Highways to hell

[eyeball]

Sure there are carpooling website but I'd imagine the aggravation of finding someone to carpool with isn't worth the effort.

So during rush hour these HOV lanes are freakin' empty!

Ever think of tinting your windows and buckling in a few mannequins?

[eyeball]

Build up and down, not sideways.

I'd go with google-cars. Need to get somewhere, just google up a car crack a cold one on the way home and send it on its way once you get there.

I really feel for you people though. Sometimes I just row to work. Congestion around here amounts to being stuck behind a tourist from Alberta now and then.

Edited June 30, 2011 by eyeball

[M.Dancer]

I live in Hamilton. Since we DON"T HAVE good public transit alternatives then driving is a NECESSITY!

To limit people's ability to access a necessity is smarmy at best and downright cruel at worst!

Too many people that support public transit alternatives seem to put the cart before the horse, expecting people to use poor or non-existent alternatives and sit around for a generation or two expecting those alternatives to be either created or improved.

Frankly, that's crap!

If you want people to use an alternative you'd best first create and IMPLEMENT that alternative! Put your money where your mouth is instead of expecting people to sacrifice trying to prove YOUR dream!

Good thing the subject ain't hamilton

[Bonam]

A few bill here and there, a couple of key assassinations in the oil industry and we are good to go. Get your slide rule out dude, and engineer us a teleporter.

I'll probably be on that project when the time comes No assassinations necessary, just about 3-4 decades of technological progress continuing apace.

Actually I was thinking of some sort of point-to-point nuclear hyper-subway.

You mean like this?

Edited June 30, 2011 by Bonam

[August1991]

According to a report from the Toronto Board of Trade, gridlock is one of the biggest barriers to the continued economic prosperity of the GTA. Currently gridlock costs about $6 billion a year and that number is expected to rise.

It seems odd that the Toronto Board of Trade estimates the cost at $6 billion when Statistics Canada estimated that for all of Canada, the cost of congestion was about $3.7 billion.

A 2006 Statistics Canada study revealed that traffic congestion could cost Canadians $2.3 billion to $3.7 billion annually, mainly in time and fuel costs.

A 2009 Transport Quebec study found that congestion cost motorists and businesses more than $1.4 billion a year in Montreal alone, a 50% increase over the last five years.

Link

I suspect that someone is just making up numbers which means that anyone with an agenda can prove their point.

----

Congestion costs are borne by people who choose to drive. If you don't like the cost, don't drive. IME, congestion costs are greater in Montreal than in Toronto and neither is as bad as most other cities in the world.

Nevertheless, I agree that charging for time of day road use is a good idea and is inevitable. The technology exists now. In Montreal, both the Autoroute 30 and the 25 bridge will use modern toll technology.

Edited June 30, 2011 by August1991

[Bonam]

These costs are borne by people who choose to drive. If you don't like the cost, don't drive.

Not really, the costs are borne by everyone. Businesses in congested areas lose business because people can't get there due to congestion. Companies lose employee time or productivity if people arrive late or have to leave early due to traffic or trying to avoid the traffic. Increased emissions and pollution due to people idling in gridlock for hours costs everyone both through health effects as well as environmental effects. People sitting in traffic takes away time from them pursuing leisure activities, which could include spending money at various entertainment/recreation venues, reducing economic activity in that sector.

Edited June 30, 2011 by Bonam

[August1991]

Businesses in congested areas lose business because people can't get there due to congestion.

Businesses could move to less congested areas.

Companies lose employee time or productivity if people arrive late or have to leave early due to traffic or trying to avoid the traffic.

This would show up as lower salaries for such employees.

People sitting in traffic takes away time from them pursuing leisure activities, which could include spending money at various entertainment/recreation venues, reducing economic activity in that sector.

If people choose to drive, presumably they prefer to do this than sit in a cinema.

----

Bonam, my point is that it is easy to overestimate "congestion" costs. But I agree that they exist and the current way of allocating this scarce resource is inefficient.

[DFCaper]

Good thing the subject ain't hamilton

The TO issue overflows to the outlying areas as well though. This is not just a downtown issue. TO traffic backs up to Milton some days. I like the town of Cobourg and others just North east of TO, but don't visit as the extra hours the traffic TO adds to the drive make it not worth it. I actually visit the city less as well as a result. I have a brother who has a house on the north edge of downtown, and last time traffic added 1.5 hours to the trip to see him... Was the last time I bothered to go. I don't enjoy weekends that stress you our before you arrive.

I do find it interesting that people think availability to access roads should be based on wealth. Tolls to reduce traffic are only affective if we can prevent the freedoms to the lower classes... Interesting Black Dog...

People who drive cars do pay their own way and subsidies transportation of goods for all....

[Boges]

The TO issue overflows to the outlying areas as well though. This is not just a downtown issue. TO traffic backs up to Milton some days. I like the town of Cobourg and others just North east of TO, but don't visit as the extra hours the traffic TO adds to the drive make it not worth it. I actually visit the city less as well as a result. I have a brother who has a house on the north edge of downtown, and last time traffic added 1.5 hours to the trip to see him... Was the last time I bothered to go. I don't enjoy weekends that stress you our before you arrive.

I do find it interesting that people think availability to access roads should be based on wealth. Tolls to reduce traffic are only affective if we can prevent the freedoms to the lower classes... Interesting Black Dog...

People who drive cars do pay their own way and subsidies transportation of goods for all....

Yes but not enough, it's never enough for left wingers than think anything a government spends money on is a good idea.

It's true though, tolls and gas taxes are punitive to the poor. If you're low income it's likely you can't afford to live downtown. Then again if you work downtown and live outside it's safe to say you can afford a modest toll. If money was the issue you wouldn't have a car and you'd take the GO like our friend shwa.

[M.Dancer]

If you're low income it's likely you can't afford to live downtown.

That's right. There are no poor in Jamestown, no poor in Regents Park, no poor in Parkdale...

[Boges]

That's right. There are no poor in Jamestown, no poor in Regents Park, no poor in Parkdale...

I doubt those people are contributing to the gridlock problem.

[M.Dancer]

I doubt those people are contributing to the gridlock problem.

So do I. Can't say what your point was claiming there are no poor in Downtown Toronto

...oh right!

You think poor are commuting to work in Toronto....

[Oleg Bach]

The Don Valley corridor would be perfect for a high speed rail system that comes all the way down from Barrie. There could be a train that travels at 200 clicks and gets you in and out of the city in 9 minutes...There has been no talk of such a visionary project...interestingly enough..the man who built the Bloor Via duct ...made room for a rail line under the bridge..this was done long before a subway was even considered. We need politicans and builders with vison of the future. We can not continue to have roads like the DVP....operate at an energy wasting and polluting stand still...The Park Way was obsolete a couple of years after being built....and now is a blight on the human spirit and the environment.

[Boges]

So do I. Can't say what your point was claiming there are no poor in Downtown Toronto

...oh right!

You think poor are commuting to work in Toronto....

No I actually think quite the opposite, people who drive downtown for work probably can afford a modest toll.

This issue all depends on what the goal of the toll is. A $1 or $2 toll per trip into the City would be a good revenue generation tool to contribute to the upkeep the 2 or 3 Toronto highway's (427 is debatable since it's the main way people get to the Airport in Mississsauga)

But I've heard people say $5-$10 a trip is a reasonable toll. That would make driving downtown exceptionally expensive and GO would probably be the better alternative for most folks.

But if you look at all the parking lots in each GO train station on the Lakeshore line in Mississauga, Oakville and Burlington it would be clear to most that GO can't absorb that many more commuters.

BTW anyone proposing a toll on the 401 is an idiot.

[Oleg Bach]

That's right. There are no poor in Jamestown, no poor in Regents Park, no poor in Parkdale...

The core of the city has more poor than are viable to the eye. Most suburban types see a few street people and figure that must be Torontos` poor. Not so - it is an awesome fact how many poor are in the core and around the core. Most are very private...and hunker down to survive..so you don`t see them...others have a middle class mentality and fell great shame in being poor. The other day I saw a well dressed man look around then pick up a cigarette butt. It seems that poverty is spreading up the ranks..but it is hidden.

[Shwa]

BTW anyone proposing a toll on the 401 is an idiot.

Now why would you go and write something like that? Is the 401 untouchable or something?

The 401 can be tolled like the I-90 in New York. It works since as far as I can see...

[Oleg Bach]

Now why would you go and write something like that? Is the 401 untouchable or something?

The 401 can be tolled like the I-90 in New York. It works since as far as I can see...

I would not pay to ride on the highway of death...The 401 is one of the most crowded and poorly designed super highways in the world - It`s just plain dangerous.

[dre]

Toll roads are a poor way to solve this problem. You will be lied to about what the money will be used for and how long the toll will last, and it cost money and requires permanent employees to collect the tolls.

We are better off just taxing people and businesses for infrastructure.

[Boges]

And there's already a very expensive toll road that pretty much runs parallel to the 401.

The 401, through Toronto is 16 lanes.

You're basically saying anyone that wants to go from one end of Ontario to the other has to pay just for the privilege of entering the great city of Toronto. Total bullshit.

If you want to toll it, it better be a provincial initiative and the profits should go to everyone in the province (or at least all the communities that use the 401) not just Hogtown.

[M.Dancer]

You're basically saying anyone that wants to go from one end of Ontario to the other has to pay just for the privilege of entering the great city of Toronto. Total bullshit.

Tolls could be put on the exit ramps...

[Bonam]

You will be lied to about what the money will be used for and how long the toll will last, and it cost money and requires permanent employees to collect the tolls.

Er, you haven't heard of electronic tolling? I mean yeah, a couple employees at some government department will oversee that the tolls are collected permanently, but we are decades past the days when you'd need a physical tollbooth with live humans in it.

[Boges]

Er, you haven't heard of electronic tolling? I mean yeah, a couple employees at some government department will oversee that the tolls are collected permanently, but we are decades past the days when you'd need a physical tollbooth with live humans in it.

So the City of Toronto would be mailing out bills to everyone and suspending licenses if people don't pay? Wonderful!

[M.Dancer]

So the City of Toronto would be mailing out bills to everyone and suspending licenses if people don't pay? Wonderful!

They can outsource the mailings...

[dre]

Er, you haven't heard of electronic tolling? I mean yeah, a couple employees at some government department will oversee that the tolls are collected permanently, but we are decades past the days when you'd need a physical tollbooth with live humans in it.

Sweet. Please let the operators of all the physical tollbooths know that k?

Whether you automate the system or not though, youre adding lots of overhead, and the problem is they will collect way more than it takes to build or maintain the roads. Once that revenue stream is there its probably there for good.

This is the most expensive and inefficient way to manage public transportation infrastructure that has ever existed.

http://www.motorists.org/tolls/bad-idea

Toll roads are literally a monopoly that is sanctioned and protected by the state.

Yet, the state's citizens and other highway users have no channel to influence toll road management and pricing decisions. Upgrades and improvements to any highway viewed as competing with the toll road are likely to be postponed or ignored. Unnecessary congestion, underposted speed limits and arbitrary enforcement on alternative roads are silently condoned by transportation officials and elected officials.

Think about it, toll roads can't compete without the presence of congestion and motorist inconvenience on the public highway system. Are congestion problems going to be corrected if they threaten the income of the toll road? Not in our lifetimes!

Motorists found this out the hard way in Orange County, California, when a clause in the model contract for the 91 Freeway Express Lanes prevented expansion of the freeway's regular lanes. As a result, congestion got so bad that in April 2002 the Orange County Transportation Authority paid $207.5 million to buy out the toll lanes that originally cost just $139 million to build.

Not suprising is it? How do you make the most money on a toll road? CONGESTION! The greater the traffic density the more money you make. Same goes for traffic in the aisles at your local wallmart.

A real market-based system has willing sellers, willing buyers, and reasonably unfettered competition.

Any highway of consequence falls flat from the get-go, when it comes to market principles.

First, highway corridors are not assembled by willing buyers in competition with other willing buyers. The state identifies the corridor it wants, establishes what it considers to be a politically and judicially acceptable price, and condemns the land of those sellers who disagree. This is market principles at the end of a gun barrel.

Edited June 30, 2011 by dre

[August1991]

You're basically saying anyone that wants to go from one end of Ontario to the other has to pay just for the privilege of entering the great city of Toronto. Total bullshit.

And Boges, you're arguing that all drivers/taxpayers should subsidize/suffer the cost of any poor idiot with time on her hands who wants to drive between point A and point B.

If someone wants to enter any large city at 8 am on a Monday, they should pay. Why? They are taking road space from some else.

Boges, when you go to Toronto, do you park your car for free? Why should the road space you occupy when driving be any different?

To park a car on a street in NYC costs about $3/hour at a meter (assuming that you can find one). I reckon that all urban drivers should pay at least this amount for using road space. What's the difference if your car space is moving, or stationary?

It's true though, tolls and gas taxes are punitive to the poor. If you're low income it's likely you can't afford to live downtown.

So, between poor people in Africa, and the poor people near Toronto who can't afford to pay transit fees, you think my tax dollars should go to those people in Toronto. Edited June 30, 2011 by August1991