robmausser
Senior Member
I don't think there is any practical way to forbid lefts at Leslie. With the CP bridge and the road bridge as constraints either side, I would have rather Sunnybrook Park had been built as a subgrade station (and the track between SP and Science Center in a cutting or cut/cover tunnel resulting in reduced grade change) but the construction impacts to road traffic on Eglinton at the CP bridge would have been fairly epic. Unfortunately the disjoin at Lawrence/Bayview/Bridle Path makes everything difficult.
Ironically, lefts never had to be banned on Leslie nor interact with the LRT at all in any way. It could be accomplished with one of the simplest fixes in human history. One that is used everywhere around the world with LRT's already, but Toronto is completely blind to because "we do things best here" and we are the centre of the universe. This solution is so groundbreaking it will completely shock you to your core: have had the LRT leave the Laird tunnel to the south of Eglinton and move the street to where the LRT is in the centre. Then have the LRT continue on the south side of a shifted Eglinton until it goes under at Don Mills again.
This radical, mind blowing invention (for Toronto, elsewhere in the world its the norm) would have allowed Leslie to have an intersection that doesn't interfere with the LRT at all, because its a 3 way street that only goes north, and meant the entire segment from Laird to Don Mills could have been completely grade separated.
Unfortunately this would have meant doing things in a way that we don't do them in Toronto (streetcars run in the centre lane and thats the word of the gospel in Toronto gosh darnit!) which is something Toronto is incapable of doing because we love to look at our own reflection in Lake Ontario sooo much.




