Everyone, from Steve Munro and Stephen Rees to the community at the Urban Toronto Forum, seems to be talking about a very interesting article that appeared in the Globe and Mail today. Referencing the work of Professor Patrick Condon, senior researcher at the Design Centre for Sustainability, University of British Columbia, David Beers discusses some very interesting findings in the sustainability of different modes of travel.

Vancouver has a plan to extend one of their Sky Train lines from the downtown core to the University of British Columbia campus at a cost of $2.8 billion, and while this is a missing link in their network, there have been many calls to consider other technologies, such as the same European-style trams being considered for use in the City of Toronto. There’s no question that more lines could be built for the same price tag if trams are used, but the Sky Train (the next evolution of our Scarborough RT) has a speed advantage that is very difficult to ignore in today’s fast-paced society. (more…)

Second Meeting: Saturday, December 13th

2:30 PM to 4:30 PM at Toronto Reference Library (Room B1)

 MEETING GUIDELINES

Members should bring screen-caps, sketches, photos, etc. of favourite websites in preparation for the website design charrette. Refreshments will be provided.

 Full agenda follows after the jump. (more…)

One of the things I pride myself on is my ability to sleep on the train and not miss my stop. I’ve never missed my stop on the GO Train, and the two or three times I’ve missed my subway stop I’ve been able to backtrack without being late. Yesterday, it was a well-timed text message that woke me up as the subway was cruising northbound between Wilson – my stop – and Downsview. The fact that the northern arm of the Spadina subway is outdoors made that possible, but what would have happened if I was going north on Yonge Street? Could I have gone to Finch, turned around and ended up back downtown?

According to a Thursday post on the Post’s Posted Toronto blog, the TTC will have a contract and roll-out plan for mobile-phone service in the subway tunnels. Once the details are ironed out it could take two or three years to install the infrastructure, but the $30 million price tag would be payed by the mobile phone carriers. Market research shows that 59% of subway riders want this service, 24% are indifferent and 17% are opposed, so I suppose we can say that the TTC is giving riders what they want. But do we really want this? (more…)

Thanks to all the members of the Metronauts community (and beyond!) who came out to the inaugural meeting of the Transit Riders Advocacy Coalition (T.R.A.C.) on Saturday! Although only 8 people were able to make it to the meeting, we had an engaging discussion about the roles, tactics, and objectives of the Coalition. So engaging, in fact, that we hardly had enough time to get to the second half of the agenda! As such, we’ve decided to hold a second meeting on Saturday, December the 13^th – almost two weeks from now. The meeting will be held at 2:30-4:30 PM in room B-1 at the Toronto Reference Library (just north of Bay Station); I will post the agenda as soon as it is approved. In addition, there is limited amount of space in the room (no more than 15 people), so please RSVP before Thursday December 11th by emailing me at peter.kucirek [at] utoronto.ca

 The minutes for Saturday’s meeting can be found after the jump…

(more…)

For those of you wanting to stretch your creative boundaries for transit ideas geographically, the Chicago Chamber of Commerce has put out a request on the Innocentive website for ideas on: Ideas for Increasing Public Transportation to Reduce Greenhouse Gases in Chicago.

Checkout: http://www.innocentive.com/

Its not a traditional RFP, they just want your ideas, and there is no cost for submission, other than your time.

Did I mention there is a $5,000 prize for the best idea ?

I am sure many of the ideas generated through TransitCamps and Metronauts are as applicable in Chicago as they are in Toronto.

If anyone wants to collaborate on a submission, contact me at

Blinkenlights Stereoscope (2008), City Hall, Toronto

Binary data is often represented by two states: on and off. The Blikenlights Strereoscope installation at City Hall this year during Nuit Blanche, made data very public.  If you attended, you may have noticed the installations’ connection to open, malleable and user-contributed data.  As stated on the project website, “Project Blinkenlights invites the public to be a part of the installation by opening up a variety of ways to interact with and provide content.”  In terms of a practical application of open data, the issue returned to city hall through the issue of open transit data, discussed at the Web 2.0 Summit on November 26, 2008.

Wikipedia defines that open data is “a philosophy and practice requiring that certain data are freely available to everyone, without restrictions from copyright, patents or other mechanisms of control.”  The challenge to open up the city’s transit data (i.e., schedules, routes and timetables) to be used in Google Transit was posed by Mark Surman of the Mozilla Foundation during his talk at the summit.  Mayor Miller stated in response to Surman that the process to get Toronto online with Google Transit is underway and we can hope to see results next year.  Surman summarizes this exchange via a blog entry accompanying an archive of his talk.

Many questions about opening up transit data are still outstanding in relation to the draft RTP or final RTP in relation to trip planning and fare cards:

Trip planning:

• If Toronto opens up data their data for Google Transit, will the other regions and transit agencies in the GTHA be encouraged to do the same? (Note: Hamilton’s HSR system is already online at Google Transit)
• Do Metrolinx’s plans for an integrated trip planner take into account Google Transit, mashups or citizen initiatives?
• What information is needed by citizen and community-based groups like myttc.ca to continue to innovate and build from the community level up?

Fare cards: intense data collection is also a real possibility with fare cards when they are implemented across our region.

• What data will be collected through fare cards?
• Where will this data be stored, who will access it and for what purposes?
• Will any of the aggregated data from fare cards be opened up?