Adjei
Senior Member
Yes and I guess the Relief Line which was to be built to Pape was a "complete" line.
Toronto Ontario Line 3 | ?m | ?s | Metrolinx
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Yes and I guess the Relief Line which was to be built to Pape was a "complete" line.
W. K. Lis
Superstar
The Don Mills LRT would have continued up north on Pape, as part of Transit City. Could have continued up Don Mills to York Region. Then the Ford Nation cult came to rule the city.
The Relief Line extension was for the second phase. Eglinton for second phase, and maybe Sheppard the third phase (over time).
Now the Ford Nation rules the province. With the Ontario Line, the extension to Sheppard would be now second phase.
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TheTigerMaster
Superstar
We’re talking about adding capacity to the OL. What does the RL have to do with this? Any discussions about the RL are completely tangential.
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
I’m just trying to understand why people are actively against adding capacity to the OL. It less expensive over the long run. It only makes the OL more effective. What’s the issue? What benefit do we derive from lowering the capacity of the OL?
KhalilHeron
Active Member
literally, they were responding to someone saying DRL could proceeded...
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
My bad I responded to the wrong comment
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
If MX announced they were adding capacity to the OL tomorrow, would anyone here oppose that?
KhalilHeron
Active Member
adding extra capacity would cost more upfront and would likely take longer to construct. There are definitely big benefits to higher capacity, but I think using the money saved by smaller trains and partially above and at grade segments of the line on other downtown transit could benefit more people overall, especially when that extra 20 percent capacity just isn't necessary right now. By the time it is necessary we will be able to invest that money we saved in new lines or new upgrades to lines instead of pouring all our money into one line. If the OL was the only downtown transit we're gonna get for 100 years definitely pay the extra money for higher capacity, but I'd rather see more people be served by more projects that are cheaper to construct (not cheaper in quality).
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
It will be necessary whenever we're ready to extend the OL to Sheppard, which realistically should be today. MX themselves has acknowledged that the Yonge Line will not see major relief until the subway on Don Mills Road is extended towards Sheppard. We need to be having these discussions right now, unless we've decided we're done with the idea of Yonge Line relief.
If the OL is built as currently designed, and we immediately extend the line to Sheppard (as we should), we'll be in a situation where we will need expensive retrofits on a brand new rapid transit line. Heck, we might even be planning for those retrofits before the OL is even running (if we want the OL North to be under construction by 2031, we'll need to begin planning for the extension within the next couple of years). This makes no sense. I'm sure none of us would be too amused if we were today if MX was discussing expensive retrofits to the Eglinton Crosstown before that line has seen a single passenger.
The only situation in which lower capacity makes any sense is if we build the OL, and don't extend it north for the next twenty of thirty years, largely giving up on any hope of Yonge Line relief. In that case, we've failed at our jobs miserably.
KhalilHeron
Active Member
What makes you think the OL will be at capacity by the time it makes it to Sheppard? It will definitely be a lot closer to capacity than it will be when it opens but I doubt Metrolinx wouldn't have studied this and determined it will be enough capacity unless again there are ulterior motives I'm not considering. There is a lot of ridership north of Eglinton along Yonge, but I doubt the number of people that use the OL instead of line 1 plus the residents of the relatively low-density areas the OL will go through to get to Sheppard will be enough to push the OL overcapacity. I mean it's not like half of the people who take line one will suddenly switch to taking the OL. If Metrolinx has studied this I definitely think they need to show us some of these numbers to prove that it'll work, but even without them providing proof this definitely seems like their project, and not some politicians, so I trust that the professionals know what they're doing to some degree.
tsm1072
Active Member
Frequent Stouffville line service also factors in for anyone commuting from further east.
KhalilHeron
Active Member
This. And even the SSE to a degree. A TTC passenger who lives in Agincourt and usually takes the bus to don mills and then ends up on line 1 to get downtown could use the SSE instead (though that wont make a very large dent it shows the OL isn't going to be the only project relieving line 1.
ARG1
Senior Member
Nobody is against more capacity, the question is if it is necessary, and unfortunately the numbers we are throwing around to decide if this is the case has mostly been conjecture. We're throwing around numbers like "30% less capacity" with very little evidence that this is the case. We do not even know what vehicles the Ontario Line will be running yet we are forming assumptions after assumptions, and the people on here who desperately want to prove that the Ontario Line won't be enough are stretching numbers to be as "worst case scenerio" as possible, and are justifying this by making Metrolinx and Doug Ford look as incompetent as possible, that none of the engineers working on the Ontario Line are aware about how they're making something that won't have enough capacity, and that the only people who know what the city actually needs to fix its problems are the members pushing for the DRL.
We could make the Ontario Line have a ton of capacity. We can expand the tunnels and run GO EMUs under Toronto so that capacity never becomes an issue for the rest of time, however that costs a ton of money. Even if we take the worst case scenerio if the Ontario Line has 15-30% less capacity than the DRL, if building shallower stations and opening ourselves to less tunneling means that we get less capacity for half of the cost, that's an absolute win. Let's do some math. Let's say we have a budget of about 20 Billion dollars. Option 1 we build a single subway line at a peak capacity of 36k ppdph, and option 2 is for the same price we build 2 subway lines at 25k ppdph (30% less capacity). The 2nd option offers the city significantly more coverage, offering subway service to more parts of the city, and introduced an additional 50k ppdph into the city, for the same price as a single subway line that only introduced capacity for 36k ppdph and did not extend the coverage of the subway system as far.
With the Ontario Line this is what we're effectively doing, except the capacity isn't 30% less, its maybe 10-15% less.
syn
Senior Member
Yes, the Relief Line North was supposed to go up to Don Mills.
TheTigerMaster
Superstar
MX previously determined that a subway on Don Mills terminating at Sheppard would saturate 70% of the Ontario Line's theoretical capacity upon opening in 2031. This also does not consider that demand that the Ontario Line would need to absorb from RER passengers diverted away from Union. It also does not take into account that the ultimate capacity will likely be lower than the design capacity. Nor does it take into account future population growth and increases transport demand.