Toronoto’s King Street 504 Streetcar
What both Vancouver’s Granville St. and Chinatown need for rejuvenation: A modern tram. A tram in Toronto
As mentioned before, the King Street A&B Streetcar routes carries more customers than the Broadway B Line bus.
99 B 35,800 Boarding’s (Fall 2022)
King 504 A&B Streetcar: 48,900 Boarding’s (Fall 2022)
Well let’s have a look at the King Streetcar route.
A King St. Streetcar in a rather tight local. No problem.
A 90 degree turn is common for streetcars/trams!
Streetcars do not need towers along its route.
Vancouver city Engineers and Translink claim streetcars cannot operate on narrow streets. I guess they forgot to mention Toronto.
Zwei, its the 504 not the 514..
Vancouver could have a street line like Toronto in an s shape. Starting at Waterfront station going east to Chinatown then turning south and west around false creek to Granville island. Then it can turn south to South Vancouver and east to River district in East Vancouver. It would be on a right of way for most of the way, except downtown. West 1st avenue was designed for a street car to go down the middle of the street with a grassy median.
More factors than just Boarding’s numbers.
Nothing wrong streetcars/trams.
But Frequent bus is close on boarding to TTC 2nd busy a streetcar should be noticed?
99 B 57,240 Boarding’s 2019 (up to 60,000ish)
King 504 A&B Streetcar: 90,560 Boarding’s 2019
501 QUEEN Streetcar 62,450 Boarding’s 2019
yearly averages from Monday to Friday.
99 B 35,800 Boarding’s 2022
King 504 A&B Streetcar: 48,900 Boarding’s 2022
501 QUEEN Streetcar 28,650 Boarding’s 2021
what’s the recovery percentage?
99-B 35,800/57,240=0.6254*100= 62.54% On-time performance 80.5%
King 504 Streetcar 48,900/90,560=0.5399*100= 53.99% On-time performance 71.8%
84 bus and R4 spread out the Riders going to UBC.
36 FINCH WEST 54,870 to LRT(2019)
32 EGLINTON WEST 40,966 to LRT(2019)
99 B 57,240 + 84 bus 11,990 + 9 bus 23,240= 92,470 to Skytrain(2019)
1 big question? Zweisystem. is Flexibility Transat in Operations?
Streetcar can’t run single track or detour.
Other News WCX New Train 907 is SD40-2F
not ignoring the WCX.
Translink 2022 invested $459 M on ‘improvements’
Transit Revenues $552.6 M
cost of operation: bus $860.5 M, Rail $361.6, TP $48.1 M, CO $120.8 M and Roads $108.4
=$1.5B and $552.6 M ‘improvements’ to be $2.05B on transit for lower mainland. wow!!!
BCTransit Total Boarding 38.2 M
Transit Revenues $51.61 M
Total operating expenses $376 M
cost/Revenues
BCTransit $376/$51.61= x 7
Translink $2.05/$0.55= x 3.72
Sorry for being all over place.
sources of information
https://swanboatsteve.files.wordpress.com/2022/07/201920202021stats.pdf
https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/translink/viz/2019TSPR-BusSeaBusSummaries/TheWorkbook (Route number 99)
https://ttc-cdn.azureedge.net/-/media/Project/TTC/DevProto/Documents/Home/Transparency-and-accountability/Reports/CEO-Reports/2022/CEOs-Report–August-2022.pdf?rev=aba96df3224347f28cf1b5ef90b2dfac&hash=832B76E179F63C1B90B849549F5740BD(OTP TTC)
https://www.translink.ca/plans-and-projects/data-and-information/accountability-centre/service-quality(Frequent Bus OTP Translink)
https://www.bctransit.com/documents/1529719117548 (BCTransit Financial)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbIdzBPX6_0&t=2048s(Translink Financial 1:47:00, 1:49:00 and 1:45:00)
Zwei replies: I would be very careful quoting Translink’s numbers, especially with the 99 B Line bus. At a maximum of 3 minute headway’s (peak hours), the 60,000 number is somewhat questionable. The Fall 2022 numbers is 35,800 boarding’s a day. I would say the 60,000 number includes all the buses that use Broadway, including the Arbutus and Fraser St buses.
Even with the subway, the Fraser and Arbutus buses will not feed into the subway and if TransLink is that daft to do this, expect a passenger revolt. Translink has a sordid history of fudging numbers.
“The problem with TransLink is that you can never believe what it says; TransLink never produces a report based on the same set of assumptions.”
Former West Vancouver Clr. Victor Durman, Chair of the GVRD (now METRO) Finance Committee.
The problem for Vancouver and Translink is that they have a bad international reputation, so much so, Vancouver and Translink is all but ignored. The system is extremely politicized to suit the premier’s mood. Sadly Translink’s accounting, in the end, seldom adds up.
Example: Translink has claimed that 80% of their pre covid ridership has returned to transit and also claim that the 99B, fuelled by the U_pass was alsmost at Pre covid ridership numbers, yet their fall boarding fall far below the mark. 80% of 60,000 is 48,000, yet their fall boarding’s numbers is 38,500 a day.
Something is not right.
Example: Translink claims the subway will have a larger capacity than a tram or streetcar, yet, according to Thales in their News Release about the re-signalling of the Millennium Line, that maximum capacity on the Millennium Line is a mere 4,000 pphpd and after re-signalling 7,500 pphpd. Modern trams have been known to carry in excess of 20,000 pphpd.
Translink gets away with this because there is no independent audit of ridership on the regional transit system and until there is, Translink can claim any number it wants with impunity.
Zwei replies say ‘Translink has a sordid history of fudging numbers.’ Translink Calculate starting Compass card, pay customers and if bus driver add Free loader. Calculate pay customers or bus driver add Free loader. Starting. All Digital open source with Google maps uses it on demand busy levels for transit for travelers. Same system BC Transit uses for calculation of boardings.
Poorly written my question.
Is on time performance and Reliability= A world class service/ Better service?
Current service pattern and Existing rolling stock Availability for Millennium Line 7,500 pphpd.
Across the network 94%, Vancouver and North Vancouver 81%
good news 99-B. Spread out Easton or West bound passengers traveling 84 bus or R4 increase ridership!!!
TransLink say RapidBus routes experienced some of the highest ridership in the region with three routes (R1, R4 and R5) ranking in the top 10 busiest bus routes.
Zwei replies: Again, as there is no independent audit of this claim, TransLink can claim anything they want had has.
Example: Translink has always claimed a higher capacity number for the light metro network, but if we read Thales News release the present maximum capacity of the Expo Line is a mere 13,500 pphpd and the Millennium line 4,000 pphpd.
I also know there is a lot of proprietary information on ridership, etc. that is not released or cannot be released to the public.
Again, if the SkyTrain/MALM light metro system is so good, why does everyone else avoid it like the plague? Obviously operating authorities have secured their own numbers to compare with other modes and made their decisions accordingly.
light metro network. 2 way look at very expensive to LRT or cheaper to metro/heavy metro.
Kelana Jaya Line Ridership 94,657,974 2019 1 Line
SkyTrain ridership 165 M 1 2019 3 Line
It’s on the transit agency on how to Install, operate And integration.
Hyundai Rotem 2 Lines Automated systems.
Bombardier 8 Lines Automated systems.
Alstom metropolis 2 and 2 In planning Lines Automated systems.
VAL People movers 12 Still in operation. 2 more in development Lines Automated systems.
Lines Automated Never popular.
MALM light metro car Electric pick up outdated.
Zwei replies: Kuala Lumpur has a population of 2 million and a metro population of over 7 million! Remember, Kuala Lumpur bought into ART (as it was called back then) after large “success fees were paid to senior bureaucrats, and senior politicians including the Prime Minister!
Kuala Lumpur has 7 rapid transit lines, including a Monorail and one ART line. The Ampang Line line called LRT (but it is really a light metro, carries over 213,000 passengers a day. The Kajang Line (conventional metro) carries around 216,000 riders daily. The monorail which carries around 35,000 people a day.
The Putrajaya Line, a conventional metro, opened in 2022 and the Sha alam line, a conventional metro, will open in 2024.
It seems transit authorities in Kuala Lumpur are building convention metros and not continuing using the ART/MALM proprietary system.
Toronto saved a majority of its streetcar network and has maintained a dense streetcar network so it can and often does, go around trouble spots. There’s no need for single track operations in the core of the network. Only when maintenance is being done on large sections outer areas of the network do tney need to replace their streetcars with buses. Unlike Vancouver’s Trolley Bus network, the TTC is actually adding to and upgrading their existing streetcar network, with existing and new lines that are physically segregated from traffic. This greatly adds to ridership.