[Adjei]

Fine....then why go through the exercise of pretending otherwise? The Big Move is a heavily touted plan...that cost how many millions to create and it did not call for this subway.......so why bother if, as soon as the inevitable political interference comes, the plan is amended?

So, what would getting rid of ML do? It would save the money of running ML and all of its plans...which have little value if the chairman of ML is just gonna kowtow to the minister anyway.

The only money you would save is the salary of the Metrolinx employees. Is that savings going to go towards building transit? This is the Rob Ford thinking. Cutting down on government will lead to money for transit. We all saw how that worked.

Most of the plans drawn up in the Big Move have to be built anyways or do you think by getting rid of them, we don't have to build what's identified in the plan?

 

[TOareaFan]

The only money you would save is the salary of the Metrolinx employees. Is that savings going to go towards building transit? This is the Rob Ford thinking. Cutting down on government will lead to money for transit. We all saw how that worked.

Most of the plans drawn up in the Big Move have to be built anyways or do you think by getting rid of them, we don't have to build what's identified in the plan?

Keeping ML doesn't mean the plan will be built....that much is clear.....you have me mixed up with people opposed to the Big Move...I am in favour of it...so much so what I am saying is why bother planning if the plans carry no weight in the face of political interference...or, alternatively, once a plan is drawn up and pitched and accepted we should live with it and implement it.

We do not lead the world in transit but we have developed a great industry in transit planning and re-planning!

If, even, the Chairman of ML had said today that he/they did not think that the subway was better than his/their proposed LRT but that they have been ordered/instructed to implement it and will do their best...that would be one thing.

What he said though was "This is a genuinely a good idea ” so that not only raises the notion that the plan can be manipulated at political will it also brings into question their abilities as transit planners because they did not come up with this "genuinely good idea" it was given to them by the ministry and they have rubber stamped it.

 

[Mapleson]

what I am saying is why bother planning if the plans carry no weight in the face of political interference...or, alternatively, once a plan is drawn up and pitched and accepted we should live with it and implement it.

So long as Queen's Park controls ML purse strings, they can jerk them around any which way they please. Dedicated transit funding would let ML get on with the most needed projects and let pet projects come from supplemental funding.

 

[TOareaFan]

So long as Queen's Park controls ML purse strings, they can jerk them around any which way they please. Dedicated transit funding would let ML get on with the most needed projects and let pet projects come from supplemental funding.

Dedicated funding will come from all over the region....but it seems some politicians are more powerful than others and political intervention to change/re-prioritze Big Move projects will lower support (and therefore likelihood of implementation/continuation) for the dedicated funding tools.

 

[gweed123]

Metrolinx are now supporting this subway.....then they need to explain why, if subway is a good idea, they never suggested it in the Big Move and what other parts of the Big Move do they think can/should be changed.

Transit City was absorbed into the Big Move wholesale. There were likely some parts of the plan Metrolinx didn't agree with in the first place, but didn't want to fight the TTC and the City over it.

 

[waterloowarrior]

Globe: Light-rail plan for Scarborough back on the table as Stintz questions feasibility of Ontario’s subway route
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...-chair-amid-clashing-agendas/article14241178/

Ms. Stintz’s meeting with the Premier did not appear to bring the two sides any closer together. The province’s chosen route has such tight turns, she said, it might not be able to accommodate subway trains. She even went so far as to say it is “not a subway†because it will run above ground on an elevated guideway.

“I don’t even know that this plan should come to council. I don’t even think that it’s technically feasible,†she said outside Queen’s Park after the sit-down. “It’s not a subway. It’s an elevated two-stop route to Scarborough Town Centre which, technically, we donâ€t know if we can do.â€

 

[ssiguy2]

Stinz says a subway isn't a subway unless it goes underground???

Who is this person? I suppose she thinks the Spadina ext is not a subway because it is an extension of a line that runs partially at grade. I guess that also means that Eglinton isn't an LRT because it does run underground.

 

[EnviroTO]

Stintz is a few fries short of a Happy Meal. How can one validate technical feasibility of a line running roughly along a similar route to the existing line? I'm pretty sure a blue line on a map isn't quite at the engineering drawings phase. It clearly isn't running exactly on the same route in the curves since the line through Kennedy is roughly straight and the curve at Ellesmere starts south of Ellesmere.

Let's make some equally informed statements:
- There isn't a subway connecting Warden to Victoria Park.
- I'm not sure the subway proposed by Stintz would be able to accommodate subways since they may have made the tunnels only a metre wide which is too thin.

 

[CapitalSeven]

Like most politicians around Toronto, Stintz wants to keep all of the magic subway crayons to herself, and gets snitty when someone else (who happens to have a lot more money) starts colouring too. She's hoist on her own petard. How sad.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

I think it has more to do with her realizing how stupid the Scarborough subway plan is. Less stops, up to six months of shuttling all the Warden and a much higher price tag. It may be hard sell.

 

[Dan416]

Not many people are happy with this plan. I guess that's what makes it a good compromise--no one's happy.

 

[GenerationW]

Not many people are happy with this plan. I guess that's what makes it a good compromise--no one's happy.

Wait, there's more -- only 19 days until the feds give us an official "no!" (or surprise us all and fund this).

Though I'm betting the final decision gets delayed indefinitely.

 

[BurlOak]

What he said though was "This is a genuinely a good idea †so that not only raises the notion that the plan can be manipulated at political will it also brings into question their abilities as transit planners because they did not come up with this "genuinely good idea" it was given to them by the ministry and they have rubber stamped it.

Yup,

Metrolinx worked on the SRT replacement for some 5 years and someone (Murray) with no training comes up with a better plan (as admitted by Metrolinx) in 2 months. What does that say about ML. If the Liberals really want to win a Whitby riding, will Metrolinx conclude that extending the subway to Whitby is the best option. If the PC or NDP get in, they can create a subway to Oak Ridges and Hamilton (respectively) and Metrolinx would endorse it for their re-election bid.

It also suggests that these Metrolinx guys have not properly considered any of the other options and the entire Big Move is just a politically decided plan. Next up, someone suggest that SRT be combined with an elevated ECLRT and Metrolinx says that it is a better plan. It just needs to be someone who has contol over ML.

 

[sixrings]

Embarrassingly, Rob Fords underground Eglinton LRT connected to the SRT might be the best compromise and plan.

I will say that I've gone from respecting Stintz, to thinking she's a flip flopper simply out for a mayoral campaign run. That being said this last flip flop looks to me to have zero political motivation and be instead solely about transit. She could have been like Rob Ford and claimed the 2 stop extension a victory (after all she thought a subway extension here made sense), instead she appears again like a flip flopper which is something most people do not respect.

BTW CALGARY showed their new LRT cars and they are NOT made by Bombardier.... Siemens ftw.

 

[nfitz]

They could, but it wasn't really necessary if LRT is built in the corridor. It can handle more extreme grades and curvature than a subway could.

It can, but you still have to tunnel (or elevate) over the GO tracks north of Ellesmere. If the LRT and GO swapped, you wouldn't need that tunnel segment.

I'm pretty sure a blue line on a map isn't quite at the engineering drawings phase. It clearly isn't running exactly on the same route in the curves since the line through Kennedy is roughly straight and the curve at Ellesmere starts south of Ellesmere.

What about the 8 engineering drawings dated August 2013 by Hatch Mott MacDonald attached to the "Subway in Scarborough RT Corridor" Feasibility Report - http://www.metrolinx.com/en/docs/pdf/20130910_Scarborough_Subway_Feasibility_Study.pdf