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Debate on the merits of the Scarborough Subway Extension

Rainforest said:
There is no entitlement in Scarborough. They are located further than other inner suburbs from the city core, and their transit situation is worse than in other areas.

What you are trying to paint as "entitlement", is a natural and justifiable desire to reduce (not even eliminate) that gap.
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Then why would anyone support this plan? This 'extension' reduces rapid transit access for thousands of riders, all so Scarborough can claim to have a 'subway', just like downtown.

It's essentially based on the idea that Scarborough entitled to one, even if it means screwing over priority transit projects in other areas of the city - all while they have a perfectly functional rapid transit connection to their 'city centre', and have since the 80s - a benefit plenty of malls and 'city centres' across the GTA don't enjoy.

For the $5 billion+ it will cost to build this one stop they could have a comprehensive LRT network that serves many more users and is easily expandable in the future.
 
sixrings said:
FYI the second line (spadina subway) was built to relieve yonge. It wasn't built because the area was dense enough to support it. Are you going to argue that this scarborough extension is going to relieve yonge better than a "relief line."
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Fair enough, but was responding to a poster who basically said density is all that matters.
 
TheTigerMaster said:
Arguments over density are completely misguided, when virtually all of suburban subway demand comes from bus transfers.

The Relief Line will be busier than Line 2, and nearly as busy as Line 1, despite it travelling through some of the least dense parts of the city!
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Agreed, but I was objecting to a specific post.
 
pstogios said:
You've beautifully explained why the TYSSE is another waste of limited transit dollars. So let's keep wasting money on lines to areas without the density to warrant them. Right. /sarcasm

Guess why the TYSSE was built? Politics. MPP Greg Sorbara wanted a subway line to his riding.

Guess why the SSE will be built? Politics. This time to feed Tory's mayoral ambitions.
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There is an element of politics in both, but your original post claimed that SSE is special in being built into low density and my objection is related to that.
 
syn said:
Then why would anyone support this plan? This 'extension' reduces rapid transit access for thousands of riders, all so Scarborough can claim to have a 'subway', just like downtown.

It's essentially based on the idea that Scarborough entitled to one, even if it means screwing over priority transit projects in other areas of the city - all while they have a perfectly functional rapid transit connection to their 'city centre', and have since the 80s - a benefit plenty of malls and 'city centres' across the GTA don't enjoy.

For the $5 billion+ it will cost to build this one stop they could have a comprehensive LRT network that serves many more users and is easily expandable in the future.
Click to expand...

No part of SSE funding is taken from "other areas".

As of "reduced" access: what matters for most of riders is not "access" but the combined travel time. For many riders, SSE even with just one stop will result in faster trips (bus to STC plus subway). For some riders, the current scheme will result in a disadvantage. We can debate the counts of those who benefits vs those who loses out, but either way the idea of "entitlement" is totally unjustified.
 
Rainforest said:
No part of SSE funding is taken from "other areas".
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Of course it does. The tax levy for the SSE could have been used for the DRL, for example. If you don't see that the DRL is extremely pressing, I encourage you to ride Line 1 some day.

Rainforest said:
As of "reduced" access: what matters for most of riders is not "access" but the combined travel time. For many riders, SSE even with just one stop will result in faster trips (bus to STC plus subway). For some riders, the current scheme will result in a disadvantage. We can debate the counts of those who benefits vs those who loses out, but either way the idea of "entitlement" is totally unjustified.
[
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$5B is worth saving one transfer? $5B is worth saving a few minutes travel time? Using that logic we should have a subway everywhere in the city, there are hundreds of transfers everywhere and there are hundreds of routes that are slower than a subway.

Those of us that see through all the BS arguments "justifying" the SSE call those supporters suffering from "entitlement" precisely because they aren't being rational. There are no other reasons to support a SSE than jealousy and politics. By those logic, there should be a subway to every pocket of the city, but most of us realize that would be stupidity.
 
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It's not $5b. Its $3.5 b. And the LRT would have cost $2b. So really the "cost" of saving the transfer is $1.5b.

Of course that is arguably a waste still - but lets use the facts here at least.

The media makes the SSE as a devil with no justification. It isn't. It has some uses. Arguably not worth the costs - but its not going to be some $5 billion line with nobody on it like many like to portray. It will be busy for an end of line station, it will not cost $5 billion, and it will not cost horribly more than the LRT would have cost.

TYSSE was built to Steeles as a purely planning based line. The planners supported it as the preferred way forward and the highest priority transit project at the time. The 2 additional stations were pure politics.

Remember as well that the TYSSE is going to be significantly lower ridership than the SSE - even for the part that was done without political meddling.

If the SSE is a waste of transit dollars, there isn't much that isn't. DRL phase 1 and the Yonge extension are the only other subway projects with more justification in terms of pure ridership. Given the much higher costs of those projects - SSE is actually fairly good for ridership for money.


DRL BTW will only be higher ridership than the SSE south of Bloor if it runs to Eglinton. South of Eglinton if it runs to Sheppard.

End of line stations are always fairly low ridership as there isn't any through ridership. it's part of the job. Doesn't mean that the station won't get a ton of use.
 
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Who here is suggesting that the money SSE is wasting should be spent on anything that isn't a DRL? The DRL is universally supported except when it comes in front of SSE and even then it is only rejected by Scarborough residents with little understanding of Transit.
 
pstogios said:
You've beautifully explained why the TYSSE is another waste of limited transit dollars. So let's keep wasting money on lines to areas without the density to warrant them. Right. /sarcasm

Guess why the TYSSE was built? Politics. MPP Greg Sorbara wanted a subway line to his riding.

Guess why the SSE will be built? Politics. This time to feed Tory's mayoral ambitions.
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It happens to be what the majority wants, as opposed to the alternatives. Unless a better alternative is proposed, the SSE is the holy grail as far as transportation in Scarborough is concerned.
 
pstogios said:
Of course it does. The tax levy for the SSE could have been used for the DRL, for example. If you don't see that the DRL is extremely pressing, I encourage you to ride Line 1 some day.



$5B is worth saving one transfer? $5B is worth saving a few minutes travel time? Using that logic we should have a subway everywhere in the city, there are hundreds of transfers everywhere and there are hundreds of routes that are slower than a subway.

Those of us that see through all the BS arguments "justifying" the SSE call those supporters suffering from "entitlement" precisely because they aren't being rational. There are no other reasons to support a SSE than jealousy and politics. By those logic, there should be a subway to every pocket of the city, but most of us realize that would be stupidity.
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Exactly.

Scarborough doesn't have a direct subway connection to the STC because it's a suburb that hasn't made much progress towards increasing density since it received it's first subway station nearly 50 years ago.

Having to make transfers is a reality of transit, something that's been pointed out repeatedly.

How many people downtown have to transfer from a streetcar line, to the subway, to a bus?

Shouldn't residents of Spadina have an extension, so they don't have to get off the subway and transfer to a streetcar??

I'd also say the idea that riders in Scarborough don't care about transit access is absurd.
 
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