Pipe Dreaming Accounting | GTAMotorcycle.com

Pipe Dreaming Accounting

nobbie48

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Nothing to do so I muse.

The 10 mile long PEI Confederation Bridge cost a Billion about 20 years ago. Average crossing price is about $25.00. Daily traffic about 4,000.

It's about 30 miles from the Red Hill in Hamilton to the CNE as the crow flies.

So if they built a lake crossing could it work out?

BS numbers but who would pay 3 X $25.00 to avoid the QEW?

Double the numbers to get past Scarborough.

What would it cost to buy land to expand the QEW?

Wynne would have made it a go if they put windmills on it.
 
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Nothing to do so I muse.

The 10 mile long PEI Confederation Bridge cost a Billion about 20 years ago. Average crossing price is about $25.00. Daily traffic about 4,000.

It's about 30 miles from the Red Hill in Hamilton to the CNE as the crow flies.

So if they built a lake crossing could it work out?

BS numbers but who would pay 3 X $25.00 to avoid the QEW?

Double the numbers to get past Scarborough.

What would it cost to buy land to expand the QEW?

Wynne would have made it a go if they put windmills on it.

The 407 cartel would never let it happen. A ton of people are already paying >$30 per trip to avoid the QEW/401. Many of those would happily pay double to take another hour+ out of their commute.

I think you can likely adjust your price down substantially as you could easily have 20,000+ vehicles per day (and I wouldn't be surprised if you got to six figure volumes if you can keep the price low enough as the whole niagara region could become another "affordable" suburb).

I think it makes more sense to put the far end near grimsby, it cuts a lot off the corner, Red hill doesn't cut much distance off the existing route.

EDIT:
Almost any transportation solution (up to and including taxpayer funded sled dogs) makes more sense than Wynne's high speed train to Windsor. I have trouble thinking of a dumber idea. They have combined a ridiculously expensive project with a ridiculously low ridership to service a route that is already well serviced (by highway, Via or Porter depending on your speed requirements).
 
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The 407 cartel would never let it happen. A ton of people are already paying >$30 per trip to avoid the QEW/401. Many of those would happily pay double to take another hour+ out of their commute.

I think you can likely adjust your price down substantially as you could easily have 20,000+ vehicles per day (and I wouldn't be surprised if you got to six figure volumes if you can keep the price low enough as the whole niagara region could become another "affordable" suburb).

I think it makes more sense to put the far end near grimsby, it cuts a lot off the corner, Red hill doesn't cut much distance off the existing route.

EDIT:
Almost any transportation solution (up to and including taxpayer funded sled dogs) makes more sense than Wynne's high speed train to Windsor. I have trouble thinking of a dumber idea. They have combined a ridiculously expensive project with a ridiculously low ridership to service a route that is already well serviced (by highway, via or Porter depending on your speed requirements).

IIRC the 407 is an Ontario sweet deal for the investors, no competition allowed. Could the feds build it as they weren't likely to have signed the deal? Borrowing from the US mind set it could be a military road for reasons of national security.
 
sure
as long as GTA residents pay for it
but as usual, the entire province will foot the bill
for people who refuse to take public transit
that the rest of the province also pays for
 
sure
as long as GTA residents pay for it
but as usual, the entire province will foot the bill
for people who refuse to take public transit
that the rest of the province also pays for

What would make the most sense is to have rail lines on the bridge. It makes very little sense to bring a ton of cars into the downtown core. Build a huge *** parking lot on the niagara side and make parking and taking transit cost less than driving across. It may be more cost effective to build the parking lot and have express GO trains from grimsby. The initial investment is a fraction and the trip time could be similar (well within 25% or so).

If you want to pay for the bridge, just add $20K to the DC for each house built in the Niagara region. Their house value will easily go up by at least that much with the shortcut.
 
What would make the most sense is to have rail lines on the bridge. It makes very little sense to bring a ton of cars into the downtown core. Build a huge *** parking lot on the niagara side and make parking and taking transit cost less than driving across. It may be more cost effective to build the parking lot and have express GO trains from grimsby. The initial investment is a fraction and the trip time could be similar (well within 25% or so).

If you want to pay for the bridge, just add $20K to the DC for each house built in the Niagara region. Their house value will easily go up by at least that much with the shortcut.

Trains don't like steep inclines (Burlington Skyway) and the Port of Hamilton wouldn't like a level crossing. They could make a RR swing bridge. Could they run an express instead of a milk run?

A lot of Grimsbyiers aren't all that keen on being a terminus for the bridge to hell.

https://www.popsci.com/technology/a...st-sea-bridge-toppling-american-record-holder

Of course, what do you do with all the cars when they get to Toronto and there's no dispersion zone or parking.
 
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Trains don't like steep inclines (Burlington Skyway) and the Port of Hamilton wouldn't like a level crossing. They could make a RR swing bridge. Could they run an express instead of a milk run?

A lot of Grimsbyiers aren't all that keen on being a terminus for the bridge to hell.

The theoretical bridge has enough length that it could have train friendly grades and room underneath for boats.

Sadly the way most development works is the many (the new people) trample the opinions of the few (the existing residents). It almost has to work that way. Everyone is opposed to development as soon as they have the house they want. In the vast majority of cases, guess how your house got built? It was built over the objections of those before you.
 
By the time this is planned, approved, funded, and built, it would be totally unnecessary (probably 2050).

Newer more efficient technologies are on the horizon and it would be better to design a solution based on those (personalized air-transport / self driving machines)


*note I said machines because we have no idea what cars of the future will actually look like.
 
By the time this is planned, approved, funded, and built, it would be totally unnecessary (probably 2050).

Newer more efficient technologies are on the horizon and it would be better to design a solution based on those (personalized air-transport / self driving machines)


*note I said machines because we have no idea what cars of the future will actually look like.

50 years ago they said we'd have flying cars. We're still in metal boxes suspended on spring steel and rolling on rubber tires. :(

I will say that I'd like to see some sort of study to see how many commuters go to jobs that involve design, programming/developing, data etc and how much of that could be done from anywhere in the world via high-speed communications links. IOW, how many of us drive from our den in the suburb to sit at a desk and work on a computer, then drive home again and spend the evening surfing the web via our high-speed internet connection?

How much could traffic be reduced if we developed and leveraged high(er) speed and bandwidth comms that allowed people to more effectively work from home?
 
By the time this is planned, approved, funded, and built, it would be totally unnecessary (probably 2050).

Newer more efficient technologies are on the horizon and it would be better to design a solution based on those (personalized air-transport / self driving machines)


*note I said machines because we have no idea what cars of the future will actually look like.

It could also be like building a new road into Detroit.
 
That's how Yonge St. came about....

Thanks for that reminder bit of history. Actually read about this just last week at Ottawa.

Headed to tank Saturday at Oshawa today. Tank demos at 1 if anyone interested
 
Odd at history repeating itself.
There was a high speed electric railway from Hamilton to Toronto at the turn of the century (1900) , the foundation piers can still be seen at Bronte Creek and 16mile. And a high speed train Guelph to T.O. via Georgetown , part of the rail operates as a electric rail museum north of Campbellville.
They both backrupted when the car showed up.

There was a large passenger ferry from Downtown T.O. to Hamilton, it backrupted, the Ferry from NOTL to T.O. and T.O. ferry across the lake from Rochester. All cooked.

A causeway like the PEI bridge could work, It would need to be a LONG way off the water at points, there is a ton of frieghter traffic in Port of Hamilton and fuel tankers into the pier at Burloak.

And off Bronte is were I race my sailboat twice a week so come to think of it, NO TO THE CAUSEWAY or BRIDGE. keep your traffic problems ashore.....
 
Odd at history repeating itself.
There was a high speed electric railway from Hamilton to Toronto at the turn of the century (1900) , the foundation piers can still be seen at Bronte Creek and 16mile. And a high speed train Guelph to T.O. via Georgetown , part of the rail operates as a electric rail museum north of Campbellville.
They both backrupted when the car showed up.

There was a large passenger ferry from Downtown T.O. to Hamilton, it backrupted, the Ferry from NOTL to T.O. and T.O. ferry across the lake from Rochester. All cooked.

A causeway like the PEI bridge could work, It would need to be a LONG way off the water at points, there is a ton of frieghter traffic in Port of Hamilton and fuel tankers into the pier at Burloak.

And off Bronte is were I race my sailboat twice a week so come to think of it, NO TO THE CAUSEWAY or BRIDGE. keep your traffic problems ashore.....

I think of a earthen dam like structure when I hear causeway and an elevated structure when I hear bridge. I can't recall the lake depth in the area or what the Northumberland Strait is like but Lake Ontario isn't a wading pool. I'm guessing several hundred feet.

The bridge is a pipe dream, a causeway is a pipe joke.
 

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