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Transit City Plan

Which transit plan do you prefer?

  • Transit City

    Votes: 95 79.2%

  • Ford City

    Votes: 25 20.8%
  • Total voters
    120
I expect on Transit City that Ford simply said that they were working on a plan to use the same money more wisely to build subway instead of above-ground LRT, and McGuinty would simply have said that if such a plan came forward, they would consider it.

Ford isn't detail-oriented enough to go any deeper. And McGuinty doesn't need to shoot him down yet. It's quite evident that any new plan isn't going to fly, without cancelling the underground section of Eglinton RT, which Ford will likely never get Council to agree to.
 
nfitz said:
Looks like the money for Toronto's first Transit City line might end up putting LRT on Hurontario:

Mississauga only too pleased to take Toronto’s light rail money
Click to expand...

At least Mississauga's light rail is supposed to be real LRT, not the tramway design Toronto was proposing. Take a look at the stop spacing in this PDF:

http://www.hurontario-main.ca/PDFs/Newsletter 3.pdf

Since most people are unaware of the stop spacing of Transit City routes, they will get to see real LRT constructed in Mississauga with the money and plans Ford fumbled, and will cost him the next election. This is assuming he isn't forced to resign early due to public pressure...
 
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You guys understand that if there end up being operational concerns with regards to stop spacing it's trivial to remove some of them, right? Next you'll be saying we have to cancel Transit City because you don't like the paint colour on the vehicles.
 
Are there not sections of the Mississauga LRT that will operate in mixed traffic?

I can only imagine what would by said by the Subway junkies on here about TC lines if the same were true of TC
 
nfitz said:
Looks like the money for Toronto's first Transit City line might end up putting LRT on Hurontario:

Mississauga only too pleased to take Toronto’s light rail money
Click to expand...

Well, we can look at it this way: at least any dollars not being spent on transit in Toronto will be spent on transit in the rest of the GTA. And since a lot of the 905 projects are BRT, we could see some pretty substantial improvements in BRT in the next few years. Not great news for Toronto, but hey it's better than everyone getting nothing.
 
GraphicMatt said:
You guys understand that if there end up being operational concerns with regards to stop spacing it's trivial to remove some of them, right?
Click to expand...

That doesn't seem likely once they're in. Removing them may not be an engineering challenge exactly, but the optics of the money wasted and the poor planning on the other hand...

Hurontario is also an appropriate corridor, it isn't central to the region, and no existing subway line would be cynically preempted either.
 
Electrify said:
At least Mississauga's light rail is supposed to be real LRT, not the tramway design Toronto was proposing. Take a look at the stop spacing in this PDF:
Click to expand...
I'm calling BS on this one.

There is nothing in the defnition of LRT that is a function of stop spacing.

Your just making this up.

Even in this, the average stop spacing on the reserved lane from the North Service Road to Nanwood is 850 metres. The average stop spacing on the Eglinton LRT is 700 metres. One is LRT and the other one isn't?

And much of this line actually operates in mixed traffic. Mixed traffic is LRT but non-mixed traffic isn't?????
 
GraphicMatt said:
You guys understand that if there end up being operational concerns with regards to stop spacing it's trivial to remove some of them, right? Next you'll be saying we have to cancel Transit City because you don't like the paint colour on the vehicles.
Click to expand...

They did this on the B Branch of the Green Line in Boston... Didn't really help much. It only marginally improved the line's performance.

Also, taking out stops isn't as easy as taking down a bus stop pole. If all they do is stop servicing the stop, it'll start to look like an eyesore pretty quickly. On the otherhand, it would cost a fair bit of money to rip out the stop and replace it with curbing to make it look like it was never there. Either way, it's not good. I'd much rather add stops later (Like North York Centre), then have to remove stops.
 
GraphicMatt said:
You guys understand that if there end up being operational concerns with regards to stop spacing it's trivial to remove some of them, right? Next you'll be saying we have to cancel Transit City because you don't like the paint colour on the vehicles.
Click to expand...

I do support Transit City more than some, but the stop spacing is a deal breaker for me personally. The stop spacing makes the difference between a rapid transit line and a tramway. If they can fix the stop spacing, then I can and will support it 100%. I've stated this numerous times, and I think you would find that many TC opponents would get on side with the project as well.
 
nfitz said:
Even in this, the average stop spacing on the reserved lane from the North Service Road to Nanwood is 850 metres. The average stop spacing on the Eglinton LRT is 700 metres. One is LRT and the other one isn't?
Click to expand...
I seem to recall that of all the complaints on this forum about Transit City, the central Eglinton portion was actually the least objectionable. If the whole system had been laid out with stop spacing similar to that, I could see a lot of anti-TC people converted.

And much of this line actually operates in mixed traffic. Mixed traffic is LRT but non-mixed traffic isn't?????
Click to expand...
5 out of 29 stations are in mixed traffic. I'm not entirely sure that constitutes "much".

Arguing the semantic usage of "LRT" is going to get nowhere. What people really wanted was "rapid" transit, and the Mississauga proposal actually delivers on that for the majority of the line.
 
I honestly don't think the stops will impact speed or reliability that much - they're further apart than the downtown streetcars and all-door low-floor boarding plus proof-of-payment will mean minimal dwell time at each stop. Working signal priority is probably a bigger concern.
 
I second the BS call. The Mississauga plan is virtually identical to most of the Transit City proposals. Stop spacings vary according to local conditions and the purpose of the line of course but in many respects they aren't that much different. What is cynical about building an LRT line that will use half of its maximum capacity in place of a subway line that would use one sixth?
 
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