Airports pitch sites as all-purpose transport hubs

[nfitz]

niftz, your numbers are terribly wrong. If Eglinton only captured half of the riders that the B-D did in the section past Jane (read: virtually a totally new swath of riders taken in, as well as airport trips, as well as same density as the Bloor corridor and intercepting riders off busses bound for Bloor,) there would need to be 50 hours in the day for it to have a peak 2k pphpd, and that's disregarding rush hour commutes that'd push that peak number even higher. So it'd need to have maybe 1/8 of the ridership that Bloor picks up for it to have a peak of 2k pphpd west of Jane. By just looking at a map, you can easily laugh at that estimate.

Where are you getting this from?

Stop pulling these things out of your imagination. This is the real estimate of ridership in 2031 made by people a lot more qualified than you, using computer models. It's about 2,300 in the peak hour. It's not conceivable that these estimates are so wrong, that LRT capacity issues would exist. Your statement to the contrary is utter nonsense.

Let's put this in perspective. There's only 12 buses an hour during the peak period; with the current loading standard of 50, that's only 600 people per hour. With a 4-car LRT on Eglinton you would need one train an hour to carry the current demand. Four trains an hour to meet the 2031 demand.

There is no capacity concerns with running LRT on this part of Eglinton West.

 

[kettal]

there would need to be 50 hours in the day for it to have a peak 2k pphpd

lol. The PH in PPHPD stands for "per hour". The number of hours in a day is irrelevant. Please stop now before you embarrass yourself further.

 

[Second_in_pie]

lol. The PH in PPHPD stands for "per hour". The number of hours in a day is irrelevant. Please stop now before you embarrass yourself further.

As in, if there was no such thing as peak hour, there would need to be 50 hours in a day to have 2k pphpd on Eglinton west of Jane.

And when you have your employer telling you that you're going to put LRT on Eglinton, don't you think that it might be a good idea to appease them? Estimates can vary heavily, and it's apparent that people will eat up anything that the TTC has to throw at them.

By just taking a look at ridership patterns on the B-D line, again, Eglinton would need to have 1/8 of the ridership of the B-D for this "forecasted" 2k pphpd peak west of Jane. When you realize that both lines surroundings would be essentially identical in their ability to suck up riders (same density, same geographic range of passenger catchment,) I consider this estimate to be heavily flawed.

 

[nfitz]

And when you have your employer telling you that you're going to put LRT on Eglinton, don't you think that it might be a good idea to appease them? Estimates can vary heavily, and it's apparent that people will eat up anything that the TTC has to throw at them.

If that were the case, then don't you think they would have estimated something that was actually in the LRT range? What they estimated can be handled quite easily with a bus.

By just taking a look at ridership patterns on the B-D line, again, Eglinton would need to have 1/8 of the ridership of the B-D for this "forecasted" 2k pphpd peak west of Jane. When you realize that both lines surroundings would be essentially identical in their ability to suck up riders (same density, same geographic range of passenger catchment,) I consider this estimate to be heavily flawed.

Your assumption that the density is the same is flawed. If you look at the figures in this thread you will see that the density along Eglinton west of Jane is a lot lower - for example see the final figure in the thread. Eglinton west of Jane - and certainly west of Scarlett is pretty barren. The higher density sections of Eglinton are where the LRT will be in a subway.

 

[kettal]

As in, if there was no such thing as peak hour, there would need to be 50 hours in a day to have 2k pphpd on Eglinton west of Jane.

Doesn't this just exemplify how backwards you are going about this? You're using phony numbers and dividing them in some bizarre way which does not reflect reality. I'm serious, quit trying to play with numbers you're only making everybody roll their eyes at you.

 

[Second_in_pie]

Your assumption that the density is the same is flawed. If you look at the figures in this thread you will see that the density along Eglinton west of Jane is a lot lower - for example see the final figure in the thread. Eglinton west of Jane - and certainly west of Scarlett is pretty barren. The higher density sections of Eglinton are where the LRT will be in a subway.

Er, how does this show that Eglinton is of significantly lower density? Around Eglinton Flats is just of slightly lower density than Islington on Bloor, while it has more density around Scarlett and Martin Grove. I'd have to crunch hard numbers to say that they're exactly the same, but it's quite easy to see that the densities are pretty equal. And even if Eglinton had half the density and therefore half the ridership of Bloor, that's still in the range of subway, especially for just the periphery of the line.

 

[Second_in_pie]

Doesn't this just exemplify how backwards you are going about this? You're using phony numbers and dividing them in some bizarre way which does not reflect reality. I'm serious, quit trying to play with numbers you're only making everybody roll their eyes at you.

I'm assuming you skipped out in high school algebra. If you take the daily ridership of the line and divide it in two across both directions and by the number of hours it runs for, you'll get the lowest possible peak ridership in pphpd (assuming everyone hops on evenly throughout the entire day, meaning it's very likely to fluctuate significantly higher during rush hour periods.) And so, I took the ridership of the stations on the B-D west of Jane, divided it by 2 for direction, another 2 for contingency against arguments that Eglinton's so much less likely to attract ridership (even though density and catchment areas are quite similar,) and then divided by the magical 2000 pphpd peak that is apparently forcasted for that section of Eglinton. And the result is that a day would need about 50 hours, based on what I'm sure many would call a reasonable estimate of ridership maybe a decade after line completion, for the lowest possible peak ridership to be 2000 pphpd (again, disregarding actual rush hour traffic which is much harder to properly correct for, but if you're paying attention you'd know that it only would put the peak pphpd estimates even higher.

 

[kettal]

I'm assuming you skipped out in high school algebra. If you take the daily ridership of the line and divide it in two across both directions and by the number of hours it runs for, you'll get the lowest possible peak ridership in pphpd (assuming everyone hops on evenly throughout the entire day, meaning it's very likely to fluctuate significantly higher during rush hour periods.) And so, I took the ridership of the stations on the B-D west of Jane, divided it by 2 for direction, another 2 for contingency against arguments that Eglinton's so much less likely to attract ridership (even though density and catchment areas are quite similar,) and then divided by the magical 2000 pphpd peak that is apparently forcasted for that section of Eglinton. And the result is that a day would need about 50 hours, based on what I'm sure many would call a reasonable estimate of ridership maybe a decade after line completion, for the lowest possible peak ridership to be 2000 pphpd (again, disregarding actual rush hour traffic which is much harder to properly correct for, but if you're paying attention you'd know that it only would put the peak pphpd estimates even higher.

Your methodology is extremely flawed. For example, if somebody goes from Kipling Station to Jane Station in one trip, then the passenger count for both Kipling and Jane Stations would go up. So in your methodology that one trip would be counted twice.

And that's presuming that the station passenger counts are only for subway riders, not passengers entering the station to get to a bus platform. May I ask what source you are using?

I understand what you are trying to calculate, but you're going at it completely the wrong way. If you get your hands on the actual PPHPD peak count for any point in the subway line within the specified area, then you can work with that, but you cannot get anything close to accurate with station passenger counts.

 

[nfitz]

Er, how does this show that Eglinton is of significantly lower density? Around Eglinton Flats is just of slightly lower density than Islington on Bloor, while it has more density around Scarlett and Martin Grove. I'd have to crunch hard numbers to say that they're exactly the same, but it's quite easy to see that the densities are pretty equal.

What on earth are you talking about? What figure are you looking at. This is the one:

http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/1242/employ3.png

There is no orange alogn Eglinton west of Jane. There is very little green, and none past Royal York. Eglinton Flats is completely empty, and the area around it is the only density at all. What's with the Petruchio routine?

 

[W. K. Lis]

What on earth are you talking about? What figure are you looking at. This is the one:

http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/1242/employ3.png

There is no orange alogn Eglinton west of Jane. There is very little green, and none past Royal York. Eglinton Flats is completely empty, and the area around it is the only density at all. What's with the Petruchio routine?

They have recently built high-rise buildings along Eglinton West (Scarlet, Plant World, Royal York, etc.) in Etobicoke and the zoning has changed to allow more. While they may keep the linear parks along Eglinton West, higher density is slowly blossoming along that stretch, but slowly. Its the zoning changes to allow higher density that matters.

 

[Second_in_pie]

Your methodology is extremely flawed. For example, if somebody goes from Kipling Station to Jane Station in one trip, then the passenger count for both Kipling and Jane Stations would go up. So in your methodology that one trip would be counted twice.

And that's presuming that the station passenger counts are only for subway riders, not passengers entering the station to get to a bus platform. May I ask what source you are using?

I understand what you are trying to calculate, but you're going at it completely the wrong way. If you get your hands on the actual PPHPD peak count for any point in the subway line within the specified area, then you can work with that, but you cannot get anything close to accurate with station passenger counts.

Then where would I find such counts? But just at a rough estimate as this, which I specifically made to produce the lowest possible result mathematically, shows that Eglinton would have a significantly, significantly higher peak ridership than 2k pphpd. I have no idea where to find pphpd peak counts for a certain section of a line, so I improvised. If you'd like to do a better job, I'd love to see it.
Also, are you trying to say that Eglinton wouldn't have similar ridership patterns to Bloor where one person could walk in at Martin Grove but get off at Jane? That's just silly.

There is no orange alogn Eglinton west of Jane. There is very little green, and none past Royal York. Eglinton Flats is completely empty, and the area around it is the only density at all. What's with the Petruchio routine?

There is a very large high density band going up Scarlett from Eglinton, with an "orange" Eglinton Flats just a 5 minute walk away from Jane and Eglinton. There is also a lot of density up on Dixon between Kipling and Islington, and up west of Islington north of Eglinton, where you've got a string of apartment blocks.

 

[nfitz]

They have recently built high-rise buildings along Eglinton West (Scarlet, Plant World, Royal York, etc.) in Etobicoke and the zoning has changed to allow more. While they may keep the linear parks along Eglinton West, higher density is slowly blossoming along that stretch, but slowly. Its the zoning changes to allow higher density that matters.

Development is also occurring along Bloor. And employment. The estimates are based on 2031 densities.

As for Pie II's further comments about mathematics ... I'm not sure if it's crossed your mind, but the analyses that have been done do take densities, travel demands, routings ... and yes, even mathematics in mind.

 

[Second_in_pie]

That's cute. You don't actually know how to refute my point so you make little jokes.

EDIT: Could we get all these posts moved to the transit city thread? I'd like to discuss the viability of a Pearson transit hub in peace from Eglinton madness.

 

[nfitz]

That's cute. You don't actually know how to refute my point so you make little jokes.

I saw no joke in what you send.

Your statements that the density along Eglinton are bizarre and completely without basis. This is your point, and I've refuted it. If your going to go all Petruchio on us, what else can we do? Yes that is the sun I see in the darkness.

 

[AnarchoSocialist]

An LRT and Blue 22 are fine as stop gap solutions or for providing local service to Pearson but are far from real solutions to the problem of connectivity with the airport and the rest of the city. The only real solution is a new deviation of the Georgetown line that goes directly under Pearson and provides walkable connection with Terminal 1. It would also be electrified and serve GO, VIA, and a Union-Pearson only rail link if there was still a market for it. But given how much it would cost (Somewhere between $1 - $2 billion) it isn't likely to happen for another 10 or 15 years time.

As far as the article goes it is old news. Even in Canada the idea of airports being intermodal hubs has been discussed for at least a decade or two. Not having done much about it about it has been an unfortunate mix of money, politics, and infrastructure.