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

[Steve X]

Two reasons why many passengers do not board the 32A Eglinton West from Etobicoke, unless they have to, at the moment. One, construction and traffic congestion on Eglinton. Two, no express bus on Eglinton West. Instead, they board the southbound buses to get to the 2 Bloor-Danforth line. Unfortunately, getting a seat on the 1 Yonge-University subway transfer would be difficult doing so at St. George Station.

Once they open the first phase of the Crosstown LRT, there will be many people boarding the feeder buses to the LRT. Even more when the extension opens. However, the northern areas of Etobicoke may start to use the Finch West LRT more, when that line opens. More chance of getting a seat on the Spadina leg of the 1 Yonge-University line at the Finch West Station (or whatever name they will call it on the Finch West LRT).

The 32A Eglinton West isn't reliable. It sometimes don't show up.

The problem with the LRT design is the waiting area. If it's easy to transfer with waiting areas, riders are more likely to transfer.

The problem of getting a seat will come back to bite you. If buses start running from the Bloor-Danforth Line, they'll be very pack at Eglinton.

As we discuss northwest Etobicoke, we seem to be assuming that the peak ridership (which is what we base decisions for rail transit on) consists of people travelling to downtown. So we are analysing whether we can get them to the Spadina line versus the Bloor line. I think we may be going in the wrong direction here. Certainly, looking at the non-dense suburban areas close to Eglinton, there are many upper middle class people there who work downtown. But the people who are on the bus coming from the north end are more likely heading to other employment areas elsewhere.


- Paul

Riders in Northern Etobicoke would rather ride the Finch West LRT across to Finch West Station at Keele than to Eglinton and across to Eglinton West Station at Allen. The intention of LRT was to developed the whole corridor and increase local ridership. Townhouses are going up now even without the LRT.

 

[ehlow]

New renderings for some stations are on http://www.thecrosstown.ca/the-project/stations-and-stops

Also some info about bike parking

 

[crs1026]

Actual data on what exactly?

Is there data showing where the ridership that is a potential transfer to Eglinton from north-south routes in Etobicoke is going.

My curiosity being - We know from the data that ECLRT-West trips to the airport will be low. Is there another potential ridership that we are missing? Can we find this in the north-south bus ridership who are believed (I'm wondering if this is fact, or assumption) to transfer to the Bloor subway?

- If there are people who would go east on Eglinton if the trip were faster, ECLRT offers them something. This business might grow and the west extension might be justified.
- If they are headed to lower downtown, then east on Eglinton offers them something as they can take ST downtown rather than via Bloor. That ridership segment might be growable.
- But if (as I suspect) the north=south bus riders are headed elsewhere again, transfer to Eglinton offers them nothing and there is no potential ridership growth.

We seem to be assuming with both Finch and Eglinton that the demand is tied to getting downtown, and I'm just questioning that assumption.

- Paul

 

[BurlOak]

Actual data on what exactly?

As was discussed before, the EA had zero people travelling from Pearson airport via ECLRT at peak hour. I doubt Finch would have been any better since there are fewer destinations along Finch than Eglinton.

This maybe shows how flawed the EA study was. Pearson has hundreds of shifts with workers starting and finishing at all hours of the day. Also imagine if employee parking rates went up (maybe because of some city bringing in a parking levee), a lot of employees would be looking for alternate ways to get to YYZ.

Riders in Northern Etobicoke would rather ride the Finch West LRT across to Finch West Station at Keele than to Eglinton and across to Eglinton West Station at Allen. The intention of LRT was to developed the whole corridor and increase local ridership. Townhouses are going up now even without the LRT.

People on Finch will take the FWLRT, but there is a lot of area between Eglinton and Finch. Anyone living on a north-south road south of Finch will go south to Eglinton.

 

[Hopkins123]

Are we really discussing not building any form of rapid transit west of Mt Dennis on Eglinton? Have you've not seen all the apartment buildings between Scarlett Rd and Royal York? At Kipling? Is connecting to Renforth Gateway not a regional planning goal worth extending the Crosstown for?

 

[TOareaFan]

This maybe shows how flawed the EA study was. Pearson has hundreds of shifts with workers starting and finishing at all hours of the day. Also imagine if employee parking rates went up (maybe because of some city bringing in a parking levee), a lot of employees would be looking for alternate ways to get to YYZ.

And, what if only tens of those lived east of the airport? Now you are getting some percentage of tens of people. Last I heard/read, the vast majority of airport workers live in or around Peel region.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

Are we really discussing not building any form of rapid transit west of Mt Dennis on Eglinton? Have you've not seen all the apartment buildings between Scarlett Rd and Royal York? At Kipling? Is connecting to Renforth Gateway not a regional planning goal worth extending the Crosstown for?

We don't decide where to build transit by counting apartment buildings. The TTC did their evaluations and the results were well below the threshold for well light rail would be justified.

Connecting to Renforth Gateway is a reasonable regional transportation goal, which is why I support extending the Mississauga Transitway to Mt Dennis.

 

[Steve X]

People on Finch will take the FWLRT, but there is a lot of area between Eglinton and Finch. Anyone living on a north-south road south of Finch will go south to Eglinton.

Within 1 km radius of the LRT, it might be actually faster to take the bus north to Finch, across on the Finch LRT and back down than to Eglinton. The 45E Kipling Express and 37 Islington get really packed in AM rush hour.

We don't decide where to build transit by counting apartment buildings. The TTC did their evaluations and the results were well below the threshold for well light rail would be justified.

Connecting to Renforth Gateway is a reasonable regional transportation goal, which is why I support extending the Mississauga Transitway to Mt Dennis.

They should build phase 2 to Martin Grove or Renforth and then reconsider the airport link. Metrolinx might be happier this way.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

And, what if only tens of those lived east of the airport? Now you are getting some percentage of tens of people. Last I heard/read, the vast majority of airport workers live in or around Peel region.

Yeah. The other issue with servicing the airport with rail is that the airport is a large geographical area, making it incredibly challenging to properly service that employment area with rail. The only economical way to connect to all those jobs is with busses.

 

[BurlOak]

A huge percentage of the jobs are at Pearson itself. If the demand was there, companies would hire shuttle buses to bring their workers to the more distant business parks, or Mississauga Transit would take it up if there is enough demand.

 

[salsa]

Connecting to Renforth Gateway is a reasonable regional transportation goal, which is why I support extending the Mississauga Transitway to Mt Dennis.

That might be a viable option, only problem is Smart Track won the election, not Smart Bus. However lets wait and see what the new LRT ridership numbers will look like when the Smart Track studies come out.

 

[sixrings]

I think anyone south of Finch is going to head towards the Eglinton or Bloor line for a couple reasons. One people are generally going to go the direction they are heading versus go backtrack even if it is indeed faster. But I will question if it would be faster to backtrack to Finch LRT because the stop spacing on Finch is considerably closer than what is on Eglinton, especially when we think of the underground Eglinton section.

 

[Hopkins123]

We don't decide where to build transit by counting apartment buildings. The TTC did their evaluations and the results were well below the threshold for well light rail would be justified.

Connecting to Renforth Gateway is a reasonable regional transportation goal, which is why I support extending the Mississauga Transitway to Mt Dennis.

Then why are we even building the Finch West LRT which will carry only 2800 pph by 2031? Or the TYSSE which will carry only 2700 pph? For the sake of connectivity we group in less dense areas along a corridor with the more dense ones. Old Mill and Royal York Stns are sparsely used, for instance, but they're the intermediaries to the busier Islington and Kipling stops. It's a necessary evil to route rapid transit through that area to connect to nodes west of there. Likewise we route through Richview in order to get to Airport Corporate Ctr and Pearson. That's how transit's always worked in this city.

And building a grade-separated bus transitway along Eglinton West runs the same expense as building a grade-separated LRT minus the trackbed. Surely the one seat ride from the airport to Scarborough is more critical than a one-seat ride from Mt Dennis to Scarborough.

 

[sixrings]

We don't decide where to build transit by counting apartment buildings. The TTC did their evaluations and the results were well below the threshold for well light rail would be justified.

Connecting to Renforth Gateway is a reasonable regional transportation goal, which is why I support extending the Mississauga Transitway to Mt Dennis.

The thing is that Miller and the people in charge then thought the line did make sense. Only because the liberal government was trying to stagger their spending combined with an elected Rob Ford who had "Subways subways subways" mantra did this line get cut at coincidentally the same place where Rob Ford comes from.

 

[salsa]

The thing is that Miller and the people in charge then thought the line did make sense. Only because the liberal government was trying to stagger their spending combined with an elected Rob Ford who had "Subways subways subways" mantra did this line get cut at coincidentally the same place where Rob Ford comes from.

I don't think that's true. Eglinton West got stopped when the McGuinty government cut $4B out of the Transit City budget in 2010, while Miller was mayor. The cuts also caused the Finch LRT to stop at Keele, the Malvern SRT station to be cancelled, and has posponed construction timelines long enough for Ford to get elected and cancel Transit City.