Transit City Plan

[SunriseChampion]

Calgary overtaking Toronto? In what? Lameness?

I drove Toronto-Vancouver last August and Calgary was the only city I visited that I don't want to go back to. This includes Regina!

 

[doady]

Calgary overtaking Toronto? In what? Lameness?

I drove Toronto-Vancouver last August and Calgary was the only city I visited that I don't want to go back to. This includes Regina!

Personally I think the whole GTA is going downhill and Transit Shitty is a good example of that. It is sad to see what is happening. I don't think Toronto will ever be able to recover from this mistake.

 

[Second_in_pie]

I agree. We're heading downhill with just about everything. We seriously need to get a more (how do I say this) open minded (?) politician who understands the importance of big projects. I have to admit, Miller was a nice break for the city. He did some pretty good things, but we really need a change.

I think Transit City is good in principle, but they should have a careful mix of Subway Extension, LRT, "Real" LRT, and completely new Subway lines for it to work properly.

Then again, just my 2 cents

 

[SunriseChampion]

Well, yes, I agree with you guys, with a bit less emphasis on how downhill we might be going but Calgary?


Man, what a sterile and glib wasteland that place is! No offence to anyone from there but I found it to be a very.......odd city with a ghost town of a central district (and that at 11pm) and almost NO character. Just cause they have LRT doesn't make them great. So, they got one thing right.....cookies for them then?

See, if Van City or Montreal were to take over our power and influence, I'd be more hesitant to disbelieve their ability to do so in a more complete way...but Calgary? Never!

Besides, oil is over and that's what they're built on. We have an increasingly powerful financial sector going for us. Finances are nowhere near being on the way out; oil, not so much.

In fact, if I may, I'd like to predict that Calgary's power and influence will peak (if it hasn't already) by 2015 and then steadily drop as we start tripping over peak oil.

 

[prosperegal]

I think our politicians just don't know how to spend money wisely. I mean, extending the subway to Richmond Hill? Come on! Maybe in like 2035 or something, but right now, I think it shouldn't go beyond York (or one stop north of York), I'm also not too sure if we need all those EW "LRT" lines north of Bloor. Eglinton is necessary, yes, but the others? As I've said over and over, I was *SHOCKED* to see NOTHING going further south of Bloor on the Transit City plan, and to hear from the TTC peeps that it is in "phase 2." This needs to be PHASE 1!

You should also see the reply in my "Cynthia's Thoughts" post this week. Once again, it isn't about what $$$ we have, it's about how we spend it.

 

[Dan416]

I think I speak for everyone here when I say we all support the DRL, in one form or another. That should have been our priority, and based on logically expanding the subways we do have, give LRT to the corridors that don't need subway-level capacity. And I mean REAL LRT. LRT so good it would almost be a match for the subway in terms of speed, not limping along at near-bus speeds.

 

[SunriseChampion]

I think our politicians just don't know how to spend money wisely.

You meant to say: I know our politicians just don't know how to spend money wisely. Right?


What I don't get are the Scarborough components of Transit City. If, as has been said here, they're doing it for political gain, they're still going about it the wrong way! This will get them minimal support in Scarborough, if any at all (above and beyond their current support there).

 

[Hipster Duck]

Personally I think the whole GTA is going downhill and Transit Shitty is a good example of that. It is sad to see what is happening. I don't think Toronto will ever be able to recover from this mistake.

Well, I'm not going to lie: Transit City sucks, and it will probably prevent us from having a decent intracity rapid transit system for the foreseeable future. That said, it doesn't really mean that Toronto is going down the drain. This city is too robust and dynamic for that and, if it wasn't for the abysmal state of our transit system, I would say that Toronto is firing on all cylinders. Transportation is very important, but it won't completely make or break the city. Besides, Transit City is, at least, better than the status quo (bus service), even if it is horribly expensive for what it does and would fail any real cost benefit analysis.

 

[LAz]

I have a question... and sorry if it has been asked before.


They plan to make the eglinton cross town thing partly under-ground. Now, what I don't get is why not make the under-ground part a subway automatically, IF they are bothering to dig?

 

[Second_in_pie]

I agree with the above. Toronto is definitely not going downhill. We're just missing out on the opportunities that we have to make it better, and are partially screwing ourselves over for the opportunities we may have in the future.

The Transit City idea is good, but relying solely on streetcar-style LRT is a silly way of providing intercity transit. As I said before, in this plan, we need to find the opportunities for Streetcar-style LRT, fully separated LRT and Subway. I just hope we look for those opportunities before we screw our future over too much.


LAz, there are two reasons I can think of. The first is that it is easier to connect the LRTs if the vehicles can run on all the new lines. The second is that the TTC and City believe Toronto doesn't need any more Subway. To be honest, I can't imagine Eglinton with a LRT instead of a Subway.

My idea for Transit City Phase 1 would be this:

Sheppard East: Merge with Sheppard Subway, run with fully seperated LRT.
Finch West: Fully Seperated LRT
Don Mills: Median Seperated LRT
Waterfront: Median Seperated
Eglinton: Subway
Scarborough: Fully Seperated
Jane: Median Seperated

 

[adma]

Calgary overtaking Toronto? In what? Lameness?

I drove Toronto-Vancouver last August and Calgary was the only city I visited that I don't want to go back to. This includes Regina!

Which, in a subtle way, may say more about Regina than it says about Calgary. (Saskatchewan cities are underrated.)

 

[LAz]

LAz, there are two reasons I can think of. The first is that it is easier to connect the LRTs if the vehicles can run on all the new lines. The second is that the TTC and City believe Toronto doesn't need any more Subway. To be honest, I can't imagine Eglinton with a LRT instead of a Subway.

They may as well call it the eglinton subway then! =P

In chicago there is the red-line. Our subway system is actually 90% above ground. Anyhows, the red line goes down bellow ground, and the bellow ground part is called the state-street subway. Same with the blue line. Now, it's all heavy rail, but perhaps they might do that, call it a subway just 'cause it's bellow ground.


But still, I am just disgusted that the underground part is not a real subway, if they bother to dig.

 

[Rainforest]

My idea for Transit City Phase 1 would be this:

Sheppard East: Merge with Sheppard Subway, run with fully seperated LRT.
Finch West: Fully Seperated LRT
Don Mills: Median Seperated LRT
Waterfront: Median Seperated
Eglinton: Subway
Scarborough: Fully Seperated
Jane: Median Seperated

I would think that Sheppard is a better place for subway than Eglinton. Sheppard is quite far from Bloor and there is no other good alternative for fast E-W trips across the north of 416. For Eglinton, the alternatives would be Bloor subway, and in future (hopefully) the Midtown GO line. So, Eglinton can focus on better short- and medium-length trips, and being a feeder for multiple subway and GO lines that cross it, or will cross it in future. LRT should work just fine for those purposes.

Besides, a portion of Sheppard subway exists already.

Regarding the fully separated Sheppard E and Scarborough LRT: where would they be placed? Maps do not show space for them (although I am not familiar with the areas).

 

[Second_in_pie]

Having fully separated LRTs anywhere would require a fair bit of work and land-grabbing on the City and Commision's part, but I think they both are important lines to be faster and higher-capacity than the proposed LRT.

I understand your point with Eglinton, but I think it is a much better route for densification than Sheppard is right now, as it is closer to downtown. Also, there is already a fair bit of development on Eglinton already, so a fully separated LRT would be much harder to do. Basically on Eglinton, it's either TTC style LRT or Subway or Nothing.

Of course, all the median separated LRT lines MUST have signaling priority, as well as Spadina, Waterfront and St. Clair.

 

[LAz]

I think it would be good if they extended the sheppard line by one stop - to say oh, victoria ave?, and then down to eglinton...