Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxWjtpzCIfA
I found the Notjustbikes channel 2 months ago and have been binge-watching all the videos. I agree with a lot of the points in Jason's videos (that's his name, in case you didn't know haha). For this video, it was so great that he pointed out how the rail transit in Toronto and lots of other North American cities are designed in a way to support cars instead of supporting walkable spaces, thus somewhat defeating the point of public transit. However, I found it odd that he did not mention the Toronto subway and say something along the lines of "the Toronto GO rail does not support walkable cities, but the Toronto subway does".
While the Toronto subway system is not perfect (many cities have better systems), the subway system solves the problems of GO rail that he mentioned. First of all, one of his biggest criticisms is that GO rail does not have interconnections within the downtown area since it serves to bring people from suburbs into downtown, not to let them travel through downtown. Well, taking people through downtown and having connecting lines is the job of the subway. The subway also has none of the other problems of GO rail mentioned in the video such as: a) only operated during rush hour; b) stations are far away from walkable places; c) too many parking lots beside the station; d) no connections between lines. I've visited Toronto before and I can tell you that the subway runs frequently, has connections between lines, and stations are mostly located in walkable spaces instead of parking lots. So why is he being hard on GO rail when the subway is there to do what GO rail can't do? He is rating GO rail as if it is a subway system.
Therefore, I am wondering whether he left it out because he will address it in a different video? Or is it that (please don't downvote me for this, read what I wrote above first and consider that I support this channel, this is just constructive criticism) he purposely didn't talk about the Toronto subway to make the transit system look worse than it is? As in "look at how crap it is, we have this poorly designed GO rail instead of a subway system".
All of his points about the bad methods of urban planning in American cities are true. However, it is only fair to point out the good things too, so why was he saying that GO rail does not support walkable places, while not bringing up how the Toronto subway system does? Oh an
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i've checked every time i passed by my nearest subway but they don't carry it at all, but it's on the subway canada website? thank you in advance!
First of all, Toronto is yet to be mega city since its population hasn't even reached 3 million.
But somehow every construction cost from the proposal seems outrageous and makes me wonder where all those money goes?
"Ontario line" is 16km long with almost $11 billion budget.
which means the construction cost is $687 million / km
and let's take a look in other cities ( I won't mention china since we know it would be damn cheap):
Tokyo Metro Fukutoshin Line: ¥250 billion for 8.9 km of new track. $280 million per km.
Paris Metro Line 14: €1.13 billion in 1998-2003 for 9 km. This line crosses under the Seine and had construction problems due to catacombs. $184 million per km.
Copenhagen Circle Line: DKK 21.3 billion in 2010 for 15.5 km. $270 million per km
Seoul in general gives its tunneling construction cost as $150 million per km in context of a proposal
Barcelona L9/10 (fully automated with nearly 100% undergraound): €6.5 billion in 2006-14 for 47.8 km. $200 million per km.
Milan Metro Line 5: €500 million for 5.6 km of fully underground driverless metro. $131 million per km.
*source: US Rail Construction Costs | Pedestrian Observations
(inflation matters but not so much in those cities especially in europe and japan where inflation rise by %1 per year or less. and I can see that there are few cities like london and new york has a construction that is close to $1 billion / km but it is due to their complicated and extensive subway network not like ours...)
so can someone explain why it cost double to quadruple to build a damn simple subway line in Toronto?
Toronto has much complicated underground network than PARIS or SEOUL? Really?
Math doesn't add up
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fun fact.
I looked up the one subway line construction proposal from montreal in 2017 (it didn't happen tho) and their budget was $5.9 billion for 25 km long which go through the whole Montreal downtown.
which means $236 million / km
Maybe all construction mafias from Montreal moved their base to Toronto.....?
