Waterloo Region Transit Developments (ION LRT, new terminal, GRT buses)

[nfitz]

The line's only expected to see 30-40K passengers per day initially, which is already much higher than the existing 200 and 7. What I'm starting to question now is why they didn't build a station at Bearinger, because the entire McCormick neighbourhood is not being served by the LRT.

Bearinger itself isn't that badly served, as the platform for the Research and Technology stop is only 375 metres to the south, and accessible to the offices on Bearinger and Phillip, and with the Parkside Drive extension running down near it (hmm, that Google tells me is now called Wes Graham Way).

But I'm surprised there isn't a station at Old Albert next to the Albert McCormick Community centre. Say start the platform 350 metres north of Bearinger. That would put the centre of the platform about 800 metres north of the Research and Technology stop and about 1 kilometre south of the unfortunately-placed Northfield stop (which can only be accessed by walking north from the platform to Northfield!). A 1.8 kilometre distance between stops is almost double the average streetcar stop distance on this line!

When did they start calling that area "McCormick"? I only heard Lakeshore and occasionally Cedarbrae when I used to live near Bearinger.

You can see that's it's an unusually large gap, looking at this map. I've circled where an Old Albert stop would go in red.

 

[Streety McCarface]

Bearinger itself isn't that badly served, as the platform for the Research and Technology stop is only 375 metres to the south, and accessible to the offices on Bearinger and Phillip, and with the Parkside Drive extension running down near it (hmm, that Google tells me is now called Wes Graham Way).

But I'm surprised there isn't a station at Old Albert next to the Albert McCormick Community centre. Say start the platform 350 metres north of Bearinger. That would put the centre of the platform about 800 metres north of the Research and Technology stop and about 1 kilometre south of the unfortunately-placed Northfield stop (which can only be accessed by walking north from the platform to Northfield!). A 1.8 kilometre distance between stops is almost double the average streetcar stop distance on this line!

When did they start calling that area "McCormick"? I only heard Lakeshore and occasionally Cedarbrae when I used to live near Bearinger.

You can see that's it's an unusually large gap, looking at this map. I've circled where an Old Albert stop would go in red.

View attachment 161500

I just suggested Bearinger because it's the closest main road to the old McCormick stop. Then again, they could always put in a new station behind the McCormick community complex if they wanted to, it would just have to be 2 side platforms and trail access would need to be improved, but it's possible.

It seems really short sighted because the majority of 200 users at UW are going to McCormick.

 

[nfitz]

It seems really short sighted because the majority of 200 users at UW are going to McCormick.

Really? Good grief, it was only a few minutes on a bicycle when I used to do that. Which I'd think would be faster than the bus, given how direct that pathway is, and that you can bike from door to door, rather than having to walk to the stop at the arena, and the stop at the Davis Centre (I assume that's where the 200 stops - I've only used GO recently).

I can see on a horrible winter day that might be popular! But perhaps that's why I weighed a lot less when I was in university, as there were no viable transit options back then, other than taking the 9 to WLU and changing ... which I never tried once!

 

[Streety McCarface]

Really? Good grief, it was only a few minutes on a bicycle when I used to do that. Which I'd think would be faster than the bus, given how direct that pathway is, and that you can bike from door to door, rather than having to walk to the stop at the arena, and the stop at the Davis Centre (I assume that's where the 200 stops - I've only used GO recently).

I can see on a horrible winter day that might be popular! But perhaps that's why I weighed a lot less when I was in university, as there were no viable transit options back then, other than taking the 9 to WLU and changing ... which I never tried once!

God, things have gotten so much better here, and they'll continue to get better with the new bus terminal they want to build. Lime has piloted electric scooters here which seem to be popular for some students, but they're expensive as hell.

I personally would bike from my house on the East Side to Waterloo, but going over the freeway during winter is a no go for me (it also doesn't help that I have a bunch of textbooks), and with a free bus pass, why bike when the bus is faster?

The 200 no longer stops at Davis centre for both directions, but DC/E3/E5/EIT area (so basically DC, just shifted over for GO buses) for southbound buses, while northbound buses stop on the west side of campus (STC, QNC, EV3 (New Buildings), BIO, STC, etc). In the future, all buses will either stop on University, or will stop at E5/E6/E7/E8/E9 when the new bus terminal opens.

 

[blaixx]

It's really exciting to see a smaller city getting rapid transit, this is pretty common in Europe ofc. Will be interesting that GO will touch 4 different rapid transit systems within 5ish years.

Toronto, Mississauga, York, Waterloo, Hamilton?

 

[hw621]

^nothing in York, two in Toronto: subway and Crosstown

 

[blaixx]

^ Crosstown is part of the "Toronto subway" system, even if it is not a subway. York has a Bus Rapid Transit system called Viva.

 

[hw621]

^honestly I would not consider this rapid transit

 

[blaixx]

Why not? It has many of the same features as the Ion LRT. Dedicated ROW, Off-board fare collection, further stop-spacing, platform-level boarding, etc.

 

[Streety McCarface]

^honestly I would not consider this rapid transit

Why not? It has many of the same features as the Ion LRT. Dedicated ROW, Off-board fare collection, further stop-spacing, platform-level boarding, etc.

To be honest, with the exception of the Elevated/Underground sections of the Eglinton Crosstown, and the separated portions of the Waterloo Region LRT, I wouldn't even consider Light Rail to be rapid transit, rather, higher order transit. They're basically just trams at this point. Anything that runs on street cannot be considered "grade separated" for obvious reasons, and if there's no grade separation, then it cannot be rapid transit because the corridors are shared and other modes can be given priority.

 

[hw621]

^without proper signal priority they are not even high order transit

 

[Streety McCarface]

^without proper signal priority they are not even high order transit

It does seem apparent that iON is on track to having signal priority. I can't say the same for any Toronto line given how they treat the streetcars.

 

[robmausser]

^honestly I would not consider this rapid transit

ok, well, youre wrong.

 

[Midtown Urbanist]

ok, well, youre wrong.

Most concise end to a disagreement that I have ever seen on UrbanToronto. Succinct, to the point. I am pretty impressed.

 

[hw621]

ok, well, youre wrong.

It's missing at least two key characteristics of rapid transit: frequency and signal priority, as well as ROW only part of the route.