Richmond Hill Yonge Line 1 North Subway Extension | ?m | ?s | Metrolinx

[nfitz]

Yes, they did. The Yonge extension was originally in the 15 year plan, and the DRL in the 25 year plan. However, City Council passed a resolution to make the DRL a precondition of the Yonge extension. I'm just curious if anyone knows whether or not Metrolinx actually acknowledged this resolution and is taking it into account, or if they just continued on with their day like nothing happened?

I don't think anyone has said anything.

However Metrolinx didn't fund the Yonge subway extension when it funded some of the other projects. And TTC is proceeding with the DRL study that City Council asked them to complete at the same time they asked Metrolinx to change the priority.

Sounds like a good question for the upcoming DRL open houses.

 

[gweed123]

I don't think anyone has said anything.

However Metrolinx didn't fund the Yonge subway extension when it funded some of the other projects. And TTC is proceeding with the DRL study that City Council asked them to complete at the same time they asked Metrolinx to change the priority.

Sounds like a good question for the upcoming DRL open houses.

Yeah, right now it's pretty much just piecing together bits of information from various aspects of the situation in order to guess what's going to happen. The Yonge subway not being funded however could just mean that it wasn't high enough up on the 15 year priority list. Heck, even projects that were on the priority list got their funding cut, so the fact that it wasn't funded is by no means an indication that the DRL is making progress within Metrolinx. It just means there wasn't enough money to go around.

But the fact that the TTC is continuing with the study despite not having explicit approval from Metrolinx that it will be moved up is a good sign. If the TTC comes to Metrolinx sometime next year (I think that's when they said the study would be complete, right? Mid 2011?) with study in-hand, hopefully Metrolinx will take a serious look at it.

Do you know when these open houses will be? I haven't heard anything about them (not that I'll be able to make them anyway, unless they're on a weekend or a Friday night).

 

[Electrify]

How can you have a Yonge extension without a DRL since it would end up being more crowded.

Worth mentioning that an extension of the Yonge line would simply be having passengers who already commute by bus through the corridor catch the train sooner, rather than attract new riders. While I'm sure it will attract new riders, I believe those who currently live in Thornhill who drive downtown everyday will be in the minority of users of this extension. Most people using this line are the ones that are currently coming from buses from Steeles, Clark, Center/John, Highway 7, and Yonge St north.

 

[nfitz]

Do you know when these open houses will be? I haven't heard anything about them (not that I'll be able to make them anyway, unless they're on a weekend or a Friday night).

No idea. There's been a dearth of such events with the election and all. Only thing I've heard, is that the next Don Mills EA open houses have slipped again, this time to 2011.

 

[M II A II R II K]

Worth mentioning that an extension of the Yonge line would simply be having passengers who already commute by bus through the corridor catch the train sooner, rather than attract new riders. While I'm sure it will attract new riders, I believe those who currently live in Thornhill who drive downtown everyday will be in the minority of users of this extension. Most people using this line are the ones that are currently coming from buses from Steeles, Clark, Center/John, Highway 7, and Yonge St north.

They could also start trains from stations like Finch too so those trains would start empty.

 

[nfitz]

Most people using this line are the ones that are currently coming from buses from Steeles, Clark, Center/John, Highway 7, and Yonge St north.

There's hard numbers in the EA isn't there? While the majority of the users are those currently taking the subway to Finch, if only a minority - say 40% are new, then the existing subway is completely overwhelmed.

They could also start trains from stations like Finch too so those trains would start empty.

If they would already be at 100% capacity at Bloor, with no room for additional trains, then it doesn't really matter if they start empty trains at Finch ... you still have a huge problem with no capacity by the time you get to Eglinton and Bloor.

 

[Woodbridge_Heights]

In case you haven't noticed, there is a subway (def. subway |ˈsəbˌwā| noun 1 an underground electric railroad.) running from Queen's Quay to Union Station, except that it is using streetcars at the moment.

Here we go again.....

Tyre, Tram, and Trolley's oh my! I gotta say this was the funniest semantic play I've read on here in a long long while, the ~2 km of streetcar track from Union to Queens Quay qualifies as a subway? Boy I've just found a bunch of new subways in Toronto!!! The Spadina LRT south of Spadina station, the St. Clair line at St Clair west station, all subways!!! Huzzah!!!!

PS. CC I only quoted you for effect

*** Edit ***

On the New vs. existing ridership issue. First I do agree that the majority of riders on the Yonge extension will be current riders who take the GO, YRT, VIVA, TTC to Finch right now. VIVA blue for example is effectively running as an extension the the Yonge line right now. Putting aside the planned development at RHC and considering the situation on the Yonge line further down the line I see very little room to grow additional ridership.

Really the only way to grow ridership is to add new lines (DRL, Bay maybe, Queen etc) as these will add capacity (and add it to the downtown core) to the system. As the existing ridership redistributes itself in the new system potential riders who weren't taking public transit due to capacity issues, as well as proximity will now be attracted. Yonge itself may not carry the same number of passengers as it did before the addition of new lines, however the system as a whole carries much, much more than it could without them. Incremental extensions to the system really only bring the system closer to existing riders and doesn't attract as many new riders.

 

[Chuck]

If they would already be at 100% capacity at Bloor, with no room for additional trains, then it doesn't really matter if they start empty trains at Finch ... you still have a huge problem with no capacity by the time you get to Eglinton and Bloor.

You're one of the few who thankfully mentioned Eglinton. Most people ignore the fact that the Yonge subway is just as bad north of Bloor as it is south. At least at Bloor, lots of space is opened up by the people getting off. Try boarding at Davisville or St. Clair and you're out of luck for several trains in a row. For me and many others, the DRL will be all but useless unless it continues well north of Bloor into North York.

 

[EnviroTO]

At Eglinton between 8:00 and 8:40 if the time between trains becomes 5 minutes rather than 2.5 minutes there is often no room at Eglinton to get on for a number of trains afterwards. South of Eglinton you really don't need the schedule to slip much for there to be no space at all. I agree that on the east side the DRL needs to go to at least Eglinton in the King - Pape - Don Mills corridor. On the west side the University Line doesn't really require relief and the Bloor line needs a little relief which indicates the east-west alignment of the DRL would add more value (especially considering the Weston corridor) than the north-south portion.

 

[gweed123]

I think the Spadina extension may help this, at least until the Yonge extension opens. With the subway extending into York Region, hopefully VIVA will tweak their service slightly to favour dumping passengers off on the Spadina line, instead of the Yonge line. For commuters, a shorter ride on VIVA and a longer ride on the subway is preferable to a 20+ min VIVA ride down Yonge St to an overcrowded subway. I think people will choose to travel to the closest subway stop, which for a lot of people in York Region, will be somewhere on the Spadina line, not Finch Station as it currently is.

 

[Markster]

I think the Spadina extension may help this, at least until the Yonge extension opens. With the subway extending into York Region, hopefully VIVA will tweak their service slightly to favour dumping passengers off on the Spadina line, instead of the Yonge line. For commuters, a shorter ride on VIVA and a longer ride on the subway is preferable to a 20+ min VIVA ride down Yonge St to an overcrowded subway. I think people will choose to travel to the closest subway stop, which for a lot of people in York Region, will be somewhere on the Spadina line, not Finch Station as it currently is.

The TTC has done studies on this exact diversion. They've quantified the number expected to switch to the Spadina line, and they've quantified the capacity increase thanks to ATC, and rolled that all into a nice stat that effectively says how much life is left in the Yonge line before the "something" has to be done.

 

[gweed123]

The TTC has done studies on this exact diversion. They've quantified the number expected to switch to the Spadina line, and they've quantified the capacity increase thanks to ATC, and rolled that all into a nice stat that effectively says how much life is left in the Yonge line before the "something" has to be done.

Do you happen to know what those stats were? I'd be interested in seeing them.

 

[Markster]

I did a quick look, and I couldn't find it.
I recall that it was part of a Yonge subway extension document.

This gives some of the numbers for diversions.

This goes into more detail.

Of course, those are rose-coloured glasses reports designed to convince you that the Yonge subway can be extended without issue. They actually go so far as to say that the DRL is the absolute last resort.

 

[nfitz]

I thought it was in a stand-alone report to the commission ...

 

[Markster]

It could be. I can't remember, nor can I find it.