The Great Canadian Transit Thread

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by someone123

"Road diet" is becoming a meme, and the idea that traffic is just "induced" and can be arbitrarily cut back on by reducing infrastructure without causing major problems is another bad old planning meme (less nuanced version of an economics style concept that as supply increases and the "cost" drops in monetary price or time, there will be higher utilization, all else being equal). I think part of what's going on is there are a lot of overbuilt 1970's era roads that are part of uncompleted plans, can handle more traffic than the bottlenecks around them, and can and should be downsized without causing traffic problems. The typical stroad is more complicated.

I think all of that is pretty implicit within the word "diet" though. The use of the term specially denotes cases where someone or something is "overweight," literally or metaphorically. I don't think anyone thinks of it as arbitrary. In the same way that a 180cm tall man who weighs 75kg with little excess body fat isn't going to go on a diet to become a 170cm, 65kg man, people don't want to put a road on a diet unless it's actually overweight. We just happen to encounter many roads that are obese due to poor prior planning practices - not just in terms of their number of lanes, but things like rounded corners that that reduce pedestrian safety but facilitate faster automobile turns, wider lanes that encourage increased speed, etc. The main problem of course is an over focus on roads as a means to get from point A to B and a neglect of roads as of places in their own right that need to support a good quality of life for the people who aren't just passing through.

[Beedok]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

I think all of that is pretty implicit within the word "diet" though. The use of the term specially denotes cases where someone or something is "overweight," literally or metaphorically. I don't think anyone thinks of it as arbitrary. In the same way that a 180cm tall man who weighs 75kg with little excess body fat isn't going to go on a diet to become a 170cm, 65kg man, people don't want to put a road on a diet unless it's actually overweight. We just happen to encounter many roads that are obese due to poor prior planning practices - not just in terms of their number of lanes, but things like rounded corners that that reduce pedestrian safety but facilitate faster automobile turns, wider lanes that encourage increased speed, etc. The main problem of course is an over focus on roads as a means to get from point A to B and a neglect of roads as of places in their own right that need to support a good quality of life for the people who aren't just passing through.

Also, simply our society being excessively auto-dependent as it is. We need to reduce the number of cars on the road. Between the greenhouse gas emissions, the environmental/human impact of lithium mining, and the negative impact on human health that driving everywhere has, it's clear that cars have become a harmful addiction in our society. We destroy our neighbourhoods and ourselves in order to support them.

[Reecemartin]

Toronto's Milton Rail Line might be getting all-day service! Mississauga finally has a reliable & fast connection with Toronto!

https://youtu.be/B9nLvWfhDfE

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by Reecemartin

Toronto's Milton Rail Line might be getting all-day service! Mississauga finally has a reliable & fast connection with Toronto!

https://youtu.be/B9nLvWfhDfE

Could this mean we could see a Cambridge GO station?

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by Reecemartin

Toronto's Milton Rail Line might be getting all-day service! Mississauga finally has a reliable & fast connection with Toronto!

https://youtu.be/B9nLvWfhDfE

I hate to bring things back to VIA rail - because it's a topic that seems to bleed into other, unrelated threads, and we already have a giant thread on it - but note the difference in Minister Alghabra's tweet on the Milton Line versus the very vague promises of nothing on improving passenger rail connections to London.

Now a good chunk of this announcement is probably Liberal electioneering. However, he actually provides some semblance of a number: the Feds are willing to finance 50% of the costs of expanding the Milton line.

If the Feds are willing to make a statement to this effect, they probably have a good idea of how much it will cost. This leads me to believe that Metrolinx is on the brink of releasing a detailed business case for the Milton expansion, similar to what they did for the Kitchener Line recently, where they cited 3 options for how to overcome the bottleneck at Silver Jct and how much each option would cost.

I don't think Metrolinx is a perfect organization - they obviously have many flaws, particularly around costs, project management and community consultation - but they excel at getting the funding for the projects they want to build. In fact, the fact that they have a great track record getting everything they ask for might be the reason why they can be so frivolous with everything else. They get what they want because, unlike VIA, they move quickly with detailed business cases and engineering reports and make them publicly available.

We're in an environment where the Feds aren't skimpy with infrastructure cash, but you have to prove that a project is shovel ready and the costs you cite have to be backed up by some engineering assessments. If you can provide those, the Feds generally will pony up. A lot of organizations and municipalities haven't seemed to figure this out.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by Reecemartin

Toronto's Milton Rail Line might be getting all-day service! Mississauga finally has a reliable & fast connection with Toronto!

https://youtu.be/B9nLvWfhDfE

Great video. The progress in the GTA is phenomenal to watch. Good to see the federal Liberals and provincial Conservatives set aside differences to get things built.

If this keeps up, a decade from now public transport in the GTA will actually be somewhat decent with frequent all-day GO service, the Ontario Line and Yonge and Scarborough Subway extensions, the Eglinton Crosstown + West + East, and Finch West, along with half the region's buses electrified. Dare we dream of a comfortable and efficient transit system that covers the whole region?

Now if they can just get cracking on the Pearson Transit Hub...

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

I hate to bring things back to VIA rail - because it's a topic that seems to bleed into other, unrelated threads, and we already have a giant thread on it - but note the difference in Minister Alghabra's tweet on the Milton Line versus the very vague promises of nothing on improving passenger rail connections to London.

The feds aren't going to build the most important intercity line in the country and skip Pearson. And till the whole Pearson Transit Hub and Kitchener Line is sorted out they can't do anything on taking HFR West of Union. It's that simple. So yeah, they had to make useless vague electioneering promises about a pledge to study improvements. There's really nothing to discuss until everybody sits down and discusses what to do about Pearson.

Originally Posted by hipster duck

I don't think Metrolinx is a perfect organization - they obviously have many flaws, particularly around costs, project management and community consultation - but they excel at getting the funding for the projects they want to build. In fact, the fact that they have a great track record getting everything they ask for might be the reason why they can be so frivolous with everything else. They get what they want because, unlike VIA, they move quickly with detailed business cases and engineering reports and make them publicly available.

We're in an environment where the Feds aren't skimpy with infrastructure cash, but you have to prove that a project is shovel ready and the costs you cite have to be backed up by some engineering assessments. If you can provide those, the Feds generally will pony up. A lot of organizations and municipalities haven't seemed to figure this out.

Well put.

Few weeks back, we had the question of why some Northern Ontario cities aren't getting electric buses. People don't seem to understand that the federal government is not the fairy godmother to municipalities. Municipalities and transit authorities have to put in the work and build credible business cases to qualify for federal funding. It tooks years for Metrolinx to get good at this. And while they are not perfect, their analytical teams are now good at looking ahead to the next projects and developing business cases quickly and sometimes before anybody might really ask for them.

[Doady]

More service on the Milton Line would be pointless because there is not a lot of undeveloped or redevelopable land along the corridor. The Mississauga Transitway serves the Square One area so converting that to rail would increase development much more than any improvement to Milton Line would.

[ScreamingViking]

Originally Posted by Doady

More service on the Milton Line would be pointless because there is not a lot of undeveloped or redevelopable land along the corridor. The Mississauga Transitway serves the Square One area so converting that to rail would increase development much more than any improvement to Milton Line would.

But the great leap in service that is direct to Union Station would be a huge benefit for all the condo dwellers around the mall and probably many of the corporate employees in that area.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by Doady

More service on the Milton Line would be pointless because there is not a lot of undeveloped or redevelopable land along the corridor.

Thankfully Metrolinx doesn't listen to developers (at least bit not all of the time).

They point of Milton line service increases is facilitate a modal shift. Not to help developers sell more million dollar drywall boxes.

[Innsertnamehere]

Originally Posted by Doady

More service on the Milton Line would be pointless because there is not a lot of undeveloped or redevelopable land along the corridor. The Mississauga Transitway serves the Square One area so converting that to rail would increase development much more than any improvement to Milton Line would.

what? Milton is the third-busiest GO line and I believe has the second-largest peak period ridership. Milton is expected to grow by hundreds of thousands of people over the next few years, and connections to Downtown Mississauga are fairly straightforward via the Hurontario LRT. The all day ridership on the line would likely be extremely successful.

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by Doady

More service on the Milton Line would be pointless because there is not a lot of undeveloped or redevelopable land along the corridor. The Mississauga Transitway serves the Square One area so converting that to rail would increase development much more than any improvement to Milton Line would.

Development is great, particularly in a region with a growing population, but isn't it also important to improve service to an undeserved area that already has a substantial population? I find it interesting how in the transportation section of the main forum you often criticize smaller US cities for building rail service for reasons other than to address existing capacity requirements, but in this case the Milton line has suffered crowding and has the highest ridership of any GO route outside the lakeshore despite only having 9 round trips per weekday. It needs improved rail service specifically because of existing ridership and capacity needs which is exactly the condition in which you suggest rail projects make the most sense.

Besides, the MCC highrise cluster around Square One starts less than a km from the Cooksville GO station and there's plenty of development going on there with some towers over 200m u/c. And of course the station is being connected to the whole Hurontario corridor by the new LRT.

[Floppa]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

Few weeks back, we had the question of why some Northern Ontario cities aren't getting electric buses. People don't seem to understand that the federal government is not the fairy godmother to municipalities. Municipalities and transit authorities have to put in the work and build credible business cases to qualify for federal funding. It tooks years for Metrolinx to get good at this. And while they are not perfect, their analytical teams are now good at looking ahead to the next projects and developing business cases quickly and sometimes before anybody might really ask for them.

I think taking a conservative approach to electric buses is the prudent option. Better to let other cities be the guinea pigs and choose an appropriate model based on that data. Especially for small municipalities with limited funds.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by Floppa

I think taking a conservative approach to electric buses is the prudent option. Better to let other cities be the guinea pigs and choose an appropriate model based on that data. Especially for small municipalities with limited funds.

1) The larger agencies share substantial amounts of data through CUTRIC.

2) Battery Electric buses aren't some new fangled tech. They've been around for over a decade now. So while data maybe scarce in Canada, there is more usage elsewhere.

3) Rising carbon taxes are going to hurt their operating budgets. They need to start deploying Hydrogen or Battery Electric to start blunting that effect.

[Reecemartin]

A vlog for my trip down to Hamilton on the first day of hourly service on the Lakeshore West GO line in Southern Ontario. Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f97YFanjg5o

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by Reecemartin

A vlog for my trip down to Hamilton on the first day of hourly service on the Lakeshore West GO line in Southern Ontario. Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f97YFanjg5o

It really surprised me that you didn't have any experience with the night service. Maybe that would be another good video to do, and maybe show what is done elsewhere.

[matt602]

I took the blue night bus from Eglinton to Union once and it was an absolute nightmare (maybe because it was closer to rush hour unlike your ride). Really reminds you how comfortable and reliable the subway is when its actually operating.

[Reecemartin]

The rebuild/upgrades at Unionville Station in Markham looks to be nearly complete! Great to see the progress here.

https://youtu.be/_FxBK5MTNUw

[swimmer_spe]

With the sight of the GO train in London, where could we expect other extensions go to? Cambridge? Brantford? Kingston? North of Barrie?

[Innsertnamehere]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

With the sight of the GO train in London, where could we expect other extensions go to? Cambridge? Brantford? Kingston? North of Barrie?

There are no tracks north of Barrie, but there is a corridor to Collingwood. That would be expensive though as it would need new track laid.

Mind you a London GO extension is basically need new track anyway, if not immediately, as most of the track west of Kitchener is rated for 50km/h speeds only.

Brantford would be a good, fairly low cost addition, if you are looking to replicate the London or Niagara service extensions.