kaptrice
New Member
Toronto has a pretty uniquely weird LRT complex. In most of the US and in Alberta, the modern (70s and onwards) systems tend to be of a "tram-train" type, mixing fast railway or highway rights-of-way with inexpensive surface access into urban cores. There are a few examples of systems that are mostly rapid-transit, like those in St. Louis and Ottawa; Seattle mostly builds to rapid transit standard but is constrained by the relatively small suburban street median segment. There are some legacy systems that have central tunnels with surface branches, like San Francisco and Philadelphia. Toronto's first LRTs, on Spadina and Queens Quay, were higher-quality tramways, and the Transit City lines to me evoke the Ile-de-France tramways, even if the FWLRT flops the execution.It's unfortunate that Toronto fell for the now declining LRT fad that struck North America. I've always believed that a subway along Eglinton (and in Scarborough) would serve our needs much better, especially in the future since the region has seen record growth over the years...
The ECLRT, stitching together a rapid transit line and a tramway at Laird, definitely ought to have been either one or the other. But it's rather distinct from other LRT lines across the continent; I don't think its poor planning is a product of imitation. It's a homegrown Toronto mistake.