Sheppard Stubway

[kettal]

Even if they converted the subway into a light rail, you'd still have an unnecessary transfer between Scarborough Centre and North York Centre, because somebody inexplicably (perhaps because otherwise it would leave a ward of the city unserved by a streetcar) decided that the Sheppard LRT should run east to serve the squirrels in Rouge Park rather than the tens of thousands of people at Scarborough's designated regional growth centre.

You won't get any arguments from me on this. I'd love to see Sheppard interlined with the SRT, or have a branch of Sheppard LRT reach Scarborough Centre by some other means. Even in this case, I still think a certain number of these streetcars should run to the far east of Sheppard.

 

[Epi]

So as I understand, the Sheppard stubway has only marginally increased ridership after $1 billion and 10 years... transfer city indeed lol. They should have just ran 1 extra express bus every 15 mins and it would have made up the increase in ridership over the last 10 years! [/sarcasm]

(for the record I voted for the subway extension )

 

[Dan416]

Well given the Sheppard Stubways length, it's not surprising that people are still using Bloor-Danforth as the main crosstown line. Thus far, it connects North York Centre with....well, nothing. A mall or two. Give it some real connections before you judge it. The basis for judging Sheppard, if we were to apply it to Bloor-Danforth, would be like judging its usefullness as if it only went from Yonge to Chester and saying that was a failure.

 

[scarberiankhatru]

So as I understand, the Sheppard stubway has only marginally increased ridership after $1 billion and 10 years... transfer city indeed lol. They should have just ran 1 extra express bus every 15 mins and it would have made up the increase in ridership over the last 10 years! [/sarcasm]

Sarcasm, yes, but that does seem to be what gweed123 thinks, so let's help him out. "Sheppard"'s daily ridership went from roughly 36K right before the subway to 46K now with the subway but some of that 36K consisted of trips made east of Don Mills, so the real pre-subway figure is lower (and this caveat applies to all surface routes).

If we guess that 25K was the pre-subway ridership along Sheppard between Yonge and Don Mills, ridership has actually almost doubled in the corridor (and shiftees from other routes are really not as numerous as people might think - for example, many 139 riders just go to Fairview or Seneca and don't use the subway). It also suggests a significant base of riders exists on Sheppard that would be new to the subway should it be extended, even before factoring in increased transit usage due to a subway line reaching new neighbourhoods.

All we have to look at is Bessarion, which may not even have 2000 people living within walking distance, yet gets about 2000 riders a day, indicative of a very high local transit share...it's a shame that Willowdale wasn't built.

 

[Epi]

Interesting thing about Bessarion, there's an abandoned Gateway newsstand inside. It's also built with super large platforms and a super large mezannine like the rest of the Sheppard line. Talk about overbuilt lol. I guess though in 15 years when Park Place is fully built people will be buying newspapers, although a fair amount of Park Place residents will be using Leslie or GO instead. I believe there's supposed to be a free 'community shuttle bus' which ferries people around without the need for the subway.

Bessarion does benefit from a large population of drive-up riders (I see a steady stream of drop offs every morning there), and people going to nearby medical buildings/schools and so on. There's also quite a few people living in that area if you look closely.

It really is a shame though that the Leslie station is so damn far away from the actual intersection. I gather a lot more people would use it to get to the hospital, if it weren't a 500m walk which is absolutely killer in the winter.


They really should in-fill a station at Willowdale though, I imagine it would be pretty well used and spur quite a bit of development at that point.

 

[GenerationW]

Choice #4 would be political suicide and thus not in the realm of possibility IMO.

I can't believe doing nothing only got one vote.

 

[GenerationW]

I believe there's supposed to be a free 'community shuttle bus' which ferries people around without the need for the subway.

That goes between IKEA and right across from Leslie Stn.

It really is a shame though that the Leslie station is so damn far away from the actual intersection. I gather a lot more people would use it to get to the hospital, if it weren't a 500m walk which is absolutely killer in the winter.

It's not that bad considering that most walks to anywhere around that area are similar.

With the opening of the subway, they rerouted the Leslie bus to go through the hospital.

 

[scarberiankhatru]

Bessarion does benefit from a large population of drive-up riders (I see a steady stream of drop offs every morning there), and people going to nearby medical buildings/schools and so on. There's also quite a few people living in that area if you look closely.

There aren't many people living near...yet. All the people around Hawkesbury/Rean walk to Bayview and even as far over as Greenbriar, but I'm not sure about people on streets like Eunice/Clarinda - they're closer to Leslie but perhaps they use Bessarion because it's easier than crossing Sheppard. I expect most St. Gabriel's residents will use Bayview, too (Bayview should reach 10K per day in the near future).

Beyond the 1000 or so homes within walking distance of Bessarion, there's about 8 additional crescents that supply some kiss'n'riders. There's maybe 150 jobs near Bessarion, but perhaps the medical building generates 20 or 30 trips. The mere existence of the subway generates a fair number of trips, too. Every future tower adds at least as many residents to the Bessarion zone as each entire street currently does, but towers concentrate the residents (Bessarion could easily hit 5K per day by 2015, but beyond that it depends on how much redevelopment takes place on streets like Bessarion itself).

 

[nfitz]

It really is a shame though that the Leslie station is so damn far away from the actual intersection. I gather a lot more people would use it to get to the hospital, if it weren't a 500m walk which is absolutely killer in the winter.

??? The eastern-most entrance to Leslie station is right at the south-east corner of Leslie and Shepherd

 

[Epi]

??? The eastern-most entrance to Leslie station is right at the south-east corner of Leslie and Shepherd

It's also about 150-200m from the subway platform to the intersection... there's this massive walkway. And then if you want to go to the hospital it's another 500 from that point to the entrance.

 

[Epi]

That goes between IKEA and right across from Leslie Stn.

Nono, Park Place itself (aka Concord Adex) is supposed to have it's own shuttle bus. At least that's what the salesperson told me when I visited a few months ago.

 

[Epi]

There aren't many people living near...yet. All the people around Hawkesbury/Rean walk to Bayview and even as far over as Greenbriar, but I'm not sure about people on streets like Eunice/Clarinda - they're closer to Leslie but perhaps they use Bessarion because it's easier than crossing Sheppard. I expect most St. Gabriel's residents will use Bayview, too (Bayview should reach 10K per day in the near future).

Beyond the 1000 or so homes within walking distance of Bessarion, there's about 8 additional crescents that supply some kiss'n'riders. There's maybe 150 jobs near Bessarion, but perhaps the medical building generates 20 or 30 trips. The mere existence of the subway generates a fair number of trips, too. Every future tower adds at least as many residents to the Bessarion zone as each entire street currently does, but towers concentrate the residents (Bessarion could easily hit 5K per day by 2015, but beyond that it depends on how much redevelopment takes place on streets like Bessarion itself).

St Gabriel is actually slightly closer to Bessarion because there's less lights, and less driveways (of people getting into Bayview Village).

As for the medical building, 20 more people means only 10 patients use it per day, in a building with 20 doctors (likely seeing 20-40 people a day)? Especially since parking in that building is absolutely horrible (and now you have to pay). I think it's probably much more than that.

There's also the people in the townhomes just to the east. They are equildistant to Leslie St, but that walk is a really horrible walk that I can see people trying to avoid.

But yes Bessarion will become a better used station in the future, although it'll always be massively overbuilt.

 

[scarberiankhatru]

St Gabriel is actually slightly closer to Bessarion because there's less lights, and less driveways (of people getting into Bayview Village).

As for the medical building, 20 more people means only 10 patients use it per day, in a building with 20 doctors (likely seeing 20-40 people a day)? Especially since parking in that building is absolutely horrible (and now you have to pay). I think it's probably much more than that.

There's also the people in the townhomes just to the east. They are equildistant to Leslie St, but that walk is a really horrible walk that I can see people trying to avoid.

But yes Bessarion will become a better used station in the future, although it'll always be massively overbuilt.

Some people closer to Bessarion use Bayview because Bayview is closer to Yonge. Even if a few dozen more patients use it, what doesn't change is the fact that transit use near the station is high and has gone up since the subway went in.

Bessarion could be a bit smaller, but it wasn't expensive, and is likely far smaller than what will end up getting built at stations like Cummer, Clark, Sheppard West, etc. Bessarion should have had two entrances, one each at the east/west end of the platform.

 

[Ansem]

Stats Sheppard line vs Chicago line

I've posted this in april***


That's TTC argument but let's compare...really

Toronto:2,503,281
Chicago:2,836,659

TORONTO
Daily ridership ***just to give us a rough idea**
2007-2008

Yonge-University-Spadina
672,390 (avg. weekday)
32 Stations and 30.2Km

Bloor-Danforth
484,000 (avg. weekday)
31 Stations and 26.2 Km

Sheppard
45,860 (avg. weekday)
5 Stations and 5.5 Km

Scarborough RT
43,770 (avg. weekday)
6 Stations and 6.4 Km


CHICAGO

Red Line
approx. 230,000 (avg. weekday boardings)
34 Stations
37.7 KM

Blue Line
approx. 147,000 (avg. weekday boardings)
33 Stations
55.7 KM

Brown Line
approx. 90,000 (avg. weekday boardings)
28 Stations
18.3 KM

Orange Line
approx. 59,000 (avg. weekday boardings)
17 stations
20.1 KM

Pink Line
approx. 26,000 (avg. weekday boardings)
22 Stations
18 KM

Purple Line
approx. 31,000 (avg. weekday boardings including Purple Express)
19 Stations
24 KM

Yellow Line
approx. 5,000 (avg. weekday boardings)
2 Stations
5.1 KM
*******************************************

Is it me or our useless low ridership Sheppard Subway has more ridership than Pink, purple and Yellow line?

Sheppard a 5 station and 5.5KM has more ridership than a
22 station line with 18 KM (Pink) or (Purple) 24 KM and 19 stations. Imagine a Complete Sheppard line.

May I add that the trains have similar capacity?

Not bad for a line:

-That Short
-Not Going downtown (All Chicago lines goes downtown)
-Questionable station emplacements

A complete Sheppard line would have more ridership than their orange line...easily

 

[unimaginative2]

There's nothing to refute. It's a fact. By the standards of other cities, the Sheppard line is very well used. For a 6 km suburban shuttle to serve 45,000 a day (and growing rapidly) is very impressive. It also moves a comparable number of people to the L train in New York, which is three times as long.