Toronto Ontario Line 3 | ?m | ?s

I agree. Even if on paper the DRL is the same speed from Eglinton to Union as the Yonge line is, it will still be preferred by those who have the option. "Do I want to spend 22 minutes crammed onto a Yonge train? Or do I want to have a shot at maybe getting a seat on the DRL? (Granted, peak hour they probably won't get a seat, but they won't be packed in like sardines either)".

It doesn't have to be faster, it just has to be there as an option. Heck, even if it's slower, people from the eastern B-D still transfer at St. George instead of B-Y just to avoid the hastle. People will choose the path of least resistance and greatest comfort, even if that path is actually slightly longer.

Also not everyone who transfers to the YUS line is just getting off at downtown, some take the streetcars further west or east to their destination, the DRL would possibly be able to drop them off closer in this case, also, it would be good for those people who just stay on the YUS line all the way around to stations like st. Andrew, or osgood as this line would cut right across, so there might be some time savings there.
 
I agree. Even if on paper the DRL is the same speed from Eglinton to Union as the Yonge line is, it will still be preferred by those who have the option. "Do I want to spend 22 minutes crammed onto a Yonge train? Or do I want to have a shot at maybe getting a seat on the DRL? (Granted, peak hour they probably won't get a seat, but they won't be packed in like sardines either)".

It doesn't have to be faster, it just has to be there as an option. Heck, even if it's slower, people from the eastern B-D still transfer at St. George instead of B-Y just to avoid the hastle. People will choose the path of least resistance and greatest comfort, even if that path is actually slightly longer.

I think this is the right perspective. Speed isn't really a deciding factor--the line will be well used regardless. It's much more important that the line support the development that will take place on the east side of downtown in the coming decades. Of course, it would be nice if the line were eventually paired with an express, potentially one that runs in the rail alignment.
 
Not sure if this has been addressed already, but do Union Station's subway platform expansion plans accommodate for a DRL? (I posed this question in the Union Station reno thread too just to cover my bases.:))
 
If there is, it hasn't been said. Knowing the TTC, a separate station would likely be built to house the lines separately.
 
Interchange can probably answer this question better than I can, but as far as I know, the Union renovation project does not preclude the DRL platforms from being built.
 
This kind of addresses my question...


http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/archive/2009/08/28/experts-ponder-if-there-is-to-be-a-downtown-relief-line-where-will-it-go.aspx

Experts ponder: If there is to be a Downtown Relief Line, where will it go?

...(T)oday’s proponents are weighing both practical and fanciful considerations, from whether it has a better chance of getting done if it follows the southern railway corridor, which would be cheaper, to where it could go if cost wasn’t a factor, to whether it should pass through Union Station.

Adam Giambrone, chair of the TTC, mused this week about whether the coming $640-million renovation of Union Station, and a simultaneous $137-million revamp of the cramped subway station beneath it, will preclude routing the DRL through the historic hub.

“It’s unlikely to come to Union Station,” he said. “Putting another subway station in the mix would be complex and perhaps not advisable. You need options and that’s what the downtown relief is, it gives you alternatives. Pushing everything in to Union Station doesn’t necessarily make sense.”

Mr. Giambrone said Union Station is fast running out of room and the thought of tearing it up again not long after the impending work is completed may prove unpalatable.

But to some transit enthusiasts, the DRL skipping Union Station is practically heresy.

“In our view it would stop at Union Station and that would be the major interchange,” said Jonathan English, a transit enthusiast and member of a loose-knit group calling itself the DRL Action Committee. “Some people were talking about how that would be difficult to build, but it was studied in 1985 and the conditions there have not changed significantly since then. They were incorporating the streetcar loop, they were incorporating a GO concourse and they said it actually could be built quite easily.”

Many, however, have already turned their attention to alternative alignments for the DRL (one early suggestion is below). Mr. Giambrone thinks it should run somewhere between Wellington and Queen, and indeed some in the blogosphere are pushing for a Queen Street subway, but Mr. English thinks that’s too far north.

“The issue with that is Queen Street isn’t the hub of downtown employment that it was back in the ‘50s before the office towers were built. And the other thing is that east and west of downtown, Queen Street runs through areas that are zoned and designated in the official plan as stable residential neighbourhoods,” he said. “The route we recommended was more or less the route studied in 1985… which was along Front Street west of Union Station. So it would have stops near the convention centre, near the Sky Dome, near City Place, which is developing like crazy.

“Wellington was another route that was studied and Wellington does have its appeal. You wouldn’t have to interrupt the streetcar route during construction, it’s close to all the office buildings and you could connect to both King and St. Andrew’s Stations.”

The beauty of the DRL, for both cost containment and ease of construction, is that early plans envisioned it making use of an existing rail corridor. As luck would have it, said Jason Paris, another advocate who started a DRL Facebook group, that route also traces a path near most of the employment districts and neighbourhoods a new subway line would ideally be designed to serve.

“In 1988, the railway corridor was basically just that, a corridor that served industrial parts of Toronto where nobody really lived,” he said. “The railway corridor has completely changed, like Liberty Village, the Distillery District and the new waterfront, which probably represents the biggest increase in population into the downtown in the modern history of the city in the next 30 years.”

There is also the question of where the DRL would meet the Bloor-Danforth subway. There is broad consensus that the western terminus should be Dundas West Station, because it is already a hub for GO, subway and streetcar routes. But about the eastern end, debate continues.

Many, like Mr. English, believe Pape is a no brainer, because it, too, is a hub for one of the busiest north-south bus routes, the 25, and would connect with the planned Don Mills light-rail line.

But Mr. Paris thinks there’s merit in pushing it further east if the rail corridor is favoured. There is already a TTC subway yard at Greenwood Station that abuts the rail corridor itself.

Steve Munro, a transit activist and blogger who helped save Toronto’s streetcar fleet from being scrapped in the 1970s, notes the greatest demand for the DRL is in the east. For that reason, he believes the DRL shouldn’t end at the Danforth, but instead be extended north from Pape Station to Eglinton, replacing the proposed Don Mills LRT to that point.

“If we have to build a tunnel and probably a new bridge across the Don [Valley] south of Thorncliffe Park, it may as well have the DRL in it,” Mr. Munro said. “This would create a major junction at Don Mills and Eglinton between the DRL, the Eglinton LRT and the Don Mills LRT.

“Stops to hit en route… assuming we start at Eglinton, there would be one or two stops serving both Flemingdon and Thorncliffe Parks, then across the valley to O’Connor, then Danforth, Gerrard, Queen [East], Distillery District, maybe somewhere near St. Lawrence.”

Dieter Janssen, a professor at the University of Toronto’s John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, proposes another pathway altogether for the DRL – one he acknowledges would be more expensive, but which he argues would knit the city together.

He suggests the eastern terminus should be Coxwell, or even Woodbine, so the DRL can head due south and brush the edge of the Beach neighbourhood, before traveling along Queen Street East through Leslieville and South Riverdale.

Once it crosses the Don Valley, however, Prof. Janssen believes the line should then descend to King Street for the thoroughfare’s entire length, before swooping up Roncesvalles Avenue where King meets Queen Street West and the Queensway and concluding at Dundas West Station.

Prof. Janssen agrees with Mr. Giambrone that the DRL should bypass Union Station altogether, connecting to the Yonge and University-Spadina axes of the subway through other stations.

“My inclination would be to skip Union Station as well, as it already has significant congestion,” he said. “You’d have two opportunities to connect to the Yonge line, one to the east and one to the west… It makes sense if you think about who uses Union Station.”

Councillor Michael Thompson (Scarborough Centre), who has become a champion of reviving the DRL in recent months, said he doesn’t want to presuppose any route for the new subway.

“I’m not married to ‘It has to go here’ or ‘It has to go there,’” he said. “I’m married to making it happen.”
 
The big advantage for Union is connectivity. But what is it really connecting to?

GO bus routes:
likely to be cut back when all-day train service comes online for more corridors. For routes that aren't replicated by train service (like Square One) they might be better off being rerouted to the outer GO hubs, like Kipling, or Kennedy Stations (and Langstaff/Richmond Hill Centre in the future) which are both close enough to the highway and give people the option of continuing to Union on GO trains, or taking the subway.

GO train routes:
This one seems like a no-brainer, but I'm not convinced it is. The DRL will likely stop at Dundas West to pick up Georgetown and Milton customers, Exhibition to pick up Lakeshore West riders, and I would expect a stop could be created at Cherry, Queen E., or Gerrard to catch the Lakeshore East and Stoufville riders. That leaves only Richmond Hill and Barrie trains which won't connect directly to the DRL.

Airport Rail Link:
If ever built, it will connect to the DRL at Dundas West

Waterfront Streetcars:
In the west they can connect at Exhibition, Bathurst, and Spadina. In the East its likely they will connect at Cherry.

VIA:
no connections.

So, if the DRL hits Exhibition, Dundas West, and Pape/Gerrard, it will only miss connecting to GO trains from Barrie and RH, and VIA trains.

My point being, its not the end of the world if it misses Union.

That said, I support a Front St. alignment, but for other reasons.
 
The wellington connection doesn't seem to bad. It's close enough to union without touching it. Sometimes Union gets flooded with water and closed or electrical problems. That would cause problems for the line. So having it on Wellington would be an alternative. Maybe have an underground path for it? Or just get people to transfer out and walk along the path and transfer back in at St. Andrew or King. It's common in big cities to do that.
 
A Wellington alignment would have the advantage of connecting to not only Union but to King and St. Andrew to the north. Kind of in a big triangle. Instead of one transfer point for subway and GO passengers it would have 3 transfers for subway (though most would use St. Andrew and King) and one for GO. Crowding would be reduced pretty drastically.

I'm also thinking that when GO is upgraded to frequent regional rail and fares are integrated (it's inevitable), the Weston sub will become a local transit corridor in the west end. Routing the DRL through Dundas West will create needless duplication. It could go up Dufferin instead.
 
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Is it even really possible to build transfers between a DRL and the stations like King, St. Andrew, Union, Queen or Osgoode? They all seem very cramped to me, and they are usually pretty close to the foundations of other buildings so I dunno how feasible expanding them would be.

It may be easier to just integrate all of the 5 downtown stations into one kind of super station via the PATH network and not bother linking DRL stations directly to any of the others. The main issue would be controlling fare paid zones, but if we assume that by the time a DRL exists we will have some kind of smart fare medium, it should be possible to have people just transfer easily.
 
As for Giambrone, he should go back to doing whatever it is he's qualified to do. Must all our multi-billion dollar technical infrastructure projects be directed by dilettantes?
 
I'm also thinking that when GO is upgraded to frequent regional rail and fares are integrated (it's inevitable), the Weston sub will become a local transit corridor in the west end. Routing the DRL through Dundas West will create needless duplication. It could go up Dufferin instead.

It seem ideal then to build a new subway line for local trips, especially once its expanded north of Dundas West, and GO as the express option. This would probably tackle many different kinds of trips quickly and make transit the best form of transportation for a change here.
 
King and St Andrew stations already essentially connect to Union through the PATH. With some better signage and maybe a moving walkway for the lazy, you could easily have connections. Get off the GO at Union and you see "DRL - 500m." For 90% of riders, they'll walk it. I can't imagine anyone coming in on the Lakeshore GO line, getting on the YUS line to King, and then transferring to the DRL.
 

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