Transit City Plan

[W. K. Lis]

Tourists will leave?

"Honey, let's go to Toronto for the weekend!"
"No way Jose, I can't drive down Spadina, so we're not going anywhere!"

ya that makes sense.
Here's the thing, I've worked for the city and province in tourism and people that visit Toronto don't care whether they can drive from the CN Tower to the ROM. Our downtown is very compact and a large percentage of the attractions are within a walkable distance of eachother. Tourists know that and I don't think I ever once spoke to one who had complaints about traffic. You know why? Tourists like to experience new things. Riding the subway or the streetcar is like an adventure for them. It's a fantastic opportunity to see the city in a whole other way and they jump at it.

You also make it sound like tourism and driving go hand in hand. Well, try driving in Paris or London as a foreigner. You'd be hard pressed to find a tourist doing that, and those two cities are doing quite well for themselves. Also, don't you think people know about traffic? They tend to come from places that have traffic too. it's not something that's unique to Toronto.

If I go downtown, I sometimes transfer at Dundas West station and take the 505 Dundas streetcar to get to Dundas and Yonge. If I am in a rush, I would continue riding the subway down there. However, I prefer to ride on the streetcar and look out the window. It is the same if I have to get to any of the streetcar intersections with Yonge.

For Wellesley, I stick with the subway. A bus serves that station, so I have no desire to use a bus to get to that intersection.

 

[Dichotomy]

Tourists will leave?

"Honey, let's go to Toronto for the weekend!"
"No way Jose, I can't drive down Spadina, so we're not going anywhere!"

ya that makes sense.
Here's the thing, I've worked for the city and province in tourism and people that visit Toronto don't care whether they can drive from the CN Tower to the ROM. Our downtown is very compact and a large percentage of the attractions are within a walkable distance of eachother. Tourists know that and I don't think I ever once spoke to one who had complaints about traffic. You know why? Tourists like to experience new things. Riding the subway or the streetcar is like an adventure for them. It's a fantastic opportunity to see the city in a whole other way and they jump at it.

You also make it sound like tourism and driving go hand in hand. Well, try driving in Paris or London as a foreigner. You'd be hard pressed to find a tourist doing that, and those two cities are doing quite well for themselves. Also, don't you think people know about traffic? They tend to come from places that have traffic too. it's not something that's unique to Toronto.

There we go again, comparing ourselves to London (8 million) and Paris (10 million) and their 1,500 year old road network. London surpassed 1 million persons when Toronto was still a farming community, so how can we compare our challenges to theirs?
Whether the tourists arrive by bus, taxi or plane - they have to get into this city somehow. Our traffic rivals cities twice our size - not an accomplishment to brag about. I have taken the Red Rocket to the airport because it is faster than the bloody Gardiner (plus the exorbitant parking at the other end!) but how many tourists know about that link at the end of Kipling?
I am sure many of them do walk or take the TTC once they have checked into their hotels, but first they have to arrive there, no?
The hatred for the automobile on forums like these is irrational. Even if tourists take a taxi, will they also not be caught in our hellish 4 lane roads while the meter ticks?

BTW, I rent a car in most every city I have been in: L.A., Sao Paulo, Vancouver, etc. Unless I am travelling within the central core, the car is almost always faster and more convenient. (I've even driven to Vancouver 3 times in my life, in my younger days )

 

[MisterF]

There we go again, comparing ourselves to London (8 million) and Paris (10 million) and their 1,500 year old road network. London surpassed 1 million persons when Toronto was still a farming community, so how can we compare our challenges to theirs?
Whether the tourists arrive by bus, taxi or plane - they have to get into this city somehow. Our traffic rivals cities twice our size - not an accomplishment to brag about. I have taken the Red Rocket to the airport because it is faster than the bloody Gardiner (plus the exorbitant parking at the other end!) but how many tourists know about that link at the end of Kipling?
I am sure many of them do walk or take the TTC once they have checked into their hotels, but first they have to arrive there, no?
The hatred for the automobile on forums like these is irrational. Even if tourists take a taxi, will they also not be caught in our hellish 4 lane roads while the meter ticks?

What's irrational is your argument. You say that Toronto's streets are too narrow and congested, but completely dismiss the experiences of bigger cities with narrower, more congested streets? The fact that London is thousands of years old is irrelevant. What's relevant is that it's a huge, dense city with a narrow, medieval street system and zero freeways in its core. By your logic it should be deserted by now, yet it's one of the biggest economic powerhouses in the world. Obviously wider roads aren't the answer.

Re: the Gardiner, we've already shown you what a tiny percentage of downtown workers use that section of the Gardiner. No need to keep proving you wrong in every thread you hijack.

 

[nfitz]

Paris's streets have never struck me as narrow - and they have plenty of downtown arteries and expressways. And they are very straight, like here.

And Paris seems to have worse traffic than London - at least as far as I could see.

Perhaps Dichotomy could expand on this?

 

[Hipster Duck]

There we go again, comparing ourselves to London (8 million) and Paris (10 million) and their 1,500 year old road network.

Yeah, if you read the text closely you'll notice that Beowulf slayed Grendel on the Watford exit of the M-25.

BTW, I rent a car in most every city I have been in: L.A., Sao Paulo, Vancouver, etc. Unless I am travelling within the central core, the car is almost always faster and more convenient.

Are you this guy?

 

[Whoaccio]

Beijing's Subway in 2005:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/73/Beijing_Subway_System_now.png

Beijing's Subway in ~2012-4:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a2/Beijing-Subway-Plan.png

Now, I know Beijing is infinitely larger than Toronto, and the context of the Olympics and China's economic boom make comparison to Toronto more than a little bit unfair; but I think the dramatic nature of that transformation should at least give Toronto an idea of the direction it needs to go. Or at least dispel the notion that every other city on earth is breaking it's back to partake in the magnificence of the streetcar renaissance. Seriously, no city Toronto's scale is actively ignoring it's RT network.

NYC? 2nd Av. Line

Vancouver? RAV & Evergreen Lines

London? Crossrail (arguably not "subway", but more impressive than anything we have on the books).

Copenhagen? City Circle Line.

The whole of China is basically going ape with subway construction.

Singapore has odd 70km of subway construction on the books.

Dubai has a system coming, but I guess that is no surprise.

 

[Dan416]

Beijing's Subway in 2005:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/73/Beijing_Subway_System_now.png

Beijing's Subway in ~2012-4:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a2/Beijing-Subway-Plan.png

Now, I know Beijing is infinitely larger than Toronto, and the context of the Olympics and China's economic boom make comparison to Toronto more than a little bit unfair; but I think the dramatic nature of that transformation should at least give Toronto an idea of the direction it needs to go. Or at least dispel the notion that every other city on earth is breaking it's back to partake in the magnificence of the streetcar renaissance. Seriously, no city Toronto's scale is actively ignoring it's RT network.

NYC? 2nd Av. Line

Vancouver? RAV & Evergreen Lines

London? Crossrail (arguably not "subway", but more impressive than anything we have on the books).

Copenhagen? City Circle Line.

The whole of China is basically going ape with subway construction.

Singapore has odd 70km of subway construction on the books.

Dubai has a system coming, but I guess that is no surprise.

Ah don't destroy your credibility by using Dubai as an example.

 

[Calrissian]

Beijing's Subway in 2005:

Now, I know Beijing is infinitely larger than Toronto, and the context of the Olympics and China's economic boom make comparison to Toronto more than a little bit unfair; but I think the dramatic nature of that transformation should at least give Toronto an idea of the direction it needs to go. Or at least dispel the notion that every other city on earth is breaking it's back to partake in the magnificence of the streetcar renaissance. Seriously, no city Toronto's scale is actively ignoring it's RT network.

NYC? 2nd Av. Line

Vancouver? RAV & Evergreen Lines

London? Crossrail (arguably not "subway", but more impressive than anything we have on the books).

Copenhagen? City Circle Line.

The whole of China is basically going ape with subway construction.

Singapore has odd 70km of subway construction on the books.

Dubai has a system coming, but I guess that is no surprise.

Hey Man, what about the YUS line extensions to Vaughan and Richmond Hill? Or the Sheppard line out past don mills to ??? And the Eglinton crosstown which has been offered up as underground in the center and ALRT as options?

Plus the beefing up of GO transit lines/extensions/train service?

Transit plans are looking better than they have in a long time.

We're not done by any means, but hopefully Metrolinx can fill in some of those gaps and sell in some other big ideas to compliment these initiatives.

 

[jn_12]

Thanks MisterF for pointing out his flawed argument. Saves me some typing.

Paris's streets have never struck me as narrow - and they have plenty of downtown arteries and expressways. And they are very straight, like here.

And Paris seems to have worse traffic than London - at least as far as I could see.

Perhaps Dichotomy could expand on this?

Ya Haussmann created the grand boulevards, but by no means were they because he had the foresight to imagine a world of automobiles. If anything, you could say that London did more to help traffic than Paris ever did. They destroyed all of the old city gates because they impeded horse/carriage traffic. If you have a chance to read "London: A Life in Maps", it details in a lot of detail the changes that have taken place in London over the centuries. The London we know today is really only 350 years old and that's just the City. Much of the city was built during Toronto's era.

So how does this tie in with Transit City? Well, I think if anything Toronto can learn from the older European cities about how to use its space better and enable an environment that is conducive to every mode of transportation. I think it'd be interesting to look at the type of resistance that European cities had to put up with when it came to transit choices, and compare it to what we're doing today (Perhaps a nice little grad paper to work on down the line). All we're doing is disadvantaging those who choose to take the most inefficient means of transportation. Its not like we're infringing on rights or livelihoods as Haussmann did when he razed buildings in Paris to complete his vision.

 

[Rainforest]

Rainforest

I actually think the subway will easily be able to absorb the extra trips generated by a northward extension to Richmond Hill. The reasons are as follows:

-The Spadina subway will already have been built, which will take many people from Finch and Steeles buses off of the Yonge line.

-Signal improvements and new vehicles will increase capacity by possibly 10% or more.

Most importantly:

-Those who work or attend school south of Bloor are likely already using transit. A northward extension won't necessarily generate that many new trips south of Bloor.

-I wouldn't be surprised if more people from York Region work in midtown (St. Clair, Eglinton, and NYCC combined), than right downtown. Probably only 1 in 10 of the new riders will still be on the subway at Bloor.

The Yonge subway extension can generate more downtown trips in a number of ways. Some will switch from the Richmond Hill GO line. Since that line is so indirect, it will be only marginally faster than Yonge subway for a trip to Union (35 min on GO vs about 40 min on subway), while having a lower frequency and just one downtown stop. Some will switch from their cars. This is good for the overall mission of public transit, but still adds passengers south of Bloor. Yet, some people will just choose to work downtown and live in Richmond Hill because the subway line has become available.

Diversions to the extended Spadina line will help to de-congest Yonge north of Bloor. But south of Bloor, both Yonge and Spadina trains are sardine-packed during AM peak, and a load shift won't be helpful there.

The signal improvements would accommodate just the Richmond Hill extension plan, but not the combined effect of that + Eglinton + Finch W + Sheppard E.

The most reliable way to mitigate that would be to build the downtown relief subway before any other subway expansion. Unfortunately, DRL does not show up very high in the current list of priorities. Metrolinx's Plan B and C both include the Sheppard E and Eglinton subways, but only Plan C has DRL.

Potentially, there are other ways to prevent the crunch on the downtown subway routes. Metrolinx touts GO service enhancements as a remedy, but no numerical estimates of the effect (number of trips diverted) or the costs are available to date. I hope such estimates will be published within the RTP in September. Another option would be to encourage employment growth along the new rails transit lines north of Bloor, but again, it is not clear how effective it might be.

 

[balmoral]

Drl

Does anyone agree that the Downtown Relief Line is poorly branded? Its' name implies a finality, or an end solution. To my mind, it should be the first of multiple downtown lines. The fact that it takes 45 minutes and multiple transfers/vehicle types to get from, say, Bathurst and College to the Distillery District, is an absolute joke. Its about time the residents of the city proper took a stand - enough with placating suburbanites.

 

[Whoaccio]

Does anyone agree that the Downtown Relief Line is poorly branded? Its' name implies a finality, or an end solution. To my mind, it should be the first of multiple downtown lines. The fact that it takes 45 minutes and multiple transfers/vehicle types to get from, say, Bathurst and College to the Distillery District, is an absolute joke. Its about time the residents of the city proper took a stand - enough with placating suburbanites.

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&ll=43.624147,-79.356308&spn=0.358371,0.892639&z=11&msid=113698378265685182514.000453e955001c59f21be&mid=1218162100

If we build this, I would be happy.

 

[RedRocket191]

@ Rainforest

Three points of clarification.

Metrolinx's reasoning for not releasing any numbers right now is because it will all be released in the plan and the investment strategy. I'm looking forward to the numbers, but if the objective is to get the general public on board, there's no benefit to releasing the numbers without context.

The white papers are not plans. They are merely concepts used in modelling to say "if we did this, what would be the result?" The final plan may look like A, B or C, a combination of all three, or nothing like any of them.

Based on the numbers found in the White Papers, the speed from Langstaff GO via REX would be between 20 and 30 minutes, assuming track and equipment upgrades.

 

[Rainforest]

Rainforest

Metrolinx's reasoning for not releasing any numbers right now is because it will all be released in the plan and the investment strategy. I'm looking forward to the numbers, but if the objective is to get the general public on board, there's no benefit to releasing the numbers without context.

Understood. Sorry if my posts on DRL and REX sound a little impatient, but the reason is that many other prospective lines implicitly affect the situation in the downtown hub, due to both the passenger flows they will generate, and the distribution of funding.

 

[RedRocket191]

Understood. Sorry if my posts on DRL and REX sound a little impatient, but the reason is that many other prospective lines implicitly affect the situation in the downtown hub, due to both the passenger flows they will generate, and the distribution of funding.

No worries. We definitely need something to make getting into the downtown core from midtown Toronto much easier. Shifting riders onto GO trains (without charging an additional fare) can take a big chunk of that, but there is no doubt in my mind that a downtown relief line is needed. It may come in the form of a short-turn GO service, or it may come in the form of a new subway line. Either way I'm confident it will be there, be it green or red in colour.