Inkarnate
Active Member
Looking good. That's all I can say, pretty much.
Yes, I should look at the TTC rapid transit map which clearly shows the network extending one stop beyond major subcentres at each end (except Spadina, which is being extended to one-arguably). This is good planning. Serve the major centres with a stop, then extend a bit further past the centre for various reasons; allow space for parking, regional bus connections, promote outward growth of the subcentre, etc.
Yes, Square One is very different from Sherway, or even Don Mills. First, it has jobs, lots of them, and not just in the mall. Secondly its a major hub for local bus services. Thirdly, it will likely soon be the interchange point for an LRT and BRT. How Sherway even compares to this I really don't know.
You can disagree, but I fully support the Square One or bust approach. Its incremental thinking that got us a Sheppard Subway which we now have no political will to finish, and just creates a 'transfer city' as some have called it.
Here is the nearly finalized version of our map. Still need to do a few small tweaks, but it's coming along.
I think it is mandatory to have a connection from Malvern and Sheppard East to the Bloor line at SCC. Current travel patterns are bus routes taking people to SCC or Kennedy from the Sheppard East and Malvern area. Eliminating the Malvern to SCC connection means the existing travel patterns aren't served by the "improvements".
That map has some strange elements. What's the point of a Don Mills LRT line that's only 6km long and doesn't serve the enormous quantity of residents, schools, and jobs north of Sheppard? What's the point of that Jane LRT after Eglinton and the Spadina extension are built? Why run a BRT line to UTSC along the 401 instead of actually serving Ellesmere? Why run a BRT line through the hydro corridor near Kipling instead of up the 427 where there are actual people? Will Dundas between Dixie and Kipling have no transit? Why extend the Sheppard subway eastward and still build the LRT when there's no traffic or ridership out east? If these route choices are just the result of taking X billion dollars and dividing it up based on assumed costs of $X per km for each mode, recognize that that could be wildly off from the real costs, especially without a list of potential stations.
Scarberian
I really don't think it helps your case to call me 'amusingly ignorant'.
Anyway, I disagree about the "situation on the ground" as you call it. Mississauga Transit and GO have put a lot of resources into making Square One a major hub for local and regional transit service. An extension to Sherway or even Cooksville will likely not change the fact that a lot of service goes through Square One. The reason being that Square One is a major employment centre, with a growing residential population and planned transit-oriented developments. Yes, all those people who daily go through the Square One Terminal could just take a bus down to Cooksville, or Sherway (or Kipling). But whats the advantage to extending the subway to those points at all? Can't people from Sherway just take a bus to Kipling?
I haven't heard anyone say that an extension to Square One is needed, or even a realistic possibility at this point. I personally don't ever expect to see it happen. But if we can't manage to bring the subway all the way out to Cooksville, then up to Square One, then it might as well stay where it is now. The money needed to extend to Sherway could be better spent elsewhere, and that alignment might not be the best for continuing extensions to the west. Toronto's experience has shown pretty conclusively how much more development is spurred when subways run under streets.
Maybe I just don't understand the need to constantly expand our subway system toward the periphery. I can't imagine how an extension to Sherway will help Etobicoke or Mississauga more than an equivalent amount of money being put into GO improvements, Eglinton LRT grade separations, the Mississauga busway, Dundas LRT, etc. All of those should be higher priority than an extension to Sherway; a mall surrounded by parking lots, a ravine, light industry, a highway interchange, an unfriendly arterial, and single family homes. Explain to me why a subway needs to go here.
Why run a BRT line to UTSC along the 401 instead of actually serving Ellesmere?
Why run a BRT line through the hydro corridor near Kipling instead of up the 427 where there are actual people?
I think calling Square One the "periphery" is pretty ridiculous. Oakville or Burlington or Oshawa are periphery. Mississauga is as close to downtown as Scarborough is (UTM and UTSC are about the same distance out from UT-St George). Mississauga is home to 700,000 people, and Peel Region to over 1 million. Yet not a single subway crosses the border into this supposed "periphery" of a million people.
If Hazel McCallion wanted a subway, we wouldn't even be having this discussion. It'd be like discussing the current Spadina extension.
In additional to the Regional Rail there is also the two PATH subway tunnels from Manhattan to New Jersey (one to Hoboken, and one to Jersey City). There are 6 stations in Manhattan and 4 underground stations in New Jersey, plus one line heads to Newark with 3 outdoor stations.Here's the thing. I liken Mississauga to New Jersey in terms of the two cities relationship with it's larger neighbour. And as far as I can remember there is no subway service into Jersey from New York but there is regional rail.
In additional to the Regional Rail there is also the two PATH subway tunnels from Manhattan to New Jersey (one to Hoboken, and one to Jersey City). There are 6 stations in Manhattan and 4 underground stations in New Jersey, plus one line heads to Newark with 3 outdoor stations.
I always thought the PATH system was closer to an electric railroad than a subway. Both are similar enough I guess.
A Mississauga subway (to Square One) only makes sense if the goal is to integrate Mississauga with Western Toronto. Is there that much demand for travel from Mississauga to Etobicoke? I don't see it. A subway would also do nothing for travel inside Mississauga, since the stop spacing being proposed is almost GO like and the stops aren't necessarily being placed at major nodes in Mississauga.
What Mississauga really needs is better connections to the TTC's subway network. As has been pointed out before, an extension to Sherway would pull this off. So would an extension of say the Eglinton LRT for example. Or better connections with Mississauga LRTs so that they connect with the TTC subway network better. That's what would help Mississauga residents.
I fail to see why any of them would take the subway for other than travel to western Toronto. The analogy to Scarborough is flawed. Scarborough being part of Toronto, residents expect to pay one fare for their bus ride to the station and then their subway ride to the core. With a subway in Mississauga, residents would be paying a MT fare and the TTC fare. If that's the case why not pay a tad more and take GO anyway?
On the broader scale, if demand does not materialize will Mississauga taxpayers still be amenable to keep paying for the operating expenses of the subway, above and beyond what they'd have to pay to get their portion of the subway? I doubt it. And that reason alone is enough to caution any expansion into Mississauga. Sherway is good for the foreseeable future.