[Rainforest]

its crazy how much development is planned for golden mile because of this project. its so much that the area is going to be horribly underserviced by this line once all the condo developments are completed. its too bad our political leaders want toc's so badly but then don't have the foresight to adequately service them.

No way the LRT will be overloaded just by the local riders, even after massive residential construction. Look at Steeles / Bathurst: packed with highrises, yet manages to do with mixed-traffic buses only, without any dedicated lanes. Each ECLRT train will have the capacity of ~ 5 buses combined, and the peak-time flow will be split between the two directions: some westwards to Yonge, some eastwards to Kennedy Stn.

 

[expo5770]

No way the LRT will be overloaded just by the local riders, even after massive residential construction. Look at Steeles / Bathurst: packed with highrises, yet manages to do with mixed-traffic buses only, without any dedicated lanes. Each ECLRT train will have the capacity of ~ 5 buses combined, and the peak-time flow will be split between the two directions: some westwards to Yonge, some eastwards to Kennedy Stn.

I don't buy it. Maybe over-capacity was an exaggeration from my disdain of this whole bungled project, but with 35,000+ proposed new residential dwellings along a 2 kilometre stretch from Victoria park to Birchmont, coupled with the redundant stops and a lack of true signal priority, I expect the eastern portion of the line to be near, or at capacity very quickly once all development is finished. Also Steeles and Bathurst is a very poor comparison here in my opinion. Would hardly call 25-30 buildings around 10-16 storeys tall "packed with high rises", especially when being compared to golden miles proposed development of more than 75 35+ storey towers. That 2 kilometre stretch is going to be just as dense as North York. But I'm not gonna argue about this any longer. The whole under capacity/over capacity argument is just beating a dead horse at this point. We'll really just have to wait and see the reality of the matter once it opens.

 

[nfitz]

Vic Park west to south and Credit Union Road west to south are both no left's

PS - as are Pharmacy and Birchmount west to south.

- Paul

Thanks.

Victoria Park west to south is a bit of a special case, as you do turn left to do that one at the previous lights at the other end of the platform, onto "Eglinton Square" (aka O'Connor). Maybe they just need big Victoria Park south overhead signage or something, to make things clear. Though as that whole Eglinton Park/O'Connor thing is suppose to be rebuilt with a new layout, I don't know what that does to it.

I was surprised they kept the crossing at Credit Union, as it's so close to Bermondsey. If that's a problem, they should eliminate the track crossing.

No left turns at Birchmount or Pharmacy on Eglinton Westbound. I'm surprised! There was plenty of room to put a left-turn lane in. And both are nearside stops, so I'd think that a turn wouldn't interfere with the westbound LRT operations much. The real benefit for this is eastbound Eglinton, which can have longer straight-through stages. Maybe these two should have turns added? Or changing the road layout a bit to make it more evident.

 

[picard102]

I don't buy it. Maybe over-capacity was an exaggeration from my disdain of this whole bungled project, but with 35,000+ proposed new residential dwellings along a 2 kilometre stretch from Victoria park to Birchmont, coupled with the redundant stops and a lack of true signal priority, I expect the eastern portion of the line to be near, or at capacity very quickly once all development is finished. Also Steeles and Bathurst is a very poor comparison here in my opinion. Would hardly call 25-30 buildings around 10-16 storeys tall "packed with high rises", especially when being compared to golden miles proposed development of more than 75 35+ storey towers. That 2 kilometre stretch is going to be just as dense as North York. But I'm not gonna argue about this any longer. The whole under capacity/over capacity argument is just beating a dead horse at this point. We'll really just have to wait and see the reality of the matter once it opens.

Is there an LRT line being built in the city that won't reach capacity fairly quickly after opening? Maybe Finch?

 

[nfitz]

I don't buy it. Maybe over-capacity was an exaggeration from my disdain of this whole bungled project, but with 35,000+ proposed new residential dwellings along a 2 kilometre stretch from Victoria park to Birchmont, coupled with the redundant stops and a lack of true signal priority, I expect the eastern portion of the line to be near, or at capacity very quickly once all development is finished.

That seems unlikely to me. The 2031 AM peak ridership per direction per rider was only modelled to be 3,000 at Victoria Park. And that did account for densification. With 600 on a train, that's a train every 12 minutes. Even if you assume the capacity on the surface sections is only every 4 minutes, that's 15 trains an hour - capacity of 9,000. Probably higher, as I think you can both run a train every 4 minutes, and with more than 500 people.

The modelling would have to be extremely wrong, for the ridership to be 3 times higher than forecast. And if the LRT is so utterly successful (in contrast to what some here say), then it's time to build more of them - on St. Clair and Lawrence!

Is there an LRT line being built in the city that won't reach capacity fairly quickly after opening? Maybe Finch?

No there isn't.

Conversely, is there an LRT line being built in the city that will reach capacity fairly quickly after opening? Of course not.

I really love the fan optimism that LRT is going to be so hugely successful, but I'd be shocked if ridership was double that forecast; and it would have to be much higher to exceed capacity for many years. I think the best to hope for is that they might have to buy more cars sooner than planned.

 

[Rainforest]

I don't buy it. Maybe over-capacity was an exaggeration from my disdain of this whole bungled project, but with 35,000+ proposed new residential dwellings along a 2 kilometre stretch from Victoria park to Birchmont, coupled with the redundant stops and a lack of true signal priority, I expect the eastern portion of the line to be near, or at capacity very quickly once all development is finished. Also Steeles and Bathurst is a very poor comparison here in my opinion. Would hardly call 25-30 buildings around 10-16 storeys tall "packed with high rises", especially when being compared to golden miles proposed development of more than 75 35+ storey towers. That 2 kilometre stretch is going to be just as dense as North York. But I'm not gonna argue about this any longer. The whole under capacity/over capacity argument is just beating a dead horse at this point. We'll really just have to wait and see the reality of the matter once it opens.

I guess we have to wait and see. However, it should be noted that while frequent stops and a lack of signal priority increase the travel time, they do not affect the line's capacity. The same number of trains per hour will pass any given stop, they just travel slower between the stops.

 

[nfitz]

I guess we have to wait and see. However, it should be noted that while frequent stops and a lack of signal priority increase the travel time, they do not affect the line's capacity. The same number of trains per hour will pass any given stop, they just travel slower between the stops.

Which mathematically would reduce demand, and increase capacity.

 

[MisterF]

I guess we have to wait and see. However, it should be noted that while frequent stops and a lack of signal priority increase the travel time, they do not affect the line's capacity. The same number of trains per hour will pass any given stop, they just travel slower between the stops.

Reducing speed does reduce capacity. If a train doubles its average speed then it can make a trip twice as often, doubling its capacity. That's an oversimplified example but the principle applies in the real world. An on-street LRT that doesn't have to wait at red lights will get to the end of the line faster and will be able to start coming back sooner, increasing the number of people it can carry in a day. The subway and GO trains have so much capacity not only because of the size of the trains, but also because they're fast.

 

[goodcitywhenfinished]

Still looks like it's travelling too slow. I hope when the line officially opens, the travelling speeds will be quicker than what I'm seeing in this video. The C-trains in Calgary were a lot faster than this. I also didn't like how often the train had to stop for red lights. Really seemed to slow things down.

C train does stop at red lights in the downtown core, it’s a major flaw in their system. If I recall it was planned to eventually become a tunneled section when the lrt was originally conceived. But as with most pre-metro systems, the upgrade to full grade separation never really happens.

 

[nfitz]

Reducing speed does reduce capacity. If a train doubles its average speed then it can make a trip twice as often, doubling its capacity.

For vehicle. The constraint is the line, not a given vehicle. The situation you describe is simply mitigated by adding additional vehicles.

 

[MisterF]

For vehicle. The constraint is the line, not a given vehicle. The situation you describe is simply mitigated by adding additional vehicles.

You can add vehicles when the trains are going faster too. All else being equal, speed does increase capacity.

 

[nfitz]

You can add vehicles when the trains are going faster too. All else being equal, speed does increase capacity.

True - but only a barrier if you are up against the ultimate capacity of the line. You are already in deep trouble if you need to rely on that to keep the line moving (which I suppose is where the Yonge subway was before Covid). It's certainly not going to be a Line 5 issue in the near future.

 

[Rainforest]

You can add vehicles when the trains are going faster too. All else being equal, speed does increase capacity.

Depends on what constraints you set. If you decide on the # of vehicles per hour, and can correctly predict the speed, you can calculate the total number of trains needed. Lower speed will results in a larger required number of trains and higher operating expenses. But if you are willing to pay that price, you still can provide the desired frequency and capacity.

If your total number of trains is fixed and you can't get more, then your statement is correct; higher speed results in a higher frequency and capacity, because each train makes more trips per day.

 

[MisterF]

Depends on what constraints you set. If you decide on the # of vehicles per hour, and can correctly predict the speed, you can calculate the total number of trains needed. Lower speed will results in a larger required number of trains and higher operating expenses. But if you are willing to pay that price, you still can provide the desired frequency and capacity.

If your total number of trains is fixed and you can't get more, then your statement is correct; higher speed results in a higher frequency and capacity, because each train makes more trips per day.

Yeah that's pretty much it. If you have higher speeds then you can carry more people with fewer trains. Sure you could add more trains to a slower line, that will cost extra.

 

[crs1026]

I'm not sure why we are revisiting the design basis for this line - great theory, but water under the bridge at this point.

If the Crosstown as opened proves inadequate, there are at least two things that can be done.

One is to deal head on with the traffic signalling issue - there is no reason that the line in its as built form can't have this retrofitted, probably mostly through the as built signalling. There may be more leverage for this after we have a few thousand people riding every hour....if the line proves too slow, and the right things were done to create political awareness and pressure, the penny may drop with Council.

The other is to replace the fleet (it will happen sooner than we think, the oldest cars in the fleet are already five years old) with higher capacity cars. A three car Flexity train has a lot of wasted space - long couplers, rounded ends, cabs at the end of every car including middle cars. I'm sure there could be a 15% capacity improvement just by addressing that. (I wonder what the longest single carbody segment that will fit in the curve geometry is.... three Flexities is an awful lot of axles)

The signalling changes can happen immediately, there is likely no rush for the fleet solution but it may be needed some day.

- PUl