[andyt]

If a few commie vegan hippies don't have cars, that's their problem. They probably don't have jobs to go to anyway, just sit at home and smoke dope or clog the streets protesting. The rest of us need to get there now. Plus with a car you don't have to share it with a commie vegan hippy - have you smelled their farts - you're in your own little kingdom.

[Lemmy]

QBall QBall:

Did you not see what happened to St. Clair?

"Happened to"? The St. Clair streetcars started running in 1920s. And LRT isn't a streetcar, no matter how many times you and Mayor Flintstone call it one. LRT is a lot more like a subway than a streetcar. If you don't get that, there's no point discussing this topic with you.

QBall QBall:

Take the partisan glasses off, take off the 'I Love David Miller' t-shirt and wake up.

Delivering a service or undertaking a project in the most economically sound manner seems a lot more like conservative thinking than NDP-Miller thinking.

[BeaverFever]

Ya...your own little kingdom that you can use to completely block off one of those supposedly precious lanes of traffic while you're stopped in the street waiting your turn to pull into a Timmy's drive through line-up that stretches up the road for half a block because you're such a fat lazy suburban fuck you'd rather spend the next forty minutes moving 1 inch per hour in the drive-thru than take 2 minutes to park your car and walk in. I see it every morning and I can't believe there's not a law against it.

[Gunnair]

andyt andyt:

If a few commie vegan hippies don't have cars, that's their problem. They probably don't have jobs to go to anyway, just sit at home and smoke dope or clog the streets protesting. The rest of us need to get there now. Plus with a car you don't have to share it with a commie vegan hippy - have you smelled their farts - you're in your own little kingdom.

This is why people can't be bothered to have a meaningful dialogue with you.This is how you get your kicks - no end if trolling shit disturbing.

[andyt]

I know. Almost as bad as asking you if you plan to vote Liberal. The horror.

[Gunnair]

andyt andyt:

I know. Almost as bad as asking you if you plan to vote Liberal. The horror.

The subtle difference. I voted Liberal for years. You've been an asshole since birth.

[andyt]

Well, you're making up for it now.

[OnTheIce]

llama66 llama66:

I'm happy council is staying with the transit city idea. LRT is cheaper to build, look at Calgary, the C-Train is total success story. Toronto would benefit from multiple LRT lines, and I hope they get them

Calgary is 1/2 the size with better infrastructure and better roads.

bootlegga bootlegga:

LRTs can carry close to 25,000 people per hour, when coupled with two lanes of road pushes it to almost 30,000 people per hour. To move that many by car, you need an eight lane road - and given that there's no space to build such a massive road, it makes sense to split the traffic between LRT and road vehicles. Many cities have done it (or are doing it and it is the future of public transit - subway lines are the past.

Not only that, but the LRT will be done in a fraction of the time and cost that a subway would take and cost.

The problem is, the amount of cars aren't going to change. Capacity means dick if people don't use it. So while the LRT may hold more people than a bus, it's not going to be attractive enough to pull people out of their cars.

The area is currently services by bus. Now, it'll be serviced by LRT with fewer stops.

Lemmy Lemmy:

"Happened to"? The St. Clair streetcars started running in 1920s. And LRT isn't a streetcar, no matter how many times you and Mayor Flintstone call it one. LRT is a lot more like a subway than a streetcar. If you don't get that, there's no point discussing this topic with you.

St. Clair made changes that gave the streetcars right of way.

Regardless of how many times LRT supporters tell me LRT's are like subways, I laugh....because they're nothing close. They hold less people and they're above ground. LRT's, like streetcars, are above ground and take up valuable lane space.

I can't wait until this project gets underway, the chaos and uproar from residents and businesses will be awesome to watch.

[bootlegga]

andyt andyt:

So each lane of traffic can only move 2500 an hour? Wouldn't you need 10 lanes then to equal the LRT?

I'm just looking at an article that says the max capacity of LRT is 20,000 per hour - in each direction. So an LRT line would move 40,000 per hour (max capacity). If your figure of 2500 per lane of road is accurate, that would give 16 lanes of road to equal 1 LRT line.

It was a typo on my part (should have been 20,000, not 25,000) - LRT lines carry about 20,000 people per hour, so it's equal to about eight lanes of vehicular traffic.

And you'll almost never have 20,000 going in each direction at the same time - people pretty much are either going to work or coming home from work. If the line ran past the ACC, you might get lots of traffic both ways (people going in different directions after a hockey/basketball game).

[andyt]

Just as you won't have car lanes maxed out most of the time either. But it sure sounds like LRT would take a lot of cars off the road.

In Vancouver the discussion is between skytrain and LRT. Turns out Skytrain can only do 15,000 people an hour, and of course costs way more to build. It is nice and fast tho. Still, we should be going for LRT too, and Surrey's mayor, the fastest growing region, has come out for just that. She would get three lines for what it would cost to build one skytrain line.

[bootlegga]

OnTheIce OnTheIce:

bootlegga bootlegga:

LRTs can carry close to 25,000 people per hour, when coupled with two lanes of road pushes it to almost 30,000 people per hour. To move that many by car, you need an eight lane road - and given that there's no space to build such a massive road, it makes sense to split the traffic between LRT and road vehicles. Many cities have done it (or are doing it and it is the future of public transit - subway lines are the past.

Not only that, but the LRT will be done in a fraction of the time and cost that a subway would take and cost.

The problem is, the amount of cars aren't going to change. Capacity means dick if people don't use it. So while the LRT may hold more people than a bus, it's not going to be attractive enough to pull people out of their cars.

The area is currently services by bus. Now, it'll be serviced by LRT with fewer stops.

LRT works wonders at getting people out of their cars and onto public transit, especially if the city building it is smart enough to build park & ride lots in the suburbs (like Edmonton and Calgary did).

Sure the amount of cars will change - once people realize there are only two lanes on a road that was formerly four lanes, the roads will congest and people will begin to say, "Hey maybe I should get that new LRT and save myself an hour of commuting time everyday." Then they'll get out of their cars and take the LRT. When I worked downtown, I did the exact same thing - as do thousands of other Edmontonians and Calgarians every day.

But who knows, maybe Toronto residents aren't as smart as us Westerners...

[OnTheIce]

bootlegga bootlegga:

LRT works wonders at getting people out of their cars and onto public transit, especially if the city building it is smart enough to build park & ride lots in the suburbs (like Edmonton and Calgary did).

Sure the amount of cars will change - once people realize there are only two lanes on a road that was formerly four lanes, the roads will congest and people will begin to say, "Hey maybe I should get that new LRT and save myself an hour of commuting time everyday." Then they'll get out of their cars and take the LRT. When I worked downtown, I did the exact same thing - as do thousands of other Edmontonians and Calgarians every day.

But who knows, maybe Toronto residents aren't as smart as us Westerners...

Why would I get out of my car and onto a LRT? The area is already serviced by bus and it has more stops. Is a few minutes faster going to change my mind? If I'm not already using the bus, I don't see this causing a mass exodus of people out of their cars.

We don't have the space to build lots, we're putting these lines in areas that are fully developed. We would have to expropriate land. Very expensive land.

Comparing what works in Edmonton and Calgary just isn't comparable. Completely different Cities in so many ways. Size, traffic, infrastructure,etc .

[bootlegga]

andyt andyt:

Just as you won't have car lanes maxed out most of the time either. But it sure sounds like LRT would take a lot of cars off the road.

In Vancouver the discussion is between skytrain and LRT. Turns out Skytrain can only do 15,000 people an hour, and of course costs way more to build. It is nice and fast tho. Still, we should be going for LRT too, and Surrey's mayor, the fastest growing region, has come out for just that. She would get three lines for what it would cost to build one skytrain line.

LRT lines do get cars off the road - a quick glance at the park & ride lots in Calgary and Edmonton are proof of that. Hell, Edmonton is going to extend the existing LRT line by one stop in either direction just so it can build an extra huge park & ride lot at each end of the line.

That's the biggest advantage of LRT - price. It cost Edmonton far less to build close to 10 km of surface track (and five stations) than it did the five downtown (located underground) stations.

[BeaverFever]

OTI, think about it:

First LRT is train, not a car. It is much larger than a streetcar, which has only one passenger compartment, and therefore can cary far far more passengers. To compare LRT to streetcars is false. It's a small 'subway' that can go either above or below ground - the Eg line will do both.

Second - think about what you're saying about a preference for bus routes over LRT. In order to move the same amount of people, entire fleets of busses have to be driving in mixed traffic at the same time. And as you mentioned, the stops are closer so they're moving over to the right lane and stopping all the time. Is that really what you want as a motorist? And because you have to put more busses on the road to move people, the overall maintenace cost per passenger moved is higher. Is that really what you want as a taxpayer? You're just saying anything you can to keep the debate going.

[bootlegga]

OnTheIce OnTheIce:

bootlegga bootlegga:

LRT works wonders at getting people out of their cars and onto public transit, especially if the city building it is smart enough to build park & ride lots in the suburbs (like Edmonton and Calgary did).

Sure the amount of cars will change - once people realize there are only two lanes on a road that was formerly four lanes, the roads will congest and people will begin to say, "Hey maybe I should get that new LRT and save myself an hour of commuting time everyday." Then they'll get out of their cars and take the LRT. When I worked downtown, I did the exact same thing - as do thousands of other Edmontonians and Calgarians every day.

But who knows, maybe Toronto residents aren't as smart as us Westerners...

Why would I get out of my car and onto a LRT? The area is already serviced by bus and it has more stops. Is a few minutes faster going to change my mind? If I'm not already using the bus, I don't see this causing a mass exodus of people out of their cars.

We don't have the space to build lots, we're putting these lines in areas that are fully developed. We would have to expropriate land. Very expensive land.

Comparing what works in Edmonton and Calgary just isn't comparable. Completely different Cities in so many ways. Size, traffic, infrastructure,etc .

I'll be honest, I don't know the geography that well - there very well may not be any space for park & ride lots. No matter, the LRT still works.

In some ways, you're right - commuting by car still makes sense in Edmonton and Calgary - but from the sounds of it, it no longer makes sense in Toronto. Maybe it's time for something different...

And sorry, but it sounds to me like you're saying that Torontonians are lemmings who always do the same thing the same way, no matter the circumstances. If that's the case, then it's time to weep for you and your city.

But I'm guessing people will quickly figure out that it makes sense to hop in the LRT (which has right of way over cars) and get to work in 30 minutes instead of 2 hours by car. I know I would.

THAT'S HOW LRT GETS PEOPLE OUT OF CARS - by shortening their commute.

It's just like when you hear on the radio that there is a big accident on the route you usually take home/to work. Do you still take the same route? I certainly don't, and I think that a pretty universal thing.

But then again, maybe you guys just aren't as smart us...