I'm doing my part to relieve Toronto traffic congestion. I live in Mississauga and stay the hell out of Toronto to the greatest possible extent. The closest I get is driving across the 401 in non rush hour (an oxymoron in the GTA) on the way to and from the cottage. There is no play or sporting event compelling enough for me to drive to the downcore core, just not worth the hassle.
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It took 3 hours to drive a 7-minute walk in Toronto Tuesday
- Thread starter matthew
- Start date
Eastern was two lanes during rush hour, and you knew the only place where the radar would sit.
Lakeshore in the East end was always two or three lanes. It's a mess now because of the Gardiner being dismantled.
Danforth was two lanes if you had a small vehicle. It was only later when we started having too many cars, that people would park illegally so that you couldn't get by.
Eglinton/St Clair etc. too many lights now.
It used to take me 8-12 minutes to cross the city on the Gardiner from Mississauga to the Beach.
Ontario Line costs have been updated to well over $1B/km (double last years prediction). That is >$1300 for every person in Ontario. I suspect >90% of the population will never use it even once in their lifetime. It makes it really hard to improve transit when we have set up a system where prices are this crazy. For comparison European high speed rail is $15-25M/km (not a great comparison as they are operationally different), tunneled projects in the US are ~250-500M/km, Singapore recently built a line at $130M/km.
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I don't consider any of those usable alternates for at least a decade+, likely much more, but they may have been at one time.
As an old timey example, when I lived downtown and worked downtown I actually drove/rode to work, back then I used Queens Quay and Sherborne. Queens Quay these days is a total no-go with the changes they made and all the condos now. Even back then Lakeshore was a waste of time during rush "hour".... Queens Quay was also great for driving to Jays games from out of the city back then as well, if you knew where tons of cheap parking, walking distance to the dome, less traffic--all long gone now.
I would NEVER consider driving to a concert or game downtown these days, why pay that much for parking and fight traffic with clueless people that don't normally drive down there (more times than not less cars but worse than rush hour as they have no clue where they are going). Transit is the answer in this case.
Back to modern day, my daughter is now a city lifeguard but started this summer in wading pools. She was moved all over the city from Yonge west and sometimes as far as the Don Valley....my wife insisted on driving her to work and picking her up each day (mostly 10AM ish drop off and 4 to 5 PM pickup), very few issues with traffic, again knowing the routes pays off. There were a few pools where I put my foot down and told her, you are taking transit to that one... ain't nobody got time for that.
Lack of long term planning, politics, fear of repeating previous mistake and special interest groups are a huge problem.
Looking at the raised portion of the Gardiner. We have a wide railway ROW that crosses the city. We could build over-top of the railway from roughly Fort York to the DVP with minor issues near Union and crossing overpasses. The rail could be used to ship in prefabbed sections with few disruptions to rail traffic. Transit and highway on the raised section. Tear down the current raised section once complete to make a grand Lakeshore... Instead they want to do this to build a f-ing park....
There is a fear of raised highways due to the condition of the Gardiner, I say it owes us nothing given how long it has been in place but it IS still needed, we also have better tech for raised highways these days. Railways will block it, having them ship in sections can fix that with $$$$s. Special interest groups want less roads... and would rather everyone rot on Lakeshore (schadenfreude). Lack of planning, should have been done 20 years ago, before most of the condos were built around it.
Afaik, rail companies own the air rights above that corridor. They know what they have and what it is worth. Even if government expropriates, rail companies will push for (and probably get) land prices suitable for a row of condos. That is in the ballpark of $300 per buildable sq ft so in the ballpark of $15,000/sq ft of air rights above the rail. The stupid rail deck park was going to be 20 acres. The cheque to the rail company would be on the wrong side of $10B. You haven't even built anything yet (and that was a relatively small park, not the entire corridor). Now, if government changed laws to make that air space worth less (eg. no structures allowed in the area), then expropriated, then changed laws to allow construction, it could be a fight over bad faith but would probably save billions.
We have a similar issue in hightension hydro corridors. Great places to build light rail, big fight over ROWs...
Time for Canada/Ontario/Toronto to grow some for the better good IMO.
Have you noticed how, when you share something, the borrower locks in the deal and you never get sole possession back again? I can understand the ROW issue.
Putting in a bike path is relatively cheap with more spent on legalities than asphalt. A few million makes a long asphalt pathway. Of course then comes winter maintenance.
Light rail with stations, even on free land, you couldn't get one station built.
Nationalize right of ways? Obviously quite a few issues there but an interesting thought experiment. Instead of every project being a fight, right-of-ways are protected as a way to get people/goods/data/utilities places and other entities can apply to a centralized authority controlling them all when they want to add something.
"centralized authority"
Can you name an unbiased, competent one acceptable to all parties?
No. I told you the idea had major flaws. Sadly, when things get nationalized, bias, competency and acceptable no longer matter. If you want access, you deal with the bureaucracy as you have no other options. On the upside, you only need to deal with one authority instead of a half dozen.
ROW is a major issue both on the surface, above ground and underground.
Turns out the city owns the ROW down below also! You know how much of a pain in the *** it is to get easements below ground!? Just went through it. Then there is a 1ft (!!!!!) wide sliver between the ROW and private property that also needs to be expropriated / leased.
Want hydro to do some work on a pole and move it 5m? Good luck with that. 5 months of back and forth over a 3x3m parcel of land.
There’s a reason projects cost this much here…and construction is just one part.
Each utility company does their own work. You don’t get a quote…they do it, and we pay.
‘Oh sorry….there was more work than we anticipated….that’ll be another 200k.’
I could go on and on and on….because I’m living it. LoL
A 2x cost for OL at this stage is not surprising. Add another 10B by the end of it. Building downtown is painful, frustrating, and demoralizing once you get every stakeholder to the table.
‘Hey utility you forgot to move that thing. What’s up with that?’
‘Oh sorry. We forgot.’
‘When can you get it done?
‘Not sure. Well slot it in.’
‘But I got a contractor waiting and claiming for delays.’
‘Sounds like a you problem not a me problem.’
Turns out the city owns the ROW down below also! You know how much of a pain in the *** it is to get easements below ground!? Just went through it. Then there is a 1ft (!!!!!) wide sliver between the ROW and private property that also needs to be expropriated / leased.
Want hydro to do some work on a pole and move it 5m? Good luck with that. 5 months of back and forth over a 3x3m parcel of land.
There’s a reason projects cost this much here…and construction is just one part.
Each utility company does their own work. You don’t get a quote…they do it, and we pay.
‘Oh sorry….there was more work than we anticipated….that’ll be another 200k.’
I could go on and on and on….because I’m living it. LoL
A 2x cost for OL at this stage is not surprising. Add another 10B by the end of it. Building downtown is painful, frustrating, and demoralizing once you get every stakeholder to the table.
‘Hey utility you forgot to move that thing. What’s up with that?’
‘Oh sorry. We forgot.’
‘When can you get it done?
‘Not sure. Well slot it in.’
‘But I got a contractor waiting and claiming for delays.’
‘Sounds like a you problem not a me problem.’
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Horrible place to build light rail. The towers that hold up the cables are robust…but sensitive to vibrations.
They have very little tolerance for any type of disturbance. I believe the limit set by the utility is 0mm of movement, and 0mm/s (?) vibration allowed.
Those are hard numbers to achieve when you have light rail, or any type of constant movement, passing by all day long.
A zero limit is them being obstinate aholes not engineering. Even most historic buildings have an acceptable limit above zero where no damage is expected.
Oh I know. But that’s what they’re pushing and that’s what I have to deal with.
A few years ago they said that hydro, cable and telephone wanted to team up and go underground, sharing the costs. Everyone agreed as the poles in the back yard were over 50 years old.
Then Bell and cable bailed out but hydro continued on. I was told the price per house was $60,000. We still have the poles.
How do they recoup the $60,000?
Bell has an acess easement across the back of the property
Agreed. The cost is very high to take all the cabling underground. New subdivisions have it underground as it makes sense and much cheaper to do it at the start instead of breaking apart driveways, roads and sidewalks along with lawns.
Enbridge also has an easement on your property for their lines.
Hydro has one for the aerial cable between the feed and your house also.
Every utility maintains an easement to access their property.
AllistonGT
Well-known member
You'd be too late. Those lands for the most part are already owned by developers.
And have been for decades. They had land locked up and plans in place for subdivisions in hillsdale decades ago for instance. If they dont own the land, one of them will have it optioned so it's not available for you to purchase.
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