[Rainforest]

Even when we improve TSP, remove stops and raise the ridiculous speed limits, the LRT will never be able to achieve speeds comparable to a rapid transit line, since it's in the middle of the road with pedestrians wandering across the tracks, to/from platforms and across.

Speed of a true rapid transit line may not be achievable. But at least, this thing needs to run faster than a mixed-traffic bus.

The mixed-traffic bus deals with all the same impeding factors: traffic lights, pedestrians wandering across. In addition, the mixed-traffic bus gets blocked by other vehicles (normally, not the case for LRT), and has more stops than the LRT.

The TTC or Metrolinx should review the situation, and let the public know how the mixed-traffic bus manages to run faster under those conditions.

Is that just because the rail transit department wants to be more cautious than the bus department, and the two departments don't talk to each other? In that case, the rules ought to be changed.

Or, is there something that makes the LRT inherently slower than the bus? Rails, steel wheels, overall weight, location of platforms in the middle of the road instead of curbs? If that's the case, then it pretty much ends any plans to have more suburban LRTs built. Noone will want to invest in making the public transit slower.

 

[robmausser]

Even when we improve TSP, remove stops and raise the ridiculous speed limits, the LRT will never be able to achieve speeds comparable to a rapid transit line, since it's in the middle of the road with pedestrians wandering across the tracks, to/from platforms and across.

This is easily fixable with barrier fencing along the route of the LRTs.

But people find this unsightly and overbearing.

Pedestrians wandering platforms is a non-issue in that its the same issue with any other kind of rail without platform screen doors.

 

[reaperexpress]

This is easily fixable with barrier fencing along the route of the LRTs.

View attachment 709807

But people find this unsightly and overbearing.

Pedestrians wandering platforms is a non-issue in that its the same issue with any other kind of rail without platform screen doors.

That's part of it, but the other part is that it's a lot harder to provide a green light for a line going through the middle of an intersection than a line that just crosses roads using a level crossing or simple intersection. Even the City of Toronto can implement highly effective signal priority at simple intersections:

To enable the signal to provide a green for approaching trams you need to be able to truncate the side street, so there needs to be a separate pedestrian signal just for crossing the tracks, separately from the ones crossing the road. So for a median ROW you need three-stage pedestrian crossings:

and for side-of-road ROW you need at least two-stage pedestrian crossings:

That requires more lateral space for pedestrian islands than the 1- or 2-stage designs used on Ontario's existing median transit ROWs. So if we want to be serious about providing signal priority to transit in dedicated ROWs, we need to start building intersections in a way that actually makes it practical to do so.

 

[mrgrieves]

I think it's tempting to blame all the speed issues on TSP... but I'd bet that even if the lights were ALWAYS GREEN for the LRT it would still be slow and unreliable.

The TTC is still afraid to run the LRT through intersections faster than 30km/h (which is hilarious)
The TTC still doesn't want to run the LRT at its top speed of 60 - 70 km/h anywhere because of increased wear and tear and maintenance
The stops are still spaced way to close together compared to other LRTs
The TTC operators still like to accelerate super slowly
The TTC still has switch problems that require the LRT to run slower over switches and around curves
The LRT still can't run after a modest snowfall

So by all means let's demand TSP but just don't make that a scape goat for all that ails this awful $3B waste of resources.

Politically, I'm wondering what happens after improvements are made but the line is still slow. Definitely LRT's will not get built again in TO. The line is in a part of the city that unfortunately many people don't care about. Does the $4Bn wasted matter to the public?

All of these might get lumped together with Eglinton, which could be a disaster also, but is higher profile

 

[reaperexpress]

However, it is a good idea to address the TSP improvements first, simply because there exists a political consensus that it has to be done.

And then, dependent on the outcome of TSP improvements, the TTC will have to decide if they want to:
- Accept the outcome and do nothing else
- Review and modernize the safety rules to improve the speed
- Dramatically cut the number of stops (cutting just 3 stops would be hardly noticeable, they would have to go from 16 non-terminal stops to just about 7 or 8)
- Change the safety rules and cut the stops at the same time

TSP only works effectively if it has an accurate estimate of when the tram will arrive at the intersection. So if you add or remove speed restrictions you need to recalibrate the whole system. For this reason I think it makes more sense to raise the speed restrictions at the same time they're redesigning the TSP so they don't have to redesign the TSP twice.

If there is enough political support, raising the speed restrictions could also happen equally quickly, it's not like any physical changes are needed to lift them, it's just a matter of programming in the CBTC system.

 

[Monarch Butterfly]

Don't most transit vehicles now have GPS included in them? Part of why they are more expensive cost of electronics these days. With GPS, they could give their locate and speed to trigger a green signal for them, not to the second. No need for sensors in the track or overhead to implement real transit priority. If I can track my luggage at the wrong airport, Shirley surely they can track the larger LRVs.

 

[reaperexpress]

Politically, I'm wondering what happens after improvements are made but the line is still slow. Definitely LRT's will not get built again in TO. The line is in a part of the city that unfortunately many people don't care about. Does the $4Bn wasted matter to the public?

All of these might get lumped together with Eglinton, which could be a disaster also, but is higher profile

Based on my observations of delay sources on Finch, if they eliminate the speed restrictions at intersections/platforms and improve the TSP they should be able achieve Metrolinx's original 34-minute schedule, which is an 18 km/h average. That's faster than the bus, but still far short of any subway line. Eliminating a few stops could maybe get it down to around 31 minutes (20 km/h). The question then becomes whether a 20 km/h average is fast enough for a line that costs billions of dollars.

If they had built the line in the Finch hydro corridor, it easily could have averaged over 30 km/h with level crossings where it intersects other roads. In that case the line would have provided much greater benefit to the people of northwest Toronto who currently need to spend a ridiculously long time on the tram/bus/subway to get to their workplaces, appointments, etc.

 

[Milaisacat]

I think the very term "transit signal priority" overpromises, because it sure sounds to reasonable people like transit will get signal priority.

It's not a great parallel, but at airport security, the priority line is universally understood to be designed to let eligible people get through security as fast as possible. The priority line is an exclusive line that gives special people priority to access the next available screening station ahead of regular people.

If, instead, the priority line still had to take turns with the regular line and allow, say, a dozen regular people to proceed to security for every priority line person, it would still be faster, but not by a whole lot. Maybe if the priority line person was running late and their flight was departing soon, they would only have to wait for 6-8 people to go ahead of them, but under no circumstances would be given front-of-the-line privileges.

 

[reaperexpress]

I think the very term "transit signal priority" overpromises, because it sure sounds to reasonable people like transit will get signal priority.

It's not a great parallel, but at airport security, the priority line is universally understood to be designed to let eligible people get through security as fast as possible. The priority line is an exclusive parallel line that then gives uses priority to access the next available screening station ahead of regular people. If, instead, the priority line still had to take turns with the regular line and allow, say, a dozen regular people to proceed to security for every priority line person, it would still be faster, but not by a whole lot. Maybe if the priority line person's flight was really soon, they would only have to wait for 6 people to go ahead of them, but under no circumstances would be given front-of-the-line privileges.

Exactly. This is the fundamental miscommunication between traffic engineers and the general public. The public hears "transit gets through with as little delay as possible", while engineers hear "transit gets through with less delay than it would have if we completely ignored transit"

 

[urbanclient]

That requires more lateral space for pedestrian islands than the 1- or 2-stage designs used on Ontario's existing median transit ROWs. So if we want to be serious about providing signal priority to transit in dedicated ROWs, we need to start building intersections in a way that actually makes it practical to do so.

Toronto's street right-of-way widths, or road surface widths are not conducive, if not wholly incompatible with building such a wide cross-section with a side or median tram ROW, if two car lanes are maintained in each direction. (Median trams tend to be more space efficient.)

This is why it's not feasible to replicate Line 6 Finch West on other corridors, much less build a version of the Calgary CTrain in the City of Toronto, even if the bus corridor has the transit demand to justify an upgrade. Zoning laws and municipal code would have to be completely revamped for building setbacks and driveway lengths to be shortened to squeeze a tram ROW onto something like Finch East, the busiest bus corridor. This is politically infeasible as NIMBYs would fight this tooth and nail, especially if expropriation is necessitated by inconsistently narrow public ROWs.

The minimum curb to curb width needed for mid-block is 23-24 metres for a tram and a four lane road. This translates to 32 metres for the full public right-of-way including sidewalks and boulevards (road verges), with more width needed at intersections. The vast majority of Toronto streets are narrower. Even places that are ostensibly 36 metres in official documentation are often significantly narrower due to materially inaccurate records or the City not building to the full width for bridges etc. Finch West is listed as 36 metres wide, and even it becomes uncomfortably narrow for car lanes in certain areas. Both screenshots show the width of two car lanes in one direction on Finch (lane lines not painted yet).

Here are two examples of '36' metre wide ROWs that come nowhere close: section of Bayview 18 to 25 metres wide, and Finch near Yonge 24 to 27 metres:

https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/984d-cp-official-plan-Map-03_OP_ROW_AODA.pdf

Toronto Official Plan Street ROW widths: https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/984d-cp-official-plan-Map-03_OP_ROW_AODA.pdf

Toronto LANE WIDTHS GUIDELINE V3.0: https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9175-Lane-Widths-Guideline-Version-3.0-AODA.pdf

I'll expand on this at a later date.

 

[innsertnamehere]

Toronto's street right-of-way widths, or road surface widths are not conducive, if not wholly incompatible with building such a wide cross-section with a side or median tram ROW, if two car lanes are maintained in each direction. (Median trams tend to be more space efficient.)

This is why it's not feasible to replicate Line 6 Finch West on other corridors, much less build a version of the Calgary CTrain in the City of Toronto, even if the bus corridor has the transit demand to justify an upgrade. Zoning laws and municipal code would have to be completely revamped for building setbacks and driveway lengths to be shortened to squeeze a tram ROW onto something like Finch East, the busiest bus corridor. This is politically infeasible as NIMBYs would fight this tooth and nail, especially if expropriation is necessitated by inconsistently narrow public ROWs.
View attachment 709816
The minimum curb to curb width needed for mid-block is 23-24 metres for a tram and a four lane road. This translates to 32 metres for the full public right-of-way including sidewalks and boulevards (road verges), with more width needed at intersections. The vast majority of Toronto streets are narrower. Even places that are ostensibly 36 metres in official documentation are often significantly narrower due to materially inaccurate records or the City not building to the full width for bridges etc. Finch West is listed as 36 metres wide, and even it becomes uncomfortably narrow for car lanes in certain areas. Both screenshots show the width of two car lanes in one direction on Finch (lane lines not painted yet).

Here are two examples of '36' metre wide ROWs that come nowhere close: section of Bayview 18 to 25 metres wide, and Finch near Yonge 24 to 27 metres:
View attachment 709821View attachment 709830
View attachment 709823View attachment 709822
View attachment 709828
View attachment 709827View attachment 709829
https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/984d-cp-official-plan-Map-03_OP_ROW_AODA.pdf
View attachment 709826
Toronto Street ROW widths: https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/984d-cp-official-plan-Map-03_OP_ROW_AODA.pdf

Toronto LANE WIDTHS GUIDELINE V3.0: https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9175-Lane-Widths-Guideline-Version-3.0-AODA.pdf

I'll expand on this at a later date.

you are confusing existing and planned ROWs, and the actual width of the physical road vs. the width of the road right of way. The OP identified the City's planned ROW for major streets - whenever a property redevelops along these streets, they provide the land required to meet these widths. But many areas of these roads do not meet the width today.

Most of your examples are fairly unique roads running through valleys - not really comparable to streets LRTs would be running on.

The finch west example you have at Yonge/Finch actually has a 36 metre existing ROW for example, but it includes significant areas of excess sidewalk and grassed areas to allow for potential future expansion. There is easily space for extra lanes.

Indeed, the City's planned ROW widths largely date from 1970's and 1980's when these widths were intended to accommodate 6-lanes of car traffic. The City generally required suburban arterials to be 36 metres in width as that allowed enough space to accommodate 6 lanes, double turn lanes, right turn lanes, centre turn lanes, etc. - if you have a ROW that is actually that width, it's not that hard to do 4 car lanes and bus lanes or LRT lanes.

 

[reaperexpress]

I don't have time currently but if someone else does it would be interesting to compare a selection of LRT segments in North America and overseas, comparing the average speed of:

- segments with median ROW without fencing or crossing gates
- segments with median ROW with fencing and crossing gates
- segments with ROW separate from roads.

We've seen a few examples of each type in this thread but it would be nice to have them all together in a single table with a larger sample size to get a sense of the typical average speeds associated with ROW types

 

[urbanclient]

you are confusing existing and planned ROWs, and the actual width of the physical road vs. the width of the road right of way. The OP identified the City's planned ROW for major streets - whenever a property redevelops along these streets, they provide the land required to meet these widths. But many areas of these roads do not meet the width today.

Most of your examples are fairly unique roads running through valleys - not really comparable to streets LRTs would be running on.

The finch west example you have at Yonge/Finch actually has a 36 metre existing ROW for example, but it includes significant areas of excess sidewalk and grassed areas to allow for potential future expansion. There is easily space for extra lanes.

Indeed, the City's planned ROW widths largely date from 1970's and 1980's when these widths were intended to accommodate 6-lanes of car traffic. The City generally required suburban arterials to be 36 metres in width as that allowed enough space to accommodate 6 lanes, double turn lanes, right turn lanes, centre turn lanes, etc. - if you have a ROW that is actually that width, it's not that hard to do 4 car lanes and bus lanes or LRT lanes.

That's a good catch on the existing vs. planned ROW width. But my point still stands, the vast, vast majority of Toronto streets are not wide enough to fit a median tram without major, politically infeasible, and currently unlawful changes. Having only one car lane in each direction is infeasible IMO due to snow plowed windrows in the winter.

But you are very wrong about Yonge/Finch being 36 metres wide property line to property line. The two through lanes and centre turning lane together are ~10 metres wide. Assuming the curb lanes are 4 metres wide each, that's 18 metres total curb-to-curb. Generously estimating 5 metre boulevards on each side puts the public ROW at 28 metres in this screenshot below. Even a worst case underestimate will not allow you to find an extra 8 metres between building faces on opposite sides of the road. There is always a setback between property line and building face. https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9175-Lane-Widths-Guideline-Version-3.0-AODA.pdf

Take a walk around where I took the screenshots for Finch near Yonge. 36 metres would be right up against the house / commercial building with little or no room for sidewalks. And the narrow curb-to-curb width would certainly necessitate expropriation for the legacy, single family residential section. The curb-to-curb being narrower than 24 metres and whole public ROW including boulevards being narrower than ~30 to 32 metres would effectively preclude an upgrade to tram in residential areas. Unless you want to tell homeowners they won't have access to their driveway for an extended period. A tram being marginally more politically feasible in non-residential areas, but still infeasible for all intents and purposes. Widening the roadway and public ROW in these too-narrow corridors would violate current zoning laws and municipal code.

if you have a ROW that is actually that width, it's not that hard to do 4 car lanes and bus lanes or LRT lanes.

Besides Finch West, where can we find an ROW 36 metres wide that would actually have the transit demand to justify an upgrade to tram? Latent + current demand. The top 10 busiest bus corridors are all too narrow, except for maybe Steeles, but Steeles doesn't have the daily ridership per km to justify an upgrade.

 

[lastcommodore]

For just construction costs:

I found part of the VIVA extension at about $30 million/km in 2014 dollars - https://canada.constructconnect.com...d-2605-million-vivanext-contract-dcn059977w-2

Construction cost for Finch was about $100 million/km in 2018 dollars

Finch West Line 6 LRT

Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but $2.5 billion/10.3 km=$240 million/km was the estimated cost in 2023. As of March 31 2025, the estimated cost is now $3.585 billion. Toronto Star: https://archive.ph/lILv8 https://urbantoronto.ca/forum/threads/finch-west-line-6-lrt.11783/post-1878069 When...

urbantoronto.ca

I maintain a spreadsheet purely for construction costs of major projects. Thankfully, I did track viva, 6, and pretty much all the other HOT projects in the GTA.
I have decided to also include all the other notable LRT projects.

Source	Notes	Name	Cost/km ($, 2025, mil/km)	Opening Year	Length	Cost, YOC, ($, millions)	Cost, 2025, ($, millions)
Yonge Street Rapidway / Richmond Hill, frequently asked questions | York Region Rapid Transit Corporation	* Mixed traffic segments not inc.	Viva Phase 1	67	2020	34	1800 (2017 $)	2270
Amid cost overruns and project delays, the Mississauga Transitway is complete Mississauga’s long-awaited bus rapid transit project is finally complete, albeit over budget and behind schedule. www.mississauga.com	* Mixed traffic segments not inc.	Mississauga TW	65	2017	10.3	528 (2017 $)	666
Ion construction costs run $50 million over budget Delays in construction and vehicle delivery have pushed up the cost of the Ion rapid transit line to $868 million. www.ctvnews.ca		ION	58	2019	19	868 (2019 $)	1095
https://assets.metrolinx.com/image/upload/v1763754630/Documents/Metrolinx/Item_13.5_-_Capital_Projects_-_Rapid_Transit_-_FINAL_ENG_Mx.pdf	* Incurred costs taken as of late 2025.	6 Finch West	267	2026	10.3	2548 (2022 $)	2746
https://assets.metrolinx.com/image/upload/v1763754630/Documents/Metrolinx/Item_13.5_-_Capital_Projects_-_Rapid_Transit_-_FINAL_ENG_Mx.pdf	* Incurred costs taken as of late 2025.	5 Crosstown	591	2026	19	9171 (2019 $)	11228
https://assets.metrolinx.com/image/upload/v1763754630/Documents/Metrolinx/Item_13.5_-_Capital_Projects_-_Rapid_Transit_-_FINAL_ENG_Mx.pdf	* O&M included. Preliminary.	10 Hurontario	319	?	18		5742
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener-waterloo/lrt-to-cambridge-regional-council-vote-on-route-recommendation-9.6964717	* Preliminary.	ION Cambridge	182	?	17		3100

Natural caveat that it's pretty difficult to find exact apple to apple numbers for this stuff. It's incredibly easily to only get a portion of the cost, or to get much more of the cost than construction esp. w. MX who for some reason hates to separate O&M with construction.

Some takeaways:
- Though it is apparently possible to build LRT for cheaper than BRT, it seems like ION is a bit of an outlier given ION Cambridge is 3x more expensive.
- Otherwise, assuming ION Cambridge costs, an LRT is about 2.7x more expensive.
- Assuming 6FW costs, an LRT is 4x the cost of a BRT like Viva.
- MX is not involved in ION or ION cambridge, but was in Mississauga TW (Though primarily for the western portion) and Viva phase 1.

 

[reaperexpress]

But my point still stands, the vast, vast majority of Toronto streets are not wide enough to fit a median tram without major, politically infeasible, and currently unlawful changes. Having only one car lane in each direction is infeasible IMO due to snow plowed windrows in the winter.
View attachment 709850

It is absolutely possible to have roads with one lane per direction in places with snow. It just means that the lane needs to be at least 3.7 metres wide to accommodate the blade of a full-size snowplow. If some snow falls back into the lane after the snowplow goes through, that's fine since 3.7 is a very wide lane anyway. The wheels of trucks and buses will keep the central 3.0m of the lane clear by spraying the slush off to the side.

There is also a requirement for emergency vehicles to have overtaking opportunities, so if the lane is less than about 4.5 metres wide (exact dimension varies between fire departments) there need to be mitigation methods such as a mountable LRT track (allowing the emergency vehicle to drive with one wheel on the ROW, as is the case on some segments of Eglinton East), intermittent laybys where drivers can pull over, or a mountable cycle track that allows cars to drive onto the cycle track if necessary to pull over.

If you want to argue that it's politically infeasible to narrow major arterials like Finch East to one lane per direction then I'd tend to agree, but let's not pretend that snow is what's preventing us from reducing the number of car lanes.

But you are very wrong about Yonge/Finch being 36 metres wide property line to property line. The two through lanes and centre turning lane together are ~10 metres wide. Assuming the curb lanes are 4 metres wide each, that's 18 metres total curb-to-curb. Generously estimating 5 metre boulevards on each side puts the public ROW at 28 metres in this screenshot below. Even a worst case underestimate will not allow you to find an extra 8 metres between building faces on opposite sides of the road. There is always a setback between property line and building face. https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/9175-Lane-Widths-Guideline-Version-3.0-AODA.pdf


View attachment 709842
Take a walk around where I took the screenshots for Finch near Yonge. 36 metres would be right up against the house / commercial building with little or no room for sidewalks. And the narrow curb-to-curb width would certainly necessitate expropriation for the legacy, single family residential section. The curb-to-curb being narrower than 24 metres and whole public ROW including boulevards being narrower than ~30 to 32 metres would effectively preclude an upgrade to tram in residential areas. Unless you want to tell homeowners they won't have access to their driveway for an extended period. A tram being marginally more politically feasible in non-residential areas, but still infeasible for all intents and purposes. Widening the roadway and public ROW in these too-narrow corridors would violate current zoning laws and municipal code.

Besides Finch West, where can we find an ROW 36 metres wide that would actually have the transit demand to justify an upgrade to tram? Latent + current demand. The top 10 busiest bus corridors are all too narrow.

The right of way is defined as the distance between the property lines. You cannot definitively measure the right-of-way from Google Maps or Streetview. For the property lines you need to use Toronto Maps.