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7 minutes ago, leylandvictory2 said:

Good.  Does that mean we will get more streetcars than expected this year?

I'm gonna say no - for now. I think the ramp up later in the year is very aggressive, so if they are a few days early now it can be set against other delays later.

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4435 should be ready for service within the first week on next board at this rate. TTC has peg July to be the month the 514 Cherry line conversion to be completed. (The schedule says summer and Andy Byford said July). So we'll end up with possibly CLRVs/ALRVs on the 514 to fill in for some of the peak runs even through 514 is scheduled with Flexity's.

Hopefully Bombardier is past the learning stage now. The second assembly line shouldn't take took long to setup. They should be able to be pushing cars out at a faster rate very soon with the Metrolinx cars moved to Kingston and TR order completed. 

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10 hours ago, dowlingm said:

I passed this on to someone on Twitter who knows railfan photogs in TBay. 4435 is already picked up as of this morning, and its position in the CP yard means no opportunity to photograph it today.

By the time 4435 arrives at Hillcrest and goes through acceptance testing, it'll be May, so technically 4435 could be the 1st of 3 "May" cars.

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4 hours ago, Orion9131 said:

By the time 4435 arrives at Hillcrest and goes through acceptance testing, it'll be May, so technically 4435 could be the 1st of 3 "May" cars.

Not necessarily. It would count as an April car. The list was based on car deliveries for the year, not as for when the vehicles enter service. 

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On 2017-04-16 at 3:31 AM, nfitz said:

Though part of it is that the Broadview streetcar platforms are so short.

If there's a Flexity already there, the second one can only open the front door, and will be sticking out on Broadview, blocking the sidewalk and at least one lane of traffic. A third one would have to sit north of Danforth. A fourth would have to sit south of Danforth.

Ditto for 505.

I really don't know why they haven't got any plans to address such an obvious deficiency. 

The situation at Dundas West is slightly better (could probably get 2.5 cars in there if they moved the walkway). I can't think of any station that suffers such similar constraints (though the two underground loops for the Spadina line are lacking - at least they aren't stopping pedestrians being able to walk into the station!)

They had about 15 flexities out today on 504 during the morning but ultimately, they had to send 5 of them back to Leslie/Connaught during the afternoon due to the backlogs at Broadview and Dundas West. There was a supervisor that was stationed on the 504 platform @ Broadview to keep the CLRV runs moving to prevent the flexities from holding on Broadview.

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1 hour ago, Andythagiant said:

They had about 15 flexities out today on 504 during the morning but ultimately, they had to send 5 of them back to Leslie/Connaught during the afternoon due to the backlogs at Broadview and Dundas West. There was a supervisor that was stationed on the 504 platform @ Broadview to keep the CLRV runs moving to prevent the flexities from holding on Broadview.

Putting some Flexities on 506 this weekend might have helped keep High Park transit users moving.

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Good thing they did perhaps. If Broadview can't handle a Sunday with only 17 cars in service, but mostly Flexities, on a 7-minute headway, what's going to happen in rush hour, when plan to have 24 Flexities in service, plus ALRVs, on a 4-minute headway - or less.

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42 minutes ago, nfitz said:

Good think they did perhaps. If Broadview can't handle a Sunday with only 17 cars in service, but mostly Flexities, on a 7-minute headway, what's going to happen in rush hour, when plan to have 24 Flexities in service, plus ALRVs, on a 4-minute headway - or less.

If the terminals can't or won't be extended, then keeping the cars moving and spaced out has to be priority. The best ways to achieve that are headway vs schedule management, telling drivers to go "set down only mode" if another car is trailing them, and minimizing time cars are halted by using stepback crewing.

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7 hours ago, nfitz said:

Good think they did perhaps. If Broadview can't handle a Sunday with only 17 cars in service, but mostly Flexities, on a 7-minute headway, what's going to happen in rush hour, when plan to have 24 Flexities in service, plus ALRVs, on a 4-minute headway - or less.

The TTC is going to have to come up with some kind of plan to deal with this. Other than expanding the loops (which their is available land at both stations), either shorter or no layovers, short turning cars before they reach the the stations, or rerouting the 505 so king cars can use both tracks.

Of course the TTC managed to run far more cars through both Broadview and Dundas West in the past, with both Dundas and King sharing single track loops.

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16 minutes ago, IRT_BMT_IND said:

short turning cars before they reach the the stations

Could you realign the #504/#514, to have one route going from Dundas West to Distillery and another route going from Broadview to Dufferin Gates? Would that ease the pressure on the terminals at all?

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2 hours ago, GORDOOM said:

Could you realign the #504/#514, to have one route going from Dundas West to Distillery and another route going from Broadview to Dufferin Gates? Would that ease the pressure on the terminals at all?

No - you'd wouldn't be providing enough service from Broadview to River - where you frequently see people left standing now. I can't speak to the west.

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2 hours ago, nfitz said:

No - you'd wouldn't be providing enough service from Broadview to River - where you frequently see people left standing now. I can't speak to the west.

Roncy is busy too. Lots of shops out there. I don't go there in rush hour through so I'm not sure if people are left behind. The 514 headways won't do. The least busy part of the 504 is between Queensway and Dufferin. 

For (offpeak hours) the 505 it's between Landsdowne and Dundas West Stn. 506 is least busy on Howard Park. Upper Gerrard is quieter bust still has a higher demand than Howard Park I believe.

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20 minutes ago, Xtrazsteve said:

For the 505 it's between Landsdowne and Dundas West Stn. 506 is least busy on Howard Park. Upper Gerrard is quieter bust still has a higher demand than Howard Park I believe.

Well, I boarded 506 on Upper Gerrard about 8:10 AM this morning, and looking at the gaps before and after, it was perhaps 1 minute late. And was standing room only by Woodbine (this must be pretty close to ultimate peak). If that helps put 506 in perspective. Needless to say, people were being left behind by about Jones.

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22 minutes ago, nfitz said:

Well, I boarded 506 on Upper Gerrard about 8:10 AM this morning, and looking at the gaps before and after, it was perhaps 1 minute late. And was standing room only by Woodbine (this must be pretty close to ultimate peak). If that helps put 506 in perspective. Needless to say, people were being left behind by about Jones.

I was mostly mentioning offpeak hours, but it's true for all times too. The 506 is connected to the subway in the east. Upper Gerrard does have a larger demand than Howard Park. Most of the demand comes east of Lansdowne on the 504, 505 and 506. Lower Gerrard would have a higher demand if it wasn't so packed. TTC looks at their loading but I don't think they properly calculated those missed trips by people avoiding the streetcars all together cause it's near impossible to board.

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1 hour ago, Xtrazsteve said:

I was mostly mentioning offpeak hours, but it's true for all times too. The 506 is connected to the subway in the east. Upper Gerrard does have a larger demand than Howard Park. 

There's always people getting on the 506 at Main - but most are off by Coxwell - except when the subway is down ... and then it's standing room only at Main! So I end walking down to Kingston Road.

I don't think the subway particularly adds to the AM peak loading on 506 (which is probably about Logan, with all the kids who get off at Degrassi, and people changing cars at Broadview.But I don't disagree about Howard Park.

1 hour ago, Xtrazsteve said:

Lower Gerrard would have a higher demand if it wasn't so packed. TTC looks at their loading but I don't think they properly calculated those missed trips by people avoiding the streetcars all together cause it's near impossible to board.

I think that's true of many lines. I've always thought it was true of Spadina.  And I think it's true of the Yonge subway as well.  It will be interesting to see what happens to ridership as the new cars are added, and more capacity is available. Does growth accelerate?

You'd think we'd just about be able to see if there was any trend on Spadina now, if the ridership data was more frequent and granular. Oh well, I guess Presto brings that.

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53 minutes ago, nfitz said:

There's always people getting on the 506 at Main - but most are off by Coxwell - except when the subway is down ... and then it's standing room only at Main! So I end walking down to Kingston Road.

I don't think the subway particularly adds to the AM peak loading on 506 (which is probably about Logan, with all the kids who get off at Degrassi, and people changing cars at Broadview.But I don't disagree about Howard Park.

I agree. Hardly anyone would want to spend extra time riding the streetcar from the subway, especially if they have a seat from Kennedy. Most of the demand comes locally where it doesn't make sense to take the bus north to the subway and back down on Yonge or University.

The only major subway to streetcar destinations are Queens Quay via 509/510, Spadina via 510, Bathurst via 511, Roncesvalles via 504, Broadview via 504/505 and St Clair via 512. I would say most people will avoid transferring from the subway to a streetcar if the have to spend more than 20 minutes on them.

1 hour ago, nfitz said:

You'd think we'd just about be able to see if there was any trend on Spadina now, if the ridership data was more frequent and granular. Oh well, I guess Presto brings that.

Or found out how much less they are making cause transfers are accepted within two hours. Althrough we have discussed that walking off a streetcar and into Broadview station will result in another charge, I believe if one would have walked to a bus stop on Broadview and took the bus into the station, it should count as a valid transfer. One can do whatever quick shopping on Danforth and still get back in within a timeframe. Bus transfers are not location based as many times boarding location still appear as "0" or at a garage. They don't have valid transfer points setup yet. Maybe the VISION system can fix this.

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18 hours ago, Xtrazsteve said:

The 506 is connected to the subway in the east. Upper Gerrard does have a larger demand than Howard Park.

Upper Gerrard is considerably longer than the Howard Park section. But it's true, if there are people left on the Carlton car when it turns onto Howard Park, they mostly get off at Roncesvalles. And I've seen people staring out at High Park loop, wondering where High Park subway station is.

The streetcars ran into High Park, on the same alignment as far as I can tell, at least nby 1899. Hopefully they won't get removed. Howard Park is the last quiet residential street with streetcars on it. (Used to be on streets such as Dovercourt, Hallam, Lappin, etc.)

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On 4/25/2017 at 3:23 PM, Ed T. said:

Upper Gerrard is considerably longer than the Howard Park section. But it's true, if there are people left on the Carlton car when it turns onto Howard Park, they mostly get off at Roncesvalles. And I've seen people staring out at High Park loop, wondering where High Park subway station is.

The streetcars ran into High Park, on the same alignment as far as I can tell, at least nby 1899. Hopefully they won't get removed. Howard Park is the last quiet residential street with streetcars on it. (Used to be on streets such as Dovercourt, Hallam, Lappin, etc.)

It's interesting to ride a streetcar in a residential neighbourhood without all the shops and people walking on the streets. The 506 offers that on Howard Park and Upper Gerrard. Hopefully the 506 will stay put.

 

4415 was tracking on the 509 most of the day. It's back?

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54 minutes ago, skyfirenet said:

Out of curiosity, has the TTC ever looked at extending the 506 from High Park loop to the subway at either Keele or High park?

A route up Parkside from the loop past Keele and connecting to St Clair West might work, assuming the TTC could be persuaded to countenance running not in ROW over most of it, since with a curve addition at Howard Park and Roncesvalles it would also be a shorter way to west St Clair West for 512 cars.

Proposing a Howard Park Loop-High Park subway route on the other hand would probably earn you a price on your head. 

 

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13 minutes ago, dowlingm said:

A route up Parkside from the loop past Keele and connecting to St Clair West might work, assuming the TTC could be persuaded to countenance running not in ROW over most of it, since with a curve addition at Howard Park and Roncesvalles it would also be a shorter way to west St Clair West for 512 cars.

Proposing a Howard Park Loop-High Park subway route on the other hand would probably earn you a price on your head. 

 

Mind you, they don't even run the 80A along Parkside Dr on Sundays (except this year due to construction). The 41 Keele and 89 Weston Rd will still need to connect to the subway. I don't think the idea of 3km of deadheading tracks will fly at all in this modern age.

With new streetcars that's able to climb the Bathurst hill and the possibility of converting Hillcrest into a small carhouse in the future, the idea of a second link to St Clair is very low in priority.  

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Councillor Joe Mihevc

 

 

 

"For riders of the 512 St. Clair route, I have fantastic news: the new streetcars will be rolling onto our tracks starting on September 3!  The shiny new Light Rail Vehicles (LRVs) are low-floor, accessible, air-conditioned, and have a higher passenger capacity.  After suffering through over a decade of major and minor construction, shuttle buses, and the dilapidated TTC streetcars, I consider this to be the crowning achievement of the St. Clair right-of-way project.  This is a cause for celebration, and I hope you will join the party later this year!"

 

 

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