TTC calls for patience amid planned weekend closures
38 service disruptions in 2016 will be 'worth the wait,' TTC CEO Andy Byford says
TTC officials are calling on commuters to be patient as they deal with weekend subway closures throughout the year — all part of a major upgrade to the rail system.
- Subway closed between St. George, Lawrence West this weekend
- Transit control: Where the TTC makes day-to-day decisions affecting your commute
Including this weekend, the city is planning 38 subway service disruptions before the end of 2016, including seven weekends in a row during April and May.
By 2019, this overhaul will increase transit capacity in the city by 25 per cent and get people moving faster, Byford vowed.
While maintenance work is getting done every night after the subway closes, the TTC says one weekend of work during a closure is equivalent to about five weeks of nightly work.
"I liken it to having a house with a furnace that's 50 years old. You can't just leave that be if you want to have an efficient house."
This weekend, there isn't any subway service on Line 1 between St. George and Lawrence West stations as work crews lay some 11,000 metres of cable for a new signal system, replace over 800 metres of track and perform other maintenance work including station cleaning.
This kind of work is especially important with the Toronto-York Spadina Subway Extension underway and SmartTrack construction on the horizon, Byford said.
"There's no point in having a shiny new extension or a shiny new line if the existing system is falling apart."
The next major scheduled service disruptions are:
- March 19-20: Line 1 – St. George to Lawrence West closure
- April 2: Line 2 - Kennedy to Victoria Park closure
- April 3: Line 2 - Pape to St. George late opening