[Streety McCarface]

I'm not bitter about Wynne. Don't turn things around. If I'm bitter at all it is that TC was cancelled and gleefully people on here gloated that Ford was going to put subways everywhere and that only downtown elites who bike and drink lattes like LRT. Sorry if these people rubbed me the wrong way and now I'm happy seeing ford fall of his pedestal.

Transit city was a joke, let's be fair. They're using the wrong types of LRT technologies in the wrong places. Besides, TC has basically been resurrected with a few changes: Don Mills LRT converted to a subway (how was this not in the original plan???), SRT replaced with subway (this makes more sense than replacing it with an LRT, but less fiscal sense than replacing it with new SRT technology or running a subway on the corridor), Sheppard has been deferred until the subway is feasible (~2030s maybe 2040s. This makes sense because there is room for stopgap bus lanes, and there are other routes in the city that need the attention of LRT). I don't understand why TC hasn't looked at Kipling, Steeles, Lawrence, and York Mills for potential LRT routes. Some of those bus lines badly need increased capacity.

PCs alone in not pledging dollars for ‘critical’ Toronto waterfront LRT

This LRT is critical for the city. The size of this development is huge - nearly as large as Downtown Toronto. The development we see here will far exceed any other mass redevelopment in recent memory, including City Place and Liberty Village. No transit is not an option.

It's not just the LRT, but the entire revitalization of the Downtown streetcar network. If Scarborough can have a subway (which is fine if they do), midtown have the crosstown, and Uptown have the Sheppard Subway, then Downtown should have a revitalized streetcar network with new Portlands and other downtown lines (ie Church, Parliament, Bremner, etc, throw in Coxwell, that could actually do some good), new switches, and more streetcars. The fact that there's not more outrage over this astounds me. Everyone argues about a need for the DRL, but it's not the save all line, and neither is RER. People need to realized that a lot of things are required.

Then again, we'll be having 4-5 LRT lines under construction (Finch West, Eglinton, Eglinton West, Eglinton East, Jane) during the next political term, so it just might not be feasible to have another ongoing LRT project when workers are already scarce.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

It's not just the LRT, but the entire revitalization of the Downtown streetcar network. If Scarborough can have a subway (which is fine if they do), midtown have the crosstown, and Uptown have the Sheppard Subway, then Downtown should have a revitalized streetcar network with new Portlands and other downtown lines (ie Church, Parliament, Bremner, etc, throw in Coxwell, that could actually do some good), new switches, and more streetcars. The fact that there's not more outrage over this astounds me. Everyone argues about a need for the DRL, but it's not the save all line, and neither is RER. People need to realized that a lot of things are required.

Then again, we'll be having 4-5 LRT lines under construction (Finch West, Eglinton, Eglinton West, Eglinton East, Jane) during the next political term, so it just might not be feasible to have another ongoing LRT project when workers are already scarce.

I'm personally counting on the Relief Line West eliminating much of the need for an expanded Downtown streetcar system. Planning for that should begin once Relief Line North completes, around 2022. But in the meanwhile, the additional 70 streetcar order and the Portlands LRT are the minimum the city needs.

By the way, when is the deadline for that additional streetcar order?

 

[BurlOak]

I like PARTS of transit city but not all of it.

I like Finch West, Waterfront, Jane and Malvern now Eglinton East.

I don't like Sheppard East, should be subway down the road (post 2030s)

I don't like the at grade section on the crosstown. Should have been skytrain with a mix of elevated and underground merged with Scarborough RT

Don Mills was downright insanity. Rightfully so a subway.

Is this extremist?

So basically, the 3 projects that were prioritized (Sheppard, SRT, Eglinton) they got wrong.
The most obvious subway (DRL) was planned as on-street until Rob Ford came along.

I like (very small) parts of Transit City as well - but to me that means it was quite a bad plan.

 

[Hopkins123]

So basically, the 3 projects that were prioritized (Sheppard, SRT, Eglinton) they got wrong.
The most obvious subway (DRL) was planned as on-street until Rob Ford came along.

I like (very small) parts of Transit City as well - but to me that means it was quite a bad plan.

I will fondly look back at the 2000s-2010s as the lost decades of transit planning.

 

[pman]

Do you mean lost as in a golden age when the lines doodled on the cocktail napkins weren’t demonstrably insane? Or lost as in a dark age when the lines doodled on the cocktail napkins were lunatic even by Toronto standards?

 

[Streety McCarface]

I'm personally counting on the Relief Line West eliminating much of the need for an expanded Downtown streetcar system. Planning for that should begin once Relief Line North completes, around 2022. But in the meanwhile, the additional 70 streetcar order and the Portlands LRT are the minimum the city needs.

By the way, when is the deadline for that additional streetcar order?

I believe that passed a few months ago.

In terms of fantasy mode being enabled, I think it would be really cool to see the streetcar lines integrated with the subway lines (like in Philadelphia, their trollies run with the subway underground, with the trollies making local stops and the subway making express stops).

Ignoring fantasies, there will still be a huge need for the streetcar network even with the DRL, the Spadina Streetcar is proof of this. Despite there being a subway line literally 2 blocks away from that street, the 510 has some of the highest ridership/km in the system. Local service will still be required given that there will only be 1-2 DRL stops within the confinement of downtown. It'll also pave way for new streetcar lines since new transferring abilities will be available to users.

The biggest mistake the old TTC made was closing the Bloor, University, and Yonge streetcars when the subways were built. If they were still around, many people downtown would choose to take those over the subway and therefore, reduce some crowding. They also provide redundancy in case of streetcar reroutings.

 

[Allandale25]

Moore article on the PC Party subway upload pledge:

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/can...take-over-torontos-subways-would-that-work-a/

 

[aquateam]

The biggest mistake the old TTC made was closing the Bloor, University, and Yonge streetcars when the subways were built. If they were still around, many people downtown would choose to take those over the subway and therefore, reduce some crowding. They also provide redundancy in case of streetcar reroutings.

I can see an argument for keeping the Harbord, Dupont, Church, Oakwood, Mount Pleasant etc., streetcar routes parallel to the newly opened Bloor/Yonge subways, but it would be insane to keep the Bloor/Yonge streetcars still running.

• Who would take a streetcar, which is mired in mixed-traffic and needs to stop at every intersection, when there is a much more reliable, faster subway directly underneath which stops every 500 meters anyway?

• Those streetcar lines had a streetcar every 100 seconds before the subway opened. How much do you think the TTC would have had to spend in operating costs to staff those streetcars, maintain the track, replace a fleet of PCCs at the end of their life, etc. This is also at a time when rising car ownership meant that transit productivity was rapidly dropping (because more people driving -> more traffic -> slower vehicles -> more operating costs for worse service -> more people driving)

Part of the benefit of upgrading a line to a fixed guideway system (whether LRT, ICTS, subway) is that you can have more passengers per vehicle hour and have decreased operating costs, which allows service to be redeployed across the network. Those streetcar drivers you want to drive mostly-empty streetcars above Yonge could be driving buses in other parts of the city instead.

Besides, having two routes on the same street goes against the TTC service standard:

2.2.5 Duplication of Service
In most cases, only one local route will operate on each major arterial roadway or on closely spaced parallel roadways (less than 800m) to make the best use of available resources. When parallel routes operate closer together, they split the potential demand for service. In areas and time periods of low demand, this can result in many routes competing for the same passengers and no route attracting enough demand to warrant higher frequency service. It may be necessary in some cases; however, to duplicate service along major arterials where a) routes merge to feed a rapid transit station, b) routes are designed and function as branch services, or c) to achieve other system design objectives.

I can think of a couple candidates for the “biggest mistake” the TTC made, but closing the Bloor/Yonge/University streetcar lines isn’t one of them:

• Building the Spadina line before the Queen line
• De-LRT-izing the St. Clair streetcar line in the 1930s
• Abandoning the trolley-bus network (all electric, no emissions, bigger buses)
• Building the SRT instead of just extending the Bloor-Danforth line
• Building the Sheppard line before the DRL
• Building the Eglinton line before the DRL
• Building the Spadina line in a highway median instead of under Dufferin
• Building Eglinton as LRT instead of as an extension of the SRT
• Building the Kipling interregional terminal instead of extending the subway to Cloverdale

 

[Hopkins123]

Do you mean lost as in a golden age when the lines doodled on the cocktail napkins weren’t demonstrably insane? Or lost as in a dark age when the lines doodled on the cocktail napkins were lunatic even by Toronto standards?

How shameful that the complete dearth of vision from City planning officials has led to the rise of armchair cartographers to pick up the slack and colour in our own lines on a map to compensate. At least in my case, my maps were informed and based upon popular plans of the day, nothing lunatic about that.

 

[W. K. Lis]

I believe that passed a few months ago.

In terms of fantasy mode being enabled, I think it would be really cool to see the streetcar lines integrated with the subway lines (like in Philadelphia, their trollies run with the subway underground, with the trollies making local stops and the subway making express stops).

Ignoring fantasies, there will still be a huge need for the streetcar network even with the DRL, the Spadina Streetcar is proof of this. Despite there being a subway line literally 2 blocks away from that street, the 510 has some of the highest ridership/km in the system. Local service will still be required given that there will only be 1-2 DRL stops within the confinement of downtown. It'll also pave way for new streetcar lines since new transferring abilities will be available to users.

The biggest mistake the old TTC made was closing the Bloor, University, and Yonge streetcars when the subways were built. If they were still around, many people downtown would choose to take those over the subway and therefore, reduce some crowding. They also provide redundancy in case of streetcar reroutings.

Having streetcars instead of buses as shuttle vehicles would provide a larger capacity.

 

[Streety McCarface]

Having streetcars instead of buses as shuttle vehicles would provide a larger capacity.

Local service would be the greatest benefit, but times have passed. I'd just be happy if portlands streetcars are built, and Parliament, Coxwell and Church get some service with their seldom used lines.

 

[Sandpit]

I can see an argument for keeping the Harbord, Dupont, Church, Oakwood, Mount Pleasant etc., streetcar routes parallel to the newly opened Bloor/Yonge subways, but it would be insane to keep the Bloor/Yonge streetcars still running.

• Who would take a streetcar, which is mired in mixed-traffic and needs to stop at every intersection, when there is a much more reliable, faster subway directly underneath which stops every 500 meters anyway?

• Those streetcar lines had a streetcar every 100 seconds before the subway opened. How much do you think the TTC would have had to spend in operating costs to staff those streetcars, maintain the track, replace a fleet of PCCs at the end of their life, etc. This is also at a time when rising car ownership meant that transit productivity was rapidly dropping (because more people driving -> more traffic -> slower vehicles -> more operating costs for worse service -> more people driving)

Part of the benefit of upgrading a line to a fixed guideway system (whether LRT, ICTS, subway) is that you can have more passengers per vehicle hour and have decreased operating costs, which allows service to be redeployed across the network. Those streetcar drivers you want to drive mostly-empty streetcars above Yonge could be driving buses in other parts of the city instead.

Besides, having two routes on the same street goes against the TTC service standard:

If the streetcars were cheaper, some people would choose to take them (although this would mean a separate fare system). Also, tourists would take them for sightseeing.

 

[Cobra]

Yikes....
https://newsinteractives.cbc.ca/onvotes/poll-tracker/

87.4%
Probability of the Progressive Conservatives winning a majority

I better look at those promises one more time...

 

[narduch]

My bet is they move forward with the Finch LRT and the 3-stop SSE.

Most other projects will be canceled or put off to help fund tax cuts. And they will make a big stink saying the Liberals lied about how bad the books are, so transit funding will have to wait.

DRL will be set back another 4 years at least.

 

[WislaHD]

I'll be setting low expectations for transit expansion.

Confident that Yonge North will proceed ahead without the DRL. That alone will probably cost the city, region, province and country billions of dollars in congestion and lost worker productivity.