Roads: Keep the Gardiner, fix it, or get rid of it? (2005-2014)

[hawc]

Searched for a thread on this, but couldn't find one.

I went out and watched some of it last night. It was pretty intersting. A whole line of trucks line up to be filled up with chewed up highway and then a bunch of trucks with hot ashpalt back up to a paver. Presto, brand new highway. I watched them do a couple hundred meters of the center lane.

This section of the Gardiner used to be sooo bumpy and had so many ruts. I'm glad they're repaving it. And because no pipes are burried under it, we won't see Enbridge rip it up in a few weeks to put something in and then do a bad patch job.

I am very excited about this project!

*** Pictures further down ***

 

[Dan416]

Searched for a thread on this, but couldn't find one. Can't believe nobody has started a thread on what is a fairly major project.

I went out and watched some of it last night. It was pretty intersting. A whole line of trucks line up to be filled up with chewed up highway and then a bunch of trucks with hot ashpalt back up to a paver. Presto, brand new highway. I watched them do a couple hundred meters of the center lane.

This section of the Gardiner used to be sooo bumpy and had so many ruts. I'm glad they're repaving it. And because no pipes are burried under it, we won't see Enbridge rip it up in a few weeks to put something in and then do a bad patch job.

I am very excited about this project!

Ugh is what they were doing when I was trying to drive downtown Thursday night for Harry Potter? I was soooooooo pissed. Did NOT expect traffic on the Gardiner at 10 pm.

Let me clarify that. Not just traffic. A traffic jam.

 

[hawc]

Yup and that's why the Lakeshore is jammed right now Eastbound from Humber to the SkyDome.

 

[EnviroTO]

The ruts on the stretch from 427 to Humber used to be so bad my car would try to steer itself. Usually they do this on one of the two work weekends scheduled each year. The reason there isn't a thread for it is because it really isn't a fairly major project. The city is repaving all the time... usually leaving it a little longer than they should but still every summer they are repaving somewhere.

 

[hawc]

Completely agree with you that repaving a road isn't a big enough deal to justify a thread..... however that stretch of the Gardiner has been so bad for so long that I think it's reason enough to get excited. It's honestly been super bumpy and rutted for as long as I can remember. At least 10 years. And all the heavy equipment tearing down the bridges made it even worse so I'm very pleased with the repaving.

 

[Dan416]

I'm happy about the repaving too, but they chose the worst night ever to do it (Harry Potter!)

 

[hawc]

Few shots from tonight (July 19/11)

 

[hawc]

Look at all these lucky people enjoying the brand new, freshly paved Gardiner!

(Dark side is the newly paved side)

 

[interchange42]

So, short of making every day a school holiday or Easter Monday, let's keep the thing in the air, beautify the underside where possible, replace the York/Bay/Yonge ramps with a Simcoe ramp, and keep it operating as is otherwise. It's far cheaper, and the dollars we don't spend on the Gardiner can be put towards far more effective transportation projects such as electrifying and expanding the GO network, building a DRL, etc. We'll never have the cash for those things if we blow it all on replacing the Gardiner.

42

 

[pman]

If we must keep it then the City should at least recognize the negative externalities and revenue losses from undevelopable land along the elevated portion. This means:
1. Toronto should impose meaningful tolls on the Gardiner, and
2. It should be a route to downtown, not through downtown, which means demolishing it from Spadina to the Richmond/Adelaide ramps of the DVP.
3. To further recognize the cost of car commutes into downtown the City could also raise fees on commercial parking spaces in an area bounded by, say, Dundas, the Lakeshore, Jarvis and Spadina.

 

[TOareaFan]

So, short of making every day a school holiday or Easter Monday, let's keep the thing in the air, beautify the underside where possible, replace the York/Bay/Yonge ramps with a Simcoe ramp, and keep it operating as is otherwise. It's far cheaper, and the dollars we don't spend on the Gardiner can be put towards far more effective transportation projects such as electrifying and expanding the GO network, building a DRL, etc. We'll never have the cash for those things if we blow it all on replacing the Gardiner.

42

Interesting idea using Simcoe but I don't think it works. Simcoe turns into a 1 - way street at Front then ends at Queen.....so, unlike Y-B-Y it is not a very good road for an off ramp as all the traffic needs to turn/disperse at Front or (in the event you convert it to two-way) Queen....I think it would cause a lot more traffic issues than it would solve.

 

[jaycola]

It should be a route to downtown, not through downtown

I don't know why this is the case? If someone lives at Islington and Lakeshore, works in Markham, say Woodbine and Hwy 7, should they not be able to travel through the city on the Gardiner to the Don Valley/404?

Why should this person pay congestion charges if they neither live nor work downtown but have the need to travel through it?

Interchange is right. We need to accept that the Gardiner exists and move on to projects that will improve the transportation situation without dwelling on mistakes of the past. Billions of dollars in construction costs and further billions in costs from additional traffic during and after the construction is far too much cost for the perceived benifit. We have a tonne of land over at the Portlands that needs to be developed. There are still lots of opportunities for development on major arteries throughout the city.

The fact that the rail tracks border on the Gardiner make the land less developable even if the Gardiner were not there.



Besides making the underside more livible, beautiful and accessable, maybe some developers will look at opportunities for developing over the highway.

 

[k10ery]

Interesting idea using Simcoe but I don't think it works. Simcoe turns into a 1 - way street at Front then ends at Queen.....so, unlike Y-B-Y it is not a very good road for an off ramp as all the traffic needs to turn/disperse at Front or (in the event you convert it to two-way) Queen....I think it would cause a lot more traffic issues than it would solve.

I thought the idea was the Simcoe ramp would channel onto Harbour St, not just Simcoe St. I'm more worried about closing the Bay onramp.

 

[nfitz]

I don't know why this is the case? If someone lives at Islington and Lakeshore, works in Markham, say Woodbine and Hwy 7, should they not be able to travel through the city on the Gardiner to the Don Valley/404?

Your suggesting that if someone lives near the 427/QEW interchange, that they shouldn't be subject to congestion charges, if they decide to travel on the busiest corridor in the city to a location near 407/404? There are so many faster ways to do that drive in rush hour! This is exactly the person who should be dinged with congestion charges, because he's the person who least needs to actually use that route!

 

[M II A II R II K]

Instead of burying it, encase it in a manmade mound.