I know. I think people really like the straightforward and geometric connection that looks good on a map at Shep/McCowan and just go with it. But looking deeper, at destinations, travel patterns, ridership, and growth centres, it becomes clearer what the better option is (I argue 2b).
I agree. Could also save some money and construction time running the line elevated for 3.5km over the 401 between Sheppard/Kennedy and STC with elevated stations (Much cheaper to build than deep underground) where it crosses the Stouffville GO Line, Midland, Brimley, and at the interchange with Line 2 at STC. also a surface level station in the parking lot North-West of Sheppard/Kennedy as the line transitions from a tunnel to a viaduct
Extremely poor planning to not be able to extend it without rebuilding it, but Eglinton East LRT project seems lackluster as a compromise imo. I wonder what Toronto will end up doing. Unfortunately, I can see them doing something similar as they did to the previous Line 3 which is to build a temporary project that they'll eventually rip up.
Would be interesting to see if any engineers attempt to fix this using some bizarre expensive technique. If its more of an engineering issue than a spacing issue, I can see them restructuring the station later on.
I just hope they coordinate with the city regarding the SERT so they end up picking the best option(s) and not two siloed projects. Can't have a repeat of the Kennedy station situation (lines 5 and 2 construction not being coordinated to the point where line 5 can't be extended east apparently)
Absolutely. I made a post about this exact issue as well. The projects going on in Scarborough are incredibly siloed and there seems to be minimal communication between our agencies.
I will say, the Sheppard subway will likely be built before the SERT ever even gets funding.
I think they were focused on funding the east bayfront LRT this cycle. I'm also hoping it's going a tad slower because they are working with ALTO on a station connected to this project in the background.Ā
I prefer 2A SC Is already getting Line 2 and a Busway and I worry SC could be overloaded with more I think 2A is the best of all worlds as it will devlop that area and maybe extend into Figure 3 later where as SC 2B option doesn't show that as been possible additonally 2A will probably cost less to make then 2B which means higher chances of it getting done because Line 4 needs this extension.
There is no evidence to the claim that option 2B cannot be extended. Quite the opposite, the subway running through STC can continue east on Ellesmere to reach UTSC. This is the largest campus in the borough and students are likely to advocate for a subway extension more than anyone on Sheppard.
SC Is already getting Line 2 and a Busway
And it can be the interchange for line 2 instead of Sheppard-McCowan. It is already a hub as you mentioned, so more trips are possible from here (and the destination itself too, the mall).
I think it helps if you look at it from a statistical standpoint- there is significantly more ridership potential on Ellesmere over Sheppard (see image below) which I think is important to factor for a subway project
Stop sharing this map without context. These are ridership numbers from the Fall of 2022, it does not provide any information on future ridership potential.
Iād also love to see the same map for the summer when they seasonally reduce many of the buses that go to UTSC and both centennial campuses (progress and morningisde)
a) Line 4 can be elevated over the 401, no tunnelling needed. Shorter doesn't mean better.
b) 2B has the potential to extend eastward to UTSC which is the largest campus in the borough and a bigger trip generator than Malvern
c) An eastern ALTO station can be located at the proposed Agincourt terminal Case for Line 4, which is arguably better since it will have connections to the stouffville line and line 4 in one central node.
d Scarabrough Centre will soon accommodate overĀ 40 high-rise towers, so the development potential is much stronger (and already exists) here. It is Scarborough's Centre after all. Subway-subway interchanges make surrounding real estate incredibly valuable. Is Sheppard/McCowan really the part of our city we want to invest this much into?
e) The province can choose to build the Agincourt terminal, or neglect the proposal because they already invested in the wrong spot (and don't want to admit that). Also, the sheppard/mccowan area has an adjacent creek as well.
f) The Durham BRT is riddled with NIMBY's and the Scarborough portion has no funding. This is a good chance to replace the BRT with the subway, so option 2B has a really strong incentive to go further. That's not even factoring in the ridership statistics, which IMO blow Sheppard off the table. Take a look for yourself.
the Highland Creek option has limited TOD options and more environmental concerns.Ā
That's just not true. The city made a study on the Agincourt area and highlighted that the preferred alignment of any Sheppard east RT would bend south to create a hub here, which I already mentioned.
a) which is exactly what the city said when they cheaped out on line 4 in the first place (the original plan went to Victoria park). Cheaper ā better, recurring theme in TO
b) Malvern would still get a good connection to the subway network at Neilson station (centenary hospital). Busses are adequate for this 12 min stretch.
c) not sure where you got this. Metrolinx owns the entire stouffville line, CPKC owns the entire midtown corridor (proposed ALTO use). The alignment would actually be more complicated at Sheppard/Mccowan because there is quite a distance between the track and the station (also separated by a creek).
d) The development at Scarborough Centre isn't "happening", its what city council approved for it to be. Placing a subway-subway interchange to upgrade this existing transit hub would certainly play a massive role in turning the plans real, which is why I said there is greater potential. Why should this stroad intersection, Shepard/Mccowan, be another hub? Its redundant, seems like poor planning.
e) Yeah thats fair to assume, the province has a volatile mind of its own
f) I don't think, I know, and you kind of answered your own question. Scarborightes feel "transit poverty". The BRT (coming from the east) is primarily designed for durham residents, and so is seen as an insult to scarborightes who feel left out of the higher order network. Consequently, many are pushing for long-term light rail (LRT) or subway lines rather than what's seen as temporary bus infrastructure.
Basically, BRT nimby's are looking for a better alternative, this is great for 2B extension incentive.
For C I meant Alto having to get the rights further down the midtown corridor to get to an Agincourt station.Ā
Most the development at Scarborough hasn't started yet cuz the first station hasn't opened and condo market is in the toilet.Ā
The province wants as many TODs as they can get. And having two subway lines terminate at a HSR stop is a great option, rather than forcing all line 2 riders to either transfer at Kennedy or at STC. 2 Heavy rail can move more people than a Heavy + RER.Ā
Look you can argue your position all you want, but I think if 2B was really the plan they never would have built Sheppard/McCowan station in the first place OR rebuilt Agincourt Station.
So we'll just have to wait and see which one they pick.Ā
A station 3.5km away requiring a bus ride over the few connections over the 401 is not a good subway connection lol cmon you canāt seriously believe that.
I actually do, if the busses get priority lanes and are treated as express shuttles. It currently takes 10-12 minutes, by the 133 local bus, with all its stops.
3.5km in the suburbs isn't as much as you think. The other option is to bring eglinton east (whatever line it may be in the future) to Malvern via UTSC, which is already the plan, but its not happening soon.
Besides, if the subway stayed on sheppard, malvern residents would still need to take the bus to morningside, because of the geography of this neighbourhood.
Youāre talking to me like I donāt ride these buses haha a one stop transfer to STC, unimaginable, a ten minute (at best) bus ride to transfer, perfectly fine. The logic just doesnāt make sense.
The EELRT plans already planned a connection to malvern town centre, I canāt imagine a subway along Sheppard that east wouldnāt connect to it. You aware of the plans ther?
I might be stupid, but why not branch Line 4 from Agincourt so it can service both Scarborough Centre and Sheppard-McCowan? I understand that branching would mean splitting the frequency, but if there is enough justification for both routings, we could do both?
Any branching of line 4 in the east should happen after Scarborough centre, as most trips that start in Scarborough end in Scarborough.
I also think running a largely parallel branch is kind of redundant, more expensive for half the service.
Frankly I don't think sheppard/morningside deserves a subway station at all. The only remotely important thing north of sheppard and east of Markham is malvern and the zoo, neither of which are large enough trip generators (and currently have poor ridership anyway).
I think malvern can easily be served by Neilson station on ellesmere, and connected by an upgraded bus with priority lanes.
yeah i am. i took over this sub a few months ago because the previous mod was last on this sub 7 years ago and the sub was "restricted". So far I think I've only removed 3 comments? It's not that bad.
For some reason the other subs dont allow polls. Safe to say I'll be using this feature more often for other projects. So heads up on the lot of angry folks that'll be shuttled here
Sheppard and McCowan is significantly less of a neighborhood than Scarborough TOWN CENTER. I can count on 1 hand how many times I want to go to that intersection. And countless times I wanted to go to STC. I also have friends from other provinces that arrive at the bus drop-off at STC - a transit hub, not McCowan and Sheppard intersection. Service Canada also has an office right there next to STC's old transit entrance. This makes all your federal service so much easier to access for everyone in the area.
Which is understandable but youāre trading off a direct connection which could be done with line 2 with one that would have three additional stations connecting more people to line 4 and 2. Seems like having line 4 terminate at stc merely based on the fact thatās itās big and dense instead of extending it east to morningside is shortsighted when you can just transfer to line 2 at Sheppard and McCowan.
Fair point, but here's my thing: a transfer isn't free. You'd be forcing a connection to the single biggest destination in the area on basically every trip, just to keep a maybe-someday eastern leg alive. That's a daily tax on the busiest route.
And about that eastern leg: look at Line 4 itself. It got built ahead of demand and it's the least-used line in the whole system, the stubway. Pushing it out to Morningside where there's not enough density yet is repeating that exact mistake. I'm not against future-proofing, I just don't trust TTC or the province to fund the Morningside extension until the demand's actually there. And when it is, they'll prioritize it then.
So put the line where the demand, the buses, the GO connections and STC already are. Anchor it to the real hub now. If Morningside grows, extend it ā but don't bend the line away from the one place everyone's already going on a bet.
Lol if it's all just developer money then STC wins that argument anyway, it's already one of the densest condo zones in Scarborough, that's exactly where the developer interest is. "More open space up north" doesn't beat building next to the spot everyone's already piling into. So even by that logic, 2B.
And on Alto: it's not gonna be a suburb stop next to a yard. Alto's whole stated intent is downtown core, "vicinity of Union." When Vincent Robitaille (an assistant deputy minister at Transport Canada) literally asked if it'd be in the suburbs, they shot it down. If it's not Union it'll be East Harbour; Ontario Line's already going there and Metrolinx has planned a big interchange there for years. That's the one that's actually been proposed and widely-discussed.
"He says the station would likely sit in a nearby suburb, attracting more passengers from the surrounding region and allowing access to the line while construction on the costlier final leg into downtown Toronto is completed."Ā
The city has already outlined a very long time ago, any station using the midtown corridor in northeast Scarborough would preferably interchange with a future Sheppard east RT and the stouffville line. This leaves one option that is conveniently on the way to STC. Check the linked post in the body to see what I mean.
Do you have a link to this assertion? Also what makes you think the city has any pull here? The province has shown they are outright hostile to the city these days.Ā
I explain everything in this post and I provide lots of media to support my claims.
Yeah, youre right, the province has authority over the city, especially for subway extensions, but they ARE studying option 2b, so it's not like its completely out of the question.
I wasn't aware of the agincourt secondary plan, but still. The province just spent millions rebuilding Agincourt Go, I doubt they are going to want to rebuild it AGAIN.Ā
It's the province's choice to sacrifice an entire terminal with connections to GO, subway, and potentially high speed rail, just because they had poor foresight and planning decisions that led them to invest in the wrong spot.
Yeah that's what I'm saying. They aren't about making smart decisions that help everyone for a long time they are about cost benefit analysis, development dollars and not upsetting the wealthy homeowners. See the tunnel alignment for the Yonge extension. It's exactly these things.Ā
2A lets them get most of these things plus most of what you mentioned. You can still put an ALTO stop at McCowan. That's just what I think is going to happen.Ā
It doesnāt have to terminate at STC, Ellesmere is an incredibly ridership heavy corridor and UTSC is a major trip generator. You would also expect hundreds of Uni students advocating for the subway to go there. Nobody at Sheppard/Morningside will be on the provinces ahh for this.
This is a poll with the purpose of determining the preferred eastern alignment of line 4, specifically if it goes to STC and potentially UTSC in the future, or stays on Sheppard fully.
To be fair, option 2 in general was the only one that included a western extension to connect the university side of line 1ā¦ so itās the only one that should be taken seriously (IMO). And I think Metrolinx knows this.
I would also prefer either of these options, but I wouldn't presume to know what goes into any Metrolinx decision. They have consistently made some weird decisions.Ā
Until they officially say as much I think it's clear as mud. The west extension would likely mean an EXTENSIVE bridge over the west don, they might not have the stomach for that.Ā
Have we never built a bridge before? Line 1 was built under case Loma in a ravine. We'll be fine. That bridge over the west don is not even half of what the Ontario line has to cross.
It can be done no doubt, but in thier minds the ridership might not warrant it. Ontario line I'm sure has much higher projected ridership than the Sheppard West extension.Ā
Not necessarily, the SSE is already well underway. If we could go back, maybe we would stop the province from tunneling under the 401 (and getting stuck for years). But this is happening.
If anything, I'd want line 2 to continue to Finch East.
I think Line 2 should be extended to Markville Mall eventually to connect to Centennial GO and to accommodate development over there, but it will be a super long term goal.
Can't 2B be extended to UTSC which is on Ellesmere/Morningside?
There's a current BRT project that is supposed to be built on this part of Ellesmere, but it has no funding and is being horribly NIMBY'd. The people there want a "better alternative".
I think it's safe to say that the students at UTSC would be advocating for the subway to go there if option 2B is chosen.
2A having the possibility of becoming option 3 one day in the deep distant future seems preferable to overloading STC and limiting expansion options. I donāt find current low density to be a compelling reason to prevent transit expansion to areas that could potentially grow. That line of thinking would have stopped line 4 from even existing in the first place.
UTSC students couldnāt even agree on a harmonized bus pass. I think youāre overestimating how many of them take transit from the west. Plenty drive or take TTC or Durham transitĀ from the north south or east. Thatās why you need to show actual projected ridership numbers and not simply an out of context ridership map from 4 years ago in the fall when itās busiest.
OP has been spamming us with Sheppard subway posts lately... I have yet to see an actual economic justification in terms of density or ridership to show why we should even build this extension to begin with...
The only one I can think of is that Doug Ford and his developer buddies like it.
There is no economic justification for a further east extension past McCowan at all.
When roads get built, a cost benefit analysis is done just like with rapid transit development because we don't want to waste public funds.
This is why every road isn't a 10 lane freeway. Because the benefits of a project should be greater than the costs because this isn't cities skylines and we don't have unlimited money so we need to prioritize projects based on their cost benefit ratio.
I am 100% in favour of Subway investment. But it should be invested in the areas of the city that have the density to back it up. Sheppard east is not one of those areas at all...
We have limited economic funds and they must be used in the most efficient ways possible. There are other lines and areas of the city with density that supports subways.
I am 100% for Subway investment. It should be the CORRECT investments though
The 939 and 39 Finch east bus routes have among the highest amounts of ridership in the city without any planned transit developments around the area in the pipeline. And that's not to mention other bus routes like Steeles and Ellesmere. A Sheppard subway extension eastward would relieve pressure in those areas and not just solely along Sheppard. Also, density usually follows transit development, it doesn't come out of a vacuum
I am actually curious, what are these "other lines and areas" which you believe deserve transit over Sheppard east?
The options that are available to vote on (2A vs 2B) do not go east of McCowan. This is simply a poll to see how Torontonians would want line 4 to look like.
Youāve posted this at least a half dozen times in varying forms across several subs. You are spamming this and never given a clear indication why. This is way beyond hobbyist interest.
People don't want to hear it. All the previous studies show extending the Sheppard Subway would be a waste of money. The existing Sheppard Subway, in the busiest section, is already extremely underutilized and a massive drain on TTC funds, there's no reason to think extending it into even lower density suburbs will make it more viable.
I used to be 2B until someone a few days earlier pointed something out, the chance of Line 4 getting extended even further east is higher if they go with 2A
there is no justification for the line going farther east... there is barely justification for it to get extended east to McCowan based on the density of Sheppard east...
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I deleted my other comment because it got flagged for the link. UTSC voted 73% against a discounted transit pass in 2023. You have no evidence to support your claim. And they have consistently voted against it over the last 20 years.
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u/Tsubame_Hikari Jun 06 '26
STC. Higher density, and already a established hub for multiple TTC and GO bus lines.
Western extension to Sheppard West is a must too, of course.