Palma
Senior Member
that's time problem, that you cannot just get off the UP, walk 30 sec go get to an escalator to go up or down to connect to subway at Union. It was not till I used it over the Family Day weekend that I ralized
No, it's quite a walk. The UP platform is west of York Street - half-way to Simcoe. The subway entrance is near Bay. The connection at Dundas West-Bloor would be the quickest, if they completed the tunnel as originally planned.that's time problem, that you cannot just get off the UP, walk 30 sec go get to an escalator to go up or down to connect to subway at Union. It was not till I used it over the Family Day weekend that I ralized
Is SmartTrack still alive?
Was there not a council vote to request city manager to complete analysis for SmartTrack for options C and D and remove option A and option B. And then all those side motions that got added in by various councillors like Palacio adding a motion to put a stop at Keele and St Clair even though Keesmaat felt it was not a growth area
If those 8 station within Toronto would have been added anyways as part of the RER plan, I still do not understand why Toronto has to pay towards it. Was Toronto asked whether they wanted those stations and if they had the money to fund those stations?Council, backed by mayor Tory, voted to have it whittled down to adding a 1 or 2 more GO trains per hour with some kind of fare integration. We'll get more details in the fall. 4 to 5 OR 7 to 8 stations might be added to the RER network within Toronto, though many of those stations would've been added as part of the RER plan regardless of SmartTrack
http://www.metrolinx.com/en/docs/pd...oardMtg_RER_and_SmartTrack_Integration_EN.pdf
If those 8 station within Toronto would have been added anyways as part of the RER plan, I still do not understand why Toronto has to pay towards it. Was Toronto asked whether they wanted those stations and if they had the money to fund those stations?
The grand vision of SmartTrack from the campaign is dead. What remains will be a good addition to our rapid transit system, but won't have a large impact.
Council, backed by mayor Tory, voted to have it whittled down to adding a 1 or 2 more GO trains per hour with some kind of fare integration. We'll get more details in the fall. 4 to 5 OR 7 to 8 stations might be added to the RER network within Toronto, though many of those stations would've been added as part of the RER plan regardless of SmartTrack
Options C and D on Page 16 of this presentation are what remains on the table. Option D, which is essentially identical to what was planned for RER, is most likely to be picked in my assessment. This is also the option favoured by Metrolinx staff. This is because Option C would add too many stations on the corridor, slowing down regional RER trains, and there isn't enough distance for these regional RER trains to overtake trans serving the new "local" stations each other sadly.
Note that frequencies at and north of Scarborough Station and west of Union would be 9 and 10 minutes respectively. Our chief planner has said that SmartTrack ridership drops dramatically once frequencies dip a little below the 5 minutes mark, having an inconsequential impact on the broader network.
http://www.metrolinx.com/en/docs/pd...oardMtg_RER_and_SmartTrack_Integration_EN.pdf
If those 8 station within Toronto would have been added anyways as part of the RER plan, I still do not understand why Toronto has to pay towards it. Was Toronto asked whether they wanted those stations and if they had the money to fund those stations?
Shhhh! Some still think those are "SmartTrack" tracks.I think Option C is needed if they are indeed moving towards the Scarborough Subway being only 1 stop. The SRT corridor will be cleared for the GO tracks, and Scarborough may be fighting for more stations.
It will be the biggest transit project since the Montreal métro, but this one will be built and mostly funded by a pension fund.
The Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, the province’s pension fund manager, unveiled on Friday a light-rail network it intends to build, with the first stations coming online in 2020.
“Every time you take this train, you’ll be paying into your retirement,” said Michael Sabia, the CEO of the Caisse.
Answering decades of demands for an airport link from downtown, the $5.5-billion Réseau électrique métropolitain will be a vast network linking the South Shore, the West Island and Deux-Montagnes to both the airport and the downtown core.
“What we’re announcing today is the most important public transit project in Montreal in the last 50 years,” said Macky Tall, the president of CDPQ Infra, the Caisse’s infrastructure arm.
Leaving from Central Station, the 67-kilometre network will use the track running through the Mount Royal tunnel, taking over the Deux-Montagnes line — which already runs electric trains — from the Agence métropolitaine de transport. New tracks will be built over the new Champlain Bridge, and link to the South Shore, ending near the intersection of Highways 30 and 10 in Brossard. Two other dedicated tracks will be built, branching off from the Deux-Montagnes line, where Highway 13 meets Highway 40. One track will head to Trudeau airport, with a stop in the Technoparc in St-Laurent. Another will follow Highway 40 toward Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue. The existing Vaudreuil-Dorion train line won’t be affected by the project.
Light rail trains are smaller and carry fewer passengers, but the service will be more frequent than the current AMT service, Tall said.
![]()
This is not the pension manager’s first foray into public transit. The Caisse is one of the builders of the Canada Line, a train that links Vancouver’s airport to the downtown area and the suburb of Richmond. It was built in time for the 2010 Olympic Games.
However, Sabia admitted this project represents a much greater risk, since the Caisse is the principal investor and has to recoup both its capital investment and its operating costs. But he’s confident the Caisse will achieve “market competitive returns” on the project.
“We are taking the traffic risk here,” Sabia said. “This is unusual because generally, it’s governments that take that risk.”
![]()
Mayor Denis Coderre, right, listens as Michael Sabia, president and CEO of the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, describes public transit projects for the South Shore and West Island at a press conference at the Caisse’s headquarters in Montreal on Friday, April 22, 2016. John Mahoney / MONTREAL GAZETTE
Matti Siemiatycki, an associate professor of urban planning at the University of Toronto, said this is a first for Canada, so it’s an untested funding model.
“Internationally, there have been privately funded and financed commuter rail lines, but in most cases, they don’t recover their operating costs, let alone their capital costs,” Siemiatycki said.
He said because it has holdings in engineering, train manufacturing and train operating companies, the pension fund does have an advantage. But he’s not sure it will be enough.
“It’s possible they can realize economies, but it doesn’t take away the fact that most transportation systems in North America are not recovering their operating costs, let alone their capital costs, so that will be the Caisse’s challenge,” he said.
Sabia said the Caisse intends for most of the revenue to come from fares, which he said will be similar to the ones currently charged by the AMT.
“That’s a big chunk of it but, of course, as you know municipalities today have made a public policy decision to encourage people to use public transit,” Sabia said. “We would expect that current practice would continue and contribute to the overall financing of the project.”
Because the trains will be fully automated, Sabia said the operating cost of the network will be low.
The Caisse, which has a real-estate investment division, will also try to recoup some of the investment through development along the line, but Sabia said the bulk of the revenue will come from ridership. The Caisse expects a daily ridership of 150,000, compared with 85,000 that currently use the Deux-Montagnes line, the 747 airport bus and buses across the Champlain Bridge.
The Caisse has promised trains will leave every three to six minutes from the South Shore and every six to 12 minutes on the West Island and Deux Montagnes Line, for the duration of its 20-hour operation schedule from 5 a.m. to 1:20 a.m. The Caisse estimates it will take 40 minutes to take the train from either Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue or Deux-Montagnes to downtown. It will take 30 minutes to go from Central Station to the airport. It will take between 15 and 20 minutes to travel from Brossard to downtown.
Tall said the decision to follow Highway 40 was made because of work going on in the Turcot Interchange. That work would have prevented crews from building dedicated lines for the next five years. He said building along that corridor would also cost $1 billion more because it would require a track dedicated to passenger traffic.
The thorny issue of parking remains unsolved, however. Currently, many stations along the Deux-Montagnes line are over capacity and there is no space to build new parking spots.
Tall said the Caisse will speak with municipalities about this issue and hopes to come up with a solution.