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| Geoffrey, Westminister, Fermanagh/High Park |
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About midway along Roncesvalles we get to Geoffrey, Westminister, Fermanagh/High Park. You'll need to look at two scrolls: part one and part two.
East Side
West Side
These plans were based on input from the TTC, the BIA and Roncesvalles Renewed, among others. They show the proposed bumpouts and places where the TTC wants to extend the sidewalk. They'll be built with ramps for cyclists.
The sidewalk extension at the TTC stops shows up on the scroll as a dark grey bar These raised lanes slope at each end, for cyclists. Transit riders can board the streetcar without crossing a lane of car traffic and without having to step down onto the road and back up to board the streetcar. The TTC is referring to these raised lanes as "transit platforms" in their EA materials. Too bad, because it makes you think that riders will be standing on these so-called "platforms" waiting for the streetcar. Completely wrong! In fact, they are not transit platforms at all. They are raised lanes. The BIA has a detailed description of these raised lanes.
To get your bearings, see a google map for these blocks.
This is not a final plan. This is a starting point for the formal design and consultation process that will begin in the late summer or early fall. It's part of an informal process that has taken place over the last two years. We don't need to wait until the summer to make ourselves heard. These conversations are very productive, and have already resulted in important and beneficial changes to the original proposals. But there's lots of work to be done, so Roncesvalles Renewed is grateful for whatever insight you can provide. |
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| Re: Fermanagh/High Park, Westminister, Geoffrey |
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This aerial sketch depicts the City’s proposed “CONCEPT 2 - BUMP-OUTS & TRANSIT PLATFORMS”, and is my own interpretation of the their drawing. Generic in illustrating the intended ways in which the road width would be reduced at transit platforms, it specifically shows the High Park Blvd., Fermanagh, Roncesvalles intersection, as seen from a bird’s eye view above the northwest corner.
The heights are exaggerated to illustrate the roughly 6” grade separation between the road, parking and bicycle lane (dark grey) / transit lane (light grey) and the sidewalk / transit platform level (beige). We have been told that the bike lane will continue to be asphalt as it rises up and becomes flush with the sidewalk / transit platform, though a more refined material for what will become part of the pedestrian domain when streetcars stop. (The transit platforms are shown in their current positions, not at the Transit Platforms, shown south of the intersection, as they would presumably be, when complete.
Mark Campbell |
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| Re: Fermanagh/High Park, Westminister, Geoffrey |
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The two pictures above were taken from a BlogTO piece by Rick McGinnis about the changing nature of Roncesvalles Avenue throughout the years. The picture on the left is the corner of Roncesvalles & Fermanagh/High Park from 1914. The one on the right is the same intersection today. The large 5 storey building on the north-east corner (whose "sorted" history is discussed in the blog piece) is still there, largely unchanged.
It's nice to see some (although limited) mature growth trees on the street today, compared to the saplings from 1914. But those nice long soil troughs in the 1914 picture would promote a root system for sustainable long-life trees... Too bad they were removed sometime in the last 100 years. I wonder what this intersection will look like 100 years from now...?
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| Re: Fermanagh/High Park, Westminister, Geoffrey |
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I notice in those days they made the effort to retouch the upper photo to edit out the overhead wires. They knew ugly when they saw it.
At the public EA meeting a couple of months ago, a fellow from Europe observed that over there they bury their wires, and expressed a little disgust that here we do not. What is with that anyway? Wouldn't the wires be safer, and the trees less deformed from needing to be pruned around them? Where does this sit in our priority list? Why can other jurisdictions afford to bury their wires? The wires are bad enough, but the overhead transformer boxes? That just isn't neighborhoodly.
And why in Europe is it enough to have one traffic light facing each direction, and here we have to clutter the sky with two, for a total of eight big ugly yellow boxes looming over each signaled intersection?
I love the awnings on the apartment building. Today we substitute energy by cranking up the air-conditioning, although that doesn't help with fading carpets.
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| Re: Geoffrey, Westminister, Fermanagh/High Park |
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From Saturday's walk:
@ Westminster crosswalk- relocate to north side, with bumpouts on east AND west sides
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