micheal_can
Senior Member
Not including the bus route that runs the length of it, how many bus routes serve between Sheppard West and McCowan?
Using that same distance, are there parts of existing subways that have the same or less routes?
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Sheppard Line 4 Subway Extension (Proposed)
- Thread starter denfromoakvillemilton
- Start date
Using that same distance, are there parts of existing subways that have the same or less routes?
EnviroTO
Senior Member
The situation on Sheppard doesn't justify a subway based on expected utilisation... it justifies a Line 5 style treatment. Unfortunately people really find the idea of right sizing line 4 unpalatable, so we continue to get proposals for extending heavy subway. If the Ontario line through much more urban areas doesn't justify subway like vehicle capacity and fully underground routing, how could Sheppard?
Bureaucromancer
Active Member
has anyone objected to Ontario Line like tech? it’s losing grade separation that I hear regular people not thinking is palatable… though conversion to some other tech seems really hard politically
frankly right sizing it could absolutely look like full automation of mostly subway compatible equipment in two car sets with roughed in four car platforms, and not create the kind of extended shutdown and optics issues that rebuilding the existing line would have.
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adys123
Active Member
The Ontario Line unfortunately has been marketed poorly. The technology that is used on the Ontario Line is considered full metro and is used in many places internationally as full metro (and is in fact wider than most international systems). It's just that in Toronto, the trains can be considered smaller than what people are used to.
T3G
Senior Member
The question we should be asking ourselves, if the Toronto trains are still larger, and this is the most necessary transit project that most of us will see built in our natural lifetimes, why would we intentionally choose to buy smaller rolling stock and leave capacity on the table? Are the cost savings of buying some off the shelf trains instead of a bespoke design REALLY so important? We are absolute ass in this city at predicting future ridership, one needs only look at the new streetcar order for proof of that. If we ended up getting it wrong and the OL was at capacity sooner than it otherwise had to be, the choice of rolling stock is going to look absolutely foolish.
It sounds like Metrolinx was trying to show much better they know than the old dinosaurs at the TTC.
Northern Light
Superstar
Says who?
Seriously, even what's public by way of development along this route is very substantial; but there's a lot that isn't yet public.
But forget about the fuzzy.
There are 40s+ towers rising and proposed at Bayview, Bessarion, Don Mills (by by count more than a dozen tower form proposals are public at this intersection alone); Consumers, Victoria Park, Kennedy (Agincourt Mall redevelopment) etc.
While to the west, the proposal at for adding tens of thousands of people at Downsview is public.
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I'm not going to pre-empt too much, but I've hinted already at big proposals at Bathurst, be assured big things are coming at Midland, McCowan and Markham.
Line 5 is radically under-sized vs the development already proposed/approved along the east end of the route; we've going to have to go back and bury it.
This is fortunate, actually, if we're going to build what a lot of interested parties imagine.
As @adys123 notes above, while I may feel the O/L capacity estimates are a tad optimistic and I have concerns about the capacity constraints imposed on GO/VIA/HSR by the joint corridor, the O/L is very much a Metro/Subway.
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Northern Light
Superstar
The cost savings from the rolling stock were not the driving factor.
The cost savings from smaller station boxes was much more important. Additionally, smaller, lighter trains can handle slightly more challenging grades/curves.
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I disagreed w/the choice to go w/the smaller overall design here, in part, because it will be prohibitive to ever add capacity (go back and enlarge the underground stations); and in part because I just don't like the way the capacity assumptions were made...........
That said, there will be substantial capacity here; and if they run the service anywhere near its optimum, it will have sufficient capacity for some time...........whether that will still be true in 2050 may be up for further discussion.
Islington Express Bus
Active Member
I am a staunch believer that we should slightly undersize transit whenever possible.
That way we can run more frequent service and point to full vehicles as proof of high transit demand.
That way we can run more frequent service and point to full vehicles as proof of high transit demand.
junctionist
Senior Member
I agree completely. I'd rather have lower-capacity lines that compel the government to keep expanding the system to more neighbourhoods to relieve the existing lines than to have a single high-capacity line that leaves system expansion to be a "want" that can get ignored versus a "need".
If lines 1 and 2 were lower capacity, we would have had to build the Ontario Line at least 2 decades ago (and perhaps another line as well), and we'd be able to travel to more parts of the city by rapid transit for a generation already. I suspect that Montreal had to expand their system for this reason, building out a metro that more comprehensively covers their city in less time than we took to build our system.
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Northern Light
Superstar
This is a very expensive choice.
I appreciate the desire for more transit; but one slightly higher capacity line is a lot cheaper than 2 slightly lesser capacity lines.
I don't really want the government forking out $$ just so the transit map looks better to some.
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We can always slightly under-size the initial train, or run slightly less frequent service, to begin; but building under-sized, underground stations, or providing curves which preclude longer trains is a real problem.
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In the case of the O/L, there will not be another East-West, underground train corridor through downtown in the lifetime of most UT members; undersizing it does not produce a College Street subway.
Likewise, under-building Sheppard will not produce a subway on Finch or on Wilson/York Mills/Ellesmere. Not going to happen. At least not in the next 4 decades.
81-717
Active Member
2 wrongs don't make a right. Ofc the OL should've been built as a TTC-spec subway line, complete with track connections to 1, 2 & 4, but just because the OL was wrongfully downgraded doesn't mean line 4 should be as well (least of all, downgrading the existing line 4).
junctionist
Senior Member
This approach isn't "just so the transit map looks better to some". That couldn't be further from the truth. It's so that the people who actually use transit can take rapid transit to more places in the city. I don't think we should deliberately undersize to the point that the system can't meet current needs. But there's no real reason to build lines with Line 1's capacity underground all across the city.
That sort of approach precludes faster system expansion due to cost. If we didn't have the existing railway corridors for RER, we'd probably be looking at another 1-2 Ontario Lines into the downtown core in the next couple of decades. The city is quickly densifying, road capacity is disappearing for sidewalk space and bike lanes, and the need to reduce carbon emissions is intensifying. Building out rapid transit in the core isn't a want anymore; it's quickly becoming a need for the city to function (like in various European and East Asian cities).
At some point in time, the city may also have to deal with a loss of commercial vitality in the core due to the prevalence of work from home. A lot of cities with shorter commutes saw a faster return to the office and to "normal" for their downtown cores after the pandemic. Our city, with its underdeveloped transportation systems, has struggled relative to other cities. If you want vitality, you need to make the right investments in transportation, which includes covering all the places people want to go for work, to see family, for shopping, for recreation, for spirituality, etc. with rapid transit.
Northern Light
Superstar
I'm fine w/your general intent here, but I'm simply saying that in the Toronto context, a marginal reduction in capacity on Sheppard or the O/L doesn't produce any net new lines.
Moreover, the discussion above involved the suggestion of a Line 5 treatment.
By which one must mean a portion of the line at-grade, with traffic lights, and limited capacity that will be quickly overtaken by proposed and approved development.
There is certainly room to suggest that some lesser capacity metro/subway forms are more appropriate in the inner/outer burbs (so long as they are fully grade separated); but that is not what Line 5 is; and therefore is not the notion I was questioning.
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The O/L in the core is a different issue; under-sizing the above-ground stations, in such a fashion as to allow for future expansion may be reasonable. Under-sizing underground stations is vastly more of an issue.
You may feel it would be nice if we had a College Street subway......... I'm not going to disagree; I'm simply going to say that it will not happen in the foreseeable future, so any undersizing of O/L stations will not have produced an offsetting gain.
We don't disagree on any of the above; its simply that that sentiment doesn't change what I have written above.
Rainforest
Senior Member
The actual riders might not want to accept overcrowding in order to draw attention to transit
Rainforest
Senior Member
If you say so. Honestly, it is hard to visualize that situation. Even in its present state with the surface section in the east, Line 5 will have capacity in the range of 13,000 per hour, in each of the 2 directions. In the morning rush, not every riders needs to go west towards the OL or Yonge. Some might prefer to go east to Kennedy and transfer to Line 2 or to Stouffville GO.
Furthermore, frequent bus routes on Vic Park, Warden, Birchmount aren't going to disappear when Line 5 opens. Those buses can take some of the area's riders.
However, if Line 5 does require a rebuild, then the rebuild period will turn into an absolute nighmare. If the rationale for the rebuild is that the LRT with 13,000 x 2 capacity can't handle the demand, then what will carry that demand during the years when the LRT isn't running at all, and the Eglinton general lanes are reduced for the new construction.