Rainforest
Senior Member
Well given that one would still have to pay the transit fare on top of the parking fare, that pretty much prices the whole model out of competition.
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Well given that one would still have to pay the transit fare on top of the parking fare, that pretty much prices the whole model out of competition.
Rainforest
Senior Member
That's much more interesting .. except that free GO trains would be completely swarmed by commuters boarding inside the 416 boundaries for a fast trip to Union.
Maybe, something in between; cheaper but not completely free GO fares, compensating the lost revenue with some reasonable parking fees.
Rainforest
Senior Member
Fair enough; but it seems to me that the root is built form, rather than parking lots or lack of them.
I am in favor of shifting the transit/car balance by making transit more attractive. Policies that attempt to shift that balance another way, artificially making car trips less attractive, concern me due to the higher probability of unintended consequences.
When people feel under pressure, they respond in a variety of ways; and not necessarily in the way the policy-makers expected.
Rainforest
Senior Member
Another thought on the topic: with the arrival of self-driving cars, leaving a car at the parking lot will become optional if your transit station is not far from your home. Instead, the car will just drive itself back home, and stay there until it is needed again.
Thus, on one hand there will be less need to allocate land for parking lots, or to build the parking structure. On the other hand, you can't really use parking space restrictions to discourage people from driving, as they will be able to keep driving without relying on any parking lots.
Thus, on one hand there will be less need to allocate land for parking lots, or to build the parking structure. On the other hand, you can't really use parking space restrictions to discourage people from driving, as they will be able to keep driving without relying on any parking lots.
Streety McCarface
Senior Member
That's an even bigger waste of resources than a parking lot...
Rainforest
Senior Member
Not necessarily; that depends on the distance, efficiency of the car, and whether it is electric.
Plus, car-sharing for trips to a local transit hub will become more common. Self-driving cars will necessitate shifting much of the insurance burden from the car owners to manufacturers (as they will become the party who really has control over the car's driving skills). That, in turn, will cause people to be less attached to their cars and more willing to share them, or accept a ride.
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W. K. Lis
Superstar
We already have traffic congestion caused by single-occupant automobiles. Traffic congestion (both ways, correction four ways) would be worse caused by zero-occupant automobiles.
adrianaliu
Active Member
i guess its a tradeoff, if self driving cars make commuter lots obsolete, then that space can be used for transit oriented development within walking distance from the station. its also fair to assume that most self driving cars will (hopefully) not be privately owned. so when it drops someone off at a go station it can serve another customer. The use of cars causes traffic but the private ownership of cars causes wasted spaces in cities for parking lots
crs1026
Superstar
^ This.
When I cruise around the 905 (and parts of the 416) , I am struck by just how much of the built form is a) recently constructed and b) auto necessary (not just transit unfriendly, but downright survival-only-by-car). One simply can't say to all those folks "Our urban planning has changed, so tear down your property and build something else". If nothing else, that would be billions and billions of innvestment down the drain.
The old adage "When you are in a hole, first step out is to stop digging" certainly applies. There needs to be an override on municipal planning to force an end to further expansion of the auto rich suburbs. A hard, full stop. But then we have to figure out how to retrofit transit into the sprawling suburbs. The mainline forty-foot buses and artics that I see running up and down the main arterials out there don't accomplish that. We need new solutions. But not force-fed solutions.
- Paul
micheal_can
Senior Member
First we need to shut down the OMB. Then, if developers don't like the municipal's plan, they won't mess it up.
narduch
Senior Member
They are already changing the OMB .
But the changes will increase sprawl because they will give more power to NIMBYS
Wynne is desperate to get reelected .
Megaton327
Senior Member
I know a lot of people on this forum and elsewhere are extremely skeptical of this, but I sincerely believe self-driving cars are the solution to the problem of Toronto's suburbs' transit. Traditional mass transit in the form of larger buses, streetcars, LRT, subway, and heavy rail will, I think, probably remain necessary in major corridors, but for first/last mile trips and local or suburb-to-suburb travel, I really think self-driving cars will fix it. That might not happen until 2035 or 2040, but I don't think anyone can reasonably debate that it is inevitable and by 2050 as the absolute, worst-case latest date.
I love the idea of most people no longer owning cars, but rather there are fleets of self-driving electric cars run by Tesla, Uber, GM, etc. which roam around, pick people up and take them where they need to go, find somewhere to recharge, then go out and do some more work. And once 100% of vehicles are self driving, and the law prohibits manually driven vehicles, then (and this is where most people get skeptical, but I'm not) congestion will disappear since self-driving cars, if they constitute 100% of the vehicles on the road, can drive 1 metre from another car's bumper at 200 km/h safely, and there would be no need for traffic signals except for pedestrian/cyclist crossings (optimally with 100% self driving cars, for peak efficiency cyclists should be relegated to off-road trails or at least curb-separated/raised cycle tracks).
Of course, we do need a solution for the 25 years or so until that's a reality. I think micro-transit is the only solution that has even a chance of being feasible, run as an UberPool-type service, or using small buses like that failed Liberty Village private transit project did. Innisfil's results working with Uber are extremely promising. But I don't think that will shift the modal share that much since, for someone who owns a car, it just doesn't make any sense--it will make their trip slower, less comfortable, and more expensive. That can only be solved with full self driving roaming fleets where it no longer makes any practical sense to own a car.
crs1026
Superstar
^The problem with the self-driving car part is not that I don't accept the vision, it's that a) we can't wait for them and b) they will not ever be a sufficient and full solution.
As a first step, we need to revisit the location of services and commerce in the burbs so that the number of trips and their length is reduced. That includes, by the way, things like parks, community fitness centers, skating rinks and swimming pools, libraries, schools - all the public infrastructure which is currently as auto-only accessible as anything else.
My pet idea (which I have no spreadsheet quality supporting data for) is some form of electric mini bus jitney service which can penetrate the "curvy" streets of subdivisions and provide frequent, app-trackable, perhaps hailable or variable-routable service to key local destinations. Make them free, on the premise that a fare will be collected when people either transfer to a "grid" bus or to GO. Perhaps these could be self-driveable themselves.
I support the OMB changes, but I do not support making developers the "enemies" in this. They are, after all, the ones building all that suburban sprawl. Rather than driving them into a position of opposition, they need to have confidence that they will still make money if they transform their design and marketing to a different built form. That's a tough sell because they know what the proven markets are, and they need both carrot and stick to push towards a different market.
That market is the biggest problem. People like living in those suburbs (at least until the commute gets too long). They don't really experience the cost (except through taxes, which they fight tooth and nail). If city houses were cheaper than suburban homes, that might reverse....but we won't see that anytime soon.
- Paul
As a first step, we need to revisit the location of services and commerce in the burbs so that the number of trips and their length is reduced. That includes, by the way, things like parks, community fitness centers, skating rinks and swimming pools, libraries, schools - all the public infrastructure which is currently as auto-only accessible as anything else.
My pet idea (which I have no spreadsheet quality supporting data for) is some form of electric mini bus jitney service which can penetrate the "curvy" streets of subdivisions and provide frequent, app-trackable, perhaps hailable or variable-routable service to key local destinations. Make them free, on the premise that a fare will be collected when people either transfer to a "grid" bus or to GO. Perhaps these could be self-driveable themselves.
I support the OMB changes, but I do not support making developers the "enemies" in this. They are, after all, the ones building all that suburban sprawl. Rather than driving them into a position of opposition, they need to have confidence that they will still make money if they transform their design and marketing to a different built form. That's a tough sell because they know what the proven markets are, and they need both carrot and stick to push towards a different market.
That market is the biggest problem. People like living in those suburbs (at least until the commute gets too long). They don't really experience the cost (except through taxes, which they fight tooth and nail). If city houses were cheaper than suburban homes, that might reverse....but we won't see that anytime soon.
- Paul
Neutrino
Senior Member
Local bus service improving doesn't logically follow from closing parking lots. 905 bus service will likely remain just as crap as it is today, unless there is a major push to improve it simultaneously with the lots closing.
Streety McCarface
Senior Member
I would argue fare integration and transit spines (ie subway lines) need to be implemented before local transit will significantly improve. It's how the subway in Toronto succeeded.