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 kowalski
   
 |  | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 20 on 10/30/2007 5:06 PM >
|  | | | Posted by Air 33
I know your arguing now for the sake of arguing, because Spadina is and was busy enough to justify placing the subway line there which would have eliminated a secondary streetcar lane.
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This is pure and simply wrong. If there was enough ridership on Spadina to justify a subway it would be impossible to climb the stairs from the Bloor-Danforth platform for most of the day because the floor above would be completely packed with people waiting for a streetcar. It would look all the time like the corner of Yonge and Bloor does when the subway goes down. Since it doesn't, and since the streetcar route on Spadina seems to handle the demand quite effectively, it's really impossible to argue that Spadina could support a subway.
| University and Yonge are too close together. |
Based on what criteria, beyond your own sense that they are too close together?
| Also, the university subway line was you know eventually comes up and then snakes further west via bathurst and then ending at dufferin at downsview. |
It snakes further west to take advantage of the Allen Road corridor, as originally laid out in the Spadina Expressway proposal, and not because of any natural, irresistable need for heavy rail at this longitude. In fact, given the more sustained densities that went up along Bathurst Street rather than along the Allen, the line would arguably have been better set beneath Bathurst (although this would have been much more expensive).
| So that is how the university line is justifiable so close to yonge street? |
It served the other side of the extant downtown commercial centre and acted as a relief for Yonge line overcrowding once the Bloor-Danforth line opened -- it allowed commuters coming in from East and West to ride this line down to their jobs in office towers and provincial ministries on University and York rather than the overcrowded Yonge line, and provided a choice for those heading to Bay Street. Since the line is packed at rush hour and reasonably busy south of Bloor even in the late evening, I have to conclude that this routing was a success.
Since there are plenty of other transit lines in the cities you apparently admire that run very close together while beneath major business centres, I'm really dumbfounded by your fixation on this, unless you're trying to prove your complete ignorance about transit systems.
| The Chinatown is quite new @ Dundas and Spadina. Its actually grown substantially with many European buildings and churches torn down which were in the early 80's bought up by Chinese businessman. It's not as old as you suggest. If anything that area was Jewish, eastern European if anything with Kensington market and the outlying area. |
a) I didn't suggest it was any older than the 1960s. This is when Chinese merchants were forced to move west from the "original" Chinatown at Bay. What I'm saying is that since then you cannot imagine a subway beneath Spadina without imagining the destruction of this Chinatown and its replacement with higher density office and condo towers. Well, unless you simply desire a subway there for a whim and don't think about how it would be justified or what its ramifications would be for the area. I think you're wrong about the dating though, the major period of growth as a Chinese business centre seems to have occurred in the 1970s, not the 1980s. Feel free to provide me with actual proof of your date though, and I'll stand corrected.
b) How would the East European shops and churches that preceded the current ones have supported a subway line any better than Spadina's current businesses do today?
| But let's go with your argument for a minute, if the subway was built under spadina, how would that disrupt that 'building stock'? Are you suggesting that building a transit system there is impossible, because if it physically is -- rather then practically I'd love to know why. Also, practical arguments aside, I won't even bring up how yonge and Sheppard was torn up for 3 years if I remember right when it was being built. |
I'm suggesting that the only way you can justify a subway beneath Spadina is if you envision the current buildings and businesses replaced by larger office towers and condos.
| I didn't realize one had to be qualified to enter a discussion here. Your making that claim for me, and obviously for yourself. If we want to speak about 'qualifications' maybe the only person engaging in this discussion should be a transit planner or urban planners. |
I use 'qualified' in this discussion to denote being aware of basic facts such that you make arguments in reference to them, rather than airing opinions that have no basis in fact. If you want to have a discussion about the current and future transit system in this city, you need to know what the TTC is proposing. If you don't know that, you have no legitimacy in having this discussion until you go and do some reading.
| There is a whole corridor of apartments along Eglinton from Weston road onwards which is high density. Also I never said people lived at the airport. I said many people work there, both at the airport and the related light industry around. |
There is a group of towers between Scarlett and Royal York, then suburban residential housing west until Kipling, and then another line of towers west of Kipling. This does not a corridor make, and even if it did it's unclear to me how you envision an airport subway serving the more eastern cluster of towers. An Eglinton LRT line does seem to make a fair measure of sense, as has been proposed in Transit City, but you'd actually have to read up on that proposal for us to be able to discuss it.
| Well that's a whole 'nother issue all together. I won't even bother saying anything about how poorly the future developments were planned for by the city itself. There area large sections of this city that are impossible to navigate without a car. |
It's no worse than any other area of the GTA, and much better than Mississauga. It's a development that we as a North American civilization have dropped the ball on. But there's no sense throwing good money after bad, we need to plan a future transit system that is responsive to the scale of city that we have built for ourselves, and the needs of the people living it, not wasting our money on subway dreams (see: Sheppard subway, Spadina subway extension to Vaughan). Unless you want to advocate for a massive crash program in urban redevelopment, spending untold trillions to change the built landscape we have today to one more reflective of those in which interlaid heavy rail transit systems are justified.
The service the TTC provides has always been poor, but now with further discussion of cuts and a fair hike, I don't think there's much to defend there.
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This is something you really have to unpack. Define "always".
How does "always" relate to cuts to TTC funding?
Specifically, what was TTC service like before the mid-1990s cuts when the province withdrew its operations funding? (and here I don't want a subjective "it was never good," I want hard numerical facts)
Is service today better than it was at the beginning of the decade? (The answer I'm getting from everything I read is "yes")
And more importantly, what happens to TTC service if we don't have the fair hike?
What is behind the TTC's funding shortage? (I've already given you the answer in a previous thread, an answer which you continue to conspicuously ignore in favour of blaming the system itself)
What sort of transit service do we get if we refuse to properly fund the system?
How does building more subways improve service on St. Clair or Steeles (or for that matter, Warden or Martin Grove?)
| Also, I'm not against an LRT lines as you seem to be saying, I'm asking why this was NOT something that happened 20 years ago. |
Because in North America, people saw heavy rail subways and gas-fueled buses as the twin pillars of the future. In the mid-1960s the TTC had a plan to build an LRT network throughout Metro but it was shelved. Toronto almost tore up its remaining streetcar lines in 1971, like every other city in Canada did. Some brilliant activists (who were probably pilloried as out-of-touch ultra-leftists at the time) managed to convince the TTC and the city to retain them. But through to the present day, the provincial and federal governments (the guys who write the capital cheques) have been strongly biased towards heavy rail systems. They look bigger and better, and they allow more money to be funneled to friendly construction and engineering firms. The internal engineering culture at the TTC has walked in lockstep with this until very recently, and that's why we're getting the Spadina subway extension.
The Transit City proposal represents a sea change in how the TTC is approaching transit development in Toronto, and what now has to happen is for the provincial and federal governments to come onside and give it the capital to actually build the thing. The province has announced a bunch of funding, but of course none of that has actually been delivered yet. And essential also is that expansion in service always comes with an expansion in operating expenses. We need the province and feds to both acknowledge how essential effective transit systems are going to be, not only to the futures of our largest cities, but to the country as a whole, and to fund their operations accordingly.
I've said this before, and I'll say this again since you didn't acknowledge it last time. Since the mid-1990s when the Harris government eliminated its funding, Toronto is the only city in North America whose transit system's operating budget is funded completely out of the municipal budget and the fare box. The McGuinty Liberals have provided a couple of one-time subsidies, but have failed to restore a long-term commitment to operations funding. This is why the fares are rising, this is why services recently improved may have to be cut again, this is why other improvements are not being made.
| No, I was aware of the density and size differences, but is there any other type of infrastructure development going up to accommodate all the high density buildings downtown? Because if transit isn't cutting it now, they won't be 10 years from now either. |
You point to problems with service far from downtown, you complain about the lack of rapid transit service to the airport, and then you connect these to increased density in the downtown itself? Your argument is muddled, so I really don't know how to respond to this part.
| And you've ignored the best part of this post itself, the amalgamation/take over aspect aspect. I think its a great idea. |
It's a terrible idea. Why would we want a province that refuses to commit to restore funding to TTC operations now, and which has a history of promoting or adopting bad technologies and bad development plans (the current CLRV streetcar, GO Urban/Magnetic Levitation, the Scarborough RT, Sheppard subway, Spadina subway extension), in charge of the entire system? Why would we want a government that is responsive to voters in Wawa and Sarnia and Carlton deciding the level of service that riders of the 79 Scarlett Road bus are going to receive?
There is no shortage of things that the current administration of the TTC does poorly. I would submit to you that giving the province control would improve nothing, would make the service even less democratic than it is now, and would introduce many new opportunities for incompetence and for terrible boondoggles wasting your hard-earned tax and fare dollars.
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Swamp Thing
 
Location: Elsewhere
Not a real user.
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 21 on 10/31/2007 2:13 PM >
| | | | Posted by kowalski
Not to be pedantic, but Toronto's subways are heavy rail. Streetcars are LRTs, and the Scarborough RT is a bastard hybrid that was only birthed through provincial incompetence. When the TTC and transit advocates talk about a new network of LRTs, they're talking about streetcars on, as you say, dedicated right-of-ways.
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Thanks for the clarification, kowalski.
As I went walking, I saw a sign there,
And on the sign it said “No Trespassing.”
But on the other side it didn’t say nothing, That side was made for you and me. - Woody Guthrie, "This Land Is Your Land" |
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Jannx
  
Location: on Location
Gender: Male
stay low
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 22 on 11/1/2007 3:50 AM >
| | | | In public speaking you have a maximum of 10 minutes before you lose people's interest or attention. In radio/tv advertising you have 20 seconds, print it's 5 words.
You're losing us. But I'll vote for you as the next TTC Chairman.
ue.. it ain't what it usta be... |
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kowalski
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 23 on 11/1/2007 5:44 AM >
| | | | Posted by Jannx
In public speaking you have a maximum of 10 minutes before you lose people's interest or attention. In radio/tv advertising you have 20 seconds, print it's 5 words.
You're losing us. But I'll vote for you as the next TTC Chairman.
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This is a text-based message forum. If you can't be bothered to read what I've written, you can't be bothered to read what I've written. Don't push that back on me.
All I'm trying to do is answer and evaluate, honestly and thoughtfully, what's being said. I don't think I should have to provide soundbytes here, but if you really need a 5 (6) word distillation of the message, here it is:
The province has hurt the TTC.
There you go, feel free to return to watching television.
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Swamp Thing
Location: Elsewhere
Not a real user.
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 24 on 11/1/2007 3:36 PM >
| | | | Posted by Jannx
In public speaking you have a maximum of 10 minutes before you lose people's interest or attention. In radio/tv advertising you have 20 seconds, print it's 5 words.
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You lost me after "In public speaking you have".
As I went walking, I saw a sign there,
And on the sign it said “No Trespassing.”
But on the other side it didn’t say nothing, That side was made for you and me. - Woody Guthrie, "This Land Is Your Land" |
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Jannx
Location: on Location
Gender: Male
stay low
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 25 on 11/1/2007 4:49 PM >
| | | | Posted by kowalski
This is a text-based message forum. If you can't be bothered to read what I've written, you can't be bothered to read what I've written. Don't push that back on me.
All I'm trying to do is answer and evaluate, honestly and thoughtfully, what's being said. I don't think I should have to provide soundbytes here, but if you really need a 5 (6) word distillation of the message, here it is:
The province has hurt the TTC.
There you go, feel free to return to watching television.
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I won't watch television. Do you?
ue.. it ain't what it usta be... |
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Jannx
Location: on Location
Gender: Male
stay low
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 26 on 11/1/2007 4:50 PM >
| | | | Posted by Swamp Thing
You lost me after "In public speaking you have".
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lost me after, "You lost me after "in
ue.. it ain't what it usta be... |
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Air
  
Location: Canada
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 27 on 11/1/2007 5:49 PM >
| | | | Posted by Jannx
lost me after, "You lost me after "in
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... This conversation is lost.
"The extraordinary beauty of things that fail." - Heinrich von Kleist |
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micro
Gender: Male
Slowly I turned
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 28 on 11/1/2007 5:53 PM >
| | | | Kowalksi won.
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Air
Location: Canada
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 29 on 11/1/2007 5:56 PM >
| | | | Posted by micro
Kowalksi won.
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So that would make you a yes man?
"The extraordinary beauty of things that fail." - Heinrich von Kleist |
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micro
Gender: Male
Slowly I turned
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 30 on 11/1/2007 6:52 PM >
| | | | No, that would make me someone who couldn't resist a dumb play on words. On the other hand, if agreeing with someone who puts forth a position based on facts and logic results in me being seen as a "yes man", then so be it.
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Stewie
Location: Hamilton, Ontario
Gender: Male
kill your idols
| |  | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 31 on 11/1/2007 9:11 PM >
| | | | Nobody won, the TTC is still fucked up.
> The hierarchy of power dictates that the person with the most power does the least amount of work and retains the highest benefit. |
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Jannx
Location: on Location
Gender: Male
stay low
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 32 on 11/1/2007 10:46 PM >
| | | | Posted by micro
Kowalksi won.
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I'm back! Micro,some of us have to be prudent about surfin' at work.
I didn't know this was a contest... now you tell me! That's a material omission. You should let everyone else in the thread know it's a contest and let us know what the prize is for winning. BTW did K know this was a contest? I think he'd have tried harder if he knew. I know I would have.
Alternatively how about all thread participants meet at the Vesta Lunch this Saturday at noon for arm wrestling. Loser buys the other guy a bowl of soup.
I'll still vote for ya K as TTC "Commish". BTW what's yer opinion of the Golden Report?
ue.. it ain't what it usta be... |
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kowalski
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 33 on 11/2/2007 2:09 AM >
| | | | Posted by Jannx
BTW what's yer opinion of the Golden Report?
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If we're going to discuss that anywhere, I'd suggest we'd better do it in the "housing activists are raging ultra-leftist aliens... and incompetent too" thread.
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micro
Gender: Male
Slowly I turned
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 34 on 11/2/2007 2:48 AM >
| | | | Posted by Jannx
I didn't know this was a contest... now you tell me! That's a material omission. You should let everyone else in the thread know it's a contest and let us know what the prize is for winning. BTW did K know this was a contest? I think he'd have tried harder if he knew. I know I would have.
Alternatively how about all thread participants meet at the Vesta Lunch this Saturday at noon for arm wrestling. Loser buys the other guy a bowl of soup.
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Dude, it's UER. Everything's a contest.
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micro
Gender: Male
Slowly I turned
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 35 on 11/2/2007 2:49 AM >
| | | | p.s. I really miss eating at Vesta.
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Air
Location: Canada
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 36 on 11/2/2007 4:14 PM >
| | | | I'd prefer Madeleine's Cherry Pie And Ice Cream down the street. I'm not to fond of how Vesta changed its sign, it was its hallmark.
[last edit 11/2/2007 4:15 PM by Air - edited 2 times]
"The extraordinary beauty of things that fail." - Heinrich von Kleist |
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Agent Skelly
 
Web Sheriff
Location: Oregon Territory
Gender: Male
Prenez De L'Avance Avec Chrysler!
| |  |  | | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 37 on 11/2/2007 7:22 PM >
| | | | Just out of curiosity, is the TTC's bus, LRT, and Subway divisions all separate agencies with their own DBA?
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y2k98
Gender: Male
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 38 on 11/3/2007 12:52 AM >
| | | | Posted by Air 33
NYC...
http://www.mopocke...bway-map-thumb.jpg
Moscow...
http://www.aisee.c..._month/metrosm.gif
1. London, England: 258 miles
2. New York City, United States: 230 miles
3. Moscow, Russia: 211 miles
4. Tokyo, Japan: 175 miles
5. Seoul, South Korea: 173 miles
Now, the fact that this subway doesn't even connect to the airport, which would also be greatly useful for workers who work in the light industry/hotel industry in that area isn't pathetic enough.... I've never understood why the university line is 400m away from the yonge line downtown. That's the stupidest layout ever.
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i really like the way Moscow is laid out the circle in the middle connecting you to all lines
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OCInfiltrator
Location: Ottawa, ON
Gender: Male
| | Re: TTC --- Provincial?
<Reply # 39 on 1/14/2008 4:03 PM >
| | | | Posted by kowalski
It's a terrible idea. Why would we want a province that refuses to commit to restore funding to TTC operations now, and which has a history of promoting or adopting bad technologies and bad development plans (the current CLRV streetcar, GO Urban/Magnetic Levitation, the Scarborough RT, Sheppard subway, Spadina subway extension), in charge of the entire system? Why would we want a government that is responsive to voters in Wawa and Sarnia and Carlton deciding the level of service that riders of the 79 Scarlett Road bus are going to receive? |
Could you expand on the CLRV thing? I never heard anywhere that they were a "bad technology". In fact I've heard that they are what kept the streetcars running into the next century.
If they kept the PCCs running, then they would of kept having people trying to elimate the streetcars claiming the "Fleet is old". It's happened in Ottawa and it's happening in Edmonton right now with their trolley buses.
[last edit 1/14/2008 4:06 PM by OCInfiltrator - edited 1 times]
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