The “hard truths”:
• Subways are not the only good form of transit.
True. I just came back from London UK and the DLR is fantastic. So is Milan's Streetcar network which I find similar to our own.
• Transit does not automatically drive development. Transit’s lifeblood is jobs along a route, not massive number of condos or people.
Well...Transit planning needs to be harmonized with good city planning as well. On it's own, I agree. Just look at the Spadina line's lack of density around it's stations until recently. Again, the DRL and the Jubilee line on it's own would have not revitalized the docklands and Canary Wharf since there would have been nowhere to go. It took great city planning and vision to make it work.
• Building a transit line is not the main expense; maintenance and operating costs are huge.
True
• Everyone benefits from transit: riders, business, drivers and a region’s economy.
True
• Transit building is vigorous in the region and not at a standstill as it appears.
True
• Cuts to government waste alone cannot fund transit.
True but it helps when they are not wasting billions on gas plant, e-health, ornge, subways to Vaughan etc...
- Only the second one — transit doesn’t necessarily lead to increased development that delivers new riders (build it and they will come) — should raise eyebrows as it goes against conventional wisdom. The Sheppard subway from Yonge to Don Mills is a perfect example. It was supposed to spark development — and it did. More than 20 highrise towers are supposed to go in around Sheppard and Leslie on the Canadian Tire lands. Unfortunately, it’s not nearly enough to deliver riders, for several reasons.
The main reason being that it's incomplete and doesn't go anywhere. To be fair, (which he's far from being), Sheppard has incredibly changed within 10 years. Eglinton should have been a subway WAY before Sheppard since it had the numbers. I believe that you build subways where the density justify it first and then (and only then) you use it to expand and increase development like the Jubilee Line to Canary Wharf which connects City of London to Canary Wharf or like Paris connecting "La Defense" to its core by rapid transit.
Sheppard Subway was premature and built for the wrong reasons, but you can't argue with the results nonetheless.
For one, a subway gobbles up so many people per hour that all the condos planned along Sheppard don’t generate enough riders.
Although he's correct, the Sheppard Subway is only 10 years old and incomplete. Despite this huge disadvantage, the development along Sheppard Avenue East is undeniable.
Secondly, even if there were enough people in those towers, their places of work are so dispersed that we can’t build enough subways to take them to their work and school destinations all across the region. Where a subway works best is in delivering workers to their jobs. Such high-capacity transit is needed in corridors where people must go for work and serve as a funnel to get them there.
Aren't they mostly going downtown? This is why the Yonge line trains are full by Sheppard-Yonge in the morning. It also demonstrates that the future DRL reaching Don Mills and Sheppard has its merits if you plan on extending Yonge to Richmond Hill.
LRT designed like the DLR in London would be great. The whole problem with Transit city is that the Sheppard LRT and the Finch LRT are not even close to the DLR service level. The initial plans showed the vehicles stopping at red lights and the stops being too close (400 m in average) just to avoid having to run parallel bus services for local stops which slows down the service.
If Metrolinx did the following:
-eliminates a few stops with a stop spacing of let's say between 650 to 800m with TTC running a parallel service like on Yonge st. and Sheppard Avenue East
-Priority lights (like Europe) where the trains never waits at a red light
-increased operating speed
LRT would have been embraced long ago and would have killed Ford's crusade a long time ago. Miller wanted those LRT lines except Eglinton central portion, to be operated as "
streetcars +" taking
"the speed out of rapid transit"...Did I just quote Royson James article that he wrote criticizing Transit City a couple of years back?
I would take the above map (add Jane to Finch) anytime. Hopefully, that's what Metrolinx is aiming for and with the increase costs of building those lines, I wouldn't be surprised if some of the smaller stops gets cut in the end.
