Jaye101
Active Member
Scarborough already has all day RER lite on Stouffville and LSE with more improvements are coming. North York has only the paltry Richmond Hill line with no midday, evening or weekend service (not even busses).
People in Scarborough don't typically use GO. There's no culture of driving to GO stations in Scarborough. This is not Brampton. So once you're on the TTC you might as well remain in the system, unless you wanna more than double your fare. Also, most people who use transit in Scarborough are not travelling downtown. Though increased integration would be welcomed.There's a thing called GO Transit. You've never brought it up but it looms as the largest item of "historical context." Tens of thousands use(d) it daily at its many station stops all over Scarborough. You can't spout of about Scarborough transit history and ignore that elephant that's been in the room for 60 years.
Scarborough wanted GO and didn't care about else. Spare me any "but what about now" crap. Here's context from someone who lived "historically" (cause I guess the 20th century is now historical) : Scarborough got the exact shitty terrible transit it demanded to have. All I hear now is regret for the terrible decisions of the past, and blaming everyone else for making their own mess. Look inwards to find the problem, not to the rest of the City because we moved on while you still stomp your feet and slam doors shut like children having a temper tantrum.
EDIT: Oh, and by the way, you can make a valid argument about social equity and "three cities" and forgotten poor, etc... but many vocal people who chose to forget them were Scarborough residents, many of them still living there, driving to work each day, often by choice.
But where did all that ridership come from?
Apart from people going to/from Scarborough Town Centre, it's all people connecting in from the bus lines which sprawl out all over Scarborough. There has been near zero development along the intermediate stations, or at McCowan. The only stations on the RT that actually matter are Kennedy and STC. It is a glorified shuttle to there, hardly a transit oriented development success story.
Scarborough Town Centre doesn't get buses from all over Scarborough, nice try. But even so, the shortest route is often routed elsewhere. Example, I used to live at Morningside and Finch, took the subway to UofT St George. everyday. The fastest route to school was a 40 min ride to Kennedy Station at Eglinton. The traffic around STC makes most trips even for areas adjacent longer if routed through STC. Often, perpendicular routes like Steeles East to Finch Station from as far east as Markham Road are shorter than the 4km bus ride to STC for trips headed downtown. I recognize such trips would be better handled by GO transit and increased fare integration for downtown bound trips. Too bad that's not typically where they are headed, nor does it negate the need for a more central, useful terminus for Line 2.
The ridership has also been at capacity during rush for decades (RT). And no, STC isn't an example of how to build a transit oriented community but there's no room for them on the train anyways.
Sheppard East turns something virtually useless into a line that connects to 3 Subway lines and 2 GO lines. The effects of which will change travel patterns of people well into York Region.
As a Liberal who lives in the Junction, I'm happy Doug Ford won if not for this one reason. Scarborough.