[T3G]

And see how that sits with the new mayor.

Why would that be a factor?

All of these new projects are owned by Metrolinx, meaning they are able to impose their will on the city however they see fit. The mayor is a sitting duck and if she is outraged by this, I can assure you no one at Metrolinx cares one bit.

 

[ARG1]

Why would that be a factor?

All of these new projects are owned by Metrolinx, meaning they are able to impose their will on the city however they see fit. The mayor is a sitting duck and if she is outraged by this, I can assure you no one at Metrolinx cares one bit.

It wasn't Metrolinx' decision to not have TSP on the surface section of Line 5, that was entirely on the city for opposing its use. If the city wants TSP, they can have it.

 

[smallspy]

No big harm calling Finch LRT "rapid", but I feel it leads to the expectations-vs-reality mismatch.

I suspect that a lot of the mismatch is largely due to a lot of the expectations being built up by people on groups like this.

From my experience, the people who will actually be using the service don't care how rapid is "rapid". They just care that the service will be faster and more reliable. And in this case, it will be.

The 9xx express buses are more rapid than all-stop buses. Dependent on the stop spacing, the 9xx might even be more rapid than the LRT. The blue night buses are more rapid than the daytime buses. Yet, we do not call them "rapid 9xx network" or "rapid blue night network", because those services do not have the main features people are used to associate with rapid transit.

But now we're getting into an apples-and-oranges situation again. The blue night buses operate in a totally different world than the regular day-time service, with different traffic patterns and loading. Comparing the two is quite literally akin to comparing an apple and an orange. The express buses have a different stopping pattern, and so are not going to make every single one of the customers trips faster.

Dan

 

[Rainforest]

I suspect that a lot of the mismatch is largely due to a lot of the expectations being built up by people on groups like this

98% of riders do not read transit blogs, and their expectations cannot be built up by any group on the blog.

 

[nfitz]

I was referring to the fact that LRT stands for Light Rail Transit and BRT stands for Bus Rapid Transit

well it can mean light rail transit. Though experts might disagree.

I though the "rail" was a fan retronym.

 

[afransen]

There was an option to have a faster LRT and parallel, less-frequent bus service to provide very local service for those who don't mind low speeds to avoid a few minutes walking.

This would probably have higher ridership than a bus-replacement LRT.

 

[Northern Light]

Part of the problem is the tendency for politicians and agencies to try to sell their projects by calling them Rapid Transit when what they really mean is the less sexy Higher Order Transit.

In the earlier days of planning the suburban LRTs, planners were saying speeds could be 26-27 kph with wider spacing, or about 23 with more stops. If those speeds are no longer possible, someone needs to say why. Math and engineering haven't changed that much in 12 years. If the difference is that they have given up on wringing signal priority out of the car enablers, I mean traffic engineers, which is the most evident explanation, someone needs to say out loud "We're going to run a multi-billion dollar rail system like a streetcar in order not to annoy drivers." And see how that sits with the new mayor.

This gets my top comment award.

Debating spacing is fair game; but here, 18 stops over 10.2km gets average stop spacing of ~566m; some are doubtless closer and we may question those; but overall, that doesn't offend me for what this is designed to do; and to ask it to behave as a subway is to ask for something entirely different than what was built.

On the other hand, an average speed that seems to be under 20km/ph does bother me, and brings us back to transit priority, intersection design, intersection frequency and boarding practices. We should be able to do better w/the current stop spacing.

*****

To come back to what customers may expect; I think everyone should be asking for the shortest possible travel time commutes, understanding that we have to negotiate what is affordable and reasonable access, so it is not a subway to everyone's door.

But I think we should aim to give the vast majority a total commute not greater than 45M and an average commute under 30M. That's not a function of any one transit line, but each does contribute to the whole.

 

[drum118]

It's literally the same thing.

BRT is similar speeds for similar stop spacing, with similar grade seperation. The difference is capacity and comfort.
Subway and streetcar speeds would be faster if there was almost no riders. Ditto for roads!

I was never quite sure why they expected significant ridership on the BRT, given the forecast Line 5 ridership is so low between Jane and Renforth. It has no receptors and doesn't make most trips to the subway any faster.

It serious be interesting to revisit the original EA and ridership forecast assumptions

The EA calls for 25,000 between Renforth and MCC for peak time by 2025 or 2030. I need to check the year to make sure what it was. Doing the math back then I would see a bus about every 15 seconds, a DD bus every 25 seconds and a single LRT car every 1 minute going from memory that I need to check for final numbers when I have time as well find my report. It was stated after the fact that the 25,000 number was for the full GO system and talking about skewing numbers to justify something that was to be built. You may see something like 5,000 today including miWay and had not look at numbers for it in years.

Feb 14
The speed limit for the Mississauga Transitway stations is 50K not 30k(?) that shows often I ride the line.

Since I had a free afternoon, I decided to check Finch out. The 107 40' bus was a crush load when I got on. We bypassed two stations with no one there; two stations saw a single rider get off/on; Dixie saw a few riders get on/off; Renforth saw the bus at peak load; 50% of the riders got off at Viscount; we were now to 20% departing Westwood Mall for Humber College. Took an hour from Central Pkwy to Westwood Mall

My goal was to have a look at the Finch Humber station and walk up to the Millwood stop to catch a TTC bus. I was then going to do some jumping off and on to Jane and ride the bus to Finch Station before heading home.

That plan went out the window that I ended up walking to Islington based on several things I was seeing, as well checking it out.

Substantial completion barely meets the requirements for ML to run trains on the line. I will say that the line is only 80-85% complete with several months of civil work still to be done for sidewalks, retaining wall, for a few stations, let alone paving the bike paths and the road. Finch station exterior should be done by the end of the month.

Stations are 75% complete with some glazing needing to be replaced or installed and plywood removed at various locations for each platform. I'm not sure if it is protecting something or waiting for something to be placed, Some platforms missing railing and civil work. Was told that the stainless-steel handrail system for the station came from California of all places, not Canada. The rails were missing parts, wrong parts and not sitting together like they are too.

Crews working on the overhead as well checking it.

The guideway saw crews working on switches, working on trackwork under a tent between Jane and Keele between the crossovers. I stand to be corrected, but there are five sets of crossovers for the line, and they have no block signals like the two for Crosstown line. Lots of plywood over various size of holes in the tracks and between the tracks.

Wood boards are used for the ramps for the bridge over the line and the steel work looks like it only has a primer on it. If it was painted, it needs a new paint job.

Density from 27 to Islington is really low along the line with a lot of development sites to help ridership in the coming decades. Most riders will have long walks coming in from the side streets. I don't know what is planned between Kipling and Islington on the northside, but that will be a major issue of an exceptionally long walk to either station from the centre. The centre area of that block indicates there will be an intersection there as there is no curb across it today.

Weston Rd is a bottle neck going eastbound until they finish building the curb lane as well the northbound curb.

Still a single lane in the eastbound lane at Keele that slows eastbound traffic down. They were stripping a crosswalk somewhere west of Keele that wasn't helping traffic at all.

Lot more, but will cut it here.

Shot 200 shots for the line that will join the 300 in my backlog with no timetable when they will be uploaded to my site.

 

[nfitz]

The EA calls for 25,000 between Renforth and MCC for peak time by 2025 or 2030.

Hopefully eastbound at Hurontario.

But how the heck do they get number that would have at the time challenged Line 2 in central Toronto? That must be hugely flawed, or assume massive density added along the Transitway (which seems like a no brainer - now at least).

It's far beyond what they estimated for even a full build of Line 4 from Sheppard West station to Scarborough Centre.

 

[drum118]

Hopefully eastbound at Hurontario.

But how the heck do they get number that would have at the time challenged Line 2 in central Toronto? That must be hugely flawed, or assume massive density added along the Transitway (which seems like a no brainer - now at least).

It's far beyond what they estimated for even a full build of Line 4 from Sheppard West station to Scarborough Centre.

It was part of several questions that got swiped under the table and only been told of the number after the EA was done. It was all westbound. It was the key point to my opposition of the BRT as it should have been an LRT but was told it had to be an BRT to go from Hamiliton to Oshawa.

The vision how the transitway was to go east has been kill by Hydro One as they have stopped the use of their lands for most things these days to protect their need for more service along it.

GO was a different story back then as they called all the shots compared to ML now doing it for them.

 

[Rainforest]

There was an option to have a faster LRT and parallel, less-frequent bus service to provide very local service for those who don't mind low speeds to avoid a few minutes walking.

This would probably have higher ridership than a bus-replacement LRT.

I can see both pros and cons with that solution. The paired service would work very well during the peak periods, as the LRTs would carry the bulk of load, and the local bus would not be too busy (packed buses is a common problem on the regular bus routes). Moreover, fast LRT means each train takes less time for the round-trip, and thus fewer trains are needed to maintain the scheduled frequency. That's an advantage often being overlooked in the debates about speed; a better speed means lower operating expenses for the same number of riders carried.

But off-peak and on weekends, the demand is much lower, then how should the paired service be scheduled? Run both LRTs and buses at a high frequency, means high operating expenses not being offset by the ridership revenues. Run both LRTs and buses at a low frequency, means an inconvenience for all riders, especially since the LRT stops are in the median and the bus stops are at the curbs. Run the local buses only, means an odd situation where an expensive rail line is only used for half of weekly daytime hours.

I suspect that local LRT + no bus is the correct choice for Finch (but not necessarily for every other corridor). Speed is still important, and should be addressed by working with the TSP model and the operational rules, but not by dropping any stops.

 

[smallspy]

98% of riders do not read transit blogs, and their expectations cannot be built up by any group on the blog.

The percentage of riders that don't read a blog such as this is far higher than 98%.

This is a false dichotomy. There's no reason a more rapid option doesn't "serve" everyone on the corridor, Line 1 still "serves" me if I have to walk 10 minutes to a station or even take a bus to one.

It's not a false dichotomy, it's a function of the purpose of the line. Not all rapid transit lines are equal.

One thing that a lot of people seem to miss is the whole question of access. Standing at the corner of Glen Echo and Yonge, you may be only 50 feet away from the Yonge Subway - but the reality is that you have a 2300+ foot walk to the nearest subway entrance. And there are not a lot of people who live right on Yonge, but rather in some distance from Yonge, meaning that their walk is that distance from Yonge PLUS the 2300-some-odd-feet.

Are those people still served by the Yonge Subway if all of a sudden transit is so much of a bear that they'll just drive instead?

Can there be too many stops? Absolutely. But there can also be not enough depending on what role the line is supposed to play.

Toronto has a very odd obsession with building rail (of any shape or size) that replaces *all* local transit service (which you seem to suggest is necessary in OP), which leads to silly things like a suburban tram line (built for billions of dollars!) that has an average speed of ~20kph, better than the bus or not thats *bad* especially in the sprawling burbs.

Again, that statement only applies if you take the purpose of each rapid transit line as just that - a rapid transit line. Each line is planned for a purpose, or a group of purposes. In this case, the purpose is to replace the surface transit line. Will it serve other needs? Of course - but just not as well as if it had been built for those.

The glaring analogy to me is the Crosstown West extension. Had it been built as a surface line with more stops, it would have been built for cheaper, sooner, and would have had higher ridership because it's purpose was different. It would have been a replacement to the existing surface transit. Instead, it won't be. Will it still cover many/most of those trips? Sure - but it won't cover all of them like the surface line would have. And so the surface bus will have to remain.

For the record, replacing "all" existing transit service should be seen as a goal where the purpose of the line is to replace that surface transit - such as Finch West or the eastern half of Eglinton. No one would suggest that because the UPX is running parallel to Weston Road that it should replace the buses there, that would have been silly. And if you were serious about pushing transit, you should also be serious about trying to do the most with the scarce resources that are given. Running buses - especially when empty - is hugely expensive. So is running grade separated transit when it isn't necessary.

Even if Finch has just been more like Edmonton's Valley line with long stop spacings you could have gotten a lot more speed, the idea that Albion mall and surrounds needs three stops is . . . some people may have to take buses to the tram if there were less stops, and they'd probably still be better off.

That is a false dichotomy, as the two lines serve very, very different purposes. One line is designed for local uses, and on a linear corridor. The other is a long-distance commuter run, winding its way from destination to destination from downtown to the outer suburbs.

Dan

 

[T3G]

that is not the case with most subways.

Huh? What corridors are you looking at?

This might be the case if we were talking about station to station runs downtown, but if you tried to do a crosstown trip from suburban terminal to suburban terminal, outside of rush hour the car will absolutely come out on top.

The idea that if someone has to take a bus to the subway it will be too much of a bear is silly, most of the Yonge Subways riders come from off the corridor! And a 2300ft (~800m) walk is about 10 minutes, a totally normal distance to walk. This person is served as are people coming in on buses (which again you highlight is most people - who are indeed being served).

I feel like I'm a broken record here, but this is just untrue, especially in the particular case of the Yonge corridor. Again, I need to point out: not everyone is able bodied. And if they are, they might not always have the strength to walk almost a kilometre to the nearest subway station. I'm 26 now, hardly very old, and when I was younger I would have no issues with walking 1-2 kilometres to my destination, but at this point when I look at a journey I have to make and I see that the walk is anywhere above 500 m, it feels like an imposition. And let me tell you outright, if I had a car, I would use that, and tell you exactly what you can do with your rapid transit line.

Having to walk a kilometre because we want our trains to be zoomy is bad enough. If you live off Yonge, it'll be even worse. Let's consider a traveller who lives at Deloraine Avenue and Greer Road, a comparison point I selected because it's roughly midway between York Mills and Lawrence, and also midway between Yonge Street and Avenue Road. To get anywhere, they have two choices: via Avenue Road or via Yonge Street.

The Avenue option will take them to a bus which is slow, and even at rush hour runs every 14 minutes. The Yonge option should on paper be faster, but is instead needlessly convoluted: they have to walk 650 m to Yonge (roughly 10 minutes), but then, they still are nowhere near available transit, because that would let them out at the midway point (1.06 km) between York Mills and Lawrence (separated by 2.15 km). They now have to use the 97 Yonge bus to get to their nearest station, a service which never has a (combined) frequency of greater than 25 minutes, so it is not a serious option. If you are able bodied, you can walk another ~15 minutes to get to the next station and all the way back, in the time that you'd have to wait for that joke of a bus to arrive. If you have mobility challenges, or the weather is inclement, you have no alternative options. This is the kind of garbage you are stuck with while subway trains (ostensibly) run every 90 seconds not 6 meters below you. This doesn't strike me as an urban planning success story, it sounds like another flavour of the same unwalkable hostility that our suburbs are well known for.

Or, there is a secret third option: they use the car. They might get stuck in traffic and have to pay for parking, but it sure beats having to put up with the hostile conditions they would have to deal with if they used transit. This is what you want to promote?

All of this is not to say that the Yonge corridor shouldn't have had express and local tracks from the get go. The fact that it didn't is a huge mistake.

The existing transit frankly doesn't need to be replaced, it needs to be augmented with bus lanes and potentially an additional faster service level.

And what happens when your bus reaches capacity? The 36 already runs every 3 minutes 25 seconds in the morning rush hour. There is not much more room for improvement.

I've already indicated in the thread that you would not be able to couple Nova LFS artics together, so BRT would be a stopgap solution that would be required to be replaced by rail at some point anyway.

 

[Northern Light]

"Bad enough" and yet the Yonge Subway is Canada's most successful transit line and one of the most successful in the Americas! It being "zoomy" is why its popular! The idea that we need super tight station spacings does not at all align with the global best practice which has closed in around ~1km station spacings for metro.

I would suggest that Reece that while you're right about 'Metro' standards, that most people here don't view Finch West as a Metro.

***

As to the comment exchange regarding Glen Echo and Yonge, I would point out that the current station spacing is 2km here, with Glen Echo just under 1km to Lawrence and just over 1km to York Mills.

 

[sixrings]

So, you are suggesting that you were not presenting a false dichotomy here.



That certainly looks like a dichotomy ^, is there another option that would make it a false one? Yes, because you can just run a local transit service like on so many rapid transit corridors around the world.

"Or you do want a high-speed line that bypasses a lot of stops, will require more transfers and/or walking, and may not serve all of the residents and commuters in the corridor? Ridership may be higher, because you're able to draw more people onto transit. Or it may not be, because the number of new people drawn is outweighed by the number of people who who currently use the line but will have to figure out some other way to get to work/home/school."

1) Less stops doesn't mean people aren't "served" they may well be able to walk to a stop.
2) Those current users of the line can continue to use the local bus service which can stay (even if it was silly back then - we are no longer in the transit city era where there is no money for transit), but like in most places around the world where there are parallel local and express services the riders on the local will likely ride to the first local / express stop and get on the express. They do not need to "figure out some other way to get to work/home/school."

Just because a person might have to take some other transit, walk, or cycle to a stop on a new rapid transit route does not mean they are not served! When I was living in Scarborough and took the bus to Line 1 to get downtown (which is how most people get to Line 1) Line 1 was absolutely "serving" me.

Some people want the least amount of transfers. I don’t want to have to take a bus to a lrt to a subway if I can just take an lrt to a subway. Transfers take time and are annoying.

Comparing finch west to Yonge is a huge stretch. Not in anyone’s wildest dreams would finch if it was built as a subway, be anything like Yonge. Also yonge was built when stations were much cheaper so it has decent walkable stop spacing. The spacing on finch would be more like sheppard and it’s decades later and that does not resemble anything like Yonge.