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Brampton Transit/Zum

You'd think that they'd at least run half-hour all-day service along the only route which directly connects Shoppers World to Bramalea City Centre though as well the whole section of Queen/Hwy 7 between West and Peel Centre Drive.
 
Fresh Start, I don't think you don't understand Brampton at all.

You'd think that they'd at least run half-hour all-day service along the only route which directly connects Shoppers World to Bramalea City Centre
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Via a very indirect routing in areas often close to direct routes that are or are going to be seriously beefed up like 501, 2, 7. Look at the map.

well the whole section of Queen/Hwy 7 between West and Peel Centre Drive.
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Nobody lives there. The 1 goes along Clark, where it serves (and will continue to serve) the high-density housing near Lisa and Dixie as well as provide drop-offs and pick ups to the garage. A quick glance of Google Maps would have made it clear. Anyway, 501 Queen will do that soon enough.

Since it keeps being brought up then, I'll take the opportunity to compare to Mississauga again.

Try going between Square One and Meadowvale Town Centre during the off-peak. Route 9, via an indirect route, runs every 35-36 minutes off-peak weekdays (30 minute Saturday, 40 minutes Sunday) , or try Route 10, which has strange 34, 35 or 29 minute headways off-peak (every hour Saturday evening, every 40-60 minutes also via a not all-too-direct route.

Or try Malton to Square One off-peak!

MT is so screwed up, they don't even offer paper schedules for routes for which they can't be bothered to run clock-face schedules. Try memorizing your bus times!
 
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All I was saying though is that when you have major terminals like these which a lot of people would desire to travel between, you ought to provide them with fast, reliable, one-seat options to in order to get them there. 52 McMurchy for instance links major transfer points like Shoppers, DT, Sheridan and Ray Lawson/Hwy 10 but yet is also a local route. That the 8 Centre bus route largely parallels Steeles, Kennedy and Queen is a good thing as it spares commuters from having to endure several transfers just to go from point-A to -B. Perhaps not via #8 as is, but BT definitely needs an express bus route to link the terminals directly.

I agree about MT though, what a headache it is everytime that I need to go to Meadowvale. It's enough for me to want to take up biking again.
 
ShonTron said:
Try going between Square One and Meadowvale Town Centre during the off-peak. Route 9, via an indirect route, runs every 35-36 minutes off-peak weekdays (30 minute Saturday, 40 minutes Sunday) , or try Route 10, which has strange 34, 35 or 29 minute headways off-peak (every hour Saturday evening, every 40-60 minutes also via a not all-too-direct route.

Or try Malton to Square One off-peak!

MT is so screwed up, they don't even offer paper schedules for routes for which they can't be bothered to run clock-face schedules. Try memorizing your bus times!
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What is your problem? The person who brought up 8 Centre was actually bashing Mississauga...

For the record, route 9 actually provides 30 minute service for weekday off peak, route 10 provides 30 minute service for weekday and Saturday off-peak, and route 7 provides 25 minute and 30 minute service in the off-peak. They take 40, 50, 60 minutes respectively to connect their two major terminals, versus the 40 minute travel time for 8 Centre. So not a single one of these MT routes are more infrequent or meandering than 8 Centre.
 
Fresh Start said:
All I was saying though is that when you have major terminals like these which a lot of people would desire to travel between, you ought to provide them with fast, reliable, one-seat options to in order to get them there. 52 McMurchy for instance links major transfer points like Shoppers, DT, Sheridan and Ray Lawson/Hwy 10 but yet is also a local route. That the 8 Centre bus route largely parallels Steeles, Kennedy and Queen is a good thing as it spares commuters from having to endure several transfers just to go from point-A to -B. Perhaps not via #8 as is, but BT definitely needs an express bus route to link the terminals directly.

I agree about MT though, what a headache it is everytime that I need to go to Meadowvale. It's enough for me to want to take up biking again.
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The 8 Centre is not the best way to travel between BBC, and Shoppers World. Anyone who have lived in Brampton especially in the past 5 years know the 1 Queen/2Main, or 18 Dixie/11 Steeles will get you to either destination quicker than the 8. Transfers are a part of riding transit, I am amazed people still think otherwise. Contrary to ShonTron's assumption, the 8 is well-utilized. I lived on the route for 25 years, and the ridership seems to be growing. The route could use 20 minute allday service on the weekdays, and and at least 30 minutes on Saturdays.

And BT does not an express bus between Shopper's and BCC. I cannot remember a time where I, or any of my Brampton friends ever wanted to travel between BCC, and Shopper's World for any reason. Come to think of it, I do remember Brampton Transit experimenting with express service on Kennedy Road for a time, I think the stickers are still up on some signs.
 
A bit off-topic, but does anyone know of any ridership projections for these routes? I would assume that the projections for the 501 Queen are more finalized than the Main or Steeles routes. I'm just curious to see what they're expecting to get from this. Also, according to the Brampton website, Phase I (which I'm assuming is Queen, Main, and Steeles corridors) is going to cost $159 million, with Phase II costing another $126 million. Are they doing curbside lanes along the entire Queen corridor? Or is it weiving in and out of dedicated lanes?

I appologize for my lack of knowledge of this project, to be honest I have not followed it very closely until recently. I'm just trying to get an idea of how many riders they expect to carry, to see what the ridership vs cost figures are for this style of BRT vs TC-style LRT.
 
Justin10000 said:
And BT does not an express bus between Shopper's and BCC. I cannot remember a time where I, or any of my Brampton friends ever wanted to travel between BCC, and Shopper's World for any reason. Come to think of it, I do remember Brampton Transit experimenting with express service on Kennedy Road for a time, I think the stickers are still up on some signs.
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BT had two express bus routes in the early 1990s that were cut when transit funding from the province across the board, marketed as "Fast Track" - one route ran from Heart Lake to Bramalea City Centre via Kennedy and Queen, the other from Shoppers World to BCC via Steeles and Dixie. They never brought them back, unfortunately. The Steeles/Dixie Fast Track bus would work very well today, and I would have used that often.

I used the 8 Centre for a few summers. It's busy in rush hour, but mostly on the Rutherford Road side, it empties out on the Centre Street side south of Williams Parkway, and quiet through Peel Village. It was never that busy except the east end. I'm not against improvements at all, it was just nuts how it became the standard in which to judge the entire system all of a sudden, as BT's priority is Zum and the main "support corridors," but without cutting service elsewhere.

I'd reorganize the 8 anyway and try to integrate with the minimally useful 21 Heart Lake Rd-Southlake-Conestoga rush hour circuit to provide useful through routes. The 21 will see a lot of highrise developement near Heart Lake mall and on Heart Lake Road, so needs more service too.
 
Yeah, it was silly for members to use the 8 as a standard. I used the 8 as an example why not every route connecting to Zum is not going to improve to 10 minutes. I would leave the 8 just the way it is and have the 21 connect to BCC. Why anyone would want to go to Heart Lake Town Centre is beyond me.
 
Justin10000 said:
Yeah, it was silly for members to use the 8 as a standard. I used the 8 as an example why not every route connecting to Zum is not going to improve to 10 minutes. I would leave the 8 just the way it is and have the 21 connect to BCC. Why anyone would want to go to Heart Lake Town Centre is beyond me.
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Perhaps because they live nearby? Perhaps because it is a location of a BT terminal? Perhaps because there is a fairly significant higher density housing project about to get going there? Or maybe they just like Irish pubs and don't want to drink and drive ;) ?
 
Except everyone drives to Heart Lake TC, and the Bus Terminal isn't exactly that convenient in the area. What a sllly area to place high density development. That area is going to be a traffic nightmare.
 
Justin10000 said:
Except everyone drives to Heart Lake TC, and the Bus Terminal isn't exactly that convenient in the area. What a sllly area to place high density development. That area is going to be a traffic nightmare.
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It was always going to be high density....the fight is over a matter of degree. There is a thread in another area (the projects) area where I give my thoughts on why this is an appropriate area for higher density....an opinion that the city must have shared decades ago when they zoned it for higher density.
 
TOareaFan said:
It was always going to be high density....the fight is over a matter of degree. There is a thread in another area (the projects) area where I give my thoughts on why this is an appropriate area for higher density....an opinion that the city must have shared decades ago when they zoned it for higher density.
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I read your points, and I have to disagree with almost all of them, especially about Sandalwood Parkway. Sandalwodd is already fairly congested, and I doubt it will be able to handle much more traffic without widening, and I do not see how that is possible between Conestoga, and the 410, without pushing the road right the fences of residences.
I am not against high density development, but putting that sort of massive development in that area is a really bad idea, and is going to ruin the character of the area. I used to bike there all the tme in the 80'a and 90's. It may have been zoned long ago, but that doesn't mean it is good idea now, especially when even City council is against the development.
 
Justin10000 said:
I read your points, and I have to disagree with almost all of them, especially about Sandalwood Parkway. Sandalwodd is already fairly congested, and I doubt it will be able to handle much more traffic without widening, and I do not see how that is possible between Conestoga, and the 410, without pushing the road right the fences of residences.
I am not against high density development, but putting that sort of massive development in that area is a really bad idea, and is going to ruin the character of the area. I used to bike there all the tme in the 80'a and 90's. It may have been zoned long ago, but that doesn't mean it is good idea now, especially when even City council is against the development.
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How many units would you put there, then?

Brampton has to intensify...not only for its own good (ie producing some growth that actually pays for itself as opposed to the growth that we have had that leads to the inevitable property tax increases each year with the city using the cost of growth as one of the reasons) but also because it has been designated as "a place to grow".

Intensification, then, has to ocurr somewhere and, I would imagine that it will be in nodes spread around the city as opposed to a wall of condo across Queen Street (as the city seems to want but, for some reason, after over 20 years of asking for that no development has ocurred between Kennedy and the 410 - well, Kennedy and the BCC to be true..what is there was before the Queen Street Corridor plan was developed). If it is nodes, as I suspect, each part of town will see some of this happening........Heart Lake is a desirable part of town to live in and with a decent park/school/amenity profile I can see condos (and some rental buildings) being well accepted by the market....

.....this debate has always been about "how many" not "yes/no"....the city wants to stick with a decades old (pre-intensification push) zoning of 419 units......the developer asked for over 1,400 then compromised to just over 800. If city council is opposed to development on this site and wanting to preserve wild life and open space....perhaps they should have rezoned it open space?

How many would you say is appropriate for this site? You say that you disagree with almost all of my points in favour.....could you give me responses (as a resident of the area I really would like to keep Sandalwood easier for myself to drive on....I just can't think of a justifiable reason to oppose the development).
 
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