Quote:
Originally Posted by Bdog
I live in Toronto right now, and you're right about rush hour being longer than it is in other cities. Perhaps though I wasn't clear in my argument. What I was trying to say was that in the central Toronto (aka pre-1998 amalgamation), there aren't really any freeways to get you around within the central city. The 401, DVP, Gardener, and 427 form a rough "perimeter" around the city... If you live in the middle of this "perimeter" (which I do now), it doesn't make sense for you to drive all the way to one of the freeways if you are going somewhere else inside that rough perimeter (just as most often in Winnipeg, someone in the west end isn't going to drive to the perimeter to get East Kildonan, as there is too much backtracking). The freeways are great for commuters from the exurbs (if they don't mind an hour and a half commute each way), but if you live within the city, it's much more practical to get around using other methods (streetcar, subway, walking). Using the freeway system to get in and around Toronto (proper, not sauga/markham, etc) isn't very practical:
http://maps.google.ca/maps?hl=en&ie=...,0.216465&z=13 |
That's true. Freeways in Toronto are for getting out of the city, or going through the city (401), not so much for getting from one point to another within the city. Unfortunately, many of the alternative surface routes are jammed to a standstill a lot of the time as well. This is the result of too many people and too much growth. It will backfire as business can no longer be done here and businesses and people move out into the 905 or maybe even to other parts of the country.
Toronto's experience is not really relevant to Winnipeg, in general. Surface streets are narrow and inadequate in comparison to Winnipeg. Toronto has a grid formation with almost no "angle" streets, unlike Winnipeg's more convenient radial alignment. And there are just far more people in Toronto.