I apologize to any reader of this post who is not from Toronto. This is going to be a very Toronto-specific post, but it should still be informative, enlightening and entertaining for others to see how transit planning is done in the city I like to call The City That Used To Work.
The Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) is not enamoured by my proposal for cable transit in Toronto, likely because their plan is a multi-billion dollar network of light rail lines throughout Toronto called Transit City. Fair enough.
But let’s actually break down the TTC’s argument and see why they’re not into the idea. Brad Ross, TTC transit spokesman was interviewed for the same story in the Toronto Star as I was. Let’s see what he said:
Brad Ross explicitly states “I don’t know how fast cable cars go.”
Then how can you make an effective comparison between it and Light Rail?
Brad Ross then states that “it’s not speed that makes dedicated rights-of-way (be it streetcar or other mode) so much better. It’s reliability – they don’t operate in mixed traffic and, therefore, are less likely to be delayed due to conditions beyond our control.”
No one was talking about dedicated rights-of-way in the article but, okay I’ll bite:
1) Toronto streetcars that operate in semi-dedicated rights-of way operate at speeds equivalent to those that operate purely in mixed traffic. The Globe and Mail published an article on this matter a few years ago and the TTC’s own internal statistics demonstrate this. The reliability Mr. Ross speaks of is not due to the dedicated right-of-way. It’s due to the fact that there are far more streetcars on these routes than others, giving the impression that it is more reliable, when in fact it is not.
2) The Transit City Light Rail plan does not include vehicles operating in a dedicated right-of-way. Vehicles will operate in a semi-dedicated right-of-way. This means that at intersections, the vehicles will have to contend with traffic just like everyone else, whether they implement a Transit Signal Priority scheme or not. Only the Eglinton Crosstown will have a dedicated right-of-way and that will be in the downtown portion of the line where vehicles will run underground.
(Incidentally: I am very positive on the Eglinton Crosstown line. It is the only Light Rail line we should truly be considering in my opinion.)
3) Virtually every cable transit system in the world operates in a fully exclusive dedicated right-of-way. Shouldn’t the TTC prefer a technology that operates in a fully dedicated right-of-way rather than a semi-dedicated right-of-way?
Brad Ross states that the TTC’s new streetcars will hold twice as many riders, about 260.
Okay … The Sheppard Avenue LRT plan has one streetcar arriving every 4.5 minutes. That means, every 4.5 minutes, 260 spaces will pass by a given stop. A solid, good gondola system, meanwhile can only carry 24. But let’s say you have a vehicle arriving every 25 seconds, which is totally doable with cable. Over the course of 4.5 minutes you’d have (wait for it) 260 spaces pass by the same spot. If you had a vehicle pass by every 10 seconds (also doable) you’d have 648 spaces pass by the same spot.
Brad Ross also believes that cable “would be more expensive to build, maintain and operate.”
The facts simply do not support this statement. I’ll be in Toronto for a couple of weeks in January. I cordially invite Mr. Ross to prove his point of view over dinner at The Mandarin Chinese All-You-Can-Eat Buffet (neutral territory). My treat.
Mandarin.
