Roads: Gardiner Expressway

[ShonTron]

Ha! Eric Miller, the same guy who promoted SmartTrack, including the dubious Eglinton West section, and sat on Tory's transition team.

He's sounding more and more like Gordon Chong, except with his Dr. in something more relevant than dentistry.

 

[Riverdale Rink Rat]

Let’s not forget that we have a populace who seemingly despise bridges, viaducts, or any kind of elevated rail. So the massive rail corridor stretching from Bathurst to Pape and passing through Union...it was clearly a mistake. Naturally we should bring it back down to street level as it once was, level crossings be damned. We’ll work our way out from there, closing any transport infrastructure that might cast a shadow or be viewed as unsightly.

An elevated roadway designed to bypass an industrial port that no longer exists is clearly a different kettle of fish than the rail corridor. The visceral reaction to any re-routing of transport is quite amazing. Building out Southcore, QQE, and the soap plant while tearing down a crumbling roadway is clearly a better option for the city in general. The fact that it's cheaper, too, is a bonus.

Single car commuting has gone the way of the dodo. Single car commuters need to adjust, not the city nor its economic growth.

 

[Amare]

An elevated roadway designed to bypass an industrial port that no longer exists is clearly a different kettle of fish than the rail corridor. The visceral reaction to any re-routing of transport is quite amazing. Building out Southcore, QQE, and the soap plant while tearing down a crumbling roadway is clearly a better option for the city in general. The fact that it's cheaper, too, is a bonus.

Single car commuting has gone the way of the dodo. Single car commuters need to adjust, not the city nor its economic growth.

Tearing that section of that Gardiner down and not building a replacement (ie: hybrid option) really makes no sense. There's a $100 million cost (or so it's claimed-probably more like $300-$400 million) differential between the two so they might as well build a replacement section. Once you tear down the Gardiner and sell off the land, there's no getting back that land and let us remember that congestion is only going to get worse in the future.

In the past, we actually used to plan for future traffic demand (ie: the Bloor Viaduct, Highway 401, Original Yonge Subway with longer platforms than originally needed). It seems as though today we have the opposite thought process, and that's the same thought process that would screw this city up.

 

[Transportfan]

Single car commuting has gone the way of the dodo.

Hardly. You may want it to be but that doesn't mean it has.

 

[torontologist]

What a biased little report that is, funded by "The Gardiner Coalition".

Industry has left our downtown waterfront, with the exception of a few holdovers like Redpath. It's now in the sprawl; those areas have more than enough access to highways for shipping goods. It's no wonder the CAA is behind this study, you can count on a knee-jerk reaction from them any time there might be something that potentially inconveniences someone driving an automobile somewhere.

The fact of the matter is that cities all over the developed world are taking down their highways. We would be the one of the only ones to invest money in a new elevated expressway. And it is a significant investment: we'd be spending $500 million to save 3% of commuters 3-10 minutes. Not only would it be an immense waste of taxpayer money, I would argue that it would be immoral, considering that it could be put towards improving the lives of many more people through transit. The boulevard option not only compliments development of the Unilever lands, it would also generate thousands of new jobs through the development that would happen on either side of the new Lakeshore. It would also generate a greater amount of municipal tax revenue for the city to pay for the necessary work to take it down in the first place. The replace option costs more and generates less money.

I was a firm supporter of the replace option, however having read the reports that have come out in the last few months, it just doesn't make economic sense to keep it elevated. I'm all for maintaining the western Gardiner and DVP, but an elevated link between the two is not worth $500,000,000+ when this city has so many urgent issues that need funding.

 

[44 North]

An elevated roadway designed to bypass an industrial port that no longer exists is clearly a different kettle of fish than the rail corridor.

The port still exists. It’s hurting compared to its heyday, and the eastern sections never became what was envisioned. But there’s still salt, sugar, sewage, cement, a gas plant, and other uses that still make it an active industrial area. Regardless, there are parallels between a grade-separated elevated railway and a grade-separated elevated highway. Similar kettle, similar species of fish.

The visceral reaction to any re-routing of transport is quite amazing.

My point exactly.

Building out Southcore, QQE, and the soap plant while tearing down a crumbling roadway is clearly a better option for the city in general. The fact that it's cheaper, too, is a bonus.

But it’s more than that. We’re also making what could theoretically still be a major at-grade thoroughfare with only the backs of properties fronting onto it, into a developed avenue with parking and condos facing the road. That’s more than simply tearing it down. The newly-created parcel of land on the north side of Lake Shore between Jarvis and Sherbourne is basically a new part to this debate that didn’t exist a year ago, and if I’m not mistaken may not have even been calculated into the traffic study.

Single car commuting has gone the way of the dodo. Single car commuters need to adjust, not the city nor its economic growth.

That’s fine and dandy, but as my earlier post showed there are many companies and organizations that rely on transportation for more than single occupancy commuting. And notice how the renderings of this new Lake Shore Blvd show cyclists and cafes, but not the the dump trucks and semis that will still be roaring down the road? We're not tearing down a sector of the economy with the eastern Gardiner...these things will still exist.

 

[Grimace]

Tearing that section of that Gardiner down and not building a replacement (ie: hybrid option) really makes no sense. There's a $100 million cost (or so it's claimed-probably more like $300-$400 million) differential between the two so they might as well build a replacement section. Once you tear down the Gardiner and sell off the land, there's no getting back that land and let us remember that congestion is only going to get worse in the future.

In the past, we actually used to plan for future traffic demand (ie: the Bloor Viaduct, Highway 401, Original Yonge Subway with longer platforms than originally needed). It seems as though today we have the opposite thought process, and that's the same thought process that would screw this city up.

There is no logic behind building/maintaining highways into the core to support future traffic demand. The core itself cannot reasonably sustain a significant increase in traffic demand, so why would we want to bring more cars in? The Eastern Gardiner is nothing more than an underutilized 2 km stretch of highway in between 2 bottlenecks. It backs up going westbound in the morning because of the bottlenecks entering the core, and it backs up eastbound in the afternoon because of bottlenecks getting onto DVP. From my perch in my office looking over the Eastern Gardiner, I have a hard time believing that leveling the Eastern Gardiner and adding intersections at Jarvis, Sherbourne, Parliament and Cherry will have a bottleneck impact that backs up traffic to Parklawn, which makes me question the assumptions that go into the UofT report.

 

[k10ery]

From my perch in my office looking over the Eastern Gardiner, I have a hard time believing that leveling the Eastern Gardiner and adding intersections at Jarvis, Sherbourne, Parliament and Cherry will have a bottleneck impact that backs up traffic to Parklawn, which makes me question the assumptions that go into the UofT report.

The eastbound Gardiner is already regularly backed up from Jarvis to Park Lawn. So, anything that slows traffic at Jarvis, even a bit, will necessarily affect drivers all the way back to Park Lawn, right? That's just logic.

 

[k10ery]

I was a firm supporter of the replace option, however having read the reports that have come out in the last few months, it just doesn't make economic sense to keep it elevated. I'm all for maintaining the western Gardiner and DVP, but an elevated link between the two is not worth $500,000,000+ when this city has so many urgent issues that need funding.

That $500 million figure is very misleading. Tearing down the Gardiner is NOT ANY CHEAPER than refurbishing it completely right now. The supposed extra cost of the maintain or hybrid options is the higher projected maintenance costs OVER 100 YEARS!

First, nobody really knows how much that will cost in a 100 years. Second the 100 year time frame was obviously chosen to torque the comparison in favour of the tear down option. If you think instead of the annual cost of this at a five percent real interest rate, it's just $25 million. A drop in the bucket. Just think about it. If we saved $25 million a year because we didn't have to maintain the Gardiner, then we'd be able to finance the TTC operating subsidy FOR ALL OF 17 DAYS per year.

Let's face it folks, the Gardiner is a bargain. You're either fer it or agen it, but if you're agen it, it's because you just plain hate cars.

 

[Filip]

The eastbound Gardiner is already regularly backed up from Jarvis to Park Lawn. So, anything that slows traffic at Jarvis, even a bit, will necessarily affect drivers all the way back to Park Lawn, right? That's just logic.

My $0.02 - when the DVP was closed two weekends ago I drove down the Gardiner to get up to Yonge/St. Clair. All the downtown offramps were clogged (this was Saturday morning btw), and thinking I'm smarter I might as well drive down to Lake Shore and backtrack - baaaad idea. The line of cars trying to maneuver around there was a sight to behold. 15 mins to pass that bottleneck.

I can't imagine that without the Gardiner East, not to mention the new cars being put on the road as the East Bayfronts materialize and dump more cars into that stretch...

 

[W. K. Lis]

Build a hybrid version of the Gardiner, Then, after they build the DRL, they should charge tolls on the Gardiner & Don Valley for non-commercial vehicles. Commercial trucks, vans, and buses would pay no toll.

 

[DarnDirtyApe]

My $0.02 - when the DVP was closed two weekends ago I drove down the Gardiner to get up to Yonge/St. Clair. All the downtown offramps were clogged (this was Saturday morning btw), and thinking I'm smarter I might as well drive down to Lake Shore and backtrack - baaaad idea. The line of cars trying to maneuver around there was a sight to behold. 15 mins to pass that bottleneck.

I can't imagine that without the Gardiner East, not to mention the new cars being put on the road as the East Bayfronts materialize and dump more cars into that stretch...

Last Saturday the Gardiner was close from 427 to DVP. On Saturday morning (around 11AM) the DVP northbound was jammed, 401 was jammed in both directions, and even Dupont street in town was way busier than normal. Our road network is basically pushing up against the breaking point at the best of times, and any disruption leads to total chaos everywhere.

 

[Grimace]

The eastbound Gardiner is already regularly backed up from Jarvis to Park Lawn. So, anything that slows traffic at Jarvis, even a bit, will necessarily affect drivers all the way back to Park Lawn, right? That's just logic.

But it is not backed up to Jarvis. I have never experienced a back up between Yonge Ramp and Jarvis Ramp, and rarely a back up in the left lane Spadina Ramp to Yonge ramp (even though the Yonge/York/Bay ramp itself may be backed up).

 

[torontologist]

Let's face it folks, the Gardiner is a bargain. You're either fer it or agen it, but if you're agen it, it's because you just plain hate cars.

Not really, I just hate wasting money on an elevated expressway for the next 100 years when we live in probably the least ideal climate for maintaining such a structure. I'm all for having a tunnelled expressway across downtown, but unfortunately it's just not an option.

If the replace option gets voted through Council, it'll be because characters like DMW, Mammoliti, and Karygiannis are pandering to me-me-me voters (or in the case of the latter two, whoever bribed them recently)

 

[PinkLucy]

Agreed; I look out my window multiple times a day where I can see the Gardiner near Spadina and more often see it backed up westbound than eastbound at this point.