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TTC: Sheppard Subway Expansion (Speculative)

AlvinofDiaspar said:
Wonder if possible for a tunneled section to veer north after Senlac and realign with Finch at Bathurst, to maximize the area served? There seems to be a few clusters of density and redevelopment opportunities along that route.

AoD
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Interesting idea, there's a bunch of different possible combinations. That would mean a significantly longer tunnel though. Unless of course you did surface up Bathurst, but even then it would be more expensive than tunnelling to Downsview and then doing cheap LRT in an open space and along a rail corridor.
 
gweed123 said:
I've called it the Northern Crosstown, seeing as how referring to it by Sheppard or Finch is no longer really appropriate, plus I think it more accurately describes what it is.
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Looking at a map Sheppard or Finch looks like mid-town to me.

Northern Crosstown would be the Highway 7 VIVA routes or perhaps even Major Mac :)
 
Transfer at Don Mills is not the main problem of Sheppard LRT.

Its main problem is that it is too slow for the distance covered. North-eastern Scarborough is the most remote part of the city; Meadowvale is 21.5 km from Yonge while Hwy 427 is only 17.5 km. The LRT trip from Meadowvale to Don Mills will take 35 - 40 min and Don Mills is not even the final destination for the majority of riders. Even if the LRT line is extended in the subway tunnel all the way to Yonge, it will be a 45 - 50 min trip to a point that is again not the final destination for many riders. The only good thing about Sheppard LRT is that it will improve the local service compared to the bus; but it is not designed as a trunk route.

"Northern Crosstown" will be even more inadequate for the distance covered. The end-to-end trip will take more than 1.5 hours, and many trips that involve a bus ride to / from LRT will take even longer. Choice riders will not use such line for long trips, and captive riders who have no other options will be miserable. Meanwhile, diverting Finch LRT off Finch between Dufferin and Yonge will deprive that relatively dense stretch of the local LRT service that can be quite handy there.

Eglinton Crosstown is actually much better, both because it is shorter and because it will have a significant tunneled portion. The trip from Kennedy to the airport will take about 1 hour which is not perfect but tolerable.

If we choose low-end, relatively slow LRT implementation for Sheppard and Finch, then it is better to focus on the role that such LRT can do well: quality local service.

We should not pretend that those LRT lines can simultaneously work as long-haul trunk routes, and break the grid system for the sake of creating one long line on the map that very few will ride end-to-end.

Therefore, I believe that Finch West LRT should stay on Finch all the way to Yonge, and continue as Finch East LRT to serve Seneca College, Warden, and McCowan clusters. Sheppard East LRT should terminate at Don Mills, and the subway extended westward to meet the Spadina line at Downsview or Wilson. In the very long term, the subway can possibly be extended both east and west and become a fast inter-regional line.
 
Rainforest said:
Transfer at Don Mills is not the main problem of Sheppard LRT.

Its main problem is that it is too slow for the distance covered. North-eastern Scarborough is the most remote part of the city; Meadowvale is 21.5 km from Yonge while Hwy 427 is only 17.5 km. The LRT trip from Meadowvale to Don Mills will take 35 - 40 min and Don Mills is not even the final destination for the majority of riders. Even if the LRT line is extended in the subway tunnel all the way to Yonge, it will be a 45 - 50 min trip to a point that is again not the final destination for many riders. The only good thing about Sheppard LRT is that it will improve the local service compared to the bus; but it is not designed as a trunk route.

"Northern Crosstown" will be even more inadequate for the distance covered. The end-to-end trip will take more than 1.5 hours, and many trips that involve a bus ride to / from LRT will take even longer. Choice riders will not use such line for long trips, and captive riders who have no other options will be miserable. Meanwhile, diverting Finch LRT off Finch between Dufferin and Yonge will deprive that relatively dense stretch of the local LRT service that can be quite handy there.

Eglinton Crosstown is actually much better, both because it is shorter and because it will have a significant tunneled portion. The trip from Kennedy to the airport will take about 1 hour which is not perfect but tolerable.

If we choose low-end, relatively slow LRT implementation for Sheppard and Finch, then it is better to focus on the role that such LRT can do well: quality local service.

We should not pretend that those LRT lines can simultaneously work as long-haul trunk routes, and break the grid system for the sake of creating one long line on the map that very few will ride end-to-end.

Therefore, I believe that Finch West LRT should stay on Finch all the way to Yonge, and continue as Finch East LRT to serve Seneca College, Warden, and McCowan clusters. Sheppard East LRT should terminate at Don Mills, and the subway extended westward to meet the Spadina line at Downsview or Wilson. In the very long term, the subway can possibly be extended both east and west and become a fast inter-regional line.
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I agree that travelling from one end of the line to the other would be a pain, but I don't think many people would be doing that. Most people don't travel Bloor-Danforth end to end.

To me the biggest advantage is connectivity from one side of the YUS loop to the other, through the middle of NYCC. It gives the riders on Finch West an option of a transfer-free ride to NYCC, and it gives Sheppard riders access to the area west of Yonge without having to take a 2 transfer jog on the subway. It also avoids the very disruptive and expensive construction of an underground LRT station at Finch, because the line would be using the existing Sheppard-Yonge station instead.

As for Finch West, I would hope that the LRT corridor could be designed to accommodate buses as well, so that they can run a BRT route along all of Finch, using the LRT corridor until Keele, and then dedicated bus lanes or queue jump lanes where needed on the rest of Finch.
 
gweed123 said:
I agree that travelling from one end of the line to the other would be a pain, but I don't think many people would be doing that. Most people don't travel Bloor-Danforth end to end.

To me the biggest advantage is connectivity from one side of the YUS loop to the other, through the middle of NYCC. It gives the riders on Finch West an option of a transfer-free ride to NYCC, and it gives Sheppard riders access to the area west of Yonge without having to take a 2 transfer jog on the subway.
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That's true, but the connectivity to both sides of the YUS loop can be achieved without through-routing Finch West and Sheppard East. Simply extending Finch West to Yonge and beyond, and Sheppard subway to Downsview will have the same effect.

gweed123 said:
It also avoids the very disruptive and expensive construction of an underground LRT station at Finch, because the line would be using the existing Sheppard-Yonge station instead.
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Point taken. However, this is only one spot saved, out of the whole corridor where the construction will be fairly disruptive anyway. I am not sure that it should be seen as deciding factor.

gweed123 said:
As for Finch West, I would hope that the LRT corridor could be designed to accommodate buses as well, so that they can run a BRT route along all of Finch, using the LRT corridor until Keele, and then dedicated bus lanes or queue jump lanes where needed on the rest of Finch.
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That's an interesting resolution. However, here we might have a capacity mismatch issue; TTC might not want to run double service (LRT plus frequent bus) on the common part of Finch West, if one of them can handle the demand alone.
 
Rainforest said:
Therefore, I believe that Finch West LRT should stay on Finch all the way to Yonge, and continue as Finch East LRT to serve Seneca College, Warden, and McCowan clusters. Sheppard East LRT should terminate at Don Mills, and the subway extended westward to meet the Spadina line at Downsview or Wilson. In the very long term, the subway can possibly be extended both east and west and become a fast inter-regional line.
Click to expand...

Face reality. It takes large amounts of time to move from a remote area at the edge of the city to Yonge or beyond. A subway won't fix that. Not that you'd want to extend a subway to a forest.
 
Rainforest said:
Transfer at Don Mills is not the main problem of Sheppard LRT.

Its main problem is that it is too slow for the distance covered. North-eastern Scarborough is the most remote part of the city; Meadowvale is 21.5 km from Yonge while Hwy 427 is only 17.5 km. The LRT trip from Meadowvale to Don Mills will take 35 - 40 min and Don Mills is not even the final destination for the majority of riders. Even if the LRT line is extended in the subway tunnel all the way to Yonge, it will be a 45 - 50 min trip to a point that is again not the final destination for many riders. The only good thing about Sheppard LRT is that it will improve the local service compared to the bus; but it is not designed as a trunk route.

"Northern Crosstown" will be even more inadequate for the distance covered. The end-to-end trip will take more than 1.5 hours, and many trips that involve a bus ride to / from LRT will take even longer. Choice riders will not use such line for long trips, and captive riders who have no other options will be miserable. Meanwhile, diverting Finch LRT off Finch between Dufferin and Yonge will deprive that relatively dense stretch of the local LRT service that can be quite handy there.

Eglinton Crosstown is actually much better, both because it is shorter and because it will have a significant tunneled portion. The trip from Kennedy to the airport will take about 1 hour which is not perfect but tolerable.

If we choose low-end, relatively slow LRT implementation for Sheppard and Finch, then it is better to focus on the role that such LRT can do well: quality local service.

We should not pretend that those LRT lines can simultaneously work as long-haul trunk routes, and break the grid system for the sake of creating one long line on the map that very few will ride end-to-end.

Therefore, I believe that Finch West LRT should stay on Finch all the way to Yonge, and continue as Finch East LRT to serve Seneca College, Warden, and McCowan clusters. Sheppard East LRT should terminate at Don Mills, and the subway extended westward to meet the Spadina line at Downsview or Wilson. In the very long term, the subway can possibly be extended both east and west and become a fast inter-regional line.
Click to expand...

Someone on another blog made a very good point regarding the stop spacing. Will not much of the traffic for the line come from people transferring from other north-south routes? I don't ride the Sheppard East bus often, but is there that much passenger volume mid-block that putting stops every 400m at various side streets really worth it? Yes, some people may have to walk a little further than if the stops were closer, but if the vast majority of riders arrive at stops from other buses, it might be worth the little extra walking time for the few in order to improve cross-Scarborough commutes.
 
gweed123 said:
So initially, not gonna lie, I just kinda pulled this out of my ass. But after thinking about it a little bit, it actually does kinda make sense. The concept wouldn't be all that different from what is being done now on Eglinton (surface on the ends, tunnel in the middle).

The connection between the two is done to by the least expensive connection possible, hence why it's LRT on open land around Downsview, and then up the rail corridor to Finch.

I've called it the Northern Crosstown, seeing as how referring to it by Sheppard or Finch is no longer really appropriate, plus I think it more accurately describes what it is.

Just an alternative to ponder.

View attachment 8710

PS: This could mean that Eglinton could be renamed the Midtown Crosstown, which I've always been a fan of, especially considering that if it's interlined with the SRT over 1/4 of it won't even be on Eglinton.
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You know, if they could connect the Finch line to Sheppard at Downsview or Sheppard West station, while not a single northern crosstown route, it could provide rapid crosstown transit for each of the suburbs. The SELRT could provide crosstown transit for Scarborough, the SS could provide crosstown transit for North York, and the FWLRT could provide it for Etobicoke.
 
Electrify said:
You know, if they could connect the Finch line to Sheppard at Downsview or Sheppard West station, while not a single northern crosstown route, it could provide rapid crosstown transit for each of the suburbs. The SELRT could provide crosstown transit for Scarborough, the SS could provide crosstown transit for North York, and the FWLRT could provide it for Etobicoke.
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check my post.
 
With the number of stops on the TC system, getting across northern Toronto is going to be a painfully slow trek but with a little planning it doesn't have to be an unpleasant one.
If the Finch and Sheppard LRts are an actual go they should make it one interlined route:
Finch from Humber all the way to Don Mills, south on DM to Sheppard and then iinterline the 2 routes {why interling is not considered in Toronto is anyone's guess} until the GO rail line where the Sheppard Line continues to Malvern and the Finch head south to interline with the Eglinton LRT and continue east to STC and further east where the Eglinton eventually head north to Sheppard near the college {can't remember the name of the college for the life of me} while Finch continues further east to UTSC.
In other words one long route from Humber to UTSC and by using interlining it actually wouldn't be that expensive. It would make a direct connection to STC and by interlining stations, transfers are easier and more pleasant.
Using Primove technology should be the only type considered as it is more esthetically pleasing {and yes that matters especially to local businesses along the route} and be cheaper by not having so much renovation on the SRT stations.
 
denfromoakvillemilton said:
@gweed
http://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/mmis/2012/cc/bgrd/CC20_1_app3_3.pdf

The Finch LRT will turn down at Don Mills Road and link to the Sheppard LRT. Eliminating a transfer.
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Yes, but that still means building an LRT along half of Finch East, which means that everyone east of Don Mills is going to either have to have to transfer onto the LRT to continue further west, or the buses are going to run the in the LRT corridor. With the first option, all you're really doing is swapping one transfer for another.

And in either case, the Sheppard Subway becomes even more of a white elephant, because it's being bypassed. I'd like to see Sheppard used more, not less.
 
ssiguy2 said:
With the number of stops on the TC system, getting across northern Toronto is going to be a painfully slow trek but with a little planning it doesn't have to be an unpleasant one.
If the Finch and Sheppard LRts are an actual go they should make it one interlined route:
Finch from Humber all the way to Don Mills, south on DM to Sheppard and then iinterline the 2 routes {why interling is not considered in Toronto is anyone's guess} until the GO rail line where the Sheppard Line continues to Malvern and the Finch head south to interline with the Eglinton LRT and continue east to STC and further east where the Eglinton eventually head north to Sheppard near the college {can't remember the name of the college for the life of me} while Finch continues further east to UTSC.
In other words one long route from Humber to UTSC and by using interlining it actually wouldn't be that expensive. It would make a direct connection to STC and by interlining stations, transfers are easier and more pleasant.
Using Primove technology should be the only type considered as it is more esthetically pleasing {and yes that matters especially to local businesses along the route} and be cheaper by not having so much renovation on the SRT stations.
Click to expand...

I believe the section from Yonge-Finch to Don Mills-Sheppard has been tabled for the time being. It would be nice for people trying to go cross-town, but there's already a subway connection between the 2 stations, so I think this will be a fairly low priority.

Anyways, I'd much rather see FW-LRT and SE-LRT interlined on Don Mills down to Eglinton to meet the DRL. But until the DRL is there it seems like overkill.
 
SlickFranky said:
Anyways, I'd much rather see FW-LRT and SE-LRT interlined on Don Mills down to Eglinton to meet the DRL. But until the DRL is there it seems like overkill.
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FWLRT may be a bit of a stretch, but I'd certainly like to see the SELRT turn (or at least branch) south at Don Mills, and continue down Don Mills to a DRL terminus at Eglinton. At least then SELRT riders would have a 1 transfer ride downtown, instead of a 2 transfer line onto an overcrowded subway.
 
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