nfitz
Superstar
I don't think that induced demand is even the biggest issue. Surely it's latent demand that's the issue.
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Roads: Ontario/GTA Highways Discussion
- Thread starter Haljackey
- Start date
lenaitch
Senior Member
It would be an interesting legal exercise to consider the implications of banning a certain class of vehicle from a major highway. It would be a different argument than, for example, banning trucks from city streets or banning pedestrians, bicycles, etc. from most major highways because those have a foundation in safety and there are reasonable alternatives. Banning a class of vehicle because it is inconvenient or disruptive might be problematic. There is also the issue of commercial motor vehicles that would have to use the 401 simply because they need to access a business.
No doubt the tolling software could differentiate commercial motor vehicles. It is currently done for other classes of vehicles and owners/ operators as well as differentiating between classes of vehicles for toll rate periods. The proposal of eliminating tolls only for certain periods is interesting. For 'enroute' trucks; those who are simply traversing the city, companies and schedules would adapt. Even for the vagaries of travel times, long haulers could wait in lay-by lots or commercial truck stops. When you get paid by the kilometer, drivers would no doubt get grumpy being paid nothing to sit.
No doubt the tolling software could differentiate commercial motor vehicles. It is currently done for other classes of vehicles and owners/ operators as well as differentiating between classes of vehicles for toll rate periods. The proposal of eliminating tolls only for certain periods is interesting. For 'enroute' trucks; those who are simply traversing the city, companies and schedules would adapt. Even for the vagaries of travel times, long haulers could wait in lay-by lots or commercial truck stops. When you get paid by the kilometer, drivers would no doubt get grumpy being paid nothing to sit.
afransen
Senior Member
You won't be eliminating CMVs on the 401, just adding enough to the 407 to congest it too.
innsertnamehere
Superstar
yes, latent demand is often misconstrued as "induced" demand. I.e. a highway is widened but traffic at 5pm doesn't get any better as everyone who avoided making trips at that time or shifted travel times to off peak periods now does those trips at peak.
This is made out as if the roads project was pointless, ignoring that more people are now making trips at their preferred time, and the reduced amount of congestion experienced in the off-peak hours due to the traffic shift. It also ignores that many road projects actually do improve peak hour travel times for many years after expansion, and that often traffic growth is from growth for which the projects were specifically designed to support.
The debate about road projects shouldn't be "it's useless so don't do it", it should be "will this project support the type of growth and mobility we want?" Widening the Gardiner probably won't do what we want it to. Widening a highway to support industrial and logistics growth? That's a different value proposition.
Also generally too much energy is spent on transportation planning and not enough on land use planning, which is the real biggest influence on transportation modal decisions. Many people drive because they have to, and no matter how much transit we build it will be hard to get people onto transit as it simply won't be competitive. We need to design cities to support transit, and we have made a lot of progress on this front in the GTA (almost too much in some ways). We also have to be realistic about how much driving can realistically be avoided in a western economy and what realistic modal shifts can be expected.
Hairball
Active Member
So basically the government buys 50% of the 407, and then basically try to sabotage the business? That might not be a terrible idea given we meddle in all sorts of things already, then perhaps the value will tank, and it helps lower the price so they can take back the rest of the lease.
innsertnamehere
Superstar
if the gov wanted to make changes to reduce total revenue they would need to:
1. buy the entire highway outright.
2. pay the company for any lost revenues
1. may work as they would also get all the revenue from any tolls that remained, but personally I would be hesitant to support this as I think that political pressures would inevitably lead to reduced tolls on the highway leading to congestion.
2. would be cheaper in the short term for the government but may not work out over the long term in the same way, but would definitely keep peak hour tolls up.
As a whole the 407 has been an excellent "investment" for any purchaser. I imagine the province buying it back would earn healthy returns on it, provided they continued current tolling practices. The problem is that they would buy it specifically to reduce tolls, which would instantly make it a huge money sink. And I don't trust the province for a minute to not reduce / eliminate tolls in some political move were they to purchase it.
1. buy the entire highway outright.
2. pay the company for any lost revenues
1. may work as they would also get all the revenue from any tolls that remained, but personally I would be hesitant to support this as I think that political pressures would inevitably lead to reduced tolls on the highway leading to congestion.
2. would be cheaper in the short term for the government but may not work out over the long term in the same way, but would definitely keep peak hour tolls up.
As a whole the 407 has been an excellent "investment" for any purchaser. I imagine the province buying it back would earn healthy returns on it, provided they continued current tolling practices. The problem is that they would buy it specifically to reduce tolls, which would instantly make it a huge money sink. And I don't trust the province for a minute to not reduce / eliminate tolls in some political move were they to purchase it.
Dan416
Senior Member
Maybe they should buy out the portion of the 407 that was originally supposed to be the 403 to make the 403 continuous.
Sunnyside
Active Member
A few ideas crossing my mind as I catch up here. Thinking of some alternatives and such.
Gonna preface this with my belief that a transit alternative is desirable, but will cost significantly more than any real highway proposal, and drags in a bunch of other lengthy, costly hurdles we are already working through within the transit file…
So minimizing such variables is a worthy priority too.
Anywho:
1. Could or should we toll *just* the express or local sections of the 401? (And do so at a much lower rate than the 407, of course)
2. Knowing that a notable bottleneck is the lack of continuous express/local lanes from Peel through Toronto…
A. Is there room to reconfigure for this?
iirc there is not, so …
B. Does a…. Tunnel… for this much shorter section have a good value prop?
3. Are there any other small highway segments (besides the 413, Bradford bypass) that could be built that could divert traffic off the 401?
I’m largely sympathetic to @innsertnamehere ’s framing of demand, here. So…
4. Im getting the feeling that we are all realizing in this thread that a new highway like the 413 is probably the easiest option to fix this.
Whether it’s better than a transit alternative is another question, but it is certainly easier and more affordable- doubly so compared to a car tunnel.
Gonna preface this with my belief that a transit alternative is desirable, but will cost significantly more than any real highway proposal, and drags in a bunch of other lengthy, costly hurdles we are already working through within the transit file…
So minimizing such variables is a worthy priority too.
Anywho:
1. Could or should we toll *just* the express or local sections of the 401? (And do so at a much lower rate than the 407, of course)
2. Knowing that a notable bottleneck is the lack of continuous express/local lanes from Peel through Toronto…
A. Is there room to reconfigure for this?
iirc there is not, so …
B. Does a…. Tunnel… for this much shorter section have a good value prop?
3. Are there any other small highway segments (besides the 413, Bradford bypass) that could be built that could divert traffic off the 401?
I’m largely sympathetic to @innsertnamehere ’s framing of demand, here. So…
4. Im getting the feeling that we are all realizing in this thread that a new highway like the 413 is probably the easiest option to fix this.
Whether it’s better than a transit alternative is another question, but it is certainly easier and more affordable- doubly so compared to a car tunnel.
I am going to again remind everyone a worthwhile option is the 403/407 rail Transitway of the recent GGH 2051 Plan.
afransen
Senior Member
Only the 413 won't 'solve' anything for the 401.
Sunnyside
Active Member
For better or worse, highways are easy as hell to build. Maybe the 413’s another bandaid, but to fully shift/mode-shift enough commuters off the 401 to make a real difference is a much larger task.
Jonny5
Senior Member
The problem with short tunnel segments to bypass congestion points is that they will make new congestion points where the exit portals merge back in to the surface highway.
Sunnyside
Active Member
To be fair, this tunnel wouldn’t really “merge” into an existing highway- it would create a link between two segments that currently do merge into a single highway. they’d no longer have to.
If you mean the literal geometric constraint of the exit portal impacting extant lanes on the surface prior to where the local/express configuration begins, Im not sure how to get around that. I don’t see why that wouldn’t also be workable, though.
T-Bor
Active Member
It definitely would - anyone currently coming from the west going north will now skip the Toronto section of the 401. They'd just take the 413
Could have a particular impact for anyone coming from the west heading to cottage country during the summer
innsertnamehere
Superstar
The 413 isn't expected to have much impact on the 401 actually - even according to MTO's studies.
Most of the 413's benefits come from reductions in arterial road congestion in Peel and York Regions.
There is a small impact on freeway traffic levels, but not massive.
The highway would be helpful for people looking to "go around" the GTA to cottage country / northern Ontario, but that isn't actually *that large* of a traffic volume.
Looking at the original 413 background study - page 49:
the 413 results in an approximate 13% reduction in traffic on the freeway network (19,624 hours of auto vehicle delays a day vs. 22,661 without the highway), but a whopping 40% reduction in arterial road congestion hours (22,185 vs. 37,371 without the highway). Across all road types, the 413 reduces auto-delay-hours in the western GTA by about 30% vs. without the highway.
So the highway overall does create significant congestion relief - but it's mostly realized not on the regional freeway network but on local roads. This is actually a good thing as it means we need less large arterial roads and can "right size" more local roads to a more pedestrian scale.
The Netherlands of course figured this out long ago.. put cars on freeways away from pedestrians.
Most of the 413's benefits come from reductions in arterial road congestion in Peel and York Regions.
There is a small impact on freeway traffic levels, but not massive.
The highway would be helpful for people looking to "go around" the GTA to cottage country / northern Ontario, but that isn't actually *that large* of a traffic volume.
Looking at the original 413 background study - page 49:
the 413 results in an approximate 13% reduction in traffic on the freeway network (19,624 hours of auto vehicle delays a day vs. 22,661 without the highway), but a whopping 40% reduction in arterial road congestion hours (22,185 vs. 37,371 without the highway). Across all road types, the 413 reduces auto-delay-hours in the western GTA by about 30% vs. without the highway.
So the highway overall does create significant congestion relief - but it's mostly realized not on the regional freeway network but on local roads. This is actually a good thing as it means we need less large arterial roads and can "right size" more local roads to a more pedestrian scale.
The Netherlands of course figured this out long ago.. put cars on freeways away from pedestrians.
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Haljackey
Active Member
It would take a small percentage of trucks off the 401 as well, thereby helping with logistics and deliveries. Any truck from say K-W that wants to head to Barrie or north would likely be using the 400/401 interchange now. Those truckers can use the 413 to bypass this congested interchange.