyone who thinks they will get a full-blown Eglinton subway, and a Sheppard line (STC to Downsview) and a BD extension to the Scarborough Town Centre for these funds is dreaming.  Sadly, however, Toronto has a bad habit of wanting more than it can afford especially when someone else will foot the bill.

If I try to put myself in a conservative mindset (and that’s with a small “c”), I would be asking how much of that $8b actually needs to be spent at all, or spent on transit rather than some other portfolio.  That would be a common sense thing to do, the kind of approach we might expect from Mike Harris.  Alas, “common sense” also includes buying off local politicians by keeping their pet subway projects alive.

But no, Tim Hudak wants to spend $8b he doesn’t have on overbuilding a partial subway network apparently because he thinks this will play well to Ford’s base.  He might want to think about the uproar over paltry hundreds of millions wasted on shifting power plants out of Liberal ridings and consider whether the lure of the megaprojects has clouded his vision.

Of course, all this depends on “affordability” which is tied to the end of the provincial deficit, and so Hudak will likely never have to borrow that $8b whatever he might spend it on.  All he will achieve is even more delay in building any transit for Toronto.

Thanks to the Liberals’ tinkering with project schedules and love for P3 implementation, little work will actually be tendered by the time the government falls sometime in 2013.  Cancelling the Finch and Sheppard LRT lines will be child’s play, and the SRT upgrade will probably morph into an unbuilt subway while the SRT lies at death’s door.

Toronto Council needs to wake up and remind Mr. Hudak that the Mayor does not speak for the City.  Does Hudak even care, or is he just giving his pal a chance to say “screw you” to his opponents?

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