Please provide examples of transit infrastructure built in Toronto that have become inadequate in a short time period.
The 510, the 504 KSP, the Bloor-Yonge Expansion, The Union Station Platform widths, St George Station in general, and most certainly the Yonge North Subway extension if it's built, subway platform lengths (all), Kitchener GO line platform lengths, second exits all around the system, the UPX, Union Station "Improvements", and I'm even going to throw in the Eglinton Crosstown (More on that later). Going back to the original point, we've never had these problems before because we always built with the future in mind. All these issues have occurred recently. The Yonge subway initially ran 2-4 car Gloucester trains, which are about 30% shorter than T1 and TR cars.
a 2 car train can hold only ~250 passengers, less than a light rail line. Imagine if trains like these were used currently on the yonge line or if they went with light rail instead? We'd be nowhere better than totally f***ed. Imagine the bloor line like this, or if the DRL were built to these specifications. My point is that the city doesn't do enough when planning for the future. Growth can occur very quickly; Line's 1 and 2 have seen growth of about 45K PPD each over a 5 year period, and that's despite all the system's shortcomings in that same time period.
“Trains are full at rush hour” is a completely meaningless statement. You could have a line that moves 900 pphpd with one train per hour and claim that “trains are full at rush hour”.
In the case of Sheppard Line, the trains are 33% smaller than elsewhere on the system, and trains come less than half as frequent. It’s no wonder that the trains are full at rush hour.
Anyways we have actual ridership data. The line moves 4,000 PPHPD at peak. There is no reason to be using the fullness of trains as a proxy for actual ridership data, unless we’re trying to be misleading.
https://www.daniels.utoronto.ca/sites/daniels.utoronto.ca/files/old/transit_panel.pdf This report from 7 years ago states that ridership was at 4,500 PPHPD on average (and as we can see with the Yonge line, 500 extra people per hour can make a huge difference; another train being required), and ever since then, many housing developments have taken place. It sucks that the TTC isn't very open to providing more and more statistics to the public. We haven't had a ridership update since 2015.
Also, if I remember correctly, trains on Sheppard come on an average of every 5 minutes and 30 seconds. By way of comparison, the maximum for the Yonge line currently is ~2 minutes and 30 seconds. That's not more than twice as long, and this is only for the Yonge line. The Bloor line frequencies hover at around 3 minutes during the peak periods and all subway lines have frequencies of between 4-6 minutes during the off-peak hours. Ridership levels along most lines compared to the number of cars per train are pretty similar, the exception being the TYSSE (which has no stable ridership levels at the moment).
Might I add that although trains are only 4 cars, they can carry the equivalent of 6 G-series subway car trains, so the capacity expectations are greater than that of the original Yonge subway. It's a null argument considering the fact that the DRL is going to be built and operated with 4 car trains, and that the line itself is a stub. It's 5 km long. Line 1? 38. Line 2? 28. The longer the subway line, the more traffic it receives, and this is especially true for lines like Sheppard and the Bloor Danforth: everyone gets on as the train as it approaches a transfer station: Bloor Yonge, St George, or Sheppard yonge. That higher capacity is only really ever utilized the closer the trains are to the transfer stations themselves. If the sheppard line was built like an Eglinton style LRT/Subway, people east of don mills would have a greater incentive to use transit, and therefore, more people would ride the line. However, as you approach sheppard yonge, the train begins to approach its choke point: 9,000 PPHPD. If ridership even nears this value than the new line is a failure at addressing capacity issues. This is why I worry about Eglinton; The line is expected to see about 300K PPD a few years after its completion, but we all know based on experiences on the new streetcars that the capacities of 15K PPHPD is not going to happen; 9-10K PPHPD will be more likely its upper limit. With extensions, things will only get worse for the line, especially out west.