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Roads: Keep the Gardiner, fix it, or get rid of it? (2005-2014)

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I'm starting to think that the Gardiner as psychological barrier is one of the greatest myths in the city. The fact is that the lake itself is not really a draw (especially in the colder months), since the city has evolved detached from the waterfront by industry over a century. Consequently, what we think of downtown is quite removed from the water (i.e Yonge and Dundas). Besides the Gardiner, it's also separated by the rail corridor, and a fairly boring and expansive condo and office zone.

The Gardiner simply wouldn't matter if there was a kind of Queen Street or entertainment district by the lake along with the density of the condos. Lots of Asian cities have massive expressways through quite vibrant areas. But the fact is that the downtown waterfront area has quite limited appeal. Torontonians gravitate towards areas which evolved from higher density Victorian commercial and residential areas. That's where the diversity of retail, entertainment, culture, and dining outdoes the waterfront.

Removing the Gardiner achieves little and it would be nice to see a shift in discourse to a more practical solution. We shouldn't curse the construction of that expressway, because for many kinds of trips, the car is quite fast and efficient. We shouldn't be so adamant on downgrading the infrastructure, but rather to lobby the government to continue to expand alternatives like public transit.

To conclude, proposal is obviously misguided in the amount of investment it would take for questionable gains and for the accessibility issues. But so is removing the Gardiner in the first place. It's best to make enhancements to it to improve perceived safety pedestrians, deck it to reduce noise or bury it. Costs can be offset by tolls.
 
why not kill 2 birds with one stone. Put the Gardiner over the railway so it's decked over and avoids snow. Deck over the Gardiner on top with a park so they don't need to shovel snow in the winter. It will help with rain flood in the spring and autumn, snow melting turning to water in the spring, and keep snow off in the winter. Course it would render those new track projects GO just added on to melt snow during the winter, useless.
 
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If someone wouldn't mind telling me what makes the Gardiner so terrible and how anyone could get downtown (from Mississauga or Oakville) without it?

And how is the Gardiner a "barrier" to the waterfront when that portion of the highway is elevated so cars can go underneath as well as pedestrians?

I'm behind on all this Gardiner fuss.
 
Cooool said:
If someone wouldn't mind telling me what makes the Gardiner so terrible and how anyone could get downtown (from Mississauga or Oakville) without it?

And how is the Gardiner a "barrier" to the waterfront when that portion of the highway is elevated so cars can go underneath as well as pedestrians?

I'm behind on all this Gardiner fuss.
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The Gardiner's perceived issues have been discussed extensively here and the threads here on UT on the subject will prove to be informative if you look them up.

But your first question is quite obvious. You could take the QEW to Toronto and then take some other streets. GO service allows you to travel downtown from Mississauga and not worry about the high cost of parking and wear and tear on your vehicle. You could also take Mississauga transit to a subway station, or drive to a subway station. Cycling in some cases can also be an option (for instance if you live in southweestern Mississauga, or you can cycle to a GO station). There's a myriad of options.
 
Cooool said:
If someone wouldn't mind telling me what makes the Gardiner so terrible and how anyone could get downtown (from Mississauga or Oakville) without it?

And how is the Gardiner a "barrier" to the waterfront when that portion of the highway is elevated so cars can go underneath as well as pedestrians?

I'm behind on all this Gardiner fuss.
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The Gardiner is considered a bad thing for a number of reasons. First, while it doesn't provide a physical barrier (at least not on the east end) it provides a psychological barrier that, when combined with the rail corridor, really splits the city in half. It's also rather ugly, especially the closer you get to it as then you can see it's state of disrepair.

Of course, it's basically the opposite on the west end, as the highway's neatly tucked down on the ground and very unobtrusive, but it physically splits the areas around it in half.

I believe that the Gardiner, and also the many other highways and expressways in the GTA were necessary for the region's growth, but that past growth needs to be managed less with cars and more with transit. So in maybe 30 years, it and a fair bit of the DVP (probably just the area south of Bloor) will be torn down, as the infrastructure simply isn't going to be needed.

If you want to get downtown without using the Gardiner, well there's a bunch of ways. From Mississauga, you could take your car to Go stations on the Milton Line or Lakeshore. You could also just drive along one of the nice big arterial roads like Lakeshore or Eglinton. Like Junctionist said, you could also take the Subway, but Go will provide you a faster, more comfortable trip while also saving seats for people further downtown that the subway is meant to serve.
 
This proposal is one of the dumbest I've ever heard of. The "architect" should have been laughed out of the room.
 
sjc said:
I think the roof idea is a good one -- but it should be used to provide space for 6 more lanes of traffic.
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I agree and add some bike lanes with a barrier of course because if the Gardiner comes down then there are more crazy drivers on the local roads.
 
This idea is being proposed for the wrong place. It could be turned into an excellent proposal by using the same system of supports to deck over the central part of the rail corridor.

We'd have a linear park from Liberty Village to Simcoe St (just West of the Union Station shed). It would mostly be level with the streets and properties flanking it (Front on the North, Fort York, CityPlace on the south) with a only a shallow hill required to access the park (as to maintain the required height for the trains below).

$600M and we get rid of the real physical barrier to the waterfront while creating a living machine breathing CO2 smog right from within the heart of the city where levels of that pollutant are at its highest.

I'm not an engineer but I envision a micro-permeable membrane lining the base of the deck with a layer of soil atop this membrane. Soil would be too large to permeate the membrane while moisture would be allowed to seep through the soil onto the tracks below (they get rained on now anyway). The combination of moisture and soil would absorb the fumes from the current diesel engines.

Forget about the need to build pedestrian bridges at Fort York and CityPlace. Have trails across the park connecting every major street from the north to its orphaned street to the south.

Breath life into Liberty Village by connecting it to King St. Give Fort York a purpose by linking it to Stanley Park and turning it into a thoroughfare to the waterfront for King West/Queen West residents. Turn the north side of the SkyDome into a green space with community baseball diamonds and gathering spaces. Create a park surrounding the CN Tower grounds while becoming the northern edge of Roundhouse Park which in turn leads to the waterfront. Generate a free outdoor convention driven space between the two wings of the Metro Toronto Convention Centre.

This, I consider an excellent idea.
 
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Now that makes all the sense in the world.
 
Actually the space around the Skydome and CN tower is part of the John Street revitalization. It proposes the tracks to be covered with a large square, and also to renovate the back of the buildings adjacent to it (which face onto the square) with restaurants, cafes, retail, etc.

I love your idea, we need something like this to happen. What I think would be cool to have also is a "Martin Goodman Trail 2.0" running along the linear park, connecting to Union.

The area above the train shed could be a multi-programmed square, going around the proposed glass roof so people could see inside.

Oh, and one more thing. Just south of the Distillery, there is a parking lot and underused land. That could perhaps be a major park / square and a kind of grand eastern entrance to the linear park.
 
MetroMan said:
This idea is being proposed for the wrong place. It could be turned into an excellent proposal by using the same system of supports to deck over the central part of the rail corridor.

We'd have a linear park from Liberty Village to Simcoe St (just West of the Union Station shed). It would mostly be level with the streets and properties flanking it (Front on the North, Fort York, CityPlace on the south) with a only a shallow hill required to access the park (as to maintain the required height for the trains below).

$600M and we get rid of the real physical barrier to the waterfront while creating a living machine breathing CO2 smog right from within the heart of the city where levels of that pollutant are at its highest.

I'm not an engineer but I envision a micro-permeable membrane lining the base of the deck with a layer of soil atop this membrane. Soil would be too large to permeate the membrane while moisture would be allowed to seep through the soil onto the tracks below (they get rained on now anyway). The combination of moisture and soil would absorb the fumes from the current diesel engines.

Forget about the need to build pedestrian bridges at Fort York and CityPlace. Have trails across the park connecting every major street from the north to its orphaned street to the south.

Breath life into Liberty Village by connecting it to King St. Give Fort York a purpose by linking it to Stanley Park and turning it into a thoroughfare to the waterfront for King West/Queen West residents. Turn the north side of the SkyDome into a green space with community baseball diamonds and gathering spaces. Create a park surrounding the CN Tower grounds while becoming the northern edge of Roundhouse Park which in turn leads to the waterfront. Generate a free outdoor convention driven space between the two wings of the Metro Toronto Convention Centre.

This, I consider an excellent idea.
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Fantastic idea!! Maybe you should formulate a letter to Mr. Hume. :)
 
Rail corridor: There would be limits to how much decking could be done for ventilation reasons, as even with GO electrification you'd still have a number of diesel VIA and freight movements, so there would have to be gaps. For me I see decking over the rail corridor where it is trenched as an opportunity to provide additional sporting facilities such as tennis courts in addition to the more costly additions such as green roofs in addition to adding many more pedestrian/cycling accesses from one side to the other.

At this point it's worth recalling Eb Zeidler's decking proposal for a trenched corridor - the Allen: http://urbantoronto.ca/showthread.php?t=5180

I agree that the Gardiner roof would be of limited benefit, and would mostly help the vehicular traffic by reducing the impact of winter snow and so on. For me the major opportunity is, in some places, under the Gardiner by reclaiming "dead" space.
 
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