Many valid points, and of course a kingston rd lrt to pickering should not be considered for now, however, in my opinion, ridership numbers on many of the transit city routes do support rapid transit service. I believe that spending money on a few of those lite rail lines is better than one under used subway
Yes, the ttc ridership projections are often politically motivated, last i read in the paper the existing ridership on the sheppard subway is still well below what was projected, meaning those numbers where inflated to support the subway.
Suppose that 3000 pphpd doubles to 6000 or 7000, still not in subway territory.
I don't believe that simply building condos will drastically increase ridership. I am currently working on a large condo development right next to an existing subway and go station, I see many more people come and go in their cars than walk the 100 feet to the station.
i think that we can build a transit system that serves downtown trips as well as does its best to serve inter suburban trips. This could be done through a combo of existing subway and improved go transit, as well as the transit city lines and better express bus service
Show me where I said none of the Transit City routes should have rapid transit...you won't be able to, because I've never said that. Some TC routes will be overcrowded and should be built as subways, while others will be lightly used and should stay as bus routes. I probably support more km of light rail than you do, just not in ridiculous places or where other modes are more appropriate.
As long as the proper use of light rail is for anything between 0 and 1,000,000 rides a day in your eyes, you'll think every route should be light rail. "Under-used" subway is a meaningless statement...under-used compared to what? To a subway line that leaves people behind at the platform? To Tokyo? Do you really want overcrowded streetcars just to prove to some guy on the internet that a subway project would be "under-used"? Yeah, that attitude sure has the city's best interests in mind...
You say the Sheppard projections were inflated to support the subway, but when were those projections made? I'd bet real money that the projected Sheppard ridership was for a line to Victoria Park. Anyway, the projections will soon be reached, probably next year. At some point, you're all going to have to face the fact that the Sheppard line is a success even though it was amputated at both ends.
Condos won't boost ridership? Tell that to North York Centre station. Condos will add thousands of riders, but as for drawing more riders, extending the subway is the very best way to stimulate ridership amongst existing residents, and the longer the line is, the more people will be tempted to switch from parallel routes, especially if it went over to Downsview like it was supposed to. No transit line makes complete sense if you only build 1/3 of it - it'd be like building a Kingston streetcar from Morningside to Altoona and then complaining not enough people from Ajax are riding it.
There's a big difference between a subway extension and an entirely new subway line, a difference that you and other light rail supporters consistently ignore. Short, logical extensions should always be done using the same technology...*extension* means extension of the existing line, not a piece-meal string of modes. An extension
cannot utilize the full capacity of a subway line or no one would be able to get on. In some places, it's better to spend a bit more per km and reap the benefits of higher ridership, of redevelopment, of eliminating a transfer, of improving travel time, perhaps of keeping road lanes available for cars, etc. Subways don't need to be as expensive as everyone claims (the Spadina extension includes $500M of padding, for example, as well as everything from vehicles to yard modifications) and LRT is not as cheap as it seems.
If ridership on outer stretches of some subway lines could be handled by crowded LRT, ridership on outer stretches of every LRT line could be handled by simple buses...LRT lines costing, cumulatively, many
billions of dollars. At an estimated $9 billion and counting, Transit City isn't exactly a cheap way to marginally improve upon bus service.