I can see how that would be unclear. I mean East of Victoria Park, where it rises from the tunnel and becomes at-grade until after Warden (?) I believe. Your map has it coalescing with the B-D line from Victoria Park to Kennedy and eventually taking over the Scarborough extension.

Why not just have B-D end at Victoria Park and let the Scarborough portion of the DRL take over its tracks? We'd lose the ability for B-D travelers to transfer to Eglinton Crosstown at Kennedy but it would be cheaper and probably more sellable for an admittedly extraneous line. It would probably also lessen congestion at B-Y by deterring Scarbarians from using B-D over the DRL.
 
One thing I always hear when debating about the DRL is just it's relief of the YUS and B-D lines, which is its biggest purpose for sure, but one thing that seems to never be mentioned is that it would take a lot of relief off the current E-W streetcar routes. This would be huge as the current situation makes it so every streetcar is full during rush hour.

Totally agree, this is a huge benefit of the DRL. A traffic protected, fast & reliable way to travel E-W near Queen or King would serve so many destinations & neighbourhoods. I hope it gets built as far west as Liberty Village at least.
 
I can see how that would be unclear. I mean East of Victoria Park, where it rises from the tunnel and becomes at-grade until after Warden (?) I believe. Your map has it coalescing with the B-D line from Victoria Park to Kennedy and eventually taking over the Scarborough extension.

Why not just have B-D end at Victoria Park and let the Scarborough portion of the DRL take over its tracks? We'd lose the ability for B-D travelers to transfer to Eglinton Crosstown at Kennedy but it would be cheaper and probably more sellable for an admittedly extraneous line. It would probably also lessen congestion at B-Y by deterring Scarbarians from using B-D over the DRL.

I originally had it that way, but the problem I ran into was with the math. It was very tough to turn around all Bloor-Danforth trains at Victoria Park with the 3-4 minute frequencies that B-D operates at. By having half of them short turn at Victoria Park and the other half at Kennedy, not only does it give more Scarborough riders direct access to Bloor-Danforth, it spreads out the short turn load.

Even if my configuration of 3 tracks, 2 platforms at Victoria Park and possibly Kennedy is implemented, it would have still been tough to have so many trains short turning at just one of those locations without completely screwing up the flow of the line.
 
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/tra...ing_downtown_relief_line_report_suggests.html

Instead of spending $7.4 billion to build a downtown relief line, Metrolinx should use the GO system to relieve congestion on the subway downtown, a new independent analysis says.

The relief line is part of Metrolinx’s Big Move transit plan and is broken into two phases. According to the report, an “initial phase†line from Pape-Danforth to St. Andrew stations will cost $3.2 billion. The full line will travel from Don Mills-Eglinton to Dundas West.

But the transit authority has not released any quantitative data about the likely benefits or incremental ridership, says the report’s author, Michael Schabas.

“They tell us what it will cost, but they don’t tell us what the benefits will be,†said Schabas, a partner at First Class Partnerships Limited, an international transit and rail consulting firm.

However, Metrolinx vice president of policy, planning and innovation Leslie Woo told the Star that the benefits case analysis (BCA) to which Schabas refers is merely preliminary, and it has just begun a new relief line study.

Schabas conducted his own analysis of the benefits compared to the cost, using TTC figures, for a report commissioned by Toronto-based nonpartisan research group the Neptis Foundation.

He found that the Pape-St. Andrew line would attract about 53,600 new riders, or an increase of 4 per cent. Overall, the line will not provide enough benefits to offset even half of its $7.4 billion cost, he says.

Instead, he suggests building a new pedestrian walkway between TTC’s Main Street station and GO’s Danforth station — which are just 250 metres apart — and offer integrated fares and shuttle trains to Union Station.

The scheme would cost $100 million, a fraction of the cost of a new line, and would take thousands of passengers out of the Bloor-Yonge station at rush hour, the report states.

Similar opportunities to transfer passengers to GO routes exist at Dundas West, Kipling and Kennedy stations, but Schabas says they may not relieve congestion as much.

After dropping passengers at Union Station in the morning, GO trains (other than the Lakeshore line) typically retire to the yard until the afternoon rush. Instead, these trains could go to Danforth to pick up passengers from the subway and make a final trip downtown, the report suggests.


Schabas estimates as many as 10 to 15 trains could do that trip to Union every morning. A train would stop at Danforth every five to 10 minutes, with a journey time of 10 minutes to Union, he says
 
Perhaps if the DRL's sole and only function was to reduce congestion on the YUS line.

I feel that should only be the DRL's primary role. It should also reduce congestion of the E-W streetcar lines in downtown, service local neighborhoods like Liberty Village, and provide an opportunity for city-building and spurring development both east and west of the conventional borders of downtown. For this multi-pronged role, I'd much prefer current plans.
 
One problem I have with any heavy rail (subway) terminal station is that the trains start to lose their "rapid" speeds and go slow entering them. Sometimes very slow, crawling in fact. I have been on trains entering Downsview, Finch, Kennedy, and Kipling stations, and they can be frustrating when compared to the speeds the train comes in at other stations.

A terminal station should be PAST any transfer or interchange station. Even one station past the terminal station will allow the trains to enter the transfer station at a fair speed. We could still have cross-tracks at the transfer station for emergencies.
 
One problem I have with any heavy rail (subway) terminal station is that the trains start to lose their "rapid" speeds and go slow entering them. Sometimes very slow, crawling in fact. I have been on trains entering Downsview, Finch, Kennedy, and Kipling stations, and they can be frustrating when compared to the speeds the train comes in at other stations.

A terminal station should be PAST any transfer or interchange station. Even one station past the terminal station will allow the trains to enter the transfer station at a fair speed. We could still have cross-tracks at the transfer station for emergencies.

But current planning practices tend to make any terminal station a major transfer station. If you extend from Finch one stop to Steeles, than that becomes the major transfer point. Extend from Downsview one stop, that becomes the major transfer point. Same at Kipling, and Kennedy.
 
In order to ameliorate the situation, why not install sufficient tailing tracks to ensure trains can enter full-speed?
 
One problem I have with any heavy rail (subway) terminal station is that the trains start to lose their "rapid" speeds and go slow entering them. Sometimes very slow, crawling in fact. I have been on trains entering Downsview, Finch, Kennedy, and Kipling stations, and they can be frustrating when compared to the speeds the train comes in at other stations.

A terminal station should be PAST any transfer or interchange station. Even one station past the terminal station will allow the trains to enter the transfer station at a fair speed. We could still have cross-tracks at the transfer station for emergencies.

That's a very good point. In my plan, I do in fact do this with the Exhibition Subway, which is really just a stub for turnarounds and to serve the Waterfront West area. I suppose Bloor-Danforth could extend one stop east of Victoria Park along Danforth Road to achieve the same effect.
 
In order to ameliorate the situation, why not install sufficient tailing tracks to ensure trains can enter full-speed?

The tail tracks at all stations - save for Don Mills - are long enough for a full-length train or more, which would in theory allow an incoming train to pull in at full speed.

I suspect that the issue stems more from the geometry of the crossovers, which is not something that can be easily fixed, or the inevitable line-up of trains, especially at the tail end of the rush hours.

Dan
Toronto, Ont.
 
The tail tracks at all stations - save for Don Mills - are long enough for a full-length train or more, which would in theory allow an incoming train to pull in at full speed.

I suspect that the issue stems more from the geometry of the crossovers, which is not something that can be easily fixed, or the inevitable line-up of trains, especially at the tail end of the rush hours.

Dan
Toronto, Ont.

Do it like Montreal but their trains slows down too at the terminal station. Snowdon is the only exception where the train arrives at full speed

[video=youtube;8kQBJhBtFGI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=8kQBJhBtFGI[/video]
 
In Montréal, the trains enter the terminal station at regular speed, and the passengers egress. They then go into a tail-track where the crews change while the trains wait. Then they go back into the terminal station (other side) to pick up passengers.

In Toronto, the trains enter the terminal stations, passengers egress, and the crews change as the trains wait IN THE STATION.

Hopefully, ATC will speed the changeover better. We'll see what happens.
 
In Toronto, the trains enter the terminal stations, passengers egress, and the crews change as the trains wait IN THE STATION.

Is the time impact of doing the changeovers past the station significant enough to require more trains to run at the same frequency?
 

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