facepalming_brooklynite
Active Member
The planned stations are on Bloor (Lansdowne) and Eglinton (Caledonia). If you're adding additional ones, there should be one on King or Queen also.
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Ontario Line Extension West of Ontario Place (Speculation)
- Thread starter thettctransitfanatic
- Start date
TRONto
Active Member
The ridership + the built form of the street requires higher order transit. As ridership shows, people need to travel down Dufferin even though a subway is a few KM away.
nfitz
Superstar
It's not a few km away! It's less than 700 metres from Wilson station to Dufferin. Sheppard West station is literally at the corner of Dufferin and Sheppard! Even Cedarvale is only 1.1 km from Dufferin - on the other hand, there's literally a subway station at Dufferin and Eglinton!
Dufferin is pretty low density from Lawrence all the way to past Dupont. Higher order transit is needed south of Bloor - and if it stops at Dufferin station (or even St. Clair!) that doesn't preclude it running along Weston Road or Dundas West (or both!) out to the burbs. Dundas West would get it to the proposed Ontario Line station at Kipling.
TRONto
Active Member
That's the point. Even with those stations so close, Dufferin has the ridership to support higher order transit. Is it the whole length of Dufferin, or maybe up to Eglinton? that would need some analysis.
nfitz
Superstar
Maybe even up to Eglinton, before Line 5 opened.
We do need analysis - and we also need new system-wide ridership numbers after Line 5 and 6 opened. I'd guess the peak direction Dufferin bus ridership has dropped south of Eglinton.
TossYourJacket
Senior Member
Personally I like the idea of the OL servicing the lower part of Dufferin, but I don't think it makes sense to keep it on Dufferin anywhere north of Dupont. Ideally I'd have it move over to Jane and St Clair and run up Jane from there.
I feel like because of our subway lines being named for streets we often think of aligning any future subways along major streets, but subway technology allows for so much more flexibility that we might as well make use of given the high cost.
I feel like because of our subway lines being named for streets we often think of aligning any future subways along major streets, but subway technology allows for so much more flexibility that we might as well make use of given the high cost.
facepalming_brooklynite
Active Member
Case in point: the Ontario line going from Queen & Spadina to King & Bathurst
JasonParis
Moderator
This is pretty much what I'd like to see. I'd also like to see Line 3 and the UPX eventually using the same technology, if not being interlined in spots. UPX should also just be a numbered subway line and continue past Union to at least East Harbour, but maybe all the way to The Beach(es).
You should post this on the Relief Line Facebook Group too!
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Tyler Friesen
New Member
Been thinking about about the best way to extend the Ontario Line westward for a while now, and this is what I've come up with:
You'd start from Exhibition, tunneling under Parkdale to hit a stop at King and Jameson, with another stop at Queen and Roncesvalles (a connection the Lakeshore West line would be great to have here, too). The line would turn north, tunneling under Roncesvalles with a stop somewhere in the middle of the neighbourhood (I've notionally put it at High Park Boulevard, but this could be changed - there isn't one super obvious location for a station here), then connecting with Line 2 and the Kitchener/UP Express trains at a renamed Bloor-Dundas station. You'd keep it underground heading north, turning left to hit a stop just south of Dundas and Keele, with another station somewhere in the block bounded by Dundas, St Johns, and Gilmour. The line would turn north at Jane, creating a new connection to the Milton Line, and from there it's a straight shot up Jane, terminating at Pioneer Village Station.
On Jane, I've tried to keep ~1k station spacing. The exceptions are between Eglinton and Lawrence where the midpoint is industrial land along the rail corridor, and between Lawrence and Wilson where the midpoint is nothin' but sweet sweet highway!! Otherwise I've got stations approximately every kilometer until the terminus to provide fast but local service to the dense communities along the corridor. By the time the line crosses the rail corridor near Weston Road, Jane Street is sufficiently wide enough to allow the line to run elevated. This remains true until the terminus, though a bridge would need to be built to cross Black Creek near York University. At Jane & Finch, for example, an elevated structure could be built straddling Finch Avenue, with stairs/elevators providing a quick transfer to the Line 6 platforms (although one of the existing farside platforms would need to be relocated, unless the station building is built over the entire intersection which...... feels like a bit much)
This alignment seems to me like a good option because it covers the most new ground, while also creating a number of useful connections. An extension up Dufferin Street would be great, but north of Eglinton there's no obvious place to go that isn't extremely close to Line 1. Similarly, an extension down the Queensway with a stop in the Humber Shores area, possibly terminating at Kipling, is what I previously thought the best option might be, but it'd be duplicating the Lakeshore West line for half the alignment, then running through a relatively low density area for the rest. And so, replacing the Jane LRT (which, given how Line 5 and 6 have gone, probably isn't going anywhere fast (((in every way)))) seems to me like the best course of action.
The biggest questions I have (besides some of the questionable station naming) are 1: where to transition the line from underground to elevated, and 2: whether or not the line should divert off of Jane to make a connection at Weston Station.
With respect to where the line should emerge from the tunnel, I think the road is reasonably wide enough north of around Alliance Avenue such that an elevated structure could be built without TOO much trouble? But it'd have pretty tight margins, just eyeballing Google Earth. Plus you've got the elevated Line 5 station at Eglinton to get past, so an elevated Line 3 station here would presumably have to be quite the structure. Though, I'm not familiar with the soil conditions in the area (what with the area being a floodplain), so tunneling might be even tougher, but I really can't speak to this.
As for a diversion to Weston Station, I'll admit it's damn tempting, and an additional station could be built between Eglinton Ave and Weston Station along Weston Road. But I don't see a way to do it without tunneling from just north of Eglinton through to Highway 400/Black Creek Drive. If it isn't possible to build the segment between Dundas and Eglinton elevated, the cost of keeping the tunnel boring machine in the ground might be small, but otherwise I'd imagine that the project cost would get a hell of a bump from the diversion (but again, I'm not that familiar with tunneling costs, so I'd love to be wrong about that)
But uhhh... yeah! Sorry for the essay, this mostly just started as map making practice, but I figured it'd be a good idea to dump my needlessly convoluted thoughts here
You'd start from Exhibition, tunneling under Parkdale to hit a stop at King and Jameson, with another stop at Queen and Roncesvalles (a connection the Lakeshore West line would be great to have here, too). The line would turn north, tunneling under Roncesvalles with a stop somewhere in the middle of the neighbourhood (I've notionally put it at High Park Boulevard, but this could be changed - there isn't one super obvious location for a station here), then connecting with Line 2 and the Kitchener/UP Express trains at a renamed Bloor-Dundas station. You'd keep it underground heading north, turning left to hit a stop just south of Dundas and Keele, with another station somewhere in the block bounded by Dundas, St Johns, and Gilmour. The line would turn north at Jane, creating a new connection to the Milton Line, and from there it's a straight shot up Jane, terminating at Pioneer Village Station.
On Jane, I've tried to keep ~1k station spacing. The exceptions are between Eglinton and Lawrence where the midpoint is industrial land along the rail corridor, and between Lawrence and Wilson where the midpoint is nothin' but sweet sweet highway!! Otherwise I've got stations approximately every kilometer until the terminus to provide fast but local service to the dense communities along the corridor. By the time the line crosses the rail corridor near Weston Road, Jane Street is sufficiently wide enough to allow the line to run elevated. This remains true until the terminus, though a bridge would need to be built to cross Black Creek near York University. At Jane & Finch, for example, an elevated structure could be built straddling Finch Avenue, with stairs/elevators providing a quick transfer to the Line 6 platforms (although one of the existing farside platforms would need to be relocated, unless the station building is built over the entire intersection which...... feels like a bit much)
This alignment seems to me like a good option because it covers the most new ground, while also creating a number of useful connections. An extension up Dufferin Street would be great, but north of Eglinton there's no obvious place to go that isn't extremely close to Line 1. Similarly, an extension down the Queensway with a stop in the Humber Shores area, possibly terminating at Kipling, is what I previously thought the best option might be, but it'd be duplicating the Lakeshore West line for half the alignment, then running through a relatively low density area for the rest. And so, replacing the Jane LRT (which, given how Line 5 and 6 have gone, probably isn't going anywhere fast (((in every way)))) seems to me like the best course of action.
The biggest questions I have (besides some of the questionable station naming) are 1: where to transition the line from underground to elevated, and 2: whether or not the line should divert off of Jane to make a connection at Weston Station.
With respect to where the line should emerge from the tunnel, I think the road is reasonably wide enough north of around Alliance Avenue such that an elevated structure could be built without TOO much trouble? But it'd have pretty tight margins, just eyeballing Google Earth. Plus you've got the elevated Line 5 station at Eglinton to get past, so an elevated Line 3 station here would presumably have to be quite the structure. Though, I'm not familiar with the soil conditions in the area (what with the area being a floodplain), so tunneling might be even tougher, but I really can't speak to this.
As for a diversion to Weston Station, I'll admit it's damn tempting, and an additional station could be built between Eglinton Ave and Weston Station along Weston Road. But I don't see a way to do it without tunneling from just north of Eglinton through to Highway 400/Black Creek Drive. If it isn't possible to build the segment between Dundas and Eglinton elevated, the cost of keeping the tunnel boring machine in the ground might be small, but otherwise I'd imagine that the project cost would get a hell of a bump from the diversion (but again, I'm not that familiar with tunneling costs, so I'd love to be wrong about that)
But uhhh... yeah! Sorry for the essay, this mostly just started as map making practice, but I figured it'd be a good idea to dump my needlessly convoluted thoughts here
Mrgeosim
New Member
Of all the suggested Western alignments, in my opinion this one makes the most sense. It would solve the need for high frequency transit on Jane, it would serve the Junction, it would connect at the major western interchange station (Dundas West), and it fills in some transit gaps for Liberty village. If they could extend the St Clair street car to Jane, it would make this alignment even better.
Jonathan's Junction
New Member
I really like this alignment. It also opens up an interesting door- I wonder if it could then turn east along maybe even the York Subdivision (if that's even feasible, but the corridor is decently wide). Then it could turn south along the 404 and make its way back down Don Mills, and continue down to Eglinton. A lot of these stations have very developable land nearby too, and the entire thing can be at or above grade.
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urbanclient
Active Member
I think station spacing here is too tight. Should be kept at an average of 2 km. For example, the Don Mills circle above Fairview Mall/Henry Farm is a supermarket and fast food plaza with two schools surrounded by low density suburbia. Why does that area need 4 stops within 2.5 to 3 km? Having a Seneca and Fairview Mall stop is enough.
nfitz
Superstar
I don't know why you'd duplicate the 407 Transitway, when you are already getting quite close to it.
T-Bor
Active Member
The argument is that with an above ground station there, the Peanut would be able to be entirely redeveloped. There are also probably a good 15 towers within walking distance.
Jonathan's Junction
New Member
I do agree the stations should be kept to a minimum, it was more of a thought experiment of where they could be. Although stations at places like Hilda start to make a lot of sense once you realize there’s going to be 50+ story buildings down the street in a couple years.
I think they are fundamentally different things at this point. The transitway always seemed like more of a regional thing to me at least. Also, this alignment would serve the area south of the 407 so much better than the transitway. Highway running rapid transit, especially next to a transmission corridor, does not necessarily attract the same development potential (ie Mississauga Transitway). I also happen to be in areas around where the 407 transitway would be built in frequently enough and they are all incredibly hostile to those outside the car. I think the transitway is better looked at as a regional connector for go busses.