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King Street (Streetcar Transit Priority)

Steve X said:
Vancouver is better off than Calgary. I'm not so impress with their skytrain capacity. It's packed within years of opening. They miscalculated their ridership and would need a major expensive overhaul at every station to support longer trains. They are also very proud that the newly opened Evergreen Line has 30,000 daily ridership while we call the 50,000 ridership Sheppard subway a white elephant. They did manage to separate the Expo line from the Millennium Line allowing trains to run closer together. Personally I think Vancouver is just wasting money on this so called Skytrain proprietary technology. They could have invested in a heavy rail with wider cars. The SkyTrains could only carries half the capacity of the Yonge line. Their zone system makes it more expensive to travel the same distance vs. Toronto or Calgary. At least they have affordable rapid transit to the airport unlike the pricey UPX that doesn't connect to the TTC. Vancouver's bike network works better cause their city is more dense than Toronto, Montreal or Calgary. They also invested years before TO.
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The reason that it's packed is because there are not enough trains. The reason that some stations require expansion is just that the stations are only built to accommodate the projected ridership short and medium term. Some stations are now obviously outgrown this projection. Metrotown, for example, was surrounded by industrial wasteland and single-family homes at the time when it was built, and so the station was designed to accommodate those. Who knows a mega mall would come a few years later and the station would become one of the most heavily used in the system?

None of these you mentioned had anything to do with the technology. Of course they could build huge stations to begin with, but most would just see them as waste as it would take decades to fill up. The separation of Millennium from Expo line actually make the trains run further apart (to be exact, it went from every 108s to about 132s), and this is again because of there are not enough trains. The system is capable of carrying 30,000 pphpd if there are enough trains to run at minimum headway of 75s, and this is quite comparable to subway capacity.

And for the Evergreen comparison... so you think it would be fair to compare the ridership from the second full month of operation with a line that had been running for more than a decade? By the way, the bus route that the line replaced directly only carries about 1/3 of those ridership.
 
Sorry guys but this whole cities are made for people not cars idea is totally out to lunch. Cities aren't made for people, they exist because the productivity enhancement of the collective generates a small boost to the economic well-being of the individual. Cars and other vehicle traffic are central components of this system and the very source of our prosperity.

Transit, pedestrianization etc. may make sense in isolated pockets as the productivity enhancement of cars and other vehicles chocks on it's own success or reaches the physical limitations allowable without overlaying alternative separate modes of transportation; however, these are special cases. Important and interesting special cases, but special cases none-the-less.
 
ssiguy2 said:
SteveX.............you talk of SkyTrain's low capacity and stating they should get rid of the proprietary technology {which it's not BTW} and switch to higher capacity standard 3rd rail. Well the line with, by far, the lowest capacity is the Canada Line which IS 3rd rail. The technology has nothing to do with capacity, it's 2 things...........frequency availability and station size. The Canada Line stations are puny at 40 meters and can only be extended to 50 meters. The ART SkyTrain stations on the other hand are all 75 meters and can be extended to 100 meters.

As for CTrain transit mall in downtown Calgary being "so yesterday" is NOT the point. The point was that Calgary was willing to cut off an entire road thru the downtown from cars to give transit 100% priority backed up with the pedestrian-only Stephen Avenue Mall. The article was about cities reclaiming their downtown streets for transit and pedestrians and technically Calgary has done more in that regard than any city in the country.

Also if CTrain's downtown transit-only route is "so yesterday" then god help what you think of Toronto's "bold" intiative of King Street to hurry along the streetcars and still not even getting streetcar-only lanes little alone and entire downtown road strictly for transit.
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It would be cheaper to use wider trains like the Canada Line than longer trains to carry the same capacity. SkyTrain tech doesn't offer wider trains as it is designed for as a medium capacity metro system. Clearly we can all agree the Canada Line also suffer a failed design for capacity.

For Toronto, we are behind yesterday in terms of pedestrian space. Calgary introduced that years ago and it has already filled up beyond capacity. I just want to point out Calgary really needs a subway/tunnel to carry all those people. Also note that Calgary downtown has a completed grid system with through streets much closer to each out than our downtown. Closing one street in Calgary has a much smaller traffic effect than doing the same thing in Toronto.

snowystar said:
The reason that it's packed is because there are not enough trains. The reason that some stations require expansion is just that the stations are only built to accommodate the projected ridership short and medium term. Some stations are now obviously outgrown this projection. Metrotown, for example, was surrounded by industrial wasteland and single-family homes at the time when it was built, and so the station was designed to accommodate those. Who knows a mega mall would come a few years later and the station would become one of the most heavily used in the system?

None of these you mentioned had anything to do with the technology. Of course they could build huge stations to begin with, but most would just see them as waste as it would take decades to fill up. The separation of Millennium from Expo line actually make the trains run further apart (to be exact, it went from every 108s to about 132s), and this is again because of there are not enough trains. The system is capable of carrying 30,000 pphpd if there are enough trains to run at minimum headway of 75s, and this is quite comparable to subway capacity.

And for the Evergreen comparison... so you think it would be fair to compare the ridership from the second full month of operation with a line that had been running for more than a decade? By the way, the bus route that the line replaced directly only carries about 1/3 of those ridership.
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Yes many that is the case for Toronto as well but for the TTC, it took 50-60 years to get to that point oppose to 25 years in Vancouver. They should have overbuilt the stations as the TTC did. A 75s headway is not feasible not because the ATO system can't support it but people will not be able to swap out of the platform in time. It takes time for people to get from the concourse onto the platform. With headways less than 2 minutes, the stairs and escalators would be continuously packed and not be able to support such capacity of 30,000 ppdph. The line up for the elevators would be worst.


Final note. For Toronto, a transit mall on King would be a good start but capacity will eventually overgrow the line if their is no relief in the future. It will end up with the same Calgary 7 Av transit mall problem. Toronto really needs to do away all the cars on every main road.
 
Calgary and Edmonton took different routes for their LRTs which were built at roughly the same time. Edmonton went for a smaller system serving fewer areas in exchange for a costly downtown tunnel while Calgary went for the cheaper downtown at-grade option but a far larger system and Calgary's design has clearly been the superior of the 2 in terms of both ridership and residents and areas served. Also remember that when the CTrain was designed and construction began Calgary was only half the size of what it is today and a downtown tunnel in Calgary would have been far too costly due to Calgary having a very high water table downtown.
 
Steve X said:
It would be cheaper to use wider trains like the Canada Line than longer trains to carry the same capacity. SkyTrain tech doesn't offer wider trains as it is designed for as a medium capacity metro system. Clearly we can all agree the Canada Line also suffer a failed design for capacity
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SkyTrain system do offer wider trains. However, the system utilize existing railway tunnel, which can only support 2.65m trains. If conventional subway train is chosen, it can still only fit 2.65m. To use a wider train, they would have to dig a new tunnel through downtown.

Steve X said:
Yes many that is the case for Toronto as well but for the TTC, it took 50-60 years to get to that point oppose to 25 years in Vancouver. They should have overbuilt the stations as the TTC did. A 75s headway is not feasible not because the ATO system can't support it but people will not be able to swap out of the platform in time. It takes time for people to get from the concourse onto the platform. With headways less than 2 minutes, the stairs and escalators would be continuously packed and not be able to support such capacity of 30,000 ppdph. The line up for the elevators would be worst.
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Again, that's not because of the technology, but the decision of building everything huge at first, or save on initial capital and operating cost and upgrade only when needed. Over the next 10 or so years, probably only 6 of the initial 20 stations require upgrading while the others are handling the demand just fine. While a line may carry 30,000 people an hour, not all of those 30,000 will enter or exit at every station. With more frequent trains, it actually helps as the passenger will be more spread out and does not stay at the platform for as long. It would be fine as long as a station is able to process the subset of those 30,000 passengers leaving the station before the next train arrives.
 
ssiguy2 said:
As for CTrain transit mall in downtown Calgary being "so yesterday" is NOT the point. The point was that Calgary was willing to cut off an entire road thru the downtown from cars to give transit 100% priority backed up with the pedestrian-only Stephen Avenue Mall. The article was about cities reclaiming their downtown streets for transit and pedestrians and technically Calgary has done more in that regard than any city in the country.
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I'm pretty sure they did that to offset the impact of the +15 system - it largely killed the street-level downtown because people could actually walk indoors everywhere, and they chose to because of Calgary's weather (and unlike the PATH here, +15 is more-or-less parallel to the street grid)
 
amnesiajune said:
I'm pretty sure they did that to offset the impact of the +15 system - it largely killed the street-level downtown because people could actually walk indoors everywhere, and they chose to because of Calgary's weather (and unlike the PATH here, +15 is more-or-less parallel to the street grid)
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They got that beautiful indoor garden and transit is free along the downtown transit mall. Who needs to walk outside.
 
TrickyRicky said:
Sorry guys but this whole cities are made for people not cars idea is totally out to lunch. Cities aren't made for people, they exist because the productivity enhancement of the collective generates a small boost to the economic well-being of the individual.
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I own a car but I also use transit.

Cars are built by people, and so are trucks.

They're people-made machines.

Office tower are designed to house humans.

So are stores. Stuff like that.

So cities are made for people, full stop :)

Look past the opposing sides (e.g. the pro-car and the anti-car folks) and let me me tell you that the old "Overdo the freeways and destroy the stuff people made" actually exist -- a few cities "overshot" and did too much for the car without properly balancing things out like other cities did. The double edge sword factor. For example, look at what happened to Detroit. Look at these photographs of the expropriation destruction. The capacity wasn't needed to support the motown industry, and hurt themselves more than helped. While many factors hastened its decline, one thing that happened was how much they overemphasized certain elements of the car (which was a big economic benefit, as they are Motown after all) -- demolished a lot of downtown & residences (much more expropriation than the average city) when building massive interchanges, and also made their downtowns very pedestrian-unfriendly and started a blight-amplification effect (much moreso than the average city -- this is in addition, above-and-beyond economic decline and the famous Detroit politics), it helped accelerate Detroit's decline to an extent. The overshoot factor does exist. So stop letting your mind getting poisoned by the polarized arguments from the extremes of the two procar/anticar camps, and at least understand the whole "cities are made for people" argument from a proper pragmatic perspective, TrickyRicky! As a Car Owner, I truly Respect "Cities Are For People". There IS two sides to the coin.

Now, yes, we need King Transit Mall. Definitely. Without question. Very badly.

Toronto's growth benefitted from the car, but the time has come where King Street corridor would move more total GDP/economic benefit along its corridor now as a speeded-up transit corridor today than via cars, given the law of people-moving density (which favours high-capacity rail-based rapid transit) and the lack of east-west rapid transit options. I'd even advocate eventually upgrading King to pantograph operation & then beginning chained-consist operations on King too (60 meter trains -- 2-LRV operation) by ~2031-2041.

I'd support the eventual switch of King to full "LRT-specification" dedicated-corridor operations at least in the core segment. Full traffic priority signalling too along entire length of King streetcar route, complete with higher platforms with wheel-on subway-style all-door rampless level boarding onto a linked multi-vehicle consist. Proper station spacing optimized for LRT operations. The new streetcars supports eventual conversion of certain streetcar routes to true LRT routes. King would be a wonderful route to begin. Too bad the 1911 design for the Queen subway never got built a hundred years ago.
 
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ADRM said:
Staff are predicting that vehicular traffic volumes will be reduced by up to 50% along any given block but (at a glance) aren't venturing to say how much they expect transit travel times to decrease (which is the whole point of this thing IMO).
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I'd say that increasing potential capacity is the whole point, which you can get by decreasing transit times (and thus have more runs per unit time). But since the whole thing is a pilot project, I'm not too upset that staff don't have any predictions of how times will be impacted. It's ultimately an empirical question, and given that the project is very cheap, it seems reasonable to simply try and see what happens.
 
Tulse said:
I'd say that increasing potential capacity is the whole point, which you can get by decreasing transit times (and thus have more runs per unit time). But since the whole thing is a pilot project, I'm not too upset that staff don't have any predictions of how times will be impacted. It's ultimately an empirical question, and given that the project is very cheap, it seems reasonable to simply try and see what happens.
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Increasing transit capacity, predictability, and reliability and decreasing transit times are all certainly important aspects, but I think it's important to keep in mind that all of this is occurring in the transit-hating (or, at least, streetcar-hating), car-obsessed Toronto Council.

My greatest worry about the pilot as proposed is that there won't be significant improvement in the various transit-specific metrics because they're not being removed from mixed traffic, which (almost) all of the suburban councillors will take as "evidence" that either A) "Streetcars really DO suck, see?!", and/or B) "All of your lefty War on Car BS is ruining our city."
 
I'm pretty underwhelmed by how this pilot is watering down the transit priority and that extending sidewalks onto the street is taking precedence over giving transit protected lanes.
 
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