Bike Walk Bus Toronto

Every year, in December, I review the entire  list of TTC bus stops to see which ones have been made accessible. I have never really wrote about my findings, but I think it would make an interesting blog post. January 1, 2025, was the date that our province was supposed to be 'fully accessible', through the Accessibilities for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA). I don't think it takes much to realize we haven't reached that goal in many aspects. TTC, unfortunately, is not fully accessible, and it probably won't be for a few years. Nevertheless, some progress has been made this year. I will recap all improvements that TTC has made to accessibility on the subway and bus network. Please note that I will not take a look at the streetcar network as I am unclear on how different types of streetcar stops are deemed accessible or not. Maybe this is something I can look at next year... TTC Easier Access (Subway) TTC's Easier Access program is currently in Phase 3. At...

 In a previous blog post , I spoke about how the lack of GO bus stops on rail-replacement routes within the City of Toronto was one of the most significant examples of downtown-centrism in our region transit system. Recently, I was thinking about how other GO Transit policies punish passengers taking trips within Toronto that aren't downtown. In this blog post, I will provide a few examples of how GO Transit prioritizes downtown--suburban trips at the expense of numerous others. Transfer Barriers I won't rehash his article, but Sean Marshall recently wrote about how the new One Fare removes only one of a number of barriers between TTC and GO Transit. Because the TTC network was built around the subway system, connections to GO stations tend to be pretty poor. Considering that GO stations were built with a parking focus, transferring to connecting bus routes can be a pain. Sean gives examples of Old Cummer and Etobicoke North, which are two stations on major arterial roads, wit...

 In previous blog posts, or even if we've spoken, I have stated that the Montreal Metro is better than the TTC subway, but Toronto has better transit as a whole. I've talked at length about the second part of the sentence, but I've never properly interrogated the first part. In this blog post, I will compare the two heavy rail systems on a number of criteria in order to decide which is the better system. What Am I Comparing? I will compare the systems on a number of important points. I won't be providing a number grade to each, as I think that the qualitative comparison better reflects the nuance in this comparison. The systems will be graded on: Hours of service Frequency Reliability Scheduled closures Speed Connections (walkability and destinations) Connections (other transit) Accessibility Architecture Cleanliness Safety Also, for ease of writing, Toronto's system will be referred to a the 'subway' whereas Montreal's will be referred to as the 'Me...

 On this blog, I rarely speak about downtown transit issues. This is for a few reasons: there are lots of other people doing it, and in terms of the basics of providing transit service, downtown has a solid grid shape. This works well for transit, except for the areas to the southwest of Union Station. In this blog post, I will outline the basics of this area, outline its recent transit history, and what I think the next steps should be. The Area The area in question is roughly defined as anything bounded by Lake Shore, Strachan, King, and York. This area is high-density, and there are significant development pressures here. Neighbourhoods include CityPlace and Fort York. In addition, numerous attractions can be found here, including the CN Tower, Rogers Centre, and Fort York. In this block, there is east-west transit service along King, as well as along Queens Quay, just south of Lake Shore Boulevard. There is north-south transit on Bathurst, Spadina, and via Line 1 from Union (wh...

 I don't think I need to explain this, but most TTC routes require additional frequency. Many routes have not yet returned to frequencies from prior to the pandemic, and some streetcar routes operate much less frequently than they did in the 1980s. I think, however, that there are four TTC bus routes that TTC underinvests in. By this, I mean that they keep service at a minimum, despite high demand, and convenient routings that, if they were more frequent, would serve an important purpose for the entire network. In this piece, I will briefly identify the four routes that TTC is missing opportunities with by not providing a better service. 9 Bellamy The 9 Bellamy is the least frequent mainline route in Scarborough. Its morning peak frequency of 18 minutes is quite poor, and aside afternoon peak, service ranges from every 26 minutes to every 30 minutes. While Bellamy is mostly low-density, it serves large parts of Scarborough that are otherwise a distance from other transit services. ...

 As any regular GO Lakeshore East Line user can tell you, travelling along the corridor has been a challenge on some weekends this year. Due to Ontario Line construction, service on some weekends on the line, as well as the Stouffville Line, has been suspended, with replacement bus services offered. As I tend to avoid using the GO train during these times, I have been able to avoid these detours. This past weekend, when service was replaced by buses, I was able to see some of the first-hand challenges related to the disruptions. However, I also noted how easy it would be for GO to resolve some of these issues. GO's unwillingness to reduce severity of train disruptions speaks to how incapable they are in promoting regional transit, instead of a downtown-centric system. The impacts in this case are Scarborough-heavy, but they affect all parts of non-downtown Toronto. In this blog post, I will explain some of my overarching concerns with GO Train service disruptions, and how I think t...

 Despite living quite close to the 'Shops at Don Mills' outdoor mall, it's a place a rarely go to. Even during high school, I never met the question "Want to go to Shops?" with enthusiasm. In spite of my opinion, many people seem to love this place. So, I figure it's time to explore why I consider the Shops at Don Mills a failure. And yes, it deals with my hatred of cars. A Brief History The old Don Mills Centre was a strip mall that opened in 1955, at the southwest corner of Don Mills Road and Lawrence Avenue East, in North York. Successive expansions of the mall led to it being enclosed in 1978. This mall was a typical neighbourhood mall, not unlike Parkway, Agincourt, or Sheridan. I have a vague memory of this mall, but I was so young when it was fully open. The enclosed Don Mills Centre mall. In the early 2000s, owners Cadillac Fairview decided they wanted to renovate the mall and make it an outdoor lifestyle center. This opened in 2009. I would generalize...

Hey everyone! Politicians love flashy projects. If there's an opportunity for a photo op, they will be there. However, this obsession with capital projects instead of operations and maintenance leads to big facilities that are criminally underused (if you're interested in the topic of maintenance of urban systems, I recommend reading A City is not a Computer: Other Urban Intelligences by Shannon Mattern). Ontario is ground-zero for this projects: huge infrastructure that is seldom used. I argue that York Region is a particularly bad example of this relationship. As they say, every decision is made in York Region, and this political clout has led to a huge amount of money allocated for physical infrastructures and little for actually making them work. As construction on the Yonge North Subway Extension to Richmond Hill Centre is set to begin, I argue that York Region is not deserving of this. Using examples of the subway extension to Vaughan, as well as the new Cornell Terminal,...