article
Cost may stall automated train plan
Commissioners split on $750M recommendation
Idea would increase rider capacity: Moscoe
Nov. 18, 2006. 01:00 AM
DAVID BRUSER
TRANSPORTATION REPORTER
TTC commissioner Peter Li Preti hears about automated trains and thinks:
Big cost. Wrong move.
Li Preti and other commissioners weighed in on TTC chair Howard Moscoe's controversial $750 million recommendation that a computer drive our subways.
"Every time he comes up with a bright idea, he comes up with a big cost, and the TTC cannot afford it," he said.
Li Preti would rather build new subway lines, and believes it's a service expansion plan the provincial and federal authorities would get behind quicker than driverless trains.
"I think building out is the only way we'll increase ridership, by reaching out to the 905 areas, to make sure people leave their cars at home and hop on the subway."
But Moscoe says that automated train service — where a computer system tells the train how far it is behind the train in front, when to slow down and when to speed up — would allow running trains closer together and, as a result, increase rider capacity by at least 40 per cent without sinking a shovel.
Automated trains are not new: Paris, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Turin, New York, Tokyo, San Francisco and Toulouse all have driverless metros, streetcars or Light Rapid Transit systems.
The TTC's Scarborough Rapid Transit uses it on its smaller, mostly ground-level trains. Vancouver's SkyTrain has been running without drivers, a derailment or collision since 1986, a spokesperson said.
In Montreal, Metro operations executive director Carl Desrosiers says the subway trains have been capable of automatic, semi-automatic and manual operation since radio signals sent through the rails began guiding the network in 1976.
Desrosiers also says the system is currently upgrading to the computer-driven automation Moscoe wants here in Toronto.
"If something doesn't go well, or there is a malfunction, the system would shut down, then the (human operator) can override it," Desrosiers said. "My own opinion, the system is much safer than the train operator. Very safe. Since 1976 we never had any derailments, any collisions."
Though TTC commissioner Joe Mihevc thinks money should first be spent on more buses, streetcars and Light Rapid Transit, he is confident automated train technology is safe.
Mihevc said he's seen how the Vancouver SkyTrain works and was impressed with its system of safeguards.
"It's almost like two computer systems operating at the same time verifying each other and if one doesn't verify the accuracy of the other, the system shuts down. (The train) doesn't move until it's corrected. It's very technologically sophisticated."
Both commissioner Brian Ashton and TTC interim general manager Gary Webster say that there is already $300 million in the capital budget to replace the 50-year-old conventional signalling system in the Yonge-University-Spadina line over the next several years. Under one scenario that money could be used to pay for automating the line. But both say such a plan would probably require provincial and federal money.
Meanwhile, Moscoe's recommendation sparked many Star readers to post their thoughts yesterday on the newspaper's website, thestar.com. From Silvio Di Nicola of Toronto: "Why don't we get an automated system to replace Howard Moscoe? A system that would stretch further north, west and east is where the money could be better spent. That would increase ridership and reduce gridlock on our streets."
And from Leo Gonzalez of East York: "I think it's a great idea if it really does increase capacity, as Moscoe suggests. Plus, the current arrangement of two operators per train seems quite wasteful; one operator per train is all that should be needed."
Under Moscoe's plan, the train driver would essentially become someone who sits at the front of the train and manually closes the doors once all commuters are aboard.
He or she would also presumably override the computer system when and if it malfunctions. But automation would antiquate the other employee — the guard — who under the current system manually opens and closes doors.
With one of the two subway staffers made extraneous by automation, Moscoe wants to create a rank of subway station masters in charge of improving service and beautification.
TTC commissioner Sandra Bussin wants both train automation and station masters.
"A lot of times, the things that seem different from the norm end up being popular," she said.
Train automation would also allow the TTC to operate two-way, all-night service on only one track — say, from 10 p.m. to 5:30 a.m. — as it could deftly navigate trains moving in opposite directions out of each other's way using short peripheral, or "cross-over" tracks that run off a main line about every 5 kilometres.
Commissioner Suzan Hall says she would rather spend money on Light Rapid Transit.
But commissioner Glenn De Baeremaeker said, "Howard (Moscoe) is bang on the money. (Automation) is the way of the future."
Meanwhile, commuter Brian Levine, a 48-year-old music industry consultant, told the Star's Matthew Chung he has safety concerns.
"An automated system obviously can't be as flexibly responsive to an emergency as a live driver," Levine said.
