How to improve the Streetcar network in Toronto Brian, February 12, 2024February 12, 2024 On November 17 2023 the first of the additional streetcars entered into service. Car 4604, is the first of the new order. Originally the TTC ordered 204 of the new streetcars with an option for an additional 60. These cars are part of that order. So as transit expert Steve Munro points out on his website, with the previous 204 cars currently only 140 or so are in service at a time and pre-pandemic there was only about 160 in service in the peak hours. So why is there an additional 60 cars being added? Well first of all there are a few from the original order that are damaged and may never be used again. One of them was caught in a flash flood under the train tracks on king street. Actually I believe 2 were caught there, and another one was damaged over a year ago in a collision on St Clair with a garbage truck. But there are plans for service expansion in the future. As for right now, I have some ideas for improving service and using more streetcars. It starts with taking the existing streetcar network and making it new again so to speak. Changing some of the routes and hours of frequency. Lets take a look at existing routes: 501 Queen Currently the 501 operates (when there is no construction) between Neville Park in the East and Long Branch in the west. It is the longest streetcar route. Currently it gets cut in two at Humber Loop for now. Streetcars would generally operate from Neville Park to Humber Loop then transfer to a 507 to operate from Long Branch to Humber Loop. 502 Kingston Temporarily suspended due to closure of Queen St downtown 503 Downtowner Operates from King and York area to Kingston and Victoria Park (Bingham Loop) 504 King Operates as 2 branches, when no construction projects change that. One branch operates from Dundas West Station to the Distillery Loop. The other branch operates from Broadview Station to Dufferin Loop 505 Dundas This route travels from Dundas West station to Broadview Station. Temporary construction routing has it operating from Dundas West Station to Kingston Road and Queen Street. It operates via the regular route to Broadview and Gerrard. From there it proceeds east on Gerrard to Coxwell, then it goes south to Queen and Kingston. 506 High Park This route operates from Main Street Station to High Park loop 507 Humber/Long Branch This is the shortened version of the 501 that operates between Long Branch and Humber Loop. 508 Long Branch/Downtown This route operates peak period service from Long Branch loop into Downtown via King street. Service on this route has been cancelled or suspended many times over the years 509 Harbourfront This route travels along Queens Quay connecting Union Station to Bathurst Street before proceeding to the Exhibition Loop next to the Exhibition GO station and the starting point of the future Ontario Line 510 Spadina This route travels from Spadina Station down Spadina, to Queens Quay and then over to Union Station. It has some trips that end earlier, either at King St or at Queens Quay. Although I believe the trips that used to terminate at King were extended down to Queens Quay. 511 Bathurst This route operates from Bathurst Station to Exhibition loop. 512 St Clair This route starts at Gunns loop just west of Keele Street next to the Stockyards shopping centre. It travels along St Clair and stops at St Clair Station while also serving St Clair West station first. So how do we take this service and add more streetcars to the network? Well its simple I think. We modify routes to provide better service in some areas. Lets look at the 501 route. I believe the 501 should be shortened a little more than Humber Loop. Lets take that route and have all trips start at Neville Park. Take that route and operate one car to McCaul street, take the other and run it to Sunnyside Loop at Roncesvalles Ave. This way it is less service into Humber loop which works for my other ideas. The 507 could basically stay the same and operate only Long Branch to Humber Loop. But be enhanced by a second all day route running through that area. The 508 could be modified to operate both ways all day service with a route extension. It could operate as loop through downtown. Leaving Long Branch it could follow the existing route into downtown but extend to Parliament or Broadview. From there the route could go to Carlton and then head west to Bathurst and down Bathurst to Queen or King, continuing west from there back to Long Branch loop. It could provide a little relief to other streetcars in the area. The 502 could eventually come back but be extended to Bathurst St and then down to Exhibition loop. The 503 would not need to really change at all. Same with the 504, except for when the track gets built to extend Broadview to the future East Harbor station. My recommendation at that point is to run the 504 from Broadview station to East Harbor and the distillery district via the new tracks they plan to build. From the distillery district the streetcar could proceed like normal to Dufferin Loop. From Dundas West station the streetcar could travel like normal to the distillery loop before proceeding to East Harbor station. The 505 is an interesting one, same with the 506. The 505 could be two routes. All trips could start at Dundas West Station, with trips alternating between Broadview Station, and Kingston and Queen. So it would extend the route, and provide more service on Gerrard street. The 506 could have all trips start at High Park Loop, with one trip operating to Queen and Coxwell loop and the other to Main Station. I covered the 507/508 already. As for the 509 and 510 I believe those routes should stay the same, except that all trips on the 510 should go to Union, and for both routes the layover/recovery time should not be at Union. Currently streetcars enter union, drop off first, then pull forward and load, before leaving. They sit there until it is time to go. My opinion is all cars should enter union, pull forward, unloading and loading at the same time, before leaving the station. Cars could layover easier at Exhibition loop or at Spadina Station. Now this is an interesting idea I have for the 511 and 512. First the 512. That route should operate from Gunns loop to St Clair West station only. The 511 should operate from Exhibition loop travel the normal route to Bathurst Station. Instead of entering the station going Northbound the car should stay on street to St Clair West station then to St Clair Station. St Clair West has a little bit of a capacity constraint as it is currently designed. I believe that could be improved by building a platform on the roadway downstairs just outside of the station and using the traffic lights for pedestrians and allowing the 511 to go straight through the outside of the station. Passengers would just have to walk through the station a little further. By taking this route and not having it turn into the station and then trying to turn back out, it does two things. First, it allows the 512 to have a proper layover inside without blocking the 511. Second, it allows the 511 to save on time. Currently the 512 turning into the station and exiting eats up about 5 minutes on average. For people that want to transfer between streetcars, they can do it at the stops at Bathurst Street. Getting off of the 512 people could stand at the same spot and get the 511. The reason I suggest this route change is it means more streetcars in use, but more importantly, it can shorten the route 7 so that all trips or most trips could terminate at St Clair West Station. Even if every third bus went all the way down, it means that the service north of St Clair on Bathurst could still be improved by having the bus service shortened. It also adds more capacity for riders south of St Clair. On the 511 heading south I would still have the streetcars turn into Bathurst station so passengers are not having to run across a busy street to try to catch the streetcar. Another suggestion I have for improving service and using the streetcars more, is a 10 minute frequency circle style route. One operating clockwise and one counterclockwise. The route could travel Parliament, then to King, over to Spadina, to College and back over to Parliament. It would essentially be a relief route for parts of King, Spadina and College. It would also connect to 4 subway stations. The idea with that route would be to operate it in a clockwise and a counterclockwise routing. Having that route would also give a second option for service along Parliament as well. For all these changes to work well, there would be minimal construction, except for the 504 extensions which are planned for the most part. The only thing that could cause issue is having major delays on certain routes with 2 or more routes operating along it. But if the schedules are built correctly and the city implements some traffic control measures, such as no left turns at certain intersections, or extending the King transit corridor to other spots so that streetcars can operate better, than these changes will be really good for Toronto. Increasing transit service is a big priority under Mayor Chow, and with the new One Fare system in place, there could be an increase in ridership coming, but for that to be successful the service will need to be better. Freeing up some buses by replacing parts of a route with streetcars will help. It will boost frequency on the Bathurst bus, but even if they do not want to boost the service on the route, those buses can be moved elsewhere. By continuing to operate the 502/503 to late night service then the Coxwell bus will not need to revert to the old service of travelling to Bingham loop at night. Again that saves buses in that area to move them to other routes. These changes may not move the needle a lot in terms of buses that can be reallocated, but it greatly increases capacity on certain corridors, especially with the overlapping routes. Even though I took the 501 and removed it from Humber loop, there is still the 508 that would take people there, and there is a perfectly good transfer stop for the two routes. I believe increasing the service on the streetcar routes and extending some routes will be a huge benefit in the future. I also believe that ALL streetcars should operate in service when travelling to or from the yards, so that they provide a relief on each main corridor as they travel across the city if needed. Let me know down below what you think. Related Ontario TransitTTC