In Saturday’s Globe and Mail, I wrote about a Markham councillor – a conservative, no less – who has a radically sensible notion: That Metrolinx and the Toronto Transit Commission should actually work together to create an integrated transit network. Imagine that: cooperation in the public sector. What a concept!
In particular, Jim Jones has been talking up a plan to twin the tracks on the GO rail corridors, buy electric trains, and develop a two-tier express/local commuter rail service linked to the TTC’s east-west lines. Building on the anti-diesel movement in the west end, Jones’ scheme not only delivers rapid transit to Scarborough, it also opens up a space to re-cast the debate about the downtown relief line, which, to date, focuses mainly on another subway line.
But before Jones’ untested idea can receive any kind of serious technical and financial scrutiny, the province and the city need to make a concerted effort to coordinate the way Metrolinx and the TTC carry out their long-ranging planning.
The lack of interoperability between GO and the TTC is an old and much commented-upon phenomena rooted in jurisdictional rivalries and the physical constraints of the city’s rail infrastructure. The consequences are writ large on our geography: with a few exceptions – Union Station, Yorkdale, Finch, etc. – the GO network doesn’t connect to the TTC, and the city, for its part, turns its back on the GO stops (e.g., Oriole Station, hidden cleverly under the 401, off Leslie).
The new LRT lines, coupled with Metrolinx’s proviso that the TTC roll out the Presto card across its entire network, begins to break down the pointless psycho-political wall separating the two agencies. The question now is, what else can be done to further reinforce and build on these connections, with the goal of leveraging the opportunities that arise by combining two crucial transportation networks.
Seems to me we’ve arrived at an especially fortuitous moment to be thinking creatively about far-sighted solutions that don’t involve uploading the TTC.
With Metrolinx preparing its long-awaited investment strategy, John Tory is brewing up an advocacy campaign to encourage the McGuinty Liberals to get off their asses and implement the revenue tools needed to fund transit expansion. Metrolinx, moreover, is cooking up Big Move 2.0, a mandated refinement of the agency’s long-range plan. The TTC, in turn, is scrambling to solve the worsening subway crowding crisis. And Waterfront Toronto is trying to figure out how to deliver transit to the soon-to-be-populated West Donlands and East Bayfront.
A good first step: quickly move to improve the linkages at the governance level. Why isn’t TTC chief general manager Andy Byford, for example, an ex-officio member of the Metrolinx board? And given the imminent citizen appointments to the TTC, why shouldn’t Metrolinx have a guaranteed seat on the Commission?
Right now, the lines of communication between the two are hopelessly circuitous, as the March transit war proved. There’s no reason why the two agencies shouldn’t have some kind of institutionalized connection at the governance level. That’s how it works with Waterfront Toronto. Why not with transit?
It also seems logical that the GTA’s major transportation agencies (GO/Metrolinx, TTC, Mississauga Transit, York Region Transit, etc.) establish some kind of permanent secretariat so senior officials have a forum where they can regularly meet and address future planning issues related to the integration of their respective networks.
Transit officials do talk to one another already about operational matters. But if Metrolinx and the province succeed in gaining support for new revenue tools, those communication channels and venues for joint planning will need to become much stronger.
The same thing should happen with land use planning. Metrolinx, to its credit, is actively developing “mobility hub” strategy to intensify around some of the GO stations. The goal: create mixed-use, pedestrian-friendly nodes on lands now dominated by asphalt parking lots.
Many of these are in the 905, obviously, but Metrolinx is working on a couple of potential City of Toronto locations, including Weston and Bloor/Dundas West, both planned stops for the Air-Rail Link on the Georgetown South corridor. Metrolinx and the City have been refining a planning vision for Dundas-West [PDF] for about two years. A key detail: digging a short pedestrian tunnel linking the eastern end of the Dundas West subway station and the GO platforms, currently accessible by a pair of glorified drain-pipes under a rusty rail overpass.
That planning process, long-overdue, is evidence of increased institutional cooperation, although the money decisions — who’s going to pay for that tunnel? — have yet to be worked out. Less clear, however, is whether the TTC and Metrolinx, the city’s planners, and other agencies (e.g., Infrastructure Ontario) are putting their heads together to find other locations and opportunities to create those kinds of connections. The Waterfront seems like one obvious venue, but there are others.
Markham’s Jim Jones, taking the long view, correctly believes there’s an opportunity to intensify at the proposed local Scarborough stops along his I-METRO-E, each of which intersect with TTC routes and east-west arterials.
Or consider the west end, and #stclairdisaster specifically — intersected, as it is, by two GO rail corridors (Barrie and Georgetown) at Caledonia and Keele. At council last week, a staff report estimated that it could cost at least $30 million, but probably more, to widen the underpass just west of Old Weston Road.
It’s a huge sum. But if we’re going to go to the trouble and expense of re-building that bridge to fix a traffic problem, surely we should thinking about how to leverage that outlay to link the streetcar and the GO service that passes above.
Yes, it’s all very long-range stuff. But if and when Metrolinx’s investment strategy receives political assent, the possibility of establishing such linkages is no longer abstract and impossibly remote. Yet all that potential depends on the province and the city demolishing the silos that have long separated GO and the TTC and replacing them with a formal kind of partnership arrangement, such as the one that characterizes the relationship between Waterfront Toronto and the city.
With tens of billions of dollars and the GTA’s congestion crisis at stake, the region simply can’t afford to have these two systems traveling on separate tracks.
10 comments
It’s unbelievable that the connection between the ARL and Dundas West Stn. is not on the table to be open by the time the ARL is ready. This is the only other stop on the line right now, and without it, the stop is pretty much useless.
I think that this idea is only halfway there… I think the TTC and Metrolinx should be abolished along with all the other Transit systems. A new system that combines the current ones (Brampton, Mississauga, TTC, YRT/VIVA, GO, essentially Hamilton to Pickering) should be made and a zoning system should be put in place. Think London UK. There system runs fluidly and functionally and transports so many people efficiently and from a large area without much of a headache (even when the tube has problems there are way better fixes/alternatives than TTC). This would help remove the problems of funding since the funding pool would be larger and more would have to come from the province since it is cross-regional. The initiative would also have to have a plan for the next 50 years that is phased in with major hubs and major lines leading to those hubs. Oh, and first on the list should be an airport to downtown rapid transit/subway line.
What do you think about Montreal’s system integration? Is it something Toronto should consider and look towards?
The key is fare integration. Riders should pay a small premium instead of a second fare to transfer between the two systems- like they do in the 905. I think it would entice millions of TTC riders would start using GO to travel within Toronto overnight.
It will never happen, but I would like to see some of our subway and GO stations relocated to facilitate better connections. For example, imagine if when you got off the subway at Main, Dundas West, or Leslie transferring to a GO train would be as seamless as going up a set of stairs and changing platforms.
Another more realistic option could be running TTC buses which run directly into GO stations, and are scheduled to connect with the trains. An example could include to create a branch of the Leslie bus to connect directly into the Old Cummer station to connect with the GO trains, rather than have them all operate on the street with no consideration for such purposes.
For its credit, this does exist a little bit. Kipling and Kennedy both have relatively smooth connections to their GO counterparts. And Exhibition GO has a smoothish connection with the Harbourfront streetcar and the Dufferin bus (the latter over the summer months only). But more needs to be done.
In a perfect world, the TTC would realize that it should buy the Toronto parts of the GO network along with a few disused CN and CP tracks, build some new connections and then integrate it fully into their system. This is exactly what was done in London with several surface rail corridors to create the new Overground, which is part of Transport for London. Anyone who has ridden both Overground and Underground on the same journey (same fare zones, same fares, utterly seamless) can tell you how incredibly pleasant the experience is — it overnight greatly boosted the suburban transit experience and filled in some big gaps. They will even open a suburban circle line of sorts later this year using the Overground. Transit heaven.
GO could still run in giant trains from the more distant suburbs and cities, like proper regional railway, but the TTC would control all “urban” transport above and below ground allowing for smooth travel within metro Toronto.
Shame we will never see it here.
@Ben Smith. you’re right – it will never happen. You can’t move subway tracks and you certainly can’t move rail corridors. But the city can direct development, it can invest resources to improving the public realm around these stations and it can work with property owners to dig pedestrian tunnels. In every big city metro I’ve been in, there are some long tunnel networks between interchange stops and I’m okay with that. Mostly, you want to allow commuters to do two things: (i) switch systems/lines without going outside (or at least remain under a roof); (ii) pay using one fare media that allows riders to buy combination fares either online, at the point of embarkation, or via a monthly/weekly pass.
iSkyscraper – for the City it was deemed more important to put a bike path on the CN Leaside Branch. I’m sure the voters in the leafy estates either side of the line like the idea of bikes more than an MP40 or even an electric ALP46 thundering past. The big picture be damned.
I find it suprising that Long Branch hasn’t been discussed as a mobility hub. The station includes TTC streetcars and busses, Mississauga Transit busses, and a GO station. It certainly isn’t perfectly seamless (there is a parking lot between the GO station and the other modes of transit), but with a presto card, it works decently. Perhaps it would be worth finding out how the TTC and Mississauga transit managed to make this station work and build on that.
TFL (Transport for London) is indeed a good model here as they are focused on the identity and the general seamlessness of Greater London’s transportation needs (even extending to Bixi/Boris bikes). It doesn’t mean individual companies/agencies can’t operate under the TFL umbrella, but that they must meet certain targets, fares must be integrated based on the region’s zones and the look, feel and identity carries throughout. I just keep getting the sense that Metrolinx doesn’t have the imagination and likely political power to make this a reality. All eyes should really be on McGuinty to charge Metrolinx with doing much more.