Danforth Line 2 Scarborough Subway Extension

[JasonParis]

I too have come to a sense of peace with the Line 2 extension. The time has come to move on and just get the thing built. I also don't think anyone will look at a map of Toronto's higher-order transit system in a century and say "what the hell were they thinking extending Line 2 to there?" The LRT would have been cheaper and have served more, but it is what it is. Also, maybe it's just something amalgamated Toronto needed to do to make Scarborough feel part of it all. A mental city-building exercise, if you will. While the other three downtowns got subways, Scarborough didn't. And it was super hard to make them see otherwise, even with better alternatives on the table.

 

[innsertnamehere]

I still can't believe how little scrutiny the Eglinton West extension is getting over this one. It's so much larger of a waste of money than this.

City Hall is just a more open government than the province so the decisions can get so much more scrutinized.

 

[JasonParis]

Also, despite Ford's focus on tunnelling, it's still LRT. Whereas Scarborough became an RT vs. LRT vs. Subway vs. SmartTrack sort of fight. It's also new higher-order transit, whereas Scarborough was primarily replacing existing higher-order transit which probably creates a situation of way more stakeholders.

 

[innsertnamehere]

Also, despite Ford's focus on tunnelling, it's still LRT. Whereas Scarborough became an RT vs. LRT vs. Subway vs. SmartTrack sort of fight. It's also new higher-order transit, whereas Scarborough was primarily replacing existing higher-order transit which probably creates a situation of way more stakeholders.

The cost per mile difference is negligible for Eglinton West compared to a subway, and the ridership is 1/3rd of the Scarborough Subway.

Scarborough was such a mess simply because the TorStar had a reporter who had a bit of a vendetta against the project and had access to a much wider range of documents to write stories with as the approvals process was through City Hall instead of Queens Park.

 

[ARG1]

I still can't believe how little scrutiny the Eglinton West extension is getting over this one. It's so much larger of a waste of money than this.

City Hall is just a more open government than the province so the decisions can get so much more scrutinized.

IMHO, The version of Eglinton West is arguably the 2nd best version we could possibly get. While ideally the entire extension should be elevated, having a median solution simply makes 0 sense. The extension is connecting to the airport, one of the largest growing job centers in the region, as well as renforth gateway, a completely grade separated busway (at least until Mississauga Center). Furthermore, if Doug Ford is really serious about his plan on having a ton of high density construction in the area with developers paying for a good portion of the cost, Eglinton West is at the very least reasonable.

 

[syn]

The cost per mile difference is negligible for Eglinton West compared to a subway, and the ridership is 1/3rd of the Scarborough Subway.

Scarborough was such a mess simply because the TorStar had a reporter who had a bit of a vendetta against the project and had access to a much wider range of documents to write stories with as the approvals process was through City Hall instead of Queens Park.

I believe the history of the project is a factor, and as @JasonParis mentioned, there are more stakeholders involved with the SSE.

The EWLRT also hasn't been politicized to anywhere near the same degree as the SSE, which is arguably the biggest reason there isn't nearly as much debate.

Personally the EWLRT is a huge waste, but Ford isn't offering any sort of dialogue. They're just doing what they want and pushing it through as fast as possible.

 

[OneCity]

Also, despite Ford's focus on tunnelling, it's still LRT. Whereas Scarborough became an RT vs. LRT vs. Subway vs. SmartTrack sort of fight. It's also new higher-order transit, whereas Scarborough was primarily replacing existing higher-order transit which probably creates a situation of way more stakeholders.

The biggest issue we faced was a dysfunctional amalgamated City Council admin that chose not to listen to the voters and initial Scarborough council requests on how to upgrade the RT. Over time Scarborough councils requests for the BDL extension became diluted and they had to join and move on to just build something when it was clearly not being allowed. It was no secret residents here wanted the Centre connected to the BDL and Sheppard. Heck look back here on UT, most here never would have expected anything other then the BDL being extended. In addition they tried to add in a transfer on Sheppard, so the only surprise to me was this very poorly designed plan which put technology over detail was that it wasn't dealt with sooner.

The 'subways' and 'transfer city' slogans were politically symbolic of all the major flaws in Transit City with the lack of connectivity the Centre, the lack of grade separations in combination with the removal of vehicle lanes in other large chunks of the plan. This was not a good design at all. Keep in mind Ford and McGuinty also agreed to Crosstown LRT being connected straight thru Scarborough Centre but sadly the dysfunctional City Council stepped in once again to stop a reasonable solution and soon after Wynne and friends (and then Tory) insincerely got hands into the pot pushing the McCowan alignment yet watching all the stops get stripped out and said nothing on delaying matters further.

It was also truly sad for residents here when we had a major City media outlet which used their scarce funds sent a full time reporter strictly to narrate or oppose any better solution simply because a Conservative Ford was going gain votes and picking on the poorer areas of the City telling them whats best for them is an accepted political practice for far too many if other parts of the City. Now we can clearly see the Star would never dare do the same nonsense to the whiter, wealthier areas with projects of lesser value as we have seen over an over again. The entire time this crap went on we were building a subway to the empty lands of wealthier Vaughan and barely a peep, but for the media it was F Scarborough voters request to the fullest extent possible. This extreme partisan reporting working directly against the voters in Scarborough voters continued up until Doug thankfully was able to salvage the line, adding the mandatory stops and finally put an end to the nonsense and games for good. What made this more unacceptable is the fact we had 99% of elected politicians at all levels and all 3 stripes overwhelmingly support the subway projects within Scarborough during this period of media 'outrage'. There are no words big enough to explain for how divisive and harmful this type of crap is to the City

I am very thankful Sheppard East can be fixed and none of the overly entitled politics of the City will be able to oppose, impede or severely damage progress on a supportable solution.

 

[robmausser]

IMHO, The version of Eglinton West is arguably the 2nd best version we could possibly get. While ideally the entire extension should be elevated, having a median solution simply makes 0 sense. The extension is connecting to the airport, one of the largest growing job centers in the region, as well as renforth gateway, a completely grade separated busway (at least until Mississauga Center). Furthermore, if Doug Ford is really serious about his plan on having a ton of high density construction in the area with developers paying for a good portion of the cost, Eglinton West is at the very least reasonable.

The end goal was to extend the LRT along Missisauga transitway when demands warrants.

As indicated by the second blue arrow.

at-grade Eglinton West would have seriously broken up what could be a fully grade separated rapid line from Winston Churchill to Yonge Street. It would affect service levels and reliability as such that it would make such a long line very difficult to manage.

Having the line fully grade separated makes this a possibility.

But elevated would have made the most sense, absolutely.

 

[Jaye101]

LOL Mississauga? This joke just keeps getting worse and worse.

 

[Toronto1834]

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[Allandale25]

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[Rainforest]

A fully grade separated LRT between Square One and Eastern Toronto would probably need to be broken up in the middle somewhere just given the insane length (other places do it ofc but I am not sure we could pull it off) but I am sure it would be *very* successful.

They could do two branches: one between Pearson and Kennedy, the other between Square One and Laird. The second branch would avoid the street-median eastern section. The service frequency east of Laird would be lower than west of Laird, but still sufficient for the demand.

 

[ARG1]

They could do two branches: one between Pearson and Kennedy, the other between Square One and Laird. The second branch would avoid the street-median eastern section. The service frequency east of Laird would be lower than west of Laird, but still sufficient for the demand.

Personally I think especially with the OL being built, ideally we find a way to grade separate Sunnybrooke Park (most likely by elevating it), so that the 2nd branch actually terminates someplace with connections to other RT and Busses rather than just a minor station.

 

[Bureaucromancer]

They could do two branches: one between Pearson and Kennedy, the other between Square One and Laird. The second branch would avoid the street-median eastern section. The service frequency east of Laird would be lower than west of Laird, but still sufficient for the demand.

As ever, the break-point really should be Don Mills, a single signalized intersection is not the end of the world. That aside, yeah, this is the pattern that seems best, plus Square One - Pearson and Kipling - Pearson iterations.

To me the real question is what mix of services should actually terminate at Pearson vs extensions north to Humber... I'm thinking that in an ideal world Pearson probably doesn't actually have many route regularly terminating there, and we actually have, essentially, Airport/Humber and Mississauga branches of Eglinton layered over Mississauga and Kipling branches of Finch.

Mind you, the complexity of this service pattern (along with the politics of adding tracks to the Mississauga transitway so soon) is a good part of why I am somewhat sympathetic in concept to, at least in the short to mid-term, leaving the LRT terminals at Finch and Renforth with 427/Airport connections built as a transitway linking into the 407.

 

[CapitalSeven]

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Interesting article. I'd like to see an environmental audit of the various options. Sure megabores are cool. But do we end up expending twice as much energy and greenhouse gases from the concrete? Canadians have more or less abandoned small cars for big SUVs and trucks. Same trend.