[Chuck]

This Project is NOT apart of TRANSIT CITY... I think the reason most Torontonians would be against this project is because there really arent many torontonians who live right in the area between Finch and Steeles on Yonge. However building this expansion is the equivelant to opening pandoras box since there are MANY 905 residents who will use the line. Sure some could argue that Torontonians would be able to use the system to get to richmond hill but the reality is that much more 905 users will be using the extension then torontonians... Some might say well weve already gone into vaughan so whats the difference? Vaughan doesnt have nearly as many potential transit users as does the 905 situated right beside Yonge.. Also many people believe the vaughan expansion was a mistake. Why duplicate it? Personally Id like the expansion if I a Torontonian doesnt have to pay a dime..

So you're saying that the best new transit projects are the ones which attract the lowest number of new riders to the system? While we're at it, let's run the Eglinton line on Lawrence instead. You might also have preferred that a dedicated streetcar line be built Dupont instead of St. Clair.

I do get what you're saying, but in this political climate, it would appear as though building the Yonge subway first is the ONLY way that anyone will consider starting construction on the DRL. Sad, but true.

 

[drum118]

So you're saying that the best new transit projects are the ones which attract the lowest number of new riders to the system? While we're at it, let's run the Eglinton line on Lawrence instead. You might also have preferred that a dedicated streetcar line be built Dupont instead of St. Clair.

I do get what you're saying, but in this political climate, it would appear as though building the Yonge subway first is the ONLY way that anyone will consider starting construction on the DRL. Sad, but true.

The argument against extending the Yonge line north of Steeles is the low ridership and the line has no capacity to handle anymore riders in the first place regardless going to RH.

Until you can get headway down to 90 seconds between trains, having more exits at existing stations to removed riders faster, wider stairs and adding the 7th car, riders inside 416 will never get a seat going south nor would there be capacity to handle all the new development that is taking place on the line after 50 years of being built.

You need the DRL to removed the people coming from the east sooner and that would see about 18-22,000 pphpd off the Yonge line. The ones still heading toward Yonge are not going to the city core and will get off before Bloor.

The GO RH line needs to be a faster line, service every 10-15 minutes all day and a fare integration for both areas.

Doing the math for RH, you would only see a subway train every 20-30 minutes depending on the time of the day and the day of the week. The Sheppard existing line should see the same type of service since it empty outside of peak most of the time. Giving the fact that the DRL has been on the books for 103 years, you would think its time to built first, not an extension thats only been on the books 20 years max.


The political climate of York is to recover the $2B invested in land and help developers make some money.

 

[Disparishun]

The argument against extending the Yonge line north of Steeles is the low ridership and the line has no capacity to handle anymore riders in the first place regardless going to RH.

Neither of those arguments, which contradict one another, are good arguments against extending the Yonge line north of Steeles.

The fact is that the Yonge line is bumping up against capacity, while the Yonge corridor will continue to densify steadily and quickly -- north of Steeles, south of Eglinton, and everywhere in between.

Relief is needed immediately for the Yonge line, in the form of rapid transit solutions on other north-south corridors. Whether or not the Yonge line is extended north to its natural endpoint, the 407, really won't change that -- it's a problem that has to be fixed regardless.

If the Yonge extension creates some pressure to do what has to be done then that's yet another reason why I'm all for it. Just as I'm all for the World on Yonge project despite knowing the effect it will have on already-existing bumper-to-bumper traffic, including the bus flotilla, at Yonge and Steeles.

The traffic on that stretch of Yonge is saturated and has to be solved. The traffic on the Yonge subway line is saturated and has to be solved. Stopping existing projects that make sense, in order to wait for that to happen, is a recipe for planning gridlock: the only outcome will be that nothing happens.

The GO RH line needs to be a faster line, service every 10-15 minutes all day and a fare integration for both areas.

This is one of the things that in my view badly needs to happen. Done right, it will take traffic off of the Yonge line all the way along the RH line's eastern north-south corridor, from Steeles down to Eglinton. I believe it will do that if it is upgraded to have interconnections at the major interconnect points along the way -- Steeles buses, Finch buses, Sheppard LRT, Eglinton LRT.

Fare-integration-wise, I guess we are already on the way. A system which charges by distance will incent people to live as close to their destinations as they are able and to take the fastest mode of transit for their journey.

Beyond fare integration, I understand that this will be a very difficult project institutionally, given the importance of those railway tracks for non-commuter purposes. But it is surely a lower-hanging fruit than the DRL in terms of cost and complexity, and should be pursued at the same time.

 

[EnviroTO]

I have mixed feelings about the extension. Nothing it more aggravating that arriving at Eglinton station in the morning to find the platform packed and needing to wait four trains before getting in barely. However knowing how things go here they will not build another subway downtown until it is completely impossible not to. Their primary reason for building subways is to bring in new customers or make operating the system cheaper and not to improve the convenience of the existing users. So until life is complete hell for me and everyone else that gets on south of Sheppard they likely will not build a DRL. So is it practical to extend the line now? No. But it is probably the only way the DRL will get built.

 

[M II A II R II K]

There needs to be a DRL to accommodate the future Eglinton riders since Eglinton Station would become a bottleneck, and Bloor Station even more so.

 

[nfitz]

There needs to be a DRL to accommodate the future Eglinton riders since Eglinton Station would become a bottleneck, and Bloor Station even more so.

The Eglinton line is the DRL - the Danforth Relief Line.

 

[drum118]

The Eglinton line is the DRL - the Danforth Relief Line.

Really!! More like the Coke line

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

The argument against extending the Yonge line north of Steeles is the low ridership and the line has no capacity to handle anymore riders in the first place regardless going to RH.

Disparishun already covered a lot of this but it's amusing how many times these two totally contradictory anti-Yonge arguments will get made:
1) It will overwhelm the Yonge line
2) It will have low ridership

The absurdity is obvious so I won't belabour the point. A couple of points Disparishun didn't make (though they're likely made earlier in the thread by me or others):
1) The Yonge extension would serve two key groups. One is the 10s of 1000s moving to the densified corridor in the next 20 years. The second is the people who ALREADY use it, but who have to drive to Finch Station, or take the bus. While you are looking only at the underground view there is a HUGE impact to taking those thousands of cars and hundreds of buses each day off of Yonge Street. It's absolutely vital, especially given the intensification coming.
2) The DRL is a priority on this board and nowhere else. The fact that someone conceived it 103 years ago doesn't change the fact that it's nowhere on Toronto's radar, nor on Metrolinx's 15-year plan. By contrast, the Yonge subway has already completed its EA. I agree there should be a DRL but don't punish York Region for prioritizing transit and doing it's homework. Isn't that what we WANT the suburbs to do?

You're not going to end urban sprawl by asking them to add 100s of 1000s of new residents while denying them transit, that's something you can take to the bank.

 

[gweed123]

I agree with this statement.

Yes, the TTC is supposed to receive a report on the merits of constructing some sort of DRL. But the phrasing of the mandate seemed to suggest ruling out all alternatives before agreeing to it.

Yes, Toronto's previous City Council made building the Yonge Subway extension contingent upon building the DRL. But that was the previous council and, regardless, all of us are aware that there have been many much more "guaranteed" transit projects, Transit City not being the least, that have disappeared as soon as the political winds changed.

As hard as it might seem to accomplish, I think that getting a DRL built, any version of it, will have to be a grassroots initiative involving the constituencies along its path.

Now back to the Yonge Subway extension!

The political winds may have changed, but I don't really think that the support for the DRL has gone anywhere (whether it be up or down). Think about it, those who are on the left in council probably voted for it last time, and will vote for it again. Those who are on the right may vote for it by the sheer fact that it's a subway. The wild card is whether or not Ford will support it. On the one hand, he wants subways, but on the other, he wants Sheppard. Ford hasn't given any statements (that I've heard) explicitly supporting or being against the DRL. Time will tell.

 

[gweed123]

Conversely, I'd say that it is pretty telling that the DRL made next to no headway (if any at all) during our recent municipal election. Toronto turned Conservative federally without any specific championing of contributing funds to it. The provincial election -- Well, too soon to tell, but McGuinty isn't likely to respond to Hudak's charges that he overspends and that he is the "tax man," by announcing another transit project for Toronto that is equivalent, if not more expensive, than the Eglinton - Scarborough Crosstown.

I don't think that it would be an election promise, given that based on the current speed of the DTRTES, it won't even be finished by election time. But that's just the pessimist in me.

I don't need to think about it. I know that the DRL isn't truly on any politician's radar.

Oh I realize it isn't, I'm just saying that it's not like the new council has made it less of a priority than the old council. They're paying it equal lip service. The real test will come when the implementation recommendations from the DTRTES come down the pipe. It's easy for any council to pass a motion to commission a study, but it takes a champion on council to bring it from a report to actually getting the ball rolling on it.

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

The good news is that the new council is committed to building subways (or the mayor is, anyway).
The bad news is they have very close to no plan for how to pay for them. Personally, I'd put the DRL very high on a priority list if the province came up with $10B+ like they did a few years ago. But we're past that now. Besides, Metrolinx's first priority is finding money for the few of their top 15 projects that weren't funded, including Yonge.

Then, there's going to be road pricing or similar proposals coming down the line and the Brothers Ford are so far totally averse to that. Since their commitment is sort of an all-or-nothing approach (in terms of being underground and waiting for magic private sector $), I don't know if other "lesser" forms of rapid transit are going anywhere anytime soon either.

So, it seems to me the only way you start getting new subways (starting with Yonge, then DRL) are absolutely fundamental changes be they federal transit funding or transit-specific taxing.

Putting aside politics and easy shots at Rob Ford I don't see how a Ford-Hudak-Harper triumvirate bodes well for any kind of fundamental change in transit funding/development in Toronto/GTA. I think the Yonge extension will happen sooner or later but I don't see the DRL happening within even a decade. Fingers crossed....

 

[gweed123]

The good news is that the new council is committed to building subways (or the mayor is, anyway).
The bad news is they have very close to no plan for how to pay for them. Personally, I'd put the DRL very high on a priority list if the province came up with $10B+ like they did a few years ago. But we're past that now. Besides, Metrolinx's first priority is finding money for the few of their top 15 projects that weren't funded, including Yonge.

Then, there's going to be road pricing or similar proposals coming down the line and the Brothers Ford are so far totally averse to that. Since their commitment is sort of an all-or-nothing approach (in terms of being underground and waiting for magic private sector $), I don't know if other "lesser" forms of rapid transit are going anywhere anytime soon either.

So, it seems to me the only way you start getting new subways (starting with Yonge, then DRL) are absolutely fundamental changes be they federal transit funding or transit-specific taxing.

Putting aside politics and easy shots at Rob Ford I don't see how a Ford-Hudak-Harper triumvirate bodes well for any kind of fundamental change in transit funding/development in Toronto/GTA. I think the Yonge extension will happen sooner or later but I don't see the DRL happening within even a decade. Fingers crossed....

Personally I think the DRL is the best candidate for a PPP arrangement. Guaranteed ridership that more than justifies a subway (nearly double the minimum threshold for a subway), and a tonne of extremely valuable land on/around station sites that would be open for redevelopment. Couple that with some type of a TIF on new buildings within X metres from a station, and you have a pretty decent funding formula. The City gets private sector money in exchange for air rights on top of stations. The City also gets money from TIFs on properties around the stations, which at the very least would cover the necessary profit margin for the private investor.

I'm pretty sure that developers would be lining up to develop condos overtop of a new subway station in Riverdale or the King-River area.

 

[M II A II R II K]

If a Yonge extension has enough ridership for local travel on the extension itself then fine. If not then the already existing commuter rail corridors should be used for long distance travel from Richmond Hill to downtown which would be express too.

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

If you're saying you want to see riders going from 7 to Royal Orchard, I don't know how significant that traffic will be but I'm sure there will be lots of local traffic overall.

This shows a bit of a fallacy that pops up on this thread, namely the assumption that all the riders will board at Highway 7, clog the system, and finally get off at Bloor or Union.

What about serving people who want to go from Clark to Eglinton? Or Steeles to York Mills?
What about providing a better option for people who work at Bloor but now have to backtrack north from Union if they take GO?
etc. etc.

GO will remain the best way to get down to Union and the financial district but it only helps the overall transit network to have both a cheaper "local" service and a pricier "express" service. Choice is good for consumers and this sort of system would provide a much better overall system, I suspect.

[Personally, I live just north of Steeles and often forego transit simply because of the double fare issue and/or the hassle of getting to/parking at Finch Station. A subway north of Steeles would make me far more likely to, say, go to midtown on a weekend night or downtown to a ballgame etc. Those few km of non-subway make a huge difference.]

 

[BMO]

If a Yonge extension has enough ridership for local travel on the extension itself then fine. If not then the already existing commuter rail corridors should be used for long distance travel from Richmond Hill to downtown which would be express too.

Lots of the younger use will be within York Region. My experience from high school and elementary school was that we never took the Viva into Toronto, because usually we were either hanging out around yonge/ 7 or around clark and yonge, or hillcrest mall at 16th ave. Due to the School board difference between toronto and York Region you'll find that a large proportion of off-peak trips for fun and play will be within York Region, especially in the younger demographic, since the majority usually just have friend in York Region, or just in Toronto, not in both.