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There's a difference between a transfer to change directions, and a transfer to keep going the same direction you were already going (a linear transfer).

Most people accept the fact that if you're going north on the Yonge line and you need to get to Bayview & York Mills, that you're going to need to transfer from the subway to the bus at York Mills Station. That's just part of transit. What people don't like accepting is getting off one rapid transit line just to continue in the exact same direction on another rapid transit line, especially when for most people that transfer occurs nowhere near either your origin or your destination.

All transfers are not created equal, and some are a bigger PITA than others.
 
Woodbridge_Heights said:
Selective acceptance of transfers are always fun. It's just a simple transfer if it's not affecting your commute, unless it does and then it's a child of the devil good god why do I have to walk x m and wait y mins just to continue my trip.
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Bus to bus transfers are the most common and they often involve waiting for a streetlight and crossing a large number of lanes of traffic, sometimes in less than favourable weather (rain, snow, slush, etc.)..

These transfers could be made much easier on riders by having bus stops on both sides of major intersections (near-side and far-side stops) which actually has a fairly low cost to implement (1 or 2 extra buses on some routes: $25M/year; shelters are paid for by the advertiser not TTC).


Most bus to bus transfers would no longer require crossing the intersection. This cuts out up to 90 seconds of waiting time for the light to change and eliminating the frustration of watching your connecting bus drive past during that time period.


If we're going to spend $500M to simplify transfers, I choose near-side and far-side stops at all major intersections for all bus-routes around the city. It would directly impact 750,000 trips per day. (Total TTC ridership minus subway ridership and assume that most riders make 1 transfer per trip, round to show it's an approximation).



No, a BD extension is not a 1 time cost. It comes with about $7M/km/year of maintenance (todays subway maintenance budget) when it hits 30 years of age. This bus proposal is cheaper on a 50 year time scale and helps 10 times the number of customers if SRT corridor ridership doubled, if it doesn't double it's 20 times the number of customers.
 
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gweed123 said:
There's a difference between a transfer to change directions, and a transfer to keep going the same direction you were already going (a linear transfer).
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There are dozens of linear transfers in the system already. Think of all the existing surface routes that end at Bloor or Yonge instead of instead of continuing across town. They're split for the same reason that Eglinton and the SRT are going to be split: so that we can easily provide different levels of surface on different parts of the line.

Transfers will always be an essential part of any efficient transit system, especially at busy hubs like Kennedy. They are a good thing, not a bad thing, and the TTC is wise not to place that much value on eliminating them.
 
rbt said:
Bus to bus transfers are the most common and they often involve waiting for a streetlight and crossing a large number of lanes of traffic, sometimes in less than favourable weather (rain, snow, slush, etc.)..

These transfers could be made much easier on riders by having bus stops on both sides of major intersections (near-side and far-side stops) which actually has a fairly low cost to implement (1 or 2 extra buses on some routes: $25M/year; shelters are paid for by the advertiser not TTC).
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It would also slow the busses down, so some people would be happier with both side stops, but many would not be.
 
Thoughtless Miscreant said:
There are dozens of linear transfers in the system already. Think of all the existing surface routes that end at Bloor or Yonge instead of instead of continuing across town. They're split for the same reason that Eglinton and the SRT are going to be split: so that we can easily provide different levels of surface on different parts of the line.

Transfers will always be an essential part of any efficient transit system, especially at busy hubs like Kennedy. They are a good thing, not a bad thing, and the TTC is wise not to place that much value on eliminating them.
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But a lot of the transfers at Bloor are there because a lot of, if not the majority of, the people on either side of the route are transferring to and from the subway to go in a perpendicular direction. Not that many people get off the Bathurst Streetcar and continue north on the Bathurst bus, at least compared to the number that get off the streetcar and walk down the stairs to the subway.

How many people getting off the SRT at Kennedy are either a) exiting at Kennedy, or b) transferring to a bus? Compared to the number walking down the stairs to the subway, I'd say very few. Most of the people are transferring to continue on in the exact same direction.
 
Not only do people not care about the plight of Scarberians for the 3 or 4 years that the SRT will be shut down for construction, but based on the past few posts, it seems people also do not care about Scarberians for the 40 years afterwards as well.

A linear transfer would make more sense at York U or Yonge/Steeles than it does at Kennedy.
 
BurlOak said:
Because of this a separate terminal station is required for the ECLRT and another terminal station for the SRT - actually a station that is on an underground loop so that the SRT train does not need to go in reverse. It seems to me they are spending more to not have a combined route than they would spend if it was run through.
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That's impossible. One Eglinton - SRT station is needed anyway, and it needs at least a crossover and preferably a third track, so that any service disruptions on one leg do not affect the other leg.

The second LRT station adds cost, but it cannot cost as much as 5 km of fully grade-separate route.

BurlOak said:
I think the reason they are not running through is that they want to prevent passengers from going from SRT to ECLRT - since they want to run less service on the in-median portion and they do not want the Scarberians clogging up the spaces. To do this, they force everyone off the SRT, and then assume most would transfer to the B-D subway instead of switching to ECLRT. The alternative would be to grade-separate (preferably elevate, since it is much less costly) the roughly 5km portion from Kennedy to Don Mills (actually west of Kennedy to east of Don Mills since each of those are underground stations) and then Scarberians would have great connectivity to the rest of Toronto via Eglinton or Danforth.

Scarberians have put up with the transfer at Kennedy for 30 years and I do not expect they will be too happy when it sinks in that this forced transfer will continue.

There is a connection for non revenue service though.
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To some extent, TTC's concern is legitimate. It does not make sense to build Eglinton route with many local stops, and then have the trains totally occupied by riders coming from central Scarborough, so that local riders cannot even get in.

However, they go too far when they refuse to run through trains at all. I would think that sending every 2-nd SRT train down Eglinton can provide direct connection from Scarborough to Midtown, while preserving enough capacity for riders boarding on Eglinton.
 
Rainforest said:
However, they go too far when they refuse to run through trains at all. I would think that sending every 2-nd SRT train down Eglinton can provide direct connection from Scarborough to Midtown, while preserving enough capacity for riders boarding on Eglinton.
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This to me is a good compromise. Half the SRT trains stop at Kennedy, half continue westbound to Black Creek. Personally I don't think the full Malvern LRT route is needed, but Eglinton can be extended to Kennedy, and the every-2nd-train service along that stretch would be enough to meet the demand.
 
Looks like Minister Murray is asking questions at Metrolinx, according to an article on the front page of today's Globe - Ontario rethinking Toronto region's $34-billion transit plan - http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...ions-34-billion-transit-plan/article11662019/

Despite the stated concerns from Metrolinx about changes, the one example from Murray is the lack of connectivity between what's being built along Eglinton in Toronto and Mississauga, wondering if it's worthwhile to connect them and extend to the high-employment lands near the airport.

Finally some common sense. From the comments, I'd guess that Stintz's discussion to re-open the SRT has been through the Minister.
 
The only guarantee here is that rethinking plans will always take place but these string of plans will end up not existing in corporeal form.
 
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