[RedRocket191]

I would expect the agenda for Sheppard to be an eventual conversion of the subway to LRT - I imagine the thinking is that with Don Mills LRT the amount of people connecting to the Yonge line will decline, or will use DM LRT+Eglinton LRT if they don't mind standing. Certainly that's how Steve Munro and the other Sheppard-sceptics would like to see it go.

I would entertain that expensive refurb if frequency was high - 90-120 sec - and there was a commitment to continue the LRT to Downsview so York U commuters would have 1-change travel from East Sheppard East to York, otherwise leave it alone. Extending Finch West LRT to Finch East, at least as far as Don Mills and linking to DM LRT there, might also be a prerequisite.

I'm tending to agree, although you're right, it would be expensive. I doubt we'll see that unless Toronto find oil, but we must never forget to dream big.

 

[unimaginative2]

In Toronto, "dreaming big" means reducing capacity?

 

[RedRocket191]

In Toronto, "dreaming big" means reducing capacity?

Don't be a negative nancy!

 

[scarberiankhatru]

Reduced capacity = overcrowding + complaints + frustration = success!

 

[dowlingm]

Not necessarily a reduction in capacity. Remember, the Sheppard stations are not six cars but four, and running every 5-6 minutes even at peak. An LRT running every two minutes need only be 33-40% of the subway train's capacity to deliver the same capacity, but in doing so would eliminate many bus-rail transfers at Don Mills and Sheppard.

 

[scarberiankhatru]

I've been left on the platform a few times because of full Sheppard trains...why would we want the same capacity as what exists now? And this is aside from the fact that Sheppard's train can be made 50% longer and can be run more than twice as often. The Sheppard "LRT" is both small and short-term dreaming.

 

[unimaginative2]

Exactly. Let me guess, scarberiankhatru: it would be built to accommodate conversion to a subway at a later date, so that it can follow the sainted "Logical Progression." Well, here's a fact: the logical progression doesn't happen anywhere. Even Brussels, which is supposed to have all these premetros, has no plans to convert its premetro lines to subway despite spectacular overcrowding (I had to wait for three trains on a Sunday afternoon) because it would require shutting them down for at least a year.

Here's actual big dreaming: finish the damned subway that we started, rather than spending hundreds of millions to convert subway that we've already built into an inferior system.