[gweed123]

With the elimination of Obico, how much freight will still use the Milton line? Anyone know? Either percentage-wise or generally...

I'm wondering if this will free up slots for more Milton service which is desperately needed and can reduce the number of buses needed on the line.

CP doesn't really have a line around Toronto like CN does, do they? I know the general layout of the tracks, but I'm not exactly clear on who owns what, or who is allowed to run what on what tracks.

I'm not sure what CP's routes are like, but I would hope for what you said. Less CP trains will hopefully mean more GO trains.

 

[DavidJamesTO]

The Galt Subdivision runs through Cambridge and connects to the city's Toyota plant over former CP Electric Lines trackage. Every Toyota made in the city and bound for the rest of Canada leaves home over the Milton Line.

 

[doady]

I'm not sure what CP's routes are like, but I would hope for what you said. Less CP trains will hopefully mean more GO trains.

Yeah, I'm sure that the lack of freight traffic would result in lots of service for Milton the same way the lack of freight traffic has resulted in lots of service for the other GO Train lines. Oh wait...

 

[unimaginative2]

Again, there's plenty of room on virtually the whole Milton corridor (with the possible exception of Streetsville) for a dedicated two-track regional rail corridor alongside a two-track or one-track-plus-frequent-sidings freight corridor. We don't need to kick CP off their line, but it needs to be reconstructed in a comprehensive way that allows the two uses to share the corridor. That needs to be planned from the start, instead of having individual tracks added here and there.

 

[unimaginative2]

Personally, I think this is the way transit planning should be done:

1. Come up with a binding, long-term regional land use and transportation plan that sets out corridors for intensification, but doesn't describe in any way, shape or form, what technology will be used, nor the exact alignment nor the stations. Determine, however, what level of service impacts will be if employment and residential densities are increased by X percent. Also run a sophisticated model of travel demand, trip assignment and route assignment across the region based on the increased employment and residential numbers

2. For each transportation corridor in the land use plan, determine the mode based on travel demand and trip characteristics (distance traveled, where to?). This is done on a case-by-case basis (so line by line) and is not meant to champion one mode over another. Get international engineering firms to bid on the design, build and operation of the line in a transparent process. If the best submission meets all the detailed demand and planning requirements but happens to be some unexpected mode, so be it.

3. Get public input in station area precinct design and how to best integrate the station with area surroundings and local travel modes.

Here is how you should not plan for transit:

1. Champion a mode and suggest where it will go without any analysis of whether it fits with existing travel characteristics, future travel characteristics based on long-range land use plans, not have an idea of how much it costs or how you will pay for it, and have no idea who will operate it and how they will operate and manage it.

I don't disagree with your proposed approach at all. In fact, I'd advocate much the same thing in many cases. The problem is that I think you're drawing a false dichotomy. Again, CityRail isn't a government-sponsored plan. It doesn't have a staff of dozens of engineers who can prepare detailed land use studies and cost estimates. Instead, it's designed to champion a technology that isn't being considered. You're describing an ideal of doing everything from scratch, but we have a half dozen corridors in this city that are already established. Sure, they might not be the absolutely optimal solution, but using existing corridors rather than tunnelling some ideal route makes regional rail affordable enough that a comprehensive network can be created. That's the basis of the RER: the initial plan was pretty much as you proposed, creating new corridors along "ideal" routes through the suburbs. Unfortunately, it was so costly that the plan quickly foundered. It was only when they struck upon the idea of re-purposing the existing rail corridors and connecting them through Paris with new tunnels where necessary that the extraordinarily successful RER that Paris enjoys today was created.

When they built the S-Bahn, they didn't say "Let's consider all modes and all potential corridors." They said we already have a corridor and then they upgraded it for frequent regional rail. The point of regional rail is that it's affordable enough to actually be built. Sure, maybe they're not the perfect routes and maybe they don't connect all the growth centre dots. But building ideal corridors all across the region would be an unachievable goal. The corridors serve a lot of major concentrations, surface transit could connect most of the rest, and for a handful of the busiest you might be able to divert off the main corridor to serve them.

Again, the U10 in Berlin was designed while the wall was up to parallel an S-Bahn line, since DR ran the S-Bahn and West Berliners wouldn't ride it. Once the wall came down, they abandoned the U10 project in favour of rehabilitating the S-Bahn line. The U10 was probably the more optimal solution, since it ran closer to a major street, and I'm sure you'd find plenty of contract-hungry engineering firms that would push for it. But the obvious choice was to use the existing parallel corridor a few blocks away that would permit a line to be built more quickly and for a fraction of the cost.

This doesn't exclude the possibility of comprehensive land-use and transportation planning at all. Instead, that planning simply needs to accommodate the existing facts on the ground, which are the rail corridors that run throughout the region. Additional routes could be added following a process similar to what you describe, which sounds a lot like the Canada Line.

 

[Hipster Duck]

The point of regional rail is that it's affordable enough to actually be built. Sure, maybe they're not the perfect routes and maybe they don't connect all the growth centre dots. But building ideal corridors all across the region would be an unachievable goal. The corridors serve a lot of major concentrations, surface transit could connect most of the rest, and for a handful of the busiest you might be able to divert off the main corridor to serve them.

Okay, fair enough, but I think you will see that this sort of pragmatic ("it's good enough because it's cheap enough") approach to planning will be even more difficult in a North American region like the GTA where trip generators were often short-sightedly [because of my aforementioned lack of a coordinated transit and land use plan] located considerably far away from existing rail lines, much moreso than in Paris or Berlin. Consider the Barrie line, which manages to miss every major trip generator by about 2 kilometers (Yorkdale, York U, Vaughan Centre) - the fact that the Spadina subway had to be extended to hit these points shows why the perfect sometimes has to come to the rescue of the good. Or consider the midtown CP line, which we sometimes salivate over because it is entirely grade separated and runs through dense residential neighbourhoods. But it also runs through established neighbourhoods (read: no revelopment potential) and the almost exclusively residential character means that there are few trip generators en route. Add the fact that it dumps passengers onto the busiest section of the Yonge line at Summerhill and the fact that it largely parallels the BD and it's not such a solid case anymore.

Finally, I would be hesitant to suggest that regional rail is necessarily the cheaper alternative to building a line from scratch because our rail system is so primitive that you would have to essentially a heavy rail line from scratch. This includes complex signaling, high floor platform stations that can accomodate a large volume of passengers, extensive grade separation and the removal of all interlockings and freight spurs, double tracking to a high standard and, of course, electrification. This is considerably different from the experience in Europe where the sophisticated infrastructure and stations were already largely in place. In some cases, the original S-bahn networks were largely just rebranding exercises, such as in Zurich in the early 1990s.

Don't get me wrong: I think regional rail would be a wonderful asset to have, and I think it would actually be very appropriate on some of our lines, but I also don't think it's as much of a magic bullet as it's perceived to be, largely because of the state of our existing rail system which is built to 19th century freight standards, and the lack of coordinated land use and transport planning which put our major destinations well off the path of these rail lines in the first place.

 

[unimaginative2]

I completely agree that some of the lines aren't ideally located with respect to adjacent trip generators. The Barrie and Richmond Hill lines are probably the worst, though Barrie is better once you get north of Steeles. On the other hand, Milton, Lakeshore, Georgetown, and Stouffville are rather well located in pretty well-populated neighbourhoods. Of course the reason that we don't have development around the rail corridors is that we don't have rapid transit service in the rail corridors. Toronto sees no shortage of development, and if rapid transit service existed on the rail corridors and if zoning were appropriate, there's no question you'd see plenty of it around every station. Part of the problem right now is that we're obsessed with building cutesy New Urbanist stuff around stations, since that has the old-timey village-around-a-station feel that seems appropriate for transit-supportive development. Then we go and build the huge regional malls and office parks around arterial intersections and highway interchanges. Of course, they're by far the bigger trip generators and should be built around regional rail stations.

To a certain extent, all of that is moot since, outside of Downtown Toronto, the substantial majority of riders at almost every busy rapid transit station come from connecting bus routes rather than walk-in traffic. If you're riding the bus to a station anyway, it doesn't really matter if the station isn't at the point of densest development.

I think there's no question that regional rail is substantially cheaper than establishing a completely new right-of-way, either underground or by land acquisition. All of the things you mentioned need to be included in a new line anyway, on top of the cost of new right-of-way or tunnelling. Better yet, most of our regional rail corridors are pretty spacious and could easily accommodate a dedicated double-track regional rail line without significant additions to the right-of-way. You may also be overestimating the standards on some of the lines that have been upgraded to regional rail in Europe. Of course you're right that many of them were already in good shape, but some S-Bahn and RER lines needed double-tracking, electrification, platform reconstruction, re-signalling, etc. That's pretty much what we need here.

Many, if not most, regional rail lines in Europe, such as the new Belgian RER, have involved substantial segments of completely new double-track electrified rail within existing corridors. That's pretty much what we need to build here, and it's certainly more affordable than new rapid transit lines. Through suburban territory where stations largely rely on feeder buses anyway, a slightly less than ideal station location makes no difference for most passengers. You're absolutely right that a comprehensive land use and transit plan is vital, if only because it would encourage developers to build around regional rail. That's why a program like CityRail is so important: if developers are aware that within a reasonable time frame, there will be rapid transit stopping near their property, they will build major destinations. If all they know is that at some vague point in the future, there'll be GO trains running a little more often, they're not going to build anything beyond housing for commuters to Union.

 

[Dan416]

Nice post unimaginative2.

 

[M II A II R II K]

As long as those new built up destinations don't end up looking like VCC with parking lots, grass, swamps, far away Wal-Marts and other remote boxes.

 

[gweed123]

I think that there generally needs to be 3 types stations developed: Urban, Suburban, and Suburban Hub.

Urban is almost exclusively for the 416, with the odd exception (Brampton station for instance). Most of the land surrounding rail corridors in the GTHA is industrial land. In the case of Toronto, a lot of it, especially around the Georgetown line and the Lakeshore line through Etobicoke is underused industrial land. This is the type of location where the dense urban village scenario would be appropriate. If the station is located in a residential area already, development must be more sensitive to the existing community, and try to blend in, as opposed to wiping the slate clean like you can do with an industrial area.

Suburban is pretty much the average suburban GO station. What I'd like to see there is parking structures, with the ground floor of them being retail. There's enough parking lot space at most GO sites now that they can build multiple parking structures, with ground floor tenants like Sobeys, the LCBO, Future Shop, etc. The idea behind this is that a lot of people on their way home from work make a side trip to pick up something for dinner. By having these stores located AT the station, the side trip can be done without moving the car. It's convenient, and it's a better land use than a massive surface parking lot.

Suburban Hub is a major suburban station that will have local rapid transit connections. Examples of this would be Oakville, Langstaff, Unionville, etc. The idea is to make them a hybrid between urban and suburban stations. Incorporate the size and parking capacity of suburban stations, but the development style of more urban stations. Condos, large and small commercial (in contrast to the suburban stations, include things like restaurants), parking structures incorporated into other developments, and a rapid transit terminal.

 

[unimaginative2]

I agree, Mark, that if that's the final outcome it's a big problem. But VCC is already undergoing some pretty substantial development. I don't hold out hope for it being pretty, but barring a complete real estate market crash, I think we'll see a lot of condos and maybe some office park-style buildings. It's just a shame they didn't build Vaughan Mills at VCC.

Gweed, I think you're definitely on the right track there. Stations within the existing urban area definitely need to be sensitive to their surrounding neighbourhoods. That said, they're not bad spots in most cases for some higher density development.

I'm not sure I'd put so much focus on parking in the suburban stations. I would expect and hope that the modal split for suburban regional rail stations would be comparable to that of existing TTC suburban subway stations. The most important thing is a bus terminal for easy connections from buses to CityRail. You're absolutely right about making it more convenient for people to stop briefly on the way home at regional rail stations. That's the model in much of the rest of the world. Unfortunately, you'll get into the fare barrier issue. Unless people have passes, they can't leave the fare-paid area. If we went with a partial POP approach or, better yet, timed transfers, that wouldn't be so much of an issue.

 

[Woodbridge_Heights]

... But VCC is already undergoing some pretty substantial development. I don't hold out hope for it being pretty, but barring a complete real estate market crash, I think we'll see a lot of condos and maybe some office park-style buildings. It's just a shame they didn't build Vaughan Mills at VCC.
...

This is why I'd like to see VIVA orange re-routed to run North on Jane to serve Vaughan Mills, Canada's Wonderland, even the hospital that is being built in the area. These will be trip generators that need to be addressed, they just won't be sufficient trip generators to warrant a subway. Then VIVA purple would run E-W across 7

 

[Hipster Duck]

unimaginative,

two more things about the CityRail concept that I forgot to mention:

1. I have absolutely no faith in Metrolinx to design and operate a European-style regional rail system. Actually, I have no faith in any North American operator or transportation engineering consultancy to advise on the building of something like this. I think CityRail should be designed, built and operated by a European or Japanese state railway that's interested in semi-private foreign ventures. I heard that SNCF and JR (Japan) and even the China High Speed Rail Corporation are considering a bid to design, provide equipment and run the California HSR system. I think something similar should take place here.

2. I think CityRail has to be completely separated from any FRA or at least freight-owned track. This will make it more expensive, especially around Union station, but it avoids any of the legal idiocy that freight railways are sure to impose on a system like this. The Durham segment of the Lakeshore East line could serve as a model. North American railways are so freight-centric in their operation that I think we need to have a completely separate system. This will also allow us to run better non-FRA compliant passenger service (read: HSR) in the future on the same tracks.

If we're going to do CityRail, we need to do it right. I still think this is expensive but worth it, but the details of operation and management - and not just where the lines go and the kind of technology - need to be clear and upfront.

 

[unimaginative2]

1. I absolutely agree.

2. There's no way that CityRail would work with current FRA regulations. The proposal talks about a dedicated pair of tracks, and that's exactly why. Now the FRA is seriously looking at waivers, which I believe was mentioned in the article, and that could allow European or Japanese standard rolling stock to be used on at least partly shared corridors that have PTC signalling. Most CityRail corridors don't have significant freight traffic anyway, so an O-Train approach where FRA-compliant freights run largely at night could be used. In other corridors, CityRail would have its own pair of tracks while other lines would use separate tracks. In any case, exemption from FRA rules in their entirety and the adoption of UIC standards on all the routes is essential.

 

[diminutive]

2. I think CityRail has to be completely separated from any FRA or at least freight-owned track. This will make it more expensive, especially around Union station, but it avoids any of the legal idiocy that freight railways are sure to impose on a system like this....This will also allow us to run better non-FRA compliant passenger service (read: HSR) in the future on the same tracks.

This last sentence was interesting enough that I had to respond. The flip side is what if we integrated CityRail/REX/RER/SBahn/whatever routes into a DRL route? So, for instance, commuter trains would branch out towards Hamilton, Milton, Oshawa and Markham before converging on a tunnel approximating where the DRL would run.

A DRL line is (probably) more likely than a HSR line, so it's more practical in that regard. RER station spacing is also closer to metro system spacing than HSR station spacing, so would be a better fit in that regard.

There seems to be consensus that a DRL-like route is necessary in the somewhat distant future. If you're already putting one tunnel downtown, the marginal cost of integrating it with suburban REX trains would be minimal, possibly bypass tracks in some stations. Outside of downtown Toronto I'm not sure the cost would be very different for upgrading existing lines vs. a blank slate. We're going to need new tracks, new signaling, new stations, new trainsets and such anyways. I seem to recall that the different HSR studies found the difference between greenfield and 'incremental' HSR projects weren't very different in cost, I suspect something similar would happen here.

P.S. Just to clarify what I was imagining: A central subway trunk running from DonMills/Eglinton down, across downtown and up somewhere around Dundas West. Spacing in this section would be pretty typical urban spacing, though given the route there would be some pretty 'express' sections from Eglinton to Pape. From either end of that the routes could branch out into the suburbs with station spacing of 4-5km or appropriate.