Rob Ford's Toronto

[Armbruster]

LRT in Toronto was simply a gout du jour that Giambrone and Miller acquired while backpacking through Europe.

Maybe they were backpacking though Texas, since Dallas and Houston also have new LRT networks. So does Salt Lake City, Utah. But what else would you expect from such notorious pinkos?

 

[EnviroTO]

LRT in Toronto was simply a gout du jour that Giambrone and Miller acquired while backpacking through Europe. Sure, European cities relying on LRT are what? 300,000 in population; while those big cities building it are simply filling in gaps in their already impressive subway network. We are trying to act like a small European city by relying on LRT. Our pathetically small subway system is already crumbling, let alone after we dump a few more million riders into it.

You seem to miss the disconnect. You admit that the subway system is already crumbling, yet believe somehow there is a significant amount of money to be spent on expansion. You admit our system is pathetically small, but shun the biggest improvement in a long time as not good enough despite the replacement being a waste of money for less. Lastly you ignore the fact that some cities much smaller than Toronto have bigger networks in Toronto and those networks started with pre-metro systems. Transit City would make the system more efficient, lower energy costs, lower driver costs, increased reliability, etc. Transit City wasn't meant to be the end state, it was meant to be an improvement to the status quo which is tacking a few stations on existing lines every 10 years.

 

[Danielinthecity]

Transit City is appropriate capacity transportation for lower population density areas. If suburbanites want high-capacity transit, they should live in high population density locations.


You're asking that more per-passenger money be spent on suburbanites than those in denser areas -- how exactly is that fair?

Good points

 

[jje1000]

You seem to miss the disconnect. You admit that the subway system is already crumbling, yet believe somehow there is a significant amount of money to be spent on expansion. You admit our system is pathetically small, but shun the biggest improvement in a long time as not good enough despite the replacement being a waste of money for less. Lastly you ignore the fact that some cities much smaller than Toronto have bigger networks in Toronto and those networks started with pre-metro systems. Transit City would make the system more efficient, lower energy costs, lower driver costs, increased reliability, etc. Transit City wasn't meant to be the end state, it was meant to be an improvement to the status quo which is tacking a few stations on existing lines every 10 years.

It's really that "Go big or go home" mentality that refuses to believe that Transit City would be a interim step towards higher levels of transit. It's the thought that since ALL the big cities have subways everywhere, subways are the perfect match for any area, even post-war suburban neighbourhoods.

 

[bobbob911]

I can't speak to whether or not LRTs or subways are the better way to go but I know for sure that if LRTs are built subways would never be built to replace them. The LRTs would not be an interim step. Having the LRT in place first means very little savings for replacing later with a subway - its 100% sunk cost.

 

[ttk77]

http://www.thestar.com/news/toronto...payers-agree-rob-ford-is-right-says-ford?bn=1

It's "nice" to see Ford is maintaining his love/hate relationship with numbers and facts.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

bobbob:

I can't speak to whether or not LRTs or subways are the better way to go but I know for sure that if LRTs are built subways would never be built to replace them. The LRTs would not be an interim step. Having the LRT in place first means very little savings for replacing later with a subway - its 100% sunk cost.

If you are talking ground level LRT - no. It isn't that different from a streetcar line, and we've replaced those with subways in Toronto before.

AoD

 

[Tulse]

I can't speak to whether or not LRTs or subways are the better way to go but I know for sure that if LRTs are built subways would never be built to replace them.

But if a subway isn't actually needed, why is that a bad thing? And if demand grows up around the LRT line to the point that a subway would have feasible ridership, why couldn't the LRT be replaced?

 

[tkip]

If you build a LRT line only to then replace it with a subway line later if demand/use increases this to me seems a colossal waste and just plain idiocy. I also agree that if you build an LRT then you won't see subways in that area built. Ever....

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Whether it is worth it depends on how much later. There is a huge cost to upsizing infrastructure when the need doesn't materialize soon enough - and keep in mind that maintenance cost grows significantly after what, 30 years?

The funny thing is building an LRT is probably the BEST way to ensure you see subways - the increased accessiblity will create pressure for densification, which could very well lead to undercapacity and necessiates improvement. That's partly how all Yonge and Bloor lines came to be.

AoD

 

[ttk77]

If you build a LRT line only to then replace it with a subway line later if demand/use increases this to me seems a colossal waste and just plain idiocy. I also agree that if you build an LRT then you won't see subways in that area built. Ever....

So instead you'd build nothing and let the suburban transit infrastructure continue to rot? It's not always possible to do what's most efficient over the long term. Sometimes you have to implement something less than ideal to solve an existing problem. If we don't implement some form of LRT, the folks on Finch/Jane/Malvern etc.. will be stuck with ever increasing congestion and commute times for the next 30+ years. Even if you could convince the people holding the purse strings that the density in those areas will someday be high enough to support a subway, it will never be constructed fast enough to solve the problem. It's going to take four years just to build a few stop extension to one existing subway line and all the funding and EAs are already in place.

 

[Tulse]

If you build a subway line and demand/use never increases to its capacity, that is also a colossal waste. Just witness the Sheppard Stubway.

At the end of the day, the brute facts are a) subways cost more to build, and b) there isn't money for them, whereas there was for Transit City. The fixation on subways prevents Toronto from dealing with its current transit problems in an affordable, practical, and timely manner, while waiting for a "perfect" solution that is too expensive and inappropriate for demand.

 

[Juan_Lennon416]

I think some people are worried that when you build an LRT line and the time comes to replace it with a subway, it would take forever to do so.

 

[Juan_Lennon416]

I think some people are also worried that we will build an LRT line in the morning, the City would then approve a slew of development along those LRT lines in the afternoon and by evening, the LRT needs to be replaced with a subway.

I think there needs to be a better promoter of LRTs than Miller and Giambrone and that person needs to start working NOW!

 

[Armbruster]

I think some people are also worried that we will build an LRT line in the morning, the City would then approve a slew of development along those LRT lines in the afternoon and by evening, the LRT needs to be replaced with a subway.

Until the existing Sheppard subway has come remotely close to meeting the expectations of its proponents, there is no good reason to believe the unfunded, magical extension will be any less of an underused money-loser in our lifetimes. Doesn't anybody remember that time, only FOUR YEARS AGO, when the City nearly voted to shut the Sheppard line down?