I think the only reason this hasn't been built is because it would overload the Yonge line, which means we need to build the DRL first.
That's not going to happen anytime soon imho, although it would be nice. What we do need to do is the GO/TTC integration (all-day, station realignment, fare-by-distance) described by others. That will help offload the Yonge line at least somewhat, by diverting commuters in the middle/eastern 905 and middle/eastern 416 to routes that work better for them.
6 months after this report was
published I have heard nothing about transit projects for Yonge north of Finch.
I guess 2012 will be another year of failing to address the transportation issues on this "Gateway" to Toronto.
I think things have to get worse -- maybe much worse -- before they get better, and 2012 may be the year in which they do. World in Yonge is supposed to begin retail in 2012 (and residential in 2013), which will create some new demand, and there is of course a lot of other construction going on in the corridor which will help.
As I have said in the past I firmly believe that the Yonge subway extension will not happen anytime soon any more than the DRL will, and maybe not ever, but whether or not my cynicism is well-founded I think it is important to look to other changes that are needed within the corridor. So here are some hopes for 2012.
One, some attention paid to arterial roads. Ongoing changes and enforcement that began 20 years ago and have continued apace along Hilda and Willowdale, and possibly other roads, are starting to build to the kind of virtual moat around the City of Toronto that some have joked about in the past. Between Bayview and Yonge, and between Yonge and Bathurst, there is very little for buses or cars to use road-wise.
This is already a big problem, but it is going to be harder and harder to avoid. I would like to see a recognition that through streets are needed that run from Finch (ideally, from south of Finch) north to the 407 and that are not Bathurst or Yonge or Bayview. Those streets would be ideal routes for some buses to take which currently run along Yonge, but which only end up Yonge as their route to the subway.
For two, of course, steps towards the GO/TTC integration described above, but related to that, a move toward better hubbing. I'm thinking of the Rideau Centre in Ottawa here, so the Promenade bus terminal or even the Vaughan Mills one, getting afield a bit, are the counter-examples. Wherever possible, bus routes should ensure to connect at least two hubs, and each hub should try and work as an actual place. At the Promenade, you have the Disera street experiment (which in a world that made sense would be pulled across Centre and connect the Promenade Shops plazas), and you have the shopping mall. And in between, fenced off and connected to nothing, you have the bus terminal -- cold, outdoors, nowhere to buy coffee. Makes no sense. I get that this is largely due to the facility owners (hello, Cadillac Fairview forward-thinkers), but surely some accommodation can be made.
For three and four, I'll add in more modest fare integration so that it actually made sense for anyone in the Finch-407 corridor to take the bus rather than drive to the subway, and denser zoning to allow Yonge-adjacent land to find its proper value and, in turn, to intensify the obvious case for better transportation options -- which, unfortunately, will not include a subway extension.