[Midtown Urbanist]

Looking forward to hearing testimonies of the commute this morning.

 

[PL1]

Train was 2/3 full WB from Laird at 7:54

 

[hawc]

Is Eglinton Station on the Yonge/University Line 1 going to be able to handle the extra volume that will be dumped on it from people transferring over from Line 5? Isn't it already pretty crowded? Or was that all from bus routes, that will now simply be LRT passengers so no real change?

 

[EllaW]

Is Eglinton Station on the Yonge/University Line 1 going to be able to handle the extra volume that will be dumped on it from people transferring over from Line 5? Isn't it already pretty crowded? Or was that all from bus routes, that will now simply be LRT passengers so no real change?

I’ll be surprised if there is any change. How many people living along Eg who work downtown near line 1 would have been driving and parking downtown and now switch to transit? I think basically almost all the riders switching to line 1 were already taking the bus there to do the same commute. The real change will come when they build more housing along Eg, and it attracts people who have a downtown commute and are looking for where they can live to do that commute easily without a car.

 

[PL1]

Is Eglinton Station on the Yonge/University Line 1 going to be able to handle the extra volume that will be dumped on it from people transferring over from Line 5? Isn't it already pretty crowded? Or was that all from bus routes, that will now simply be LRT passengers so no real change?

It'll be interesting to see if there's any immediate increase traffic. I rather suspect a large part of the previous bus traffic will now be LRT.

 

[Bojaxs]

I wonder how many of the people that trot out this bullshit argument actually use the line they are condemning for being built as the wrong form of transit?

I have no idea how anyone can look at the overcrowded, traffic logged buses that were running on Eglinton and think that those were preferable to a vehicle that has infinitely higher capacity and its own lanes to boot, just because it's not the proper form of transit, whatever the hell that means. Thank Christ we don't have people like you making decisions on what gets built.

You complain about the over crowded buses that used to run along Eglinton, and yet the line is already showing signs of capacity issues.

Something that wouldn't had been an issue had we constructed a subway instead.

So yes, you may not want to hear it, but wrong form of transit was built along Eglinton.

 

[PL1]

One immediate issue I see is there is zero wayfinding as to which exit you are going towards, at least at Laird and Leaside stations.

Laird has different set stairs from the platform to each of the two exits. At Leaside the corridors to each exit go from the mezzanine. There LED map at Leaside outside the fare gates does show which building you are going to, but it should be obvious from the fare-paid side.

Laird station platform: to secondary (East) exit, then primary.

 

[T3G]

You complain about the over crowded buses that used to run along Eglinton, and yet the line is already showing signs of capacity issues.

Something that wouldn't had been an issue had we constructed a subway instead.

So yes, you may not want to hear it, but wrong form of transit was built along Eglinton.

Well, no, we don't know that, because we have no idea what percentage of the ridership yesterday were people who were only riding the line to check it out. The coming weeks are what will demonstrate whether there are latent capacity issues present or not.

And like I said before, criticize all you want, but there is a MAJOR difference between doing so, and outright declaring that, because the line's design is not to your liking, that we shouldn't have bothered to build it in the first place and that buses would have been fine until we could afford to bury it along its entire length. In most if not all circumstances, the line is going to be a significant improvement over what came before, whatever shortcomings it has. These criticisms are letting perfect be the enemy of good and if this line or thinking were applied to literally any other area of life, no one, anywhere, would do anything, for any reason, since perfection is unattainable.

 

[Midtown Urbanist]

https://www.reddit.com/r/toronto/comments/1qzu3pf

Here’s a video of the Flexity Freedom vehicles going 80km/h in the tunnel during service yesterday.

 

[nightstreak]

To answer my questions about bus route changes, of course Steve Munro has an article. The Eglinton 34 bus will remain but only every 20 minutes (expected to be reduced to half hour later this year) and many other routes along Line 5 will change.

TTC Service Changes Effective February 8, 2026

The TTC has not yet issued its detailed memo listing the operating designs for bus service changes effective February 8, 2026. When it is available, I will update this article with all of the usual…

stevemunro.ca

 

[crs1026]

Here’s a video of the Flexity Freedom vehicles going 80km/h in the tunnel during service yesterday.

While riding yesterday I noticed trams that were being driven by white hard-hatted types in hi vis vests with the operator standing behind them watching. Not sure what that was about.

- Paul

 

[Bojaxs]

Well, no, we don't know that, because we have no idea what percentage of the ridership yesterday were people who were only riding the line to check it out. The coming weeks are what will demonstrate whether there are latent capacity issues present or not.

And like I said before, criticize all you want, but there is a MAJOR difference between doing so, and outright declaring that, because the line's design is not to your liking, that we shouldn't have bothered to build it in the first place and that buses would have been fine until we could afford to bury it along its entire length. In most if not all circumstances, the line is going to be a significant improvement over what came before, whatever shortcomings it has. These criticisms are letting perfect be the enemy of good and if this line or thinking were applied to literally any other area of life, no one, anywhere, would do anything, for any reason, since perfection is unattainable.

We could afford to build a subway. Money was never an issue. The issue was that politicians simply didn't want to build a subway because they didn't want to be seen supporting Rob Ford.

Had the city council voted in favour of a subway along Eglinton, the province and Feds would have helped with funding. Just like they did with this LRT project.

 

[nightstreak]

Is Eglinton Station on the Yonge/University Line 1 going to be able to handle the extra volume that will be dumped on it from people transferring over from Line 5? Isn't it already pretty crowded? Or was that all from bus routes, that will now simply be LRT passengers so no real change?

I suspect we’ll see a new type of passenger. Have you ever taken Line 1 north, only to realize you’re on the wrong side of the fork? Yeah, that’s been me more times than I can count. I would never take the bus, I’d just go back down on Line 1 and use Line 2 to switch sides before proceeding on my route. Being able to transfer at Eglinton (or Cedarvale) to switch sides will come in handy more times than I care to admit.

Then there are deliberate commute patterns like someone who lives at Lawrence (on the Yonge fork) wanting to go to Yorkdale. In the past they might go up Line 1 then take a bus across, now they’ll almost certainly go south a stop to Eglinton, transfer there to the University/Spadina fork and go up to Yorkdale.

I can think of many of these in addition to new bus routes feeding Line 5 beyond the traffic that came in on the bus. The new east/west connection will certainly change travel patterns and make Eglinton and Cedarvale stations busier.

 

[crs1026]

We could afford to build a subway. Money was never an issue. The issue was that politicians simply didn't want to build a subway because they didn't want to be seen supporting Rob Ford.
.

You are misstating the history. There was a subway, until Harris cancelled it. And one for Sheppard, until Lastman cancelled most of it (he only cared about the North York segment, and nobody cared about Scarborough....which gave rise to Ford's eventual platform). The cancellations were publicly known, but there was no blowback and little advocacy to challenge those decisions.
The political mood of the day was very much about not spending money on subways because they were considered too expensive. Love him or hate him, Ford fought for an underground line on Eglinton. But in general, LRT was all the voters would accept.

- Paul

 

[81-717]

I suspect we’ll see a new type of passenger. Have you ever taken Line 1 north, only to realize you’re on the wrong side of the fork? Yeah, that’s been me more times than I can count. I would never take the bus, I’d just go back down on Line 1 and use Line 2 to switch sides before proceeding on my route. Being able to transfer at Eglinton (or Cedarvale) to switch sides will come in handy more times than I care to admit.

In this instance, taking a bus across Eglinton, Sheppard, Finch, etc beats going all the way down to Bloor and back (let alone all the way down to Union). The fact that line 6 doesn't allow this strips away probably well over 50% of its usefulness. And obviously extending line 4 to allow this (no LRTs plz) should be obligatory.