[Justin10000]

Yay, unabridged propaganda from LRTnow, with complementary typo. If you are going to quote from there, at least try to look up what happened since 2006. Other than Toyama (not Toyoma) and Matsue making some progress in construction or planning, LRT in most other cities are being delayed, shelved for bus expansions, cancelled, or otherwise going nowhere.

Since Naha Yui opened in 2003, Tokyo and Osaka monorails underwent extensions in 2004 and 2007 respectively. And in the previous decade, significant new lines and expansions were made in both the Tokyo and Osaka areas. Many of these networks still have more expansion plans in the works. Sure monorails will always have a smaller role than conventional rail, but in the Tokyo metro at least, monorail has, and will have, significantly bigger role than LRT for years and decades to come.

I love LRT, and they have their place where the implementation works. But the bottomline is, the Japanese recognize the niche where each mode has their advantage (eg, LRT for frequent-stop, city centre urban rail) and recognize that monorail has a legitimate role as an alternative form of true rapid transit, and not deride it as some "pie-in-the-sky" amusement park ride.

(Of course, none of this means I necessarily support the idea of introducing monorail in Toronto)

And that niche is still pretty small in Japan. There isn't really a role for Monorails in North America, except in airports, and theme parks.

 

[ssiguy2]

Well a lot of cities worldwide tend to differ as Monorail construction has exploded all over over for mass transit systems not little airport connectors or zoos. Tehran is the latest city..............it just announced a 7km Monorail system.
Sao Paulo has begun its biding process on it's new 100km Monorail system to be complete by 2016. Toronto wouldn't even have the paper work done by 2016.
Contrary to what many here think I am a very big fan of LRT but TC is simply a $9 billion streetcar system.
Even if you are concerned about the elevated tracks Monorail certainly has its real possibilities in Toronto. I still think my idea of a UTurn type system in Toronto is an excellent one. Convert the SRT to Monorail {which would be a hell of a lot cheaper than converting it to LRT or subway}.............Begin the Monorail at Malvern and use the existing rail ROW with subway spacing and take it all the way down to Woodbine or Pape and then tunnel right across Queen to the Dundas West rail ROW all the up to Humber. It would act as a DRL and get Torontonians from the burbs to downtown in a direct way and connect it with the BD line. Point to point transit is something doesn't have and should because all the transit routes run on a grid so going frtom A to B is much morer time consuming.
What is wrong with this idea of a fast, affordable, mass transit direct line that also works as a much needed DRL?

 

[Fresh Start]

But monorail has higher costs per kilometre than LRT, less carrying capacity and has to be completely grade-separated its whole length. No matter how narrow its pilons may be, it'd still be a tight squeeze to fit an elevated monorail down the path of the DRL as well. You're from BC right? Why would you recommend dismantling our ICTS/ALRT in favor of monorail when the former mode's been a proven success in your region for decades now?

 

[andomano]

Convert the SRT to Monorail {which would be a hell of a lot cheaper than converting it to LRT or subway}............

!! Completely replacing existing infrastructure and building new is cheaper than simply using the existing infrastructure?! For LRT, the system would simply need overhead wires. For subway, either changing the guage (and making the entire system compatible) or new (standard guage) vehicles would be needed.
For Monorail, you'd need to tear everything out, and build a completely new line, and still have an incompatible technology!

 

[golodhendil]

Elevated Monorail: Cheaper construction than other elevated options and the cheaper rolling stock is slower and has less capacity. Guideways without emergency walkways are only practical when low capacity vehicles are used. When high capacity vehicles are used a walkway must be installed to meet our safety codes which makes the structure look like a one lane overpass (an eyesore for any urban environment). Even without the emergency escape walkway the road widths where grade separated LRT was being proposed is quite thin and obstructing any amount of sky would make the area look dark and uninviting. On these streets there is a push to put hydro wires underground to reduce the blight so I doubt anyone will take too kindly to taking down wires only to have them replaced by huge pylons and girders.

Finally another sane response! I mostly agree with the later part of your post. In terms of cost vs capacity, it would be better if you can actually provide where you got the pricing. The recent purchase of 2 medium-capacity Hitachi vehicles by Naha (165 passengers) cost 500 million yen each (~$5 million CAD), ie, $30m per passenger. That's comparable to, say, the new TTC LRVs ($1.2 billion for 204 trains of ~200 passengers), with a comparable speed (65 vs 70 km/h) (though these will likely not be the exact specs of LRVs that would be used on an elevated LRT). As for emergency walkways, none of the high-speed, high-capacity lines in Japan have them, but of course, Canadian safety regs might require otherwise. Whether elevated structures are "eyesores" have been discussed and debated many times in other threads and I don't think it will be settled here.

And that niche is still pretty small in Japan. There isn't really a role for Monorails in North America, except in airports, and theme parks.

Small, sure (because conventional rail began construction a century earlier), but significant and growing. Of the ~250 km of new urban rail built in Tokyo in the past 20 years, 15% were monorail (with another 20% being AGTs, and 0% LRT). Something doesn't have to have swept and replaced half the entire country's rail infrastructure to be a respectable and legitimate technology.

But monorail has higher costs per kilometre than LRT, less carrying capacity and has to be completely grade-separated its whole length. No matter how narrow its pilons may be, it'd still be a tight squeeze to fit an elevated monorail down the path of the DRL as well.

Naha's recent system cost ~$1b USD for 13 km ($77m/km), comparable to the current projected (likely much lower than final) cost for TC (and eg, much lower than that for Eglinton), with comparable/higher capacity and higher speed. And the whole point of building grade-separated rapid transit like monorail is, well, to have them grade-separated and provide true rapid transit. And it would, of course, be a rather stupid idea to use monorail for DRL, but as for whether it can handle the tight corridor:

 

[EnviroTO]

Finally another sane response! I mostly agree with the later part of your post. In terms of cost vs capacity, it would be better if you can actually provide where you got the pricing. The recent purchase of 2 medium-capacity Hitachi vehicles by Naha (165 passengers) cost 500 million yen each (~$5 million CAD), ie, $30m per passenger. That's comparable to, say, the new TTC LRVs ($1.2 billion for 204 trains of ~200 passengers), with a comparable speed (65 vs 70 km/h) (though these will likely not be the exact specs of LRVs that would be used on an elevated LRT). As for emergency walkways, none of the high-speed, high-capacity lines in Japan have them, but of course, Canadian safety regs might require otherwise. Whether elevated structures are "eyesores" have been discussed and debated many times in other threads and I don't think it will be settled here.

The capacity per vehicle proposed for the Eglinton LRT is 3 times the amount of a new city streetcar. This would necessitate using the large type Hitachi vehicle which requires a larger beam. In Japan they call for evacuation via other monorail vehicles which would not likely be supported here. In addition, while monorails work well in Japan where many post-war buildings spread across the city which are better hidden than looked at, it would be unacceptable to see THIS on an urban main street where you can't even see the right side of the street. If you look at the majority of monorail installations they are largely in the center of wide street ROWs. In the suburban areas where there are wider streets (i.e. the equivalent of 8-10 lanes when the median and sidewalks are included) a monorail would make sense and fit in. If the Finch LRT was proposed as a grade separated line rather than an at grade line then a monorail would be cheaper, but compared to the proposed at grade LRT the monorail would be more expensive. On Eglinton the tunnel section would be more expensive as a monorail and if the suburban ends of the line were grade separated it would be cheaper as monorail... but the ends are proposed at grade so there is no savings realized. If Toronto was building elevated subways then there would be cause to wake the city up to monorails because they would be wasting money but as long as the city is running LRT or subways on the surface or in tunnels there is no savings in monorails. The only route in Transit City or subway expansion plans which could make sense as a monorail is the SRT upgrade but due to all the other lines being installed as LRT there is not much point having one piece of unique technology.

 

[EnviroTO]

Monorails are a great replacement to the elevated subways built in New York, Chicago, and Philly in the past. They are an aesthetic improvement, fully capabile, and cheaper to construct. They are not an improvement over anything on the surface or in a tunnel.

 

[golodhendil]

3 times each, or in 3-car trains (which seems to be what I'm finding). It would mean 600/train, which is in fact within range of medium-type Hitachi vehicles (in four-module trains), and these can be further coupled if necessary. And yes I am aware of the use of other vehicles for evacuation.

I would actually consider the picture of Chiba I posted, and especially the picture of Naha that you posted, to not only be acceptable but beautiful. But then that's someone who grew up with elevated railways and expressways crisscrossing the city and the countryside, so it might not jive with the general aesthetic taste of Torontonians or North Americans.

 

[M II A II R II K]

Maybe an automated people mover in a downtown circuit.

 

[SlickFranky]

I'm no fan of monorail but I find the ridiculing of a monorail enthusiast to be a bit disturbing and mean. I don't like seeing people getting ganged up on and bullied. It's almost an affront to my humanity. But maybe I'm just overreacting.

Agreed. The second someone mentions monorail the thread turns into a Simpsons quote-off.

The technology is sound, and does have a place in certain scenarios. Currently I don't see many appropriate (or at least important) places for it Toronto, but I'm 100% open to suggestions.

 

[ssiguy2]

The ones that I think would be most effective for Toronto would be Urbanaut, Metrail, and the huge Scomi. Like I propose thee big U route using rail ROW with a Queen St tunnel would be ideal for Toronto and especially Monorail tech. Also due to being one large project as oppose to extensions, it could be built as PPP. I know in Miller's socialist book that's a dirty word but can work well ie Vancouver's Canada Line. The budget was set with the prov,feds,city,and YVR putting up the money and the private partner the rest. The one thing that is a great benefit is that the budget and timetable were set in stone and the private company was financially responsible for any cost over runs and were going to subject to some pretty whopping fines if it wasn't done on time.
You say the stations are too small?...........well you're right but that had NOTHING to do with the company and EVERYTHING to do with Campbell. He said he wanted a system that at a capacity can carry 15,000pphpd and it can with station extensions and more cars running every 90 seconds.
They get built quickly, with budget restraints so the the public is not on the hook for any cost over runs. Are they more expensive over the long term?....................yes but that is in TODAY'S dollars. If the city didn't have the money to start even till 2020 it would save Torontonians hundreds of millions due to much higher labour/material/land prices. Just look at the stubway. It was built at $150 million per km just 9 years ago but today the cost of any extension is $250 million/km.
PPP gets thing built today which could take decades and over the long term saves Torontonians money. Even automated for 10 years would cut down significantly on the labour costs being used right now for service in the immediate area. I do not at all agree with private companies running transit systems but they can be excellent in helping built individual rapid transit lines.

 

[adma]

I know in Miller's socialist book that's a dirty word

Just by referring to "Miller's socialist book", I think you've gonged your integrity into James Alcock-ian internet-nutso territory...

 

[Asterix]

The one thing that is a great benefit is that the budget and timetable were set in stone and the private company was financially responsible for any cost over runs and were going to subject to some pretty whopping fines if it wasn't done on time.
...
They get built quickly, with budget restraints so the the public is not on the hook for any cost over runs.
...
I do not at all agree with private companies running transit systems but they can be excellent in helping built individual rapid transit lines.

This is something I don't quite get.

If you are suddenly transferring the entire risk of delays and cost over runs on to a private entity, how on earth are they budgeting for this risk if they aren't incredibly inflating their bid price?

What possible motivation would there be for any private company to bid on such a project? Where is their potential for profit to come from (potential profit obviously correlating with the risk they are assuming) if they aren't looking forward to operating profits through their future running of the line?

So in the end, where is the real benefit to the public and the public purse between paying these huge sums to a private for-profit firm vs having the city/TTC do the design and project management while tendering contracts to private firms to do the actual construction (as is done with current projects)?

 

[ssiguy2]

Several good reasons. First if you get a private company to pony up a good chunk of money you are much more likely to get the prov and especially the feds to help out financially as they are much more willing to back up PPP than just gov't handouts alone. One of the potential benefits of getting fed funds is creating PPP as they have clearly stated. Second, the projects are much more likely to get started immediatly as companies would rather start sooner than later as they know their labour costs will be lower than waiting thus resulting in more profit potential for them. Third, funding opportunities are far more diverse and competetive than they once were. In today's irratic stock and bond markets nearly all pensions, long term retirement funds, etc are looking for a long term financially stable investments for their portfolios. This is is why many teacher and gov't pension plans are now investing in gov't backed PPP projects.............the returns, although perhaps lower, are sound, gov't backed, long term, and free of the wild shocks that have rocked the stock markets in the last decade. Forth, They are cheaper ovewr the long haul. yes the prices maybe inflated by 10 to even 20% but that is still a massive hundreds if not billions of dollars by waiting for 10 or 15 years. If even only 10 years with inflation at 2% is almost 25%................still a whopping savings and raw material cost have consistently been rising faster than inflation in the last decade.

 

[Asterix]

Are the funds from provincial or federal sources not also public money?

What does "gov't backed PPP projects" mean if it doesn't mean the government (municipal, provincial or federal) is there to backstop any overruns?

If they aren't, then how are those investments so sound that they aren't at risk to labour rate increases, equipment and material cost increases, delays due to severe or extreme weather, delays due to protests or lawsuits from locals or delays due to unforeseen conflicts with existing infrastructure, geology or other utilities?

Those are all very real risks to any significant public infrastructure project, regardless of whether it is managed by a public entity and built by a private one or both managed and built by the private firm. Those risks have to be accounted for somewhere and if they are being offloaded to the private, for-profit company, then they are going to significantly increase their bid price to account for that.

It seems the fundamental basis for your claim that PPP is 'better' is they would start construction in a more timely manner. There's really no insurmountable reason this couldn't also apply to a traditional project, unless you are suggesting that the PPP version would not be subject to time consuming things like environmental assessments, public consultations and the like.