Toronto Union Pearson Express | ?m | ?s | Metrolinx | MMM Group Limited

TheTigerMaster said:
What costs do you think are too high for the UPX to not be worth running anymore?
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I don't know -- $1000/passenger? $10,000? $100,000?

Given that we've built a fast, efficient, direct link from the airport to downtown, I think we should pay whatever necessary to have said link bring people into Toronto. The pissant bleating about this line is insane. This is a full-out amazing improvement to our international travel infrastructure, and Toronto treats it like it's the same as East QQ LRT. I want East QQ LRT, too. But UPX and East QQ LRT are apples and oranges, and we should continue to subsidize UPX at whatever amount is necessary.

Also -- the accounting concept of 'sunk cost' is so relevant here. The $500M is gone. Spent. Your choice is 'use the $500M for the use it was spent' or 'do not use the $500M for the use it was spent.' You cannot reclaim it, spend it on something else, apply to our debt, or burn it in a bonfire. So the next time someone quotes $500M to you, just say 'Yeah, I spent it on a train to the airport. So?' and be done with it.
 
For Sheppard -- Key word is "historic" -- at one time it exceeded 10/rider -- even if not anymore.

TheTigerMaster said:
The fare cut could have very well increased the required subsidy. We really don't know at this point.
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Doubtful. If a bookmaker existed on this, I'd bet money on this. My math shows, at 8200/day riders, total subsidy is less at same operating cost.

2500 to 8200 is 3.5x more riders, and I doubt all of them suddenly are paying $5 instead of $27. More realistically, the average fare dropped from about $22 down to about $10, a 1/2.2 ratio rather than a 1/3.5 ratio. Sems to be quite a very safe margin for my claim, especially as 8200 clearly doesn't seem to be the floor... AND operating costs are almost certainly down during year 2 (elimination of some UPX execs, other costcutting under pressure, less advertising costs, startup promos, etc)... unless diesel skyrockets.

Again.....not good enough for a lot of taxpayers....no dispute.....even if it is infrastructure that is already important and useful. But the point is it is clearly highly likely it is covering farebox better than it did before the fare cut.
 
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mdrejhon said:
For Sheppard -- Key word is "historic" -- at one time it exceeded 10/rider -- even if not anymore.


Doubtful. If a bookmaker existed on this, I'd bet money on this. My math shows, at 8200/day riders, total subsidy is less at same operating cost.

2500 to 8200 is 3.5x more riders, and I doubt all of them suddenly are paying $5 instead of $27. More realistically, the average fare dropped from about $22 down to about $10, a 1/2.2 ratio rather than a 1/3.5 ratio. Sems to be quite a very safe margin for my claim, especially as 8200 clearly doesn't seem to be the floor... AND operating costs are almost certainly down during year 2 (elimination of some UPX execs, other costcutting under pressure, less advertising costs, startup promos, etc)... unless diesel skyrockets.

Again.....not good enough for a lot of taxpayers....no dispute.....even if it is infrastructure that is already important and useful. But the point is it is clearly highly likely it is covering farebox better than it did before the fare cut.
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Okay that seems to be a reasonable claim. We'll see in a few months if it materializes
 
Another mitigation would be the eventual tunnel at bloor/Dundas to the ttc. This would in theory provide more riders, as well as some commercial opportunities (coffee etc). Obviously they are limited now by the number of people thinking it's easier to just go via Kipling.

A ttc transfer/co-pay at bloor could also increase ridership once the line is electrified.

Also potential improved go service along the line further west will potentially bring more people to transfer at Weston.

potentially with the electrification of the line similar vehicle technology can be made use of to minimize maintenance costs with go. That could reduce maintenance costs going forward.
 
nfitz said:
I wouldn't call almost 50 million a year very few. That's about 28% of those who don't use a pass - almost 1/3.
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Okay then, lets try this wording. Roughly 92% of trips pay TTC less than a $3.25 fare, resulting in an average revenue to TTC per trip (including non-fare revenue like advertising and retail leases) of $2 per trip.

The topic was Sheppard's per-trip subsidy relative to UPX's. The relevant Sheppard-specific per-trip revenue figure is going to be some fraction of per-trip revenue.
 
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Wow. 564 pages of debate on a completed project. We are gonna generate conversations that keep us busy for years.

Let's do a little arithmetic since there is so much energy being expended on subsidies. There is no way that the cost recovery is lower post fare-reset in February of this year.

At launch.

Full fare $27.00
Presto $19.00

Let's assume half of the riders at the time were PRESTO card holders. That implies that the average fare paid was ($27 + $19) /2 which is $23. This is low. I never saw one person on the train with a PRESTO card other than me at that time. Most travelers were paying full fare. But let's be conservative.

So 2500 riders by $23 is $57,500 revenue per day.

Now.

Full fare $12.00
Presto $9.00

Let's assume again that half of the riders at the time are now PRESTO card holders. That implies that the average fare paid is ($12 + $9) /2 which is $10.50. Again this is low. I've seen a few people on the train with PRESTO. Vast majority still have tickets.

Now we are at what? In the vicinity of 8500 passengers per day? So 8500 at $10.50 is $89, 250.

The daily revenue has to have increased by somewhere in the vicinity of $30,000. For the not arithmetically inclined, this would be about $200,000 a week and that is $10,400,000 on an annual basis. Early days folks. This is still very much a successful work in progress.
 
TransitBart said:
Wow. 564 pages of debate on a completed project.
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This thread was not started with the completed project. If you'll check the first page, you'll see the thread was started in 2003, and the vast majority of it is discussion from the design and construction phases.
 
Megaton327 said:
This thread was not started with the completed project. If you'll check the first page, you'll see the thread was started in 2003, and the vast majority of it is discussion from the design and construction phases.
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I know that. I was thinking of how the debate didn't end with the start of operations. :)
 
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It still seems no one can figure out how to get close to their operating cost. Has anyone seen any breakdowns of this anywhere?
 
DSC said:
See: https://stevemunro.ca/2016/06/30/upx-ridership-update/
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It's also good to know that higher ridership means the cost subsidy per rider will lower as they won't need to run more trains to accommodate more riders.

Yeah this is simple to figure out except this isn't true for the TTC. TTC says they need more subsidies with increase ridership. The TTC is running at a larger loss with each additional rider.

Subsidy per rider is actually misleading. One can just say every additional rider means the government needs to throw $52 at every UPX passenger. Which implies maybe they should charge everyone $52+9 UPX fare to recover 100% of the operating cost. Increasing riders mean increasing subsidies is true for bus operation that doesn't break even even if the bus is full. Subways and trains usually make money as a crew can carry 200 or 500 riders instead of 50.
 
Finally saw a 3-car train yesterday. I'm not sure how common these are, but I frequently see trains on the weekend when taking Lakeshore West, and this was the first 3-car one I've actually seen.
 
nfitz said:
Finally saw a 3-car train yesterday. I'm not sure how common these are, but I frequently see trains on the weekend when taking Lakeshore West, and this was the first 3-car one I've actually seen.
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I use UP on the weekends when TFC are playing and, honestly, it is not that rare...I would say we are about 50/50 3 car trains and 2 car trains in our limited sample size.
 
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