Dan416
Senior Member
If the DRL takes King or Queen, they could modify that line into a proper LRT with fewer stops, faster and in its own ROW.
Your posts in this thread summed up:
We here in Vancouver know how to do things right. I'm smart enough to see the solution and it would only cost $2 billion but you people in Toronto are leeches and too dumb to figure this out. Rinse and repeat.
Lets look at the past 30 years of transit. Toronto completed 2km of YUS extension and a 6km Sheppard line (and maybe the 6km of SRT - although this will soon be closed, maybe).
Vancouver went from 0 transit to over 65km of rapid transit.
By my math, they have built 8 times as much as Toronto. They also seem to know how to get thing done. In the 60's and 70's, the TTC built much of the system using cut-and-cover, in trenches, or at-grade - with tunnelling restricted to where it was needed (under the West Don River). These less expensive construction techniques enable Toronto to have a first class transit system.
So if it comes to listening to someone from Vancouver or Toronto, I would have to listen to Vancouver.
They also seem to know how to get thing done. In the 60's and 70's, the TTC built much of the system using cut-and-cover, in trenches, or at-grade - with tunnelling restricted to where it was needed (under the West Don River). These less expensive construction techniques enable Toronto to have a first class transit system.
So if it comes to listening to someone from Vancouver or Toronto, I would have to listen to Vancouver.
This is exactly why I am saying that focusing on the relief aspects is a misnomer - the entire network in the inner core is saturated and the real point of the DRL isn't just to serve as a bypass for the Yonge line - but instead to provide tangible improvements of transit service in the core area (which has multiple, high intensity areas that are currently underserved) as well as providing relief to the Yonge line. Running GO trains wouldn't have done an iota to that.
AoD
Vancouver's Skytrain network barely carries more riders than the TTC streetcar system, let alone the TTC subway. It's a totally different system, a totally different scale...Vancovuer as a model for rapid transit expansion in general? That's absurd.
No, what's absurd is taking a meaningless statistic like 'absolute ridership numbers' completely out of context.
Toronto is twice as old and three times the size of Vancouver. Toronto probably has five times the number of people employed in its downtown core. Vancouver's pre-war population was the same as what London, Ontario is today. More people live within a 25km radius of the CN tower than in the entire province of British Columbia. Of course Vancouver is going to have lower ridership numbers. By your logic, Mumbai must be an example of rapid transit leadership because they have individual rail lines that carry three times the passengers of the entire TTC system.
Here's what matters: Vancouver built 70km of rapid transit during a time when Toronto built 7. It did so under roughly the same conditions as Toronto did: it had to fight a dominant car culture, high construction costs, a culture of political interference, and the same apathetic Federal government. We have more to learn from Vancouver than any other city. Sure, places like Hong Kong, Singapore, Beijing or Madrid built much more but the context is so incomparable to those cities that we risk learning nothing. We don't have millions of people living in neighbourhoods that have population densities of 25,000 people/km2; we don't have gas prices of $2.50/L; we don't have a central government that can expropriate, demolish and build at will. Vancouver might not be the best model for rapid transit expansion but, frankly, it's the best model we have.
Lets look at the past 30 years of transit. Toronto completed 2km of YUS extension and a 6km Sheppard line (and maybe the 6km of SRT - although this will soon be closed, maybe).
Vancouver went from 0 transit to over 65km of rapid transit.
By my math, they have built 8 times as much as Toronto. They also seem to know how to get thing done. In the 60's and 70's, the TTC built much of the system using cut-and-cover, in trenches, or at-grade - with tunnelling restricted to where it was needed (under the West Don River). These less expensive construction techniques enable Toronto to have a first class transit system.
So if it comes to listening to someone from Vancouver or Toronto, I would have to listen to Vancouver.
No, what's absurd is taking a meaningless statistic like 'absolute ridership numbers' completely out of context.
Toronto is twice as old and three times the size of Vancouver. Toronto probably has five times the number of people employed in its downtown core. Vancouver's pre-war population was the same as what London, Ontario is today. More people live within a 25km radius of the CN tower than in the entire province of British Columbia. Of course Vancouver is going to have lower ridership numbers. By your logic, Mumbai must be an example of rapid transit leadership because they have individual rail lines that carry three times the passengers of the entire TTC system.
Here's what matters: Vancouver built 70km of rapid transit during a time when Toronto built 7. It did so under roughly the same conditions as Toronto did: it had to fight a dominant car culture, high construction costs, a culture of political interference, and the same apathetic Federal government. We have more to learn from Vancouver than any other city. Sure, places like Hong Kong, Singapore, Beijing or Madrid built much more but the context is so incomparable to those cities that we risk learning nothing. We don't have millions of people living in neighbourhoods that have population densities of 25,000 people/km2; we don't have gas prices of $2.50/L; we don't have a central government that can expropriate, demolish and build at will. Vancouver might not be the best model for rapid transit expansion but, frankly, it's the best model we have.
There are also things like minimum wage, worker safety standards, environmental regulations, passenger comfort for crush loads, etc. where again Vancouver is the most like Toronto.
No, what's absurd is taking a meaningless statistic like 'absolute ridership numbers' completely out of context.
Toronto is twice as old and three times the size of Vancouver. Toronto probably has five times the number of people employed in its downtown core. Vancouver's pre-war population was the same as what London, Ontario is today. More people live within a 25km radius of the CN tower than in the entire province of British Columbia. Of course Vancouver is going to have lower ridership numbers. By your logic, Mumbai must be an example of rapid transit leadership because they have individual rail lines that carry three times the passengers of the entire TTC system.
Here's what matters: Vancouver built 70km of rapid transit during a time when Toronto built 7. It did so under roughly the same conditions as Toronto did: it had to fight a dominant car culture, high construction costs, a culture of political interference, and the same apathetic Federal government. We have more to learn from Vancouver than any other city. Sure, places like Hong Kong, Singapore, Beijing or Madrid built much more but the context is so incomparable to those cities that we risk learning nothing. We don't have millions of people living in neighbourhoods that have population densities of 25,000 people/km2; we don't have gas prices of $2.50/L; we don't have a central government that can expropriate, demolish and build at will. Vancouver might not be the best model for rapid transit expansion but, frankly, it's the best model we have.
Does Vancouver have a GO commuter rail equivalent?