Toronto Eglinton Line 5 Crosstown West Extension | ?m | ?s | Metrolinx

[Steve X]

I don't think they'd even done the studies to finalize the mode in 2016 - let alone announced anything. Where in the 2016 announcement does it say it's going to be on the surface?

As for Scarborough - I thought it was in the Rob Ford era, that they were looking at going surface and elevated up the SRT alignment, and not doing a tunnel at all. Though all the various options - many of them approved and funded - are tough to keep track of!

Actually they never finalized the study The city staffs preferred a surface alignment from day one and was throwing out all the reasons for it. Ford came in and asked ML to secretly write their own business case and accelerated a new EA amendment. All the open houses (city and ML) were utter BS as they hammer through their own plans anyways.

I'm pretty sure someone favoured a tunnel from day one that the SRT conversion was axed. The surface and elevated alignments with reusing the SRT was thrown in politically at a later date to justified the opposition. A secret pact was made that TO/Scarborough gets the subway and ML gets the SRT tracks for their GO expansion. It was mention in one of those board meetings back then that it was too late for a surface alignment over the SRT, ML claimed it. Only when the media asked, that option was drawn on the map along with a million reasons why it wasn't chosen.

 

[toronto647]

IO P3 Market Update January 2022

Eglinton Crosstown West Extension - Advanced Tunnel (Jane to Mt. Dennis) - RFP April 2022
Eglinton Crosstown West Extension - Stations, Rail and Systems TBD

https://www.infrastructureontario.ca/uploadedFiles/_CONTENT/News/2_Market_Update/January%202022%20Pipeline%20Chart%20EN.pdf

 

[W. K. Lis]

Actually they never finalized the study The city staffs preferred a surface alignment from day one and was throwing out all the reasons for it. Ford came in and asked ML to secretly write their own business case and accelerated a new EA amendment. All the open houses (city and ML) were utter BS as they hammer through their own plans anyways.

I'm pretty sure someone favoured a tunnel from day one that the SRT conversion was axed. The surface and elevated alignments with reusing the SRT was thrown in politically at a later date to justified the opposition. A secret pact was made that TO/Scarborough gets the subway and ML gets the SRT tracks for their GO expansion. It was mention in one of those board meetings back then that it was too late for a surface alignment over the SRT, ML claimed it. Only when the media asked, that option was drawn on the map along with a million reasons why it wasn't chosen.

The home in the Kipling/Eglinton neighbourhood of the person who didn't want to see the peasants on surface light rail vehicles passing him when he's in his motor vehicle.

From link.
Notice the lack of sidewalks and the motor vehicles.

From link.

 

[innsertnamehere]

Actually they never finalized the study The city staffs preferred a surface alignment from day one and was throwing out all the reasons for it. Ford came in and asked ML to secretly write their own business case and accelerated a new EA amendment. All the open houses (city and ML) were utter BS as they hammer through their own plans anyways.

I'm pretty sure someone favoured a tunnel from day one that the SRT conversion was axed. The surface and elevated alignments with reusing the SRT was thrown in politically at a later date to justified the opposition. A secret pact was made that TO/Scarborough gets the subway and ML gets the SRT tracks for their GO expansion. It was mention in one of those board meetings back then that it was too late for a surface alignment over the SRT, ML claimed it. Only when the media asked, that option was drawn on the map along with a million reasons why it wasn't chosen.

City Staff had their own bent against elevated as well creating those ridiculous renderings making it look like the most overbearing piece of infrastructure possible to try to justify sticking it at grade, even despite council voting to include more grade separations along it.

If City Staff had gotten over their fetishization of slow, grade level LRT systems that deliver 1/5 the benefit for 2/3 the price, they could have properly designed an elevated system that the province might have kept when they took over. Instead they designed a terrible at-grade system with a dozen planned stops which just bogged it down further and the province just wrote it all off and decided on tunneling it instead.

Metrolinx taking line planning away from the City is one of the best things to happen in a long while. The City's design process was extremely bloated that played to too many local special interests which bogged projects down to be substantially worse overall. Not saying Metrolinx is perfect, just far better than what the City was doing with producing consistantly bloated, overdesigned, lines which are bogged down in ridiculous political add-ons which compromised the projects.

 

[TRONto]

If City Staff had gotten over their fetishization of slow, grade level LRT systems that deliver 1/5 the benefit for 2/3 the price, they could have properly designed an elevated system that the province might have kept when they took over. Instead they designed a terrible at-grade system with a dozen planned stops which just bogged it down further and the province just wrote it all off and decided on tunneling it instead.

I saw the doc that said 1/2 the price. Elevated was estimated at 2x ground for the Eg West LRT. I imagine it would actually be more than double like all our construction in these parts.

 

[H4F33Z]

The LRT extension is being tunnelled under the 427/401/Eglinton interchange because there is a graveyard located there. Shh. Be very, very quiet. The light rail vehicles must not disturb the residents there. See the problems with the North Yonge Extension into Richmond Hill with the Holy Cross Cemetery.

A cemetery nestled in a highway interchange provides a noisy final resting spot.​

From link.

You might find this video of interest! It talks about the logistics of expropriating cemeteries and why they don't happen sometimes:

 

[superelevation]

When exactly will Eglinton struggle with frequency and capacity? The LRT is replacing buses, it's well within capacity.

If only faster transit didn't attract new riders and cities never changed!

Once a much faster option to get across Eglinton exists - effectively a subway west of Laird - a lot more people are going to start taking ew trips on Eglinton that will be a lot easier than when it was just buses. Eglinton is not built with the assumption many people will be attracted to it, but if it does remotely well it will be very busy very quickly.

 

[TRONto]

If only faster transit didn't attract new riders and cities never changed!

Once a much faster option to get across Eglinton exists - effectively a subway west of Laird - a lot more people are going to start taking ew trips on Eglinton that will be a lot easier than when it was just buses. Eglinton is not built with the assumption many people will be attracted to it, but if it does remotely well it will be very busy very quickly.

The statement is based on an assumption that there is enough latent demand (people currently driving during rush hour) to overwhelm the LRT capacity. The LRT maximum capacity is well within decades of transit growth on the line.

As many have pointed out, it will take years for travel patterns to change and keeping in mind the upcoming opening of the Ontario Line, it is a tough sell to state that a subway is required east of Don Mills.

 

[W. K. Lis]

The statement is based on an assumption that there is enough latent demand (people currently driving during rush hour) to overwhelm the LRT capacity. The LRT maximum capacity is well within decades of transit growth on the line.

As many have pointed out, it will take years for travel patterns to change and keeping in mind the upcoming opening of the Ontario Line, it is a tough sell to state that a subway is required east of Don Mills.

As well, over time, other east-west rapid transit corridors will be added (starting with the Finch West LRT), up and down Toronto. There could also be a GO Train Midtown Corridor that could provide a more "express" service.

From link.

 

[ARG1]

The statement is based on an assumption that there is enough latent demand (people currently driving during rush hour) to overwhelm the LRT capacity. The LRT maximum capacity is well within decades of transit growth on the line.

As many have pointed out, it will take years for travel patterns to change and keeping in mind the upcoming opening of the Ontario Line, it is a tough sell to state that a subway is required east of Don Mills.

Well "years" is a very small time frame. Remember, the principles of Induced Demand that make many of us opposed to Highway expansion also apply to public transit, and the Toronto Metro area is growing extremely quickly. Will Eglinton be fine 10 years from now? Probably. Will it be fine 20 years from now? Maybe. Will it be fine 30 years from now? Highly unlikely. All because we want it to save at most half a billion dollars.

If we elevated the section east of Laird instead of putting it at grade, we could've ran 90s headways easily, and increased our capacity by 2.5x, and it wouldn't have costed much more.

Had we gone with high platforms, we could've saved money by not paying as much in terms of maintenance costs (high floor trains are far cheaper to maintain than low floor trains).

 

[innsertnamehere]

The section east of Don Mills will be fine. There is a lot of density planned out there but with 90m trains capable, even at 3-4 minute frequencies the line will be able to handle a huge amount of people.

It''s a short enough section between transfer points that it will struggle to fill up before people transfer off the line.

If the OL wasn't going to Eglinton I'd be a bit more concerned, but as it is shouldn't be a problem for at least 1-2 generations.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

City Staff had their own bent against elevated as well creating those ridiculous renderings making it look like the most overbearing piece of infrastructure possible to try to justify sticking it at grade, even despite council voting to include more grade separations along it.

If City Staff had gotten over their fetishization of slow, grade level LRT systems that deliver 1/5 the benefit for 2/3 the price, they could have properly designed an elevated system that the province might have kept when they took over. Instead they designed a terrible at-grade system with a dozen planned stops which just bogged it down further and the province just wrote it all off and decided on tunneling it instead.

Metrolinx taking line planning away from the City is one of the best things to happen in a long while. The City's design process was extremely bloated that played to too many local special interests which bogged projects down to be substantially worse overall. Not saying Metrolinx is perfect, just far better than what the City was doing with producing consistantly bloated, overdesigned, lines which are bogged down in ridiculous political add-ons which compromised the projects.

Don't blame the city for it when the province could well have done a clean slate themselves - there is nothing that could have stopped them from elevating it should they chose to. This is a political choice and we all know it.

AoD

 

[innsertnamehere]

Don't blame the city for it when the province could well have done a clean slate themselves - there is nothing that could have stopped them from elevating it should they chose to. This is a political choice and we all know it.

AoD

Not denying that, just saying that the City was actively opposed to it as well and actively played games trying to avoid it.

 

[ARG1]

The section east of Don Mills will be fine. There is a lot of density planned out there but with 90m trains capable, even at 3-4 minute frequencies the line will be able to handle a huge amount of people.

It''s a short enough section between transfer points that it will struggle to fill up before people transfer off the line.

If the OL wasn't going to Eglinton I'd be a bit more concerned, but as it is shouldn't be a problem for at least 1-2 generations.

Don't forget though that the existence of that eastern segment impacts the rest of the line. Even if that specific segment is fine, the same can't necessarily be said for the rest of the line. The area around Richview will likely see a massive amount of intensification. Same with the Mississauga Transitway corridor, and Pearson Airport will likely become a massive employment hub. That entire area could become extremely busy and well trafficked 30 or so years from now, and because the segment way out in the east is at grade, there are limitations in terms of how often trains can run. You can't just run 90s headways in the western segment because that would require LRVs from the eastern segment to arrive to the western segment at exact time frames, that are impossible due to it being at grade. The only solution then here is to either split the line at Don Mills, or fully grade separate the entire line. Of course the better option would be to the smart thing and just have the entire thing grade separated in the first place.

 

[innsertnamehere]

Don't forget though that the existence of that eastern segment impacts the rest of the line. Even if that specific segment is fine, the same can't necessarily be said for the rest of the line. The area around Richview will likely see a massive amount of intensification. Same with the Mississauga Transitway corridor, and Pearson Airport will likely become a massive employment hub. That entire area could become extremely busy and well trafficked 30 or so years from now, and because the segment way out in the east is at grade, there are limitations in terms of how often trains can run. You can't just run 90s headways in the western segment because that would require LRVs from the eastern segment to arrive to the western segment at exact time frames, that are impossible due to it being at grade. The only solution then here is to either split the line at Don Mills, or fully grade separate the entire line. Of course the better option would be to the smart thing and just have the entire thing grade separated in the first place.

The Eglinton West line is supposed to be hilariously under capacity.

Even if it can't grab 30,000 pphd numbers with 90 second frequencies doesn't mean it'll need it.

It may end up needing more than the 15,000 that a surface LRT can provide, but I don't see a problem with the LRT being able to achieve 25,000 PPHD or so, which is plenty of capacity. That's equivalent to about a 2 minute frequency which will give more flexibility to slot in the less reliable surface trains into the network (though they may have to sit at Laird for a little bit to slot into the schedule), and would exceed the demand we see on the Bloor Danforth Line today.

It's easy to get lost in the capacity numbers and just project out infinite growth, but these things are more complex and the numbers people worry about on this board for capacity are often so insanely high and 3-4x projections. By the time the numbers could possibly be reached we are talking about another generation from now where new infrastructure can practically be implemented to reduce demand loads.