[thenorth]

"Horrific"

Haha. The horror!

Peak Urban Toronto for today.

I enjoy hyperbole. It brings light to my world.

 

[PL1]

The horrific station depths on Line 5 really reframes the whole underground vs surface debate for me. Because if I lived at Victoria Park & Eglinton, I truly don’t know if I’d prefer navigating these cavernous underground stations, to dealing with a handful of red lights on the surface.

It makes our investment in the underground Crosstown West, in particular, look especially foolish. I’d 150% prefer to use ride a surface LRT there (as compared to underground), because there are hardly any stop lights, and it’s way easier to access trains from the surface. I’m also pretty damn sure that once you consider the time spent accessing platform level, the surface running LRT would’ve been just as fast as the underground option.

I live near the central part of Eglinton, and I regularly avoid taking Line 5 because of these station layouts. There’s usually some other TTC route available that’s more convenient to use.

Counterpoint: unless a 34 is within 1 min of me arriving at Laird, it's always faster to go down the stairs, take Line 5 one stop, and climb theescalators at Leaside to catch the 11 to work. I'm 54 but very active, so your mileage may vary

 

[Northern Light]

Counterpoint: unless a 34 is within 1 min of me arriving at Laird, it's always faster to go down the stairs, take Line 5 one stop, and climbed escalators at Leaside to catch the 11 to work. I'm 54 but very active, so your mileage may vary

Double counterpoint, just for fun; you're a 54-year old in a very fit 27 year old's body, who 'jogs' at 10km/ph, which means you can traverse Eglinton, Laird to Bayview in six minutes flat, w/o breaking a sweat.

Which means that its almost statically impossible for the Crosstown to be faster, unless it was in the station when you arrived at the platform, and left immediately thereafter.

 

[Westey]

The horrific station depths on Line 5 really reframes the whole underground vs surface debate for me. Because if I lived at Victoria Park & Eglinton, I truly don’t know if I’d prefer navigating these cavernous underground stations, to dealing with a handful of red lights on the surface.

It makes our investment in the underground Crosstown West, in particular, look especially foolish. I’d 150% prefer to use ride a surface LRT there (as compared to underground), because there are hardly any stop lights, and it’s way easier to access trains from the surface. I’m also pretty damn sure that once you consider the time spent accessing platform level, the surface running LRT would’ve been just as fast as the underground option.

I live near the central part of Eglinton, and I regularly avoid taking Line 5 because of these station layouts. There’s usually some other TTC route available that’s more convenient to use.

There are 2 often forgot about methods that you forgot about.
1. Elevated. Track ~8m elevation change.
2. Cut-and-Cover Tunnel. Track ~12m elevation change.

 

[smallspy]

There are 2 often forgot about methods that you forgot about.
1. Elevated. Track ~8m elevation change.
2. Cut-and-Cover Tunnel. Track ~12m elevation change.

It's a good thing that you don't have to think about the grades on Eglinton.

Oh, wait a second....

Dan

 

[lastcommodore]

It's a good thing that you don't have to think about the grades on Eglinton.

Oh, wait a second....

Dan

Obligatory I dont know much about this, but

If Eglinton was initially supposed to be at-grade and just navigate the grades, what exactly is stopping a C&C or elevated option from just maintaining a constant depth and letting the vehicle handle the grades, just underground/above ground?

 

[Jac.]

When talking to normies about the Crosstown, their #1 complaint over and over again is station depth and layout. I’ve had multiple people bring it up to me unprompted.

I can only speak for myself because I'm like 99% certain the experience is not shared among others but as someone who absolutely LOVES walking, I don't mind the deep stations much, I think it would be better if the stations weren't as deep but it's not an issue for me, I do think the layout is an issue though but I guess that's the trade off when you make stations very deep? Idk.

 

[PL1]

My quibbles after being a near-daily user:

1. The stairs are a bit too narrow. 30 cm wider would make it easier to pass people; it's almost one person per side currently.
2. The stair railings should have gaps at the landings;
3. The white walls and other tiles really show the dust/dirt (as others have noted);
4. Wayfinding still needs improvement – there's no indication which direction you are heading to (or which stairs to take) at the stations I've used;
5. The Next Train signs are not always accurate

 

[rdaner]

The depth of the stations and the associated complex layouts are less a flaw and more the result of deliberate design choices. If you build really deep stations it takes longer to access the platform from the street, as anyone who as used the deep level lines on the London Underground, or the newer Tokyo Metro lines (especially the Oedo and Fukutoshin lines), will be familiar with often times annoyingly long process of having to take multiple escalators and walk through long corridors. FWIW the Fukutoshin line platforms at Shibuya station replaced the ground level Tokyu line platforms (this project is where the famous video of the workers moving the track overnight comes from) and people did complain that the new platforms made transfers overly onerous.

This is not something people in Toronto are really used to, and it may mean the Ontario Line will be less popular for short distance trips within downtown if it takes several minutes to get between the platform and the street at each end.

There should be a wheelchair service for our Boomer riders!

 

[urbanclient]

as someone who absolutely LOVES walking

I hate walking for the sake of walking, like going on a hike. I don't mind walking to get to where I need to go, as long as the accompanying transit experience is decent.

On-time, no inexplicable holds at stations, doesn't smell like human waste. Line 5 smells better than the old subways, and I haven't experienced any holds for no reason/non-emergencies.

 

[81-717]

Line 5 smells better than the old subways

Give it time...

 

[EnviroTO]

Story picked up by CityTV News. Seems like a pretty shocking mistake. Feels like this was designed by someone who doesn't have a disability themselves. Almost as though they of people with disabilities as a monolith, designed for a person in a wheelchair, and then thought "oh wait let's put tactile markers on the path they'll use."

Yes, but also in the risk averse culture that we are living TTC streetcars and LRTs run slow because someone could screw up and they took down the "stand left, walk right" signs because someone could fall and hurt themselves. The mentality of government these days is that they need to protect the public from themselves. Choosing to use the escalator visually impaired... too risky for the government that thinks the general public can't even walk on the escalator. After they get the social media law in place they will pass the "you must eat your veggies" law and "you must do your homework and finish your chores before play" law.

 

[ctf5650]

It’s wonderful that Line 5 is operational, but the design, construction and maintenance of these station just feels like complete amateur hour. I’m talking about everything from the depth of stations and poor layouts, to the water intrusion issue, the illegible maps and wayfinding, the poor accessibility, escalators and elevators out of order, dirty stations (the white walls are already looking filthy in many places). We even have entire entrances out of order.

I think that if this is what we can expect with the Ontario Line, we could be in big trouble. Metrolinx can get away with these issues with Line 5, becuase it’s suburban and relatively low ridership, but I don’t how the Ontario Line will perform with something like 200,000 people per day, if we can expect the stations to be this poorly designed, built and maintained. High ridership has a way of stress testing poor design.

It’s only been a few months, but I kind of get the impression that the TTC does a better job of maintaining the decade old TYSSE, than Metrolinx does with the 5 month old Crosstown. I’m nervous about what the condition of Line 5 will be in a decade.

It doesn’t help that Metrolinx doesn’t really engage in public communication, so who knows if they ever intend to fix these issues.

This just reads as someone finding little ways to be miserable about an overall great transit line. How exactly is the wayfinding illegible? I find the digital map screens in the entrances to be very useful and should be installed at every station in the system. Station depth is only an issue for a couple stations like Avenue where Eglinton itself rises to a very high elevation above the tunnel, other stations like Cedarvale and Don Valley are much more reasonable. This is quite the liberal use of "poor accessibility" when cities like Montreal have subway systems that are under 40% accessible. We're not "in big trouble", we don't realize how good we have it and how much worse it could be.

 

[Archii]

This just reads as someone finding little ways to be miserable about an overall great transit line. How exactly is the wayfinding illegible? I find the digital map screens in the entrances to be very useful and should be installed at every station in the system. Station depth is only an issue for a couple stations like Avenue where Eglinton itself rises to a very high elevation above the tunnel, other stations like Cedarvale and Don Valley are much more reasonable. This is quite the liberal use of "poor accessibility" when cities like Montreal have subway systems that are under 40% accessible. We're not "in big trouble", we don't realize how good we have it and how much worse it could be.

I would say I agree with your response almost entirely; however, I do wince at the quality of the station finishes at least on the route I take (not necessarily because its awful - its just not good given the price tag and what other western cities are able to do with similar projects). At least with many of our subway stations, including recent extensions and even line 6, the tilling used ages much better even with our poor maintenance. I would love to know what these white walls will look like in 40 years.

Not a deal breaker but rather a strong disappointment for such an important line.

 

[hawc]

Are bicycles allowed on Line 5 on off peak hours like Saturday morning? I'd love to take Line 5 out to Sunnybrook stop and then ride through the valley.