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TTC: Sheppard Subway Expansion (Speculative)

They pretty much brought back Transit city

-Eglinton Crosstown from Black Creek to STC with the eastern portion at grade
-Finch West LRT from Humber to Finch West Subway station
-Sheppard East from Conlins rd to Don Mills Station at Grade

Will all of this be deliver on budget and on time...Highly doubtful (personal opinion)

Is it 100% a certainty?
Yes for Eglinton and Finch and for Sheppard that remains to be seen.

Many details needs to be clarify.

-Will the Liberal hold on to power after the next budget? and the ones after it? If the PC wins an election, I wouldn't be surprise if they bury Eglinton and ignore Council and they have a very good chance at electing MPPs in Scarborough. I doubt they would pull the funds since not winning Toronto costed them the election. They know they won't win downtown so they will likely target Scarborough, North York and Etobicoke. There would be no more funding after an Eglinton Subway which would kill Finch and Sheppard. Believe me, that's not a good scenario.

-2014 Election (this is the key factor)
Although I'm confident Sheppard East will be under construction, It's really doubtful that Sheppard East will have reached Agincourt by 2014 since at the council meeting, TTC said it would take 5 years to complete so at the earliest we're talking 2016-2017. They would be starting from the East going Westbound

We all know Ford will run on a platform to have the Sheppard line build. If he would undo SELRT remains to be seen. This time around, council voted to have new revenues identified and reported back to council for this fall. So the fiscal plan to finance future transit extension will be crystal clear by 2014. Ford will use those revenues tools/funds to make his subway plan more viable especially if you go after the PPP model.

-There's noting stopping another candidate proposing that the Sheppard LRT under construction ends at Agincourt and have the subway runs west to Don Mills, South to STC and extended to Downsview. Politically, any mayoral candidate will find that very hard to resist since you're attracting Scarborough and North York votes without having the Councilors with LRT being built in their wards oppose it this time around.

They're opposition was normal because at the end of the day, it was subway and nothing in their wards vs having something in their wards.

Politics is what it is and at the end of the day, they're are all trying to win. Although councilors only care about winning their wards, a mayor candidate has to win most of the votes in the entire city and proposing a completed Sheppard line with the Sheppard LRT feeding it more riders and new riders is a win-win and gets you 2 major areas of the city.

-I've been talking to Con.Robinson team today and they say the Sheppard Subway issue is far from over and they are coming to the conclusion that today's decision makes a future Sheppard pitch more solid and easier to sell.

-Revenue tools will be identified and implemented
-all the ridership that the LRT will attract farther east would go to the Sheppard subway increasing the ridership projections of the Sheppard line
 
Last edited:
Solid Snake said:
They pretty much brought back Transit city

-Eglinton Crosstown from Black Creek to STC with the eastern portion at grade
-Finch West LRT from Humber to Finch West Subway station
-Sheppard East from Conlins rd to Don Mills Station at Grade

Will all of this be deliver on budget and on time...Highly doubtful (personal opinion)

Is it 100% a certainty?
Yes for Eglinton and Finch and for Sheppard that remains to be seen.

Many details needs to be clarify.

-Will the Liberal hold on to power after the next budget? and the ones after it? If the PC wins an election, I wouldn't be surprise if they bury Eglinton and ignore Council and they have a very good chance at electing MPPs in Scarborough. I doubt they would pull the funds since not winning Toronto costed them the election. They know they won't win downtown so they will likely target Scarborough, North York and Etobicoke. There would be no more funding after an Eglinton Subway which would kill Finch and Sheppard. Believe me, that's not a good scenario.

-2014 Election (this is the key factor)
Although I'm confident Sheppard East will be under construction, It's really doubtful that Sheppard East will have reached Agincourt by 2014 since at the council meeting, TTC said it would take 5 years to complete so at the earliest we're talking 2016-2017. They would be starting from the East going Westbound

We all know Ford will run on a platform to have the Sheppard line build. If he would undo SELRT remains to be seen. This time around, council voted to have new revenues identified and reported back to council for this fall. So the fiscal plan to finance future transit extension will be crystal clear by 2014. Ford will use those revenues tools/funds to make his subway plan more viable especially if you go after the PPP model.

-There's noting stopping another candidate proposing that the Sheppard LRT under construction ends at Agincourt and have the subway runs west to Don Mills, South to STC and extended to Downsview. Politically, any mayoral candidate will find that very hard to resist since you're attracting Scarborough and North York votes without having the Councilors having LRT being built in their wards oppose it this time around.

They're opposition was normal because at the end of the day, it was subway and nothing in their wards vs having something in their wards.

Politics is what it is and at the end of the day, they are all trying to win. Although councilor only care about their wards, a mayor candidate has to win most of the votes and proposing a completed Sheppard line with the Sheppard LRT feeding it more riders and new riders is a win-win and gets you 2 major areas of the city.

-I've been talking to Con.Robinson team today and they say the Sheppard Subway issue is far from over and they are coming to the conclusion that today's decision make a future Sheppard pitch more solid.

-Revenue tools will be identified and implemented
-all the ridership that the LRT will attract farther east would go to the Sheppard subway increasing the ridership projections of the Sheppard line
Click to expand...
It will be on time. Frankly you do not take into consideration that Toronto is tired of this. Something is being done. It's time to move on for most.
 
Palma said:
Dies it not make more sense to start the LRT where the subway presently ends and move east?
Click to expand...
Would it not make more sense to tender the tunnelling contract to a separate contractor than the surface contract? Surely the expertise necessary for one, is very different to the other.
 
Palma said:
Dies it not make more sense to start the LRT where the subway presently ends and move east?
Click to expand...

50% of the work (and budget) is in the portal and subway platform extension. The ordering of the rest doesn't really matter since it will all be waiting on the portal. That is, it will not be opening incrementally.

So, it makes the most sense to start where construction can be easily staged and the design is simplist. Starting to lay track where the storage yard is isn't an unreasonable thing to do while waiting for the portal to be built.
 
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Palma said:
Dies it not make more sense to start the LRT where the subway presently ends and move east?
Click to expand...

With what tunneling machines?
Initially SELRT was supposed to be built first then the crosstown. It obviously got reversed and you can use the machines from the Spadina expension because they are to small

RBT is correct
 
Solid Snake said:
With what tunneling machines?
Initially SELRT was supposed to be built first then the crosstown. It obviously got reversed and you can use the machines from the Spadina expension because they are to small

RBT is correct
Click to expand...
Use the second pair of tunnelling machines that are going to go to start on Eglinton from the portal west of Brentcliffe. If they want to start Sheppard before 2015, they'll have to slow down Eglinton anyway (as all the money that the province had allocated was going to be spent on the underground section of Eglinton until 2015). Remember, that not only is the maximum amount from the province finite, but so is the amount available in any particular year.
 
nfitz said:
Use the second pair of tunnelling machines that are going to go to start on Eglinton from the portal west of Brentcliffe. If they want to start Sheppard before 2015, they'll have to slow down Eglinton anyway (as all the money that the province had allocated was going to be spent on the underground section of Eglinton until 2015). Remember, that not only is the maximum amount from the province finite, but so is the amount available in any particular year.
Click to expand...

I doubt they'll do that since just moving those machines is so complicated, let alone the cost of having to move them back and forth
 
Solid Snake said:
I doubt they'll do that since just moving those machines is so complicated, let alone the cost of having to move them back and forth
Click to expand...
They are still at the factory. The original plan was to move them to Sheppard, and then to Brentcliffe. How would moving them to Sheppard and then to Brentcliffe be any different?
 
Thanks for the info Solid Snake.
What about the proposed Eglinton/STC LRT extension to Malvern or atleast Sheppard?
I can only assume they left Sheppard subway western expansion for another day. I hope it's subway for the western expansion and if it's LRT they convert the Stubway to LRT to eventually make it one line.
I guess there will be as many stops as TC proposed?.....I hope not. The people along Finch and Sheppard will definately be getting a more comfortable, pleasant, reliable system than they have now with higher capacity and a chance to actually get a seat all great things. It will be a real improvement over the transit service they have now. It will, however, not really cut their commuting time at all.
The simple reality is that there is no such thing as a rpaid transit system that stops every 2 to 3 blocks, has to wait for red lights {signal priority looks great on videos but unless it's complete priority like CTrain or Edm LRT then their effectiveness is limited}, and wait for left hand turns at lights. POP helps but the reality is that suburban Torontonians are getting improved transit but not at all rapid. I think Torontonians will be impressed the service itself but let down by the fact that after years of construction their commute is nearly as long as it waas before.
 
A motion was passed today to look into extension of a subway line beneath Sheppard between Yonge and Downsview.

This might be the eastern extension of the Spadina line that was mentioned in another post on here (sorry, don't know which one). At any rate, I'm glad it was floated officially. Though it may just be a political sop.
I know numbers are dubious for it, but it it came to being feasible, it would certainly help make sense of Sheppard while soothing tempers over building a "real subway", etc.
 
Here is a full breakdown on all TTC routes as per TTC info related to ridership, km travel daily, hours of service and operation cost.

I have added extra columns to give me a more detail breakdown. I have used $1.96 revenue per rider to cover all fare media as recommended by TTC.

In all my years following TTC cost ratio's, I have never seen One TTC surface route do a full cost recovery. Yet, based on TTC current numbers, almost 50% of the routes make money and they show up as red numbers. First row is per rider and the 2nd row is for all the riders.

A fair number of surprise in out come and no way to say if they are correct or wrong. No idea how current TTC ridership numbers are.

I wish TTC had number for the weekends.

Anyway you want to look a numbers, you cannot get a true picture related to any route without more detail info based on this breakdown.

I would like to see what the ridership numbers look like as blocks as follows, as it tells a very detail picture what is taking place. For 85 and 190: block A is from Don Mills to Victoria Park; Block B is from Victoria Park to Warden; Block C is from Warden to Kennedy; Block D for 190 is from Kennedy to STC; Block E 85 from Kennedy to McCowan; Block F from McCowan to Markham Rd; Block G is for the balance of the route.

I know from past travels on the 190 going both direction for block D, numbers are very low and fall below the riders/km average at times. I keep on planning to do number counts, but haven't found the time to do it so far.

If we use the ridership/km average for block D, we are getting about 16 riders per trip. Great numbers for a subway.

If 190 and 85 combine have a ridership of 37,200 a day today for the full route length, how can it get to 100,000 by 2031 to even think of having a subway if only 50% of the existing riders would use it?

You can find the spreadsheet Here and broken down on various pages for ranking.

I did a joy ride on VIVA Blue to Newmarket on Wed and here is what I observed for a southbound bus at 6:10pm. We left with 9 riders and carry a total of 27 riders from the terminal to Bernard. 9 riders were on the bus with only 7 of the original were still on it. When we left RHC, we had 17 riders with 6 of them from NM. When we hit Steeles, 3 of the NM riders got off, as well 10 other ones. We arrived at Finch with only 4 riders with one from NM. That an 70 minute trip.

Doing the math is easy, but doing for one trip is not a true picture of what the route really looks like. I know going north from RHC it was peak load, but fell to only 15 riders going to the end and no idea if they got on along the way.
 
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