The Great Canadian Transit Thread

[speedog]

Originally Posted by milomilo

Actually you're also wrong if you insist on being pedantic - 2 Ave station is located in Eau Claire. Of course any normal person is completely fine with including the Beltline, Eau Claire and the other adjacent communities when referring to downtown though.

See, your world and my world are different as I consider downtown to be anything north of the CPR, west of the Elbow River, south of the Bow River and east of 14th Street SW and there's many a normal person who would be completely fine with this as well.

[WhipperSnapper]

It's not really relevant to the discussion regardless of how people define downtown. Should of keep reading too. My second post would have likely appease your desire to comment on the matter and we could have avoided this.

[speedog]

What exactly is 'this'? Two of us have a slightly different viewpoint and now your feathers are ruffled. Regardless, Calgary seems to be doing something right with their transit system if one were to go by ridership per capita levels.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

I don't get having a lot of stations in city centres. They're usually the most walkable parts of the city. Maintaining 800 metre spacing is fine—you can easily walk to most places from there. Otherwise, if you're going to the last one, it's frustrating stopping every 400 metres.

Yeah. Over here in Prague, the metro stops are actually quite far apart from each other, relatively speaking. There are some exceptions, but generally the stations in the city centre are around 800m or so apart from each other.. and in the suburban areas, most are around 1.5km or so apart. The city centre and the surrounding urban neighbourhoods are served by an extensive network of local trams (which are very functional compared to Toronto's) which instead take the bulk of shorter distance travel where walk distances are a more sensitive issue. Overall the system works quite well, from my experience.

[ainvan]

Toronto gets a massive transit investment from the federal government

In a statement released today, Mayor John Tory said Toronto is expected to receive, "$4.8 billion of Ontario’s $8.34-billion allocation from the Government of Canada for our transit network expansion plan, which includes the Relief Line, Smart Track, the Eglinton East LRT and Waterfront transit."

According to a news release from TTC Chair Josh Colle, Infrastucture Minister Amarjeet Sohi outlined in a letter a cost-sharing plan that said Toronto transit projects should receive one third of their funding from the province.

Colle's statement says the city will advocate for a 40-40-20 funding model that's split between all three levels of government.

Regardless, a nearly $5 billion investment seems like a huge boon for public transportation in the city.

BlogTO

[The Chemist]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

I don't get having a lot of stations in city centres. They're usually the most walkable parts of the city. Maintaining 800 metre spacing is fine—you can easily walk to most places from there. Otherwise, if you're going to the last one, it's frustrating stopping every 400 metres.

You wouldn't like the Paris Metro then - it has by far the shortest stop distances I've ever seen on downtown stations. Because of the wide tunnels they use on some lines (I was mostly on Line 4) you can sometimes even see one station from the next station, they're that close together!

[WhipperSnapper]

Paris is also my favourite metro system. It just scream urban.

[Nouvellecosse]

A city can have more flexibility when there's both local urban metro and suburban express rail. The longest line in the Paris Metro (Line 13) is just over 24km long and it stretches from the top of inner Paris to the bottom, while the Green line would stretch that far from downtown with a total planned line length at 46km. Anyone coming into central Paris from 24km away is going to be using the RER or other suburban service.

[Doady]

Stations in city centres too far apart, the stations and sidewalks might become overcrowded.

Bloor-Yonge station already way overcapacity. Imagine what would happen if Bay, Wellesley, and Shelbourne stations were all eliminated for 800m stop spacing.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Doady

Stations in city centres too far apart, the stations and sidewalks might become overcrowded.

Bloor-Yonge station already way overcapacity. Imagine what would happen if Bay, Wellesley, and Shelbourne stations were all eliminated for 800m stop spacing.

We will see how Ottawa does with widely spaced downtown stations.

[The Chemist]

Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper

Paris is also my favourite metro system. It just scream urban.

It's pretty convenient and covers the city well, but I had two problems with it:
1. Too many stairs (up and down) on transfers and exits, which was a real pain when travelling with luggage. But this is probably a function of its age.

2. Poor exit signage. In Shanghai maps of the surrounding area are available inside the fare-paid area so it's obvious which exit you need to go out BEFORE you leave the fare gate. In Paris, I was only able to find such maps once I left the fare paid area, so by the time it was apparent I had gone to the wrong exit, it was too late to do anything about it.

[SkahHigh]

Originally Posted by ainvan

Toronto gets a massive transit investment from the federal government

Just curious about that map, how realistic is it to see these projects getting built in the next 20 years? I know the Finch West LRT will break ground soon, that GO RER is in full planning as well as the Relief Life but the rest? Is it just lines on a map?

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by The Chemist

It's pretty convenient and covers the city well, but I had two problems with it:
1. Too many stairs (up and down) on transfers and exits, which was a real pain when travelling with luggage. But this is probably a function of its age.

2. Poor exit signage. In Shanghai maps of the surrounding area are available inside the fare-paid area so it's obvious which exit you need to go out BEFORE you leave the fare gate. In Paris, I was only able to find such maps once I left the fare paid area, so by the time it was apparent I had gone to the wrong exit, it was too late to do anything about it.

The Paris Metro kind of reminds me of what we might today call a "light metro". The cars are small, and I think they only have 5 of them. The stations are close and not really built for high capacities.

Nouvelleecosse is correct that the Paris Metro gets away with this because (a) the RER handles the high volume, long distance stuff and is quite a comprehensive network within the City of Paris already, and, (b) the Paris Metro is a dense blanket of lines.

I wonder if the design of the Paris Metro helped shape the urbanism pattern of the City of Paris in the 20th century - that is, one where the city is very dense, but made up of many self-contained neighbourhoods and no "true centre".

[SkahHigh]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

I wonder if the design of the Paris Metro helped shape the urbanism pattern of the City of Paris in the 20th century - that is, one where the city is very dense, but made up of many self-contained neighbourhoods and no "true centre".

To answer your question, I believe it did, but the Paris Metro also helped shape that very true centre (La Défense). Same with London and Canary Wharf served by the DLR. Large european cities developed their business centers in the latter half of the 20th century with the help of rapid transit essentially.

Of course, some have not really followed that trend (Berlin and Barcelona are good examples).

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally Posted by SkahHigh

Just curious about that map, how realistic is it to see these projects getting built in the next 20 years? I know the Finch West LRT will break ground soon, that GO RER is in full planning as well as the Relief Life but the rest? Is it just lines on a map?

lines on a map but, there's a reason to be more optimistic than in a really long time

[TownGuy]

What's the PCs stance transit funding? Odds are they form the next government unless the Liberals manage to pull another rabbit out of a hat. The Liberals have been very good for transit.

[niwell]

I think (hope) we have reached a point in southern Ontario where transit can no longer be ignored by any political party. Traffic in the GTHA is bad enough that running on an anti-transit platform could easily alienate the extremely important 905 voters and those of the inner-suburbs in Toronto.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by TownGuy

What's the PCs stance transit funding? Odds are they form the next government unless the Liberals manage to pull another rabbit out of a hat. The Liberals have been very good for transit.

The tendency is that PCs will pull back on spending and big transit projects will come to a screeching halt. Projects underway will continue but projects without the shovel in the ground will not. That means at least a 10 year delay to get everything ramped up again.

[MalcolmTucker]

[del]

[lubicon]

Originally Posted by niwell

I think (hope) we have reached a point in southern Ontario where transit can no longer be ignored by any political party. Traffic in the GTHA is bad enough that running on an anti-transit platform could easily alienate the extremely important 905 voters and those of the inner-suburbs in Toronto.

I would agree with that, the question is where will the money come from to fund these projects. Taxpayers are arguably taxed to the limit as it is and government (federal, provincial, and civil) has shown a remarkable inability or willingness to cut spending in other areas.