ssiguy2
Senior Member
The cheapest alternative that this report didn't even consider is also the easiest..............electrify the Airport line and using EMU to have it travel further east using the rail corridor up to Pape. The Union station is already built, fast, direct, and only requires tunneling thru the very small stretch connecting Pape station to the rail corridor. They could have that done in 2 years and have a full rapid transit line for a fraction of the price and actually have a service to the airport that Torontonians could use.
As far as a large system Sao Paulo offers a great example of how to serve huge new areas of rapid transit Metro on the cheap. They are tranferring most of their original commuter rail corridors over to Metro system using EMU, more frequent stations, and regular fares.
Toronto is in a very enviable position in that it has a very large existing rail network but it flat out refuses to use any of them...........probably the only city on the planet that doesn't. Next time, and there will be a next time, the report should be given a definate amount of money that can be used ie 2 billion and tell them to find options within that price. This idea of giving them a mandate to report potential systems and alighnments as if the cost is irrelevant is lunacy. Why didn't they just recommend tunnels under Queen, King, rail corridor and anything else that caught their fancy? It's this little thing called money.
As far as a large system Sao Paulo offers a great example of how to serve huge new areas of rapid transit Metro on the cheap. They are tranferring most of their original commuter rail corridors over to Metro system using EMU, more frequent stations, and regular fares.
Toronto is in a very enviable position in that it has a very large existing rail network but it flat out refuses to use any of them...........probably the only city on the planet that doesn't. Next time, and there will be a next time, the report should be given a definate amount of money that can be used ie 2 billion and tell them to find options within that price. This idea of giving them a mandate to report potential systems and alighnments as if the cost is irrelevant is lunacy. Why didn't they just recommend tunnels under Queen, King, rail corridor and anything else that caught their fancy? It's this little thing called money.