TTC: Other Items (catch all)

[Streety McCarface]

Yes, but how will we be world class?!

World class my ass, it has nothing to do with the type of turnstiles a city uses. Montreal uses metal turnstiles and they have no problems. So do New York City and Chicago.

 

[crs1026]

We have a young black boy who paid his fare, did nothing wrong, wasn’t resisting, that somehow ended up on the floor pinned by five officers.

I continue to question why you have five officers in one location in the first place. That's not effective spot-checking deployment. Seems to me they hang around in groups so they have someone to go to coffee with.

- Paul

 

[steveintoronto]

I continue to question why you have five officers in one location in the first place. That's not effective spot-checking deployment. Seems to me they hang around in groups so they have someone to go to coffee with.

- Paul

Details remain scant, but three of those "officers" were Toronto Police. There were just the two 'fare inspectors' involved. Some other video is emerging on-line, some of it lasting for almost ten minutes.
http://toronto.citynews.ca/video/20...nd-after-rider-pinned-by-ttc-fare-inspectors/

It's truly bizarre to watch, *even if he'd skipped his fare*...which he didn't. There's more than two individuals who have to be called to account on this. In the video linked prior, she counts 15 cops on the scene, and shows them in the video.

WTF?

Apparently good coverage here:
https://www.blogto.com/city/2018/02/ttc-fare-inspectors-video-toronto/

 

[amnesiajune]

Part of Line 1 closed this weekend for Eglinton Crosstown construction and TTC work

February 20, 2018

This weekend, Feb. 24-25, Metrolinx crews will continue construction on the new Eglinton Crosstown LRT, while the TTC takes advantage of this closure to perform track maintenance and asbestos removal in the vicinity, resulting in the closure of TTC's Line 1 Yonge-University between Sheppard-Yonge and St Clair stations.

There will be no traditional north-south shuttle bus service on Yonge Street during this closure. Instead, to provide faster service and more options for customers, the TTC will add frequent express service on all major east-west routes to connect customers to the University portion of Line 1 at Yonge-Sheppard, York Mills, Lawrence and Eglinton stations. This will allow for quicker access to the downtown core, including the Air Canada Centre for the Toronto Maple Leafs and Toronto Raptors games this weekend.

TTC Customer Service Ambassadors will be present in all stations along the closure area to assist customers getting where they need to go.

In addition to regular weekend bus service, express buses will run frequently on the following routes:
- 32 Eglinton West
- 52 Lawrence West
- 84 Sheppard West
- 96 Wilson

For customers travelling to and from locations along Yonge St., the TTC will provide increased service on the 97 Yonge route.

The 61 Avenue Rd North and 512 St Clair routes will also run more frequently throughout the weekend.

Please see the attached map for more information.

Customers travelling from York Region are encouraged to use the University portion of Line 1. Free parking is available at Highway 407, Pioneer Village and Finch West stations.

All stations will be open for fare sales, connections and access to surface vehicles. Buses that normally service Davisville Station will board outside on Yonge St., Chaplin Cres. and Davisville Ave. TTC staff will be on site to direct customers and answer questions.

Current work on the Eglinton Crosstown project includes construction below the existing TTC station at Eglinton, a shift of the TTC's platform to the north and a new TTC tunnel ventilation system at the south and north ends of the subway platform.

The Eglinton Crosstown LRT is scheduled to open in 2021.
This is the first of several closures of this portion of Line 1 in 2018. More than 20 closures in total will be required for Crosstown LRT construction.

The next scheduled subway closures are:
- Mar. 10-11 - Line 1 Yonge-University: St Clair West to Union for ATC signal upgrades
- Mar. 17-18 - Line 3 Scarborough for track work

I'm curious how it'll work out with no shuttle buses. It seems reasonable along Sheppard, Wilson and Lawrence, but Yonge & Eglinton could be a mess - Eglinton has lots of construction, and all the people who are transit-dependent are gonna be forced to go west for 15+ minutes. Maybe it would make sense to have an Eglinton - St. Clair shuttle instead.

The closure a couple of weeks ago was actually pretty smooth for shuttle buses. The police directing traffic at St. Clair seemed very aggressive stopping cars so that buses could make the left turn. The only pain point was at Eglinton where the road went down to one lane per direction.

 

[Richard White]

I'm curious how it'll work out with no shuttle buses. It seems reasonable along Sheppard, Wilson and Lawrence, but Yonge & Eglinton could be a mess - Eglinton has lots of construction, and all the people who are transit-dependent are gonna be forced to go west for 15+ minutes. Maybe it would make sense to have an Eglinton - St. Clair shuttle instead.

The closure a couple of weeks ago was actually pretty smooth for shuttle buses. The police directing traffic at St. Clair seemed very aggressive stopping cars so that buses could make the left turn. The only pain point was at Eglinton where the road went down to one lane per direction.

We need to plan for more closures without shuttles. Give fleet availability issues with streetcars and busses there are only so many extra vehicles to put out. Keep in mind that due to a lack of streetcars and construction there are alot more busses on what would normally be streetcar routes. That takes away from the busses available for shuttle service.

It is likely easier not to run shuttles than to explain why the rest of the routes have less service.

 

[Megaton327]

We need to plan for more closures without shuttles. Give fleet availability issues with streetcars and busses there are only so many extra vehicles to put out. Keep in mind that due to a lack of streetcars and construction there are alot more busses on what would normally be streetcar routes. That takes away from the busses available for shuttle service.

It is likely easier not to run shuttles than to explain why the rest of the routes have less service.

I believe there are surplus vehicles on weekends, no? The vast majority of routes have significantly reduced weekend service levels. Only a few routes such as 510 Spadina are busier and have more service on the weekends from what I can recall, and I don't think many are even at par.

The subway is a critical piece of infrastructure, you can't say that, for instance, the 6 Bay is as critical on weekends as Line 1 is. There need to be some number of shuttles in some way shape or form.

Personally I think this distributed east-west shuttle service makes more sense from a big picture point of view. Can't imagine the hate they'll be getting from passengers during the closure, but it makes sense, regular shuttle service is such a total nightmare in so many ways and there's a perfectly good subway line a little bit west. Frankly I've done the east-west-east detour myself several times even when they ran actual shuttles and I found it comparably fast if not slightly faster, but far, FAR more comfortable and less stressful.

 

[amnesiajune]

I believe there are surplus vehicles on weekends, no? The vast majority of routes have significantly reduced weekend service levels. Only a few routes such as 510 Spadina are busier and have more service on the weekends from what I can recall, and I don't think many are even at par.

Every daytime route has much lower ridership on weekends. Only the night buses are at par or higher on weekends, for obvious reasons.

We need to plan for more closures without shuttles. Give fleet availability issues with streetcars and busses there are only so many extra vehicles to put out.

Like Megaton said, there are lots of extra vehicles. They are being used to - they're just being used to supplement existing routes instead of as a subway replacement shuttle.

Personally I think this distributed east-west shuttle service makes more sense from a big picture point of view. Can't imagine the hate they'll be getting from passengers during the closure, but it makes sense, regular shuttle service is such a total nightmare in so many ways and there's a perfectly good subway line a little bit west.

I tend to agree, but I think there needs to be some kind of shuttle between Eglinton and St. Clair. It just doesn't make sense for a high-density community where lots of people don't have the option of driving and the east-west buses will be really slow because of construction on Eglinton (and the north-south buses wouldn't be affected since they'd come out from the bus bay south of all the construction).

 

[DKsan]

Should have just stuck with the turnstiles and maybe even the tokens (with the potential to use presto if you have it).

From an internal perspective, the turnstiles were breaking down very often last year. I think many of them were on their last legs. They needed to be replaced.

 

[amnesiajune]

No closure on Sunday after all. Just Saturday: https://twitter.com/bradTTC/status/967035759256526849

I'm loving Metrolinx's wild construction ride.

 

[dowlingm]

No closure on Sunday after all. Just Saturday: https://twitter.com/bradTTC/status/967035759256526849

I'm loving Metrolinx's wild construction ride.

Wondering if it was the TTC who blinked. I suspect the reason to "no shuttle buses!!1!" was epic.

 

[amnesiajune]

Wondering if it was the TTC who blinked. I suspect the reason to "no shuttle buses!!1!" was epic.

No. They've been cancelling subway closures when Crosslinx decides they aren't needed. Same thing happened with the scheduled closures last weekend and next weekend.

 

[dowlingm]

No. They've been cancelling subway closures when Crosslinx decides they aren't needed. Same thing happened with the scheduled closures last weekend and next weekend.

Except there was supposed to be TTC work this weekend (asbestos removal) also.

 

[amnesiajune]

Except there was supposed to be TTC work this weekend (asbestos removal) also.

They're doing that on Saturday, presumably.

 

[W. K. Lis]

No closure on Sunday after all. Just Saturday: https://twitter.com/bradTTC/status/967035759256526849

I'm loving Metrolinx's wild construction ride.

To those complaining about all the closures this year in 2018, how about 30 days straight closure (including workdays)?

From link:

Baltimore’s Surprise Subway Shutdown

This week (February 13, 2018), Baltimore’s MTA ordered an emergency shutdown of the city’s Metro SubwayLink, a 15-mile route that serves about 40,000 trips each weekday and the city’s only subway line.

The metro will remain closed for 30 days for track repairs. Workers were inspecting tracks on Sunday when they discovered a critical but unspecified defect.

With almost no advance warning or planning, the closure blindsided transit riders and led to massive disruption and confusion yesterday...

It’s a story that highlights how Maryland politicians and agency officials have neglected basic transit maintenance on one of the most important routes in the state.

...One of Hogan’s first acts was to unilaterally withdraw state support for the city’s Red Line rail project, which was shovel ready at the time of his election. Baltimore leaders had spent $230 million and the better part of a decade planning the $2.9 billion project, which would have connected some of the city’s low-income black neighborhoods to job clusters. Meanwhile, Hogan allowed the Purple Line project in Maryland’s DC suburbs to proceed.

A complaint by the NAACP Legal Defense Fund held that Hogan’s decision discriminated against Baltimore’s black neighborhoods. U.S. DOT agreed to evaluate the complaint in the waning days of the Obama administration, but it was snuffed out under Trump.

After killing the Red Line, Hogan offered Baltimore $135 million for bus system upgrades. While helpful, it was no substitute for a much-need light rail link, and advocates characterized it as a “consolation prize.”

Meanwhile, Hogan’s purported fiscal prudence — he claimed the state couldn’t afford the Red Line — has not carried over to highways. His extravagant $9 billion road expansion plan will supposedly be paid for by tolls but exposes Maryland taxpayers to huge amount of risk if the assumptions underpinning the highway projects don’t pan out...

 

[LNahid2000]

This week (February 13, 2018), Baltimore’s MTA ordered an emergency shutdown of the city’s Metro SubwayLink, a 15-mile route that serves about 40,000 trips each weekday and the city’s only subway line.

That's probably one of the lowest ridership subways in the world. Line 1 alone carries 736,000 riders per day.