MDV3
Active Member
sorry guys but im very comfused right now....
What is the current situation for subway and RT in Toronto????
What is the current situation for subway and RT in Toronto????
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Transit City Plan
- Thread starter 299 bloor call control.
- Start date
Northern Magus
Active Member
Lol ask again after the next provincial election!!!
MDV3
Active Member
oh i really do hope that wasnt directed towards my question cuz im probly going to go into a VERY long depression now
Rainforest
Senior Member
In many cases, yes. If we are going through the pain of ripping up the street to add transit lanes, could as well install rails in those lanes.
One exception is when existing lanes are re-designated as transit-only lanes. In that case, painting them as transit-only is many times cheaper and faster than installing rail.
Rainforest
Senior Member
I frequently travel on Allen Rd / Dufferin. The bus-only lanes between Sheppard Ave and Finch Hydro Corridor work well and most of drivers obey them. Occassionally a rogue driver zooms there to bypass traffic, but I have not seen buses being blocked by cars.
Though, I would not predict that curbside lanes will work equally well everywhere, based just on that example. That section of Allen / Dufferin is a mini-expressway, not many cars using the curbside lane to access retail parking lots between the traffic lights. On a street with another character, the traffic patterns might be different and less favorable for curbside transit.
I used to live in the Eglinton / Bathurst area. Sections of Eglinton West around there have curbside HOV lanes, but they are of little help since delivery tracks etc park there even during the morning rush.
Though, I would not predict that curbside lanes will work equally well everywhere, based just on that example. That section of Allen / Dufferin is a mini-expressway, not many cars using the curbside lane to access retail parking lots between the traffic lights. On a street with another character, the traffic patterns might be different and less favorable for curbside transit.
I used to live in the Eglinton / Bathurst area. Sections of Eglinton West around there have curbside HOV lanes, but they are of little help since delivery tracks etc park there even during the morning rush.
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Take a trip to Ottawa. It'll change your mind on whether or not they can work on a retail-sided arterial roadway. They can.
Except that doing curbside lanes vs doing in-median lanes is a completely different exercise. Curbside is just a road widening, none of the median structures need to be changed. Doing in-median is literally a complete reconstruction of the entire roadway. It's building an addition onto a house vs ripping it down and building an entirely new one.
For people who are so concerned about the cost of projects, this idea of "oh let's just add rails" while completely ignoring the fact that it costs OVER DOUBLE PER KM to do LRT than it does BRT seems kind of funny. And as I said before, you don't need to build BRT all at once, LRT you do. Ottawa has been upgrading sections of the Transitway for the past 20 years, with most of these upgrades coming along sections where BRT service already existed. You build the cheap sections or the sections where lanes are most needed now, and then you gradually build out more sections as the need or the funding comes. It may be piecemeal, but you don't need a continuous buses only corridor for BRT to be effective. To start off with, you just need it to be able to bypass the problem spots.
Eug
Senior Member
Really?
I've driven the Eglinton from Etobicoke (Islington area) to midtown route several times in the past few months in morning rush hour (8 am), and the HOV lanes have stayed pretty empty. Not always completely empty when you get close to the core, but reasonably empty for the most part. The HOV lane does disappear at the Allen, but that's to be expected as the left lane gets completely parking-lot-ified as they went to turn onto the Allen.
On the Eglinton from Scarborough (Kennedy area) to midtown route at the same time, the HOV lane is basically completely empty. No parking of course because parking there would be pointless, but people don't venture into it driving either unless they're turning. The police are pretty vigilant along that route, and if you get caught it's a big ticket.
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TransitPolicyChanger
Active Member
I would have to say "just a widening" is not exactly as simple as paving over the grass between the sidewalk and road. Any additional lane on the road would require relocating sewers to the new inside lane and a total resurfacing of the pavement to ensure the lowest part of the road is in the new HOV lane. Obviously at this point light pole relocation and sidewalk work would have to be undertaken.
Not overly complicated and definitely not on the same level as in median work, but still something that would take time and money.
I acknowledge that, I'm just saying by and large widening a road an adding an outside lane is a less expensive and less extensive process than completely redesigning a road to accomodate two additional central 'in-median' lanes. The only time when this is not the case is on roads where a wide enough median has been left to accomodate two addtional lanes on the inside (ex: on rural 400 series highways).
And the entire roadway doesn't necessarily have to be resurfaced. I've seen many cases where the road is widened and they simply match the new asphalt grade to the existing asphalt grade.
Amy Rose
Active Member
Shouldn't Finch be in median/ Hydro corridor if there is any sort of substantial BRT construction, since it is getting an LRT somewhere in the future, but its best to rip and redo with a new ROW, followed by adding rails and utilities, than widen, followed by a rip, redo with a new ROW, and then add rails and utilities
leopetr
Active Member
Are you including vehicle purchases and garage construction in either of those numbers?
Viva is my usual example of BRT/pre-BRT because I ride it. I like what they are doing, but they are leaving the problem spots for last.
They are:
- Single tracking the busway at the Highway 7/404 chokepoint
- AFAIK, not doing anything in narrow downtown Richmond Hill
- Not building anything on Yonge between Finch and Highway 7 in hopes of getting a subway there instead
No. That's purely infrastructure costs. In any case, it would likely cost more for LRT for both of those items anyway. The City of Ottawa's Supplementary Network plan has consistently shown that the proposed BRT projects come in between 1/3 and 1/2 the cost per km as the proposed LRT projects (specifically the in-median along Carling Ave). I've referenced this plan several times in a couple of threads.
VIVA is a decent example, but it pales in comparison to what OC Transpo runs. VIVA is a premium service, and in many ways does not integrate as well with the local transit system as it should. In Ottawa, all different kinds of routes are intertwined between all different road/lane configurations.
Now that's not to say that the Ottawa BRT system doesn't have its choke points too, because it does. The downtown is a mess, and that's why they're upgrading it to grade-separated LRT. This is simply because the downtown stretch has the lowest capacity of any part of the system, and it's carrying the most number of people. It's a victim of its own overwhelming success. Excess ridership is a great problem to have, it sure beats running empty buses all the time.
But yes, single tracking the busway is a huge mistake. If the station is on a busway (dedicated road just for buses), the stations should all be 4 lanes through the station. You won't find a single Transitway station in Ottawa outside of the downtown that's only 2 lanes. Heck, even IN the downtown some of them are 4 lanes. The ability to run express buses on the same corridor is one of the strengths of BRT, and not building stations to be able to handle that is a huge mistake.
Your other two are really route-specific issues as opposed to issues with BRT itself. They would be having the same space constraints in Richmond Hill if they were doing in-median LRT, and the Yonge St situation would be even less likely to happen if they were to want to build LRT instead of BRT. Personally, I think they should build the bus lanes now, and when the subway opens, convert them to HOV lanes. It's not like those lanes are going to be 'excess' once the subway opens. All it takes is redoing some overhead signs, and maybe changing a few pavement markers.
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EnviroTO
Senior Member
Surface LRT makes its money back during operations. It has less drivers per passenger carried, lower energy costs per passenger carried, has a greater impact on land value increases, has a greater impact on ridership increases, and has lower greenhouse gas emissions. If the demand is there to support LRT it is throwing money away to not have LRT.
Dan416
Senior Member
LRT like any technology has its place. Hurontario requires an LRT. I really can't speak about Finch though. Maybe BRT would be sufficient there?