M II A II R II K
Senior Member
That looks great! And for GO interchanges there could be a GO logo attached to the subway station names in the subway.
- Thread starter 299 bloor call control.
- Start date
Thoughtless Miscreant
Active Member
Those seem like they'd be the best station names, but if I were king of the TTC, I would just call Keele "Trethewey". That way you get the unique station name and the major street name.
Contra
Senior Member
Great video of the construction of a Subway tunnel and the breakthrough connection between Downsview and Sheppard West.
TOareaFan
Superstar
I watched a pretty cool show the other day on tv...called "Stripping the City". It goes from city to city around the world and looks at its unique infrastructure profiles. The one I watched was on Toronto and had a segment on the tunnelling for the subway extension. If you can search for it on your tv, it is worth an hour of your time (IMO).
EDIT.....it is "Strip the City" and is on Discovery.
EDIT.....it is "Strip the City" and is on Discovery.
It's available online. They also did episodes on Rome, Dubai, Sydney, San Francisco, and a couple others. I did have to kind of laugh about the whole "ice city" thing. Toronto has some of the weakest winters in Canada, and they make it all dramatic.
fiendishlibrarian
Active Member
A global perspective from the Economist.
Metro systems
Going Underground
Subways are spreading fast
Jan 5th 2013
The joy of commuting
THE world’s first underground train, on the world’s first metro system, travelled the three-and-a-half miles from Paddington to Farringdon on January 9th 1863. Then, as now, Londoners queued to get aboard the packed carriages. In October that year The Economist ran an editorial arguing that more such lines under the capital were needed to relieve its congested streets. It concluded that such a network, if well run, would surely be profitable.
We were right on the first point: London would have ground to a halt long ago without its “Tubeâ€. But we were too optimistic on the second. Although fares on the Underground are now among the most expensive of any metro system worldwide—a one-stop ride costs up to £4.50, or $7.34—the system is no money-spinner. Last year, the £2 billion of fares revenue, added to the smaller amounts from selling advertising space and suchlike, only just covered running costs, at £2.2 billion.
Another 29 years passed before Chicago became the second city to boast a metro (its first line ran on stilts rather than underground—any high-frequency, high-capacity urban system separated from other traffic counts as a metro). But metro-building accelerated from the 1960s, in reaction to the growth of sprawling mega-metropolises around the world. Now almost 190 cities have metros, with more to come amid a fresh spurt of construction in developing countries. In 2012 the Chinese cities of Suzhou, Kunming and Hangzhou opened theirs, as did Lima in Peru. Among the proud new owners of a metro in 2011 was Algiers, only the second African capital (Cairo is the other) to gain one.
Existing metro systems are also being expanded at a rapid pace. On December 30th Beijing opened 70km of new lines, bringing the total to 442km and making the Chinese capital’s system the world’s longest, overtaking Shanghai’s (see table). London would still be champion if its Overground (a revamped network of surface-rail lines, completed in December), Docklands Light Railway and tramways were included in the total. But Beijing will not be outdone: it plans to expand its network to 1,000km by 2020.
China’s investment in high-speed intercity railways is tailing off but it is still pumping money into subways. So is India: Bangalore’s metro opened two years ago and Mumbai’s should open soon, following the customary delays and squabbles between the government and contractors. Smaller cities, such as Bhopal and Jaipur, have plans on the drawing-board. Brazil is expanding the inadequate metro systems in its two main cities, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, while building new ones in smaller ones such as Salvador and Cuiabá.
Metros are being built in all sorts of unlikely places, such as the Gulf: Dubai’s system opened in 2009 and Mecca’s a year later. Now Abu Dhabi, Doha, Bahrain, Riyadh and Kuwait City have plans in progress; that they have plenty of oil to fuel their cars is not stopping them from trying to become greener. Future candidates for “city you would least expect to have a metro system†include sleepy Asunción in Paraguay and Kathmandu in Nepal.
Many of the developing world’s congested cities have spent years dreaming of a metro system but making little progress towards building it. Algeria’s 1991-2002 civil war helps excuse the long gestation period of its capital’s metro; in other cases, sluggish and corrupt bureaucracies are the main obstacle. Indonesia’s traffic-choked capital, Jakarta, abandoned its attempt to build a monorail in 2008, leaving a collection of rusting stumps; it then built a successful busway as a stopgap, and now the city’s governor is promising to start work soon on an underground metro.
A recent study by Roland Berger, a consultancy, found that government stimulus programmes in the wake of the financial crisis have been boosting investment in railways of all kinds. The world market for railway infrastructure and equipment has been growing at 3.2% a year through the global downturn, and is set to grow at around 2.7% a year until 2017. Spending on metro rail systems should grow faster still, at perhaps 6-8%.
This is promising news for firms that build metro trains and equipment, such as Bombardier of Canada (which also has trainmaking facilities in Europe), Siemens of Germany and Alstom of France. They have ambitious Chinese and South Korean firms chasing them for market share, but for now they can look forward to order-books packed like the Tokyo subway.
Metro systems
Going Underground
Subways are spreading fast
Jan 5th 2013
The joy of commuting
THE world’s first underground train, on the world’s first metro system, travelled the three-and-a-half miles from Paddington to Farringdon on January 9th 1863. Then, as now, Londoners queued to get aboard the packed carriages. In October that year The Economist ran an editorial arguing that more such lines under the capital were needed to relieve its congested streets. It concluded that such a network, if well run, would surely be profitable.
We were right on the first point: London would have ground to a halt long ago without its “Tubeâ€. But we were too optimistic on the second. Although fares on the Underground are now among the most expensive of any metro system worldwide—a one-stop ride costs up to £4.50, or $7.34—the system is no money-spinner. Last year, the £2 billion of fares revenue, added to the smaller amounts from selling advertising space and suchlike, only just covered running costs, at £2.2 billion.
Another 29 years passed before Chicago became the second city to boast a metro (its first line ran on stilts rather than underground—any high-frequency, high-capacity urban system separated from other traffic counts as a metro). But metro-building accelerated from the 1960s, in reaction to the growth of sprawling mega-metropolises around the world. Now almost 190 cities have metros, with more to come amid a fresh spurt of construction in developing countries. In 2012 the Chinese cities of Suzhou, Kunming and Hangzhou opened theirs, as did Lima in Peru. Among the proud new owners of a metro in 2011 was Algiers, only the second African capital (Cairo is the other) to gain one.
Existing metro systems are also being expanded at a rapid pace. On December 30th Beijing opened 70km of new lines, bringing the total to 442km and making the Chinese capital’s system the world’s longest, overtaking Shanghai’s (see table). London would still be champion if its Overground (a revamped network of surface-rail lines, completed in December), Docklands Light Railway and tramways were included in the total. But Beijing will not be outdone: it plans to expand its network to 1,000km by 2020.
China’s investment in high-speed intercity railways is tailing off but it is still pumping money into subways. So is India: Bangalore’s metro opened two years ago and Mumbai’s should open soon, following the customary delays and squabbles between the government and contractors. Smaller cities, such as Bhopal and Jaipur, have plans on the drawing-board. Brazil is expanding the inadequate metro systems in its two main cities, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, while building new ones in smaller ones such as Salvador and Cuiabá.
Metros are being built in all sorts of unlikely places, such as the Gulf: Dubai’s system opened in 2009 and Mecca’s a year later. Now Abu Dhabi, Doha, Bahrain, Riyadh and Kuwait City have plans in progress; that they have plenty of oil to fuel their cars is not stopping them from trying to become greener. Future candidates for “city you would least expect to have a metro system†include sleepy Asunción in Paraguay and Kathmandu in Nepal.
Many of the developing world’s congested cities have spent years dreaming of a metro system but making little progress towards building it. Algeria’s 1991-2002 civil war helps excuse the long gestation period of its capital’s metro; in other cases, sluggish and corrupt bureaucracies are the main obstacle. Indonesia’s traffic-choked capital, Jakarta, abandoned its attempt to build a monorail in 2008, leaving a collection of rusting stumps; it then built a successful busway as a stopgap, and now the city’s governor is promising to start work soon on an underground metro.
A recent study by Roland Berger, a consultancy, found that government stimulus programmes in the wake of the financial crisis have been boosting investment in railways of all kinds. The world market for railway infrastructure and equipment has been growing at 3.2% a year through the global downturn, and is set to grow at around 2.7% a year until 2017. Spending on metro rail systems should grow faster still, at perhaps 6-8%.
This is promising news for firms that build metro trains and equipment, such as Bombardier of Canada (which also has trainmaking facilities in Europe), Siemens of Germany and Alstom of France. They have ambitious Chinese and South Korean firms chasing them for market share, but for now they can look forward to order-books packed like the Tokyo subway.
TOareaFan
Superstar
Recognizing it is an international show, I think they were suggesting that as large cities go we are in a cold climate and might be the iciest of the cities they are profiling. That said, as we watched it we really hoped that no Canadians outside of Toronto were watching as it might make them ill with laughter on the harsh winter angle.
We did notice one oddly wrong bit....during the segment on keeping our main thoroughfare (the 401) clear for traffic during our horrible winters a good portion of the filming was, actually, on the 410. Either the director was dyslexic or it was just easier to film on the 410 (or since it is a bit of windswept highway at times, the light snow they were filming in looked a lot worse!)
nfitz
Superstar
W. K. Lis
Superstar
Here's the table from the article.
Which of those metros get federal government support to build new metro lines and/or operate them?
nfitz
Superstar
Not sure it's a fair question. Some of those systems are in countries where you only have federal and regional governments. Rather than here where you have Federal, provincial, and regional governments. Under our constitution municipal transit is a provincial rather than federal responsibility.
The most similar city with a government process like ours is New York. And there the subways are run directly by a state agency, rather than city agency. And were mostly constructed and operated by private companies at a profit, before they were nationalized.
W. K. Lis
Superstar
The New York City tunnels were built by the city and leased to the privately owned outfits. By the 1940's, the privately run lines were running at a loss and were bankrupt.
nfitz
Superstar
Ah, I hadn't realised that. Not sure the logic of building lines for 3 different companies that didn't play well together ... 4 if you include the Hudson & Manhattan tubes - which were privately built as far as I understand it.
EnviroTO
Senior Member
It's actually a picture of himself. On his flickr account he captures his face and he indicates he is Brandon from Ajax. I guess he doesn't feel there is any risk of being tracked down for trespassing after the fact (which is probably true unless he broke something or took something).
W. K. Lis
Superstar
The Hudson & Manhattan tubes, now PATH, were privately built. The first trains ran in 1907.
jamincan
Active Member
Where is it available online? The only episodes on discovery.ca are Sydney and San Francisco.