Richmond Hill Yonge Line 1 North Subway Extension | ?m | ?s | Metrolinx

[drum118]

We will certainly see major, extremely dense developments.

To unlock demand, however, we will need to see a non-dumb fare system. Expecting people will pony up three bucks to ride between one and two kilometres does not meet that requirement. The densest part of the Blue route is a part in which almost noone is interested in taking it, because it's economically silly. Those are, ironically, the parts also slated for the most immediate densification, and which have the most potential for it -- the majority of the land between Steeles and Clark is basically sitting waiting for developers.

(Even under those circumstances, however, the Viva ridership would remain a poor index for likely Yonge extension ridership.)



Again, the relevance of all this is somewhat mysterious. However, for kicks, the average 2007 daily boardings for the YRT routes which run between Finch subway and points north of 7 (except for the GO 3 bus, which I did not bother trying to scare up):

Brampton-YRT 77: 2862
GO 3: ?
YRT 002 Milliken: 2317
YRT 005 Clark: 1794
YRT 023 Thornhill Woods: 759
YRT 088/88E Bathurst: 2431
YRT 091/91A Bayview South: 3994
YRT 099 Yonge South: 3818
YRT 300 Business Express: 306
YRT 301 Markham Express: 423
YRT 302 Unionville Express: 197
YRT 303 Cornell Express: 119
YRT 340 Bayview Express: 94
YRT VIVA Blue: 16678
YRT VIVA Pink: 2451
Total: 38,243

As indicated above, there are very few good reasons to think that the above numbers represent demand under a non-dumb fare scheme with a bus-to-subway transfer, never mind a one-shot subway ride. But there they are. (Obviously, it does not take into account transit that connects at Yonge-7 but not at Finch -- the new GO airport bus, the VIVA and GO Hwy 7 bus routes, and the RH GO train.)

Come on, trying to use those numbers to justify the Yonge extension north of Steeles is pulling numbers out of the air. The ridership is for the WHOLE route, not on Yonge section now.

You better check the 2008 numbers as they are lower than 2007.

The GO Airport is 75-90% empty to the point I have been the only rider on it from/to Sq One.

Model split is 7% for transit in York. If you build a development of 25,000 units, you will get 60,000 resident. 7% of 60,000 is only 4,200 new riders. You need a split of 30% to get 18,000 riders and not all will be using peak time service.

 

[Ansem]

Why not just built a LRT on yonge to the new Steeles station? It could go underground to the subway platform.

2.6 billions of LRT would serve the York region better than spending all that money on 3 station....with on that goes to a GO Train section... That's almost 15km of LRT track...

 

[Disparishun]

So, on opening day come 2018, you are going to spend $2.5B to move 1,466-1,759 for 1 hour of service at peak time while supplying no service to the existing system, riders and call this good investment??

(...)

6,663 is peak ridership come 2031 for the extension north of Steeles to RHC using 10% yearly growth.

Ridership on the Whole Existing Blue line various between 36,232 t0 137,457 using 3%-10% yearly growth. Current ridership is only increasing 1.04% yearly.

Sorry, I still don't understand you. It sounds like you are taking VIVA Blue ridership numbers, and VIVA Blue ridership growth over the years it has been in service; extrapolating those out into the future; and using them as a proxy for likely ridership of the Yonge extension. Is that what you are doing? If not, how did you come to those figures?

There is a two way street as to cost and benefit for both areas, but do they off set the cost of this extension?? Not at this time nor 20 years from now.

You wrote this in response to my asking why you thought all of the economic benefits of shuttling workers and shoppers from York Region into the City of Toronto accrued to York Region, and no benefits to the City of Toronto. But your response is trying to answer a different question -- you are talking about total value, not apportionment of value.

With the development taking place and plan along Yonge in Toronto, ridership will exceed capacity in 20 years not factoring in 905 and lines feeding into it. One only has to look at North York Centre station to see over 27,000 using a station that was never plan for in the first place with more riders coming as more development takes place around it.

You wrote this in response to my suggesting that the key benefit of an upgraded RH GO line vis-a-vis the Yonge TTC line would be to move 416 traffic (at Old Cummer and at Leslie-Sheppard/Oriole) off the Yonge line -- not so much to move 905 traffic off the Yonge line, which the RH line doesn't do as good a job of even if you upgrade it.

It sounds like your response is trying to answer a different question -- you are saying that, if we were to freeze all transit development immediately (subways, Transfer Cities), the Yonge TTC line would be overwhelmed by 2028 anyway. Um, okay.

If the Don Mills DRL gets built to Sheppard, it will remove 35% of existing ridership allowing room for future growth within 416 and some 905.

How much of existing ridership would get removed if we upgraded RH GO with transfer points at Leslie-Sheppard subway and via TTC bus at Finch East, by the way? I am all for the DRL, but not as a glorified GO line (as someone else put it I think).

 

[Paleo]

I am all for the DRL, but not as a glorified GO line (as someone else put it I think).

Isn't that what the Yonge-RHC extension is? A glorified GO line?

 

[Disparishun]

Come on, trying to use those numbers to justify the Yonge extension north of Steeles is pulling numbers out of the air. The ridership is for the WHOLE route, not on Yonge section now.

As I said very clearly, those numbers are very poor indicators as to demand for the Yonge extension north of Steeles. Yet you keep throwing around bus ridership numbers for those routes. I figure that, as long as you're going to do so, you might as well use accurate ones.

You better check the 2008 numbers as they are lower than 2007.

Are you sure? It says here that 2008 is up 5.7% at last update (September). How did you reach an opposite conclusion?

The GO Airport is 75-90% empty to the point I have been the only rider on it from/to Sq One.

Erm, yes -- it's a new service. We'll see how it does. Not sure how this is relevant.

Model split is 7% for transit in York. If you build a development of 25,000 units, you will get 60,000 resident. 7% of 60,000 is only 4,200 new riders. You need a split of 30% to get 18,000 riders and not all will be using peak time service.

First, are you seriously taking the modal split for all of York Region and extrapolating it for the southern, local-Toronto-phone-call, Toronto-adjacent suburbs? York Region includes all of the municipalities of Aurora, East Gwillimbury, Georgina, King, Markham, Newmarket, Richmond Hill, Vaughan, and Whitchurch-Stoufville. The modal split for any one of those municipalities wouldn't be particularly relevant, given how large they are. The modal split for all of them is way out there.

Second, you might consider that the units to be built in the high-density-zoned projects will have a different modal split than units in, oh, say, lower-density suburban housing. So even if you were to come up with modal splits that are relevant -- what are they for Thornhill, say? -- those modal splits would be pretty bad indicators for what newcomers are likely to do. Worse even than using VIVA numbers to indicate demand for a Yonge extension, I'd have to think.

 

[Disparishun]

Isn't that what the Yonge-RHC extension is? A glorified GO line?

No. There is a link in this thread to the EA documents, at which you can read more about the proposed Yonge-RHC extension.

The DRL needs to serve, well, downtown. The point was that, if the only purpose of the DRL is to shuttle folks to Union from the 416 suburbs along exactly the same route as GO trains, then it would make a lot more sense to fare-integrate and physically integrate GO with the TTC already, so that those currently streaming into Finch station on Steeles, Finch and Sheppard East buses can instead get a straight shot to Union from Finch-Leslie-ish and from the Leslie-Sheppard subway stop.

In fact, it makes sense to do so anyway.

 

[doady]

First, are you seriously taking the modal split for all of York Region and extrapolating it for the southern, local-Toronto-phone-call, Toronto-adjacent suburbs? York Region includes all of the municipalities of Aurora, East Gwillimbury, Georgina, King, Markham, Newmarket, Richmond Hill, Vaughan, and Whitchurch-Stoufville. The modal split for any one of those municipalities wouldn't be particularly relevant, given how large they are. The modal split for all of them is way out there.

Modal split overall in York is actually only around 4%. So I assume the 7% figure refers to the Yonge corridor only, which sounds about right. In comparison, overall modal split in Mississauga is 8% and Toronto is 22%.

Also I find your use of transit ridership stats to be very misleading. For example, VIVA Pink and Route 77 are routes for Highway 7, not Yonge.

 

[waterloowarrior]

Modal share for transit (journey to work, statscan 2006)

Toronto CMA: 22.2%
Toronto (city): 34.4%

York Region: 10.4%

Markham: 14.4%
Richmond Hill: 13.2%
Vaughan: 9.6%

North York (2001): 30.2%
Old City of Toronto (2001): 40.9%

 

[Disparishun]

Also I find your use of transit ridership stats to be very misleading. For example, VIVA Pink and Route 77 are routes for Highway 7, not Yonge.

On the other hand, I find your selective misreading of my post to be less than above board. I am making no use of transit ridership stats. I am merely providing more accurate numbers in order that those who keep quoting incorrect number for those routes have better ones.

As I said when I posted them: "Again, the relevance of all this is somewhat mysterious. However, for kicks, the average 2007 daily boardings for the YRT routes which run between Finch subway and points north of 7 (except for the GO 3 bus, which I did not bother trying to scare up):".

As I then said a couple of posts later: "As I said very clearly, those numbers are very poor indicators as to demand for the Yonge extension north of Steeles. Yet you keep throwing around bus ridership numbers for those routes. I figure that, as long as you're going to do so, you might as well use accurate ones."

Which part of this confuses you?

Modal split overall in York is actually only around 4%. So I assume the 7% figure refers to the Yonge corridor only, which sounds about right. In comparison, overall modal split in Mississauga is 8% and Toronto is 22%.

Now, when you take an unsourced modal split number for all of York Region (!), and layer on it your own assumption that that number is surely for the "Yonge corridor" -- do you mean Steeles to Lake Simcoe, or some portion thereof?

Modal share for transit (journey to work, statscan 2006)
(...)
York Region: 10.4%
Markham: 14.4%
Richmond Hill: 13.2%
Vaughan: 9.6%
(...)

Again, two things: these areas are very large and therefore misleading, and -- much more importantly -- they are not a good indicator as to the likely modal split of new units.

These areas are very large: most of the "Yonge Street corridor" doady is talking about is quite remote from most of Markham, Richmond Hill, and Vaughan. The Yonge extension is not intended to survey most of those municipalities, whether Woodbridge or Unionville or Oak Ridges or what you have. They're far away.

It's irrelevant anyhow: The discussion was as to the likely modal split of new units built along the Yonge corridor that corresponds to the Yonge extension. Astonishingly, someone threw out an (unsourced?) 7% modal split suggestion for all of existing York Region. The point, and I'll say it again, is that even the modal split for the Yonge corridor is not representative of new units. New units will be almost entirely high density condos. Existing units have a high-ish proportion of single-family dwellings, many of them on large lots. (Not as high a proportion of some parts of the 416, obviously, but that's not relevant either.)

Doady or Waterloowarrior, I think you would agree that the likely modal split for condos being built along a subway line will differ significantly from the modal split for the larger Yonge corridor area (with lower-density single-family dwellings), and even more so -- especially -- for the combined sums of Vaughan, Markham, and Richmond Hill, a huge area which runs from 427 in the west past Hwy 48 in the east, and from Steeles in the south to and usually past 19th Ave. in the north.

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

Modal share for transit (journey to work, statscan 2006)

York Region: 10.4%

Markham: 14.4%
Richmond Hill: 13.2%
Vaughan: 9.6%

Snap! And the modal split will be higher when there is a subway and it will be even higher when they are building transit-oriented development.

That said - this thread has become a Straw Man convention. People are throwing around all these numbers and it's to the point of absurdity - it's all BS. X + Y + Z proves that there are not enough riders. Blah blah blah. People are using any ol numbers to prove any ol thing.

You actually took the time to look up the ridership numbers for every YRT route and added them up? To what end? To killing the subway?

Don't get me wrong - this board is a great place for would-be planners to put some great alternate ideas out there, but people are just getting a bit too serious and entrenched.

I won't belabour the points but the province did not allocate money and say, "spend it as you see fit." It's for the subway and it's getting built so it's time to deal with that. It's nice to know what YOU would do with $2.5 billion and I'd be happy to tell you what I would do if I had $5 billion and my own rocket ship, but it doesn't really matter, does it? Don't feel bad - some people on Toronto council don't get this either.

Once the subway built and overwhelms the system or fails to produce new riders (or both, as someone actually argued!!), you can come on here and nyah nyah all you want. In the meantime, I think the discussions should be a bit more practical and accept the basic reality of the project.

 

[sunnyraytoronto]

Again, the relevance of all this is somewhat mysterious. However, for kicks, the average 2007 daily boardings for the YRT routes which run between Finch subway and points north of 7 (except for the GO 3 bus, which I did not bother trying to scare up):

Brampton-YRT 77: 2862
GO 3: ?
YRT 002 Milliken: 2317
YRT 005 Clark: 1794
YRT 023 Thornhill Woods: 759
YRT 088/88E Bathurst: 2431
YRT 091/91A Bayview South: 3994
YRT 099 Yonge South: 3818
YRT 300 Business Express: 306
YRT 301 Markham Express: 423
YRT 302 Unionville Express: 197
YRT 303 Cornell Express: 119
YRT 340 Bayview Express: 94
YRT VIVA Blue: 16678
YRT VIVA Pink: 2451
Total: 38,243

As indicated above, there are very few good reasons to think that the above numbers represent demand under a non-dumb fare scheme with a bus-to-subway transfer, never mind a one-shot subway ride. But there they are. (Obviously, it does not take into account transit that connects at Yonge-7 but not at Finch -- the new GO airport bus, the VIVA and GO Hwy 7 bus routes, and the RH GO train.)

Those numbers include passengers getting on and off the buses anywhere along those routes,... even outside of Yonge Street between Finch Station and Hwy 7.

Does anyone have any numbers on the number of passengers York Region Transit and Viva drops off at Finch Station on the Yonge subway line? Especially during AM Peak time (passengers per hour).

The number of buses travelling southbound on Yonge Street between Finch Avenue and Steeles Avenue is 370 buses at AM Peak time from 6am to 9am. I think this 370 buses is total number of buses southbound from 6am to 9am,... and not 370 buses southbound per hour at AM peak. See slide 44 at http://www.vivayork.com/downloads/jan_23_09/January_20_PCC_presentation.pdf Say half are TTC buses and 10% are GO, that leaves about 150 buses belonging to York Region Transit and Viva. What's the split between Viva and YRT buses? What's the split between YRT and Viva 40 foot buses that carry max of about 50 passengers and Viva 60 foot buses that carry max of 75 passengers? Let's say 50-50 so we have 75 40-foot buses and 75 60-foot buses: 75 (40 foot YRT&Viva buses) x 50 passengers + 75 (60 foot Viva buses) * 75 passengers = 3750 + 5625 = 9375 Thus YRT and Viva drops off a maximum of about 9375 passengers at Finch Subways station on the Yonge Subway line from 6am to 9am Monday to Friday,... about 3000 passengers per hour at AM Peak time (6am to 9am Monday to Friday).

 

[Rainforest]

I won't belabour the points but the province did not allocate money and say, "spend it as you see fit." It's for the subway and it's getting built so it's time to deal with that. It's nice to know what YOU would do with $2.5 billion and I'd be happy to tell you what I would do if I had $5 billion and my own rocket ship, but it doesn't really matter, does it? Don't feel bad - some people on Toronto council don't get this either.

Once the subway built and overwhelms the system or fails to produce new riders (or both, as someone actually argued!!), you can come on here and nyah nyah all you want. In the meantime, I think the discussions should be a bit more practical and accept the basic reality of the project.

Nothing is set in stone yet, and a chance still exist to move DRL ahead of Yonge North in the list of priorities. (Or, commence both projects at once if more funding is allocated.)

But when "the subway is built and overwhelms the system", it will be too late to come here and nyah nyah. I won't even bother typing my login data just for that .

 

[taal]

Those numbers include passengers getting on and off the buses anywhere along those routes,... even outside of Yonge Street between Finch Station and Hwy 7.

Does anyone have any numbers on the number of passengers York Region Transit and Viva drops off at Finch Station on the Yonge subway line? Especially during AM Peak time (passengers per hour).

The number of buses travelling southbound on Yonge Street between Finch Avenue and Steeles Avenue is 370 buses at AM Peak time from 6am to 9am. I think this 370 buses is total number of buses southbound from 6am to 9am,... and not 370 buses southbound per hour at AM peak. See slide 44 at http://www.vivayork.com/downloads/jan_23_09/January_20_PCC_presentation.pdf Say half are TTC buses and 10% are GO, that leaves about 150 buses belonging to York Region Transit and Viva. What's the split between Viva and YRT buses? What's the split between YRT and Viva 40 foot buses that carry max of about 50 passengers and Viva 60 foot buses that carry max of 75 passengers? Let's say 50-50 so we have 75 40-foot buses and 75 60-foot buses: 75 (40 foot YRT&Viva buses) x 50 passengers + 75 (60 foot Viva buses) * 75 passengers = 3750 + 5625 = 9375 Thus YRT and Viva drops off a maximum of about 9375 passengers at Finch Subways station on the Yonge Subway line from 6am to 9am Monday to Friday,... about 3000 passengers per hour at AM Peak time (6am to 9am Monday to Friday).

Well we know the total ridership is 35000 or so for all the routes that travel to the Finch Go/YRT station. So clearly the number that actually get off at Finch is much lower ... I'd argue not very much though.

You can get a good idea just based on that alone.

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

Nothing is set in stone yet, and a chance still exist to move DRL ahead of Yonge North in the list of priorities. (Or, commence both projects at once if more funding is allocated.)

Possible but highly improbable. One is approved by the province and the relevant munis, and has the engineering work and EA done. The other is basically rejected by the municipality which ostensibly needs it and, frankly, hardly exists beyond the UT boards and Metrolinx's 25-year plan.

I'm not against the DRL at all - but my support and a $1.99'll get you a muffin and a coffee at Timmies.

What would be required to make the DRL happen at this point? A road trip to Damascus for Miller & Giambrone, riddiculous lobbying of Metrolinx and hell of a lot of luck. I'm not saying it won't happen...I'm just saying the Leafs winning the cup this year might be a safer place to bet your money in the short term.

 

[Disparishun]

You actually took the time to look up the ridership numbers for every YRT route and added them up? To what end? To killing the subway?

It was actually pretty easy -- a 10-minute cut and paste job from this list of routes and this PDF to Excel.

The goal was to inject some real numbers where people seem literally to be making them up. Drum118 claiming 705 Pink riders (there are about 2500), claiming a 2007-8 drop in YRT ridership (it rose 5.7%), and so forth.

Obviously that was a bad idea -- it just proved a licence for folks to invent further arguments out of whole cloth. The made-up modal split for Georgina and King City and parts thereof, followed by an aha-this-must-be-Yonge assumption layering, is still my favourite. (Though I am kind of partial to the modal splits for Kleinburg and Unionville, too!)

Does anyone have any numbers on the number of passengers York Region Transit and Viva drops off at Finch Station on the Yonge subway line? Especially during AM Peak time (passengers per hour).

The question, Sunny, is what you think those numbers would demonstrate. Is it that you think the estimates set out in the EA report are lousy ones, and think you can do better extrapolating from the double-fare bus transferers?

Nothing is set in stone yet, and a chance still exist to move DRL ahead of Yonge North in the list of priorities. (Or, commence both projects at once if more funding is allocated.)

I think that if the City of Toronto and the TTC are serious about the DRL, they need to get on it pretty darn fast. Start by having Miller lobby McGuinty for a penny of tax per dollar, for instance. (What happened to that?) It will happen when they decide to make it happen. In the meantime, everyone else is getting on with things.

I also think that if the TTC is serious about dealing with Yonge overcrowding which, apparently, is a problem that must be addressed independently of whether the Yonge extension ever happens (it won't, I suspect), it should also be moving pretty darn fast on fare- and physically integrated TTC subways and upgraded GO train service, especially within the 416. Where is the TTC at with that, by the way?