Visited Montreal for the first time. Some questions about their Metro system

[mrgrieves]

I guess this is because Toronto was a smaller city than Montreal up until the 60s and 70s when the city started booming and it made sense to build high rises. I also think there could be cultural factors at play where people in Montreal are historically happier to use cars less. Much of Montreal is triplexes and similar buildings. I don't see much of that in Toronto.

 

[Yegger]

Having lived in both cities, I definitely find the Montreal city building model to be more appealing (given our 2018 cultural preferences for live-work-play) and more resilient to changing trends. I question how such high density developments will age in Toronto (possibly because of the precedent set by St. Jamestown) and am concerned about its implications on the transportation infrastructure, especially on the already overcrowded Yonge line.

 

[W. K. Lis]

With walkup apartments, if there is a power failure, people could still walk up the few steps.

With high-rise apartments, if there is a power failure, people could still walk up the many, many, many, many, many, many steps.

 

[nephersir7]

Interesting ridership trends for 2017:

STM Metro: 367.461 Million (+3.8%)
STM Bus: 271.618 Million (+0.09%)
RTM train: 20.315 Million (+4.13%)

TTC Subway: 289.696 Million (-0.97%)
TTC Bus: 456.947 Million (-1.27%)
TTC Streetcar: 287.8 Million (-4.24%)
GO train: 55.878 Million (+3.42%)

http://ti.org/pdfs/2017-Q4-Ridership-APTA.pdf

I wonder how much of it is due to STM fares having been frozen since July 2016.

 

[innsertnamehere]

Interesting ridership trends for 2017:

STM Metro: 367.461 Million (+3.8%)
STM Bus: 271.618 Million (+0.09%)
RTM train: 20.315 Million (+4.13%)

TTC Subway: 289.696 Million (-0.97%)
TTC Bus: 456.947 Million (-1.27%)
TTC Streetcar: 287.8 Million (-4.24%)
GO train: 55.878 Million (+3.42%)

http://ti.org/pdfs/2017-Q4-Ridership-APTA.pdf

I wonder how much of it is due to STM fares having been frozen since July 2016.

TTC fares have been frozen over the last year as well, I think they last went up in March of 2017.

 

[nfitz]

Interesting ridership trends for 2017:

STM Metro: 367.461 Million (+3.8%)
STM Bus: 271.618 Million (+0.09%)
RTM train: 20.315 Million (+4.13%)

TTC Subway: 289.696 Million (-0.97%)
TTC Bus: 456.947 Million (-1.27%)
TTC Streetcar: 287.8 Million (-4.24%)
GO train: 55.878 Million (+3.42%)

http://ti.org/pdfs/2017-Q4-Ridership-APTA.pdf

I wonder how much of it is due to STM fares having been frozen since July 2016.

If one can believe that Montreal has 25% more subway riders, with less stations, less trains, narrower trains (less capacity), less frequency, shorter service hours, etc.

Toronto's system is running near capacity at peak. You can't have more passengers if you have less of everything. Montreal's numbers have been cooked for years. I'm not sure them increasing has any meaning.

 

[W. K. Lis]

If one can believe that Montreal has 25% more subway riders, with less stations, less trains, narrower trains (less capacity), less frequency, shorter service hours, etc.

Toronto's system is running near capacity at peak. You can't have more passengers if you have less of everything. Montreal's numbers have been cooked for years. I'm not sure them increasing has any meaning.

From link:

Blue line:
Week Peak: Every 3 to 5 minutes None-peak: Every 5 to 10 minutes
Week-end Every 8 to 11 minutes

Yellow line:
Week Peak: Every 3 to 5 minutes None-peak: Every 5 to 10 minutes
Week-end Every 5 to 10 minutes

Green line:
Week Peak: Every 3 to 4 minutes None-peak: Every 4 to 10 minutes
Week-end Every 6 to 12 minutes

Orange line:
Week Peak: Every 2 to 4 minutes None-peak: Every 4 to 10 minutes
Week-end Every 6 to 12 minutes​

 

[nephersir7]

If one can believe that Montreal has 25% more subway riders, with less stations, less trains, narrower trains (less capacity), less frequency, shorter service hours, etc.

Toronto's system is running near capacity at peak. You can't have more passengers if you have less of everything.

Montreal's system has two complementary lines serving the downtown core. There are 5 inbound tracks to Berri-UQAM. That provides more capacity at peak than the TTC's "U" between Line 2 and Union.

 

[Cobra]

If one can believe that Montreal has 25% more subway riders, with less stations, less trains, narrower trains (less capacity), less frequency, shorter service hours, etc.

Toronto's system is running near capacity at peak. You can't have more passengers if you have less of everything. Montreal's numbers have been cooked for years. I'm not sure them increasing has any meaning.

Conspiracy theory?

One things for sure, trains are operating faster and with more consistency and the service is more reliable. Whenever I'm there, I know that Berri-UQAM to Honore-Beaugrand is 15 minutes.

TTC has been frustratingly slow and subpar. Bloor-Yonge to Sheppard-Yonge? I don't bother trying to guess anymore with all those slow downs. People are giving up on it and I myself, a huge public transit user and supporter, have resorted to Uber or Lyft way more often that I'm comfortable with. I feel there's a general feeling that the trust in the reliability of our subway system is going down while Montreal for the most part hasn't.

 

[aquateam]

Generally, Montreal transit is very reliable. In the more than 4 that I've been here, I've never been affected by a line shutdown (more than a few minutes delay) and even though I constantly complain about how long the wait can be between trains, once I am on one it moves very consistently (whereas in Toronto, they are very frequent but they often slow to a crawl or come to a stop for various reasons.) In Toronto, I've started driving downtown instead of taking public transit because of the unreliability.

I mentioned in another thread that Montreal's Opus data is much more reliable than the TTC's ridership data (which is based on occasional manual counts and trip diaries.) I think the issue is most likely that TTC ridership is under reported, rather than that Montreal's is over-reported. Especially with the Presto roll-out, I think much of the TTC's ridership decline is actually fare evasion (although the frequent weekend subway shutdowns probably don't help much either.)

I think the reason that Montreal's ridership is high despite the lower off-peak frequency and shorter operating hours is because:

1. Generally, although Montreal has fewer stations they are better located (I can't think of any analogs to Bessarion, for instance.) And until the TYSSE opened late last year, Montreal's network was actually larger than Toronto's (69.2 km to 68.3.)
2. The bus network isn't great, partially because of the dumb road layouts, so people rely on the metro to a greater extent
3. The urban form (consistently higher densities) is more conducive to transit use.

That being said, it's true that there seems to be a contradiction and it would be good to establish why that is. Maybe Montreal transit use is more distributed over time?

 

[nephersir7]

One things for sure, trains are operating faster and with more consistency and the service is more reliable. Whenever I'm there, I know that Berri-UQAM to Honore-Beaugrand is 15 minutes.

TTC has been frustratingly slow and subpar. Bloor-Yonge to Sheppard-Yonge? I don't bother trying to guess anymore with all those slow downs. People are giving up on it and I myself, a huge public transit user and supporter, have resorted to Uber or Lyft way more often that I'm comfortable with. I feel there's a general feeling that the trust in the reliability of our subway system is going down while Montreal for the most part hasn't.

The TTC has reported twice as much delays as the STM, but it's not that bad if you look at some other systems out there.

https://twitter.com/brianmrosenthal/status/982315600570564609

 

[aquateam]

The TTC has reported twice as much delays as the STM, but it's not that bad if you look at some other systems out there.

https://twitter.com/brianmrosenthal/status/982315600570564609

Be careful with those statistics, though, not every system has the same definition of "on time". Vancouver's definition is more strict than Toronto's.

As for the rapid transit network, the standard requires that headways should fall within ±100% of scheduled values. In other words, for the typical 4′ off-peak service, gaps of up to 8′ are acceptable. This “standard” has the nonsensical effect of making a service where only half of the trains are actually present report that it meets standard. 95% of trips are expected to operate within this extremely generous target on an all-day basis.

Another problem arises with the nature of gaps and bunches in the subway. Typically, if there is a big delay, the result is one long gap followed by many closely-spaced trains. Because the stats are recorded per train, there is only one train that is outside of standard, and the rest show up as just fine.

The result is that the subway “on time” metric routinely shows a very high value that bears little relationship to the service riders experience including the inability to board the gap train or several of its followers.

But yeah, Toronto is doing much better than NYC. But NYC is a bit of an outlier in terms of how old and expansive their system is.

Montreal has an advantage over Toronto in that:

• The system is entirely underground, without exposure to the elements and the heat-cycling that wreaks havoc on reliability
• The system is about 12 years younger
• The signalling system is newer and operates in ATO

 

[BMO]

The TTC has reported twice as much delays as the STM, but it's not that bad if you look at some other systems out there.

https://twitter.com/brianmrosenthal/status/982315600570564609

On-Time performance is super subjective, it depends on what the agency considers "on-time" some agencies consider a 5-minute delay on-time while others consider a 10-minute delay on-time. SO while on-time performance might fit within the TTC's subjective parameters, anybody who rides the subway regularly will tell you your trip from Union to Finch could be anywhere from 35-45 minutes. To most people that's not a good on-time performance despite theoretically being minor in the grand scheme of the system.

The numbers are also further hidden by the fact that peak hours comprise of maybe 3-6 hours of the total daily operating time (~20 hours) which means quiet off-peak hours where performance is great could make the overall numbers look good despite horrible peak hour statistics

 

[idc24]

Be careful with those statistics, though, not every system has the same definition of "on time". Vancouver's definition is more strict than Toronto's.

But yeah, Toronto is doing much better than NYC. But NYC is a bit of an outlier in terms of how old and expansive their system is.

Montreal has an advantage over Toronto in that:

• The system is entirely underground, without exposure to the elements and the heat-cycling that wreaks havoc on reliability
• The system is about 12 years younger
• The signalling system is newer and operates in ATO

I have always been intrigued about the fact that the system is entirely underground. I wonder if the Montreal Metro is the only metro system in the world that is 100% underground...

 

[nephersir7]

I have always been intrigued about the fact that the system is entirely underground. I wonder if the Montreal Metro is the only metro system in the world that is 100% underground...

It isn't. Pyongyang has built theirs 110m underground to double as a nuclear shelter / evil lair!