[Kelson]

Setting aside the merits or likelihood of such an exercise, lest my answer spur such replies, I'll try to give that a serious answer.

First though we have to set some parameters.

1) I'll work with the assumption that we are retaining the current running concept (train lengths, catenary, low boarding platforms.

2) I'm only considering the east end.

3) I'm going to look at this in chunks:

Brentcliffe Portal to Don Mills

Don Mills to Wynford

Wynford to Bermondsey

Bermondsey to Kennedy.

There is a logic to this based on how the current surface network is supposed to operate, whether bridges/river crossings are required, and effects on existing operations.

** Note that I am not including any rolling stock costs, maintenance costs or debt servicing costs, though the latter is surely mandatory, but too fuzzy to predict based on how the financing is done.

****

Segment 1 (west to east), Brentcliffe to Don Mills:

I could provide an estimate for full undergrounding, but it would be astronomical because you'd have to rebuilding the existing tunnel at least back to Laird Station and you might even have to rebuild the station. Getting the LRT to go under the Don River would mean a very significant re-grade of the line, its also not clear to me that the math would allow it to get back up high enough for the station at Don Mills in time.

So I won't even work out the details.

Instead, I'll give the alternative. You shift the alignment of the LRT so the south side of Eglinton at all times until it reaches the Portal into Don Mills Station.

There is an obvious problem with getting the traffic under/over the LRT at that point, but its do-able and gives full separation from the Leslie Intersection which is the only issue in this segment.

Except for the cross over this would be relatively 'cheap', providing the existing bridge structure can support the shift. I will assume that it can for the purposes of costing.

Estimate: 450M (very back of the envelope, but it should be ballpark accurate)

****

Segment 2, Don Mills Station to Wynford.

There are a series of challenges and assumptions you have to make here. You want to maintain grade separation, but you have to decide in advance what you're doing w/the line east of Wynford (how are you crossing the East Don?)

I will decide on our collective behalf, that we're using the same strategy as the previous segment in that we're going to keep the line on the existing bridge. That means we don't want or need to deep-dive.

However, given the existing depth of the line here, I'm not confident we can do this w/o reconstructing the DVP/Eglinton interchange. We might be able to, with cut and cover, but it would be quite disruptive.

I will assume we can get away w/leaving the interchange. But what to do about Wynford itself? The road passes under, but there's a traffic lit connection to Eglinton. What do we do about a Station?

Very cursory look suggests to me that the LRT should stay underground at Wynford, but at almost the exact elevation of Wynford today. That means we need to rebuild, and re-align Wynford to go over the top, at-grade.

Estimate: 600M

****

Segment 3, Wynford to Bermondsey

Here we would go underground, likely by boring, immediately east of the river crossing.

Bermondsey would then be a deep station.

Estimate cost: 500M

****

Finally, we have Bermondsey to Kennedy, I'm going to assume this is entirely underground, more or less, though it would want to try to get it level with the existing portal into Kennedy Station if feasible to avoid reconstructing that and rebuilding Kennedy.

This would likely entail a closer of Ionview. its also problematic that it would to pass under Taylor-Massey Creek then come back up. One could consider alternatives, but none are particularly appealing or easy.

Estimate: ~3.5km of tunnel + deep stations at Victoria Park, Warden and Birchmount (I'd cut Pharmacy in adittion to the mid-block stops to make this work), 1.5B

All-in, 3.2B with rounding.

* note the items I omitted; in the real world there will be debt to be serviced, that could double the cost. Also I have excluded the cost of removing the surface track and reconstructing Eglinton. That would be at least 200M, possbily double that.

There's a lot of IFs, ands and Buts there.

But I thiink a realistic range would be 5.5B-7.5B inclusive.

****

Line would be shut down for 3 years minimum, up to 5.

Not all heros wear cape's

 

[Northern Light]

**disclaimer -- I am an amateur with a crayon that doesn't really know what he's talking about*

No harm in throwing ideas out.

An easier (but unrealistic since it inconveniences drivers) solution to the first section could be to simply ban left turns to/from Leslie, forcing some drivers to U-turn at the Brentcliffe portal and Don Mills respectively, allowing for the retention of the central alignment. This still leaves the issue of passengers/pedestrians crossing the street and going between platforms, could a pedestrian bridge with ramps be a feasible build, maybe along the CPKC bridge?

How are these U-Turns being done?

Yes, you could send pedestrians up and over Eglinton, but CPKC's existing bridge would not be suitable and in any event they wouldn't share it, but that's not such a big deal, I'm not entirely convinced people would be cooperative though. You're going to have to put full height barriers, blocking not just cars but pedestrian movements, there is a question of 'emergency' egress.

Looking at the existing configuration you would have to extend the platforms slightly to the east, then run full-width stairs up and over, that, of course, means the stop would not be accessible, but there is no room for stairs and an elevator. (or more accurately, 3 elevators, one from each platform and one back to the north side of the street. There's no room for one on the south side due to the embankment.

For the second section, could the DVP interchange be reconfigured slightly to the 4-clover design of Lawrence one arterial to the north? This would get rid of both crossings of the centre ROW and extend grade separation further east. The pedestrian crossing at Wynford stop would have to be eliminated, but pedestrians could be encouraged to walk down the stairs to Wynford drive (albeit inconvenient and ramps would need to be added).

There appears to be physical space that would allow this, especially if removing the existing traffic lights and any through (over the tracks) vehicle movements. But it would be tight for radii, would mean slip lanes for pedestrians to cross those ramps, and there would be probable traffic conflicts between on/off ramps that are very close together.

Let me show you:

Crude, but I measured the diameter of the ramp on the other side, it just fits. So that you can eliminate SB DVP to EB Eglinton at the lights.

However.....

When you extend the line to the on-ramp to DVP NB on the east side of the Parkway, there is a potential issue:

You've got roughly 140m of fast-moving traffic coming off the DVP that does not want to get back on; and that same distance within which everyone who wants to get on the DVP has to get into that lane and then immediately take the ramp.

I'm not sure that would pass muster with the MTO, but I'm not sure and would leave that to the pros like @reaperexpress

Instead of tunneling beyond this point, could the line be elevated east of the Don for less money? Eglinton is wide in the area and the space available between Ionview and the tunnel portal is similar (a little shorter) than the underground-elevated transition at Black Creek Drive in the west, meaning the current trains should be able to tackle the necessary grade.

Potentially, yes. But there are multiple challenges with that choice.

You need vertical clearance over Swift/Credit Union, if you're at the same height as the current river crossing and you already have the hill to climb, that's a lot of grade change in a short distance, honestly w/o getting the gradient of the existing slope, which someone here probably has........ I couldn't do the calculation, but my suspicion is that that is too steep to pull off. If you start from further back you need a dedicated river crossing and it will have to be to the side of the bridge, unless you want to reconstruct the bridge.

It really looks pretty messy.

A more realistic choice would be surfacing east of Bermondsey and them climbing to elevation, I think.

From there, you can maintain that.....until you want to get down into the portal at Kennedy, I'd have to put some further thought into that end, but if you close all the crossings of Eglinton east of Birchmount, it should be feasible.

But.....

How are you getting people to the new elevated stations?

You now require elevators and possible escalators too. The current Platform widths would not be sufficient. It wouldn't rule it out, but there's a lot of push and pull to find the room.

 

[nfitz]

Trainspotting report: This morning I took the bus along Eglinton from Don Mills to Victoria Park. Saw zero trains heading eastbound (which may be because that was my direction), but 4 trains westbound, and 3 of them were within a range of 2 intersections. Maybe someone saw the posts here about "bunching", and ordered a "bunching test".

To me, that sounds like the typical TTC service gap that they are practising! So it's ready!!

 

[max]

There appears to be physical space that would allow this

You are of course correct that there is physical space for this, the reason being that it was originally built as a cloverleaf as can be seen in this aerial photograph from 1965

Link to original: https://www.toronto.ca/ext/archives/s0012/fl1965/s0012_fl1965_it0108.jpg

You've got roughly 140m of fast-moving traffic coming off the DVP that does not want to get back on; and that same distance within which everyone who wants to get on the DVP has to get into that lane and then immediately take the ramp.

I'm not sure that would pass muster with the MTO, but I'm not sure and would leave that to the pros like @reaperexpress

I share your skepticism that the MTO would restore the cloverleaf as they seem to favour the Parclo interchange. If I were the betting type, I'd put money on them creating a plan to eliminate that Lawrence cloverleaf and reconfigure Don Mills southbound to avoid the shared on/off lane once they own the DVP. However, I'm also not a traffic engineer so take my opinion on that basis.

 

[dullturtle06]

Setting aside the merits or likelihood of such an exercise, lest my answer spur such replies, I'll try to give that a serious answer.

First though we have to set some parameters.

1) I'll work with the assumption that we are retaining the current running concept (train lengths, catenary, low boarding platforms.)

2) I'm only considering the east end.

3) I'm going to look at this in chunks:

Brentcliffe Portal to Don Mills

Don Mills to Wynford

Wynford to Bermondsey

Bermondsey to Kennedy.

There is a logic to this based on how the current surface network is supposed to operate, whether bridges/river crossings are required, and effects on existing operations.

** Note that I am not including any rolling stock costs, maintenance costs or debt servicing costs, though the latter is surely mandatory, but too fuzzy to predict based on how the financing is done.

****

Segment 1 (west to east), Brentcliffe to Don Mills:

I could provide an estimate for full undergrounding, but it would be astronomical because you'd have to rebuilding the existing tunnel at least back to Laird Station and you might even have to rebuild the station. Getting the LRT to go under the Don River would mean a very significant re-grade of the line, its also not clear to me that the math would allow it to get back up high enough for the station at Don Mills in time.

So I won't even work out the details.

Instead, I'll give the alternative. You shift the alignment of the LRT so the south side of Eglinton at all times until it reaches the Portal into Don Mills Station.

There is an obvious problem with getting the traffic under/over the LRT at that point, but its do-able and gives full separation from the Leslie Intersection which is the only issue in this segment.

Except for the cross over this would be relatively 'cheap', providing the existing bridge structure can support the shift. I will assume that it can for the purposes of costing.

Estimate: 450M (very back of the envelope, but it should be ballpark accurate)

****

Segment 2, Don Mills Station to Wynford.

There are a series of challenges and assumptions you have to make here. You want to maintain grade separation, but you have to decide in advance what you're doing w/the line east of Wynford (how are you crossing the East Don?)

I will decide on our collective behalf, that we're using the same strategy as the previous segment in that we're going to keep the line on the existing bridge. That means we don't want or need to deep-dive.

However, given the existing depth of the line here, I'm not confident we can do this w/o reconstructing the DVP/Eglinton interchange. We might be able to, with cut and cover, but it would be quite disruptive.

I will assume we can get away w/leaving the interchange. But what to do about Wynford itself? The road passes under, but there's a traffic lit connection to Eglinton. What do we do about a Station?

Very cursory look suggests to me that the LRT should stay underground at Wynford, but at almost the exact elevation of Wynford today. That means we need to rebuild, and re-align Wynford to go over the top, at-grade.

Estimate: 600M

****

Segment 3, Wynford to Bermondsey

Here we would go underground, likely by boring, immediately east of the river crossing.

Bermondsey would then be a deep station.

Estimate cost: 500M

****

Finally, we have Bermondsey to Kennedy, I'm going to assume this is entirely underground, more or less, though it would want to try to get it level with the existing portal into Kennedy Station if feasible to avoid reconstructing that and rebuilding Kennedy.

This would likely entail a closer of Ionview. its also problematic that it would to pass under Taylor-Massey Creek then come back up. One could consider alternatives, but none are particularly appealing or easy.

Estimate: ~3.5km of tunnel + deep stations at Victoria Park, Warden and Birchmount (I'd cut Pharmacy in adittion to the mid-block stops to make this work), 1.5B

All-in, 3.2B with rounding.

* note the items I omitted; in the real world there will be debt to be serviced, that could double the cost. Also I have excluded the cost of removing the surface track and reconstructing Eglinton. That would be at least 200M, possbily double that.

There's a lot of IFs, ands and Buts there.

But I thiink a realistic range would be 5.5B-7.5B inclusive.

****

Line would be shut down for 3 years minimum, up to 5.

why not do an elevated line after the past Bermondsey? The ROW is massive and could be build adjacent to the current tracks so the service can continue until construction is completed. Then the lrt can be transferred onto the guideway and the old ROW con be restored to a road.

 

[Northern Light]

why not do an elevated line after the past Bermondsey? The ROW is massive and could be build adjacent to the current tracks so the service can continue until construction is completed. Then the lrt can be transferred onto the guideway and the old ROW con be restored to a road.

I address that possibility two posts above yours. Likely feasible, but not without challenges.

 

[Bojaxs]

Not sure if it's already been mentioned, but would the hydro cables between Bermondsey & Victoria Park not get in the way of any possible elevated rail option? Probably have to build the elevated portal between Jonesville Crescent & Victoria Park. It would be a tight fit.

By this point from Victoria Park to Kennedy, were looking at an elevated track that is less than 3.5km (if Google Maps is correct). And that's including the portal heading back underground into Kennedy. What's the point? You may as well just tunnel all the way to Kennedy.

Perhaps in the future if we wanted to extend the line eastward, we could do elevated from Kennedy to Eglinton GO and connect the line to the LSE GO line?

 

[nfitz]

Not sure if it's already been mentioned, but would the hydro cables between Bermondsey & Victoria Park not get in the way of any possible elevated rail option? Probably have to build the elevated portal between Jonesville Crescent & Victoria Park. It would be a tight fit.

I don't see any need to elevate west of there, as there's no crossings between Bermondsey and the hydro alignment.

It's over 370 metres from Jonesville to Victoria Park. I believe the maximum grade is 8%. So if they start elevating at Jonesville, they could give about 30 metres clearance over VP. I'd think they'd only need a bit more than a 1% grade - though in reality, they wouldn't start the elevation that far west.

 

[Bojaxs]

But they may scrap it like the SRT...

Considering they built short turning tracks at the Laird station, this is a very real possibility. It won't happen anytime soon, but I can see a scenario where after 10-15 years they simply say "ah screw it!", and just put down bus lanes from Laird to Kennedy, while running the trams from Renforth to Laird.

 

[nfitz]

Considering they built short turning tracks at the Laird station, this is a very real possibility. It won't happen anytime soon, but I can see a scenario where after 10-15 years they simply say "ah screw it!", and just put down bus lanes from Laird to Kennedy, while running the trams from Renforth to Laird.

In such a scenario, I'd be shocked if they wouldn't run to Don Valley station, rather than Laird, with some tweaks to grade separate at Leslie.

 

[EastYorkTTCFan]

Considering they built short turning tracks at the Laird station, this is a very real possibility. It won't happen anytime soon, but I can see a scenario where after 10-15 years they simply say "ah screw it!", and just put down bus lanes from Laird to Kennedy, while running the trams from Renforth to Laird.

In such a scenario, I'd be shocked if they wouldn't run to Don Valley station, rather than Laird, with some tweaks to grade separate at Leslie.

They have turn back switches both duel and single crossovers in several locations between Don Valley and Kenedy. I think I even remember seeing people report when a car ended up on part of the tracks, they were running both ways on a single track going around it at one point during the testing.

 

[81-717]

Especially now that the "new" subway cars are over 15 years old, so it'd make more sense to consider replacing them with new ones *in 10 to 20 years* than keep renovating these ones. Well, unless a rehaul of these cars needed to be done, but that would take much time and labour.

I don't see this opening this year, but I could be wrong.

Because it's vintage. The design was finalized a couple of decades ago; perhaps they were trying to avoid Y2K problems . Gosh, TTC was still installing CRT monitors for the station displays back then.

You wouldn't use this tech on new trains. If they'd gone for screens back then, we'd have had a thread full of complaining of more bleeding-edge/made in Ontario expensive tech, that didn't even last the necessary quarter-century.

They are the same vintage as the R188 cars that you see on the 7 trains in New York City. Heck, looks very similar tech screen:

Compare to the kind of digital displays you'd expect today, on the new 2020s R211 cars from the same manufacturer, that they use on the A-C trains:

TTC technology:

Who knew the TR tech would age so poorly and yet there are people who still think that even the much older T1s are still "timeless" & "ageless".

 

[nfitz]

Who knew the TR tech would age so poorly...

It still functions fine, as designed. It's not like the bulbs are going out.

You see the same equipment in systems bigger than Toronto. I'm not sure what the big deal is here.

 

[reaperexpress]

It still functions fine, as designed. It's not like the bulbs are going out.

You see the same equipment in systems bigger than Toronto. I'm not sure what the big deal is here.

I don't think this is how it was designed:

 

[reaperexpress]

No harm in throwing ideas out.



How are these U-Turns being done?

Yes, you could send pedestrians up and over Eglinton, but CPKC's existing bridge would not be suitable and in any event they wouldn't share it, but that's not such a big deal, I'm not entirely convinced people would be cooperative though. You're going to have to put full height barriers, blocking not just cars but pedestrian movements, there is a question of 'emergency' egress.

Looking at the existing configuration you would have to extend the platforms slightly to the east, then run full-width stairs up and over, that, of course, means the stop would not be accessible, but there is no room for stairs and an elevator. (or more accurately, 3 elevators, one from each platform and one back to the north side of the street. There's no room for one on the south side due to the embankment.



There appears to be physical space that would allow this, especially if removing the existing traffic lights and any through (over the tracks) vehicle movements. But it would be tight for radii, would mean slip lanes for pedestrians to cross those ramps, and there would be probable traffic conflicts between on/off ramps that are very close together.

Let me show you:

View attachment 707327


Crude, but I measured the diameter of the ramp on the other side, it just fits. So that you can eliminate SB DVP to EB Eglinton at the lights.

However.....

When you extend the line to the on-ramp to DVP NB on the east side of the Parkway, there is a potential issue:

View attachment 707328

You've got roughly 140m of fast-moving traffic coming off the DVP that does not want to get back on; and that same distance within which everyone who wants to get on the DVP has to get into that lane and then immediately take the ramp.

The configuration you illustrated is the interchange's previous configuration, which they changed because of the danger of weaving on the DVP. The weaving on Eglinton is not an issue because you can just use normal intersections instead of high speed ramps. But you can't do that on the DVP.

I'm not sure that would pass muster with the MTO, but I'm not sure and would leave that to the pros like @reaperexpress

One of my favourite things about the MTO is that they hate cloverleaf weaving as much as I do. If then MTO controlled the DVP I'm pretty sure they would have converted the Lawrence interchange from a full cloverleaf to a partial cloverleaf a long time ago.