Metrolinx: Bombardier Flexity Freedom & Alstom Citadis Spirit LRVs

[robmausser]

Is it confirmed that the Eglinton LRT line cars will use the grey, black and white livery that is on the Metrolinx pilot vehicles? So many renderings from Metrolinx have shown the green and white livery for years but then the pilot vehicles are grey.
I've recently seen somewhere renderings for Finch that show the Alstom in grey and I didn't know if this was going to be standard for Toronto or if it was to match the Finch Line 6 colour scheme. If the latter is the case then maybe Eglinton will be orange.

Personally I think the grey looks drab and unfinished. A brand new line should exude some excitement and colour like the Waterloo bright blue or the TTC Flexity outlook red. If the Eglinton cars are grey with grey seating I think it will be a rather flat look to and exciting new line. It would be like they were prototypes or painted with primer. I hope they don't blow this.

I really dont think an official colour has been stated, even the green was in the mockups.

Green has 2 issues. First, Metrolinx rebranded and green is no longer the colour palette. And second, people associate green with GO.

I think the cars should be red just like TTC, whether or not it is built or funded and maintained by TTC is irrelevant, it will be transferable from TTC and it will be on TTC maps.

The cars should be TTC branded. They can put both a TTC and Metrolinx logo on them if they want to showcase that they built it.

 

[drum118]

Paint them purple or strip colours them like some systems around the world. Not gun ho on the the red on the cars, let alone the red on the Orion buses.

 

[EastYorkTTCFan]

Paint them purple or strip colours them like some systems around the world. Not gun ho on the the red on the cars, let alone the red on the Orion buses.

Red is the TTC's official colour though. However I wouldn't mind seeing them in blue and white for the colours of Toronto. They could do the whole body blue with white agents and have the TTC logo on the white. Of course colours really won't material much as they are likely to be wrapped with ads like a lot of the flexstory have been recently.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

They have. But I think everyone is overreacting.

I think ridership on some lines like the Eglinton LRT will be higher than expected. My reasoning is that everyone already packs into a ton of buses on Eglinton, and its such an unenjoyable ride that I can only imagine those people are carless and have no other option. Once you switch to a nicer transit method, you get those people and then the people who decided to drive instead of be crammed into a bus taking the LRT. And more cars will be greatly appreciated.

What's the max capacity that could have been accommodated with the original Eglinton Line LRVs ordered from Bombardier? Was this enough to saturate the 15,000 pphpd capacity of Eglinton Line if necessary?

 

[EastYorkTTCFan]

I really don't understand how the screwed up this bad. I don't believe the people at Metrolinx are idiots. How did they get in this situation? Did they just gamble away hundreds of millions of dollars hoping the Bombarider deal would fall through?

They took on the order the TTC and city of Toronto made for transit city. When it got scaled back to just being Eglinton metrolix got left with extra cars and didn't need them as soon but they don't want to admit it because up until now they haven't had anyone on the board with any public transit experience.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

Is it confirmed that the Eglinton LRT line cars will use the grey, black and white livery that is on the Metrolinx pilot vehicles? So many renderings from Metrolinx have shown the green and white livery for years but then the pilot vehicles are grey.
I've recently seen somewhere renderings for Finch that show the Alstom in grey and I didn't know if this was going to be standard for Toronto or if it was to match the Finch Line 6 colour scheme. If the latter is the case then maybe Eglinton will be orange.

Personally I think the grey looks drab and unfinished. A brand new line should exude some excitement and colour like the Waterloo bright blue or the TTC Flexity outlook red. If the Eglinton cars are grey with grey seating I think it will be a rather flat look to and exciting new line. It would be like they were prototypes or painted with primer. I hope they don't blow this.

Oh, this discussion again

I'm pretty sure they'll be grey; selected because its a neutral colour.

My preference is red for the Transit City LRT lines though.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

They took on the order the TTC and city of Toronto made for transit city. When it got scaled back to just being Eglinton metrolix got left with extra cars and didn't need them as soon but they don't want to admit it because up until now they haven't had anyone on the board with any public transit experience.

It doesn't take someone with public transit experience to tell you that if you order LRVs for four lines, and only build one or two or three of them, you're going to have a ton of surplus vehicles.

 

[drum118]

Red is the TTC's official colour though. However I wouldn't mind seeing them in blue and white for the colours of Toronto. They could do the whole body blue with white agents and have the TTC logo on the white. Of course colours really won't material much as they are likely to be wrapped with ads like a lot of the flexstory have been recently.

A colour is a colour and one only has to look at YRT, Mississauga or Brampton to see what they have done to their buses for colours. Its branding and if you going to use TTC colour, which colour is right?? Look at at PCC, let alone what was out there before they came alone. I do agree that grey will look like shit and sure don't like the interior of the new GO Coaches, let alone its colour.

Once you start wrapping vehicles, you can loose parts of it to 100%, other than the front, so what colour it is doesn't matter.

As for excess LRV's, Metrolinx has already lost 2 lines that don't need cars to subways and where does Metrolinx use those spare cars? SRT is stub subway and drawings are showing up for projects on Sheppard calling for subway stations protections.

Until the Finch line gets extended at both ends, nothing on the drawing board for new LRT lines, other than what out for tender or about to go out as well being built.

 

[Allandale25]

It doesn't take someone with public transit experience to tell you that if you order LRVs for four lines, and only build one or two or three of them, you're going to have a ton of surplus vehicles.

True, but we don't know the conditions or how flexible the Alstom order is.

 

[smallspy]

They have. But I think everyone is overreacting.

I think ridership on some lines like the Eglinton LRT will be higher than expected. My reasoning is that everyone already packs into a ton of buses on Eglinton, and its such an unenjoyable ride that I can only imagine those people are carless and have no other option. Once you switch to a nicer transit method, you get those people and then the people who decided to drive instead of be crammed into a bus taking the LRT. And more cars will be greatly appreciated.

Even if ridership on Eglinton was 33% higher than predicted, there are still too many cars. We're getting 264 LRVs from the two manufacturers. Eglinton is budgetted for something like 64 BBD LRVs or 48 Alstom LRVs. Finch West is going to be another 26 or 28 BBD cars, and whatever the equivalent ends up being for the larger Alstom cars. Hamilton and Hurontario will use another, what, 55 BBD cars combined?

Remember, the BBD order was predicated on the SRT being converted AND extended, and on Sheppard East as well as Finch West and Eglinton. We're getting half of the lines (and service), and yet there are even more cars being purchased that before. Hamilton and Hurontario will not require so many cars as to reduce or eliminate the surplus, not even close.

We are nearly in full agreement....I don't think any surplus ones ever get sold....I think their existence (and the fact they are "already paid for") get used to justify the building of LRT lines on/in corridors that do not have the ridership to support LRT but, you know, "we already have the vehicles and it would be a waste not to use them".

Which is naive enough that it seems like it would make sense that the government would do it.

That thought had crossed my mind, to be honest. But I'd discounted it out of hope.

Dan
Toronto, Ont.

 

[cplchanb]

Even if ridership on Eglinton was 33% higher than predicted, there are still too many cars. We're getting 264 LRVs from the two manufacturers. Eglinton is budgetted for something like 64 BBD LRVs or 48 Alstom LRVs. Finch West is going to be another 26 or 28 BBD cars, and whatever the equivalent ends up being for the larger Alstom cars. Hamilton and Hurontario will use another, what, 55 BBD cars combined?

Remember, the BBD order was predicated on the SRT being converted AND extended, and on Sheppard East as well as Finch West and Eglinton. We're getting half of the lines (and service), and yet there are even more cars being purchased that before. Hamilton and Hurontario will not require so many cars as to reduce or eliminate the surplus, not even close.



Which is naive enough that it seems like it would make sense that the government would do it.

That thought had crossed my mind, to be honest. But I'd discounted it out of hope.

Dan
Toronto, Ont.

i wonder if it will be possible to cut down on part of the order. Its not like everything has been paid for yet so its not like bbr will need to refund part of the payment. i believe this practice has been done for airline orders where sometimes the order of planes are cut down or deferred based on shifting demands.

 

[Allandale25]

Hamilton and Hurontario will use another, what, 55 BBD cars combined?

I could look it up but it might take a bit of time. Anyone else have the Hamilton (cc Mark) or Hurontario LRV numbers from the EA/EPR/TPAPs done?

 

[TOareaFan]

i believe this practice has been done for airline orders where sometimes the order of planes are cut down or deferred based on shifting demands.

Shifting demands/trends/business is why airplane orders of any signinificant size are done as X number of planes with option of Y more. The airline is indicating that they estimate they need X + Y of the planes but structuring the deal as X plus an option for Y means they can get out of the deal with only X purchased. They are contractually obligate to buy X and cutting that would require agreement from the vendor....they have not obligation to purchase Y and, typically, have to actually take a positive step to exercise that option.

I don't think either of the ML orders for LRT vehicles is structured that way....they have ordered X + Y from different vendors and they seem like firm orders (from what has been reported).

 

[TOareaFan]

Shifting demands/trends/business is why airplane orders of any signinificant size are done as X number of planes with option of Y more. The airline is indicating that they estimate they need X + Y of the planes but structuring the deal as X plus an option for Y means they can get out of the deal with only X purchased. They are contractually obligate to buy X and cutting that would require agreement from the vendor....they have not obligation to purchase Y and, typically, have to actually take a positive step to exercise that option.

I don't think either of the ML orders for LRT vehicles is structured that way....they have ordered X + Y from different vendors and they seem like firm orders (from what has been reported).

As for the "Its not like everything has been paid for yet so its not like bbr will need to refund" part.....so what? A contract is a contract and the financial parts are promises to pay. The fact the payment comes later is irrelevant.

 

[cplchanb]

As for the "Its not like everything has been paid for yet so its not like bbr will need to refund" part.....so what? A contract is a contract and the financial parts are promises to pay. The fact the payment comes later is irrelevant.

wellit would be much more difficult to negotiate some sort of deferral or reductions in numbers if money was front already. As with all contracts, they can be renegotiated. It all depends on how much money it will involve. United were able to defer all of their A350 deliveries this year, though obviously for ml they cant defer indefinitely. I guess if it ever comes to this, the lawyers will broker some deal.