Grand River Transit

[danbrotherston]

Sprawl in Breslau is inevitable, unfortunately. When Metrolinx builds the Breslau GO station, I imagine the entire area will slowly become suburban.

I do fear this.

Frankly Metrolinx's Breslau plans are the kind of plan that perpetuates our broken transportation and land use models...there are few transit projects I oppose, but that one is on the list.

[jeffster]

 Does the sprawl in Breslau actually need encouragement?  Seems inevitable and (I thought) long planned for.

I mean, there are limits in place.  Investing in another new bridge is a great way to ensure those limits don’t get enforced.

I sort of think it's going to happen either way (that is, both the bridge and development). Whether or not we think it's a good thing is a different discussion. However, having the bridge isn't a terrible idea as it would allow for alternative transportation to and from Breslau. As it is now, it's a fast growing community, and has few options other than car for getting around. With a bridge, you now open up GRT access, cycling and even walking.

[ijmorlan]

Sprawl in Breslau is inevitable, unfortunately. When Metrolinx builds the Breslau GO station, I imagine the entire area will slowly become suburban.

With proper planning (which will not be seen from Metrolinx for the foreseeable future), the station area could become one of those highly walkable, dense areas that were only built before planning. The station itself could be the centre of a bunch of highrises built together and linked across the tracks, then nearby streets could have midrise. All uses regularly needed by residents could be available — retail, professional, etc. — with transit linking to the rest of the city and of course to Guelph and beyond by GO.

[ijmorlan]

I don't much like it either. I don't think we'll actually solve it though, until we are less ruled by money...

I’m not sure that’s really the problem. If we were ruled by money, wouldn’t we notice that 2 lanes of motor vehicles plus the same width of pedestrians and bicycles would be a way more cost-effective way of getting people across the river? And if people just have to go at rush hour so those motor vehicle lanes aren’t enough, maybe it should be on additional lanes that are tolled so as to be self-funding.

For that matter, maybe all the motor vehicle lanes should be tolled. Nobody can reasonably claim they’re being excluded — right now they can’t cross the river at all right there, so lowering the toll from the cost of an airlift down to $1 or whatever would be a distinct improvement.

I wouldn’t even be unalterably opposed to tolling pedestrians and bicycles, as long as the toll related to the incremental cost of accommodating them, which would probably mean maybe a 5¢ toll, which rounds to 0 when you take into account the costs of collection.

[danbrotherston]

I mean, there are limits in place.  Investing in another new bridge is a great way to ensure those limits don’t get enforced.

I sort of think it's going to happen either way (that is, both the bridge and development). Whether or not we think it's a good thing is a different discussion. However, having the bridge isn't a terrible idea as it would allow for alternative transportation to and from Breslau. As it is now, it's a fast growing community, and has few options other than car for getting around. With a bridge, you now open up GRT access, cycling and even walking.

I think this is defeatist. This will happen if we let it happen, resigning it to ourselves to it happening lets it happen. If we instead resolve for it not to happen, we can stop it.

As for transportation, there are two bridges already, active transportation and GRT service could easily be provided without an additional bridge.  In fact, there is easily room to put active transportation on the existing Victoria St. bridge without even removing lanes.

Edit: For reference, here's a proposed low cost (at least for Phase 1) multi-phase Victoria St. MUT expansion that would connect Breslau and the planned future suburbs with cycling/ped infra to the rest of the city...probably on order of 500k dollars--it isn't 8-80, but for 500k, it should still be a no brainer. https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1...sp=sharing

[danbrotherston]

Sprawl in Breslau is inevitable, unfortunately. When Metrolinx builds the Breslau GO station, I imagine the entire area will slowly become suburban.

With proper planning (which will not be seen from Metrolinx for the foreseeable future), the station area could become one of those highly walkable, dense areas that were only built before planning. The station itself could be the centre of a bunch of highrises built together and linked across the tracks, then nearby streets could have midrise. All uses regularly needed by residents could be available — retail, professional, etc. — with transit linking to the rest of the city and of course to Guelph and beyond by GO.

We basically have the same vision for this...

As for being ruled by money, we *are* ruled by money, and none of those things are true. You are describing a form of utopia where absolute rational economic forces are at play.  That is different from being ruled by money IMO. Instead, we have roads filled with giant trucks because there is more money to be made by convincing people that driving a big truck makes them feel more powerful, even though it makes the world worse for everyone.

But even your vision, I don't particularly support, (although at one point, I would have). I think compassion and empathy must be part of our society. At it's core, you could probably make an economic argument for euthenizing all troublemaking (non-conforming) citizens, but that's an extreme, less extreme is what we have right now, which is that capitalist markets are not particularly bothered by the US's descent into authoritarianism and fascism, because those problems don't affect capitalism, certainly capitalism has operated just fine in other less savoury countries than even the US. (And I'll leave aside the equity issue, because at it's core, you could simply argue for a UBI to solve that).

[ac3r]

Sprawl in Breslau is inevitable, unfortunately. When Metrolinx builds the Breslau GO station, I imagine the entire area will slowly become suburban.

With proper planning (which will not be seen from Metrolinx for the foreseeable future), the station area could become one of those highly walkable, dense areas that were only built before planning. The station itself could be the centre of a bunch of highrises built together and linked across the tracks, then nearby streets could have midrise. All uses regularly needed by residents could be available — retail, professional, etc. — with transit linking to the rest of the city and of course to Guelph and beyond by GO.

Transit linking to the rest of the city is key. Waterloo Region will no doubt get a 3rd LRT line in the future (or 2nd...whether we count Phase 1 and 2 as separate lines or not), and if it ran east/west then I could see places like Breslau developing in a denser way as this would let people get into the city centre as well as travel north-south to Waterloo and Cambridge. But the city planners aren't going to densify an area in the city in the way you imagine without dedicated rapid transit (GO trains obviously not counting, as they're commuter trains and buses are slow and of limited capacity). It'd be nice to see, and I'm sure as the years go on and we grow and grow we'll be going in this direction, but in the short term we can only imagine, plan and hope we actually develop things in a way that makes the most sense.

[jeffster]

I sort of think it's going to happen either way (that is, both the bridge and development). Whether or not we think it's a good thing is a different discussion. However, having the bridge isn't a terrible idea as it would allow for alternative transportation to and from Breslau. As it is now, it's a fast growing community, and has few options other than car for getting around. With a bridge, you now open up GRT access, cycling and even walking.

I think this is defeatist. This will happen if we let it happen, resigning it to ourselves to it happening lets it happen. If we instead resolve for it not to happen, we can stop it.

As for transportation, there are two bridges already, active transportation and GRT service could easily be provided without an additional bridge.  In fact, there is easily room to put active transportation on the existing Victoria St. bridge without even removing lanes.

Edit: For reference, here's a proposed low cost (at least for Phase 1) multi-phase Victoria St. MUT expansion that would connect Breslau and the planned future suburbs with cycling/ped infra to the rest of the city...probably on order of 500k dollars--it isn't 8-80, but for 500k, it should still be a no brainer. https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1...sp=sharing

It's not defeatist at all. If we want vibrant safe communities for young families we still need this type of development. It's simply not going to stop because some people don't like houses and cars.

[danbrotherston]

I think this is defeatist. This will happen if we let it happen, resigning it to ourselves to it happening lets it happen. If we instead resolve for it not to happen, we can stop it.

As for transportation, there are two bridges already, active transportation and GRT service could easily be provided without an additional bridge.  In fact, there is easily room to put active transportation on the existing Victoria St. bridge without even removing lanes.

Edit: For reference, here's a proposed low cost (at least for Phase 1) multi-phase Victoria St. MUT expansion that would connect Breslau and the planned future suburbs with cycling/ped infra to the rest of the city...probably on order of 500k dollars--it isn't 8-80, but for 500k, it should still be a no brainer. https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1...sp=sharing

It's not defeatist at all. If we want vibrant safe communities for young families we still need this type of development. It's simply not going to stop because some people don't like houses and cars.

*rolls eyes*...can you drop the nonsense, just because you grew up in a miserable car dependent suburb doesn't mean everyone wants that for their children. There is nothing vibrant about car dependency and suburban sprawl, and there's strong evidence that it isn't good for young famillies.  It's also the case that there are vast swaths of the city already built this way and it is in fact the walkable livable areas that are in desperately low supply. Of course, none of that really change the fact that the real problem is the fact that your development is unsustainable---young families probably also want to have a planet for their children to live on in the future.

But you're just going to accuse me of hating cars and houses.  Clearly we are not even on remotely the same page, nor do you care to be.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ul_xzyCDT98&ab_channel=NotJustBikes

I for one, do not want to raise my child in such an environment, and that is one reason that we will probably leave KW.

[ac3r]

Some people want that, though, so we're always going to have suburban areas. jeffster is right in saying that not all people don't want to live in urban areas in a tiny apartment. I have spent most of my life growing up in Europe and there are tons of people there who would love to have a detached home like so many people over here have. It's pretty natural to want your own independent home with your own tiny plot of land to use, so much so that in countries like Russia it's common to own a dacha in addition to an apartment in the city. There's no need to get passive aggressive over it. The city has spent the last two decades trying to densify and urbanize, but we can't exactly force people to accept that nor expect it to happen in an instant. There needs to be a balance and we're at least trying to work towards it.

[plam]

Some people want that, though, so we're always going to have suburban areas. jeffster is right in saying that not all people don't want to live in urban areas in a tiny apartment. I have spent most of my life growing up in Europe and there are tons of people there who would love to have a detached home like so many people over here have. It's pretty natural to want your own independent home with your own tiny plot of land to use, so much so that in countries like Russia it's common to own a dacha in addition to an apartment in the city. There's no need to get passive aggressive over it. The city has spent the last two decades trying to densify and urbanize, but we can't exactly force people to accept that. There needs to be a balance and we're at least trying to work towards it.

We all project what we want universally and think everyone else should want what we want. I in particular have no desire to have an independent tiny plot of land (townhouses are my favourite compromise) but other people want hem. But it is a fact that detached housing should be more expensive to buy and it is more expensive to service.

[danbrotherston]

Some people want that, though, so we're always going to have suburban areas. jeffster is right in saying that not all people don't want to live in urban areas in a tiny apartment. I have spent most of my life growing up in Europe and there are tons of people there who would love to have a detached home like so many people over here have. It's pretty natural to want your own independent home with your own tiny plot of land to use, so much so that in countries like Russia it's common to own a dacha in addition to an apartment in the city. There's no need to get passive aggressive over it. The city has spent the last two decades trying to densify and urbanize, but we can't exactly force people to accept that nor expect it to happen in an instant. There needs to be a balance and we're at least trying to work towards it.

First of all, this belief that the only choice is a "tiny apartment" in an urban area, is just missinformation, it is entirely possible to live in a dense urban area and live in a townhome, or a walkup, or any number of missing middle housing forms. It is also entirely possible to live in a large apartment, as I do. Just because our broken policies have made building these types of housing impossible, does not mean that they can not exist.

Second of all, as I explained in my first comment, those who want to live in a car dependent suburban hellscape have a nearly unlimited selection of locations in the city. It is those who want a walkable livable complete community who find it nearly impossible or completely impossible (depending on one's budget) to find a location that suits their needs.

I am not being passive aggressive, I am being very direct, I am tired of missinformation and missrepresentation around the issue of housing.  The city has not spent the last two decades doing anything of the sort.  In the past two decades the vast vast VAST majority of the housing built has been in the form of suburban housing trackts that are impossible to live in without a car. The remainder has been in the form of tiny apartments that are limited to a few tiny areas of development and that has only happened in the last few years.  You can probably count on one hand the number of small scale missing middle developments that have happened in walkable areas in the city.

The ONLY people forcing someone to live somewhere they don't want to is those who oppose densifying the city. We are working towards balance sure...but we've barely even moved the needle away from complete car dependence.

[danbrotherston]

For those who aren't sure...here's a walkscore map...I have some issues with the methodology, but it provides a reasonable map, the green areas are ones where you could reasonably expect to live without a car without too much hardship...(still some, to be sure).

   

Only a tiny portion of the city qualifies.

Edit: Oh, and make sure you see only the actual green areas, there are many parks that look a little green, it's only an illusion.

[KevinL]

I successfully live in a yellow area without a car! It's a bit more hardship - a lot of transit or walking trips - but it fits my lifestyle. I don't harbour any illusions that many other people would be willing to live this way, however.

[danbrotherston]

I successfully live in a yellow area without a car! It's a bit more hardship - a lot of transit or walking trips - but it fits my lifestyle. I don't harbour any illusions that many other people would be willing to live this way, however.

That's fair, and many people do both willingly but mostly unwillingly, for economic or other reasons. I did as well for a while, but have since moved to the "green zone" because I am so privileged to have that option--even in the green zone, not everything is sunshine and roses.

It would likely be illustrative, if someone were to overlay a zoning map on top of this walkscore map. You'd likely find that virtually all of the yellow and red zones are legally enforced, not driven by market forces nor preference.