DonValleyRainbow
Senior Member
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- Joined
- Mar 5, 2014
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- Kay Gardner Beltline Trail
The only way a Queen alignment can possibly work is if a Union Station GO train tunnel goes ahead at the same time. Putting the DRL on Queen is going to leave waterfront residents heavily dependent on GO Transit to get around because Queen Street is not within walking distance of the waterfront. Building new GO stations at Spadina and Liberty Village is encouraging but this is not going to help unless the Union Station capacity issue is solved and the Lakeshore and Kitchener lines can handle 30000/hour. If the Union Station GO tunnel is built then a Queen DRL + GO serves a larger area than a King DRL, but without a GO tunnel, a Queen DRL is going to leave GO overloaded and a Queen DRL is too far away for people living south of King Street to walk to.
A Barrie Line stop at Spadina/Front seems to be a resemblance of the other Union Capacity Study option that was short-listed: a Bathurst Yard station that ties into the DRL. Now I don't think the last part of that would happen, but it could divert some riders onto the 510 streetcar and, if required, the DRL at Queen.
The other thing that was never assumed during that study is the potential for the Milton Line to be diverted to midtown. Summerhill has historically been the Union regional rail relief station, but never seriously pursued with CP using the ROW. If Ontario has landed an agreement in principle with CN for the 407 Freight Bypass, I don't think it is out of reach yet.