Toronto Crosstown LRT | ?m | ?s | Metrolinx | Arcadis

[TheTigerMaster]

If City Planning had explicitly said that saving transit riders 2.5 mins would cost $1.3 Billion, it's unlikely Council would be debating grade separation today. Why they didn't explicitly say that, rather than choosing to dance around it with opaque cost/benefit metrics, is beyond understanding for me. Their report makes it seem as if City Planning is trying to hide something, when in fact the data from the EA strongly supports their recommendation.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

Was over at Kennedy Station to get some photos of various things and saw crew paving the area where the median used to be from Kennedy Rd to the overpass. I saw at least 5 cars exit the No Frills plaza to go east with a sergeant on duty. The sergeant went over to the Metrolinx person in charge and told him about the 4 illegal crossing the road and going east he saw and stated that they must put up barriers to stop drivers from doing these illegal moves. As he was pointing to the area, we saw another 3 cars make that illegal turn. The conversation was taking almost where I was doing some shooting.

Was there a no left turn sign at the No Frills plaza, to prohibit drivers from turning east?

 

[drum118]

Was there a no left turn sign at the No Frills plaza, to prohibit drivers from turning east?

No, since drivers were never allow to do this in the past. Even if you put those signs up, drivers will still try making that illegal turn. The problem falls at the feet of Metrolinx and the contractor for the project for not having provision in place before the work took place or while it was. Not doing this prep work before hand is only asking for trouble in the long run including accidents.

 

[3dpraxisstudio]

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[crs1026]

My problem with those numbers is
a) the fudge I described earlier, where the red light delays were understated by reducing the assumed time required for pedestrian crossings across Eglinton
b) the additional probability of red light delays at the intermediate intersections, which is caused by the use of these intermediaute intersections as u-turn points for autos turning left. These delays were not quantified but the volume of left turning cars is shown to be considerable so one assumes that large amounts of the traffic cycle will conflict with LRT operation
If you guesstimate what those added delays would add, the cost per minute of travel will change - not necessarily by an order of magnitude, but somewhat. In my view the numbers have been skewed to support a pre-determined recommendation, which is dirty pool.
The other concerns are
- there is little or no hope of transit priority signalling addressing any of this
- the delays, while perhaps not monumental, call into question the wisdom of far side platform stops
- harder to quantify, the passenger experience will be undermined by all the getting hung up at lights. If you want to make people think that LRT is just a streetcar, this is a perfect way to do that. This will affect operating culture too.
If we want LRT to prevail in this city, we need to build it to a high performance spec, and that will cost money. Not as much as subways, but more than a minimum. I worry that LRT will be mediocre as we have chosen to apply it.
Spending the money to get something right generally proves to be the smarter choice when you are measuring over decades.

- Paul

 

[crs1026]

If City Planning had explicitly said that saving transit riders 2.5 mins would cost $1.3 Billion, it's unlikely Council would be debating grade separation today. Why they didn't explicitly say that, rather than choosing to dance around it with opaque cost/benefit metrics, is beyond understanding for me. Their report makes it seem as if City Planning is trying to hide something, when in fact the data from the EA strongly supports their recommendation.

The latest memo to Council claims that City Planning has performed new additional traffic studies. I wonder why that data has not been released. It would be further compelling if the new data supported the old. Of course, if the new data indicated something else, we would have a data duel, but the EA data is somewhat stale at this point. Anyways, not releasing data is always a red flag IMHO.

- Paul

 

[BurlOak]

Quit frankly, grade separation for high speed trains is a must, but for local transit it not. The cost to save 2-3 minutes of real travel time not factoring in the extra time to get to/from these grade separation stations out weight the cost of having a station at grade. Then there is the extra cost to maintain these stations vs the grade stations. How often do you see notices of elevators or escalators out of service and what is the cost to fix them?? Any able body can use the stairs, but we are in an aging cycle, as well providing service to the accessibility community. These must be factor in when doing comparison.

Point of example, Victoria Park Eastbound elevator is out of service at this time. This means with luck, the accessibility rider only has to go to Warden to do a cross platform change to catch a westbound train to go back to Victoria to get off where they wanted to do in the first place. How much extra time does that add to a rider travel time?? An accessibility rider come in many forms, not just scooter. If Warden wasn't a centre platform with no elevator, the rider would have to go to Kennedy to do the back tracking. If both elevators were out at Victoria, the rider would have to take the Eglinton bus to Victoria and do a bus change to get to where they were going in the first place.

Oncer again, we must please the car drivers, along with the industries that put these things on the road daily so they can make a buck.

This is the main debate.

Those in Scarborough and Etobicoke want to reduce the travel time for long distances.

• A 70 minute long distance trip reduced to 50 minutes (and a 99% reliable travel time due to complete grade-separation) is huge and will positively affect ridership. A 70 minute long distance trip reduced to 60 minutes (with 75% reliable travel time due to at-grade operation) will not affect ridership.
• A 10 minute local trip reducing to 8 or increasing to 12 is not that big of a deal. Buses have higher frequency than LRT, so maybe they are best for local. Grade-separated may mean a longer walk since all mid-block stations are eliminated, so maybe takes a bit longer. Less frequent local buses along with grade-separated is likely the best, as elderly may have trouble even getting to LRT in-median stations.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

This is the main debate.

Those in Scarborough and Etobicoke want to reduce the travel time for long distances.

• A 70 minute long distance trip reduced to 50 minutes (and a 99% reliable travel time due to complete grade-separation) is huge and will positively affect ridership. A 70 minute long distance trip reduced to 60 minutes (with 75% reliable travel time due to at-grade operation) will not affect ridership.
• A 10 minute local trip reducing to 8 or increasing to 12 is not that big of a deal. Buses have higher frequency than LRT, so maybe they are best for local. Grade-separated may mean a longer walk since all mid-block stations are eliminated, so maybe takes a bit longer. Less frequent local buses along with grade-separated is likely the best, as elderly may have trouble even getting to LRT in-median stations.

The trip from Martin Grove to Jane will take just 15 minutes. There is very little opportunity for significant time savings in absolute terms with the Crosstown West. This project has far more in common with your second bullet point than your first.

And of course, only a small minoritiy of riders will be making the trip from Martin Grove to all the way to Jane in the first place.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

My problem with those numbers is
a) the fudge I described earlier, where the red light delays were understated by reducing the assumed time required for pedestrian crossings across Eglinton

Can you elaborate on this? I took a look at Martin Grove, and they calculated a 31 second walk time for north-south pedestrian crossings. This seems exceedingly reasonable to me, even for elderly pedestrians.

 

[drum118]

This is the main debate.

Those in Scarborough and Etobicoke want to reduce the travel time for long distances.

• A 70 minute long distance trip reduced to 50 minutes (and a 99% reliable travel time due to complete grade-separation) is huge and will positively affect ridership. A 70 minute long distance trip reduced to 60 minutes (with 75% reliable travel time due to at-grade operation) will not affect ridership.
• A 10 minute local trip reducing to 8 or increasing to 12 is not that big of a deal. Buses have higher frequency than LRT, so maybe they are best for local. Grade-separated may mean a longer walk since all mid-block stations are eliminated, so maybe takes a bit longer. Less frequent local buses along with grade-separated is likely the best, as elderly may have trouble even getting to LRT in-median stations.

Again, how many riders are doing the long haul ride compare to riders doing the short turn over all rider???

You will find maybe 10-15% of riders doing the long haul and that doesn't justify spending big bucks to please a few riders. Case in point, I normally travel Islington to St George or Yonge, but yesterday I did Kipling to Kennedy which is about a 45 minute ride and any 5 minute saving would mean nothing to me.

The goal is to service the local riders who will be the main riders and faster service will mean nothing to them, but only to a small number in for the long haul.

Watching the 505 and 504 while waiting for a Flexity to show up at Broadview, time between cars was all over the place with some real long gaps to ones within a minute or 2.

When I went to catch a 514 at Cherry Loop, 2 departed within 2 minutes of each other with over a 20 minute gap for the next one to the point I would been better off walking to where I wanted to go next than waited for that next car.

Regardless if you have grade separation or not, as well traffic lights, they play a minor role in how lines work, it is the riders themselves, but most of all its the driver. Not every driver drives the same way to the point you have a lot of Sunday drivers who will have cars bunch up in one area and nothing in other areas for sometime.

Some elderly as well young riders for various reasons will take a longer time not only getting to a median stop, but crossing the street itself. Same will happen for grade separation stations as well and therefore it can't be used to say one system is better than another because they are elderly.

Having a vehicle doing a trip in 50 minutes in place of 60 allows to have either better headway or less vehicles on the line and that becomes a cost saving to a point.

 

[WislaHD]

The crux of the issue here is that the ridership of Crosstown West is way too small for grade-separation to be a cost-effective use of our tax dollars.

Extending the Mississauga Transitway to Mt. Dennis would be more effective, more rapid, more reliable, more frequent service for less money.

 

[Voltz]

a) the fudge I described earlier, where the red light delays were understated by reducing the assumed time required for pedestrian crossings across Eglinton

As I said before they would likely be using two stage pedestrian crossings, this would reduce the amount of time Eglinton traffic will need to face a red light at interesections.

b) the additional probability of red light delays at the intermediate intersections, which is caused by the use of these intermediaute intersections as u-turn points for autos turning left. These delays were not quantified but the volume of left turning cars is shown to be considerable so one assumes that large amounts of the traffic cycle will conflict with LRT operation

It can't be hard to minimise the effect of the U-turn points, only allowing U-turns when traffic at the main intersection has a red light would be easy and effective, and there will be no pedestrian crossings at the U-turns so there will be no minimum green times.

If you guesstimate what those added delays would add, the cost per minute of travel will change - not necessarily by an order of magnitude, but somewhat. In my view the numbers have been skewed to support a pre-determined recommendation, which is dirty pool.

You mean if you just make numbers up.

The other concerns are
- there is little or no hope of transit priority signalling addressing any of this

Based on what?

 

[Avenue]

Based on what?[/QUOTE

Based on everything else Toronto has done in terms prioritizing transit. Also, there's zero meaningful information disclosed to the public about how transit priority in Crosstown LRT will work, this far into the project. Nobody is buying it.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

b) the additional probability of red light delays at the intermediate intersections, which is caused by the use of these intermediaute intersections as u-turn points for autos turning left. These delays were not quantified but the volume of left turning cars is shown to be considerable so one assumes that large amounts of the traffic cycle will conflict with LRT operation

While the delays at due to modified left turns (via u-turns approx. 200 metres downstream) were not qualitified, the EA authors did analyze its performance, and were quite equivocal that they did not expect this to have a significant negative affect on transit operations. We see this reflected in their expectation that the trams will run at 30 kph between Jane and Renforth.

They also mention that this strategy had been implemented successfully in several other cities.

The data we’re interested in is the NBL and SBL. The worst here is NBL at Jane, with 225 cars per hour. This is about 3.75 cars per minute.

U-turn phase lengths aren’t specified, however it seems reasonable to me that with a cycle length of 120 seconds, we could get 8 cars to make a u-turn with a 15-20 second u-turn phase.

Consider that a train would be coming once every 3 to 4 minutes. With a 20 second u-turn phase every 120 seconds, the probability of the train having coming up against a red light at any individual u-turning intersection is just 11% (I hope I’m remembering my probability correctly). And this is the worse case scenario, where there is no transit signal priority, where all u-turning intersections have traffic volume to justify 20 second u-turn phases, and where it is assumed a u-turn phase will be actuated 100% of the time. And even when the train does come up to a red light, it’s stopped for at most 20 seconds - not a huge delay.

It’s rough math, but it gives us an idea of how these u-turn lanes will affect operations. I agree with the EA authors that this will not have a significant negative impact on operations.

 

[Avenue]

The cost to save 2-3 minutes of real travel time not factoring in the extra time to get to/from these grade separation stations out weight the cost of having a station at grade

I thought the time savings estimations already factored in the extra time to get to/from these grade separation stations because the savings can't possibly be that small otherwise. I mean the difference between grade separated and not separated at an intersection as low as 15 seconds? Sounds very unrealistic by itself.