saveoursubways (SOS)

[Second_in_pie]

I have to admit, I'm kinda worried with the current scarborough plans for save our subways. No offense, but it really looks like you guys went crazy on coverage. I know it's important to get service to Scarborough, but there's easier and more efficient ways to do that than like 6 LRT/BRTs.

As much as I understand the logic behind keeping the SELRT so the funding can stay there, it's just a bad idea IMO. There's very little east of Agincourt that would require BRT, let alone LRT. I definitely think anything higher than LRT east of Agincourt is total overkill, and I'd say that even bus is questionable.
I do like the Malvern connection, and if there is actually LRT on Sheppard East, I'm all for an at grade LRT. If not, I'd think that BRT could be a good start to service, which could be upgraded to LRT later when needed. I'd think that BRT could easily handle the demands of the corridor, and it'd be a lot cheaper than building a LRT and requiring to build a LRT carhouse.
I also very much like the McCowan North BRT, which would go north from STC to Highway 7 and Markville Mall. I'd definitely help with a N/S connection with STC and the rest of Scarborough, and connect with some higher density areas.
Kingston road should be BRT, but I'd put the streetcar/LRT up to the Danforth, then have both run together towards Main St. At Kingston Road/Danforth, there'd be a station like facility for connecting BRT and LRT/Streetcar. In the end, I'd want Eglinton to go all the way to Kingston road (hopefully as a subway,) but this kind of connection with the RT network would be acceptable, IMO. Kingston Road would terminate at UTSC.

As for the Ellesmere BRT, don't really like that idea either. Frankly, I don't see a lot on Ellesmere that might warrant a BRT. Instead, just make a terminal at UTSC where Durham Highway 2, Kingston Road, and 401 express busses could connect together. Maybe even the Durham Highway 2 busses should go all the way to STC, connecting at UTSC and then going on to the 401. If they wanted to speed things up, they could add in (much needed) bus lanes and maybe a Bus only on-ramp. I calculated it out, and that'd save a couple minutes on the trip, and I'm sure bus lanes cost much less than a full out BRT. Even if they made a bus only on-ramp at UTSC and STC, I doubt it could cost more than BRT.

So I strongly urge you to think some more about what you propose, because frankly I think that if you propose all these lines, you'll look more like transit nuts that're doing this for fun instead of actual concerned citizens who believe that the subway-replacing Transit City is a load of bollux. I liked the view of the group before; promoting subways and creating a true RT network. I understand that the group's evolved a bit, but
a) You're concentrating everything on Scarborough. This is okay, but I think that you'll interest more people if you actually look at the citywide, or even regional, network as a whole instead of how transit in Scarborough could improve.
b) The way I saw the group before, it was urging Metrolinx and/or the TTC to actually make a true network; doing true and unbiased studies into the Sheppard and Eglinton subways. Instead of trying to get everything done at once, build up the network over time. Basically, responsible transit management and network building.
Now, SOS seems to be more trying to propose a bunch of things to get built themselves, instead of letting the powers that be hire planners and such to decide what the best route choices are. One of my worries about this is that it'd be much better to simply educate people about the core things like extending the Sheppard subway, rather than trying to tell them how a bunch of BRTs through Scarborough should be built. If the core leadership gets changed to be more realistic and to create a true network, all these smaller projects will get built more realistically as well.
I see the purpose as simply urging Metrolinx to create a true, comprehensive transit network. I have no objection to thinking about what affect these routes would have on things, nor about independently advocating for them, but I honestly think that these are muddling what the point of the group is about.

But if I got it wrong, please just point it out

 

[kEiThZ]

We pretty much took what was there right now or planned and upgraded or downgraded it:

SELRT became the SELRT Agincourt-Meadowvale and Sheppard extension to STC.

The SRT extension was downgraded and became the PMLRT.

The SRT refurbishment became the Bloor-Danforth Extension.

Morningside LRT got dropped in favour of an Ellesmere BRT and Eglinton LRT extension.

The Kingston BRT was extended past Morningside to connect with Durham.

We haven't actually added any new corridors. I wonder if it looks crazy because of the interlining (I am in favour of not putting it on the map and just talking about it - so the map doesn't look complicated). Or perhaps it looks crazy simply because we don't have the nice straight lines that Transit City does.

 

[kEiThZ]

Sip,

Thanks for the reality check. Well we are open to suggestion here. So far, me and gweed seem to be the only really active ones since CC's been away. If you have ideas let's debate them and get them going.

I have considered your suggestion and asked gweed to come up with a more minimalist map.

 

[nfitz]

Perhaps you should just eliminate interlining; we all expect there will be some interlining in a complete Transit City ... but there's no attempt to indicate it anywhere. Perhaps a simple note that any of the LRT will be designed so that it can be used for BRT is all that is necessary in this conceptual stage.

 

[kEiThZ]

Perhaps you should just eliminate interlining; we all expect there will be some interlining in a complete Transit City ... but there's no attempt to indicate it anywhere. Perhaps a simple note that any of the LRT will be designed so that it can be used for BRT is all that is necessary in this conceptual stage.

Yeah, that's what I had suggested earlier on.

 

[nfitz]

... sorry, I was skimming

 

[kEiThZ]

The suggestion was made in the group. And it's a good one. I am not a fan of overlapping routes since I think it's really difficult to explain such a map to the average person in a sales pitch.

 

[kEiThZ]

My proposal in order of priority:

1) Bloor-Danforth Extension till STC
2) Sheppard extension to STC.
3) Eglinton subway till Kingston Road.
4) at-grade LRT from STC till Malvern Town Centre on Progress
5) SELRT from Agincourt to Meadowvale
6) Kingston BRT from VP till Meadowvale.

I wonder if it's wise to push for the cancellation of the rest of the SELRT. That could make us look like we're anti-LRT. Though, I don't really think this portion is needed at all. I'd also like to see bus lanes on Lawrence, Ellesmere, Morningside, McCowan, Kennedy and Vic Park. I don't know though if bus lanes should be shown on the map for now.

 

[Second_in_pie]

^^ Sounds great. I totally agree that cancellation of the SELRT entirely should be taken tenderly and with care, but if the subway goes to Agincourt and STC, there's really no point for the LRT at all.

I think that we should let the "responsible" City, TTC and Metrolinx implement bus lanes on their own. They should really exist on every arterial right now (or at least in the form of HOV lanes,) and I think that's for a separate agenda, especially since an entire route could potentially be in the low 10k for bus lanes!

 

[Rainforest]

I think that we should let the "responsible" City, TTC and Metrolinx implement bus lanes on their own. They should really exist on every arterial right now (or at least in the form of HOV lanes,) and I think that's for a separate agenda, especially since an entire route could potentially be in the low 10k for bus lanes!

I suspect that the cost of bus lanes might vary dramatically dependent on the route. If the street is 6-lanes wide already and 2 lanes can be assigned to BRT, or if a strip of empty land is available, then BRT can be cheap.

But if the street is 4 lanes wide and needs to be widened, and some property acquired, then BRT won't be that much cheaper than LRT.

 

[Fresh Start]

I have to admit, I'm kinda worried with the current scarborough plans for save our subways. No offense, but it really looks like you guys went crazy on coverage. I know it's important to get service to Scarborough, but there's easier and more efficient ways to do that than like 6 LRT/BRTs.

As much as I understand the logic behind keeping the SELRT so the funding can stay there, it's just a bad idea IMO. There's very little east of Agincourt that would require BRT, let alone LRT. I definitely think anything higher than LRT east of Agincourt is total overkill, and I'd say that even bus is questionable.
I do like the Malvern connection, and if there is actually LRT on Sheppard East, I'm all for an at grade LRT. If not, I'd think that BRT could be a good start to service, which could be upgraded to LRT later when needed. I'd think that BRT could easily handle the demands of the corridor, and it'd be a lot cheaper than building a LRT and requiring to build a LRT carhouse.
I also very much like the McCowan North BRT, which would go north from STC to Highway 7 and Markville Mall. I'd definitely help with a N/S connection with STC and the rest of Scarborough, and connect with some higher density areas.
Kingston road should be BRT, but I'd put the streetcar/LRT up to the Danforth, then have both run together towards Main St. At Kingston Road/Danforth, there'd be a station like facility for connecting BRT and LRT/Streetcar. In the end, I'd want Eglinton to go all the way to Kingston road (hopefully as a subway,) but this kind of connection with the RT network would be acceptable, IMO. Kingston Road would terminate at UTSC.


As for the Ellesmere BRT, don't really like that idea either. Frankly, I don't see a lot on Ellesmere that might warrant a BRT. Instead, just make a terminal at UTSC where Durham Highway 2, Kingston Road, and 401 express busses could connect together. Maybe even the Durham Highway 2 busses should go all the way to STC, connecting at UTSC and then going on to the 401. If they wanted to speed things up, they could add in (much needed) bus lanes and maybe a Bus only on-ramp. I calculated it out, and that'd save a couple minutes on the trip, and I'm sure bus lanes cost much less than a full out BRT. Even if they made a bus only on-ramp at UTSC and STC, I doubt it could cost more than BRT.

So I strongly urge you to think some more about what you propose, because frankly I think that if you propose all these lines, you'll look more like transit nuts that're doing this for fun instead of actual concerned citizens who believe that the subway-replacing Transit City is a load of bollux. I liked the view of the group before; promoting subways and creating a true RT network. I understand that the group's evolved a bit, but
a) You're concentrating everything on Scarborough. This is okay, but I think that you'll interest more people if you actually look at the citywide, or even regional, network as a whole instead of how transit in Scarborough could improve.
b) The way I saw the group before, it was urging Metrolinx and/or the TTC to actually make a true network; doing true and unbiased studies into the Sheppard and Eglinton subways. Instead of trying to get everything done at once, build up the network over time. Basically, responsible transit management and network building.
Now, SOS seems to be more trying to propose a bunch of things to get built themselves, instead of letting the powers that be hire planners and such to decide what the best route choices are. One of my worries about this is that it'd be much better to simply educate people about the core things like extending the Sheppard subway, rather than trying to tell them how a bunch of BRTs through Scarborough should be built. If the core leadership gets changed to be more realistic and to create a true network, all these smaller projects will get built more realistically as well.
I see the purpose as simply urging Metrolinx to create a true, comprehensive transit network. I have no objection to thinking about what affect these routes would have on things, nor about independently advocating for them, but I honestly think that these are muddling what the point of the group is about.

But if I got it wrong, please just point it out

Thanks for being the voice of reason here, SIP. I've been meaning to bring up these same concerns to SOS but feared that groupthink had already set in. I was first interested in this initiative because of the promise to prioritize subways as the #1 solution for Toronto's commuting issues (congestion, gridlock, too many transfers to complete a one-way trip, too many minor stops along major routes). Extending both B-D and Sheppard subway lines to SCC would at least shorten the feeder bus commutes needed to access these trunk commuter lines. However seeing things included in the plan like BRT/LRT lines to Durham and the Zoo and the continuation of SELRT in general are disconcerting to say the least and make me feel as though our advocacy will lead to nowhere. How can we except to justify the higher cost of subway construction if we're unwilling to let some things go. You guys took the advice to downgrade some lines to BRT but the inclusion of SLRT and SELRT and ELRT will not generate any real cost savings and as the projected ridership through these areas will be low, they may even run operational deficits for many years once in service.

Rather than complain though, I'll try again to make my recommendations and see whether you'll adopt any or at least engage them in healthy debate.

• Please kill SELRT, all incarnations of it. It is not warranted. Look at the 85 Sheppard East bus' ridership levels. 28,300ppd for the entire route (Yonge-Rouge Hill GO). Of that 12,577 ride the section between Markham Road and Don Mills Stn, 9433 ride in-between Markham Road and Meadowvale Road and a final 6289 ride the sections in-between Yonge and Don Mills Stn and from Meadowvale to Rouge Hill GO Stn. Provided the Scarbrough Line to Malvern passes through the Progress/Sheppard vicinity where area riders can access mass transit, there is nothing else of significance east of Midland that the 85 bus cannot handle on its own. At most for this dismal ridership density I would recommend an increase of 85E bus services during the rush hour with wider stop spacings than the local bus.
  
  
• Kingston Road transit. Why all the complexity? Just have a continous line along all of KR, a through service from Highland Creek striaght into the downtown. Do you really think riders want to be dropped off at an arbitrary point like Victoria Park Stn, then have to commute westbound for another 40 minutes on the subway? I'd think not. Furthermore why have KR BRT route into both Victoria Park and Kennedy Stns? The time spent diverting off of KR to route into these subways would be better spent just continuing south along the corridor, going on to serve the Beaches, Leslieville and the Portlands before dropping off passengers in the downtown. Benefits: alleviating the Bloor-Danforth and B-Y interchange; and faster method overall for customers from eastern Scarborough (and 905 east) to get downtown.
  
  
• Ellesmere BRT. Indeed, keep it. Higher trip generation and ridership levels than the same stretch up along Sheppard. During rush hour and even through mid-afternoon it is not uncommon to have the 95, 38 and 133 all near capacity on every inbound/outbound trip between SCC and UTSC. It would wise to incorporate Kingston and Ellesmere BRTs as one continuous service into SCC which does away with the need for KR BRT transit to have to connect to B-D at an earlier point.
  
  
• Scarborough RT corridor. You guys can explain to higher-ups how after a Bloor-Danforth subway extension to SCC, the SRT corridor could be retrofitted to accomodate a BRT ROW from Malvern to Cliffside (and beyond). This gives students at Centennial College an alternative to the 134 + subway to get around Scarborough. This could ultimately route west along Danforth Avenue into Main Street Stn.
  
  
• Eglinton East. Let's not be too greedy. We risk putting the Eglinton subway further west at jeopardy trying to push for an LRT line through Scarborough. Like Enviro said we have to distributive with our coverage or we look like we only care about one part of the city. A fast feeder express bus or BRT line that connects to a Don Mills/Eglinton DRL station, Kennedy Stn and BRT station at Kingston Road is far more than what constituencies are getting. If we space it like a subway then everyone wins: Swift, Bermondsey, VP, Pharmacy, Lebovic, Warden, Brichmount, Ionview, Kennedy Stn, Midland, Bimbrok, Brimley Stn, Barbados, McCowan, Torrence, Bellamy, Mason, Markham, Cedar, Kingston Stn. BRT can more than handle ridership through stretch which is unlikely to exceed 3400pphpd.
  
  
• Kill the Morningside LRT/BRT. Do I even have to explain why?

Well that's about it. Just keep it simple and maybe the politicians will actually hear us out when we get to that stage. I wouldn't mind commissioning another map illustrating the above suggestions and see whether Gweed wants to do his thing to it whereby the forum can assess and offer up critiques. PM me and let me know.

 

[scarberiankhatru]

I was kidding when I said extend Morningside to the Zoo. That is not a viable transit route.

The focus should be on a few reasonable subway extensions, not on blanketing every corridor in the city with ROWs. If the entire city were to receive BRT and LRT lines at the same standard or ridership threshold as these proposed routes in NE Scarborough, it'd cost easily $100B to do it all 'fairly.' The Progress bus only moves 8000 people a day, after all, so spending a fortune on it to be able to move like 8000 per hour is simply insane when far busier bus routes are littered across Scarborough - not to mention the rest of the city. Anyone planning transit routes should at the very least go over a Ride Guide and a route ridership list. All these BRT and LRT lines are distractions...when people push the DRL, they don't do so by also pushing for GO trains to Orangeville and a monorail along Lawrence.

Look at the 85 Sheppard East bus' ridership levels. 28,300ppd for the entire route (Yonge-Rouge Hill GO). Of that 12,577 ride the section between Markham Road and Don Mills Stn, 9433 ride in-between Markham Road and Meadowvale Road and a final 6289 ride the sections in-between Yonge and Don Mills Stn and from Meadowvale to Rouge Hill GO Stn.

Those numbers are made up.

 

[Fresh Start]

I was kidding when I said extend Morningside to the Zoo. That is not a viable transit route.

The focus should be on a few reasonable subway extensions, not on blanketing every corridor in the city with ROWs. If the entire city were to receive BRT and LRT lines at the same standard or ridership threshold as these proposed routes in NE Scarborough, it'd cost easily $100B to do it all 'fairly.' The Progress bus only moves 8000 people a day, after all, so spending a fortune on it to be able to move like 8000 per hour is simply insane when far busier bus routes are littered across Scarborough - not to mention the rest of the city. Anyone planning transit routes should at the very least go over a Ride Guide and a route ridership list. All these BRT and LRT lines are distractions...when people push the DRL, they don't do so by also pushing for GO trains to Orangeville and a monorail along Lawrence.

Those numbers are made up.

Okay, do better then. I took the total ridership of the 85 bus from http://www3.ttc.ca/PDF/Transit_Planning/service_improvements_2008.pdf, and then divided the total ridership (28,300) into three sections figuring only one-third of the ridership (9433) was originating from in-between Markham and Meadowvale on a daily basis. I could be wrong, yes, but the point remains that the majority of riders aren't coming from that part of the route. Worse still if the SRT extends into Malvern, residents there will have less of an incentive to transfer off their local bus to the SELRT then Sheppard Subway then Yonge Subway. Complicated and unnecessary.

Thanks though for reinforcing what SOS-Save Our Subways should really be advocating for: minimalism. Subways to Scarborough Centre, to the airport, to Steeles, to East York/Thorncliffe, through the downtown core... those make sense. There's a reasonable end-destination demand worth the investment of subway technology. BRTs (and to a lesser extent cost/benefits wise, LRT) are more than capable of radiating out of centric transit hubs and carpeting lower-density suburban areas from there. Seeing as the population of Scarborough is declining, there'll never be enough riders to justify more than a few BRT routes along the major arteries (Ellesmere, Sheppard, Finch, Eglinton, Kingston, McCowan, Lawrence East, SRT corridor into Malvern at best) propped up by a reduced distance to/from the subway.

 

[kEiThZ]

I'll support going back to the drawing board and getting a subway plan going first.

As for Malvern....I disagree with ditching the Progress LRT. That's supposed to be a SRT extension replacement and that's a huge deal for the city and the community. Advocating for ditching both the SELRT and the PLRT/SRT Extension is not going to fly politically. It's at least needed for the sheer sake of coverage given how big Malvern is and it's location in the corner of the city. The goal of the SRT extension was to have a bus hub at Malvern Town Centre redirecting more than just the 8000 riders on the Progress bus. Said hub would have captured some (or nearly all in some cases) of riders from these routes: 132 Milner, 133 Neilson, 131 Nugget, 134 Progress and maybe even some riders from the 39G and 116 into Morningside Heights. It would also have provided quick access to STC for 85 Sheppard riders from the east. It's a case here where LRT would truly have been more than a one for one replacement of a bus route. I'd support ditching the Sheppard East LRT. But something has to be provided to Malvern and I'd prefer it be at-grade LRT on Progress.

Next comes the question of Ellesmere. Does Ellesmere need full blown BRT or will curbside bus lanes do? My vision for Ellesmere was what I like to call 'mild BRT'. It was basically curbside bus lanes with elongated bus bays which allow the diamond lanes to be used as the passing lanes. I figured that might get speeds up in the 20 kph range. The question also becomes what to do at the end, after UTSC. Do we go to the zoo or do we curve south to Kingston to connect with the KBRT out to Durham?

Finally does everybody here agree on what's being done on Kingston with the centre-street ROWs? Is that the best approach? And where should the ROW start and end?

That's Scarborough for now. We need to come up with an overall plan which will also end up impacting Scarborough (it determines what will happen to Eglinton).

 

[kEiThZ]

A side issue....I wonder too if we push for a change in management. Should we push for Metrolinx to take over the subway network from the TTC, in the way that GO has been taken over? Would this not make expansion, particularly into the 905 easier?