News   Mar 28, 2024
 164     0 
News   Mar 27, 2024
 1.8K     1 
News   Mar 27, 2024
 1.2K     2 

My Masters Projects on the Downtown Relief Line

Jupiter

New Member
Member Bio
Joined
Jul 5, 2007
Messages
39
Reaction score
0
After several months of research, writing, and coding, my project is finally ready.

When I discussed this with York faculty, I brought up the idea of making a website, as I did not see the point of doing all this work only to have a few faculty members read it. My hope was that if the public reads even a small part of the site, they may start to understand the necessity in building the line, and why it is far more important than extension up Yonge, or in Smitherman's case, to Sherway Gardens.

I encourage you to take a look and if you like it, pass it onto people. I'm really hoping this can be spread around as much as possible. Feel free to leave comments, but try to be gentle... I have spent many months putting a lot of effort into it, including non-stop work for the past week, so... I may be a little sensitive at the moment. Maybe some sleep will help that.

Hope you guys like it. UT was my inspiration for it, and what gave me the passion to pursue this... I think I even mentioned it in the acknowledgments. :)

http://www.drlnow.ca

Thanks,

Phil

Edit: I see I can't edit the title. Hooray for unnecessary pluralization. I guess that's what happens when it's 5:00 in the morning and you haven't gone to bed yet.
 
Hi Phil, congratulations on finishing your thesis.

I had a little bit of a look so far, and it seems well documented. I'm assuming with time, you'll improve the site navigation and cross references. Visuals, like a map showing the route and stations, are a big plus too.

What year are your dollars in? 2010? Did you include any cost escalation prices for delaying construction from now?

It would be nice in your tables with track lengths to also include track cost (unit * unit cost). I was looking at Stage One Costs, specifically the $1.073b for "tunnels, special structures, and operating systems". This appears to be $776m for 9km tunneled track, $51m for 0.7km cut & cover track, $52m for 2.3m at-grade track, $175m for 0.5km bridge & track, and $20m for 0.2km 'significant bridge' at a unit cost of $100m per km. If so, this isn't included in your "Construction Method" unit costs table. If not, how was the number arrived at?

Does this catagory also contain signals and switches? Are you using ATC costs for such?

Why are you including GST rebates? Does that imply that HST has not been used anywhere?

Finally, if you are taking the DRL to the Airport, why not go to Hurontario
 
There's always things to quibble over when talking about alignments and stations and phasings, but the title is right...we need the DRL now. Most of the quibbles are six to one, a half dozen to the other, anyway, and leave the line's major benefits intact. But here's three little things.

Thousands more rides would be squeezed off the Yonge line and onto the DRL by running it a bit north of Sheppard to its most logical terminus, Seneca College. In addition to the college (if memory serves me correctly, Newnham is the city's third largest campus) and a cluster of towers, it is the ideal place for connections to York Region (Leslie/Beaver Creek, Viva Green, etc.), for intercepting many of the 75,000 daily trips made on the Finch/McNicoll/Steeles trio, even for some park'n'ride spots in the hydro corridor. Terminating at the Sheppard subway looks cleaner, but Seneca is the site of greater regional consequence and better suited for a transit hub with mode changes.

I know the focus is on the "relief," and that a need for relief is what will get the DRL built, but I'm not sure about having 2km stop spacing on Don Mills...like the Spadina line, the mere existence of the DRL up Don Mills will be the overwhelming source of relief and trips diverted off Yonge, and ridership won't go up much by making it express-ish and removing a few stops. This isn't necessarily true for the portion south of Danforth when talking about people on B/D avoiding Y&B, where an express-ish DRL *would* greatly increase people switching to it to avoid the YUS loop, but it is true for the Don Mills corridor.

You should recheck your cost estimates since you use figures both with and without inflation added, and you include contingency twice in spots:

Though it may appear that stations ballooned over their expected cost by 73.5%, it isn’t quite that simple. Initial cost estimates were made prior to station design. In the revised estimates, it establishes what was actually budgeted for in the most recent $2.6 billion estimate. The total costs of the budgeted stations is $610.2 million, making the stations cost 32% over what the specific designs were budgeted for.

These increases are not insignificant, and cast severe doubts upon the estimates of the Yonge line.

Note that the first Spadina station costs are in 2006 dollars and the second set is the new budget in final costs - and this is eating into the half billion dollars of contingency already budgeted for, so the bloated station budgets are not really new costs (unless that 26% buffer gets eaten up elsewhere, like a meteor strike that caves in the tunnels or a world war or something random. By using the recent set as a standard and then adding contingency again, you're really ramping up the cost of stations before inflation. The Yonge line costs are not fleshed out in much detail and we don't know where and ho)w much contingency/padding had been added. Ten million here and ten million there (or more) really adds up.
 
Last edited:
i saw your map and stations of Queen.......................excellent.
The DRL MUST be down Queen, there are no options. Going straight to Union by rail ROW is beating a dead horse as it already has the best transit service in Toronto and after work hours is relatively empty as opposed to Queen which is a 24 hour long vibrant and destination thoroughfare. King is not option as again it is served by 2 subway stations and Union. It would also be MUCH more expensive due to having to tunnel under the King/Bay area of the massive PATH system. Ask the overwhelming number of Torontonians where a DRL should go and they, rightfully so, would choose Queen without hesitation.
 
It's going to be hard to address everything as I know you guys are all well informed, so people are going to find several minor issues they disagree with on the site. :)

First, regarding how far to take the subway... admittedly, it's a judgment call. The further it goes, the more expensive it gets, and I don't think subways should be providing regional service in the first place. Seneca is an interesting consideration, especially because there is some good density around Finch and Don Mills, but it would seem that the fastest way would still be the DRL or Sheppard and not Yonge anyway, so I'm not sure how much diversion would take place. If I had time to redo all this, I may have put more consideration into Don Mills & Finch, but I don't believe going west from the airport to Hurontario makes sense for a local subway.

Second, costs on the page are intentionally overstated. Well... let me rephrase that. They're intentionally high. To use the example you gave of station costs eating up the contingency costs, you're correct. But that doesn't change that the station costs are what they are, and future stations should be planned based on those figures. Contingency costs need to be added on top of THAT because more can go wrong, costs can go up even further... One of the studies I mention discusses the underestimation of costs in public works projects, and it's usually fairly significant, so I was trying to avoid that with this, and whenever possible, use the high end estimates, making it less likely that this would end up significantly more expensive than expected.

Oh, and regarding the 2 km spacing on Don Mills... the only thing that can really justify a stop between stations would be one at Graydon Hall, and I discuss in the station page about Moatfield (York Mills) the possibility of instead having the station located there.
 
i saw your map and stations of Queen.......................excellent.
The DRL MUST be down Queen, there are no options. Going straight to Union by rail ROW is beating a dead horse as it already has the best transit service in Toronto and after work hours is relatively empty as opposed to Queen which is a 24 hour long vibrant and destination thoroughfare. King is not option as again it is served by 2 subway stations and Union. It would also be MUCH more expensive due to having to tunnel under the King/Bay area of the massive PATH system. Ask the overwhelming number of Torontonians where a DRL should go and they, rightfully so, would choose Queen without hesitation.

Well, I do disagree, as outlined in the explanations on route determination, but I certainly wouldn't oppose a subway if the powers that be said "Okay... we want it on Queen, not further south." I believe there is more in favour of a southern routing, so that's what I based the website on. Ultimately though the DRL is needed in some sense, and you won't hear me fighting if a Queen alignment is what gains popularity.
 
i saw your map and stations of Queen.......................excellent.
The DRL MUST be down Queen, there are no options. Going straight to Union by rail ROW is beating a dead horse as it already has the best transit service in Toronto and after work hours is relatively empty as opposed to Queen which is a 24 hour long vibrant and destination thoroughfare. King is not option as again it is served by 2 subway stations and Union. It would also be MUCH more expensive due to having to tunnel under the King/Bay area of the massive PATH system. Ask the overwhelming number of Torontonians where a DRL should go and they, rightfully so, would choose Queen without hesitation.

Did you even read his report or did you just look at the pictures?

He clearly outlines the issues with construction along Queen. Namely that disruption from construction and the reduction of local service (particularly to mid-block establishments) could kill that very vibrancy you are talking about.
 
Well, I do disagree, as outlined in the explanations on route determination, but I certainly wouldn't oppose a subway if the powers that be said "Okay... we want it on Queen, not further south." I believe there is more in favour of a southern routing, so that's what I based the website on. Ultimately though the DRL is needed in some sense, and you won't hear me fighting if a Queen alignment is what gains popularity.

Agreed. However, at this point, I would bet real money that any study will reach the same conclusion that you did. With all the new development in the core, the population/activity centre has definitely shifted south. CityPlace, East Bayfront, the Distillery District, etc. were not there before. Many are now well along the way or will be by the time planning for the line starts. When that happens, a more southerly alignment will be preferred.

And none of that even includes the obvious argument: relief. For it to be a real Downtown Relief Line, they gotta pick the alignment that provides the most relief; to Yonge/Bloor specifically. As you pointed out, that would probably be the most direct routing to the Financial District.
 
Agreed. However, at this point, I would bet real money that any study will reach the same conclusion that you did. With all the new development in the core, the population/activity centre has definitely shifted south. CityPlace, East Bayfront, the Distillery District, etc. were not there before. Many are now well along the way or will be by the time planning for the line starts. When that happens, a more southerly alignment will be preferred.

And none of that even includes the obvious argument: relief. For it to be a real Downtown Relief Line, they gotta pick the alignment that provides the most relief; to Yonge/Bloor specifically. As you pointed out, that would probably be the most direct routing to the Financial District.

Yeah, I think I did that fairly objectively, because going into it I really had no preference. I actually read every single page of that like 130 page thread or however long it was where people debated which route it should take... Once I started doing density calculations, I was just amazed at how useful a southern routing would be. I mean... they considered it in the 80's when nothing was there. Now there's enough reason for there to be a subway there on it's own merit, AND still act as a relief line, reaching the heart of the core.

I have nothing against Queen and in a perfect world it would get a subway too, but given the choices I just felt that going further south made more sense, especially given that Queen West is already served somewhat by Osgoode and West Queen West is going to get a station at Dufferin regardless of which route is chosen. Streetcar service between those two stations should be fine and not mess with the vibrant street life that exists.
 
I have nothing against Queen and in a perfect world it would get a subway too, but given the choices I just felt that going further south made more sense, especially given that Queen West is already served somewhat by Osgoode and West Queen West is going to get a station at Dufferin regardless of which route is chosen. Streetcar service between those two stations should be fine and not mess with the vibrant street life that exists.

What blows my mind is the people who keep arguing that a Queen subway is needed because of its vibrancy. How do these people not see the threat to its vibrancy from a long, difficult and invasive construction period, combined with reduced local service, post construction? I am strongly against a Queen street subway, specifically because I don't want the vibrancy of Queen West coming to a very abrupt end.

Personally, I'd like to see the central portions of Queen turned into a transit mall. Only the streetcar, bicycles and pedestrians. Maybe the odd delivery van, moving very, very slowly.
 
Last edited:
First, regarding how far to take the subway... admittedly, it's a judgment call. The further it goes, the more expensive it gets, and I don't think subways should be providing regional service in the first place. Seneca is an interesting consideration, especially because there is some good density around Finch and Don Mills, but it would seem that the fastest way would still be the DRL or Sheppard and not Yonge anyway, so I'm not sure how much diversion would take place. If I had time to redo all this, I may have put more consideration into Don Mills & Finch, but I don't believe going west from the airport to Hurontario makes sense for a local subway.
You've already taken the "local subway" into the next city to reach the airport in Stage 4. If it's a scale factor for your project, I can appriciate that, but Hurontario is the main North-South corridor for the 6th largest city in Canada. That seems like a much more sensible terminal point than the location of the largest parking structure in North America, at least to me.

If it's not supposed to be regional transport, why does it extend beyond Toronto?
 
Thousands more rides would be squeezed off the Yonge line and onto the DRL by running it a bit north of Sheppard to its most logical terminus, Seneca College. In addition to the college (if memory serves me correctly, Newnham is the city's third largest campus) and a cluster of towers, it is the ideal place for connections to York Region (Leslie/Beaver Creek, Viva Green, etc.), for intercepting many of the 75,000 daily trips made on the Finch/McNicoll/Steeles trio, even for some park'n'ride spots in the hydro corridor. Terminating at the Sheppard subway looks cleaner, but Seneca is the site of greater regional consequence and better suited for a transit hub with mode changes.

I know the focus is on the "relief," and that a need for relief is what will get the DRL built, but I'm not sure about having 2km stop spacing on Don Mills...like the Spadina line, the mere existence of the DRL up Don Mills will be the overwhelming source of relief and trips diverted off Yonge, and ridership won't go up much by making it express-ish and removing a few stops. This isn't necessarily true for the portion south of Danforth when talking about people on B/D avoiding Y&B, where an express-ish DRL *would* greatly increase people switching to it to avoid the YUS loop, but it is true for the Don Mills corridor.
This is a point I really, really agree with. The DRL needs to go up to Seneca. Not only would it then serve the 3rd largest campus in Toronto and huge residential towers, but it'd have great connections with YRT and the Finch East bus.

I wouldn't say concession spacing for Don Mills a la Yonge Subway, closer to 1 km (which is what Yonge needs anyways.) There's select places where you might want 800 m in between stations, other places that you'll want the full 2k. For instance, my exact stops would be something like this: Eglinton, Barber Greene Road, Lawrence Avenue, York Mills, 401 (as an at-grade portion from Duncan Mill Rd to the 401, with a station just over the highway,) Sheppard, southern end of the Peanut, Finch, then Seneca. It'd act basically the same as Spadina, as Scarberian said, just without the annoying walk in barrier that is the Allen expressway ramps.


May I pick at 2 things: the first is method of construction on Don Mills. Basically all the way from the subway's start at Don Mills south of Eglinton near Thorncliffe Park, there could be a fairly easily accommodated elevated ROW basically all the way up to Finch. It's a very wide road, and there's tonnes of surrounding land to expropriate if the road actually needs to be widened. And I have to admit, an elevated ROW couldn't detract from that stretch if it tried, and a ROW could easily be designed to add a lot of character and warmth to the street that a tunneled subway just wouldn't (not to mention costing way less.)

Secondly, I'm still the random person who doesn't think that the DRL west even needs to go north of Dundas West station, let alone to Pearson. Going to Pearson could easily, easily be solved using the Go train which needs fixing anyways, and will be able to do the same job while providing a consistent service all the way to Brampton. There aren't a lot of specific density points along the route, and they're compacted enough that they could easily be served by regional Go service (and are in fact already served by Go commuter service.)
 
Secondly, I'm still the random person who doesn't think that the DRL west even needs to go north of Dundas West station, let alone to Pearson. Going to Pearson could easily, easily be solved using the Go train which needs fixing anyways, and will be able to do the same job while providing a consistent service all the way to Brampton. There aren't a lot of specific density points along the route, and they're compacted enough that they could easily be served by regional Go service (and are in fact already served by Go commuter service.)
I do agree with this. The airport doesn't make sense as a terminal point for Stage 4. Dundas West does make sense and you could probably cut off the idea and costs related to the DRL at Stage 3.
 

Back
Top