denfromoakvillemilton
Senior Member
im in.So @DonValleyRainbow, @smably, @44 North and myself. Anyone else interested?
@gweed123, @WislaHD, @innsertnamehere, you all have expressed interest in the past. Join us?
- Thread starter JasonParis
- Start date
Geoff Olynyk
New Member
Agreed, Tory got my vote because he was the best not-Ford, not because I endorse SmartTrack. The last election was #1 for me about basic survival (i.e. removing RF from office), #2 about transit.
I lost a lot of respect for the Tory administration when he made the choice a couple weeks ago to not listen to his bureaucrats who are telling him that SmartTrack is pointless given GO RER and to double down on the political commitment.
Rainforest
Senior Member
Honestly, never heard of anyone saying or thinking that SmartTrack is an underground LRT. Tory's campaign emphasised that it will run on surface and use existing rail corridors, which will allow to build it faster than a tunneled line.
Certainly, many voters chose Tory to beat the Fords, and not because Tory is their first choice.
But let's not forget that Chow was the front-runner in the beginning of the race. Tory was full 10% behind according to the polls. He managed to pull ahead, and I believe that SmartTrack played a role in that.
Without SmartTrack, Tory would finish 2-nd or even 3-rd. Not sure who would be first; most likely, Chow. The Fords have their firm core base, but the rest of the public were fed up with them and would stick to an alternative candidate who looks strongest.
Johnny Au
Senior Member
TTM does a much better job running his alternate website. Oh, and TTM's alternate website does a much better job at respecting privacy.
No spies or trolls to worry about!
crs1026
Superstar
This is what needs to be reconciled. Tory proposed a "surface subway" to preclude the time/expense of tunnelling. He somewhat allowed that the odd underground bit (scope unspecified) might be needed. And (reversing all this) he allowed that the Eglinton leg might need to be tunnelled.
And then some study (ML - or was it City staff? I can't recall) observed that a new tunnel across downtown might be needed because the Union station corridor and station facility might be full.....and I don't recall his objecting to that.
Personally, I don't object to building a tunnel that carries a train that looks a lot like a Paris RER bilevel, or a Crossrail train, across the downtown and then bending it north as a relief line - running on the surface whereever possible. I would be happy to look the other way on his having stressed "cheap, quick, surface" if we got a good product out of the exercise. He can call this SmartTrack and take the credit for building it. But - if he is wedded to the cheap/quick/surface model, or if his political opponents could milk the disconnect to discredit him, then we have a problem.
I wonder if he understands the topic well enough to even care.
- Paul
Palma
Senior Member
But why does that matter? The spadina subway is all surface as soon as it exits Eglinton all the way to Wilson, thats 3 subway stops. But I think you are right.
44 North
Senior Member
I can't imagine that being true, although I have no proof to back it. For me it seemed people voted for Tory because he was an all-around good candidate (i.e amicable, well spoken, intelligent, fiscal conservative but left-leaning, etc). And he clearly won the debates. IMO Chow slowly lost support because she got progressively silly and loopy as the weeks wore on. Doug kept the die-hard Ford supporters, naturally...they'd support a Ford no matter what. But long and short, I honestly don't think SmartTrack had much - if anything - to do with Tory's winning. There might be a poll somewhere on The Star that asked eligible voters how they voted and why. But I'm too lazy to check.
***
I've been having recurring ideas about the original GO-ALRT program, and can't get over how important the Lake Shore corridor is. Aside from the bygone GO-ALRT days, the Prov promised that LSE and LSW would be fully RER by now (back in MoveOntario2020, among a couple dozen other severely unmet promises). But as it stands it still seems a long ways away. One thing I particularly liked about the GO-ALRT program was that it was much more RT than a premium service GO upgrade that we seem to be headed towards now. In other words, it'd be more like taking a subway train to Hamilton or Oshawa than a carpeted bilevel.
But either way, I think with the subway projects we have on the books (SSE and DRL), it'd make a lot more sense to prioritize LSE + LSW than ST. In this map I removed a Crosstown West extn and Stouffville RER (i.e SmartTrack), but added in an upgraded Lake Shore corridor. Oh right, and a DRL is interlined with the RH corridor. IMO it looks well balanced, with more high density areas served overall.
Attachments
WislaHD
Superstar
I like the idea of the Lakeshore line, but I feel like your DRL/Richmond routing is full of missed opportunities compared to the traditional path along East York/Don Mills.
crs1026
Superstar
Lakeshore line is a mature 2-way all day route with potential to be more, where the other lines are fledgling as anything beyond peak rush hour get-suburbanites-downtown services. These need more definition and less of the end state is already 'roughed in'. I'd hate to see this work slowed down as it puts the completion dates too far out. Polishing one line to perfection while the others sit in current state doesn't feel right.
Planning for Lakeshore (which I agree is languishing) is actually pretty simple and mostly a matter of money. Bring the corridor up to four tracks from Oakville to Scarboro Jct, put more stops along that section, run stopping trains on two tracks with two for express. Eliminate all the remaining grade crossings. Electrify the stopping train zone.
The Eglinton extension is needed to link the Mississauga busway with midtown Toronto. I would not defer. If it is LRT and not heavy rail, it won't sink the funding envelope.
- Paul
44 North
Senior Member
Agreed. But a couple of things that went into the rationale behind this basic sketch: One, it was imagined with the DRL having limited funds. So perhaps only the TC Phase II money the Prov rescinded a few years back (~$4bn), plus a Fed contribution (~$1bn). As well, combining LSE and this DRL-RH line seemed more complex and beyond the scope I was thinking here. I think such a project would need at least three parallel tunnels across Old TO (perhaps a bi-directional middle track for reversing express service depending on time of day?), as well as significant depth to cross the Don. But agreed that it would be much more optimal.
Agreed. The logic that went into this was very basic, and mostly revolved around my desire to see LSE+LSW shown on a map as it was promised a few decades ago. In other words I didn't put that much thought into it. And I think all GO corridors are important for the reason you mentioned, however I feel that what is shown here is the groundwork for a more complete RER network for the majority of lines. That is, we have LSE, LSW, RH, and Kitchener (as part of the Pearson Line). That leaves out Stouffville, Barrie, and Milton. Milton I think is a bit of a non-starter in the near term. And Stouffville I think could proceed in a bare-bones approach, but perhaps less as planned since a good portion of its ridership potential would be diverted to this RH line (approx 2k peak, as mentioned in YRNS). Not to mention that SSE would probably eat into its potential as well.
Re: a Crosstown West extn to 'Sauga... I think it's important, but not for the near term. The ridership projections were rather minimal during the TC days, though I'm sure the projections would be much higher if calculated now. And I guess there are still a lot of Qs: e.g is it in-median tram style, or a more grade-separated line with a higher per km cost. But long and short I wanted to see a map without ST acknowledged.
Good looking map! Although I agree with WislaHD that the line should remain tunnelled under Don Mills until north of Lawrence. I realize you're trying to do a 'budget' alignment, but I think that hitting Eglinton at Don Mills, and having a station in the heart of Don Mills (neighbourhood) is preferable. You then also avoid the political shitstorm that would be the reactivation of the rail corridor west of Don Mills. North of Lawrence using the RH corridor is bang on though. Not sure if I necessarily agree with the station names though. They're pretty obscure neighbourhood references for a lot of them. Overall though the concept is solid.
44 North
Senior Member
Thanks! And yes, this is more of a 'budget' alignment. Hitting Don Mills at Eglinton, and DM at Lawrence would be way better from just about every perspective.
Re: the shitstorm of reactivating the Leaside Spur. What I imagine here would be cut/covered in the cheapest way imaginable (e.g concrete trench with a simple roof). So in other words, the trail/linear park could remain in a rebuilt form overtop the corridor, and residents wouldn't have to deal with noise. But that would undoubtedly raise the Q: if such an effort/cost is put into cut-covering the Leaside Spur, why not just build the line up Don Mills instead - which would naturally be better.
And yes, the station names are obscure. I'm not sure why, but I kinda like them like that. But for the most part it's a result of me doing a quick look on a map to see a nearby street that sounds nice, and isn't used elsewhere in the system (i.e - why we have Adanac for a GO LSE station instead of Eglinton).
sixrings
Senior Member
Woodbridge_Heights
Senior Member
I'm having a hard time with these projections. The "Do Nothing Scenario" has 60,300 total riders, "Relief line Short" has 59,000 total riders, "Relief line Long" 61,300 total riders, "Relief line U" 58,400 total riders, and LRT 64,100 total riders. Somehow two of the four options have reduced the total number of riders in the Yonge+DRL network??? One shows a marginal increase in total riders. And the only option, somehow, that shows a significant increase in total riders is the LRT option.
What's going on here? Are the projections being skewed somehow. Shouldn't all three options attract riders off of 1-YUS, 2-BD, + surface routes such as the king and queen streetcar, and then there is latent demand in people who are not riders now but would be if crowding and congestion were reduced?
rbt
Senior Member
It is reduced transfers. A person riding Bloor then Yonge contributes 1 point to Bloors ridership then 1 point to Yonge; 2 points total if you sum the numbers. If they took the DRL from their start to destination, they contribute 1 point total.
Those are peak point peak direction ridership numbers (so on Yonge it would be Bloor to Wellesley). If you take the person out of that section in any way, or even travelling in the reverse direction, it'll shrink the peak load despite still being a trip.
You cannot add them together to get a count of distinct people.