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High-Speed 407 Transitway - The Strategic Missing Link
We need to take a balanced approach to rail-based mobility -
from mass transit to regional to main-line services for people
and goods.
Mega-Cities & Urban Transportation:
Especially critical to the economic success and the future of
urban centers is the rail transit spine network. The development
of competitiveness, quality of life and environmental protection
in urban areas is unachievable without a functioning mass rail
transit service.
We need to:
• Connect congested urban areas
• Make it easy for people to transfer to other attractive means of
transportation
• Provide attractive services that offer reliability and security in the
vehicles, in the stations and on the lines.
• Improve passenger information
• Increase the transport capabilities and the availability of rail vehicles
• Install fully automated systems that can adjust more flexibly to
changing demand.
• Need to create major rail 407 Transitway spine to grid up the rail transit
network.
• Need to redirect growth to the 407 Rail Transitway corridor to jump
start the building of the most critical and strategic Transit infrastructure.
Thereby guaranteeing instant transit ridership success when the 407
Rail Transitway is completed in 5-7 years.
• Need to design and build fully integrated complete communities to
meet the requirement of an 80 - 90 percent modal split in flavor of rapid
transit and therefore lessen the dependency on the automobile.
Economic Generator:
The 407 Transitway is a true economic generator for the
Greater Toronto area if it is incorporated with the planning of
Transit Dependent Development around the major rail transit
stops.
During the next 50 years, it is estimated that the world population
will increase by forty-six percent or 3 billion people; eight million
more people will call the GTA mega-region home. More than
84% of these people will settle within 15 kilometres on either
side (green shaded area) of the proposed 407 transitway
corridor from Oshawa to Hamilton rather than settling within the
City of Toronto or along the Lakeshore corridor (pink shaded
area) from Oshawa to Hamilton.
It is estimated that the 407 corridor has approximately 1
trillion dollars of economic development potential if the proper
transit dependent development solution is designed, planned
and implemented. If we continue down our present path of
connecting the northern part of the GTA with bus, it will be a
fraction of its potential.
Taking four years to do an environmental assessment for
just 23 kilometres of 407 transitway and especially for bus is
absurd. The 407 transitway should be designed for speed,
operational efficiency and transit ridership convenience. The
best route should be selected and engineered, then mitigate
the environment. Need to think of burying hydro lines,
building over the 407 Highway to bridge hostile interfaces and
development compact, intense integrate communities around
major transit nodes instead of marginalizing the province’s $8-
15 billion investment in the 407 Transitway and the harm it
could have on the GTA economy.
The Premier get involved in the transformation of
the 407 Transitway Corridor
Premier instruct all the ministries, agencies, crown corporations,
407ETR and Hydro One to work together for the good of the GTA
meg-region economy and premier police this initiative to ensure that
this is happening on a on-going basis
MTO, PIR, Finance, Metrolinx, Hydro One, 407ETR, Minister of
Environment, should become part of the Can Do Team versus being
the Can’t Do Team
Places to Grow - 407 Transitway Corridor will
contribute Up to $1 trillion dollars in economic development
opportunity, home for approximately 2 million people, 840 -800,000
jobs, 125,000,000 square feet of office/commercial and 750,000-
1,000,000 transit trips a day when fully build-out
Eliminate 15 million tons of CO2 emissions a year with a savings of
$3,000,000,000 a year
Help eliminate Gridlock with a savings of $10-15 billion dollars a year
in lost productivity.
Eliminate 350,000,000,000 vehicle miles travelled a year in the GTA,
saving 42,125,000,000 litres of fuel a year
Reduces health care costs because less pollutants going into the
atmosphere with an estimate savings of $2-3 billion a year
TDD - 1,000,000 cars off the road - An additional 1,000,000 people
will be taking transit on a daily basis over time - as 407 corridor get
build-out
That the Government of Ontario through the Growth
Secretariat undertake a comprehensive Transit Dependent
Development (TDD) Corridor Study along the 407 corridor
for the purpose of identifying the real development potential,
to optimize transit ridership and design and based on the best
high-speed rail transit network solution (utilizing a 50 year
horizon and beyond).