Dufferin Street: Eliminating the jog

[innsertnamehere]

dufferin and bathurst are 2km apart... a bit too far to run opposing services.

 

[calimehtar]

I meant two lanes of streetcars, each way, and two lanes of one-way car traffic on each of Dufferin and Bathurst. I don't think they're too far apart to pair for automobiles.

 

[CapitalSeven]

They're 2 km apart. Is there another one-way pair even half a km apart?

 

[calimehtar]

I agree it's a stretch. Few people would take Dufferin north and Bathurst south on the same trip. But for driving there are plenty of alternatives depending on how far you're going, so people wouldn't have to.

At the same time neither of them have much commercial activity, which seems to be a common excuse for maintaining street parking, and both already have restrictions on street parking during rush hour. Eliminating street parking at the same time as adding a ROW would mean it would have relatively little impact on the available space for driving - when there is street parking they are effectively one lane each direction.

Of course the real motive behind the idea is to add a streetcar right of way. I can't think of another way to do it that doesn't effectively eliminate cars on Dufferin. I suppose there's room for a ROW north of Elginton on Dufferin if you take back parking in front of strip malls but that's not much help either.

 

[W. K. Lis]

Work will begin this summer to widen the north side of the Dufferin Street Bridge. http://bit.ly/29L6PzL

By "widening", I think they mean the railway tracks are widening by adding railway tracks and space for the Toronto West Railpath (bicycles) on top.

The Dufferin Street bridge project at Queen St. W. is the final phase of the original jog
-elimination project that was completed by the City of Toronto in 2010. Expanding the bridge
supports GO expansion which will bring 15 minute, two-way electrified GO service to the West
Queen West community. The project also delivers on plans to connect the community with the Toronto West Railpath and the creation of a new city park.

As part of work on the Dufferin Street Bridge, we are partnering with the City of Toronto to extend the West Toronto Railpath multi-use trail to the West Queen West community. This extension will run along the existing rail corridor, connecting cyclists and pedestrians from Dupont St. to just east of Dufferin St. These community investments add to the recently
announced new GO Train stations including the proposed Liberty Village and Bloor-Davenport stations.

We are also sharing the cost of a new city park (Dufferin-Peel Park). The future park will be a hub for West Toronto Railpath users, including cyclists and will include cycling amenities, landscaping, seating and terraces.

 

[salsa]

Work will begin this summer to widen the north side of the Dufferin Street Bridge. http://bit.ly/29L6PzL

By "widening", I think they mean the railway tracks are widening by adding railway tracks and space for the Toronto West Railpath (bicycles) on top.

I hope the widening will also allow for the possibility of a future GO station here. Especially if they build the relief line on Queen.

 

[drum118]

I hope the widening will also allow for the possibility of a future GO station here. Especially if they build the relief line on Queen.

The land on the south side of Queen can support a station platform on each side of the corridor easy, but on a curve.

To do it on the northside will require everything to the north with a longer waking distance as well exporating land and homes.

 

[Palma]

I'm not saying it's likely, but a possible solution to the "Toronto doesn't build streetcars in mixed traffic anymore" problem would be a right of way. Dufferin is too narrow to add a right of way and maintain 2 lanes of traffic each way, but it could be paired with Bathurst - make Bathurst one way north and Dufferin one way south, eliminate street parking, and put a streetcar right of way on each up to Eglinton.

sounds like a great plan to me

 

[P23]

I hope the widening will also allow for the possibility of a future GO station here. Especially if they build the relief line on Queen.

I don't think there's room on the actual bridge, but it might be possible to expropriate the industrial site to the West, there's quite a bit of space available there between Brock and Dufferin.

 

[ponyboy]

The city needs quicker solutions than the existing streetcars, and subways are too expensive. Would it be cost effective to build lightweight elevated trains over some of these streets.

Like a modern version of this
http://www.chicago-l.org/trains/gallery/images/2400/cta2483.jpg

somthing looking like this --

http://cache1.asset-cache.net/xd/95...966828B4ABE84F14DF941B45F0159F06BF04B24B4128C

http://image.shutterstock.com/z/sto...sky-train-hanging-from-elevated-260855579.jpg

http://s3files.core77.com/blog/images/0railrender032809.jpg

 

[drum118]

The city needs quicker solutions than the existing streetcars, and subways are too expensive. Would it be cost effective to build lightweight elevated trains over some of these streets.

Have you really looked at Dufferin St to see what really there not vision in your photos??

There is no land to place support columns to go over the road as well no room for centre columns. Centre columns would require removal of on street parking like it would for an surface LRT. Columns would have to be place in the front yards of the homes along the route, but what do you do for building that are built up to the property line in the first place??? A fair number of those buildings exist with retail in them.

From Dupont to St Clair you got 8% grade as well getting over CP tracks. You would have be very high starting before Dupont to get over CP tracks. From Roger Rd to Eglinton, its a rollercoaster roads area and that would see higher distance between a level line and the existing road in a number of areas.

All the existing overhead would have to be bury at great cost and would be a good thing in the first place.

At the end of the day, far better off removing on street parking and building a surface LRT line. From Dupont to north of St Clair, a tunnel to reduce the grade. From Roger Rd to north of Eglinton to be tunnel to deal with the rollercoast issue and to get under the Crosstown Line. Still would built the suface LRT to Wilson to the point you could reduce the quality of service to match ridership needs.

Any elevated line will still be costly as you will need 2-4 elevators per station to comply with accessiblity needs. 1-2 elevators doesn't cut it.

As for a station north of Queen, how far will riders have to walk to transfer between the 3 routes???

Making Dufferin and Bathurst one way will never fly and don't support it.

 

[dowlingm]

Let's maybe start small, with extending the Dufferin track to Dundas so the 193 can be converted to a streetcar service. Oh wait can't do that because when they built the jog they didn't add the north facing curve/track

 

[Voltz]

Let's maybe start small, with extending the Dufferin track to Dundas so the 193 can be converted to a streetcar service. Oh wait can't do that because when they built the jog they didn't add the north facing curve/track

Why would they have built curves to tracks that don't exist?

But the underpass was designed to accommodate streetcar tracks.

 

[W. K. Lis]

Why would they have built curves to tracks that don't exist?

But the underpass was designed to accommodate streetcar tracks.

The foundation for any future streetcar tracks have been laid under the Dufferin underpass. They just have to remove the asphalt and install streetcar tracks, whenever they get the go ahead.

 

[drum118]

Let's maybe start small, with extending the Dufferin track to Dundas so the 193 can be converted to a streetcar service. Oh wait can't do that because when they built the jog they didn't add the north facing curve/track

When they built the underpass road, they built the concrete box that would support the Dufferin line going north of Queen and fill the hole in with asphalt. When time came to build the line, asphalt is remove and tracks place in the hole. the ends would be remove to allow track to continue in both direction. I have photos of this track protection in the centre lane, but for some reason most of the photos I shoot for the construction of the underpass are missing in my Flickr account. No idea what the time frame is for when I shot the track base.

My impression at the time, there would be no northbound switch work due to location. The Queen line would see a diamond added if the line surface.

The idea that was around at the time, was the Dufferin line would go to Dupont and loop there. Now if TTC had duel end cars, no need for expensive loop and having the line stop at Bloor.