Transit City Plan

[nfitz]

An interesting point from RBT!

 

[Filip]

I read this regularly here. Are you certain? For Ontario?

Soil remediation in Ontario is significantly more strict than it used to be even a decade ago and if I understand correctly significantly more strict than much of the rest of the world. Nearly everything from Eglinton's tunnel will need to be cleaned simply because nearly everything extracted from anywhere does.

Removing double or triple the amount of soil will double to triple the cost of remediation. Leslie LRT was pegged at $50M (and climbing) for the site and doesn't go deeper than a few feet on average.

I suspect that a 30 foot deep trench through an older industrial area would be significantly more expensive than tunnelling deep below the same area if constructed today. Couldn't guess at the Richview corridor specifically but I would want someone to carefully cost both options before jumping to the conclusion it is cheaper; toss in a land sale of the Richview corridor to developers for good measure as a side-of-the-street line will have less easily developable space.

I don't believe the Richview corridor ever saw any industrial uses. Pretty sure it went from farmland to suburbia ~60 years ago.

 

[W. K. Lis]

The HRT subway construction was canceled by the Harris government because it cost too much. As an alternative, the TTC presented Transit City as a less expensive but more wide-spread alternative using light rail. Now there are those who want to cancel the less expensive, wide-spread rapid transit plan with one that is shorter and serves less people. I don't see the logic in sticking with HRT only, if we can save money with LRT and serve more people.

 

[gweed123]

The HRT subway construction was canceled by the Harris government because it cost too much. As an alternative, the TTC presented Transit City as a less expensive but more wide-spread alternative using light rail. Now there are those who want to cancel the less expensive, wide-spread rapid transit plan with one that is shorter and serves less people. I don't see the logic in sticking with HRT only, if we can save money with LRT and serve more people.

Huh? Aside from the Sheppard Subway, I don't think anyone here has been talking HRT for a while now. Especially not on Eglinton. Where are you getting this from?

And HRT was cancelled by the Harris government not because it was too expensive, but because Harris was a dick who hated transit. Big difference.

 

[gweed123]

I don't believe the Richview corridor ever saw any industrial uses. Pretty sure it went from farmland to suburbia ~60 years ago.

That was my understanding of it as well. I thought all of the historical industrial uses in Etobicoke were centred mainly around the rail lines.

I don't imagine that the remediation costs of farmland that was turned into parkland would be that high, if it requires any.

A simple $2000 Phase I ESA would show that next to no contaminants exist in that soil. PS: A Phase I ESA is required for pretty much any development project, and most of the sites that I've dealt with, the Phase I has come back showing no signs of soil contamination. It's only really if it was a former industrial site that dealt with fuels or chemicals that you would have a problem.

 

[Thoughtless Miscreant]

Correct...but guess what?

The richview corridor is so wide and big that...if you moved put the light rail on the far north end (which is partially developed east of Royal York with a new condo) then put development in the zone between the trench and the avenue...what you have is essentially a yonge st all over again.

I wouldn't be surprised if the width of that corridor is about the same as the distance from Yonge st to the subway trench... most probably it is.....

It's only as wide as Yonge corridor from Wincott Dr west. East of there the corridor kind of drifts south so Eglinton is in the middle and there isn't as much room on the north side.

 

[Rainforest]

I suspect that a 30 foot deep trench through an older industrial area would be significantly more expensive than tunnelling deep below the same area if constructed today. Couldn't guess at the Richview corridor specifically but I would want someone to carefully cost both options before jumping to the conclusion it is cheaper; toss in a land sale of the Richview corridor to developers for good measure as a side-of-the-street line will have less easily developable space.

However, does it have to be 30 foot (9 m) deep? The streetcar catenary is about 4 m above ground. So, a 4 or 5 m deep trench should be sufficient for most of the line. Perhaps 7-8 m of depth will be needed near the intersections if the LRT line goes under.

I don't think the Yonge subway trench around Rosedale is 9 m deep.

 

[Mike in TO]

That was my understanding of it as well. I thought all of the historical industrial uses in Etobicoke were centred mainly around the rail lines.

I don't imagine that the remediation costs of farmland that was turned into parkland would be that high, if it requires any.

A simple $2000 Phase I ESA would show that next to no contaminants exist in that soil. PS: A Phase I ESA is required for pretty much any development project, and most of the sites that I've dealt with, the Phase I has come back showing no signs of soil contamination. It's only really if it was a former industrial site that dealt with fuels or chemicals that you would have a problem.

You would be surprised what the costs will be and the new brownfields regs have very very high standards and $2000 is silly number to suggest (O.Reg 153/04 as amended in December 2009 implementation takes place on July 1, 2011 following an 18 month transition period) - virtually anything that is tunneled and removed will have remediation costs associated with it, not to mention all the engineering, labour, legal, testing etc costs associated with it ($2,000 would barely cover the cost of the paper for printing various required reports). The entire polciy and planning framework dealing with these issues is very time consuming and very very costly.

Unfortunately some of the cost discussions taking place in this thread are rather moot points given the number of assumptions being made about a wide variety of legislative requirements that will have to be met and other issues that haven't yet been studied or published (i.e. potential utility and trunk sewer line relocates, property aquisition etc).

 

[gweed123]

You would be surprised what the costs will be and the new brownfields regs have very very high standards and $2000 is silly number to suggest (O.Reg 153/04 as amended in December 2009 implementation takes place on July 1, 2011 following an 18 month transition period) - virtually anything that is tunneled and removed will have remediation costs associated with it, not to mention all the engineering, labour, legal, testing etc costs associated with it ($2,000 would barely cover the cost of the paper for printing various required reports). The entire polciy and planning framework dealing with these issues is very time consuming and very very costly.

Unfortunately some of the cost discussions taking place in this thread are rather moot points given the number of assumptions being made about a wide variety of legislative requirements that will have to be met and other issues that haven't yet been studied or published (i.e. potential utility and trunk sewer line relocates, property aquisition etc).

The $2000 I quoted was to conduct a Phase 1 ESA on the site. I do realize that Phase 2 ESAs cost significantly more, but you need to do a Phase 1 before you do a Phase 2. And the Richview corridor isn't even a brownfield site. It's a reserved transportation corridor. AFAIK, there hasn't been any industrial use on the corridor. As a result, it's very likely that a Phase 1 ESA will come back clean, or clean enough that it doesn't warrant a Phase 2.

PS: I'm dealing with a Brownfield site in an urban context for a new urban subdivision right now. In fact, ironically I was reading through O.Reg 153/04 today. So I'm well aware of the extra loops you have to jump through in order to get your approvals in order.

 

[rbt]

However, does it have to be 30 foot (9 m) deep? The streetcar catenary is about 4 m above ground. So, a 4 or 5 m deep trench should be sufficient for most of the line. Perhaps 7-8 m of depth will be needed near the intersections if the LRT line goes under.

I don't think the Yonge subway trench around Rosedale is 9 m deep.

Okay, 5m then.

I suspect that a 5m deep trench through an older industrial area would be significantly more expensive than tunnelling deep below the same area if constructed today.

 

[gweed123]

Okay, 5m then.

I suspect that a 5m deep trench through an older industrial area would be significantly more expensive than tunnelling deep below the same area if constructed today.

Why do you keep repeating that it's an old industrial area? Do you have any evidence that it is? I'd be interesting in seeing it.

 

[nfitz]

A Phase I ESA is required for pretty much any development project, and most of the sites that I've dealt with, the Phase I has come back showing no signs of soil contamination.

A phase 1 ESA wouldn't indicate whether that was soil contamination or not ... as it doesn't do any testing. If you start hauling soil around, you have to test it.

Besides ... why do you think that a Phase 1 of Eglinton would show no soil contamination? I admit I haven't driven this road in the 1960s ... but were there no gas stations? Was there no fill imported to construct it? In some places in the GTA, the roads themselves are hazardous waste, as they used coal tar as a binding agent from time to time in days gone by.

 

[gweed123]

A phase 1 ESA wouldn't indicate whether that was soil contamination or not ... as it doesn't do any testing. If you start hauling soil around, you have to test it.

Besides ... why do you think that a Phase 1 of Eglinton would show no soil contamination? I admit I haven't driven this road in the 1960s ... but were there no gas stations? Was there no fill imported to construct it? In some places in the GTA, the roads themselves are hazardous waste, as they used coal tar as a binding agent from time to time in days gone by.

I say again, what does fill under Eglinton have to do with the Richview corridor, which as far as I know has never been anything other than parkland and agricultural land? Unless someone can show me evidence of formal industrial uses on lands that are now part of the Richview corridor, all this talk of the lands being contaminated is just speculation.

 

[Dan416]

I say again, what does fill under Eglinton have to do with the Richview corridor, which as far as I know has never been anything other than parkland and agricultural land? Unless someone can show me evidence of formal industrial uses on lands that are now part of the Richview corridor, all this talk of the lands being contaminated is just speculation.

nfitz did bring up the possibility of gas stations. Aside from that, I think the likelihood of contamination here to be improbable and unlikely, but that's just a guess.

 

[gweed123]

nfitz did bring up the possibility of gas stations. Aside from that, I think the likelihood of contamination here to be improbable and unlikely, but that's just a guess.

Gas stations wouldn't be a big deal. Presumably they would be located at intersections (especially if the gas station was there when that area was more rural), which means that the lands that the gas stations were located on would probably be used as station lands anyway, which would be used regardless of if it was tunnelled or trenched.

But yes, other than the occasional gas station located at the intersection of major arterials, I would highly doubt that there was any sort of industrial use on the rest of the corridor that would have contaminated the soil. If anyone can provide evidence to the contrary, I'd love to see it. But until I see that evidence, I'm going with the assumption that this is parkland, and before that it was farmland.