I think everybody saying this has a fair point, but how many other cities have as much focus on the downtown and as big of a traffic problem?
Why does it matter? The fact remains that Toronto is (and will remain for the foreseeable future) moving faster than anyone else in North America.
I wish I could be optimistic about progress on the GO lines like you clearly are, but at least in the public realm there's virtually no information about where things are headed, and until those secret metrolinx plans are defined, pessimism is all i have room for.
The vision seems to be still relatively unchanged, just the timeline and initial scopes have been adjusted to better align with the constraints of reality.
I should also add, douge ford's obsession of cars gives me even less faith that go transit will continue to see outsized investment. But also political pressure to improve service rapidly.
Again, nobody in North America showers its transit networks with as much money as Ontario. Even if the current funding levels were to get cut in half, they would still be the envy of transit planners anywhere else in North America.
I get both of your statements above, and understand the idea of pushing back when the rhetoric the other way is a bit on the hyperbolas side ..... however...
I will offer that comparing to other North American cities as a whole, particularly meaning the U.S. and Canada just isn't great when, collectively, we've been laggards.
I didn‘t become a transit planner to despair about how far back we are compared to other parts of the world, but to be part of the change which is needed to catch up. As long as we move faster than our European peers (and trust me, our pace is unmatched in Europe), the gap will narrow - and
that is what we should focus on…
New York City is the sole truly extensive system, with high ridership in the U.S., and yet has been notoriously unreliable with negative public perception as to its appearance and safety.
Chicago is also, relatively robust in heavy rail, but serious shortcomings on frequency, integration with METRA/PACE etc. and so on.
LA has been growing its core mass transit system by relative leaps and bounds, but that's from nearly non-existent and its ridership remains a non-factor in the LA modal share.
You see: we are the only Tier-1 city in North America which actually follows a continuous strategy of substantial investments and progress.
Narrowing the focus to GO for a moment, yes, there has been progress and many construction projects........but in reality, service is lower today (Lakeshore East and West) than it was in 2020 some 5 years ago.
This is actually a sign of progress, not regression: the price for having more services in the future is less services now, as the existing tracks need to be partially closed while they are upgraded and expanded, to accommodate much more trains than ever before. It‘s actually a really good sign that the Lakeshore corridors have become so indispensible that it has become unthinkable to close it for multiple months to completely rebuild it, like the Germans did with the „Riedbahn“ (main Frankfurt-Mannheim corridor) which was
completely shut down for multiple months last year for a massive overhaul…
Off-peak service is notably better to Bramalea, but bare basics like weekend trains to K-W remain absent, while work on infill stations promised years ago, and at costs that are grossly excessive........is just barely beginning.
So I don't think its unfair for people to be disappointed and exasperated.
Lets be clear, if the last 5 years of actual service, as experienced by most riders was the bar, we would end up expecting virtually no improvement in the next 5.
While a good deal of that is poor project management/workflow, and some major progress has not yet been shown off, poor communication leaves only the negative impression of projects years overdue, and service sorely lacking.
A full transformation of an already substantial network takes incredibly long, not just here in Toronto, but also in Europe. The problem is not the pace of progress, but the unrealistic expectations which had previously been raised by overambitious timelines. The adjustments to scope and timelines to actually make them compatible with the political, fiscal, technological and engineering environment was an essential and overdue step we have yet to see at ALTO.
I would've actually agreed with you on this until ONxpress unravelled. Now it's hard to believe we're getting anything other than what we have now: Infrequent, commuter service that's inconsistently spread across its lines with big slow trains that drop you off in a giant parking lot.
It seems like that's all ML knows.
Only the Operations&Maintenance contract (i.e., the least relevant if the originally 3 contracts) with ONxpress has been cancelled, the rest of the project (and partnership!) is still proceeding, just on different timelines and staging…
