superelevation
Active Member
I wouldn't say Hurontario is sparsely populated at all, maybe compared to Yonge street or something... It's the busiest corridor in Peel and LRT is a good technology to serve it especially from a cost perspective, the stops themselves are already pretty spread out for a lot of the route so quite a few people will still be taking the bus because they have to go somewhere in between stops. I know I will when it opens
I never said sparsely populated, I said the density is sparse. You have a few towers and then a lot of space, and repeat. As someone else mentioned, something like the Canada Line which has probably about 2x the capacity of the HLRT seems more appropriate.
The Hurontario LRT was designed as predominantly a replacement for Mississauga's busiest bus route (19 Hurontario), which runs the entire Hurontario corridor through Mississauga and Brampton, so it needs to go the entire length and have a large amount of stops similar to the bus line. If there were fewer stops, more people would need to take an additional bus to get to where they need to be, since many people would live between stops. The Hurontario corridor is far from sparsely populated either, since it contains dense spots like Cooksvile, MCC, Uptown MCC, Port Credit, and various employment/office park areas.
An elevated metro would in no way be practical for this corridor, as it would be overbuilt and expensive. There is more than enough space to fit an at-grade separated ROW on Hurontario for the LRT trains.
The Cambie Corridor in Vancouver 100% was less dense than this route when the Canada Line was built and the line has been a huge success. I question whether we really need more local transit (LRT is much closer to a bus than a Metro), rather than actual rapid transit. Should also point out that the Canada Line was similar order of magnitude cost to this project.
The Metro word was invented by Paris. They use 'tiny' trains (thinner than a streetcar & 90m in length) that frequently run above ground.
Edit: To add, a VAL style system (Grade separated, automated, small trains running at extreme frequencies) is very appropriate for a city like Mississauga or Hamilton. The stations are small and can be cheap to build. Check out the Lille Metro.
Indeed, the Canada Line does something very similar to VAL - small trains frequently, driving high capacity and really quick service.
Speed is important when converting mode share. When it comes to HuLRT, the number of stops is not too bad. But I worry about the travel speed on a line like this. It is expected to average 28 kph according to Metrolinx. That seems too slow for rapid transit and a lot of users won't be converted from cars when you factor in the added walk and wait times. If you have money you will be inclined to continue to drive. I also worry that we may not do as good a job with signal priority as hoped.
There are no N/S GO links in Peel, and GO does not serve MCC. There is bus service, but that is just as likely to get stuck in traffic.
I agree, LRT's / Tramways work best in dense corridors, as they tend to have low average speeds.
iirc, 28 km/h is competitive with rush hour driving (about 30 km/h on average in my experience).
The problem is transit shouldn't just be competitive with driving, should and could very well beat it on speed. Particularly if it was grade separated.