Do you actually live in Toronto or is this entirely a numbers exercise?
You realize who uses streetcars, right?
It isn't just people from Mississauga and Malvern heading home lol.
I used to live in Toronto (moved to Waterloo for school), but the streetcar reference was with regards to a push from councillors to remove them. If traffic was much worse downtown as a result of fewer suburban subway stations, then the push for removing the streetcars and a restructuring of downtown's streets would have been inevitable. Also, my personal matters are really none of your business whatsoever. Of course I know who uses the streetcars (people working and living downtown that need a local way of getting around), I used to use them daily myself. You just missed the point of the statement, that suburban lobbying would have been a lot worse and we would end up much less transit oriented than we currently are.
I have never once stated such a thing.
Residential density, commercial/employment density and built form are all crucial, yet you consistently ignore them.
What would Warden's ridership numbers be like if it was just served by one bus, like Dufferin? How about Victoria Park?
You've always seemed to imply it. I mentioned employment density a while back and you just retorted with a bunch of stations with high residential use in the system. I've always said it's not just housing density that makes subway stations, but employment density. Every factor has an effect on the success of a subway station, however, the 2 biggest ones are employment density and surface connectability.
I'm not saying density (housing or employment) isn't an important item in determining ridership of a subway station -- it's the reason North York Centre is so successful, however, you cannot claim that it is the
only metric that will determine the success of a line or a station. I'm saying there's a lot more at play -- the presence of surface connections and Employment density being the most important, while walkability, geography, safety, and mode that also make a difference.
I'm not going to lie, Warden's ridership would be pretty shitty if only served by the Warden buses, however, because it serves as a transit hub (like the proposed SSE stations) it has ridership to back up its existence. It's not like you build stations for one reason only (density), or you build stations with no purpose. Warden always was meant to serve as a bus terminal, and it does its job well.
Stations like Warden aren't subway stations like Royal York. They're massive commuter hubs.
Hate to admit it, but Royal York is served by not 1, 2, 3 but 5 bus routes (including a night bus). 2 buses have multiple spurs. Compare this to Warden's 8 buses, and this seems pretty reasonable for a "commuter hub". Warden sees 920 buses while royal York sees 480 not including the night bus, around half as many buses, however, the ridership is comparatively lower. Why do you always pick on Warden by the way? Who cares if the subway station has 6K fewer passengers than one station or another so long as it has ridership high enough to justify a subway? 30K passengers per day seems quite fair. I'm no fan of commuter parking myself, but at least the TTC charges people to use it, and to be fair, it keeps people from driving downtown, which seems pretty fair to me. It's the stations that are expensive on a subway line, not necessarily the tracks.
How far away are the closest stations to Runnymede and Royal York?
How about Wellesley?
Sherbourne?
Bay?
Try building subway stations 1km apart or less with small footprints in the suburbs and I guarantee ridership will be terrible.
Again, if we take an average, the subway between Vic Park and Kennedy has relatively the same ridership as the Broadview-Main section. For a 5 km section, there would be 5 stations, so the total ridership (130K) divided by 5 is about 26K passengers per station. Of course, Scarborough doesn't NEED this many stations, because the geography allows it to get away with only needing 3 stations while serving just as many people. You don't have to spend more money operating more stations, and people will still use the system. Of course, these stations might be a bit more expensive to run, but they are still more cost effective than paying for extra stations. This is where the Sheppard subway becomes somewhat questionable in its design. Had Bessarion not been built, a Bayview bus terminal built and ridership remained where it currently is, you have a better integrated line without the need of operating an extra, fairly useless (currently) subway station.
Meanwhile, if we take a look at the Broadview to Main section, the total ridership (135K) over that 5 km stretch (which has 8 stations), the ridership per station of ~16.9K, a difference of about 64%. While the station is smaller, your only savings on a per station basis are on electricity, ventilation, building maintenance and cleaning. The main costs aren't even for this -- they're for station attendants, which remain constant between the three stations.
No.
The density (both employment and residential) is far too low.
You keep touting the ridership numbers for stations like Warden, but it's about 2 km apart from each of the nearest stations. It's also a massive station that's not even remotely pedestrian friendly. It also provides a massive amount of commuter parking space.
How many parking spots do Bay and Sherbourne have? What about passenger pickup and dropoff areas?
Even if Warden has say 2K spots, and 1.3 passengers per spot, that's only 2.6K driving passengers that make up the station's usage. Aka, less than 9%. The vast majority are still using transit in the area. Also, 2K cars. I know it doesn't sound like a lot but imagine if Warden's drivers all decided to drive downtown. How much space do you think would be wasted on parking there because of that? Also, note that while no downtown stations have Kiss-n-ride locations, a significant portion of commuters still are dropped off at stations, whether it's by rideshare services like Uber and Lyft, or by family members. Let's not forget the thousands of people that are dropped off daily within downtown by cars alone in the downtown area.
The point is that Warden doesn't need density (residential or employment) to support the station because that's not what it was designed to serve. It was designed as a terminus station for the outer suburb bus routes and drivers to connect with the subway, preventing them from driving downtown, while increasing their trip times, with the hope that the area (like Wilson) will attract developers as the subway extends. If not, then it serves as a bus hub that's heavily used.
I see.
So it's safe to say Yorkdale does not have a subway stop?
With regards to the subway terminology - It's part of the subway system (which, for the majority of its length, runs underground and is fully grade separated), but theoretically, it can be identified as a heavy rail rapid transit stop, which is basically a subway stop, with the exception that it's not underground. Also, what's the point of arguing over nomenclature when it's definitions are ambiguous?
Density is one of the key ingredients in determining whether a subway is a viable.
You might want to get in touch with NYCs planning department and tell them they got it all wrong.
Density only works in New York City as its main metric because the subway goes everywhere in the city. It's not like that here in Toronto, where you almost always have to transfer between a bus and the subway to get anywhere.
What would Warden's ridership numbers be like if it was just served by one bus, like Dufferin? How about Victoria Park?
Dufferin sees 480 buses per day, I don't know why you keep quoting it as being surface transit starved. Wellesley sees 291 buses, not insane like Warden, but given the large employment density around the station and the presence of a lot of businesses, its in line with other stations.
[well, according to a certain forum member who is obsessed with density ..]