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Finch West Line 6 LRT

denfromoakvillemilton said:
Here is thing: this is not what people want when the LRT was being built. It was supposed to be faster then the bus, this is not that. This will be the first serious LRT. If it fails, then that's it for LRT in Toronto. One shot at this and Metrolinx is blowing it. But if this was going to Finch Station, this would not be such a big deal. Being hacked off at Keele Station amplifies the issue. This will either be a sucess or the next SRT.
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Isn't Eglinton the first real LRT?
 
38 minutes is the estimated time for the entire Crosstown. Maybe they got those two mixed up? Kennedy to Yonge, which is roughly the same length as Finch, is projected at 26 minutes and most of that is surface operation.
 
robmausser said:
And then its more like a streetcar along the rest ;)
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If you want to call the 2.5 km along the Queensway from Parkside to Humber Loop or the Waterloo Ion, a streetcar ... sure ...

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nfitz said:
If you want to call the 2.5 km along the Queensway from Parkside to Humber Loop or the Waterloo Ion, a streetcar ... sure ...

View attachment 192643View attachment 192644
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Hate to say it, but iON along the street most definitely feels like the Spadina line or the 512. Too many stops at intersections and really bad dwell times. Hopefully things improve. That being said, there's absolutely nothing wrong with this type of service. Streetcars are vital to a transportation network, and writing them off as a lesser form of transportation is nuts.
 
If the "streetcar" portion of the Crosstown LRT ends up being as slow as what Finch LRT appears to be this will be a defining fiasco for public transit in this city.
 
Tuck said:
Would definitely love to hear that this was an error on their part and the line will not be that slow. But I'm not optomistic.

Toronto transportation planners/engineers sure do love taking the "rapid" out of "rapid transit." I find it a bit disturbing that some people in hear are trying to defend it. If we are spending 1.2 *billion* dollars and getting no discernable travel speed increases, we are not getting good value for the money. And most importantly, it doesnt solve the problem people care most about: getting home to their families faster.

Unfortunately I'm starting to think that the anti-LRT crowd was right. I believe the technology can work (and have seen it work), but I no longer have confidence in our region's ability to pull it off. Its a shame our only attempt at light-metro ended up the black sheep of the network.
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It's perfectly fine when their reason is to provide better service for local trips - which according to their study accounts for the majority of trips taken in the study area.
Maybe they fail to realise that by providing reliable AND fast transit options, people in those area can actually travel further outside of their immediate area and have access to more job opportunities.
 
nfitz said:
If you want to call the 2.5 km along the Queensway from Parkside to Humber Loop or the Waterloo Ion, a streetcar ... sure ...
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Queensway IS a streetcar: westbound, operators plod to burn off padding in the schedule. Or they stop and change off somewhere. Both directions, no transit priority at intersections. Velocity sucks. Stops quite close together. The rebuilt track is smoother, but there is nothing rapid about it.

Coming west, I look at Nextbus around Roncy, to see when the next 66 bus leaves Humber. Have to allow 10-12 minutes plus to have a hope of connecting.

That’s not LRT.

- Paul
 
Streety McCarface said:
Hate to say it, but iON along the street most definitely feels like the Spadina line or the 512. Too many stops at intersections and really bad dwell times. Hopefully things improve. That being said, there's absolutely nothing wrong with this type of service. Streetcars are vital to a transportation network, and writing them off as a lesser form of transportation is nuts.
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If you actually measured the distance between ION stops, they are ~650m apart compared to the 250-350m apart on the TTC streetcar network. I think speed and dwell time will improve once the operators get used to driving the Flexitys with cars around it. It will take a few months for things to settle down. Cars will get used to driving around the tracks, accidents will drop allowing operators to drive a bit faster. As for dwell time, the vehicles won't be full as the new factor is gone with the system entering ridership building phase. It's not going to be stuffed like the free period. Signal timing could be improved.

The ION is a nice local urban LRT line. I wouldn't consider it mass transit. Ottawa's system is mass transit while Eglinton is both mass transit and local LRT. TTC's LRT operators would likely be trained like they are driving a streetcar on the surface section. I would think TTC being the operator be the one whos setting the schedule too. I fear they will write the schedule like a streetcar on the surface section and introduce a slow speed limit across intersections. With the TTC operating it, I think the operating experience will be there on day one unlike the ION but it also comes with all the annoying streetcar operating practices.
 
Steve X said:
If you actually measured the distance between ION stops, they are ~650m apart compared to the 250-350m apart on the TTC streetcar network. I think speed and dwell time will improve once the operators get used to driving the Flexitys with cars around it. It will take a few months for things to settle down. Cars will get used to driving around the tracks, accidents will drop allowing operators to drive a bit faster. As for dwell time, the vehicles won't be full as the new factor is gone with the system entering ridership building phase. It's not going to be stuffed like the free period. Signal timing could be improved.

The ION is a nice local urban LRT line. I wouldn't consider it mass transit. Ottawa's system is mass transit while Eglinton is both mass transit and local LRT. TTC's LRT operators would likely be trained like they are driving a streetcar on the surface section. I would think TTC being the operator be the one whos setting the schedule too. I fear they will write the schedule like a streetcar on the surface section and introduce a slow speed limit across intersections. With the TTC operating it, I think the operating experience will be there on day one unlike the ION but it also comes with all the annoying streetcar operating practices.
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Oh, yes, stop spacing on the iON is definitely an improvement from the streetcar stop spacing, but the point is that because of all the slow orders, unnecessary stops at intersections, longer than normal dwell times, among many other things, the line just feels like you're taking a streetcar. There's nothing wrong with this, I just think it's important to point out the teething issues our system is having, and make sure none of the other lines make the mistake of ignoring our challenges.

Eglinton is definitely mass transit, but only for 2/3s of its length, it's the surface section that's going to screw everything up, I agree. From the looks of it, Finch might follow through as achieving the title of a streetcar, and I sure as hell hope it doesn't. Especially since we've been lobbying for Light rail on a bunch of corridors with the premise that they won't act as streetcars. If it does, it will be the end of light rail in this city. We will never see key corridors like Jane, Eglinton East, Steeles, and Dufferin get the transit improvements they very much need.
 
Streety McCarface said:
Oh, yes, stop spacing on the iON is definitely an improvement from the streetcar stop spacing, but the point is that because of all the slow orders, unnecessary stops at intersections, longer than normal dwell times, among many other things, the line just feels like you're taking a streetcar. There's nothing wrong with this, I just think it's important to point out the teething issues our system is having, and make sure none of the other lines make the mistake of ignoring our challenges.

Eglinton is definitely mass transit, but only for 2/3s of its length, it's the surface section that's going to screw everything up, I agree. From the looks of it, Finch might follow through as achieving the title of a streetcar, and I sure as hell hope it doesn't. Especially since we've been lobbying for Light rail on a bunch of corridors with the premise that they won't act as streetcars. If it does, it will be the end of light rail in this city. We will never see key corridors like Jane, Eglinton East, Steeles, and Dufferin get the transit improvements they very much need.
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Eh.... Just be honest and add them to the streetcar system. Don't pretend that their something that their not. Jane needs RT. That's a streetcar. Just tell the truth. I can go back and forth on the surface section of crosstown. If it was connected to the SRT I would 100% agree with you but it's not. It will go to UTSC eventually so it's okay. If it was underground there would be a transfer to the EELRT at Kennedy and people would just complain about that. But I agree, if Finch doesn't come closed to what was planned then LRT is probably over. Looks like @BurlOak was looking to be correct after all, at least on the main premise.
 
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