The Great Canadian Transit Thread

[osmo]

Scarborough Subway extension will balloon up to a record-breaking amount, likely to be the most expensive extension ever constructed (If it gets build, it won't though as there will be a breaking point where no council/body will allow it for its cost). There is a reason a subway was never considered back when subways were "cheap" the underground waterways and wonky typography of Scarborough makes tunnelling channelling as you must go very deep.

So now Scarborough residents will get a reward of having to haul on a bus to 40 minutes to reach a massive bus terminal 450m in length where they have to walk for 6 minutes to then go into a cave to ride an underground train in darkness for another 8 minutes until they reach the old main Danforth line. Glossy renderings aside nobody wants to talk about how crappy of a commute this will evolve into for the average Scarborough resident and will not make their commute any more quickly in the process.

This subway project is the critical single project that will either sink or swim Toronto. Projects such as these have a long track record of blundering city finances and setting them on fire a generation in the process.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

IMHO, they should have used the SRT right of way, and any salvageable existing infrastructure, in order to convert it as part of the Eglington LRT or Bloor-Danforth Subway. This would have been exponentially cheaper and could have preserved as many of the existing stations as required.

Yes, the area would have lost the SRT for a few years, but it's not a critical piece of infrastructure. With the existing plan, most of the service will be lost anyway. If Ottawa can go years without the Transitway for conversion, Scarborough can do the same.

I would not recommend what Ottawa has done to any other city. Closing down rapid transit for years of reconstruction is horribly disruptive, pushes ridership down and involves enormous costs to reroute transit for the reconstruction period.

The sad thing about the Ottawa situation is that years of disruption will be followed by years of more disruption for Phase 2 and likely again for Phase 3.

[613Steve]

The Ottawa disruption has been generally regarded as a success. I only occasionally go East of downtown but am frequently on the western reroute on Scott St. While it is slower than the old Transitway, the difference is minimal. I think it will be absolutely worth it in the end.

[SkahHigh]

Originally Posted by TorontoDrew

Some early renders of the Scarborough City Centre new station on the Line 2 extension. Looks like a really nice building that will only ad pressue on the already overcrowded Line 1. What an amazing waste of money that was done just to secure votes.


Source: http://urbantoronto.ca
Link: http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2018/08/design-progress-controversial-scarborough-subway-extension

Hmm, wonder where I’ve seen this design before...


articinfo.com

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by 613Steve

The Ottawa disruption has been generally regarded as a success. I only occasionally go East of downtown but am frequently on the western reroute on Scott St. While it is slower than the old Transitway, the difference is minimal. I think it will be absolutely worth it in the end.

For saving hundreds of millions, of course it was worth it.

[White Pine]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

I would not recommend what Ottawa has done to any other city. Closing down rapid transit for years of reconstruction is horribly disruptive, pushes ridership down and involves enormous costs to reroute transit for the reconstruction period.

The sad thing about the Ottawa situation is that years of disruption will be followed by years of more disruption for Phase 2 and likely again for Phase 3.

As a non-resident, I can't speak to the effectiveness of the detours and such, but after Phase two it seems like pretty well the whole RT network will be left alone. AFAIK Phase 3 is going through Kanata (Not sure if a good idea), so it shouldn't shut down much as there isn't much rapid transit there now to shut down.

[osmo]

City Building takes some pain, even with "minor disruption" all you do is prolong the timelines and everything is still a mess. The Crosstown in Toronto was planned with minimal disruption and it is still a complete disaster of a work area. It is better to get it over with and speed up the time the best you can.

Toronto example agian.... For the signal improvements, the TTC had an option of shutting down sections of the subway for 2-3 weeks or one weekend closures for 2 years, which one did they pick? 2-3 weeks of no subway would be an epic mess but it would have been done with a long time ago.

Ottawa did the right thing, you have to crack a few eggs to get an omelette, big projects like these are messy, best to get over with as quickly as you can safely. Aside from the complexity, time is what drives up much of these project costs, one can think Ottawa saved big money by moving quickly versus the pace of mud Toronto does.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by 613Steve

The Ottawa disruption has been generally regarded as a success. I only occasionally go East of downtown but am frequently on the western reroute on Scott St. While it is slower than the old Transitway, the difference is minimal. I think it will be absolutely worth it in the end.

It looked like a bit of a dog's breakfast and may have gotten off to a rough start on some stretches, but overall I heard few complaints about it from the east end peeps I know who used it daily.

If anything a lot of them thought it was faster than the old Transitway because if you're going anywhere east of St. Laurent there are no stops anymore almost as soon as you get out of the downtown core. Whereas on the Transitway there were at least a half-dozen stops in inner east Ottawa if my memory serves me right.

[ClaytonA]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/re...-128-billion-15-year-loan-691452651.html

That should mean the allocated GoC funds for the REM are now free to be used for other transit projects in QC.

Think the tram/LRT/BRT project in Ville Quebec will get an announcement/some further design commitment in terms of political strategy from the Feds and province?

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by ClaytonA

Think the tram/LRT/BRT project in Ville Quebec will get an announcement/some further design commitment in terms of political strategy from the Feds and province?

Feds and QC already announced nearly 100M$ for detailed planning. Construction should start in 2 years. Same timeline as blue line. All parties including the CAQ were in favor of financing it. Feds didn't annonce full funding yet.

I'm surprised how it took less than 6 months to have a whole new plan, and gets its detailed design financing.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Acajack

It looked like a bit of a dog's breakfast and may have gotten off to a rough start on some stretches, but overall I heard few complaints about it from the east end peeps I know who used it daily.

If anything a lot of them thought it was faster than the old Transitway because if you're going anywhere east of St. Laurent there are no stops anymore almost as soon as you get out of the downtown core. Whereas on the Transitway there were at least a half-dozen stops in inner east Ottawa if my memory serves me right.

I suppose some routes may have benefited if they bypass everything, but between Hurdman and downtown, it can hardly be said that it is faster than before especially if you end up on a route that goes through the university.

[SkahHigh]

Originally Posted by osmo

Scarborough Subway extension will balloon up to a record-breaking amount, likely to be the most expensive extension ever constructed (If it gets build, it won't though as there will be a breaking point where no council/body will allow it for its cost). There is a reason a subway was never considered back when subways were "cheap" the underground waterways and wonky typography of Scarborough makes tunnelling channelling as you must go very deep.

So now Scarborough residents will get a reward of having to haul on a bus to 40 minutes to reach a massive bus terminal 450m in length where they have to walk for 6 minutes to then go into a cave to ride an underground train in darkness for another 8 minutes until they reach the old main Danforth line. Glossy renderings aside nobody wants to talk about how crappy of a commute this will evolve into for the average Scarborough resident and will not make their commute any more quickly in the process.

This subway project is the critical single project that will either sink or swim Toronto. Projects such as these have a long track record of blundering city finances and setting them on fire a generation in the process.

Exactly.

Normally you’d think that city officials cheapened out the project but no - it’ll cost a shit load of money for... a lot of bling and not a lot of efficiency.

At least people from Scarborough will get a one-seat ride downtown... oh wait. They’ll have to rely on the already overcrowded Yonge line

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by SkahHigh

Exactly.

Normally you’d think that city officials cheapened out the project but no - it’ll cost a shit load of money for... a lot of bling and not a lot of efficiency.

At least people from Scarborough will get a one-seat ride downtown... oh wait. They’ll have to rely on the already overcrowded Yonge line

Too bad other platforms were not installed at Union, it would have been possible to split line 1 and reuse the wye.

[Reecemartin]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

Satire, I hope?

Yes

Originally Posted by GeneralLeeTPHLS

Excuse me? There hasn't been a single downtown subway line built in the last 50 years. We've ONLY been seeing construction of suburban off shoots to the downtown portion of the subway since then (unless you call the Eglinton Crosstown a part of adding to the City of Toronto, which it technically is)

I do agree the Scarborough transit line replacement MUST be built soon...but keep in mind calling out "downtown elites" is grabbing at straws. I'd like to see a subway for Scarborough, with intermediate subway stations built later on (like the creation of North York Centre in the 80's.)


The issue at hand has been and will be political stagnation and incompetence to building transit, but more importantly, the cost. Toronto must wait to build transit because the costs are so high....which really sucks for the city at this time, but is a result of political inaction. I'm not really understanding the point of building the Finch LRT before the Scarborough subway or what have you AT ALL. The city's priorities are just inane.

I thought the ALL CAPS would have made my sarcasm clear.

[GeneralLea]

My bad, keep in mind sarcasm is a difficult thing to show in an online forum. You gotta be pretty blatant.


Ottawa's new Confederation line does fascinate me, it's definitely a huge deal for the city, and looks great. Just hope it lives up to what's presented in these updates thus far.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by GeneralLeeTPHLS

My bad, keep in mind sarcasm is a difficult thing to show in an online forum. You gotta be pretty blatant.


Ottawa's new Confederation line does fascinate me, it's definitely a huge deal for the city, and looks great. Just hope it lives up to what's presented in these updates thus far.

It will be an overwhelming success in dealing with the longstanding bus jam downtown.

[ClaytonA]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

Feds and QC already announced nearly 100M$ for detailed planning. Construction should start in 2 years. Same timeline as blue line. All parties including the CAQ were in favor of financing it. Feds didn't annonce full funding yet.

I'm surprised how it took less than 6 months to have a whole new plan, and gets its detailed design financing.

Blue Line Extension has $360mm committed for design with 2026 as the operating date.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/montreal-metro-blue-line-extension-1.4610972

La Presse reported that RTC was asking for $250mm for design here; http://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/region...ojet-de-3-milliards-devoile-vendredi.php

There's also this (minor); https://www.journaldequebec.com/2018/06/...u-de-transport-structurant-a-ete-accorde

Aaah, found this report saying the provincial government committed $215mm for design with a target date to finish design in three years. Sounds like all the political parties and the chamber of commerce support the plan too. https://www.ledevoir.com/politique/ville-de-quebec/522916/tramway-quebec


So the infrastructure bank investment frees up money for either of these two transit projects for PTIF.

[TorontoDrew]

Originally Posted by osmo

Scarborough Subway extension will balloon up to a record-breaking amount, likely to be the most expensive extension ever constructed (If it gets build, it won't though as there will be a breaking point where no council/body will allow it for its cost).

I wish, under Doug Ford it will get built because he has a mandate to push through all of the bad ideas and plans his late brother was unable to do. Subways for the burbs and screw the core "They already have enough subways" his words.


When it comes to transit City Hall never has any balls and will say and promise anything every election time delaying transit by years or decades. Transit City was the last great plan which would have been built by now providing rapid transit to every corner of the city. The DRL could have beenin it's final planning stages by now but Rob Ford tore it up.

We should be taking the advice of non partisan experts when urban planning is involved and what ever plans are created should be stuck to and be protected. Every expert has said the DRL is the most important missing part of the TTC and building any new subways or feeder lines will only place more burden on a maxed out line. Good luck getting politicians to put the DRL in their campaign though, it doesn't win any votes outside of the core.

[mistercorporate]

With the recent announcement that the Presto card allows us to use both the TTC and GO Rail for a two hour window with one fair, this is a major development. With the rapid rollout of GO RER, we will have the equivalent of a doubling of our subway service essentially, only it will be over ground and at 15 min intervals outside rush hour, 7 days/week.

[J.OT13]

So much wasted space. Coupled 2 unit (48 meters each) train.

Alstom has a 59 meter unit available, so what's stopping them from creating a continuous 96 meter train? I get that the City will only be running a 48 meter car on weekends, but I feel that for efficiency and maintenance wise, a full single car 96 meter train would have been better.


https://twitter.com/rail613/status/1032429158884929536

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

I would not recommend what Ottawa has done to any other city. Closing down rapid transit for years of reconstruction is horribly disruptive, pushes ridership down and involves enormous costs to reroute transit for the reconstruction period.

The sad thing about the Ottawa situation is that years of disruption will be followed by years of more disruption for Phase 2 and likely again for Phase 3.

The difference though is that Ottawa shut down the backbone of its system, while the SRT is a low-usage stub line.