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Even by Toronto standards, it's remarkable that a big transit investment will lead to an increase in driving.
 
The new stations could have sidetracks to service those stations to make it easier to bypass them on the main tracks.

Doesn't really accomplish anything. The timing issues of running local and express on each others' tails would remain. The express trains have to maintain a certain distance behind the stopping train, otherwise they get restrictive signals and have to slow down. Stopping train pulls into the siding, route is cleared for the express.....but now the stopping train has to stay there while the express train overtakes them from that distance, which means several minutes' wait in the siding. The express in turn has to be well ahead before the stopping train can be released from the siding.

Doable, only if you have the stopping trains follow behind the expresses, and that leads to a wonky and constrained frequency of service because the following express will catch up eventually.

- Paul
 
Even by Toronto standards, it's remarkable that a big transit investment will lead to an increase in driving.
That's why the DRL Long+ (western side) should have been used to address the problem. We just wasted $3.7B on Smarttrack instead...:(
 
If a study was done that bases its assumptions on the fact that there is no fare integration, and that no express trains would be bypassing stations, then a study SHOULD be done where there is full TTC fare integration and proper express service mixed with EMU's, and where buses/streetcars are integrated within the stations to bring riders to those stations.

If then the study concludes that these stations are not worthwhile, fine so be it, but this study is so flawed and leaves out so many things that makes any transit station worthwhile and useful its laughable.

Although I think Lawrence Station should not be built because the Scarborough LRT would service that area anyways...in a perfect world. Sigh.
 
If a study was done that bases its assumptions on the fact that there is no fare integration, and that no express trains would be bypassing stations, then a study SHOULD be done where there is full TTC fare integration and proper express service mixed with EMU's, and where buses/streetcars are integrated within the stations to bring riders to those stations.

If then the study concludes that these stations are not worthwhile, fine so be it, but this study is so flawed and leaves out so many things that makes any transit station worthwhile and useful its laughable.

Although I think Lawrence Station should not be built because the Scarborough LRT would service that area anyways...in a perfect world. Sigh.
express trains were part of the base assumptions.
 
express trains were part of the base assumptions.

Then how could they conclude that these stations would force suburbanites to drive, when they wouldn't even impact their trains?

(Express train is flying past St.Clair station) "St.Clair gets a station? Those damn city slicker downtowners, I hate them! Im never taking the train again!"
 
Toronto's ST maybe just a new political term for RER but what Tory has done by rebranding a service is that he focused attention on how GO is completely irrelevant to 99% of Torontonians and that Toronto itself needed more stations and that alone is a big accomplishment.

RER will mean absolutely nothing more than GO does however if the current fare system remains in tact. Even if the price of the GO fare is deducted by the TTC fare to get to the station, it will make little difference. All GO will become is a more frequent service that people still can't afford to take. The only difference Torontonians will notice about RER is that instead of seeing just rush hour trains go by that they can't afford, they will now see trains every 15 minutes that they can't afford from the window of the packed bus they are to get to the same destination as the RER train.

The reason few in Toronto care about RER or new GO service is because it doesn't mean anything to them. ST on the other hand does because it would have allowed Torontonians to use the RER instead of looking at with envy and scorn as much as they do with the UPX...............a transit system paid for the masses but providing transit for the few.
 
The above is why fare-by-distance is the only real option once Presto is rolled out...............getting from A to B should be the same price whether that be by bus, subway, streetcar, RER, or commuter rail. It also of course is a far superior use of both the physical infrastructure, rolling stock, and labour. So instead of near empty GO/RER trains going by packed subways you would have a ore equitable use of resources. You also wouldn't get stupid things like is what is going to happen on the Miss Transitway where some buses cost more than other despite using the same corridor and going to the same destination for the sole reason that one is painted green and the other one isn't.
 
The above is why fare-by-distance is the only real option once Presto is rolled out...............getting from A to B should be the same price whether that be by bus, subway, streetcar, RER, or commuter rail. It also of course is a far superior use of both the physical infrastructure, rolling stock, and labour. So instead of near empty GO/RER trains going by packed subways you would have a ore equitable use of resources. You also wouldn't get stupid things like is what is going to happen on the Miss Transitway where some buses cost more than other despite using the same corridor and going to the same destination for the sole reason that one is painted green and the other one isn't.

Yes, this. It shouldn't matter what type of transit you take in your fare zone, if you stay in your fare zone, you pay that fare. That is how proper fare zones work.

Perhaps some small incentives can be made to try and reallocate users off of overloaded transit methods (LINE 1!!) but it shouldn't be significantly more or less.
 
What we will see, hopefully very soon, is Go Transit service that connects to many of Toronto's busiest bus & streetcar routes, and gets filled with Toronto residents who transfer to/from those routes without paying any extra fare.
That is exactly right. That is how transit works in many European and Asian cities, and how it should be in the GTA.
 

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