[BMO]

Literally in the article:



I can't help but notice the irony of billions are spent to justify those "new riders" out in the burbs when a policy change basically did the same for pittance.

AoD

Thanks, for literally helping me

 

[Edward Skira]

City of Toronto Media Relations has issued the following:
==========================================

Media Advisory

January 12, 2018

Updated travel and ridership data released for King Street Transit Pilot

Today, the City of Toronto released the second set of data on the King Street Transit Pilot, a transit-priority pilot project on King Street from Bathurst Street to Jarvis Street.

This set of data includes TTC ridership as well as updated traffic and transit travel time, and transit reliability.

This latest data shows a 25 per cent increase in King Street streetcar ridership during the peak hour of the morning commute and that the slowest streetcar travel times in the afternoon rush hour have improved by about four minutes in each direction, while vehicle travel times on neighbouring streets remain only marginally affected. Reliability of the streetcar continues to remain much higher as the variability of streetcar travel times through the pilot area has been reduced by up to 33 per cent.

The December data dashboard is available at http://bit.ly/2C1G2fQ.

The year-long pilot project is being monitored for impact on transit service, traffic flow on parallel streets and effects on pedestrians, cyclists and local businesses.

Data from the King Street Transit Pilot is being released on a monthly basis, on about the 12th of each month.

 

[salsa]

I can't help but notice the irony of how billions are spent to justify those "new riders" out in the burbs at the most expensive modes when a policy change basically got us greater numbers of new riders - for pittance. We never pick the lowest hanging fruit even when it is dead obvious how the context (dense urban setting, large and increasing resident/workers population, highly used existing transit route) points to high likelihood of success.

Because doing so usually inconveniences drivers, which got forbid we delay those people for even a second.

 

[vic]

Just wondering, does anyone know if MEC is having issues with this?

I thought it was *amazing* that when I stepped out of MEC last week it was only about 10 paces to an already waiting streetcar's door. Too bad that car was jam packed Next bunch of cars were either Cherry or also full, so it was the 5th car that I actually took home.

I was still surprised at the slow pace of the streetcar though. Not much traffic holding it up, but boarding seemed to be really slow still, as was going through intersections (particularly Spadina and Bathurst due to track switches I guess). It was a CLRV car I was on.

I also noted how busy the sidewalks were. It was early evening rush hour...around 5pm last Friday.

 

[amnesiajune]

Just wondering, does anyone know if MEC is having issues with this?

Probably not, because MEC has a big garage below its store and a loading dock on Charlotte Street. They offered free parking for customers until they announced their move, but they'll probably have something similar at their new location on Queen.

 

[steveintoronto]

I can't help but notice the irony of how billions are spent to justify those "new riders" out in the burbs at the most expensive modes when a policy change basically got us greater numbers of new riders - for pittance. We never pick the lowest hanging fruit even when it is dead obvious how the context (dense urban setting, large and increasing resident/workers population, highly used existing transit route) points to high likelihood of success.

Exactly. And given a tiny investment by "subway to STC" standards to further improve the flow and speed of the King Korridor (like a sophisticated signal and control system, which will cost tens of millions $, but be an absolute bargain) will increase that number 50% more, and save massive amounts in expenditure elsewhere.

Probably not, because MEC has a big garage below its store and a loading dock on Charlotte Street. They offered free parking for customers until they announced their move, but they'll probably have something similar at their new location on Queen.

Yeah....as someone who's been a member of MEC for generations, and watched how their cycling department grew from nothing, the irony of their (then) "new Toronto store" catering so blatantly to drivers never sat well with me. At all. Granola Greens boasting about their 'living roof' while having free parking in the basement.

They kinda lost their way somewhere.

 

[PinkLucy]

Whenever I went to MEC, and I went often, I always saw far more walk in traffic (from pedestrians, cyclists and transit users) than people parking there. However, that parking garage had great rates (I haven't used it in a while so that may have changed) so it was handy if I did need to drive to King and park in the area.

 

[MetroMan]

The City is caving to businesses and is now offering FREE PARKING for 2 hours in the pilot area. WTF? Isnt that going to defeat the purpose of discouraging car use? Would it not have been better to offer free streetcar during dinner hours?

 

[Edward Skira]

News Release

January 12, 2018

City of Toronto offers up to two hours of free parking around King Street pilot among operational changes to improve transit and traffic flow and support local business


Two months into the King Street Transit Pilot, the City of Toronto is responding to feedback from transit riders, drivers and local businesses.

To support the pilot’s objectives of moving people more efficiently, supporting economic prosperity and improving place-making, the City has made the following changes:

• The Toronto Parking Authority will be enhancing the parking discount in the pilot area. Up to $10 (a minimum of two hours free parking) will be available when parking on-street in the pilot area using the Green P app.

• In response to concerns about the removal of on-street parking on King, 90 parking spaces are being added to side streets in the pilot area – replacing 50 per cent of the spaces that were removed from King Street – with additional spaces currently under review. Today, approximately 8,000 parking spaces are available in the pilot area (within walking distance of King Street).

• To provide more locations for passenger and accessible pickup/drop offs, loading and deliveries, additional loading zones for vehicles and trucks have been added in front of the Royal Alexandra Theatre, the Princess of Wales Theatre, First Canadian Place, and between Yonge Street and Church Street.

• Signal timing has been adjusted at Bathurst Street, Church Street and Jarvis Street to improve traffic flow for turning vehicles.

• New and larger signs have been added at major intersections to improve the visibility of traffic regulations for drivers.

• Electronic signage will be implemented throughout the pilot to make new traffic regulations more visible for drivers.

• To address an increase in transit ridership on King Street, new low-floor streetcars are deployed to the 504 King and 514 Cherry routes as they become available.

• The eastbound streetcar stop at Yonge Street has also been expanded to provide more space for waiting passengers.

"We are dedicated to making sure King Street works for everyone," said Mayor John Tory. "I believe these updates to the Pilot will help transit riders, businesses and drivers. I remain committed to listening to everyone about this project and making changes where they make sense."

These operational changes are in addition to the City’s launch of the Everyone is King public realm design competition launched on January 9, which will introduce creative new public realm activations on King Street beginning in spring 2018.

"The benefit of pilot projects is that they allow us to learn as we go," said Councillor Joe Cressy (Ward 20 Trinity-Spadina). "We're able to make improvements, adjust to fill gaps and continue to evaluate options and work together to ensure the pilot works better for everyone."

The City has also launched Eats on King, a program to promote local quick and full-service restaurants in the King Street Transit Pilot area, which will run Monday, February 19 to Thursday, March 29. Interested restaurants can request an application to join the program by emailing eatsonking@toronto.ca. Completed applications are due no later than January 30 at 5 p.m. There is no cost to participating restaurants other than the value of the offer they extend to their customers. For more information, email eatsonking@toronto.ca or call 416-397-1234

In the interim, the City is introducing warming stations, art installations and performances to ensure that King Street remains vibrant during the winter months.

This morning, the City released the second set of King Street Transit Pilot data on transit travel time and traffic data. The data is for the first full month (December) of monitoring the pilot. That data is available at http://bit.ly/2C1G2fQ. The data will also be made available through the City's Open Data portal.

The City continues to measure and evaluate the transit pilot through:
• a partnership with Miovision to capture and analyze multi-modal traffic data to study changes to pedestrian, cycling and vehicle volumes throughout the pilot area
• the use of Bluetooth and GPS technology to monitor and evaluate streetcar and vehicle travel times, and
• continued monitoring and evaluation of the economic impacts of the pilot, including obtaining transactional trend data as well as working with local businesses and Business Improvement Areas.

Data from the King Street Transit Pilot will be released on a monthly basis, on about the 12th of each month.

 

[steveintoronto]

The City is caving to businesses and is now offering FREE PARKING for 2 hours in the pilot area. WTF? Isnt that going to defeat the purpose of discouraging car use? Would it not have been better to offer free streetcar during dinner hours?

"Would it not have been better to offer free streetcar during dinner hours?"

Gotta be careful on this one. As much as I detest the level of driving in this city, it's a reality for many (although thankfully diminishing fast for the younger gens). The reality is that they will not go downtown unless offered something like this. The trick is to have them park remotely from the area, pay for parking, but with that payment receive a privilege to ride the King Korridor Kars, as many times and directions, for as long as their ticket stub states they have parking for. If they wish to transfer onto other routes, they will have to pay for TTC fare.

A good part of this exercise isn't to make motorists pay their way (where do you start with that one?). It's to get in front of the PR disaster being pushed down the sewer pipe, and brace yourselves, because it has some basis in fact. That can easily and *relatively cheaply* be addressed, and it must be. Far better to get the local merchants on-board with this than to alienate them or others thinking of opening operations along King. Have projects like this gone wrong in the past? Yes, far too many.

At least Tory (belatedly) is stepping up to the podium. But Council needs to get off their arses too. And even if behind the scenes, talk about funding this the way it deserves to be. Toronto has a golden opportunity to get something right in transit for a change. And this is it.

 

[dowlingm]

The City is caving to businesses and is now offering FREE PARKING for 2 hours in the pilot area. WTF? Isnt that going to defeat the purpose of discouraging car use? Would it not have been better to offer free streetcar during dinner hours?

Next month, drivers will be offered shiny new $5 bills to park on King. Meanwhile, Crosstown-adjacent businesses are cursing the fact that they aren't sufficiently interesting to the mayor or his Etobicoke allies.

 

[dowlingm]

The trick is to have them park remotely from the area, pay for parking, but with that payment receive a privilege to ride the King Korridor Kars, as many times and directions, for as long as their ticket stub states they have parking for.

What makes you think that will be acceptable to the jackasses from Etobicoke trying to undermine this project?

 

[Neutrino]

@steveintoronto Steve, I appreciate your commentary because I have learned much from you, but why do you keep referring to the pilot as King "Korridor"? And why "kar"?

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

The reality is that they will not go downtown unless offered something like this.

I think that fact is a bonus that should be taken advantage of.

AoD

 

[steveintoronto]

@steveintoronto Steve, I appreciate your commentary because I have learned much from you, but why do you keep referring to the pilot as King "Korridor"? And why "kar"?

I blame the 'Kaspian C'.

And my K key being stuck from Literary Latitude.

I think that fact is a bonus.

Which way? After I wrote that, I found myself muttering "Congestion Charge". Unfortunately, this isn't Europe or other progressive conurbations, and Torontonians will and do vote with their cars, not their feet.

I put emphasis on the word "reality".

Next month, drivers will be offered shiny new $5 bills to park on King.

Again, I repeat "we've got to be careful on this"...from all sides. It's not "on King". It's 'off King'. I gave Skira's post a thumbs up not because I agree with every point, but because a 'realistic tone' is being taken, for all its shortcomings.

I'm still fully in favour of a signalling and control system that offers streetcars a virtual carte-blanche of green lights over-riding intersection junctions. The problem is timing that with oncoming streetcars, but that's where the 'control' comes in. It must be (and I hate this term, technically it's incorrect) 'intelligent' in timing oncoming flows to correlate with forward ones. (Logic and intelligence are not the same thing) Vehicles are going to have to wait. The King Thing must be ultimate in this exercise, make no mistake, but some of the collateral damage can be mitigated, and business is one of them. The latter point is the most common failing of transit malls if not fully thought through.

Addendum: In considering which way Alvin's statement was intended, I decided to Google for the origin of "War on Cars" as this is the massive turd in the sewer pipe of PR that's being waged by the Sun, Ford, et al, when in fact the aggrieved businesses mistake it as being the direct cause of their angst. The TorSun and Ford won't change (huge surprise there, CO2 poisoning manifest) but businesses can and will given the right attention.

But here's the problem with the term "War on Cars" being a misnomer:

[...]
“This ‘love affair’ thesis is like the ultimate story,” says Peter Norton, a historian at the University of Virginia, who warns that we need to revisit how we came to believe this line before we embrace its logical conclusion in a future full of driverless cars. “It’s one of the biggest public relations coups of all time. It’s always treated as folk wisdom, as an organic growth from society. One of the signs of its success is that everyone forgets it was invented as a public relations campaign.”

This “love affair” was coined, in fact, during a 1961 episode of a weekly hour-long television program called the DuPont Show of the Week (sponsored, incidentally, by DuPont, which owned a 23 percent stake in General Motors at the time). The program, titled “Merrily We Roll Along,” was promoted by DuPont as “the story of America’s love affair with the automobile.” [...]

The myth of the American love affair with cars
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...love-affair-with-cars/?utm_term=.e998a0170fcd

It is a theme that some other posters have been harping on, and may seem spurious to this string, but the term has been 'weaponized' in this debate, from both sides, and it only leads to more strife, not resolution on a working compromise.