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Roads: Highway 407 East (Durham Region)

Megaton327 said:
The current 407 has zones where the tolls are lower due to less demand. I see no reason why the 418-35 stretch of the 407, and the 412, couldn't have their tolls lowered if demand is low.
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Nah. If demand is low, then raise tolls. They have to make a profit off the highway. /s

For all seriousness, it would be great if different demands resulted in different tolls. Is it like that on the 407 ETR?
 
innsertnamehere said:
I imagine 412 will lose traffic once the whole thing is open. the part between the 418 and 35 I expect will be very, very empty, especially if they still change $0.29/km for that part.
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I imagine that too. The only thing the 35/115 to 418 is to avoid the weekend jam westbound. The only problem is the jam actually happens in Oshawa making the 418 useless to bypass traffic. You'll have to use the 412 from 35/115 which is a whooping 45km or $13! It's still $10 on weekends.

crs1026 said:
Well, let's try to treat everyone the same here. Ontario must have had a revenue projection for the first twelve months of operation of the current segment. I agree that ridership will go up further with further extensions, But - the first year revenue is, or isn't, hitting the target. If we are behind, by how much?

The net cost of UP Express gets a lot of scrutiny. The cost of the 417 extension needs just as much scrutiny. And if the under-recovery is in the same ballpark, it deserves equal profile.

- Paul
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It's not ridership! It's vehicle count :) Unlike the UPX, maintenance cost goes up due to wear and tear from vehicles. The expense is significantly lower if no one uses it unlike the UPX running empty trains. Policing is lowered too. There is a baseline for minimum policing and snow clearing through.

Fritter said:
Just by my own personal observation, there was a dramatic drop in traffic right after tolls began. It seems traffic has slowly climbed since, but there are times you can stand in the middle of the highway in the Oshawa area and not worry about getting hit.
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I see a stupid dare of crossing the 407 happening.

Megaton327 said:
The current 407 has zones where the tolls are lower due to less demand. I see no reason why the 418-35 stretch of the 407, and the 412, couldn't have their tolls lowered if demand is low.
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Honestly they should charge something like 5-10 cents, especially overnight on a rural highway. I'm pretty sure no where in the states charge a robbing toll. It cost only ~3.9 cents CAD per km on the I-90 based on the current conversion rate. Costs around $23 CAD to drive the 600 km from Buffalo to NYC. You can't even get anywhere near 100km with that toll rate on the MTO section.

Leo_Chan said:
Nah. If demand is low, then raise tolls. They have to make a profit off the highway. /s

For all seriousness, it would be great if different demands resulted in different tolls. Is it like that on the 407 ETR?
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It's been like that since day 1 in 1997. It has gotten more complex now.
I don't think the plan is to recover money. It's to create a steady stream of money to fund the liberal's coffin.
 
Steve X said:
It's not ridership! It's vehicle count :) Unlike the UPX, maintenance cost goes up due to wear and tear from vehicles. The expense is significantly lower if no one uses it unlike the UPX running empty trains. Policing is lowered too. There is a baseline for minimum policing and snow clearing through.
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But the maintenance cost per added vehicle of traffic is far greater than the cost per added rider.

I agree with the poster's comment the 407 extension should be held to the same (or similar) standard as the UPX.
 
nfitz said:
The point is that UPX is 2 railway tracks. It would be tough to drive on 407 if it was 2 railway tracks.

You might be overthinking this one!
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More like a highway that was supposed to be four lanes, but costs mounted so they only built three. And then they found that part of the highway is actually owned by someone else, who it turns out isn't crazy about the number of cars that the Province wants to put on it, so they let a few more cars on it than before but not at nights and weekends. So to make up for that, they decided to build a new road that the land owner could have to use and not be bothered by all that additional traffic on the 407. Except they haven't come to terms with the landowner yet. Meanwhile, they promised to extend the highway to Kingston, and hired a consultant to study whether it should be an Autobahn style road with a much higher speed limit. And, they are still working on that fourth lane.....but maybe only cars with hydrogen fuel cells can use it.....

Anyways, I stand by my original point. How is it that an investment is made in highways and nobody monitors the cost/return, or the per car subsidy? By all means lower the toll if it can raise revenue. But make the date public. And use a common yardstick.

- Paul
 
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Honestly that would make sense to me. they would have to construct a temporary exit for Taunton Road at the 418, as no such exit will exist in the final design. Probably easier to direct traffic to hwy 57 and avoid the 418 opening entirely until 2019.
 
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