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Union station bike parking potential locations

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georgevicbell

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Given all the issues with moving lots of bikes in go trains, I’m wondering if there are locations around union that could massively increase the secure bike parking options at a reasonable cost to metrolinx (realizing they are building free lots for cars that cost north of 100m$ for low thousands of spots).

Some obvious space would be station road, front street (yes, the actual street itself) or new space created while working on the lakeshore streetcar projects…one idea I had was under scotiabank, I’m wondering if anyone has information about what is down there. I remember someone saying there had been space saved for a bremner streetcar station, but that it was unlikely to ever be used for that. Does anyone have pictures of the space that’s under there? Could it be used?

Would love to hear some ideas, Amsterdam went big and built under their river…at only 80m$ for 10000 spots…I would expect something in the range of 2000-5000 with expansion potential. Currently there is 240, but with high cost given parking in the suburbs is free.
 
The Bremner access was intended as a streetcar tunnel -
  1. providing it with safe entry/egress ventilation when not intended for that purpose could be tricky
  2. if an easement was obtained for a transit tunnel it may not be usable for another purpose
could tear down some more of the Bush sheds and built a deck of bike storage at the same level as the CIBC POPS?
 
georgevicbell said:
Given all the issues with moving lots of bikes in go trains, I’m wondering if there are locations around union that could massively increase the secure bike parking options at a reasonable cost to metrolinx (realizing they are building free lots for cars that cost north of 100m$ for low thousands of spots).

Some obvious space would be station road, front street (yes, the actual street itself) or new space created while working on the lakeshore streetcar projects…one idea I had was under scotiabank, I’m wondering if anyone has information about what is down there. I remember someone saying there had been space saved for a bremner streetcar station, but that it was unlikely to ever be used for that. Does anyone have pictures of the space that’s under there? Could it be used?

Would love to hear some ideas, Amsterdam went big and built under their river…at only 80m$ for 10000 spots…I would expect something in the range of 2000-5000 with expansion potential. Currently there is 240, but with high cost given parking in the suburbs is free.
Click to expand...
Is the existing Union Station bike parking area actually filled? I do not walk past too often but it is certainly not always filled when I pass by. In addition, I think one of the problems is that the GO bikes belong to Uber etc food delivery folk and they have e-bikes and want to re-charge them not just park them overnight. IF the need is for overnight bike parking (with or without charging ports) maybe a commercial parking garage could do this as they are usually empty.
 
DSC said:
Is the existing Union Station bike parking area actually filled? I do not walk past too often but it is certainly not always filled when I pass by. In addition, I think one of the problems is that the GO bikes belong to Uber etc food delivery folk and they have e-bikes and want to re-charge them not just park them overnight. IF the need is for overnight bike parking (with or without charging ports) maybe a commercial parking garage could do this as they are usually empty.
Click to expand...
My understanding is that they still have memberships available, but they are at capacity at some points…I don’t believe the current setup has ebike facilities…I believe one of the main reasons people don’t leave their bikes in greater numbers is that the cost is relatively high (1$/day)…which if you were to institute at go parking lots in the suburbs would raise all sorts of complaints. Even more so for bikes…(for reference a bikeshare is 1$/undock)…

If metrolinx took over the Toronto facility and made it competitive with their suburb car parking (ie free) I suspect it would be full tomorrow. Although as with all parking there are large parts of the day that it would be empty…

A large new facility would definitely need ebike charging and other facilities (showers, maintenance and escalator/elevators similar to the Amsterdam model). I believe they have things like vending machines for spare tubes etc.
 
DSC said:
Is the existing Union Station bike parking area actually filled? I do not walk past too often but it is certainly not always filled when I pass by. In addition, I think one of the problems is that the GO bikes belong to Uber etc food delivery folk and they have e-bikes and want to re-charge them not just park them overnight. IF the need is for overnight bike parking (with or without charging ports) maybe a commercial parking garage could do this as they are usually empty.
Click to expand...
If it's not filled it is because of bureaucratic idiocy and lack of customer centricity.
 
The new metrolinx lots have all the features, charging, little signs that show how many spots are left, 24 hour security, priority, car share, app integration, digital signage and easy access to the road.

The union bike parking area is covered with hand written notices and hidden around the corner, there might even be some stairs required.

Rutherford, Cooksville, Pickering, Centennial, and East Gwillimbury all have bike rooms that can store 140 bikes each…union is again just 240…
 
Real talk: not only are you dreaming in technicolor on the provision of suburban car parking being equivalent to downtown bike parking with charging, if it is true as many contending on this topic here and on Twitter that many/most of these riders are international students, then the other difference between them and the auto parkers is that the bikers as a cohort are much less likely to have votes at any provincial election.
 
Probably the easiest/best solution is to turn the municipal parking garage under University Ave into a bike garage. About half of the garage was going to be converted into a PATH tunnel (which is cancelled (?) I can't seem to find the webpage on the city's website anymore), but even with the PATH tunnel using over half the space you could easily fit 1000+ bikes in the rest using two tier bike racks.

Other than that, the City should try and push for public bicycle garages in nearby developments (i.e. the Dominion Public Building and/or Union Centre, these really there are only two beside Union that are left). It's unfortunate that a bicycle garage wasn't added underneath CIBC Square.

The only other feasible option IMO would be to negotiate to convert some space in a private parking garage. Building something on top of the railway tracks or underneath York or Bremner would be very expensive, and there's not really any other space left.

What really needs to happen is new stations at Spadina and Sherbourne serving all local trains, and both of these could come with much more space for bike parking.
 
dowlingm said:
Real talk: not only are you dreaming in technicolor on the provision of suburban car parking being equivalent to downtown bike parking with charging, if it is true as many contending on this topic here and on Twitter that many/most of these riders are international students, then the other difference between them and the auto parkers is that the bikers as a cohort are much less likely to have votes at any provincial election.
Click to expand...
I’m not sure if you’re saying that one person arriving by car is different than one person arriving by bike, or if you are saying that one foreign student with a bike on a go train is not equal to one bank manager unable to get on a full go train…

I think in the first case the math is pretty simple. 100m$ capital over 20 years to get 2000 people on a train is the same no matter the mode.

As for the second one…I agree that the guy on the train doesn’t get a vote…but the guy stuck on the platform does…and my guess is he’s voting to either send the guy on the platform home, or to spend the 100m$ so he can get in the train…

Let me know which one you’re talking about?
 
sche said:
Probably the easiest/best solution is to turn the municipal parking garage under University Ave into a bike garage. About half of the garage was going to be converted into a PATH tunnel (which is cancelled (?) I can't seem to find the webpage on the city's website anymore), but even with the PATH tunnel using over half the space you could easily fit 1000+ bikes in the rest using two tier bike racks.

Other than that, the City should try and push for public bicycle garages in nearby developments (i.e. the Dominion Public Building and/or Union Centre, these really there are only two beside Union that are left). It's unfortunate that a bicycle garage wasn't added underneath CIBC Square.

The only other feasible option IMO would be to negotiate to convert some space in a private parking garage. Building something on top of the railway tracks or underneath York or Bremner would be very expensive, and there's not really any other space left.

What really needs to happen is new stations at Spadina and Sherbourne serving all local trains, and both of these could come with much more space for bike parking.
Click to expand...
I agree that the existing private lots might be doable, they would need some work to make them functional and something people would want to use. They would also need some sort of public subsidy, because the actual amount people are willing to spend on parking is 0…

If each bike coach displaces 75 people paying 10$, then 10 coaches running once per day is around 3m$/yr in lost revenue. That would be about 500 bikes/day - so16$/bike should be available to spend…I would suspect private garages would be open to 8-10$/bike….
 
I was corrected on twitter, the bike coaches only hold 18 bikes (the Niagara bike train has theee coaches for a total of 54 bikes), but still likely displace 75 people…so the calculation above means likely go transit could subsize bike parking to the tune of 40$ a spot, assuming 10$ and 75 people displaced…
 
This is where the original Union Station parking garage was, on the east side of York St, at the south end of the underpass. I had hoped that when they opened the current garage it would be in addition to the old garage, but they demolished it.

IMG_20240324_160905027.jpg


Ideally as part of the construction of the south concourse they could reopen the old garage to increase capacity for overnight storage and thereby reduce demand to bring bikes on the trains themselves.
 
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