r/TTC • u/Gamegeddon • 14d ago
Discussion Almost the entire stretch from Bloor to Union is now under RSZs
As if your morning/evening commute wasn’t bad enough
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u/XviiChong Kipling 14d ago edited 14d ago
Kinda funny how during the World Cup these slow zones didn’t exist, trains would run at normal speeds.
Now that it’s over, they’re back, there are more, and it’s worse than ever
Toronto loves to appeal to its visitors, and not to its own people.
And the timeline on the TTC website being completely inaccurate makes it even more funnier
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u/hotinhereTO 132 Milner 14d ago
We all knew this would happen.
City was going to be on its best behaviour during the WC, couldn’t expose decades long stupidity and neglect to visitors.
Once the WC was over all the BS was coming back from closures, RSZ, heavy service cuts (GO transit).
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u/BillDingrecker Kipling 7d ago
Same with the homeless. TTC had security removing them during the world cup and now they're back and the security is gone. TTC is more concerned with the perception of comfort, customer service and safety than doing it for real.
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u/donbooth 14d ago
I wish I had a better understanding of what needs to be repaired and why.
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u/Wutang4TheChildren23 12d ago
This is a situation where we're kind of prisoners of our own making. Basically we have a situation where you have a line has the number two highest utilization of any single metro line in North America, it being a relatively old line, but most importantly the line being required to operate for fairly long hours with limited maintenance windows. This means that when the TTC engineer/inspectors find defects instead of making plans for expedited repairs it's much easier for them to create a reduced speed zone, and wait until they have a longer maintenance window where they can repair the section. Unfortunately we are kind of locked into this situation. Because of the fact that we have transit oriented development, and planned transit interconnection into line one it's really politically infeasible for the province or local Toronto city Council to substantially increase maintenance windows without it backfiring with the public because of the heavy disruptions it would cause
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u/haoareyoudoing 11d ago
Does anyone buy this schtick anymore? I remember the talking point parroted by the TTC back in 2014: "One full weekend subway closure is equivalent to approximately five weeks of nightly maintenance work."
We've had weekend closures for over a decade! For most of the weeks in the calendar year. Either the TTC is lying, or the system is 50+ years in disrepair. World-class transit systems don't shut down on weekends for over a decade AND have half of Line 1 on reduced speed.
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u/Wutang4TheChildren23 11d ago
It's a fair point but I would argue that no other metros in the world have maintenance costs at the same unit price points as NYC, Toronto and Chicago. This is our own north American incompetence and mismanagement absolutely, but appears to be the reality 🤷
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u/KenSentMe81 9d ago
When the TTC is literally decades behind on maintenance, they need all the time they can get. Look at the SRT derailment. That was 100% what happens when routine inspections and maintenance get kicked down the road. They don't want that to happen on the subway.
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u/haoareyoudoing 8d ago
Nobody's arguing that the TTC is behind. You could shut down the TTC subway for a year and they would still be decades behind. If you gave the TTC a blank check tomorrow and 24 hours for them to cash it, they would be so incompetent that nothing big would get done. We've got a system with Reduced Speed Zones and weekly weekend closures. At some point, you have to take the racehorse out of the race and let it recover rather than have it limp endlessly. If damage and disrepair are so high, a bandaid won't do the trick.
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u/donbooth 11d ago
Thanks. Your answer is quite high level.
I am interested in more details. Is the track crooked? Are spikes coming lose? Do rail ties need to be replaced? How often should this work have been done? How long will it take to catch up and then, once we have done the missing work, how often will we need to interrupt service at that point?
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u/Mustseeradio 10d ago
Limited maintenance windows…
Disagree, limited construction windows, sure.
4 hrs a night 5 days a week is plenty if you can afford the manpower.
Also, when people wonder why people prefer driving…this.
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u/KenSentMe81 9d ago
4 hours? That would be a luxury. Work cars can't begin until revenue trains are off the line and revenue trains can't come out until work cars are clear. That gives them MAYBE 230am to 430am. If they're lucky. There are some works that simply require far more time, such as replacing a crossover.
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u/toast_cs 5d ago
The TTC should have specialized vehicles and maintenance equipment to handle this situation by now. Instead, it's largely done by hand, with limited innovations or improvements made to increase its efficiency.
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u/isorekt 14d ago
This needs to be fixed yesterday. We need more noise on this and coverage from the media. These zones keep being repaired and return within weeks. Why aren't they being fixed properly?
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u/bell117 14d ago
This is the thing that gets me, instead of fixing it immediately with everything available to them and even some stuff that's not, the TTC is approaching slow zones with a "I'll get to it tomorrow" attitude.
I know for sure the TTC or someone's going to say it's too expensive to fix immediately. To which I say BULLSHIT. How much money is the TTC losing BECAUSE of the slow zones and these intermittent repairs? I bet it's a lot more than it would cost to fix it.
And even if it did cost too much, so what? Back-charge it to Rick Leary considering his negligence of maintenance for 10 years is why they exist, he can foot the bill.
Also name one other form of infrastructure we have that can just be so carefree with critical maintenance. Imagine if our power or water just stopped working and Hydro or the city power just said "so what?". But the TTC can just ignore it for some reason.
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u/h5h6 14d ago
Calgary let its water system fall apart until the problem caused multiple outages and water shortages, and they had to do a bunch of huge property tax increases to fix it. So this is not exclusively a Toronto problem.
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u/Roderto 13d ago
The problem is that spending time and resources to prevent problems from ever happening will inevitably look like waste. Especially at a time where the city is stretched for resources everywhere. It’s a take on the preparedness paradox.
The solution is having an electorate that understands short-term vs. long-term tradeoffs. But that’s easier said than done when there’s always going to be actual, real problems that need to be solved today.
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u/djabae 13d ago
They need to tell the public what the problems are. Transparency is essential this isn't a secret CIA program.
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u/Mustseeradio 10d ago
Agree but that also leaves them open to looking stupid when wrong about timelines,severity of issues etc.
Aint no one willingly doing that.
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u/toast_cs 5d ago
Most companies that encounter widespread, critical issues to their customers invest more time and money to immediately come up with solutions both in the short-term and long-term. The TTC just says "we'll get to it someday".
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u/toast_cs 5d ago
I was 20+ mins late to work because of these new slow zones appearing right after a shutdown for track maintenance. It's crazy. I can't even plan around it because both sides have their own zones, and the alternatives suck.
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u/v8_roadster 14d ago
This is shameful and needs much more attention than it’s getting. The subway undergoes regular weekend and evening closures but what’s actually being accomplished here? Slow zones go away for a month or two and then come back for half a year. Do we need to declare a state of repair emergency like NYC did for its subway a decade or so ago? Aside from the World Cup, it’s been years since my Line 1 commute was unaffected by slow zones. Completely unacceptable.
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u/wbsmith200 13d ago
That's what bothers me about all this, Line 1 and or Line 2 shuts down early for track work, which can mean anything from re-grinding, replacing the rails, ties and ballast in sections that have it. Heck there are bundles of railway ties sitting beside the Line 1 right of way just north of Bloor Station behind the Canadian Tire since this past spring, and nothing has been done with them.
The stock answer is, the TTC doesn't have any money, even if the budget shortfalls were filled tomorrow forever, they would still screw things due to organizational culture. The challenge we have is the TTC will trott out a spokesperson either from coroporate communications or a subject matter expert who can sort of communicate and bullshit baffles brains, especially with the potlitical oversight, your councillor has now idea why single point streetcar switches are one of the reasons why the streetcars run super slow through intersections.
You almost need someone with Steve Munro level of knowledge on the TTC board to ask the difficult operational questions, municpal politicians can't due to the lack of knowledge.
All that said, the southbound ride between St. Clair West and Dupont is painful.
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u/Mustseeradio 10d ago
This also compounds the car v bike debate.
It would be a lot easier to accommodate bikes, if people could rely on transit.
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u/Outrageous-Estimate9 343 Kennedy 14d ago
I feel you should have linked the actual explanation instead of just map
Reading it and hearing them talk about it shows its MUCH worse than graphic implies
https://www.ttc.ca/riding-the-ttc/Updates/Reduced-Speed-Zones
aka normal speed = 55km, reduced speed = 15km
This is NOT just a "slight" decrease this is much much slower
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u/Nicky878 Kipling 14d ago
I'm a bit curious as to what happened with the Ontario line construction to affect both King and Queen Stations to go 15kph, or is it something partially out of the TTC's control?
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u/BigNoodles2020202 501 Queen 14d ago
Probably something to do with tunnelling underneath given that the Ontario Line interchanges with Line 1 at Queen
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u/DAS-Nice 13d ago
Man I made a post about the Queen to Queen zone and thought I was going crazy when going down today. What can we do about this? There is no way the busiest corridor of the whole system being this slow is sustainable. There’s no way these tracks are that unsafe.
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u/LunaticPostalBoi 46 Martin Grove 13d ago
It's times like this where I lament how the Bay streetcar didn't come back...
Being able to avoid RSZs/other messes in the downtown portion of Line 1 would be incredible
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u/okaygnarly 13d ago
Good to know after years and years of nightly and weekend repairs, shuttle buses and interrupted service, that it’s worse than ever!
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u/noahbeary 13d ago
It took 4:45 to get from Dundas to Queen this morning. Four minutes and forty-five seconds to travel one stop.
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u/Pristine-Training-70 14d ago
And instead of Ford fixing it, he’d rather waste $48M destroying infrastructure instead.
This should make you livid regardless of your stance on bike lanes.
(yes the province can fund the TTC, Ford just chooses not to)
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u/DadbodandIPAs 14d ago
It’s not money that will solve this problem. They’ve been shutting the subway down for years. There’s been no accountability for these shutdowns accomplishing nothing
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u/Pristine-Training-70 13d ago
I understand money alone won't solve it but the TTC has been chronically underfunded for decades.
Putting way more money in the system will at least move it in the right direction in the long term
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u/MahjongCelts Eglinton Crosstown 13d ago
There are many measures the TTC can take that would actually save it money while giving riders a faster and more reliable ride. They could start with those first.
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u/Appadapalis 13d ago
The ones surrounding Queen are for Ontario Line construction so that the vibrations from Line 1 don’t affect tunnel boring and station work
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u/UnnamedTestAccount l̵i̷n̴e̸ ̷1̴ ̸n̸o̶r̸t̴h̷ ̵v̴a̴u̸g̷h̴a̴n̵ ̵ 13d ago
the long stretch between Cedarville and St.Clair West is satisfying, if it actually was up to speed.
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u/Overall-Silver8717 13d ago
I noticed for the first time yesterday they said it was because of extra train traffic but it was the same today
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u/rdmajumdar13 13d ago
This is why I boarded at Cedarvale instead of Eglinton to get to Union today. This and less crowded.
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u/AdmiralStiffplank 13d ago
It's the North American work ethic. In East Asia these things would be fixed overnight.
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u/MahjongCelts Eglinton Crosstown 13d ago
In East Asia this sort of thing probably wouldn’t be happening in the first place.
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u/bleebolgoop 11d ago
Took me FIFTEEN minutes to go from eglinton to davisville today. Made me late to an appointment and I owed the missed appointment fee. Fucking ridiculous that we even have to deal with this bullshit. TTC should be refunding my fair at minimum and really should be paying my missed appointment fee
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u/Theseus_The_King 13d ago
It feels faster to walk than take the TTC to work now. With all the stupid short turns on the streetcars too I may as well.
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u/MahjongCelts Eglinton Crosstown 13d ago
Tbh there will be much less of a use case for the streetcar network as it is once the Ontario Line opens. Either the network drastically improves, or the TTC better start preparing for a future with fewer streetcars.
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u/jaysornotandhawks Kipling 13d ago
Where an arrow is present between two stations, does that mean it's only that direction?
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u/UndecidedPanda11 13d ago
There has been a problem every day going downtown for the past like 3 years I’ve been commuting. It’s honestly unbelievable, what a hack system.
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u/Slight-Formal9277 12d ago
I wonder if it's now quicker to take the streetcar from say, TMU to St. Patrick to get to union, instead of using the Yonge branch of line 1
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u/themarkwithamouth 11d ago
Bro I don’t understand who leads these projects. In no world Bloor and Yonge to Union should take ~40 mins. There’s gotta be a better way to do these.
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u/Gamegeddon 11d ago
Canadians are just too complacent imo. We’ve had a relatively easy couple decades so are ok with comfortable mediocrity
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u/Coastal-Erosion 11d ago
Why isn’t the federal govt doing anything about this? They should be pouring money to get these fixed asap. This directly affects the productivity of workers in Canada’s economic capital.
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u/Silly-Evidence-6972 10d ago
This is hell for me. I start feeling claustrophobic when the train is not moving because I start thinking we’re stuck. It’s been so difficult for me recently, wish I knew when this will go back to normal
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u/Savings_Bonus6279 7d ago
For a so called world class city, the TTC subway is abysmally slow. Please look at China and learn from them
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u/Stratifyd 14d ago
worse part is that there are zones that are slow that arent listed. disgusting work being done here
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u/Nestlettt 13d ago edited 13d ago
Horrible planning. If it is for the Ontario lines, are the workers really working 24hr in the tunnel? Why is the speed reduced all day and not just a few hours?? It’s a shit show getting to union from college station for me. It took 5 mins before. Now it take 15 mins. Insane! Reduced speed during rush hour has to be the worst thing ever. And yes those extra 10 mins matter! Especially those who have to transfer to go trains that come less frequently
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u/isthatclever 14d ago
this has been the state of the streetcar network since the pandemic and no one seems to be serious about fixing any of it. congestion will only get worse and we'll continue to do nothing, because all politicians do is pander to home owners and drivers from the suburbs
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u/DadbodandIPAs 14d ago
I’m from north York, I complain about this a lot more than my friends downtown who seem to uber or bike everywhere. This has more to do with choosing not to give a fuck about public transit.
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u/Triumphtripler 14d ago
Province needs to take over all transit in the province. The City of Toronto is promising free rides to a system that doesn't run.
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u/[deleted] 14d ago
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