[West Toronto Junction]

I enjoy the game of connect-the-dots as much as anyone and believe we need to have lots of suggested ways to connect-the-dots to be sure we’ve looked at the full range of possibilities, that we haven’t left any stone unturned before we spend thousands of millions of dollars.

The discussions in this forum are useful to stimulate ideas. However little can be decided here since none of us (?) has the tools needed to evaluate the suggestions, such as: network travel demand models, engineering rough cost estimates, and a cost-benefit framework to pull it all together.

Given that we can’t actually plan based on our discussions, what we can try to do is to get an imaginative and complete range of options together so that the planning process has lots of good inputs with which to work.

And so I revive my suggestion of an express subway on Yonge Street, basically duplicating the original Union-Eglinton line. This was discussed a few years ago (2009) under its own thread: http://urbantoronto.ca/forum/showthread.php/8582-Yonge-Express-Subway-(Y-E-S)?referrerid=3903

Much of the comment then was negative with a few practical souls agreeing that it should not be dismissed out of hand but considered as an option for evaluation. I don’t claim to have The Answer because (as pointed out above) I don’t have the tools needed to get there. I do claim to have a suggestion that should be considered on its fully evaluated technical merits by Toronto, TTC, Ontario, and Metrolinx, along with all the other basic scenarios discussed here.

I look forward to an updated Yonge Express Subway (Y-E-S) discussion here in the DRL thread.

WTJ

 

[TheTigerMaster]

Y-E-S will have to be built eventually, but we are nowhere near that time. There is still so much that can be done to relieve ridership on the Yonge subway including better use of our GO Rail corridors, the Relief Line, the Don Mills Subway, the TR subway cars, automatic train control, Bloor-Yonge redesign, a Scarborough Express subway line straight into the core, Jane LRT etc... Building the incredibly expensive YES line would be a foolish idea and it should only be built when all other options are exhausted. But I will give you credit where it's due. What you propose would effectively double capacity of the Yonge Subway south of Eglinton, and provide faster trips downtown. I can see it being built in 50 - 70 years. But for now, we should stick to discussing the urgently needed DRL instead of this pipe dream.

 

[Dan416]

Doubling up on Yonge right now is a complete fantasy. I would never support it. So many more places that we could actually expand rapid transit to. The city itself is what has caused this problem, by not zoning around other subway lines properly. The rest of the city shouldn't have to wait even longer for rapid transit when Yonge already has it.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

A properly configured DRL through downtown would negate the need for doubling up on Yonge for the immediate future anyways.

dimunitive:

This is probably pretty far from what you had in mind, but what if this kind of 'U' was a miniature streetcar subway network centred around a Queen-ish (or wtv worked...) tunnel?

In the West, services from the Queensway and Roncesvalles via Queen West could enter a subway around Queen & Dufferin (w/interchange to DRL), while Bathurst services would enter at Bathurst and Spadina and Queen's Quay West services would enter at Spadina and continue through the downtown.

To the east that would splinter off into Sherbourne, Parliament, Cherry, Broadview and Queen East services at appropriate portals.

This would provide a rapid route for the King and Queen cars through downtown and give good local service to most of downtown.

The DRL could then focus more on relieving the outer stretches of Yonge.

Except that the predominant capital cost will be putting the line underground - and if we are going through that much trouble to do that in an area of the city that will likely experience continual pressure for intensification, we might as well hook the DRL to it and have the surface streetcars splinter off (or transfer at) the stations along the line instead.

AoD

 

[diminutive]

The GO lines are getting electrified and upgraded anyway. Building a new subway line next to another mass transit line doesn't improve anything. The two systems should complement each other, not duplicate each other. Think the U-bahn and S-bahn. The U-bahn lines don't tend to be in the same corridors as the S-bahn lines, not for long distances anyway. To do that would be pointless.

I think this is a bit optimistic. From what I understand the only routes GO is seriously considering electrifying are Kitchener and the Lakeshore lines. Even then, nothing is really funded or planned, so talking like this is something that's just around the corner is a bit misleading.

Second, even if electrification were to go through, GO doesn't seem to have any plans to intensify station spacing along any of its routes. This is a big issue since, even if we got one station on an electrified Lakeshore Line around Cherry street, who would use it? The next station out would be Danforth, so not exactly connecting two thriving transit destination. If you wanted to S-bahn-ize the GO network you'd probably have to build two or three dozen more stations across the 416 just to give people places to go.

As it currently is, it would be pretty much impossible for GO to deal with that kind of project. At least in the electrification study, all electrification implied was replacing Diesel-electric locomotives with electric locomotives. While this would probably yield some performance benefits, it's a very long shot from the EMU S-bahn systems. And as long as GO is stuck to running 12-car trains which can carry 2k people and cost tens of millions of dollars, there's no way service frequency will be more than 30m off peak. There's just not the ridership to justify it.

In the DRL study the TTC did, they considered a kind of Lakeshore shuttle service which would provide S-bahn-ish service along the Lakeshore corridor (frequent stations, frequent trains...). I forget the exact details but it wasn't a very simple undertaking and would have cost billions of dollars. I think it's highly unlikely Toronto will see Queen's Park or Ottawa basically gift us tens of billions of dollars to build two simultaneous E-W rapid transit corridors that run within a km of each other. My thinking is that, since the DRL will require a high capacity rapid transit corridor anyways, you might as well run commuter trains through it between Eglinton/Don Mills and Dundas West.

 

[diminutive]

Except that the predominant capital cost will be putting the line underground - and if we are going through that much trouble to do that in an area of the city that will likely experience continual pressure for intensification, we might as well hook the DRL to it and have the surface streetcars splinter off (or transfer at) the stations along the line instead.

Ohhh yeah, it would cost a bomb. There would be at least 7km of underground, so between 2-3billion dollars.

I mean, this is really the trickier issue with the DRL's downtown routing, isn't it? How does the DRL supplant/relieve surface transit in the area and serve transit deprived (yet intensifying) shoulder areas? Relieving Yonge is just a matter of bleeding as many feeder routes as possible, but this seems way more complex.

Steve Munro's (i believed) argued that the DRL and Queen/King cars serve essentially different markets and shouldn't bleed passengers from each other. That doesn't really seem credible though, does it? There seem to be issues inherent to running such busy services at surface along the busiest stretches of the busiest streets in the City.

Would it be practical to feed King/Queen passengers onto a subway to transit the downtown core?

 

[rbt]

Steve Munro's (i believed) argued that the DRL and Queen/King cars serve essentially different markets and shouldn't bleed passengers from each other. That doesn't really seem credible though, does it? There seem to be issues inherent to running such busy services at surface along the busiest stretches of the busiest streets in the City.

Would it be practical to feed King/Queen passengers onto a subway to transit the downtown core?

Probably not. You would add $1B or more to the cost of the eastern segment only) and simultaneously reduce the Relief effectiveness (local vs express service). It takes a lot more stations for local service than for an express.

Some people will transfer, making Queen/King more cost effective (higher turnover) but DRL is not a replacement service for either of those lines.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

dimunitive:

I mean, this is really the trickier issue with the DRL's downtown routing, isn't it? How does the DRL supplant/relieve surface transit in the area and serve transit deprived (yet intensifying) shoulder areas? Relieving Yonge is just a matter of bleeding as many feeder routes as possible, but this seems way more complex

That's why focusing on the relief aspect of the line sort of does a disservice - we are planning for a piece of extremely expensive piece of infrastructure to a rapidly growing core, we really need to look at how we can leverage this line to not only serve the overall system need but the local needs as well.

Steve Munro's (i believed) argued that the DRL and Queen/King cars serve essentially different markets and shouldn't bleed passengers from each other. That doesn't really seem credible though, does it? There seem to be issues inherent to running such busy services at surface along the busiest stretches of the busiest streets in the City

I don't think he is wrong, but like you've mentioned the portion in the core proper is getting quite unreliable, and it has significant negative impact on the rest of the lines.

Would it be practical to feed King/Queen passengers onto a subway to transit the downtown core?

If the lines intersect the DRL close to the core, with the current through routing remains then I suspect not - it is probably not competitive time and convenience-wise.

AoD

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

rbt:

Probably not. You would add $1.5B or more to the cost and simultaneously reduce the Relief effectiveness (local vs express service). It takes a lot more stations for local service than for an express.

Some people will transfer, making Queen/King more cost effective (higher turnover) but DRL is not a replacement service for either of those lines.

I am not convinced that having a local service component in the core will reduce the effectiveness of the DRL significantly - in fact I think that a properly aligned DRL with stops at compelling locations will help bolster the ridership of the line, its' effectiveness as part of the broader transportation network and help support emergent development patterns. People don't stop riding on Yonge because there are frequent stops south of Eglinton, and if the DRL intercepts the feeder lines in the inner burbs properly, there are no reason why frequent stops in the core will weaken its' appeal. It is important to re-conceptualize the DRL as part of an emergent high capacity network within the core providing additional suburban access instead of it being just yet another suburb to downtown line.

AoD

 

[rbt]

I am not convinced that having a local service component in the core will reduce the effectiveness of the DRL significantly - in fact I think that a properly aligned DRL with stops at compelling locations will help bolster the ridership of the line

It depends on where local service starts.

The question was could we replace King or Queen street car service. For forcing a mode change to be worth while, we can't do that at Jarvis; it's going to be closer to Pape for Queen or Broadview for King. That's going to add a minimum of 6 stations or 10 minutes to the trip.


Those 10 minutes will prevent many people from transferring from the Danforth line to the DRL.

However, it would attract people who currently take the bus north to Danforth that will instead ride the Queen tram. How many people take the bus north, transfer onto Danforth, then transfer again onto the Yonge line southbound? Very low ridership on the 72, 83, 31, 22, 92 and 64 routes; so people doing the full circuit that would now use a Queen tram instead will be even less.

Which of these 2 numbers is bigger and that's your impact on Bloor/Yonge transfers. Remember, the entire point of the DRL is to remove people from the Yonge line from Bloor south.

You're probably right that ridership would be larger with Queen/King as feeder lines but, and I'm repeating this again, ridership of the new line isn't the goal. If it doesn't reduce Yonge line ridership, then we still need a Yonge Relief Line.

 

[diminutive]

Probably not. You would add $1B or more to the cost of the eastern segment only) and simultaneously reduce the Relief effectiveness (local vs express service). It takes a lot more stations for local service than for an express.

Some people will transfer, making Queen/King more cost effective (higher turnover) but DRL is not a replacement service for either of those lines.

1.5b seems excessive. I assume you're just assuming more stations = more money, which is true, but I think overestimating the impact.

What would stop spacing look like on a local vs. express line? Regardless of which corridor you picked I doubt there would be more than one or two stations difference.

Roughly, the corridor would stretch from ~Dufferin -> ~Broadview before turning north, right? For simplicity, let's just use a Wellington-Front alignment. From East to West you'd have stations around Leslieville, Cherry/Distillery District, St. Lawrence Market/Jarvis/Sherbourne, Yonge, University, Spadina, Bathurst, Strachan, King and Queen.

What stations would you eliminate to make the line more 'express'? Maybe St. Lawrence/Jarvis/Sherbourne and Strachan, but that's two stations. The rest would all intersect with major routes. Even assuming these stations cost 300m each that wouldn't account for 1.5b of difference between 'express' and 'local' options.

I'd also doubt the idea that more stations downtown impairs the 'relief' function of a DRL. The more areas the DRL provides access to, the more riders will use it. The 700-800m spacing I laid out above is a good compromise between local and express. It's wider than Yonge, so it should still provide good relief. Just due to its (prospective) alignment, the DRL will also have much wider spacing between Eglinton and downtown than Yonge anyways.

If you really wanted to look at reducing needless DRL stations, the obvious candidates would be Flemingdon Park and Cosburn. Cosburn is low volume, has no connecting routes and no intensification plans. With only a station at Thorncliffe, there would be a very 'express' segment between Eglinton and Bloor.

 

[diminutive]

It depends on where local service starts.

The question was could we replace King or Queen street car service. For forcing a mode change to be worth while, we can't do that at Jarvis; it's going to be closer to Pape for Queen or Broadview for King. That's going to add a minimum of 6 stations or 10 minutes to the trip.

Yea, rough transfer points would be Leslieville in the East and Dufferin or Roncesvalles in the West.

I'm not sure how you figure that would add 6+ stations. As far as I'm aware, the DRL was always intended to have ~4 stations between Pape and downtown (Gerrard-Queen East-Cherry-St.Lawrence). I'm not sure where you'd take away or add stations to really distinguish local vs. express from Pape to downtown.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

dimunitive:

Definitely wouldn't get rid of Flemingdon or Cosburn, given the large concentration of transit users in both areas.

AoD

 

[innsertnamehere]

Yea, rough transfer points would be Leslieville in the East and Dufferin or Roncesvalles in the West.

I'm not sure how you figure that would add 6+ stations. As far as I'm aware, the DRL was always intended to have ~4 stations between Pape and downtown (Gerrard-Queen East-Cherry-St.Lawrence). I'm not sure where you'd take away or add stations to really distinguish local vs. express from Pape to downtown.

It would add station costs, but also relieve the streetcar lines. (which are reaching maximum capacity and have no end in sight for new condos)

and Alvin, those are both north of Pape, and would be in the second phase.

 

[rbt]

1.5b seems excessive. I assume you're just assuming more stations = more money, which is true, but I think overestimating the impact.

Yeah, in an edit I reduced to $1B after some additional thought.

I went with stations every 500m between Pape and Queen to Spadina and Queen. I get 6 additional stations over a Relief Line configuration, 3 of which (Spadina, Pape, and Broadview) are going to be somewhat more complex than normal stations with large underground streetcar loops. Making the line straight is the shortest route, resulting in the lowest travel time/cost estimate.

Started local service at Pape rather than Broadview as I think you would get a lot of pushback if you introduced a forced transfer to go 3km from Broadview to Yonge.