Only Pricing Congestion Can Stop Congestion

[sjc]

One of the major causes of congestion comes from people driving into work and parking downtown. Perhaps building some more large parking structures close to the highway (perhaps with direct access to the highway) would reduce the number of people driving around the streets of downtown. If you offer cheaper subsidized parking, people will walk a few blocks to their car.

This could take a lot of cars of downtown streets.

Similarly, expansion of parking at all GO stations (including those inside the city like Mimico) would also encourage people to drive to the train instead of driving downtown.

I'd also look at reconfiguring the Lakeshore and Gardiner so that one is exclusively eastbound and the other exclusively westbound. If you switched directions in the afternoon, you might be able to get away with leaving the Lakeshore non-controlled-access (Gardiner would be eastbound in the morning and westbound at night).

 

[andrewpmk]

One of the major causes of congestion comes from people driving into work and parking downtown. Perhaps building some more large parking structures close to the highway (perhaps with direct access to the highway) would reduce the number of people driving around the streets of downtown. If you offer cheaper subsidized parking, people will walk a few blocks to their car.

This could take a lot of cars of downtown streets.

Similarly, expansion of parking at all GO stations (including those inside the city like Mimico) would also encourage people to drive to the train instead of driving downtown.

I'd also look at reconfiguring the Lakeshore and Gardiner so that one is exclusively eastbound and the other exclusively westbound. If you switched directions in the afternoon, you might be able to get away with leaving the Lakeshore non-controlled-access (Gardiner would be eastbound in the morning and westbound at night).

There is no room to expand parking at most GO stations. Also parking at GO stations creates traffic congestion at the GO stations as people drive in and out of the station.

Also lots of people take the Gardiner westbound in morning rush hour to jobs in Mississauga/Etobicoke/Oakville etc so there is a fair amount of congestion in the off peak direction (though nowhere near as much as on the 401). Reversible lanes would not work because of this.

 

[spider]

I wonder if pricing of anything is really a factor in this problem.

Downtown employment attracts people and those people have to get there in the morning and get home at night, their choices to do so are transit or the car.

Penalizing drivers with prohibitive parking fees and/or tolls to drive them onto transit won't work as transit is beyond capacity now, there is no room for reformed drivers.
The corollary of making transit more attractive by various initiatives is also a loser for the same reason.

Transit City is a silly plan to place streetcars where bus routes exist now in order to hustle more riders more quickly to the Yonge Street subway which is in no position to accept more riders today, tomorrow or ever.

The solution is more GO service, like 3 or 4 times that available now and a DRL line. Are we ready to bite this bullet? Not likely so let's quit nibbling around the edges of this problem until such time as reality sets in.

Thank God I am retired and don't have to face this monster every day.

 

[freshcutgrass]

Penalizing drivers with prohibitive parking fees and/or tolls to drive them onto transit won't work as transit is beyond capacity now, there is no room for reformed drivers.

Not that I am necessarily agreeing with that, but the big difference is, that we can increase transit capacity, but we can't increase road capacity. And one to pay for it, is to use road tolls/congestion fees.

The VRF didn't generate that much revenue, but at least it was a step in the right direction. It was also simple to implement and required basically no infrastructure cost. But if we can't even manage to live with something like that, what makes you think we can handle much bigger and complicated things like road tolls & congestion fees?

 

[sjc]

There is no room to expand parking at most GO stations. Also parking at GO stations creates traffic congestion at the GO stations as people drive in and out of the station.

In most cases, there should be room to build up or down. While it could be expensive, just about every car that is parked at a GO station is a car that isn't driving around downtown.

Also parking at GO stations creates traffic congestion at the GO stations as people drive in and out of the station.

I think some reconfiguring of local roads could be worthwhile in many cases to route people on and off local highways.

Rather than forcing a war between transit and cars, recognize that both will exist and find ways to have the highway and transit systems work together.

 

[sjc]

But if we can't even manage to live with something like that, what makes you think we can handle much bigger and complicated things like road tolls & congestion fees?

Could they just make everyone get a 407 transponder and put cameras up on all the streets leading into the city? You get charged when you cross the boundary of the congestion area. If you live downtown, you would only get charged if you leave downtown and re-enter.

I'm not saying this is a good idea, just that it might not be impractical.

 

[Chuck]

I'm not conviced that a congestion charge downtown would help. My job requires me to travel across all parts of the GTA by car, and downtown is honestly the least congested area of the GTA in rush hour - so much so that I can drive to my office in the financial district and park nearby faster than I can take the subway. My apartment is in midtown 3 minutes from the subway on foot, and my commute on the TTC is exclusively on the Yongle line.

Most drivers live and work in the suburbs. If we want to reduce driving, toll suburban roads or implement parking levies of $20 per day in nodes such as the Leslie/7 office park, York University. Or, implement a congestion charge to travel along Highway 7 or Hurontario by car.

 

[freshcutgrass]

If you offer cheaper subsidized parking, people will walk a few blocks to their car.

Subsidizing car drivers is the problem...not the solution.

Similarly, expansion of parking at all GO stations (including those inside the city like Mimico) would also encourage people to drive to the train instead of driving downtown.

What needs to be expanded is the local public transit in the 905 where these GO stations are located, so the people who want to take transit don't have to "drive" to take transit. That is so moronic. Or...instead of wasting all that land for a sea of subsidized parking, use that land for high density nodal development so those people don't have to drive to the GO station.

Could they just make everyone get a 407 transponder and put cameras up on all the streets leading into the city? You get charged when you cross the boundary of the congestion area. If you live downtown, you would only get charged if you leave downtown and re-enter.

I'm not saying this is a good idea, just that it might not be impractical.

If it were to be done, some sort of system like that could be implemented. What I'm saying is that there's a substantial infrastructure cost involved to instal and run such a system. As it stands, drivers in Toronto don't want to pay the fee, let alone the capital/operational costs of such things. That's why Ford was able to reduce the city's revenue by $60 million, and it seems that everyone was real happy about that.

The point being, that even the City of Toronto is not quite at the point where we are willing to let go of that car culture mentality. Yet.

 

[mpd618]

Transit capacity is not static. A congestion charge can be paired with bus lanes on major roads and highways, and of course protected streetcar right-of-way. Giving buses their own lane speeds them up substantially, meaning that you get not only a faster trip by transit but also more capacity since the bus can do more runs. The revenue from congestion charges can be used for capital investments into transit, such as vehicles, double-tracking, grade separation, electrification, busways, etc.

Pricing parking appropriately is not a solution to region-wide congestion, as much congestion on cross-town roadways is not caused by traffic heading into an area where parking is scarce nor is it a result of circling for parking. There's enough parking-friendly destinations that any decrease in congestion would induce more travel to those destinations, even if it decreases car trips downtown.

 

[M II A II R II K]

Something like SFPark with supply and demand flexible pricing would probably be better, including an app as to where to find the spot which would take out the driving around looking for parking congestion on the streets as well.

 

[freshcutgrass]

Pricing parking appropriately is not a solution to region-wide congestion

Parking pricing has nothing to do with controlling congestion, any more than public transit does.

The point of parking pricing is to have car drivers start to pay the real costs of operating a car. It's also an indication that we are starting to reduce the attitude that all facets of urban life revolves around the car.

 

[mpd618]

The point of parking pricing is to have car drivers start to pay the real costs of operating a car. It's also an indication that we are starting to reduce the attitude that all facets of urban life revolves around the car.

For what it's worth, I think the point of pricing parking should be to effectively allocate the scarce resource of parking using money instead of time. Which is exactly the same thing I see congestion pricing doing for the scarce resource of roadway space.

 

[freshcutgrass]

For what it's worth, I think the point of pricing parking should be to effectively allocate the scarce resource of parking using money instead of time. Which is exactly the same thing I see congestion pricing doing for the scarce resource of roadway space.

That's exactly what it is. We already know that while car drivers bitch about it, they are willing to pay the price with their time (cause, well....there they are). To change their minds, you need to hit them where it really counts....their wallets. We know this is true, because of the one local example we have...the 407.

We do things backwards. We say we want to encourage people to use public transit (also a scarce resource), and then we turn around and make them pay a very high up-front user fee. We say we want to discourage people from driving, yet charge no up-front user fee.

 

[Electrify]

I doubt it. I lived in downtown Calgary this summer (may-aug) and i can assure you that despite having the highest parking rates in Canada and the 2nd highest in north america, it still has more than enough traffic in downtown....

And that is with its car oriented efficient one-way system on 9th/6th & 5th/4th

Keep parking rates unchanged, put in a congestion charge because that is the only way any noticable impact will be made.

I believe Calgary has a higher per capita usage of transit than Toronto. Ditto for Ottawa, which also has parking prices well above the market rate.

 

[Electrify]

You have lots of details here and some of it makes great sense, however, your proposed solutions all simply ignore the "fundamental law" as described in the original article. For decades researchers have consistently determined that increasing highway capacity simply delays congestion problems temporarily by encouraging more people to drive. If you feel those findings are all wrong, I think you'll need to explain why you feel that way rather than simply ignore it. Do you have evidence that those findings are all incorrect or flawed?

I also disagree with your assertion that "congestion is just an indicator". I believe the exact opposite is true. It is congested roads which make routine unavoidable events such as breakdowns and slow moving vehicles into a major problem. On an empty road these things do not cause congestion: they only become critical when a road is already filled to capacity.

Somewhat of a side point, I really don't know how people can take Lewis Mumford so seriously when it came to urban planning. While he had some excellent ideas about creating community within the city, he seems to champion small villages over urban areas and had unrealistic expectations of how a mass population could function economically in such a setting.

From what I see, your proposed solutions to your issues 1, 2, 3, 4, 6 and 7 all simply describe different types of road and infrastructure improvements, some of them very extreme. These would cost billions and billions in taxpayer money to improve highway capacity and flow for only a few years at best before the population growth you describe in issue 6 caused roads to reach capacity again and the severe congestion to return. Then what?

Your solution for your issue 5, on the other hand, hits the nail on the head. We need to encourage people to change their driving patterns, drive less, telecommute, etc. Absolutely. But people don't just change their behaviours because someone tells them to: they need incentives to do so. Which is precisely the point of tolls and congestion charges! When you charge people more to drive on the busiest highways at the busiest times, they are given a strong incentive to change their behaviour, hence solving the problem.

Also, I'm am puzzled that you seem fine with the idea of spending billions and billions of taxpayer money on highway infrastructure improvements, but you reject the idea of tolls and congestion charges. The same people are paying either way, whether directly or indirectly. I say we invest our money directly in the solution that countless studies show actually works, rather than waste it on what history repeatedly shows does not work.

Sorry, I am going to have to agree with salmonz on this one. While getting people out of their cars is part of the solution, it is far from the only one. At the end of the day, congestion is caused by too many people trying to get through the same point at one time. If you increase capacity, people aren't going to magically appear and fill it up. It gets filled up because either it wasn't expanded enough to meet demand, or the population increased causing it to fill up.

To further this, let's take our own transit system to make an analogy. The Yonge line is at capacity, so we are putting in articulated trains and automatic train control to help increase capacity (adding more lanes). However, this can only do so much because there is still too much pint up demand to use the line. The solution could be a DLR (building a new highway), however as the population increases in the city, it is only a matter of time before this reaches capacity as well.

Now, the thing with building more roads into the city is that there isn't enough physical space to place them. Simply put, you can't make Yonge St. 12 lanes in each direction through downtown. So yes, getting cars off the roads by providing alternatives is part of the solution. However, to say that strategically widening roads or adjusting lane weaving would not address congestion is simply anti-mobility propaganda.