{"id":14276,"date":"2010-09-22T17:11:26","date_gmt":"2010-09-22T21:11:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingtoronto.ca\/?p=14276"},"modified":"2013-01-21T13:37:17","modified_gmt":"2013-01-21T18:37:17","slug":"tunnels-and-transportation-how-commuters-get-downtown","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2010\/09\/22\/tunnels-and-transportation-how-commuters-get-downtown\/","title":{"rendered":"Tunnels and Transportation &#8212; how commuters get downtown"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"http:\/\/farm4.static.flickr.com\/3137\/3009928780_b49d4a44ec_z.jpg?zz=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"396\" \/><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/news\/national\/toronto\/city-votes\/reality-check-rocco-rossis-toronto-tunnel\/article1706168\/\">Plenty of attention<\/a> has been paid to exploring the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thestar.com\/news\/gta\/elections\/article\/863885--the-smell-test-rossi-s-toronto-tunnel\" target=\"_blank\">logistical and financial problems<\/a> with <a href=\"http:\/\/roccorossi.com\/releases\/%E2%80%9Cwelcome-to-the-toronto-tunnel%E2%80%9D-says-rocco-rossi\/\" target=\"_blank\">Rocco Rossi&#8217;s proposal<\/a> to <a href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2010\/09\/13\/lorinc-rossis-newest-tunnel-vision\/\" target=\"_blank\">build a tunnel for vehicle traffic<\/a> from the Allen Rd. to the Gardiner Expressway.<\/p>\n<p>But it&#8217;s also worth looking at Rossi&#8217;s underlying assumption about why the tunnel is needed. More car access to downtown Toronto is required, he says, because people have such a hard time driving to jobs in the downtown core. \u201cCompanies and workers would rather establish in the 905 than fight their way into downtown Toronto every day,\u201d said Rossi. \u201cI want our kids to have a chance to live and work at good jobs in the city of Toronto.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The fact is, however, that despite the presence of both the Gardiner and the DVP feeding cars into the downtown core, only a minority of people who work downtown drive there. The vast majority &#8212; 71% &#8212; of people who travel into work downtown don&#8217;t have to fight their way through car traffic &#8212; they take GO Trains, the TTC, or they walk or cycle.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s the breakdown for people commuting to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.toronto.ca\/wards2000\/ward28.htm\" target=\"_blank\">Ward 28<\/a> (which includes most of the downtown business district) from outside the ward (all figures are from the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dmg.utoronto.ca\/pdf\/tts\/2006\/toronto_wards06.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">Transportation Tomorrow Survey, 2006<\/a> (PDF)).<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">Local transit (TTC): 38%<br \/>\nGO Train: 26%<br \/>\nWalk\/Cycle: 7%<br \/>\nCar driver\/passenger: 28%<br \/>\nOther: 1%<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>The numbers are similar (more TTC, less GO Train) in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.toronto.ca\/wards2000\/ward27.htm\" target=\"_blank\">Wards 27<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.toronto.ca\/wards2000\/ward20.htm\" target=\"_blank\">20<\/a>, which border the business district.<\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s no doubt that driving into downtown during rush hour is a pain, but if there is concern about commuters having a hard time getting downtown to work, it would benefit far more people &#8212; and increase the overall capacity of the transportation network much more &#8212; if the tunnel money was spent, instead, on enhancing rapid transit options to the downtown.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s also worth noting that, in fact, a fair amount of new commerical real estate has opened in and near the business district recently, so it does not seem like commuting woes are preventing new jobs from being created downtown. Part of the reason these new commuters have been successfully absorbed by the transportation network is that so many new condominiums have been built inside these three downtown wards, within walking distance of employment in the downtown area, that ever-increasing numbers of people are walking or cycling to work. 25% of trips to work by people living in Ward 28 were made by walking or cycling in 2006,\u00a0 29% of trips by people living in Ward 27, and 30% of trips by those living in Ward 20.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Plenty of attention has been paid to exploring the logistical and financial problems with Rocco Rossi&#8217;s proposal to build a tunnel for vehicle traffic from the Allen Rd. to the Gardiner Expressway. But it&#8217;s also worth looking at Rossi&#8217;s underlying assumption about why the tunnel is needed. More car access to downtown Toronto is required,<a href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2010\/09\/22\/tunnels-and-transportation-how-commuters-get-downtown\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"sr-only\">&#8220;Tunnels and Transportation &#8212; how commuters get downtown&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4006,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,9,8],"tags":[31],"class_list":["post-14276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-traffic","category-transit","tag-election"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Tunnels and Transportation - how commuters get downtown - Spacing Toronto<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2010\/09\/22\/tunnels-and-transportation-how-commuters-get-downtown\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Tunnels and Transportation - how commuters get downtown - Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Plenty of attention has been paid to exploring the logistical and financial problems with Rocco Rossi&#8217;s proposal to build a tunnel for vehicle traffic from the Allen Rd. to the Gardiner Expressway. 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