[Bojaxs]

I think if the Crosstown were to be designed today it probably would have been elevated between Brentcliffe and Don Mills like the western extension is over Jane

It would have to be elevated over the CPKC line. That would be fairly high. Then, from Don Mills, you would bring the tracks back down to at-grade before reaching the Don Valley Parkway. That would be a steep drop.

 

[nfitz]

A lot of pundits tried to encourage the LRT ROW to run on the south side of the road between Brentcliffe and Don Mills to avoid the signalized intersection at the time. For whatever reason, metrolinx did not head that recommendation.

When Metrolinx took over, they tried to change it from a portal east of Brentcliffe, to just tunnelling all the way to Don Mills Road. But they encountered community opposition about dropping the Leslie stop in the EA amendment process, and with TBMs already in the ground, they cancelled the EA amendment, and just stuck to what was written. These days they'd do it differently, but this was the first project of it's type, and I think they were still gun shy from their mismanaged Blue 22 EA in Weston.

 

[ThenWhat]

When Metrolinx took over, they tried to change it from a portal east of Brentcliffe, to just tunnelling all the way to Don Mills Road. But they encountered community opposition about dropping the Leslie stop in the EA amendment process, and with TBMs already in the ground, they cancelled the EA amendment, and just stuck to what was written. These days they'd do it differently, but this was the first project of it's type, and I think they were still gun shy from their mismanaged Blue 22 EA in Weston.

Community opposition by which community? At the time there were just a few residential buildings around the planned Leslie stop.
A lot of car traffic is funnelled through that intersection, because there are no other east-west options nearby. It is a choke point in every rush hour. Not a big surprise if you look at the map of the city.

 

[Adjei]

Community opposition by which community? At the time there were just a few residential buildings around the planned Leslie stop.
A lot of car traffic is funnelled through that intersection, because there are no other east-west options nearby. It is a choke point in every rush hour. Not a big surprise if you look at the map of the city.

The condos there and also the councillor at that time I forgot who it was fought to have the stop reinstated. I think if it was now Metrolinx wouldn’t have given in but maybe because the agency was new at that time, that’s why we have ended up with this current situation.

 

[crs1026]

I seem to recall Rob Ford being knees deep in that whole conversation.

- Paul

 

[nfitz]

Community opposition by which community? At the time there were just a few residential buildings around the planned Leslie stop.

I thought it was the developers who owned lands on/near the northwest. And some community opposition that it would remove easy access to the parkland there. Thinking about it more, the biggest opposition was removal of the stop east of Don Mills. You can probably find it in the Eglinton Transit City discussion thread, if you search for Ferrand and Leslie (and perhaps environmental assessment) in the early 2010s.

A lot of car traffic is funnelled through that intersection, because there are no other east-west options nearby. It is a choke point in every rush hour. Not a big surprise if you look at the map of the city.

Yeah, I used to commute that one, turning from eastbound Eglinton to Leslie (and vice-versa)!

 

[TossYourJacket]

Happy 13th Anniversary of the groundbreaking ceremony for this cursed project!

 

[Mind_the_gap]

... [T]he signal system failed pretty badly. And since then, it has not been able to operate with any semblance of reliability...

This is ridiculous at this point, reverting to old-fashioned block-signalling, or even line-of-sight operation (ala. Bay Street tunnel) at reduced speeds would be more optimal.

Still very pissed about the 51A/151 divide...

 

[Allandale25]

 

[its_Caffeine]

The Eglington LRT will at some point be replaced with a subway just like the Scarborough RT was.

I know they couldn't have foreseen this in hindsight, but with tunneling becoming vastly cheaper in recent years they should have opted to just do a C&C extension of the metro along Eglinton.

A lot of cities in North America are slowly finding out these weird ad-hoc LRT systems are often *more* expensive and less reliable than just building metro.

 

[NotACop123]

I hope with it being the 14th year anniversary of construction starting, news outlets will again bring the public’s attention back to how unacceptable the current situation is.

 

[Voltz]

I hope with it being the 14th year anniversary of construction starting, news outlets will again bring the public’s attention back to how unacceptable the current situation is.

Especially the fact that the TTC was to have the first phase open in 2015, before Metrolinx took it over from them.

 

[nfitz]

I know they couldn't have foreseen this in hindsight, but with tunneling becoming vastly cheaper in recent years ...

The actual tunnelling is a small part of the cost per kilometre for subway. Look at the additional costs that are added because of they much more frequent emergency exits. And the stations easily cost a lot more than the tunnels.

 

[ARG1]

I know they couldn't have foreseen this in hindsight, but with tunneling becoming vastly cheaper in recent years they should have opted to just do a C&C extension of the metro along Eglinton.

A lot of cities in North America are slowly finding out these weird ad-hoc LRT systems are often *more* expensive and less reliable than just building metro.

In the case of Eglinton West, its unlikely C&C would've been that much cheaper. Part of the problem is that there is a massive Gas Mainline running underneath Eglinton at that section, meaning that any and all construction would've required them to do a massive and expensive relocation of that mainline. That's why if you noticed, all of the stations for Eglinton West aren't located under Eglinton, but rather directly north of the Intersection, with entrances being limited to the north side of the street (I'm too lazy to go back a few hundred pages to find the station layout images).

 

[yurt2022]

I know they couldn't have foreseen this in hindsight, but with tunneling becoming vastly cheaper in recent years they should have opted to just do a C&C extension of the metro along Eglinton.

A lot of cities in North America are slowly finding out these weird ad-hoc LRT systems are often *more* expensive and less reliable than just building metro.

It's unfortunate that Toronto fell for the now declining LRT fad that struck North America. I've always believed that a subway along Eglinton (and in Scarborough) would serve our needs much better, especially in the future since the region has seen record growth over the years...