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ST. CLAIR STREETCAR'S NEXT STOP: THE FUTURE?
From Toronto Star - January 23, 2003

CHRISTOPHER HUME

It isn't there yet, but St. Clair Ave. W could be the road to Toronto's future.
Six lanes wide, lined with two- and three-storey buildings and full of streetcars, it is a city thoroughfare of such potential planners drool when they see it.

Compared to most Toronto streets, St. Clair W. offers the scale and scope to realize the city's goals of greater density and an enhanced sense of urbanity. So it wasn't surprising when last month Toronto Transit Commission officials proposed a streetcar right-of-way along St. Clair W.

As they pointed out, the reason the road is so wide is that it was laid out with dedicated streetcar lanes; they survived until the 1930's when the city was handed over to the automobile. As they also made clear, more than half (53 per cent) of people who live along St. Clair use the streetcar. It carries 32,000 riders daily.
According to the TTC, dedicated streetcar lanes would speed up service and increase ridership. Who could argue with that?

No one, of course, but the real issue here is how to bring about the transformation of St. Clair W., not just the TTC. Transit is undoubtedly a huge part of the equation, but if the changes being contemplated for St. Clair are anything like those introduced on Spadina, one would think twice.

Though it runs down the centre of one of the city's busiest streets, the Spadina line has been separated from it's surroundings as much as physically possible. That means better service for streetcar users but more inconvenience for drivers and pedestrians.

There's no question public transit is infinitely preferable to cars, but it shouldn't take precedence over pedestrians. The challenge is to find a balance. Spadina was turned into a mess - cluttered, confusing and chaotic. Instead of connecting the two sides of Spadina, the streetcar lanes divide them. Crossing the street is harder than ever for pedestrians and the number of traffic accidents has risen.

The real issue here is the transformation of St. Clair Ave. W, not just the TTC

Ironically, the streetcar lanes on St. Clair are already virtually dedicated; islands are located at most stops and, except for making left turns, drivers generally stay off the tracks.

TTC planners claim that a raised streetcar-only right-of-way would shave five minutes off the 32-minute ride from Yonge to Keele and maybe they're right. But does that justify the disruption these alterations would cause?

With so much space available, it may be possible to accommodate the needs of all users. Rather than raise the track bed, for example, it might be better to leave it at grade and separate it from the street where necessary with a raised strip. That would serve the same purpose but avoid the inconvenience.

The Harbourfront line, which runs along Queens Quay W from Bay to Spadina, is a more appropriate model. There the track is raised, but only slightly and with sloped edges that allow vehicles to cross over.

If the idea is to design a streetcar line that will help revitalize St.Clair, there are other strategies that should be considered. The sidewalks, for instance, are mean and narrow; the utility poles are visual pollution.

It doesn't help either that the architecture along the street is so bad. Instead of endless two- and three-storey buildings, why not five- or six-storey mixed use structures?

By the time the streetcar reaches the end of the line at Keele, it has moved into a suburban precinct with parking lots, big box stores and new subdivisions. As much as anything, the intention is to join this dreary area with the larger community.

The point of the exercise must be to find ways to knit St. Clair W., a disparate, incoherent, stretch of road, into something that makes sense. Continuity, connection and cohesiveness are what's needed. The task is to understand how the city's various systems operate, and to integrate them.

That means seeing them as a whole, not as a series of isolated functions.

Christopher Hume can be reached at chume@thestar.ca