When is enough transit infrastructure enough?

[buildup]

We're accustomed to lamenting the state of Toronto's public transit. But is it fair to say once projects in progress are completed we'll be in great shape? I'm assuming DRL is about to be approved. Seems to me a tremendous amount is happening. Only thing missing is high-speed rail to KW.

 

[innsertnamehere]

It depends. The DRL may finally be on its way to construction - but it probably won't be complete for another 15 years or so. If all that was funded today was completed today, yes, we would be in pretty good shape. But will a Toronto of 2033 be in good shape with this infrastructure? That is a more difficult question. Probably better shape than Toronto of 2010 was with the infrastructure available at that time.

15 years means Toronto will have a metro population probably approaching 8 million. The City of Toronto will be sitting somewhere around 3.2 million. That is a lot more people to move than today with populations of 6.5 million and 2.8 million, respectively. We are talking about adding a city the size of Calgary in population over the next 15 years.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

We're accustomed to lamenting the state of Toronto's public transit. But is it fair to say once projects in progress are completed we'll be in great shape? I'm assuming DRL is about to be approved. Seems to me a tremendous amount is happening. Only thing missing is high-speed rail to KW.

No. We’ll still be in poor shape after the implementation of the Relief Line South. Yonge Line will still be over capacity, and the Relief Line North will need to progress immediately. Seriously, we can’t rest on our laurels. Need to keep pushing forward.

And the Relief Line is only one major component of many that need to be implemented. Our streetcar system remains slow, over capacity and unreliable. It’ll probably remain that way until the Relief Line West is implemented. Line 2 needs a new signalling system. Our bus system, which carries more trips than the subway, needs a lot of work.

 

[pman]

No. We’ll still be in poor shape after the implementation of the Relief Line South. Yonge Line will still be over capacity, and the Relief Line North will need to progress immediately. Seriously, we can’t rest on our laurels. Need to keep pushing forward.

And the Relief Line is only one major component of many that need to be implemented. Our streetcar system remains slow, over capacity and unreliable. It’ll probably remain that way until the Relief Line West is implemented. Line 2 needs a new signalling system. Our bus system, which carries more trips than the subway, needs a lot of work.

You’re assuming RL south will actually be built. That doesn’t seem to be a given if Ford wins. But folk’ll be able to whisk underground from STC to NYCC, with the guarantee of always having a seat on virtually empty trains.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

No. We’ll still be in poor shape after the implementation of the Relief Line South. Yonge Line will still be over capacity, and the Relief Line North will need to progress immediately. Seriously, we can’t rest on our laurels. Need to keep pushing forward.

And the Relief Line is only one major component of many that need to be implemented. Our streetcar system remains slow, over capacity and unreliable. It’ll probably remain that way until the Relief Line West is implemented. Line 2 needs a new signalling system. Our bus system, which carries more trips than the subway, needs a lot of work.

Toronto's transit won't be in a good situation until the following are implemented:

1. Relief Line South: This project is important as it will relieve Bloor-Yonge Station and enable the development of Relief Line North. This project is not being advanced quickly enough

2. Relief Line North: The Yonge Line will remain over capacity without Relief Line North. Without this project, Toronto transit is fundamentally broken. It needs to be implemented immediately. Beyond the reduction in Yonge crowding, this project will enable people from eastern Toronto to travel Downtown much quicker than today (in some case, more than twice as fast).

3. Relief Line West: Downtown's population will more than double by the 2030s. That's not very long from now (less than 20 years). Our streetcar system is slow, unreliable and can't even handle today's Downtown population. Areas like Liberty Village and Humber Bay Shores are underserved by transit. Expansions to the surface transit are a bandaid solution. The only way to fix this is with the Relief Line West. We're going to have a really bad situation on our hands without it. Beyond Downtown, University Line and St. George Station crowding is expected to become increasingly problematic into the 2040s. The Relief Line West will address this.

4. GO Transit TTC fare integration

5. Eglinton East LRT to UTSC: Transportation within Scarborough is in a sad state. And it will remain in a sad state until a few things are implemented. The most important component is the Eglinton East LRT. This will be the transport backbone of Scarborough, greatly improving travel times and reliability for travel within Scarborough, and to other parts of the city. The peak ridership of this project is equal to the eastbound peak ridership of the central Crosstown LRT.

6. Bus improvements: Our bus system is in really poor shape. There are a lot of small upgrades that are necessary to get it into decent shape. Specifically, I'd like to see the bus fleet increased, so the TTC can increase the number of spares on hand, and improve crowding standards. Some of our busiest routes should be upgraded to BRT where possible. Exceptionally poor performing routes, such as Jane, might need to be upgraded to LRT.

 

[drum118]

Even if you built the DRL to Steeles, you will need to build another Yonge Line that will have to use Bay St south of Eglinton. That 2nd Yonge line to be an express line and have to use Bay St since none of the existing southern Yonge Line stations will be able to handle the ridership of the 2 lines.

Still say the DRL should go west to Jane St and then north with streetcars staying on Queen, since the subway station will be far apart due to low ridership between them for a station

You need to look at more E-W high order lines from BRT to Subway, with subway being an upgrade from BRT/LRT

I agree you will get a seat all the time from STC to NYCC even at peak time using 6 car trains. Very rare I have to stand between Don Mills and Yonge at peak time on a 4 car train these days.

Need to look at extending Bloor to Cloverdale.

All surface routes need to be beef up service wise 7x24.

Time to look at putting the Dufferin line underground as an LRT south of Eglinton, with station far apart and still having surface service, to services stops between the stations.

 

[kEiThZ]

We're accustomed to lamenting the state of Toronto's public transit. But is it fair to say once projects in progress are completed we'll be in great shape? I'm assuming DRL is about to be approved. Seems to me a tremendous amount is happening. Only thing missing is high-speed rail to KW.

What a downtown centric point of view. The DRL will be great.....if you're going to downtown. But trying going across the 416 for work or school. Or try going across the GTA for anything.

Want to know why the public at large often thinks transit is useless? This, right here. Everybody only thinks of getting downtown. GTA residents will appreciate transit more when it actually has a solid regional network that allows someone to get from their home in Brampton to their office in Scarborough in a reasonable amount of time (say under 1.5 hrs). And they can do that most times during the work day.

 

[nfitz]

I'm not sure there's any evidence that the DRL is anymore approved now, than when 90% of Torontonians voted to build the original incarnation in January 1946.

Until there's actually holes in the ground at least.

And even that's not enough. Recall there were holes in the ground on the Eglinton East subway line back in 1995, until the PCs were elected, and cancelled the funding, leading to the contractor being paid off, and the hole filled in.

And even now, PCs are getting ready to cancel the Finch West line, with construction already underway - who knows how many hundreds of millions would be elected if they got elected.

 

[Irishmonk]

Even if you built the DRL to Steeles, you will need to build another Yonge Line that will have to use Bay St south of Eglinton. That 2nd Yonge line to be an express line and have to use Bay St since none of the existing southern Yonge Line stations will be able to handle the ridership of the 2 lines.

I wish more people would get behind the idea of a Yonge Express line--it seems like such a no-brainer. It would probably run at capacity from day one and generate an operational profit for the TTC. It would also relieve the tightly bunched, south of Egg stops for local users.

Charge an additional fee for the Express line and use the money to pay off the debts for building it. (I doubt the folks north of Lawrence trying to get to work in the core would forego the extra fee for the pleasure of sniffing someone's armpit in the local trains for 30 minutes)

 

[pstogios]

What a downtown centric point of view. The DRL will be great.....if you're going to downtown. But trying going across the 416 for work or school. Or try going across the GTA for anything.

Want to know why the public at large often thinks transit is useless? This, right here. Everybody only thinks of getting downtown. GTA residents will appreciate transit more when it actually has a solid regional network that allows someone to get from their home in Brampton to their office in Scarborough in a reasonable amount of time (say under 1.5 hrs). And they can do that most times during the work day.

Actually, the truth is Tigermaster’s analysis is spot on because the DENSITY of people, jobs, and destinations are the highest in the “downtown” (or at least, the old city of Toronto).

Anyone that claims this is a “downtown-centric” analysis ignores those facts and instead wants to push an alternative “downtown vs everybody” narrative that isn’t productive at all.

True, it would be nice to have more crosstown transit options and that’s why the Eglinton Crosstown will be so transformative.

It would also be nice for all of us to have a pony. We must be aware of the facts of where transit usage is the highest and where the bottlenecks are in most desperate need to be corrected. Only then can we have a clear-eyed view of where to spend our limited transit infrastructure dollars.

 

[Towered]

When all of the proposals in this thread are built: https://urbantoronto.ca/forum/threads/toronto-2031.28534/

 

[denfromoakvillemilton]

- we need to add more streecar routes
- we need all day service on all go lines.
- we need either the LRTs to be built or all the subways to be built.
- we need the entire lower subway line built from Mt Dennis to Steeles East to have an impact

It still won't be enough. We still need more north south Transit for the east. And for Jane.

 

[buildup]

Id like to see someone challenge the 15 yer assumption of the DRL, Seriously, in China it would take 5 years. Give a financial incentive to the builder. And if sadly a worker fatality occurs dont suspend constrcution for 3-6 months is in the North York extension.

 

[Leo_Chan]

Id like to see someone challenge the 15 yer assumption of the DRL, Seriously, in China it would take 5 years. Give a financial incentive to the builder. And if sadly a worker fatality occurs dont suspend constrcution for 3-6 months is in the North York extension.

I'd like to see a new DRL Long every 10 years.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

Actually, the truth is Tigermaster’s analysis is spot on because the DENSITY of people, jobs, and destinations are the highest in the “downtown” (or at least, the old city of Toronto).

Anyone that claims this is a “downtown-centric” analysis ignores those facts and instead wants to push an alternative “downtown vs everybody” narrative that isn’t productive at all.

True, it would be nice to have more crosstown transit options and that’s why the Eglinton Crosstown will be so transformative.

It would also be nice for all of us to have a pony. We must be aware of the facts of where transit usage is the highest and where the bottlenecks are in most desperate need to be corrected. Only then can we have a clear-eyed view of where to spend our limited transit infrastructure dollars.

Funny thing is that of the three components of the Relief Line (South, North, West), only one of them directly serves Downtown people.

The primary purpose of the Relief Line south is to relieve Bloor-Yonge, which will make it easier for people form the suburbs to transfer to Yonge Line

Relief Line North will allow for less crowded Yonge Line trips for suburban residents from the North, and greatly reduce commute times for suburban residents to the east.

Relief Line West will relieve Downtown’s streetcar system