[ShonTron]

I would have reluctantly supported the three-stop subway extension under the current political circumstances. The problem isn't just the subway, it's building it with only one stop to support Tory's even more dunderheaded SmartTrack commitment.

Stops at Sheppard/McCowan, STC, and Lawrence/McCowan would have at least supported transit trips within Scarborough.

 

[Cobra]

• They didn't build it in stages. They opened it in stages. They never envisioned just having part of it open. Construction started in the 1970s. Heck 1975 for the Snowdon interchange station (the platforms for Line 4 were 100% ready when I first started using Snowdon station in 1981).

And Acadie was in the middle - it opened late because it was ... late.

Thank you for the correction. They never envisioned Sheppard to only have part of it open, the project was cut down to the stub. No one in their right mind would have ever planned just those 5 stations

It was the same with Sheppard. Only Phase 1 of the Blue Line was opened. What about Snowdon to LaSalle? Or St-Michel to Montreal-Nord? (though they later changed that to Anjou, with the plan to take Line 7 to Montreal-Nord insteade ... before cancelling Line 7).

Toronto, like Montreal, only opened the centre of the line.

You can't seriously compare both lines. The blue line connects both sides of the orange line while hitting neighborhoods to make a true north Crosstown. The western portion was over disputes with English municipalities, mainly Hampstead that's between Snowdon Station and NDG. East to Anjou was deferred by the province for years but the city wanted it decades ago.

Sheppard doesn't even go to Downsview. It would be the same if it was from Downsview to Victoria Park

Not 30 years later. But surely you recall the media reports in the late 1980s, and early 1990s, with the low ridership, and when they used to run the short 6-car trains instead of the usual 9..

And what about the budget cut at the Vincent-D'Indy station? They cancelled the deep platforms to transfer to CN.

Yes but STCUM (now STM) responded accordingly by running 3-car trains every 10-12 minutes and closing the line as early as 11h15pm. The TTC hasn't done that which is either because they like wasting money or they feel anything less off peak would be bad for service.

Took time but the blue line has good ridership with more frequent service, 6 car trains and closes as late as the other lines. It's an essential part of the network and gives alternatives to riders when there are problems on one of the branch of the orange line. With your logic, it should have never been built because the projected ridership would not have matched the green and orange lines.

Identical approaches ... you seem to be applying the grass is always greener theory - which is a failure really.

Failure? What are you 14? You get condescending when people disagree with you, show some maturity.
You seem to think that the grass is greener here and that other transit company's methods that don't match TTC logic is a "failure". If you take the politics out of it, the Sheppard Line and the blue line are almost virtually identical in term of locations on a similar network, and both lines started with low ridership. Today, the blue line shows that Montreal was right to built it and what the Sheppard line could have been if it was built as envisioned from the get go.

 

[micheal_can]

Thank you for the correction. They never envisioned Sheppard to only have part of it open, the project was cut down to the stub. No one in their right mind would have ever planned just those 5 stations



Sheppard doesn't even go to Downsview. It would be the same if it was from Downsview to Victoria Park


Yes but STCUM (now STM) responded accordingly by running 3-car trains every 10-12 minutes and closing the line as early as 11h15pm. The TTC hasn't done that which is either because they like wasting money or they feel anything less off peak would be bad for service.

Took time but the blue line has good ridership with more frequent service, 6 car trains and closes as late as the other lines. It's an essential part of the network and gives alternatives to riders when there are problems on one of the branch of the orange line. With your logic, it should have never been built because the projected ridership would not have matched the green and orange lines.


Failure? What are you 14? You get condescending when people disagree with you, show some maturity.
You seem to think that the grass is greener here and that other transit company's methods that don't match TTC logic is a "failure". If you take the politics out of it, the Sheppard Line and the blue line are almost virtually identical in term of locations on a similar network, and both lines started with low ridership. Today, the blue line shows that Montreal was right to built it and what the Sheppard line could have been if it was built as envisioned from the get go.

So, in short... The line is an unfinished line.

Great, so after building the 3 stop extension to STC and the DRL, we add more to the Sheppard line.

 

[Hopkins123]

So, in short... The line is an unfinished line.

Great, so after building the 3 stop extension to STC and the DRL, we add more to the Sheppard line.

We'll eventually get to the point where expanding the subway is simpler than finding every excuse in the book not to expand it. Give it time.

 

[micheal_can]

We'll eventually get to the point where expanding the subway is simpler than finding every excuse in the book not to expand it. Give it time.

They have been talking about making the rest between STC and it an LRT.

 

[Hopkins123]

They have been talking about making the rest between STC and it an LRT.

That was to appease then-Mayor David Miller. Times are changing.

We know both the Liberals and Conservatives at the Provincial level are floating the idea to expand Sheppard as underground metro. Voices like Karygiannis on council are too.

Like I said, postponing expansion on Sheppard only escalates the costs. Money should be put into a reserve (like Harper's original $333 million investment towards Sheppard that in theory can only be spent on Sheppard).

 

[micheal_can]

That was to appease then-Mayor David Miller. Times are changing.

We know both the Liberals and Conservatives at the Provincial level are floating the idea to expand Sheppard as underground metro. Voices like Karygiannis on council are too.

Like I said, postponing expansion on Sheppard only escalates the costs. Money should be put into a reserve (like Harper's original $333 million investment towards Sheppard that in theory can only be spent on Sheppard).

What needs to happen is less talk and more construction.
The city already knows which bus routes are the most congested.
The city already knows where the choke points in the RT system is.
The city already knows where they lack good transit.

Stop talking. Do the EA and then get those shovels into the ground.

 

[nfitz]

Yes but STCUM (now STM) responded accordingly by running 3-car trains every 10-12 minutes and closing the line as early as 11h15pm.

I don't recall ever seeing 3-car trains. I only saw 6-car trains, even in the 1980s. Have you seen 3-car trains? I didn't ride it that often, living near the Orange line.

Took time but the blue line has good ridership with more frequent service, 6 car trains and closes as late as the other lines.

I thought they were 9-car trains like the other lines - to tell the truth, I haven't ridden it in years though - only ridden the Green and Orange lines recently. Ridership is still low enough that they run 6-car trains?

It's an essential part of the network and gives alternatives to riders when there are problems on one of the branch of the orange line. With your logic, it should have never been built because the projected ridership would not have matched the green and orange lines.

If you take the politics out of it, the Sheppard Line and the blue line are almost virtually identical in term of locations on a similar network, and both lines started with low ridership. Today, the blue line shows that Montreal was right to built it and what the Sheppard line could have been if it was built as envisioned from the get go.

If you take politics out of it, the Blue line is build through a dense residential area - probably denser than the Danforth. The Sheppard line goes through suburbia - and not only suburbia, but suburbia with quite big yards. There's a bit of density right along Sheppard - but not enough.

It you take politics out of it, the Sheppard ridership projects for the full subway - don't support full subway ANYWHERE on the route, with a peak ridership well below 10,000 at Yonge - let alone at the outer edges at STC and Sheppard West station, where it becomes embarrassing even compared to the current ridership.

And yes, it was envisioned to stop at Don Mills. That was being discussed even during the Peterson government. There was never any timeframe put to the next phase.

Your claim that Blue line in Montreal was built in phases is just wrong. The Orange extension from Bonaventure to Cote-Vertu was done in stages.

 

[TOareaFan]

I though that study reported valid facts with a serious lack of context. Curtail transit as a way of Rationing concrete pouring to cut greenhouse gas? Sorry, there are other places to make the cut. Like forcing greedy developers to adhere to Official Plan height limits on new condo towers. Sorry, boys, the OMB can't help you now.....you only get x m3 of concrete. Six stories' worth is all the concrete you get.

- Paul

maybe we read the article differently (or read different articles) but I did not see any mention of curtailing transit....just a move to make how and what we build from an environment perspective part of the decisioning.

That's 168,000,000 kilograms, which is about the same as the emissions caused by 14 million pounds of beef. If the average Toronto resident cut two Big Macs per year out of their diet since the subway was opened, the reduced emissions would've already offset all the emissions from the Sheppard subway's concrete.

except that the construction of the line is directly related to the line.......not sure big mac consumption is at all.

 

[amnesiajune]

Except that the construction of the line is directly related to the line.......not sure big mac consumption is at all.

I'm just pointing out the stupidity of these sort of analyses. Yes, 168,000,000 kilograms of carbon-equivalent emissions is quite a bit. But in the big picture it's virtually nothing. To use a more "directly related" comparison, it's about 13 kg of carbon-equivalent emissions for every train-kilometer that the subway has operated since it opened in 2002 (30 km/h * 4 trains * 20 hours * 365 days * 14.5 years). Or less than 1 kg for each of the ~200 million trips on the subway line since it opened.

 

[TOareaFan]

I'm just pointing out the stupidity of these sort of analyses. Yes, 168,000,000 kilograms of carbon-equivalent emissions is quite a bit. But in the big picture it's virtually nothing. To use a more "directly related" comparison, it's about 13 kg of carbon for every train-kilometer that the subway has operated since it opened in 2002 (30 km/h * 4 trains * 20 hours * 365 days * 14.5 years). Or less than 1 kg for each of the ~200 million trips on the subway line since it opened.

I won't question those numbers....but what they are pointing out is that if ridership is low and/or if car use in the corridor is not reduced by the new transit it can take a long time to recover in savings those initial emissions....so if you build the wrong type of line and build it incorrectly it can take (in the case they cited) up to 33 years before you are actually, on a net basis, reducing carbon emissions.

 

[crs1026]

maybe we read the article differently (or read different articles) but I did not see any mention of curtailing transit....just a move to make how and what we build from an environment perspective part of the decisioning.

Not directly, no. Call me prickly - But by inference - and particularly when brought forward by the media - it's just too easy for the data to be restated as "you see, transit doesn't do all the good things that they said it would - maybe it's not worth it". The whole greenhouse gas debate is riddled with absolute numbers that are presented as shocking without looking at the proportionality and the elasticity of each source.

I liked the beef statistic, because it is much more sensible to achieve change if we say "If we all curtailed our use of xxxx by 1% we would save y kg of CO2 annually" than to say "Subways don't reduce carbon". If we see concrete as the new coal, where would we make the cuts?

- Paul

 

[ssiguy2]

The Star are doing just as much damage to this debate as Tory. LRT would also be an obscene waste of funds when the cheapest and most effective answer is also the best...............upgrade the line and use MK111 trains and use the saved funds for an eastern expansion and convert the Eglinton line to SkyTrain to eventually have a true Crosstown grade separated high capacity system from Mississauga

 

[TOareaFan]

Not directly, no. Call me prickly - But by inference - and particularly when brought forward by the media - it's just too easy for the data to be restated as "you see, transit doesn't do all the good things that they said it would - maybe it's not worth it". The whole greenhouse gas debate is riddled with absolute numbers that are presented as shocking without looking at the proportionality and the elasticity of each source.

I liked the beef statistic, because it is much more sensible to achieve change if we say "If we all curtailed our use of xxxx by 1% we would save y kg of CO2 annually" than to say "Subways don't reduce carbon". If we see concrete as the new coal, where would we make the cuts?

- Paul

But no one is saying subways don't reduce carbon....they are saying if we don't pay attention to how and what we build and consider emissions as part of the calculation....we can wait a long time before whatever line we build even reaches carbon neutrality never mind a positive impact on net carbon emissions.

You may not like the analysis or how it is presented but you don't get to say they are saying something that they are not.

 

[crs1026]

But no one is saying subways don't reduce carbon....they are saying if we don't pay attention to how and what we build and consider emissions as part of the calculation....we can wait a long time before whatever line we build even reaches carbon neutrality never mind a positive impact on net carbon emissions.

You may not like the analysis or how it is presented but you don't get to say they are saying something that they are not.

I agree with that conclusion. And I don't dispute the numbers presented. It's a valid caution to those who advocate transit projects not to throw out statements that "transit is green" when that may not be the case for a long time.

I'm just noting that every other bit of infrastructure boasts about going green too. Especially new buildings. Do we measure their "greenness" from the same baseline?

- Paul