There's an easy if unpalatable fix for high pedestrian loads at peak. Reduce the lane count on York and Bay Streets and widen the sidewalks. As a society seem to pour concrete to widen highways for peak demand all the time.
Okay, lets put this into numbers
14,000 people exited Union onto Front Street in 2006 AM peak period. 2021 pedestrian modelling estimated that 24,000 people would exit onto Front street in AM peak hour. This doesn't include GO RER, which is set to double Union Station usage. So that brings us up to 28,000 users
At 15 min frequencies, SmartTrack will add 14,000 pedestrians to Union Station in peak hour. It will add 26,000 at 5 min frequencies.
Now, the Relief Line Short (Downtown to Danforth), according to Yonge Relief Network Study, is set to add 10,800 passengers at peak hour to the vicinity.
The Relief Line Long extension will add another 9,200 riders to the vicinity.
28,000 + 26,000 + 10,800 + 9,200 = 74,000 pedestrians at peak hour.
Now this still doesn't include alightings from a Relief Line western extension, nor does it account for future growth, nor does it account for increase Yonge or University Line ridership.
We can bicker about the exact numbers, but what is clear is that the area infrastructure is nowhere near sufficient for handling these loads. Perhaps we could make area streets into pedestrian malls.
Oh, and then there's the issue of Union Station (TTC) capacity. It's apparently running at high capacity today. It won't be able to handle these loads, that's for sure.
