Eug
Senior Member
They'd have to build an extra crossover point right near Leslie, just for temp usage... to connect up the LRT to the bus.
Perhaps it would make more sense to run BRT until the tunnel is built.
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Transit City Plan
- Thread starter 299 bloor call control.
- Start date
Perhaps it would make more sense to run BRT until the tunnel is built.
Dan416
Senior Member
I have one word for keeping and expanding the SRT: bah.
kettal
Banned
nfitz
Superstar
I stand corrected. Does seem optimistic - but I guess if they really start digging in 2010 they have a chance.
kEiThZ
Superstar
^ Why would it seem optimistic? That's 7.5 years from now till the end of 2016 for a line with only 1/3 of it buried. One would hope that the TTC could do better than that.
nfitz
Superstar
Construction isn't even currently planned to start until 2010. On a line with complex connections at Eglinton, Eglinton West, Kennedy and Pearson. Using a technology that has yet to be chosen, with many kilometres of tunnel, still waiting to complete the environmental assessment. Look at the Union Station second platform ... they started in 2003, the Environmental assessment was completed in 2005, full funding came in 2005, preliminary construction started in 2006, and heavy construction doesn't start until 2010 - who knows when they will finish. Look at the Pearson train ... funding was provided in 2003, and maybe they will start construction in 2010.
If Eglinton opens in 2016, I'll be suprised. Thrilled, but surprised.
Eug
Senior Member
Is anything going to happen to the bus depot at Eglinton and Yonge?
Rainforest
Senior Member
B
barit
Guest
Not likely, there will still have to be Lawrence East, Flemington Park, Leaside and Leslie buses routing along Eglinton Avenue East unless they revamp all of these routes to avoid Eglinton.
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kettal
Banned
They can connect these buses at the LRT station rather than the subway station.
Rainforest
Senior Member
Perhaps it would be a good idea to run some of those buses to Yonge, and use them as local service over the tunneled section of LRT.
However, I heard that the LRT design includes a small bus station at Eglinton / Leslie, which will act as a terminus for those buses.
RedRocket191
Senior Member
You heard right, but perhaps at the wrong location. I've heard Don Mills where the two LRT lines will connect.
kEiThZ
Superstar
Raises good questions about how Transit City will be implemented.
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Star
DATE: 2009.05.21
EDITION: Met
SECTION: Gta
PAGE: GT03
BYLINE: Royson James
SOURCE: Toronto Star
COPYRIGHT: © 2009 Torstar Corporation
WORD COUNT: 556
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Questioning the calamity of St. Clair
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The last thing Howard Levine said before we parted company at St. Clair West subway station yesterday was, "Don't make me out to be too much of an ogre."
The first thing he said in initiating the tour of the "St. Clair calamity," the streetcar right-of-way now under construction, was this: "If St. Clair is the template for Transit City, Toronto is hurtling towards disaster."
Levine is a retired planner, city councillor, transit buff and incurable activist who lives along the controversial transit route. His claims may be alarmist, but there is much at stake - the $10 billion Transit City plan, bouncing along with far too little public debate and critical scrutiny.
Construction along St. Clair Ave. W. creeps along. Businesses along the construction zone are naturally hurting. The finished portions are not nearly as fetching as anticipated. And when it is completed - from Yonge St. to Jane St. - travellers will save about a minute in commuting time. All for about $100 million.
This would be an old story - except lines along Eglinton, Sheppard, Finch, Jane, Don Mills and elsewhere promise the same technology with a similar approach.
Levine loves streetcars. He helped save them in the 1970s when the TTC planned to mothball them. But the plans for a new St. Clair line were so misguided, Levine says, he insisted on an environmental assessment that would examine details of the proposal. The province said no, but struck a committee to monitor the work. Levine is on the committee, along with ex-mayor John Sewell and resident Margaret Smith, a vocal opponent.
Levine's frustration mounts.
What should have been a win-win for everyone - transit, cycling community, the neighbourhood - satisfies no one. And the reason, Levine says, is a stubborn transit hierarchy. Instead of employing best practices from around the world, where light rail seems to be the mode of the future, the TTC continues to reinvent the wheel.
TTC insisted on a six-inch-high concrete platform in the middle of the street to separate streetcars from cars, though other cities use more flexible and efficient methods. Engineers and designers compounded the problem by installing high centre poles to suspend electrical wires and light the tracks.
To make way for emergency vehicles and the poles, the streetcar bed had to be wider. It's still pinched and dangerous for emergency vehicles. The roads department insisted on two through lanes for traffic, so the wider right-of-way robbed space for a bike lane and sidewalks.
The raised concrete bed - as opposed to bollards or other barriers at grade - must return to street level at intersections to allow cross-traffic; this necessitates constantly ramping up and down, and left and right to align with the centre poles. Engineering, design and maintenance costs rise as a result.
Along the route, Levine points out that finishes to street furniture are often cheap and of a "mean design," not representative of a major city. Transit shelter stops are poorly lit because the original lighting scheme that required the high centre poles was abandoned, though the poles remained. Painted steel rails adorn instead of lower-maintenance stainless steel. Wood bracers are employed where metal would last longer.
Are these the nitpicky preoccupations of a curmudgeon? Or signs of an ossified bureaucracy likely to saddle us with systems that cost more money and reduce service on the streets?
Tough to tell. So we ask.
PUBLICATION: The Toronto Star
DATE: 2009.05.21
EDITION: Met
SECTION: Gta
PAGE: GT03
BYLINE: Royson James
SOURCE: Toronto Star
COPYRIGHT: © 2009 Torstar Corporation
WORD COUNT: 556
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Questioning the calamity of St. Clair
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The last thing Howard Levine said before we parted company at St. Clair West subway station yesterday was, "Don't make me out to be too much of an ogre."
The first thing he said in initiating the tour of the "St. Clair calamity," the streetcar right-of-way now under construction, was this: "If St. Clair is the template for Transit City, Toronto is hurtling towards disaster."
Levine is a retired planner, city councillor, transit buff and incurable activist who lives along the controversial transit route. His claims may be alarmist, but there is much at stake - the $10 billion Transit City plan, bouncing along with far too little public debate and critical scrutiny.
Construction along St. Clair Ave. W. creeps along. Businesses along the construction zone are naturally hurting. The finished portions are not nearly as fetching as anticipated. And when it is completed - from Yonge St. to Jane St. - travellers will save about a minute in commuting time. All for about $100 million.
This would be an old story - except lines along Eglinton, Sheppard, Finch, Jane, Don Mills and elsewhere promise the same technology with a similar approach.
Levine loves streetcars. He helped save them in the 1970s when the TTC planned to mothball them. But the plans for a new St. Clair line were so misguided, Levine says, he insisted on an environmental assessment that would examine details of the proposal. The province said no, but struck a committee to monitor the work. Levine is on the committee, along with ex-mayor John Sewell and resident Margaret Smith, a vocal opponent.
Levine's frustration mounts.
What should have been a win-win for everyone - transit, cycling community, the neighbourhood - satisfies no one. And the reason, Levine says, is a stubborn transit hierarchy. Instead of employing best practices from around the world, where light rail seems to be the mode of the future, the TTC continues to reinvent the wheel.
TTC insisted on a six-inch-high concrete platform in the middle of the street to separate streetcars from cars, though other cities use more flexible and efficient methods. Engineers and designers compounded the problem by installing high centre poles to suspend electrical wires and light the tracks.
To make way for emergency vehicles and the poles, the streetcar bed had to be wider. It's still pinched and dangerous for emergency vehicles. The roads department insisted on two through lanes for traffic, so the wider right-of-way robbed space for a bike lane and sidewalks.
The raised concrete bed - as opposed to bollards or other barriers at grade - must return to street level at intersections to allow cross-traffic; this necessitates constantly ramping up and down, and left and right to align with the centre poles. Engineering, design and maintenance costs rise as a result.
Along the route, Levine points out that finishes to street furniture are often cheap and of a "mean design," not representative of a major city. Transit shelter stops are poorly lit because the original lighting scheme that required the high centre poles was abandoned, though the poles remained. Painted steel rails adorn instead of lower-maintenance stainless steel. Wood bracers are employed where metal would last longer.
Are these the nitpicky preoccupations of a curmudgeon? Or signs of an ossified bureaucracy likely to saddle us with systems that cost more money and reduce service on the streets?
Tough to tell. So we ask.
kettal
Banned
I also don't understand why the tracks must be raised like that. But I don't think road width is a problem for much of the new lines.
RedRocket191
Senior Member
A lot of the issues in the article I find to be subjective opinions about the physical design, so to each his own...
But, lets not forget that the one-minute time saving claims don't take into account how unreliable the mixed-traffic operation was. The $100 million investment doesn't just bring 1 minute faster travel times - it also brings reliability and the ability to throw more cars down the line without them getting stuck in traffic.
But, lets not forget that the one-minute time saving claims don't take into account how unreliable the mixed-traffic operation was. The $100 million investment doesn't just bring 1 minute faster travel times - it also brings reliability and the ability to throw more cars down the line without them getting stuck in traffic.