Heavy Rail, Commuter Rail, & Intercity Transportation

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

So, What are the top 10 densest cities in Ontario?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_in_Ontario
1) Toronto
2) Mississauga
3) Brampton
4) Richmond Hill
5) Kitchener
6) Waterloo
7) Markham
8) Guelph
9) Windsor
10) Barrie

All except for 2 of them have GO train stations. 1 of them is beside a city that has GO train service

1 has the most RT; subways, LRTs and Streetcars. 5&6 have an LRT. 2,3,4, and 7 have BRT of some sort. Most of them have farmland and all except 9 and 10 are dealing with the Greenbelt.

I would argue that having a good mix of RT and some sort of Commuter service is key for the cities to become more dense. There are other things that lead to the need to become more dense, and there are certain local issues that will dictate density, but it seems that commuter service is key.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_towns_in_Quebec

Hey, look, the top 10 densest cities of Quebec all have EXO service.

Imagine how dense cities like Surrey and Burnaby would be with commuter rail. Other provinces point to them moving up.

And if you’ll take some time to look them up, how many of them have that density centered around the GO stations? Zero – if they have anything over three floors, it’s around the highways, if not local rapid transit. These are still car-centric towns (many of which are hooked on Doug Ford’s gas tax cuts) which just so happen to have a little redevelopment here and there... my argument exactly.

You’re also neglecting the fact that Toronto amalgamated its inner suburbs: Etobicoke, the three Yorks and Scarborough - the missing Burnaby/New West/Richmond/Surrey/North Van analogues, all covered by the TTC - easily push out #2-6.

Ditto Montreal. Where’s all the actual density? The subways. What’s around EXO? Suburbistan. Don’t count on the WCE transforming Surrey or Burnaby any time soon; it can't even change Pitt Meadows.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

And if you’ll take some time to look them up, how many of them have that density centered around the GO stations? Zero – if they have anything over three floors, it’s around the highways, if not local rapid transit. These are still car-centric towns (many of which are hooked on Doug Ford’s gas tax cuts) which just so happen to have a little redevelopment here and there... my argument exactly.

You know that discussion on parking lots..... Ever seen how high some of those parking garages are? We did not specify where the density is, except it was within a city.Those massive parking lots and garages point to a medium term solution to the density and transit use issues. Look at all the RT being built in the cites outside of Toronto. They all connect to at least 1 GO station. For example, the Kitchener station that GO serves is being rebuilt to also connect to the iON LRT. Hurontario LRT is being connected to Port Credit and Cooksville GO stations.

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

You’re also neglecting the fact that Toronto amalgamated its inner suburbs: Etobicoke, the three Yorks and Scarborough - the missing Burnaby/New West/Richmond/Surrey/North Van analogues, all covered by subways - easily push out #2-6.

Not my fault that amalgamation scares BC residents. I guess you like wasting taxpayer's money on government bureaucrats and politicians.

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Ditto Montreal. Where’s all the actual density? The subways. What’s around EXO? Suburbistan. Don’t count on the WCE transforming Abby or Squamish into a transit town any time soon; it can't even change Pitt Meadows.

Actually, a lot of them do not have a metro station. I wish you would do some better research.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

You know that discussion on parking lots..... Ever seen how high some of those parking garages are? We did not specify where the density is, except it was within a city.Those massive parking lots and garages point to a medium term solution to the density and transit use issues. Look at all the RT being built in the cites outside of Toronto. They all connect to at least 1 GO station. For example, the Kitchener station that GO serves is being rebuilt to also connect to the iON LRT. Hurontario LRT is being connected to Port Credit and Cooksville GO stations.

Not my fault that amalgamation scares BC residents. I guess you like wasting taxpayer's money on government bureaucrats and politicians.

Actually, a lot of them do not have a metro station. I wish you would do some better research.

Yes, you connect to existing transit, whether or not it's useful. Seeing as 85% of Mississaugans stay within their city, 71% drive and only 11% take transit, it'll most likely be Hurontario feeding GO more than the other way around; Ion's mid-pandemic numbers already surpass its respective pre-pandemic GO stations. As for parking lots, the idea is to reduce SOV driving altogether, not increase it locally.

Not my fault you like to compare apples to oranges and pretend it's apples to apples.

A lot of Montrealers do not; the ones that do have the majority of the density. I wish you'd do the same.

[Vin]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

With exceptions: Langley's cut off by the ALR, but they've been adding midrises and highrises regardless, and they've got a new OCP for the future station areas.



WCE/EXO/GO stations being 99% parking lot seems to contradict that statement. Commuter rail may sometimes be helpful for trips into the city, but evidence would suggest that most non-metro residents work and play within their own town. And commuter rail's infrastructure is a bit more pricey than advocates would like to think it is.

Langley along Fraser Hwy is only densifying because they know skytrain is coming. However the infrastructure is still going through large tracks of farmlands which make it really expensive per km to build. A commuter train in this case would serve it much better.

GO started out as a park and ride trying to bring only large groups of people in and out of downtown Toronto, and that explains the parking lots and parkades for some of the stations. However it has since become more like an intercity train system, with extended time and frequencies going both ways rather than WCE's single directional route during rush hours. Hence GO is much better and helping to densifying outlying cities and towns, including London which is pretty far away. London's station is also right in town, just like Hamilton's without the big parking lots. We should be striving for those kinds of stations.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by Vin

Langley along Fraser Hwy is only densifying because they know skytrain is coming. However the infrastructure is still going through large tracks of farmlands which make it really expensive per km to build. A commuter train in this case would serve it much better.

GO started out as a park and ride trying to bring only large groups of people in and out of downtown Toronto, and that explains the parking lots and parkades for some of the stations. However it has since become more like an intercity train system, with extended time and frequencies going both ways rather than WCE's single directional route during rush hours. Hence GO is much better and helping to densifying outlying cities and towns, including London which is pretty far away. London's station is also right in town, just like Hamilton's without the big parking lots. We should be striving for those kinds of stations.

It would not - the speed advantage is cancelled out by the long, windy route and needing to backtrack to get to/from Whalley, and the cost of upgrading and twinning the track over such a long distance makes it just as expensive. The route itself skips Fleetwood, and makes it really hard to get from Newton to Whalley or Langley/Cloverdale to Guildford; SkyTrain straight up the middle solves those problems, even if it goes through ALR.

Four of the main GO lines have been 2WAD since at least 2017; still waiting to see any of them get the same level of development (or even usage) as King Edward, yet alone Metrotown or Brentwood. For the most part, it's still a park & ride.

[FarmerHaight]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

For the most part, it's still a park & ride.

If you build a transit station with a massive parking lot around it, developers and nearby residents will take the hint and continue building and buying car-orientated housing.

Take a look at Scott Road station. It's one of the few Skytrain stations surrounded by a massive surface parking lot, and despite being built 30 years ago it's still surrounded by industrial land uses.

[scryer]

Just FYI, everyone it is kind of hard to join in on the conversation when one can return to this thread the next day with 3+ pages of conversation to sift through. Not that I'm complaining but it is getting excessive since this pace of dialogue has been kept up for the last 3 weeks.

Originally Posted by officedweller

With a park and ride model and am/pm rush hour service, people still need their cars, so you're not going to get dense development.
You'd need all day frequent service for that.

True.

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

And yet practically every other SkyTrain station in the CoV is dense or densifying. If a City Council is unwilling to rezone the neighbourhood, developers can take the initiative and ask for a spot rezoning; aside from one townhome in Maple Ridge, neither the WCE nor GO nor EXO has spurred either.

There is a lot of truth to this. A city council has to be WILLING to rezone a neighbourhood to make it enticing for developers. Sure a developer can take the initiative to ask for spot rezoning but if there are parcels of land with less red tape to cut through, they will most likely snatch up those parcels first.

Originally Posted by FarmerHaight

If you build a transit station with a massive parking lot around it, developers and nearby residents will take the hint and continue building and buying car-orientated housing.

Take a look at Scott Road station. It's one of the few Skytrain stations surrounded by a massive surface parking lot, and despite being built 30 years ago it's still surrounded by industrial land uses.

Again a lot of truth to this as well. And it is very interesting that you pointed out Scott Road station as the parking lots and areas nearby are actually redeveloping into some mid-rise density. It is actually in the process of changing and up-zoning.

But even the COV doesn't do a great job at up-zoning its Skytrain stations. Stations like Commercial-Broadway, Nanaimo, and Joyce-Collingwood are all under-built and even though there is change that is happening at those specific stations, it has taken a very long time to see these areas densify.

My point is that municipal governments have a lot of influence of what can be built surrounding major transit nodes and if they can cut the red tape and up-zone on paper, then they can attract developers to certain areas. They also control what can be built surrounding those major transit nodes.

If a municipality doesn't rezone areas near a WCE station to accommodate for some density then it is yet another roadblock that developers have to contend with when it comes to redeveloping.

I personally believe that there is a time and a place for everything... even Park & Rides and I personally don't see why we can't have the best of both worlds? In theory a municipality can sell land to developers with conditions such as that a developer has to construct a Parkade structure nearby that the city will then take over & maintain; in exchange for giving the developer larger parcels of land to redevelop near a station. Or perhaps if they construct a parkade as part of their podium, the city will then give them the land plus more density? Now I'm not a city worker or a developer so maybe these theories aren't realistic.

The rut in all of this, is that there has to be political momentum and will to densify near transit nodes and to identify what kind of density the city wants to see. At this point the density surrounding the WCE stations has been minimal. And it can certainly be improved. Heck, if a city council wanted to, they can cut the red tape to invite developers to do complete phased neighbourhood redevelopments surrounding their WCE stations.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Yes, you connect to existing transit, whether or not it's useful. Seeing as 85% of Mississaugans stay within their city, 71% drive and only 11% take transit, it'll most likely be Hurontario feeding GO more than the other way around; Ion's mid-pandemic numbers already surpass its respective pre-pandemic GO stations. As for parking lots, the idea is to reduce SOV driving altogether, not increase it locally.

Not my fault you like to compare apples to oranges and pretend it's apples to apples.

A lot of Montrealers do not; the ones that do have the majority of the density. I wish you'd do the same.

You mean people don't use horrible bus transit?
Shocking!

I'd bet some of those "drive" is Drive to GO, or even Drive to Kipling Subway. Kipling and Islington subway stations have massive parking lots.

Originally Posted by Vin

Langley along Fraser Hwy is only densifying because they know skytrain is coming. However the infrastructure is still going through large tracks of farmlands which make it really expensive per km to build. A commuter train in this case would serve it much better.

This has been my point. There will be a gap of at least 4km that nothing is. That is getting closer to RER That is the distance Exhibition GO station is from Union Station on the Lakeshore West line.

Originally Posted by Vin

GO started out as a park and ride trying to bring only large groups of people in and out of downtown Toronto, and that explains the parking lots and parkades for some of the stations. However it has since become more like an intercity train system, with extended time and frequencies going both ways rather than WCE's single directional route during rush hours. Hence GO is much better and helping to densifying outlying cities and towns, including London which is pretty far away. London's station is also right in town, just like Hamilton's without the big parking lots. We should be striving for those kinds of stations.

That is because it grew to meet the demands of the future. It used to be to feed into the financial District from the suburbs. Now, people live in a suburb and are working in another suburb. I have family that live in Keswick and work in Mississauga. Once GO RER is realized, they will be commuting by GO.

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

It would not - the speed advantage is cancelled out by the long, windy route and needing to backtrack to get to/from Whalley, and the cost of upgrading and twinning the track over such a long distance makes it just as expensive. The route itself skips Fleetwood, and makes it really hard to get from Newton to Whalley or Langley/Cloverdale to Guildford; SkyTrain straight up the middle solves those problems, even if it goes through ALR.

Four of the main GO lines have been 2WAD since at least 2017; still waiting to see any of them get the same level of development (or even usage) as King Edward, yet alone Metrotown or Brentwood. For the most part, it's still a park & ride.

https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/vancouver-frequent-transit-network-low-density-map

Most of Vancouver's frequent transit network is surrounded by low-density zoning
Jul 6 2019

In particular, areas around several SkyTrain stations built more than three decades ago — namely Nanaimo Station and 29th Avenue Station — have seen little change and are still surrounded by low-density housing.

And the area surrounding Commercial-Broadway Station woefully lacks the density that would be expected from being the region’s busiest transit hub.

Additionally, the areas just beyond the downtown peninsula, which are served by FTN routes, are remarkably undense; it is highly unusual to see large swaths of single-family dwellings so so close to the city centres of major urban regions.



Gotta love those oranges.

Originally Posted by FarmerHaight

If you build a transit station with a massive parking lot around it, developers and nearby residents will take the hint and continue building and buying car-orientated housing.

Take a look at Scott Road station. It's one of the few Skytrain stations surrounded by a massive surface parking lot, and despite being built 30 years ago it's still surrounded by industrial land uses.

Wait, A Skytrain station also has a huge parking lot? Say it ain't so!
Are there others?
I have used Edmonds before. It is surrounded by SFHs and low rises, and lots of nothing.... Where is this density the (coco)Nut speaks of?

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

You mean people don't use horrible bus transit?
Shocking!

I'd bet some of those "drive" is Drive to GO, or even Drive to Kipling Subway. Kipling and Islington subway stations have massive parking lots.

Correct, it doesn’t matter how much regional transit they have if municipal transit slows to 40-48 minutes in the evening.

So GO encourages driving. Cool. Kipling and Islington don't serve Mississauga directly; they do have large amounts of TOD to balance out the parking.

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

That is because it grew to meet the demands of the future. It used to be to feed into the financial District from the suburbs. Now, people live in a suburb and are working in another suburb. I have family that live in Keswick and work in Mississauga. Once GO RER is realized, they will be commuting by GO.

And how many people in Abbotsford or Chilliwack want to work in Cloverdale, even with imaginary 15-minute service? Not enough to justify ~$8 billion, that’s for sure.

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/vancouver-frequent-transit-network-low-density-map...

... Gotta love those oranges.

---

Wait, A Skytrain station also has a huge parking lot? Say it ain't so!
Are there others?
I have used Edmonds before. It is surrounded by SFHs and low rises, and lots of nothing.... Where is this density the (coco)Nut speaks of?

More name-calling. Classy. Metro Vancouver’s working on densifying the rest of the FTN; suburban Ontario’s happy to continue sprawling.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Correct, it doesn’t matter how much regional transit they have if municipal transit slows to 40-48 minutes in the evening.

So GO encourages driving. Cool. Kipling and Islington don't serve Mississauga directly; they do have large amounts of TOD to balance out the parking.

Look where much of the GO stations are. Many of them are part of the downtowns of the other cities. The other places were in desolate areas. They have since been building up.

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

And how many people in Abbotsford or Chilliwack want to work in Cloverdale, even with imaginary 15-minute service? Not enough to justify ~$8 billion, that’s for sure.

Commuter rail is not about filling the train at the first stations. It is about filling them along the way.

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

More name-calling. Classy. Metro Vancouver’s working on densifying the rest of the FTN; suburban Ontario’s happy to continue sprawling.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_in_Canada
Mississauga is about as dense as the other cities of the CVRD.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

Look where much of the GO stations are. Many of them are part of the downtowns of the other cities. The other places were in desolate areas. They have since been building up.



Commuter rail is not about filling the train at the first stations. It is about filling them along the way.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_in_Canada
Mississauga is about as dense as the other cities of the CVRD.

The GO trains in the desolate areas are still desolate. If Ontario's been densifying, it's in spite of frequent commuter trains, not because of it.

Ditto every other form of transit. The interurban, again, is pegged at 3,900/day from Scott Road to Chilliwack, total. It'd be half-empty even at the most crowded point, and it would do nothing to relieve SkyTrain's most crowded points.

It's a sprawling suburb in more-populated Eastern Canada; brute-force enough suburbia and you could probably get Surrey to look as "dense" as Mississauga as well. But that's not the end goal.

[FarmerHaight]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

I have used Edmonds before. It is surrounded by SFHs and low rises, and lots of nothing.... Where is this density the (coco)Nut speaks of?

Edmonds is actually seeing a fair amount of development. There are some towers in the immediate vicinity with plenty more a short walk away on Kingsway. Edmonds also does not offer any on-site parking; anyone who wants to get on a train there walks, bikes, takes a taxi, or takes a bus.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

The GO trains in desolate areas are still desolate. If they've been densifying, it's spite of frequent commuter trains, not because of it.

Ditto every other form of transit. The interurban, again, is pegged at 3,900/day from Scott Road to Chilliwack, total. It'd be half-empty even at the most crowded point, and it would do nothing to relieve SkyTrain's most crowded points.

It's a suburb in more-populated Eastern Canada; brute-force enough suburbia and you could probably get Surrey to look as "dense" as Mississauga as well. But that's not the end goal.

Actually, it is because people want a shorter drive. That is why the areas around the ones that were in industrial areas, such as Pickering, Ajax and Whitby all are seeing growth in that area. Go back to the early 2000s and there was no housing in that area.

Originally Posted by FarmerHaight

Edmonds is actually seeing a fair amount of development. There are some towers in the immediate vicinity with plenty more a short walk away on Kingsway. Edmonds also does not offer any on-site parking; anyone who wants to get on a train there walks, bikes, takes a taxi, or takes a bus.

It has been around for 35 years and only now is getting some density?

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

Actually, it is because people want a shorter drive. That is why the areas around the ones that were in industrial areas, such as Pickering, Ajax and Whitby all are seeing growth in that area. Go back to the early 2000s and there was no housing in that area.

It has been around for 35 years and only now is getting some density?

Exactly: most of that housing is conveniently close to the highway... not necessarily the train stations. Check any of those three again - even the streetscape is biased against a short walk over to GO.

The WCE's been around for 27 years and still doesn't have any density. Think that'll change if you wait another eight?

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

It has been around for 35 years and only now is getting some density?

Not really, no. There are already 16 towers developed within 800m of the Edmunds Skytrain station. But it's getting more density now - another 6 towers in development and others just slightly beyond 800m - Southgate Village will have another 5,000 units, only 950 of them developed so far.

[Vin]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

It would not - the speed advantage is cancelled out by the long, windy route and needing to backtrack to get to/from Whalley, and the cost of upgrading and twinning the track over such a long distance makes it just as expensive. The route itself skips Fleetwood, and makes it really hard to get from Newton to Whalley or Langley/Cloverdale to Guildford; SkyTrain straight up the middle solves those problems, even if it goes through ALR.

Four of the main GO lines have been 2WAD since at least 2017; still waiting to see any of them get the same level of development (or even usage) as King Edward, yet alone Metrotown or Brentwood. For the most part, it's still a park & ride.

I really can't imagine the skytrain going through this:
https://www.google.com/maps/@49.1403852,...itch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i16384!8i8192

Farmlands are in between Langley City and Surrey, and this particular stretch goes on for about 4km.
And if skytrain were to be extended to Abbotsford from Langley (God forbid!), then it would have to go through 21km of nothingness, and all along you need to maintain all the electrical parts along the guideway to service the skytrain. With a diesel or even electrical locomotives, the tracks are pretty cheap to maintain, with the exception of overhead electrical cables to power the pantographs on electrical trains, which are a lot cheaper to service and maintain for such a long distance.

Like I said, traditional tracks serve this part better.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by Vin

Do you see the skytrain going through this? Farmlands are in between Langley City and Surrey, and this particular stretch goes on for about 4km.

https://www.google.com/maps/@49.1403852,...itch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i16384!8i8192

Like I said, traditional tracks serve this part better.

It does - I'm not contesting that. But as soon as it transitions back into this or this, SkyTrain works better. Fleetwood and Clayton look a lot like Metrotown did four decades ago.

Again, a grand total of nobody on this forum is asking for SkyTrain to Abbotsford. What's actually being said is that SkyTrain and a reworked bus grid will remove the most possible drivers in the SoF region, therefore easing congestion on the highways, and that makes things easier for Abbotsford. That plus express buses with proper shelters will get the job done just fine.

[Vin]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

The WCE's been around for 27 years and still doesn't have any density. Think that'll change if you wait another eight?

Have you read what I posted before? If WCE is a FULL service intercity train system, it would create density growths. Otherwise, it would just bring people from the sprawl downtown to work, and bring them back to drive their cars after work, and will DEFINITELY do nothing to help outlying urban centres to grow.

The current WCE system is only set up to reduce automobile traffic on highways and to alleviate traffic congestions in Vancouver's city centre, and it does very little to help suburban growths. Hope you can see that.

We need massive expansion, like having 2 way trains, as well as increase train frequencies, including train services on weekends, before people in burbs will finally give up their cars, and opt to live in urban centres near train stations. Train services can even encourage commerce and tourism activities in those areas, providing much-needed suburban jobs for those people nearby to get to.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by Vin

Have you read what I posted before? If WCE is a FULL service intercity train system, it would create density growths. Otherwise, it would just bring people from the sprawl downtown to work, and bring them back to drive their cars after work, and will DEFINITELY do nothing to help outlying urban centres to grow.

The current WCE system is only set up to reduce automobile traffic on highways and to alleviate traffic congestions in Vancouver's city centre, and it does absolutely nothing to help suburb growths. Hope you can see that.

I read it. Did you read mine? Four GO lines in Toronto have had 2WAD for years (30-60 minutes in both directions), and they're still mostly park & rides, so don't expect a surge in commuter rail TOD just because service becomes slightly more reliable.

[Vin]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

It does - I'm not contesting that. But as soon as it transitions back into this or this, SkyTrain works better. Fleetwood and Clayton look a lot like Metrotown did four decades ago.

Again, a grand total of nobody on this forum is asking for SkyTrain to Abbotsford. What's actually being said is that SkyTrain and a reworked bus grid will remove the most possible drivers in the SoF region, therefore easing congestion on the highways, and that makes things easier for Abbotsford. That plus express buses with proper shelters will get the job done just fine.

Not true. Metrotown (or Burnaby) has always been connected to Vancouver with a continuous urban fabric, even 50 years ago. In fact, the new skytrain would work better going down King George, as there are more living on both sides of the corridor, without a rural break in between.