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Good points... The closest city in the US I've seen develop commuter rail to S-Bahn/RER potential is Philadelphia (SEPTA) with its 1983-built Center City tunnel connecting the huge Penn Central and Reading electrified systems... But Philly has since dropped the ball. Although they added the important airport branch in (like) 1986, SEPTA has done very little to improve service to a rapid-transit like. In fact, given the growth of push-pull locomotives for longer lines, there's evidence Philly is going the other way. For one thing, the long-talked about signal improvements for throat system from 30th Street Station through Center City and north to Wayne Junction, Jenkintown and Glenside hasn't happened nor is it even in planning. Worst yet, SEPTA should have raised platforms for level walk-in entry at every station (SEPTA has slowly raised a few platforms on some lines, but for the most part, passengers must endure the sometimes arduous climb up into/down out of SEPTA's tall-sitting trains. Only a very small fraction of the system shares tracks with freight trains anymore, so there's no excuse (and even the sections that do can use the switch-out/double rail system employed on Chicago's South Shore Line at some high-platform stations).
To further muddle the situation, a few years back SEPTA decided to dump its long-used, color-coded R-system of paring through lines and now only identifies lines based on their destinations, with schedules now only showing service from Center City to these destination points (for a while they were showing origin/completion points on schedules to help passengers on through trips ... no more). So SEPTA muddles on with its low platform, (roughly) hourly base schedule on heavy railroad-type trains with ticket-punching conductors. ... And this is American commuter rail at its best!? Oy!
I'd say that the U.S. system that has seen most improvements is Bay Area's Caltrain. It's essentially doing the exact same thing as Toronto's GO RER project: EMU trains, electrification, track upgrades, increased frequency to rapid transit levels. I believe Caltrain has already procured the next generation Swiss Stadler bi-level EMUs, which will be a first on this continent.
Chicago has quite a good system with Metra and `The L` and is far more expansive than Toronto`s subway. RER and several large projects underway will change that but for now in terms of rapid transit, Chicago beats out Toronto.
Conversely I think Toronto has a far better local system with much higher frequencies in the suburban areas. the downtown streetcars are great, and even out of the core service levels are extremely high. Even outside of rush hour the most you will wait for a bus or streetcar is about 6 minutes. What other cities consider rush hour service Toronto considers non-rush hour. Toronto also seems like a much cleaner, friendlier, well maintained system, with more modern and newer fleets and infrastructure.
Both good systems but I think their strengths are quite different.
No social stigma about riding the bus or the subway.
I lived in Chicago for years and never knew anyone who thought ridding PT there was a social stigma. Given how many people use the systems in Chicagoland, it would seem unlikely that this point is of serious concern.
I lived in Chicago for years and never knew anyone who thought ridding PT there was a social stigma. Given how many people use the systems in Chicagoland, it would seem unlikely that this point is of serious concern.
I remember when living in Baltimore how there was an unspoken stigma around people taking buses to work in Inner Harbor. I took the bus for a while but never told my colleagues as all of them drive to work from Baltimore's nicer suburbs.
How in the world is Toronto able to fund all of the construction of all these rapid transit lines???? This is BILLIONS AND BILLIONS worth of expansion/new lines!
Because Ontario is the most indebted subsovereign government in the world and Torontonians think money grows on trees.
A forward-thinking Ontario province. Canada, in general, is progressive in many ways, and it's manifested in their spending toward quality mass transit. Canada is tiny, pop-wise to the U.S., but yet they are not only investing heavily in mass transit, they are also planning a high-speed railroad/passenger line from Toronto to Windsor, ONT. Practically every, if not every, Canadian city over 400K has rail rapid transit in some form. A far cry from the United States, where some metro areas of over 3M have none at all: Detroit, San Antonio, among them. Then other huge ones, like Houston and Phoenix are barely getting started -- but at least they're doing something...
America has a negative view of mass transit: it's communistic in nature for poor and minorities while Americans (see well-off white Americans) treasure their "freedom" to drive their cars -- and clog highways while wasting fuel and valuable man/woman hours behind the wheel ... but happily all the while not having to deal with "others." While many American cities don't have enough rail transit, in those cities that have it spending for upkeep is way too stingy. I mean, as great as the New York City subway is, it's an embarrassment in terms of its filth and dinginess. Other countries around the world wouldn't tolerate this and have a much healthier view toward transit and HSR... So they invest.
... to Americans, this seems weird.
It's amazing what you can accomplish when you use a credit card and pass off the bill to your children!
Of course the difference between those Chicago suburbs and the Toronto suburbs you've listed is that those Chicago burbs are tiny compared to the massive suburban cities of Mississauga (pop. 730,000) and Brampton (pop. 600,000). Mississauga and Brampton both include within their boundaries enormous swaths of industrial areas with no residents, and Canada's largest Airport (Pearson International is within the borders of Mississauga. Take away those non-residential areas and the density figures would rise considerably -- especially in Mississauga which has many high density neighbourhoods full of residential towers. Richmond Hill is also quite big with 200,000 people but noticeably less dense than Mississauga and Brampton.
Stop being dishonest Atticman,
Cook and DuPage County have 6,141,391 people in 1,272 square miles.
How many square miles does Toronto need to reach 6,141,391 people?
Total: 6,417,516 in 2,750sqmi, or about 2,500sqmi to hit 6.1 million.
Toronto needs 2x(!) the land area to hit the same population as the core counties of Chicago. Don't try to argue that Toronto is denser. The facts are obvious to anyone who isn't a frothing Toronto booster.
Urban area is not the same thing as metropolitan area. The Greater Toronto-Hamilton urban area has 6.7 million people in only 888 sq. miles. It's the densest urban area in the U.S. and Canada.
And it's clearly a typo.
How can Toronto have 6.7 million people in 888 square miles, when it needs 2,750 square miles just to hit 6.4 million?
And stop with the specious accomplishments (Toronto is the "densest urban area in the U.S. and Canada.")
New York has 8,143,240 in its 4 main boroughs in 244 square miles. That's the same land area as Toronto with 5,411,669 more people. Now that's impressive!
Total: 6,417,516 in 2,750sqmi, or about 2,500sqmi to hit 6.1 million.
Toronto needs 2x(!) the land area to hit the same population as the core counties of Chicago. Don't try to argue that Toronto is denser. The facts are obvious to anyone who isn't a frothing Toronto booster.
LOL Dishonest? You don't even seem to understand the numbers you are looking at and what constitutes an urban area as you're comparing apples to oranges. Cook County is completely urbanized and DuPage County only has a few small areas of undeveloped land left within its borders -- they constitute a major built-up portion of what is the urban area of metropolitan Chicago which also includes the contiguously built-up portions of Kane, Lake, McHenry and Will Counties in Illinois; Hamilton County in Indiana and Kenosha County in Wisconsin.
Durham, Halton, Peel and York are are not even close to being fully urbanized, they include huge swaths of farmland, greenbelt and forested areas within their borders (so counting their total areas is quite dishonest of you) but the parts that are built up (the suburban 905 belt) are contiguous and (along with the cities of Toronto and Hamilton) form a single urban area that contains 6.7 million people in less than 900 square miles. Easily more dense than Cook and Dupage Counties, and much more dense than the total Chicago urban area.
I know this stuff can be confusing, so I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and take back my jesting comment that you in fact were the one who was being dishonest.
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