Highway 401 Transit and Auto Tunnel

[just east of the creek]

From the NY Times. Seeing as we seem to be resurrecting an era of expressway planning last seen in the 50’s and 60’s (can the Richview Expressway be far behind? Where is Jane Jacob’s!) this article on the effects of congestion pricing in NY City is worth a read:

Congestion pricing was designed to finance more than $15 billion in critical transit upgrades in New York City. Those investments will take years. But the parallel changes at street level are already apparent.

Here’s what we know so far. https://nyti.ms/4mefQp3

An excerpt from the article:

Policy changes often take years to show results. Even then, you may have to squint to see them.
And then there is congestion pricing in New York.
Almost immediately after the tolls went into effect Jan. 5 — charging most vehicles $9 to enter Manhattan from 60th Street south to the Battery — they began to alter traffic patterns, commuter behavior, transit service, even the sound of gridlock and the on-time arrival of school buses.
What’s changed since the toll began?
Cars on the street
Fewer
Traffic speeds
Faster
Peak commute times
Faster still
Local buses
Faster, less delayed
Traffic outside the zone
Not worse
New Jersey commutes
Faster
Transit ridership
Up, up, up
Yellow taxi trips
Up
Citi Bike trips
Up in and out of the zone
Car crash injuries
Down
Parking violations
Down
Traffic noise complaints
Down
Fire response times
Slightly down
School bus delays
Fewer
Visitors to the zone
Up
Restaurants, Broadway
Holding up
Pollution
Too soon to say
Lower-income commuters
Too soon to say
Public opinion
Not great, but improving
Evidence has mounted that the program so far is achieving its two main goals — reducing congestion and raising revenue for transit improvements — even as the federal government has ramped up pressure to halt it. In March, the tolls raised $45 million in net revenue, putting the program on track to generate roughly $500 million in its first year.
Congestion pricing was designed to finance more than $15 billion in critical transit upgrades. Those investments will take years. But the parallel changes at street level are already apparent.
Here’s what we know so far.

 

[afransen]

A new route is not a trip generator in and of itself, it would provide relief to the 427, Gardiner and DVP. We need a multimodal transportation system with more redundancy built into it.

If you have a clogged drain, do you think funneling water into that drain from 3 or 4 sources will help the flow? If downtown is congested, what purpose does it serve to increase capacity to funnel vehicles into that congestion? Your new highway would be instantly gridlocked.

 

[11th]

We need to be much more discerning about traffic that “needs” to come downtown (deliveries being a need) versus traffic that “wants” to come downtown (people enjoy moving by single occupant auto, but that’s ultimately an option that we can never buikd enough capacity to serve adequately).
The road network into Downtown is well enough developed and invested already that we have to turn to a demand management approach - the Ford strategy sticks our heads in the sand about this. Keeping drivers happy by letting them use road space wastefully is utterly futile.
It’s time to manage demand - some form of congestion pricing, tolls, or just let congestion force people to make different choices about when and where to use their cars.

- Paul

I am not sure if I would call the current road network well enough developed. That is actually a reason for demand management.

 

[afransen]

This traffic is coming downtown whether you like it or not. Not just people in their cars from the burbs, but deliveries, construction vehicles etc etc. Not everyone can use transit. I am as big a transit booster as anyone, but we need other modes of transportation. And if you go back to my original premise I said "If we are going to build a tunnel anywhere" not that we should necessarily build this one.

Adding new highways to downtown could be argued for if downtown was not congested and the bottleneck for getting vehicles there was the highways leading to downtown. The congestion on the highways stems from the congestion downtown. If you addressed the congestion downtown, that would reduce the congestion on the highways leading there, obviating the supposed need for new highways to downtown. There are several measures that could be used to reduce congestion downtown, such as improving intersection performance (automated enforcement for blocking the box; signals timings, turning restrictions, etc.) but the most meaningful way of reducing congestion downtown would be some sort of congestion charge to reduce demand. Those that really need to drive downtown will be willing to pay. Those that are willing enough to find other means of getting downtown will be dissuaded from driving to save on the cost. Others have suggested restricting parking, but I think that creates more of a deadweight loss (an economic burden without offsetting benefit such as user fees that can be used for transit, say).

 

[Civdis]

If you have a clogged drain, do you think funneling water into that drain from 3 or 4 sources will help the flow? If downtown is congested, what purpose does it serve to increase capacity to funnel vehicles into that congestion? Your new highway would be instantly gridlocked.

Downtown is not a clogged drain though, more of a pool collecting the drainage. A drain is not a destination, it is passage. Downtown is a destination, you come in, then leave the way you came.

 

[Civdis]

Adding new highways to downtown could be argued for if downtown was not congested and the bottleneck for getting vehicles there was the highways leading to downtown. The congestion on the highways stems from the congestion downtown. If you addressed the congestion downtown, that would reduce the congestion on the highways leading there, obviating the supposed need for new highways to downtown. There are several measures that could be used to reduce congestion downtown, such as improving intersection performance (automated enforcement for blocking the box; signals timings, turning restrictions, etc.) but the most meaningful way of reducing congestion downtown would be some sort of congestion charge to reduce demand. Those that really need to drive downtown will be willing to pay. Those that are willing enough to find other means of getting downtown will be dissuaded from driving to save on the cost. Others have suggested restricting parking, but I think that creates more of a deadweight loss (an economic burden without offsetting benefit such as user fees that can be used for transit, say).

Throw that idea in front of the various BIAs downtown and see what happens. We need a thriving downtown accessible to all in the region. Making it more expensive and difficult for people to come downtown is not the answer. Having said all of that, I would not be against tolling a new tunnelled highway downtown as long as there are free alternatives. Again, I repeat, I am a massive transit advocate, just not as anti car as some on here.

 

[afransen]

Throw that idea in front of the various BIAs downtown and see what happens. We need a thriving downtown accessible to all in the region. Making it more expensive and difficult for people to come downtown is not the answer. Having said all of that, I would not be against tolling a new tunnelled highway downtown as long as there are free alternatives. Again, I repeat, I am a massive transit advocate, just not as anti car as some on here.

I think making downtown less congested through a congestion charge would make it easier to get downtown. It would certainly help buses get downtown. As it stands, GO buses can barely function because of all the single occupant vehicles clogging the streets. Streetcars are blocked by a single vehicle trying to turn left into a street that's completely backed up from the next intersection. The current level of congestion means that fewer people can move through downtown. Why anyone thinks this is desirable is beyond me.

I'm not sure why there has to be free alternatives to drive downtown. It's not free to park downtown. It's not free to fuel your vehicle. It's not free to insure your vehicle. This province has a strange obsession that it should never cost anything to use a road.

 

[crs1026]

Throw that idea in front of the various BIAs downtown and see what happens. We need a thriving downtown accessible to all in the region. Making it more expensive and difficult for people to come downtown is not the answer.

We are hardly talking about throttling the number of people that come downtown. We are trying to get them all there. It’s not about being anti-car, it’s about acknowledging that increasing the number of cars entering the downtown will not answer that objective

Having said all of that, I would not be against tolling a new tunnelled highway downtown as long as there are free alternatives. Again, I repeat, I am a massive transit advocate, just not as anti car as some on here.

There is no corridor into downtown that will accommodate a new expressway or even major arterial. That’s why expresway building was abandoned in the 1970s. We struggle to find innocuous paths for transit, roads would be far more intrusive yet still not match the people per hour flow required.

- Paul

 

[micheal_can]

Adding new highways to downtown could be argued for if downtown was not congested and the bottleneck for getting vehicles there was the highways leading to downtown. The congestion on the highways stems from the congestion downtown. If you addressed the congestion downtown, that would reduce the congestion on the highways leading there, obviating the supposed need for new highways to downtown. There are several measures that could be used to reduce congestion downtown, such as improving intersection performance (automated enforcement for blocking the box; signals timings, turning restrictions, etc.) but the most meaningful way of reducing congestion downtown would be some sort of congestion charge to reduce demand. Those that really need to drive downtown will be willing to pay. Those that are willing enough to find other means of getting downtown will be dissuaded from driving to save on the cost. Others have suggested restricting parking, but I think that creates more of a deadweight loss (an economic burden without offsetting benefit such as user fees that can be used for transit, say).

I had to read this several times to understand this. Getting more cars out of such a small area is the key to it. Imagine if GO was not operational and everyone drove to work. We should be wanting to reduce as much as possible. Especially for those that work downtown or to other areas that are already close to transit.The goal should be to reduce the need for a car for daily use.

There is no corridor into downtown that will accommodate a new expressway or even major arterial. That’s why expresway building was abandoned in the 1970s. We struggle to find innocuous paths for transit, roads would be far more intrusive yet still not match the people per hour flow required.

- Paul

This is the one location I would support tunnel. Run it from the 427 to the 401, 4lans a side, exits no closer than 2 km. The existing Gardiner is 3 lanes a side and there is no way to widen it.

 

[Civdis]

We are hardly talking about throttling the number of people that come downtown. We are trying to get them all there. It’s not about being anti-car, it’s about acknowledging that increasing the number of cars entering the downtown will not answer that objective



There is no corridor into downtown that will accommodate a new expressway or even major arterial. That’s why expresway building was abandoned in the 1970s. We struggle to find innocuous paths for transit, roads would be far more intrusive yet still not match the people per hour flow required.

- Paul

Um, we are talking about a tunnel here

 

[crs1026]

Um, we are talking about a tunnel here

Which will require access ramps and distributive roadways. We aren't just going to put a tunnel portal at Avenue Road and Bloor and declare it open. Even connecting drectly to the Gardiner would overpower the existing off ramps at Spadina, York/Bay, and Jarvis.

Show me a single part of the downtown road network that could absorb even one lane in each direction of tunnelled roadway throughput without choking the surrounding roads.

- Paul

 

[Sunnyside]

Which will require access ramps and distributive roadways. We aren't just going to put a tunnel portal at Avenue Road and Bloor and declare it open. Even connecting drectly to the Gardiner would overpower the existing off ramps at Spadina, York/Bay, and Jarvis.

Show me a single part of the downtown road network that could absorb even one lane in each direction of tunnelled roadway throughput without choking the surrounding roads.

- Paul

Devils advocate- if you bury the Gardiner itself, you can make it as wide as you need. Theoretically, it can be buried in place.

On local traffic, you can also try to ‘tailor’ any DT highway (new or not) to its urban setting. This can be tolls, or targeting/forcing certain on-street traffic volumes (trucks, etc) to use it. Realistic or not, it’s a nice goal to try and make room for say, streetcar ROWs.

As we’re discussing urban freeways… I’ve found it interesting that 50s-era plans were routed as if they were rapid transit lines, targeting high-demand urban corridors. Food for thought- a lot of these never happened! It’s tough to sandwich a highway where transit can do the job. The inverse is also true, but you’d struggle to find cases where a highway beats a rail connection in the 416. 905’s possible.

 

[SashaLemon]

As much as the Big Dig in Boston concerns me, a tunneled Gardiner would be better than the current one. Make it wide enough not to require a super-wide surface street as previously proposed for a Gardiner teardown.

 

[micheal_can]

I feel we have hit the point where any tunnel is not worth the high cost of construction. Even with transit, elevated seems to be where we are looking towards. The issue becomes proper maintenance of those elevated structures.

 

[Civdis]

I think making downtown less congested through a congestion charge would make it easier to get downtown. It would certainly help buses get downtown. As it stands, GO buses can barely function because of all the single occupant vehicles clogging the streets. Streetcars are blocked by a single vehicle trying to turn left into a street that's completely backed up from the next intersection. The current level of congestion means that fewer people can move through downtown. Why anyone thinks this is desirable is beyond me.

I'm not sure why there has to be free alternatives to drive downtown. It's not free to park downtown. It's not free to fuel your vehicle. It's not free to insure your vehicle. This province has a strange obsession that it should never cost anything to use a

Which will require access ramps and distributive roadways. We aren't just going to put a tunnel portal at Avenue Road and Bloor and declare it open. Even connecting drectly to the Gardiner would overpower the existing off ramps at Spadina, York/Bay, and Jarvis.

Show me a single part of the downtown road network that could absorb even one lane in each direction of tunnelled roadway throughput without choking the surrounding roads.

- Paul

The main connection would be at the Gardiner and yes, some land acquisition would be required for ramps.