[micheal_can]

I'm with you there, this actually sounds great LOL. Hold everyone who needs to be held accountable, accountable; no matter the cost. You wanna take the other side of that debate and say it's not worth the time and money? Great! Simply fire the upper management and executives at Metrolinx, and have the premier and his cabinet step down.

That way, we both get what we want. The people who demand accountability get accountability, and the people who don't want to waste money on things they deem no longer relevant don't have to do that anymore. Win-win .

We have gotten into a situation where politicians and other people are comfortable with no accountability with public funds. Maybe if a project comes either/and over budget and over time it has an automatic public inquiry, we might actually get things done on time and on budget.

 

[WillTo]

Why is there a 21 minute gap leaving Kennedy for the first train?!

 

[Westey]

While I understand the public wants someone's head on a pike, if they have a public inquiry it affects ALOT of people, not just current politicians but those from the past decade or more. The complexity of any inquiry would pale in comparison to anything held before.

Liberals, PC they are all tied to this debacle with Dalton McGuinty launching it in 2011. Yes Doug Ford had the most recent hand in things but that does not mean he was the only one.

Having a public inquiry could do alot more harm than good and I can see why people want to quash the idea.

I am surprised they don't do what Justin Trudeau would have done.
Appoint one of your insiders to be the Chairperson and then conclude you are innocent and the problem was the person before.
Depending on how well you bribe the media, that should make the issue go away.

 

[nfitz]

With the Line 5 data for next week loaded to the Triplinx trip planner, I looked at some travel times.

Kennedy station to Laird station at 5:40 pm on Tuesday. It's 28 minutes on the Line 5 compared to 30 minutes (5 minutes of walking are shown here) on the 34 bus.

Interestingly the 34 bus today is 34 minutes for the same trip!

 

[nfitz]

Looking at some other trips.

Laird station to Kennedy at 5 pm on Tuesday in 27 minutes, compared to 34 minutes on the 34 bus (but 41 minutes today!)
Laird station to Kennedy at 8:30 am on Tuesday in 27 minutes, compared to 28 minutes on the 34 bus (both today and next Tuesday).

No doubt that the bus will be competitive when there's no traffic, for the section where the LRT is not grade-separated - but that's not the reason this is being built.

Mount Dennis to Kennedy at 5 pm is 54 minutes on Line 5 next Tuesday. Not surprisingly Line 2 is a bit faster at 44 minutes changing at Dundas West-Bloor to UP. The recommended non-rail trip is 68 minutes on Line 2 and the Jane 27 bus. The 34 bus is 96 minutes on Tuesday. Today the 32/34 bus is 106 minutes (losing 6 minute changing at Eglinton station). Even at midnight the bus is 59 minutes (losing 8 minutes).

The two main questions out there is will TTC achieve this kind of schedule a few weeks after opening; and what travel times will Line 5 achieve when it fully opens.

Why is there a 21 minute gap leaving Kennedy for the first train?!

Good question. Looking at the Triplinx data, Sunday service continues with the first trains at 7:30, 7:51, 8:11, 8:32, 8:42, 8:49: 8:57, 9:05.

I'm not sure why it's every 20-minutes service for the first hour. Still, it's better than Line 2 service from Kennedy between 7:30 am and 8:00 am on Sundays.

 

[T3G]

And what's with all the secrecy? This is a project for the public, funded by public money. What justification is there for all the confidentiality? From whom are you hiding all the information? Are you concerned that some other city will use it in their great infrastructure project?

I can't find the article now, but it was definitely claimed at some point over the past few years that being more transparent about the project would hurt the Ontario economy.

 

[jordanmkasla2009]

I'm not sure why it's every 20-minutes service for the first hour. Still, it's better than Line 2 service from Kennedy between 7:30 am and 8:00 am on Sundays.

Probably related to deadhead times since the trains originate at Mount Dennis. Definitely something that will likely improve over time, especially if/when they start making use of the pocket tracks.

 

[thettctransitfanatic]

I can't find the article now, but it was definitely claimed at some point over the past few years that being more transparent about the project would hurt the Ontario economy.

Ford has already hurt the economy enough himself anyways LOL Ontario now has worst unemployment in the country. So releasing info like that, if that's true, would just be more of the same.

 

[EnviroTO]

I personally don't think a full public inquiry is required as the process tends to be expensive and a bit of a Matlow (oops I mean sideshow), but a release of lessons learned does seem like the least they should do. I really don't think it would find anything too surprising, but it would be nice to put it on paper as what not to do as future projects are delivered.

It seems obvious to me that the big massive contract where you outsource everything including risk and have no in-house ability to do construction estimates and be the general contractor managing subcontracts is a big issue. The only aspect of the project that would have to do with politics would be the at grade stop spacing. I don't really see anywhere else that politics meddled in delivery. I feel like the stations initially planned are the stations they eventually delivered with no real late changes. In fact I think they postponed work, like building Caledonia GO, in order to avoid it being used as an excuse for project change requests.

 

[nfitz]

I personally don't think a full public inquiry is required as the process tends to be expensive and a bit of a Matlow (oops I mean sideshow), but a release of lessons learned does seem like the least they should do.

Something akin to the post-St Clair 512 review. But I don't know how you do that with an uncooperative agency.

 

[junctionist]

Given the egregious lack of transparency on a project involving so much tax money and so many problems, I think a public inquiry is definitely warranted.

 

[DatTranzitGuy]

I rest my case

 

[6ixGod]

View attachment 713371I rest my case

Not a surprise for anyone paying attention and /or not having motives to defend this failure.

Heck if you read the very first post of this topic way back in 2008, they spelled it out in the first few sentences.

Let it open, let it get caught at reds, let them run it abysmally slow.

Remember this is a soft taco and we're not allowed to criticise LRTs here.

 

[jordanmkasla2009]

View attachment 713371I rest my case

Considering only part of the journey is in the picture you posted, I decided to check myself.

The LRT is scheduled to take 52 minutes. If you include the walk to the bus platforms at Mount Dennis (which on Google Maps isn't pathed properly to begin with) you get to that time. However, for most bus routes, you really don't need to walk all the way to the platform to catch the bus as you would be better off walking out the entrances on Eglinton to the on-street stops.

Also worth noting is that Google Maps still hasn't updated the buses yet and still thinks the 32 goes all the way to Eglinton Station, so I had to use Transit App to get the bus comparison for the same time period. The bus travel time is scheduled at 1h23min. Taking the LRT is a savings of 31 minutes compared to the 34 bus. Even if the red lights hold up the LRT there's not enough intersections along the surface portion to close the distance between the scheduled LRT travel time and the scheduled bus travel time.

 

[jordanmkasla2009]

Not a surprise for anyone paying attention and /or not having motives to defend this failure.

Heck if you read the very first post of this topic way back in 2008, they spelled it out in the first few sentences.

Let it open, let it get caught at reds, let them run it abysmally slow.

Remember this is a soft taco and we're not allowed to criticise LRTs here.

as I just posted above, even if all the above you claim is true, that 31 minute difference in scheduled travel time is clearly going to make the LRT the better option to get across the city on Eglinton.