Palma
Senior Member
I cannot believe we are still going on about how these trains should look. Obviously no real news as to the progress of this subway
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Cobra
Senior Member
I like it although it has a New York vibe to it.
Unfortunately, this is like 30 years too late. I see this as an attempt to try to project that the RT is an integral part of the city and network (which is accurate) but most people felt all those years like they were "just the others". Didn't Royson wrote an article on "How neglecting the RT was simply shameless"? This reinforced the perception for Scarborough residents that they were second rate citizens. Perception is powerful. No wonder they aren't buying the LRT. The neglect of the RT and the perception that they were getting leftovers is the root of the problem here, which Rob Ford was able to exploit to his advantage.
They witnessed the subway (which works) and the RT (which doesn't) while the LRT (Unknown to them like the SRT was) is a question mark. It's normal for them to want something they know for a fact works instead of another technology they've never seen. The question isn't if LRT works or not but can they trust the TTC and the city to make it work properly and efficiently? This is where the trust was broken because although they know LRT works, they don't trust the TTC to deliver it properly. Who can argue that the ICTS technology works but it was poorly handled by the TTC and the city?
That perception was reinforced all those years due to all level of governments neglecting the line and due to the poor original designs and using the wrong route. I'm still amazed at how people are so surprised at Scarborough pushing back. I grow very annoyed and tired of reading condescending comments on how Scarborough are being entitled brats... From my perspective, the city and the TTC did that to themselves.
If the RT was on the right route, properly designed and properly maintained with MARK 2 trains being bought at some point, we wouldn't be here today wasting more money at starting over. We'd be talking about extending it on Eglinton Avenue or other parts of the city to save money over building conventional costly subway lines.
Furthermore, there's the human factor here. Having hundreds of thousands of people thrown into buses for over 4 years is simply a slap in the face that even pro-LRT councillors like Mihevc said would be "wrong" and he voted for the subway.
I think the whole issue on Scarborough Transit was poorly handled right from the beginning and we'll collectively be paying billions for it. Instead of pointing fingers at Scarborough residents, I should be reading about more criticism towards those who neglected the SRT, botched it's conception and handled the PR aspect poorly.
(I'm not a resident of Scarborough but wish there was more solidarity in this city and on this board)
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salsa
Senior Member
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picard102
Senior Member
Lose the station names on the top and the difference is negligible.
AlbertHWagstaff
Senior Member
The bottom one is "Railfan artist fantasy", up there with the Nova artic bus in the Flexity colours and the Flexity in red and cream.
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
I don't think the bus replacement option is as bad as people make it out to be. Bus routes in Scarborough are already heavily weighted to terminate at Kennedy, Scarborough Centre and to a lesser extent Warden Stations. Several of the routes that terminate at Kennedy or Warden Stations begin their journey in far east Scarborough (for example, the 198 Rocket, 86 Scarborough). This means that the routes don't necessarily terminate at their closest rapid transit station*. In my experience, if you are originating from eastern Scarborough, it is usually faster to take a bus route that will take you straight to Kennedy Station, rather than one that goes to Scarborough Centre, where you'll have to transfer again to Line 2. Because of this, I doubt that replacing the SRT with busses will result in notably longer travel times. In fact, travel times might be a bit quicker, since the busses will be more frequent than the SRT (the headways on the SRT are quite wide at times)
Also, remember that in terms of volume, Line 3 doesn't move very many people. It moves 44,000 per day, which is less than the 39 Finch East, 33 Finch West, 35 Jane, 32 Eglinton West, 501 Queen, 510 Spadina and 504/508 King. While usage would be more concentrated on the 7km trip to Scarborough Centre, a large fleet of busses on the route should be able to handle the volumes. Given that the CLRV has a capacity of 132, and our articulated busses have a capacity of 77, I estimate that this thing will need a little less than twice as many vehicles as the 510 Spadina, assuming that the SRT replacement busses are 60 foot artics.
Furthermore, consider that many routes that currently terminate at Scarborough Centre will be redesigned to terminate at Kennedy. For the reasons mentioned in the first paragraph, this likely means that overall trip times to Kennedy will be reduced on these routes.
Personally, I travel around Scarborough almost daily, and I've had to use the SRT only a handful of times (almost always when heading to STC).
* By the way, I think routes in Scarborough are the only place where this is true. Elsewhere in the city the routes almost always terminate at their closest station.
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nfitz
Superstar
Agreed - that thick white stripe has always looked tacky - which is presumably why Montreal is toning it down on the new cars.
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
W. K. Lis
Superstar
Having short-turn trains operating east of Kennedy on Line 2 would mean less frequent trains. May not be acceptable to some. However, from this link, reduced service on "branches", which this would be, is acceptable in other jurisdictions. This is a description of the Washington Metro's headways:
If we are looking for "efficiencies" (like a certain former mayor keeps harping about), we could even look at allowing every 3rd train to continue past Kennedy. That would make it 15± minutes in the non-rush hour, like some U.S. subways/metros have.
If we are looking for "efficiencies" (like a certain former mayor keeps harping about), we could even look at allowing every 3rd train to continue past Kennedy. That would make it 15± minutes in the non-rush hour, like some U.S. subways/metros have.
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
That's not unprecedented. We do the same thing with Univerisity Line north of St. Clair West.
This is an acceptable solution given the low volumes expected on Line 2 (likely less than the 9,000 persons originally predicted now that we have RER) and the availability of GO RER only 2000 meters west. I'd also like to see the same done to University Line north of York University.
This is an acceptable solution given the low volumes expected on Line 2 (likely less than the 9,000 persons originally predicted now that we have RER) and the availability of GO RER only 2000 meters west. I'd also like to see the same done to University Line north of York University.
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BurlOak
Senior Member
Stupidity of governments leads to waste of billions. Usual story.
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
We wouldn't be in this situation if the stupid government hadn't forced use to use ICTS, when we wanted to use LRT back in the 80s
44 North
Senior Member
Hmm. Even though I am a big supporter of the original SLRT plan, and am doubtful that the Scarb Subway is even going to be built in the end - I feel like the planned extension gets an unnecessary bad rap. Matt Elliott makes some great points, and I think it’s almost guaranteed we’ll be seeing major cost creep. But there are issues surrounding the Scarb Subway that can’t be easily quantified: namely, the socio-psychological issues surrounding Scarboro’s connectivity to the 416. They felt shafted with the SRT. And with a subways u/c or planned for the 905, the situation obviously hasn’t improved. Worsened would be more like it.
I support elevated light RT through our suburban realm, but I’ll agree the Scarb Subway does have its merits. The biggest one IMO is that its acts as a peace offering, and reduces the chances of a Ford getting re-elected.
Ah, thanks for clarifying that. I wasn’t sure.
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And thanks to others for the nice words about my Flexity LRV doodle. The next batch of designs are a bit zany. I had a flu, and perhaps was delirious when I was obsessively trying out colour schemes. I know it doesn't really belong in this thread, but I didn't know where else to put it.
-The first one is the new SRT blue (but rather than solid, has the window section as black).
-Second is if Line 4 were converted to LRT and painted to its purple line colour.
-Third is if Line 5 (aka the orange line, aka Crosstown) and SLRT were interlined (hence the orange and blue).
-The green LRV uses Metrolinx’s two-tone colour scheme (tho not as a copy of the design on the GO train/bus fleet, which didn’t look as nice IMO).
-Then we have the Tube colours.
-A Canadian flag, which I thought fits well within the five LRV segments. Perhaps for 2067 bicentennial?
-And after reading Nesbitt’s post which aptly compared the SRT stripe design to the German ICE, I thought of TPS’ old blue and red striped squad car paint job. Just for fun.
-Oh yeah, and the last one is KW’s ION.
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BurlOak
Senior Member
Maybe that's a problem in Toronto. For 4 years, the purpose of transit has been to defeat Ford (and also to get the Liberals a majority) and not to provide a fast reliable connection between parts of Toronto. With this goal, it is obvious why things became so chaotic.
And the funny thing is, the biggest reason Ford didn't win the last election is not because of the transit manipulation by Council and the province - it was because of drug use. I would suspect that if we had continued to try to build transit to serve people, then Ford would still have self-imploded and not won re-election. (unless of course Ford was a tea toadler and it was the Stintz back stab that knocked him off the wagon).
Electrify
Senior Member
I kind of like the new design. Looking forward to seeing what they do with the inside (more comfortable seats please).