Transit Fantasy Maps

[MrGoose]

This is kind of ludicrous. We could build an elevated metro line to provide that service (at least as far as Lisgar) for less. Elevated subway style line for maybe $10B.

You're probably right about my estimates they are high. Though I'd add that building an elevated metro line (which what a viaduct to Lisgar would be) over an active mainline would cost more than $10B. It adds to construction complexity.

For viaduct, think about $100M /km. If you have to straddle above a singe-track rail-line, it maybe goes up to maybe $120 as long as you can keep the spans less than about 45m and the "straddle" less than 10m. For very large spans in very large valley, or straddling up to 30m, it might get to $200.
Station, which can vary quite significantly in size, would be on top of this. .

Honestly, California is building their HSR viaducts for 56M USD/KM so 100M CAD/KM over an active rail line is probably a decent worse case scenario estimate.

 

[north-of-anything]

Part of a project to show what Toronto's transit system could look like in the future with mostly planned and existing infrastructure. This is just one of the reorganized routes, with (almost) all transfer opportunities shown in brackets. This route effectively replaces the Downtown Loop portion of the 503.

 

[Bureaucromancer]

Inspired by a grumpy take I had on mashing together all the various interlining proposals that have been made over the years I threw together in the Sheppard Line thread I've taken a shot at a more serious look at what the subway network might look like today if the city had got their way in the 60s and Bloor Danforth were built as the Flying-U.


My thinking is that following BD opening in 1968 as in our timeline things go, roughly, as follows:

• Islington and Warden extension as historically (on second thought, lets cut them back to Jane and Main as a kind of trade for the extra distance downtown that leaves the line only running as far as the streetcar)
• North Yonge extensions exactly as historically
• Spadina is still tied to the expressway, but never has a definite lack of an obvious terminal, eventually settling on phase 1 terminating at Yonge/Bloor for direct connections to both lines, but dropping the viaduct portion that would fully close the gap on Bloor.
  • Not being a University extension I imagine this opens later, delayed by conversion to whatever ICTS becomes in this timeline
• The eastern branch of Spadina takes the place of our SRT
  • This is the first time I see this as positing a lot more construction than we saw historically, but the gap on Bloor will be easy politically, East York will be putting all the weight they have into something like this and I do imagine this kills the prospects for Bloor Danforth extensions in the early 80s
  • The configuration on Bloor and Danforth is definite weird, but it seems plausible given what an after the face conversion into something like our through line plus a DRL alike routing would cost
• I've replaced Sheppard with a longer version of the Rae era Eglinton line that goes all the way to Yonge; this totally ignores the role of Mel Lastman's personality in getting Sheppard built, but feels like it fits with the rest of this
• I've made no attempt to show what the streetcar network might look like, but my suspicion is that the Flying U is too disruptive for it to survive. On the other hand, that probably means a substantially large trolley system.
• I suspect that extension west from Union will be a running theme in proposals, and I've sketched in a version of the UPX that operates as an extension of Yonge.
  • I'm not sure either way on this, it's definitely attractive, and would get attention at the time, but we aren't talking about an era where money for a big damn subway project was going to be easy to get
  • On the other hand, this version of Yonge is essentially an isolated line, mainline capable trains in place of the Rockets seems like the kind of project that could have come out of the end of private sector involvement in Blue 22.
• With the general outline of this, I would not be at all surprised to see a lot more seriousness about use of the Finch hydro corridor, quite possibly at the expense of plans for the 407 transitway. Without a Sheppard line or Downsview extension I definitely see the potential for what was the York-U busway in our timeline to become a northern crosstown . Don Mills/404 to York stage 1, with an extension southwest to meet the Mississauga Transitway happening now maybe?

Edit: added a link to a layered google map since the export really isn't great

 

[MrGoose]

snip

I can't tell if I like this version of the TTC more or our current version more.

 

[Bureaucromancer]

I can't tell if I like this version of the TTC more or our current version more.

If I step back and look at it the way I would something from alternatehistory.com the core of my thoughts are:

• Emotionally I don't love that this probably implies loss of the streetcars - were I actually writing a timeline for that website I'd try and fix this...
• This network is very fond of creating odd gaps where connections really should exist
• There is a tendency toward this being a more urban system, with a definite improvement in coverage of the city and fewer long suburban extensions
• An interesting implication I see of this is that there is that the system becomes a kind of hybrid of Vancouver and Montreal's approaches, with trolley buses on the surface, extensive use of light metro technology and a fairly dense urban network at the expense of long suburban extensions
  • There seems to be a real possibility of this becoming something of a "Canadian model" of rapid transit
• I suspect that a lot of ire would be directed at this network's tendency to force transfers and/or indirect routes on the Bloor Danforth and Spadina/Scarborough lines

 

[aquateam]

Inspired by a grumpy take I had on mashing together all the various interlining proposals that have been made over the years I threw together in the Sheppard Line thread I've taken a shot at a more serious look at what the subway network might look like today if the city had got their way in the 60s and Bloor Danforth were built as the Flying-U.
View attachment 277899

My thinking is that following BD opening in 1968 as in our timeline things go, roughly, as follows:

• Islington and Warden extension as historically (on second thought, lets cut them back to Jane and Main as a kind of trade for the extra distance downtown that leaves the line only running as far as the streetcar)
• North Yonge extensions exactly as historically
• Spadina is still tied to the expressway, but never has a definite lack of an obvious terminal, eventually settling on phase 1 terminating at Yonge/Bloor for direct connections to both lines, but dropping the viaduct portion that would fully close the gap on Bloor.
  • Not being a University extension I imagine this opens later, delayed by conversion to whatever ICTS becomes in this timeline
• The eastern branch of Spadina takes the place of our SRT
  • This is the first time I see this as positing a lot more construction than we saw historically, but the gap on Bloor will be easy politically, East York will be putting all the weight they have into something like this and I do imagine this kills the prospects for Bloor Danforth extensions in the early 80s
  • The configuration on Bloor and Danforth is definite weird, but it seems plausible given what an after the face conversion into something like our through line plus a DRL alike routing would cost
• I've replaced Sheppard with a longer version of the Rae era Eglinton line that goes all the way to Yonge; this totally ignores the role of Mel Lastman's personality in getting Sheppard built, but feels like it fits with the rest of this
• I've made no attempt to show what the streetcar network might look like, but my suspicion is that the Flying U is too disruptive for it to survive. On the other hand, that probably means a substantially large trolley system.
• I suspect that extension west from Union will be a running theme in proposals, and I've sketched in a version of the UPX that operates as an extension of Yonge.
  • I'm not sure either way on this, it's definitely attractive, and would get attention at the time, but we aren't talking about an era where money for a big damn subway project was going to be easy to get
  • On the other hand, this version of Yonge is essentially an isolated line, mainline capable trains in place of the Rockets seems like the kind of project that could have come out of the end of private sector involvement in Blue 22.
• With the general outline of this, I would not be at all surprised to see a lot more seriousness about use of the Finch hydro corridor, quite possibly at the expense of plans for the 407 transitway. Without a Sheppard line or Downsview extension I definitely see the potential for what was the York-U busway in our timeline to become a northern crosstown . Don Mills/404 to York stage 1, with an extension southwest to meet the Mississauga Transitway happening now maybe?

Edit: added a link to a layered google map since the export really isn't great

Famed Toronto Transit chronicler James Bow also wrote about this thought experiment

WHAT IF THE QUEEN SUBWAY WAS BUILT INSTEAD OF THE BLOOR-DANFORTH?

 

[north-of-anything]

I decided to map out what the Toronto streetcar system could look like if they were a little more serious about promoting the lines as separate services. I tried to minimize the amount of new streetcar tracks laid (all of the track is existing except for Waterfront West/East, Broadview south of Queen, the Portlands, the old Christie site, the west end of St Clair, and a new loop at Queen/De Grassi). I shifted the eastern termini of some routes around to properly serve East Harbour via Waterfront, Dundas, and King, and emphasized connections to the Ontario Line to ideally reduce congestion on that line west of East Harbour. I also consolidated several stops, especially in the West End, to try and have about 300 to 500 meters between stops.

I was thinking of taking this and putting it into a much larger map of GTA transit, or labelling all the stops, but I don't really have the energy to do that. There are also a few routes and extensions that I would love to add (e.g. extending a line along Dundas West to Runnymede, or a line along Parliament/Church/Coxwell/Dufferin). I decided to make this map to show what we can do with relatively little investment into new infrastructure, and I'm happy with how it turned out.

 

[DKsan]

View attachment 280302

I decided to map out what the Toronto streetcar system could look like if they were a little more serious about promoting the lines as separate services. I tried to minimize the amount of new streetcar tracks laid (all of the track is existing except for Waterfront West/East, Broadview south of Queen, the Portlands, the old Christie site, the west end of St Clair, and a new loop at Queen/De Grassi). I shifted the eastern termini of some routes around to properly serve East Harbour via Waterfront, Dundas, and King, and emphasized connections to the Ontario Line to ideally reduce congestion on that line west of East Harbour. I also consolidated several stops, especially in the West End, to try and have about 300 to 500 meters between stops.

I was thinking of taking this and putting it into a much larger map of GTA transit, or labelling all the stops, but I don't really have the energy to do that. There are also a few routes and extensions that I would love to add (e.g. extending a line along Dundas West to Runnymede, or a line along Parliament/Church/Coxwell/Dufferin). I decided to make this map to show what we can do with relatively little investment into new infrastructure, and I'm happy with how it turned out.

I think the only piece that you're really missing with existing infrastructure is Bathurst between Bloor and St. Clair, maybe only stopping at Davenport and Dupont to keep the reliability for access to Hilcrest. St. Clair West is a turn-back station, so when Line 1 is shut down south of the station, the current messaging is to the take 512 east to Yonge. But what if there was another option by taking Bathurst?

The only other new track I'd add is extending the Commissioners track to Leslie Barns, for more reliable yard access.

 

[MrGoose]

How come noone ever puts an lrt/street car down Kingston Rd?

Not a criticism, just curious

 

[Towered]

How come noone ever puts an lrt/street car down Kingston Rd?

Not a criticism, just curious

There was an EA done by the city about 10 or 15 years ago which was then quietly left on a shelf somewhere to collect dust...

 

[Midtown Urbanist]

How come noone ever puts an lrt/street car down Kingston Rd?

Not a criticism, just curious

A BRT is currently planned for the corridor which is probably more appropriate than LRT/streetcar operations, but who knows with the way transit planning and funding in this city goes.

 

[andrewmaps]

....dreaming of a better day for VIA

 

[Bureaucromancer]

Typo on Minneapolis, but aside from that, I've long thought the routing VIA briefly tried that takes the Super Contintental through Regina AND Saskatoon makes a lot more sense, albeit considerably less important with restoring The Canadian.

Also, why no Vermonter extension to Montreal? I'd also at least consider extending whatever the service south from Winnipeg is into Chicago, especially if the corridor cross-border route does that. Ideally I'd lean toward a sleeper operating Toronto - Chicago - Winnipeg and extending Windsor Corridor Trains to Detroit Michigan Central.

 

[andrewmaps]

Got it thanks!

 

[andrewmaps]

Typo on Minneapolis, but aside from that, I've long through the routing VIA briefly tried that takes the Super Contintental through Regina AND Saskatoon makes a lot more sense, albeit considerably less important with restoring The Canadian.

Also, why no Vermonter extension to Montreal? I'd also at least consider extending whatever the service south from Winnipeg is into Chicago, especially if the corridor cross-border route does that. Ideally I'd lean toward a sleeper operating Toronto - Chicago - Winnipeg and extending Windsor Corridor Trains to Detroit Michigan Central.

These are all great ideas... thought I was getting carried away taking the Ocean to London, but hey, yeah, why not Chicago/Winnipeg? - with maps like these, we can do whatever we want. cheers