Danforth Line 2 Scarborough Subway Extension

[Midtown Urbanist]

I cant take anyone seriously that lives near a subway stop in Toronto and advocates for Scarborough to be transitioned in on a separated technology in area which shouldn't require a transfer. Hypocrisy at its finest. It's called fair integration & it requires some thought aside from chanting one technology

What do you price fair integration at?

Because currently the price is $4.2 billion and the reopening of the Sheppard debate. That is a very high price, and you as a resident of Scarborough have to pay for it same as the rest of us.

Or does fairness for Scarborough stop at Scarborough? The rest of the city being some afterthought?

 

[denfromoakvillemilton]

I cant take anyone seriously that lives near a subway stop in Toronto and advocates for Scarborough to be transitioned in on a separated technology in area which shouldn't require a transfer. Hypocrisy at its finest. It's called fair integration & it requires some thought aside from chanting one technology

I don't , and I still think the transfer debate is ridiculous.

 

[Tulse]

I cant take anyone seriously that lives near a subway stop in Toronto and advocates for Scarborough to be transitioned in on a separated technology in area which shouldn't require a transfer. Hypocrisy at its finest. It's called fair integration & it requires some thought aside from chanting one technology

"Fairness" and "respect" are completely irrelevant to transit decisions -- what should drive them is moving the most people most effectively and most timely at the most reasonable cost. Plenty of people use transfers on their daily commute (I have one currently). Eliminating transfers is a laudable goal all things being equal, but if to do that involves billions of dollar more, and thus elimination of other transit projects serving the same area, that is not a reasonable trade-off to save a couple of minutes.

I am not committed to any particular transit technology. What I am committed to is evidence-based and reasoned decisions on transit in this city.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Respect doesn't matter - fairness does. But what is the indicator for it? Speed, frequency, sure - but mode? Not necessarily. What about population density? Efficiency of service? The amount of public subsidy required? Capital expenditure? Fairness has more than one dimension.

AoD

 

[pman]

I cant take anyone seriously that lives near a subway stop in Toronto and advocates for Scarborough to be transitioned in on a separated technology in area which shouldn't require a transfer. Hypocrisy at its finest. It's called fair integration & it requires some thought aside from chanting one technology

You know, arguing ad hominem is a nice rhetorical trick but it's fundamentally dishonest. The obverse is that nobody should take you seriously because you live in Scarborough. So could we please focus on the issue and cut the downtown elite conspiracy against poor little Scarborough bullshit.

If we must descend into the insanity of your identity politics, I do meet your criteria for being taken seriously because I live nowhere near a subway stop, and would have to take an infrequent bus to Rosedale station, where it's so difficult to board a southbound train in rush hour that I drive downtown instead. I don't look down on the people of Scarborough. However, I do want to see our limited transit investment dollars used to move the most incremental riders per dollar of capital and operating cost. If you want to use any other goal for transit investment then you implicitly accept that we should choose our mobility strategy based on criteria other than actually moving people around efficiently. You might notice the results of having followed your suburban identity politics strategy over the past forty years - gridlock and increasingly difficult commutes for us all.

 

[Tulse]

Respect doesn't matter - fairness does.

But the problem is that "fairness", like "respect", is an emotionally loaded term, and can mean different things to different people. I think it is instead better to frame things in terms ensuring that transit resources be distributed in a manner that serves the most people most efficiently in terms of time and cost. We don't typically talk about the placement of fire stations or sewer pipes in terms of "fairness", and I think it just muddies things to do so with transit.

 

[crs1026]

I cant take anyone seriously that lives near a subway stop in Toronto and advocates for Scarborough to be transitioned in on a separated technology in area which shouldn't require a transfer. Hypocrisy at its finest. It's called fair integration & it requires some thought aside from chanting one technology

Well, as someone who lives within walking distance of the subway, I can tell you - it only helps you if it takes you where you need to go. The years that my job wasn't on the subway, I still rode a bus. Or drove. And even when my job has been on the subway, there was a transfer involved. I don't see how being on the subway means I don't have a right to hold an opinion, or that I must demand that everyone else gets a subway too. What I would like is a transit grid that gets the most people to the most places effectively. That demands that we spend wisely and only build as much as we need in any one place.

I also can walk to a place where there ought to be a GO station, but there isn't. It's another 15 minutes walk to the nearest GO. It's actually longer by TTC. I could complain that GO doesn't respect or listen to the 416 - that's a fact - but crying 'no respect' doesn't justify the station. Whereas the huge line of cars on the street, and the number of people spending an hour on the streetcar when the GO would get them downtown in 15 minutes, does. (GO says the location has too huge a construction price - I'm not buying that, but if it's true then maybe that concern has to prevail).

It is galling, I will admit, that they dredged up Mel Lastman to offer a pro-LRT viewpoint. If anyone discredited themselves more as a self-serving, politics-over-fact dirtbag in this city's transit planning, it's Lastman. But I don't hold any grudge againt North Yorkers - it's just history at this point. Lastman was hardly an elistist downtown lefty....but his voice should not be counted.

- Paul

 

[kEiThZ]

Transit is about moving people, not making them feel better.

Was Transit City entirely about that? Or was it about "priority neighbourhoods" and development?

Because if it was about moving people, I question why Sheppard East was priority over Finch for example.

 

[Midtown Urbanist]

Josh Matlow calls out the hypocrisy of the Scarborough subway in front of City Council

 

[Tulse]

Was Transit City entirely about that? Or was it about "priority neighbourhoods" and development?

I don't think that TC was perfect (there was nothing in it for the Relief Line, for example) but it did a pretty good job at rationally servicing under serviced areas.

 

[coffey1]

http://www.torontosun.com/2016/07/11/cho-pledges-scarborough-subway-during-campaign-office-opening

Surface subway is the only way to end this debate. It does all the wonderful things trumpeted by the outsiders and does fixes the integration to Toronto's main transit backbone issue. This debate today is just the two polarizing ideals clashing. It's time for a compromise and move on.

 

[salsa]

Respect doesn't matter - fairness does. But what is the indicator for it? Speed, frequency, sure - but mode? Not necessarily. What about population density? Efficiency of service? The amount of public subsidy required? Capital expenditure? Fairness has more than one dimension.

AoD

Fairness = the subway is a higher priority and fully funded, Eglinton is not

 

[cplchanb]

council has failed to realise that the critical factor that may actually be as or even more critical is time.
every delay or shift in scope exponentially adds years to the construction as trades and management need to redesign, rebudget, retender....
by the time they figure this all out many of us will be either seniors, dead or out of the region.....
Their naivety to assume that they can just magically change the plan regardless of monies involved without incurring significantly additional time
is just sad....

 

[kEiThZ]

Pretty sad, that even after resurrecting the LRT they aren't taking to Malvern Town Centre and terminating it at Sheppard. This simply makes it easy for Cho to campaign on the subway and a further extension on that (north to Sheppard).

 

[TheTigerMaster]

Price update: Subway will cost $3.4 Billion, up $200 Million from $3.2 Billion. Previous estimates did not include financing. Prices are still subject to increase another 30% as we complete additional design work (approx $1 Billion), and further once we know the cost implications of the schedule delay.