News   GLOBAL  |  Apr 02, 2020
A Message to Our Readers
 9.6K     0 
News   GLOBAL  |  Apr 01, 2020
EarthCam Time-Lapse Documents Rafael Viñoly-Designed New Stanford Hospital Construction
 41K     0 
News   GLOBAL  |  Apr 01, 2020
Resort Town
 5.4K     0 

How should Toronto connect the East and West arms of the planned waterfront transit with downtown?

  • Expand the existing Union loop

    Votes: 205 71.2%

  • Build a Western terminus

    Votes: 13 4.5%

  • Route service along Queen's Quay with pedestrian/cycle/bus connection to Union

    Votes: 31 10.8%

  • Connect using existing Queen's Quay/Union Loop and via King Street

    Votes: 22 7.6%

  • Other

    Votes: 17 5.9%
  • Total voters
    288
That would be for the full, 5km project to East Harbour, and includes the tunnel rebuild and public realm elements along Queens Quay East, right?

It makes sense as theres a lot of extras involved through the public realm improvements and the tunnel rebuild is ridiculously expensive.. but still, damn. Construction inflation is a b****
 
innsertnamehere said:
That would be for the full, 5km project to East Harbour, and includes the tunnel rebuild and public realm elements along Queens Quay East, right?

It makes sense as theres a lot of extras involved through the public realm improvements and the tunnel rebuild is ridiculously expensive.. but still, damn. Construction inflation is a b****
Click to expand...
Delaying it further however will not make the project any cheaper or less essential.
 
DSC said:
Indeed, and we all remember the WT mantra of "Transit First' when the development of Queens Quay East was starting over 15 years ago!
Click to expand...
It's not like in the interim they've built a few office towers and hundreds (thousands?) of units of now car-dependent housing right on the proposed route....
 
polesingularity said:
2.57... billion? BILLION? For 3.8 km of an LRT?! Are they making the tracks out of solid gold?
Click to expand...
They've broken it down in the report, particular for Scenario 3, which is to split the project into three isolated parts:
  • $932 million just to re-do the Union Loop, which, fine, if it's costing $1.5 billion just to expand Bloor-Yonge, this makes even more sense considering how much stuff is around the loop station
  • $1.3 billion for the segment from the tunnel portal all the way to Villier Loops, which includes re-doing the portal, the Queen Quay Docks stations, and the Yonge Street Loop. I wonder if this also includes the QQE landscaping. EDIT: Yes, according to attachment 2, the cost includes the road and public realm improvements.
  • $337 million for the Cherry extension underneath the USRC and Gardiner
Notably, it's suggesting they do that second part FIRST so that there is interim through service while the Union Loop is under construction.
 
Last edited:
Oh this is interesting. They might try and segment based on different projects. The key one is the Parliament slip fill; basically if they get money now, they'll try and coordinate the right-of-way construction with that project...which has already started. This is attachment 2, where they have operation plans as well.
timeline.JPG
 
^Good to see this going forward. Of note is the table showing that the current spending request will double the total approved project spending, which will total $135M. The point being, if Council isn't serious about this, it's time to pull the plug. If Council is serious, well, maybe it's "fish or cut bait" time.

- Paul
 
duty free said:
is this going to proper light rail or just streetcars in a ROW headed East?
Click to expand...
It is proposed to share the same streetcar rolling stock, I believe the choice to label it LRT is to differentiate from the majority of streetcar lines which do not have a dedicated ROW.

There may be some other historical reason, I’ve only followed this project for about a year.
 
reinventingthewheel said:
It is proposed to share the same streetcar rolling stock, I believe the choice to label it LRT is to differentiate from the majority of streetcar lines which do not have end-to-end dedicated ROW.

There may be some other historical reason, I’ve only followed this project for about a year.
Click to expand...

Amare said:
It's Streetcars in a ROW, the exact same thing you see on Queens Quay West right now.
Click to expand...

that's what I figured. meh. they shouldn't label it LRT. I get that the TTC streetcars in a ROW have used that nomenclature in the past, but we now have LRT's being built and being given the distinction of being a "subway Line". it creates unnecessary confusion. they should just say this is a streetcar extension or a new 500 line.
 
They don't plan on assigning it a roundel and calling it rapid transit. Despite it having its own ROW it will have many intersections because this is not a suburban boulevard like Finch or Eglinton. I don't think the plan blocks a single street from crossing the ROW and there will be many pedestrian conflicts. You couldn't have an at grade rapid transit in this environment because it is too urban... it would need to be elevated or below ground.
 
reinventingthewheel said:
There may be some other historical reason, I’ve only followed this project for about a year.
Click to expand...
The western portion along Queens Quay was built as the Harbourfront LRT. And the 509 was originally the Spadina LRT, before the name spooked some people, with the media showing pictures of RT trains running up Spadina.
 
You must log in or register to post here.

Back
Top