[urbandreamer]

Hmm. I understand the concept. Will old-school union types at TTC and Toronto gov't types get it?

It's the same concept used in using GPS to drive--sometimes you gotta go backwards to get to destination quicker.

Now--what will barriers be made of? Off-the-shelf parts I hope.

The major problem really is how lazy ppl can be in the morning--like would I have to walk all the way to Dundas West station when Keele or HP station is easier walk in sub-zero temps?

Does express service only run during rush hour? say 6-9am, 3-7pm?

 

[Woodbridge_Heights]

You just stop at less stops.

It takes 22 seconds to stop your train from full speed.

I accounted for a 15 second average dwell time.

It takes 30 seconds to bring your train to the full speed again.

All you do is time how long it takes to drive direct end to end and strategically plan which stops are intended to be stopped at.

I have the likely best planned station choices figured out, however TTC or a consultant firm may choose to make minor changes.

For example Finch to Bloor. You only stop at Sheppard, York Mills, Lawrence and Eglinton.

If you drove your train direct, it would only take 9.375 minutes.

You than add 4 stops times 67 seconds (22 + 15 + 30) which is 4.46 minutes.

Now for all Yonge line passengers from Finch it takes 13.835 minutes.
Sharon.

No no no no. Your math is completely flawed. You simply the direct travel time, add in time to slow down stop deboard board and get going again. There are other trains using the tracks and you MUST account for them. What does the train above do when there is another train (on another route) stopped at North York Centre? It can't teleport past it, it can't drive through it, it can't go around it. It MUST sit and wait for the train ahead to move on.

Unless you plan on trains running the wrong way on the tracks.

Plus 15 seconds is not enough dwell time to let people deboard and board the train.

 

[Darwinkgo]

I think what she is trying to explain is that in rush hour trains operating in the demand direction (inbound in the am, outbound in the pm) will only stop at a limited number of stations, which makes sense. In a basic version of the system there would only be one set of inbound stations (maybe 5 stations) and you would need to transfer back to get to them. You should be able to run the inbound trains faster for the obvious reasons. This first system doesn't solve the throughput problem however, and compounds issues like Bloor and Yonge.

Now lets take the above system, and instead of having one set of express stations, make 3 sets of express stations, all not sharing any stations with the other express, but with back haul sharing all stations. If you have moving block signalling, and you are able to coordinate everything (which will be really hard without ATC) every time a train moves on the inbound trip you can move 3 or 4 stations. There is no overtaking, just think of it as overlapping fixed blocks.

Of course this introduces a significant amount of forced transfers, and makes the system harder to navigate. A large number of the current people that transfer from the YUS to BD during he morning rush would be forced to do a second transfer.

If you want to take the system a step further, you could have the express system running on the backhaul too, you just need a different set of coordinated stops. This may end up causing 4 km trips to get to the next stop, and make the system more confusing.

It works in theory, I just don't think it would work in practice. The math might be a little over exuberant, but I think you would see capacity and speed gains. Trip times is the big question, and on that I have no idea. Since you need ATC to bring it in, and the capacity of an ATC'd system hasn't been reached it is unnecessary. Also, the capacity gains are partially illusory if too many people need to take backhaul trips to get to their final destinations and overwhelm the backhaul. With the lack of centre platforms on large parts of the system transfer penalties also need to be taken into account.

 

[whatever]

We should definitely start petitioning the province to build some sort of express train connecting the outer suburbs to the downtown core. It could have fewer stops so that it could get downtown faster, and we could use larger train sets to move massive numbers of people.

The hard part will be convincing the province of course. Someone should organize a rally. Maybe at Union Station.

 

[Fresh Start]

NO Surprises, No track fires, No subway suicides, and less or no PAA's.

this infact is a 216% capacity improvement potential. ATC only proports for a 26% capacity improvement.

With what I described...........You do not require automatic train control.

This EXPRESS Subway system is available almost immediately.

All you need is your approapriated Platform Safety. I promise you, I also got all that figures out. Platform safety is all I have worked on for almost 2 years.

This about this one in some station you may only need about 200 or 250' of platform safety?

Without safety it is impossible to achieve full efficiency.

Are you more confused? This is what makes innovation fun. It stretched all of our minds.

Don't forget...........about 1/3 of commuters will go to work in the
...................O P P O S I T E D I R E C T I O N ,,....and still get there faster!

Most who go to work in the opposite direction will generally only also have about 4 subway stops in total AND HAVE A SEAT FOR HALF OF THEIR JOURNEY.

Ugh, reading this gave me a migraine. Ever heard of the Russell Hill subway accident, Sharon?

From Wikipedia:
"Three people were killed and 30 were taken into the hospital with injuries when one train rear-ended another train. The subway line was shut down for five days following the collision accident. Investigations found that human error and a design flaw in the mechanical safety devices caused this accident."

Oops, so much for fast and reliable travel on a time-worn and unpredictable system. Still think that having vehicles reverse to and fro along a single line of track is really such a good idea? If both the drivers and the technology (switches, brake mechanisms and/or electrical shortages) can and have been proven to fail to keep up to these factually questionable headways you've stated, then you are endangering the public and risking greater loss of live from unexpected mishap collisions and derailments than an entire suicide pact brigade. Like the others have said, the only way to implement limited-stopping express service along the Yonge corridor is to build a new set of tracks. New tracks cost multi-billions and do not serve a currently under-served part of the city, the way a better solution such as the Downtown Relief Line would. The goal of proposals such as the DRL are to create a viable alternative for many commuters such that their bus trip intercepts that line in advance of approaching the YUS line and therefore gives passengers on-board a greater incentive to transfer earlier. This, in essence, alleviates Yonge meaning there would be no rational justification for express service on Yonge, which by and large it acts like an express line north of St Clair already (1000 metres or greater spacing gaps). So it is only the south of Eglinton section that really needs relief. Actions such as the subway barriers at Y-B are only a temporary solution. Long term investment into intra- and inter-regional transit (GO Transit, BRT, Eglinton premetro, DRL); alternatives to just dumping busloads and commuter parking lot loads of suburbanites onto subway mega-terminals, is the correct course of action.

 

[Therion]

I always thought that an extra tunnel for Yonge would be a great idea... express trains one way during rush hour, which would use the existing bypasses at stations like eglington, Sheppard, Davisville etc. to get out of the trains heading in the opposite direction. You could also quickly switch tracks to bypass trouble spots. I'm sure there's a way to make it work efficiently. I don't think it is necessary to dig a set of tunnels in each way.

As to subway safety's proposal, it seems to have some merit, except that I use the Rosedale station an average of 4 times a day...

 

[andomano]

We should definitely start petitioning the province to build some sort of express train connecting the outer suburbs to the downtown core. It could have fewer stops so that it could get downtown faster, and we could use larger train sets to move massive numbers of people.

The hard part will be convincing the province of course. Someone should organize a rally. Maybe at Union Station.

That would be a pointless petition.

Clearly you don't use GO Transit, as GO offers many express trip(s) directly to Union from; Oakville, Clarkson, Pickering, Bramalea, and Unionville

 

[subway safety]

About the Russel Hill accident. Back then there were no rules. A red light did not mean stop . It meant slow down and proceed with caution.

Remember when at one point you would see the tail of one train leaving, while the next one pulled into the station.

Firstly, most accident happen near a station. It's hard to hit a moving train to which you are going to be going about the same speed.

With this system, there are less than half the subway stops, yet all station still get serviced.

Actuals more dangerous occur when you have trains weaving in and out of track siding. There is none of that either.


You just go as fast as the train in front. Which now because of station skipping. the whole system goes faster. You not standing on a crowded subway forever.

You go to your normal train station, and you either have a train stop at every stop, every 2nd stop or on the designated scenerio every third stop. In most cases it is every stop or every 2nd stop. On certain other stations that do not stop at all in the "downtown" direction, you are clearing instructed to board going in the opposite direction go a pre determined number of stops probably 1 or 2, cross over the centre platform, and then have one or 2 stops and then you are at Yonge and Bloor.

I've got the whole potential design mapped out.

The question now is will TTC care enough about their commuters to provide them safety and efficiency that they ought to have?

Do they also care about their bottom line, have new income potential room, without having to spend billions.

They have a wise and sensible and reasonable solution sitting right here.

The following day once the safety is in place. All trains will be about half full, since the whole system is basically operating like an express system without having to build the side lines, or any unique confusion for train routing etc.

One line, faster speed, ......now no delays, and hurrays...we..in this case since I live in the north................"you" all, most all get seats....even though you now wouldn't need them, since the ride is massively shortened.

As far as keeping the highest efficiency, I believe the execption to the rule ought to include the "stop and creep forward" option for Yonge and Bloor only. This is Steve Munro's thought too.

Sharon

 

[SlickFranky]

That would be a pointless petition.

Clearly you don't use GO Transit, as GO offers many express trip(s) directly to Union from; Oakville, Clarkson, Pickering, Bramalea, and Unionville

I guess sarcasm doesn't always translate well in type.


But seriously, I think we've all considered the benefits of limited stops during peak...but we all quickly realized it cannot be done safely (even with barriers) since an 'express' train will eventually slam into the rear of a 'local' if they're not on separate rows.

A very strange plan from someone concerned with safety. Let's try DRL, ramped-up electrified GO, maybe ATC on YUS...if all those fail we can start risking lives to save 6 minutes.

I feel bad for the TTC people that had to sit through this presentation, smiling and nodding politely, as all good Canadians would do. Over an hour!?! They should bill you. WE should bill you! That's our tax money man-hours you wasted!

 

[Darwinkgo]

Unless I am wrong the system would eliminate local trains, at least at peak in peak directions. That is how it is still safe having express trains without an express track.

 

[jeffreym]

About the Russel Hill accident. Back then there were no rules. A red light did not mean stop . It meant slow down and proceed with caution.

No, there were rules. You admit this yourself when you state that "[Red] meant slow down and proceed with caution." That's a rule. If it was broken there was a mechanical system in place to physically disable the train. That failed (As we now know) because of a lack of testing and a mentality of expand first, state-of-good repair second.

WHat was the result of this? We improved both the rules, the testing (Everything is now tested 8 times a year I believe) and the culture of 'what's important'.

Wouldn't it be wonderful to save billions of dollars and get downtown a whole lot quicker? Yes. But this is not the way.

You still haven't even discussed the fact that you propose to overload the stations beyond what they were ever designed!

Plus, what happens when a delay slows down the line? It'll still cascade down the line. Right now if I'm heading to College and service is slow on YUS I can transfer at Bloor and take an alternate route. Instead, if I hadn't gotten off at Rosedale I'd be screwed into waiting we creep along through Bloor since I couldn't get off? It's not just when there are slow boarding times that delays happen, even just when staff are working at track level trains need to slow down to a crawl for safety.

Wouldn't this also mean 3x the wait time? If you just missed train on express route A you'd need to wait for routes B and C going through before A came through again.

Suddenly 13.84 minutes = 13.84 minutes + 6 minutes for just missing your express train (SInce now it's not 2 minutes until the next train but 6) + 2 minutes to catch the local train back north + a couple of minutes to travel on the local train the one or two stations. So, if you just missed your express train going south and just missed the local train going south your trip could take 13.84(Travel)+6(Wait for Express Train)+2(Wait for Local Train)+3(Travel on Local Train)=~25 minutes. Heaven forbid the first express train on your route is full!

Maybe I'm missing something or I made a mistake. I'm just not seeing it though.

 

[GregWTravels]

I don't think she is proposing having trains reverse or having express and local trains on the same track. The way I read it is that during AM peak you'd have all trains running inbound to downtown express, and trains running out of downtown local. That would reverse during PM peak, where trains running out of downtown are express, and trains running into downtown are local.

As an example, say St. Clair is a local stop, Eglinton an express stop, Union an express stop and King a local stop. I want to get from St. Clair to King during AM peak. I would get a northbound St. Clair train to Eglinton, where I would transfer to a southbound express train. It would only make a few stops - Bloor, Dundas and then Union. At Union, I would transfer to a northbound Yonge line train to get up to King.

Is that correct, Sharon?

The problem I see with that system is that it just reinforces the downtown-centric transit system we already have, and won't necessarily get people out of their cars if they are heading from midtown to work up in North York.

Edited to add: not to mention the scheduling... As trains running in one direction would be finishing their routes much faster than trains running in the other direction, wouldn't you have a problem with trains piling up at one end of the system, and not enough trains at the other end of the system to provide service?

 

[Asterix]

I don't think she is proposing having trains reverse or having express and local trains on the same track. The way I read it is that during AM peak you'd have all trains running inbound to downtown express, and trains running out of downtown local. That would reverse during PM peak, where trains running out of downtown are express, and trains running into downtown are local.

If that's what she means, it's not what she said. Yesterday at 8:19pm:

Some trains stops at certain stations all the time. Some trains stop at certain stations every 2nd train, and at a couple of stations will stop at every 3rd train.

That seems to suggest that if you are in, say, Eglinton, you could pass on the local train currently in the station and catch the subsequent train, which would be an express train, and get to, say, Union, before the local train. How that express train gets ahead of the leading local train is a big mystery.

But assuming your interpretation is correct, how about running some numbers?

Fact: it is 2km between major cross-streets: Sheppard/York Mills/Lawrence/Eglinton/St Clair/Bloor/Queen.

Assumptions:
- in peak direction, we'll run express trains hitting only the major stops (local service will be provided in the opposite direction), peak subway speed is about 70km/h;
- it will take about 2 minutes for the express trains to travel between the major stops (probably optimistic);
- we'll go with 30 second dwell time at these stops (again, very optimistic);
- for local service in opposite direction, assume 1:30 between Eglinton/Davisville and Davisville/St Clair; 1:00 between closer stops further south;
- local service also assumed with 0:30 dwell time.

Let's take a fictional passenger getting on at Davisville and heading to College.

With the current setup, it will take: 1:30 + 0:30 (leaving St Clair) + 1:00 + 0:30 (leaving Summerhill) + 1:00 + 0:30 (leaving Rosedale) + 1:00 + 0:30 (leaving Bloor) + 1:00 + 0:30 (leaving Wellesley) + 1:00 = 9:00.

With the new proposal, they must travel north to Eglinton, south to Queen, then north to College.

New travel time: 1:30 (assume no Eglinton dwell) + 2:00 + 0:30 (leaving St Clair) + 2:00 + 0:30 (leaving Bloor) + 2:00 + 0:30 (have to switch to northbound Queen platform) + 1:00 + 0:30 (leaving Dundas) + 1:00 = 11:30.

This is incredibly optimistic given the assumption the southbound train is waiting at Eglinton, travel is fast between stations, dwell time at Bloor is short, all the people who have to get off to head back north to Rosedale or Summerhill, northbound train is waiting at Queen, switching platforms in the crowds at Queen who are trying to get back north to Dundas, College or Wellesley.

Hopefully this fictitious passenger isn't a civil servant trying to get to Wellesley and Bay. If you go express to Union, skipping Queen, that makes things even worse.

I completely fail to see how making people overshoot their intended destination in this manner can make their trip faster.

I also completely fail to see where any of this alternating express, either alternating trains or alternating peak periods, was ever part of the original proposal mentioned on this thread. It seems to me the who intent was to corral people on platforms, separated from the deadly track trench that takes hundreds of lives every year.

But then I'm probably just missing something really obvious.

 

[subway safety]

Oh my goodness,

This is so interesting from my point of view.

I promissed you. You would not get it at first.

I promissed experienced engineers and top transit experts too.

They too had the precise full map in front of them with all the approapriate stops shown on the map, which direction, when they stop.

All I had to to do is walk them through the procedure.

It is just odd to:

1. understand how you can have an express train , without a second track.

2. understand how you can have an express train, without getting bunched up or getting in the way or being stopped by a train in front of you, to which at first, you assume would be in the way meaning the "express" stops working.

and 3. understand, .......you can't get to work faster, if I go in the opposite direction.

Initially reaction always is it can't work.

similair, to you can't fly.

This is what makes innovation both interesting and unique.

I can assure you these transit specialist, one had a P.HD., after they got it.

They neither questioned my capacity improvement numbers, neither did they question the fact that the first day of operation. ALL TRAINS WOULD IMMEDIATELY BE HALF FULL.

I was even offered my own conference room downtown anytime I needed it, for the purposes of future meetings to come.

I would guess without breaking any present transit rules, all trains will likely arrive with 1 minute to 1 minute 15 seconds of each other, that being the case at 59 stations the waiting period would be 1 minute 15 seconds.

4 stations waiting would be between 0 and 2 minutes 30 seconds.

and 6 stations waiting would be between 0 and 5 minutes.

The benefit relative for waiting times would thereby be waiting woudl be decreased significantly for 63 stations.


For the other 6 stations would you rather 2 minutes 30 seconds extra standing on a reasonably comfortable uncrowded platform or with your face shoved into the side of a subway car. Need I explain more.

The only thing I suggested that was questioned was not capacity improvements of 203 % but the new annual revenue potential of 1.345 billion dollars. I used the figure of $2.75 as the fare price.

One of my meeting suggested I use the $3.00 fare, and another meeting suggested I use the lower average fare to incorporate metropasses.

It turns out likely both suggested are wrong, but I choose to keep on track with other things.

The fact of the matter is, it will be now easy for people who regularily take the go for a higher and perhaps a more inconvenient way ie, the drive is farther to get to their station,

OR, they already take the car and are not subway people anyway.

Therefore there would be a parking condo at Kipling, Kennedy, Finch, and Downsview, to accommodate 'NEW' RIDERS, and now these folks are to work in about 20 minutes, for about under $10.00 a day including parking, with of course a convenient elevator to ride down into the station, or will moving walkways, from the parking condo to the station entrance.

The government can perhaps additionally provide further tax incentives for people caring about our environment and highway gridlock that in itself costs productivity about 9 billion annually, since highways are also stopped.

It all connects, and brings huge spin off bennefits.

BUT SAFETY IS THE KEY and the SPRING BOARD FOR ALL THE SPIN OFF BENEFITS.

This is why this has become a mission. The benefits to everyone, business, personal, governements, taxes, our air, our health, our mental health, our grief, the list speaks for itself.

I will not be shunned or discouraged, or discrimminated against until I am properly shown or there is evidence of any 'UNRESOLVABLE' OBSTICLE, or solid reason why this cannot work, then and only then will I be silent and go back to a regular life with my family.

I haven't got paid a thing, I have spent thousands, I have worked on this for about 2 years day and night.

To date, no one has showen me any obsticles, except for the uphill battle of being a "little housewife, from a small town in the north," who now is up against the political, "selfish" world of pride and politics. Remember, just about any person I speak with, either affords to live downtown, or affords to live very close to downtown, or neither takes the subway.

Why would the care about the "real people" in the world.

These issues I bring don't personally affect them. They don't affect me either, but I feel responsible to follow my heart of conviction and passion.

Sure I potentially stand to be paid for my invention, however, I WILL NOT BACK DOWN WITHOUT PROPER ACCREDITATION OR REMUNERATION.

I AM FURIOUS THAT I HAVE RECIEVED NEITHER. That was my footprint for Yonge and Bloor.

There is no evidence to show this came from anywhere else but myself.

Sorry, an emotion slipped out. My new years resolution is to keep me primarily focussed about the cause. This is about the people and it's about our environment.

Sharon.

 

[Asterix]

I will not be shunned or discouraged, or discrimminated against until I am properly shown or there is evidence of any 'UNRESOLVABLE' OBSTICLE, or solid reason why this cannot work, then and only then will I be silent and go back to a regular life with my family.

...

To date, no one has showen me any obsticles, except for the uphill battle of being a "little housewife, from a small town in the north," who now is up against the political, "selfish" world of pride and politics.

Further to my previous post, two questions for you:

- Which interpretation of your plan is correct, the one based on your quote or the one interpreted by GregWTravel?

- Please compare the travel time (broken down by stages) for a passenger from Davisville heading south in peak period to Dundas or College, both as you understand the current system and with your proposal.