doady
Senior Member
Updated plan is excellent. It bugs me that people dump on the new OL because of partisan feelings. Can people stop being so political all the time just vote for good transit for a change?
Toronto Ontario Line 3 | ?m | ?s
- Thread starter JasonParis
- Start date
W. K. Lis
Superstar
People are now at the point where we want SOMETHING built already... yesterday!
syn
Senior Member
A lot of people have pointed out some major issues with the plan. Who presented it is irrelevant to a lot of us. Most of us is probably more accurate.
sixrings
Senior Member
Excellent is subjective. Some people thought transit city was excellent. It died. Some people thought a Sheppard subway would be excellent. It got cut. A long time ago people thought Eglinton west getting a subway would be excellent. Then it got filled in. I'll be perfectly happy with this thing dying a quick death. To me that would be excellent.
Rainforest
Senior Member
The OL plan has a number of issues, regardless of any partisan feelings.
BurlOak
Senior Member
The previous DRL planned may be better, but it is just too costly. If planners of the DRL would have put cost efficiency as the number one goal, and shaved off a couple of Billion $ off the price tag - then I think more people would have supported the DRL.
It comes down to the question.
Spend $9B on the 7.5km DRL, or spend $11B on the 15.5km OL?
If the DRL would have been $7B, and for $10B is could have made it to Eglinton - then it would be a different discussion.
If there is any common sense, those opposed to the OL should be finding ways of improving and reducing the costs of the DRL. I fear it will be a repeat of the Scarborough subway debate where the one side refuse to make any compromise away from the transfer LRT - and because of that their voice was ridiculed and shut out.
sixrings
Senior Member
Funny how when talking about building a danforth extension to Scarborough that is apparently money well spent. For years the subway subway subway crowd mocked the lrt crowd for going cheap. Now we are embarking on building the most important piece of transit infrastructure and the same people who were all about not introducing new technology and spending what needed to be spent are advocating for a cheaper design and new tech because this is what we can afford.
Rainforest
Senior Member
Even if the choice is binary, either DRL South "as is" or OL "as is", the answer is not obvious. Those $9B on the 7.5km DRL would result in a) potentially higher capacity limit for the future demand, and b) space in the eastern rail corridor preserved for the RER expansion.
Furthermore, elements of the DRL and OL plans could be combined for the best outcome. I definitely like it that OL is going to reach Eglinton in Phase 1. If the provincial government was more open about their design process, a better outcome would be more likely.
syn
Senior Member
There's a lot of hypocrisy, no doubt about that. A 1 stop extension was being defended, despite the price soaring to the $5 billion range. This is before the province uploaded subway construction.
The Conservatives are presenting a false choice. Why is cost all of a sudden such a huge factor, especially on a line like this where maximum capacity is crucial?
Why hasn't a full DRL been explored? With everything in their hands, they could present a plan for a full DRL running up to Don Mills. Instead we're given a lower capacity option, one that will likely impact GO expansion in the future and all they're comparing it to is what the city worked on for Phase 1.
There are people who think multiple, full capacity subway extensions in Scarborough make sense. If you agree with that, then how can you possibly want to cheap out on this?
Ford said he wanted to build subways, so why not just do it?
Streety McCarface
Senior Member
For those that frequent the Scarborough subway forums, the fact that I'm agreeing with @syn on this is telling. The Ontario line proposal has serious flaws that are not being addressed, and it's very evident that the province is pushing for this project while not addressing the very significant issues with their business case and their proposal as a whole. Their confirmation bias is unbelievably vivid, and this is NOT how a provincial transit agency should be run.
I supported the 1 stop proposal under the assumption that we'd get the Eglinton East LRT with it (it seemed like a fair compromise at the time), and defended the merits of the subway in Scarborough (which led to returned support for the three stop extension). However, the fact that there are people that are going along with this plan despite the inherent dishonesty associated with it is beyond comprehension. If Scarborough is getting a subway (which I honestly believe it should get, even if it takes 30 more years to do so), then Downtown/East York definitely deserves (and actually currently needs) the highest capacity line possible, and that cheaping out is a dangerous mistake in the long run that will cost billions to fix had we done it right to begin with. If we can spend money on airport express trains, new fare equipment, giant stations, filling in tunnels, subways to the suburbs, busways no one uses, inefficient downtown bus operations, additions to the PATH network, and PARKING LOTS, we can afford to spend an extra 1-2 billion dollars on a proper relief line that will ensure that the network remains connected (TTC rolling stock), that GO has provisions to expand (Which it very likely will need, especially since close to 100K people use the east corridor today and is likely to triple over the next 15 years), that capacity is available for at least 60 years, that the Yonge line will have a proper eastern alternative all the way up to Sheppard, and that commuters have the fastest trip downtown.
While some of the proposals in the Ontario line (better GO connections) are extremely lucrative, they can be implemented with the relief line if the planning is done properly. Spending that extra 1-2 billion dollars now will save at least 10 billion dollars in the future for required capacity improvements (platform extensions will cost at least 2-3 billion dollars without inflation, and if they can't be done due to technical challenges, another downtown line will cost tens of billions more), weather wear, maintenance associated with frequent trains (if more trains are traveling down a track, then the surroundings will need more maintenance), lost productivity (3 minute longer commute * 250K PPD * 300 days * 50 years * 25 $/h * 1/60 h/min = 4.7 billion dollars), social losses (ie noise, quality of life, vibration, additional building loading), among so many other things. It may be a hard pill to swallow, but I'm willing to pay more provincial sales tax or property tax to fund it, and everyone else here should be willing to as well.
I supported the 1 stop proposal under the assumption that we'd get the Eglinton East LRT with it (it seemed like a fair compromise at the time), and defended the merits of the subway in Scarborough (which led to returned support for the three stop extension). However, the fact that there are people that are going along with this plan despite the inherent dishonesty associated with it is beyond comprehension. If Scarborough is getting a subway (which I honestly believe it should get, even if it takes 30 more years to do so), then Downtown/East York definitely deserves (and actually currently needs) the highest capacity line possible, and that cheaping out is a dangerous mistake in the long run that will cost billions to fix had we done it right to begin with. If we can spend money on airport express trains, new fare equipment, giant stations, filling in tunnels, subways to the suburbs, busways no one uses, inefficient downtown bus operations, additions to the PATH network, and PARKING LOTS, we can afford to spend an extra 1-2 billion dollars on a proper relief line that will ensure that the network remains connected (TTC rolling stock), that GO has provisions to expand (Which it very likely will need, especially since close to 100K people use the east corridor today and is likely to triple over the next 15 years), that capacity is available for at least 60 years, that the Yonge line will have a proper eastern alternative all the way up to Sheppard, and that commuters have the fastest trip downtown.
While some of the proposals in the Ontario line (better GO connections) are extremely lucrative, they can be implemented with the relief line if the planning is done properly. Spending that extra 1-2 billion dollars now will save at least 10 billion dollars in the future for required capacity improvements (platform extensions will cost at least 2-3 billion dollars without inflation, and if they can't be done due to technical challenges, another downtown line will cost tens of billions more), weather wear, maintenance associated with frequent trains (if more trains are traveling down a track, then the surroundings will need more maintenance), lost productivity (3 minute longer commute * 250K PPD * 300 days * 50 years * 25 $/h * 1/60 h/min = 4.7 billion dollars), social losses (ie noise, quality of life, vibration, additional building loading), among so many other things. It may be a hard pill to swallow, but I'm willing to pay more provincial sales tax or property tax to fund it, and everyone else here should be willing to as well.
BurlOak
Senior Member
Combine the 2 plans is the best option - but history shows that Toronto won't explore this.
I use the Scarborough subway as the example. During the 2010 campaign, Ford was against the Transit City transfer LRT plan and was in favour of the B-D subway extension to STC. Then, he an McGuinty found a compromise between the 2 - creating a continuous transfer free connection to STC. Unfortunately, City Council and the Provincial Liberals decided to kill this plan and go back to the subway extension plan. After that point, not one person tried to find a compromise. The Subway plan was going ahead, so it was imperative for the LRT supporters to meet halfway with some type of compromise. None was ever presented to we end up with the subway extension.
In this case, I am confident that nobody will question the planning and design that resulted in the proposed expensive DRL plan. Nobody will suggest ways of reducing the cost. It will turn into a binary choice of a 15.5km line or a 7.5km line. Maybe if this was 30 years ago, we could afford to built the DRL short and extend it a few decades in the future. However, we are so far behind that there needs to be a major push to build a network, not a stub.
jcam
Active Member
If we're drawing lines on maps, and SkyTrain-capacity is what we're talking about, why not combine Ontario Line, relief-line long, Sheppard subway east, part of the existing Line 3 and a Line 3 east extension to Malvern to get the most out of this. Circuitous yes, not ideal no, but more of a possible reality if Ontario Line goes ahead as planned? (and yes this has a mid-town GO)
syn
Senior Member
This is complete BS.
Toronto's Transit Future Changes Following City Council Debate
"Initially, a compromise of running the Eglinton LRT on the surface through the wide, suburban stretch of Eglinton east of the Don Valley, while extending the Sheppard line one or two stops to Victoria Park was put forward by Stintz and other councilors opposed to the Ford plan. This was rejected by Ford and allies, leading to yesterday’s meeting."
Council attempted to work with Ford, offering a solution to lower the cost of the Eglinton line and an extension to the Sheppard Line. He rejected it all.
As Mayor, Ford showed a consistent inability to work with others. He showed a consistent inability to compromise. It's also quite clear that he was completely unfit for office (crack video, drunken stupors, Sandro Lisi, etc.).
The idea that Ford had a wonderful plan that was ruined by everyone else is nonsense.
As for the DRL, it's a critical piece of infrastructure. If they're going to dramatically reduce capacity in favour of cost savings, then maintaining a transfer at Kennedy to "reduce cost" should be a no-brainer.
Forgotten
Active Member
Yet here we are. The person you were quoting is all in favour of a city hall subway because he insisted Scamtrack is a surface subway that makes a King subway redundant and obsolete. It's enough to make me wonder if they have an office at city hall, possibly in team Tory.
Let's review:
NO 5 minute frequencies (12 trains per hour .... to 4 if that)
NO TTC fares
NO free transfers
ONE station downtown between Exhibition and Don River
Allandale25
Senior Member
Is there a full version of that map available? What's the source?