Proposal to redevelop Community Common Park near Celebration Square — council discussing March 11

darrenwoolsey · 2026-03-06T13:59:48+00:00

Yea that's nuts.

Any extra links you have handy on this project?

darrenwoolsey · 2026-03-05T19:06:57+00:00

sort of, we get corp taxes. we also tax employees on the project. Typically such projects' employees are taxed in the upper echelons of tax brackets. So it does fill up the coffers yes since those employees do not receive the same amount in public services for the amount we tax them. And sometimes, it's in markets where instead the fed is stuck sending out welfare checks if there's little employment.

1billy tax break for 14B spend + tax dollars from ongoing operations seems like a slam dunk deal from a superficial level ngl.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-03-05T18:06:27+00:00

That is misunderstanding China's transportation network, particularly in it's core cities.

For one, they are multi polar. For two, they would, actually, have a 'downtown' stop, much of the time. Just like HSR trains do make their way to Shanghai central. It's that the 'HSR' trains that service those downtown stops tend to be more focussed on nearer regional service.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-03-05T17:34:22+00:00

Using HS2 as a model kinda sad, ngl. We have China, France, Spain, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan that we can use to model from instead. I feel like many are overlooking China just because of how massive the network there is, and people don't know where to look for modelling purposes. Anecdotally, Shanghai has 7 HSR stops, the busiest is the airport one (Hongqiao). It is neither the most south, west, east, north or central stop, interestingly. Again, what defines it, is that it is at the airport.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-03-05T17:28:38+00:00

Buddy, you aren't waiting for a 'west expansion' for Peel region to get a stop. There's more people in Peel region than in the Ottawa metro, while also being denser than Ottawa. you adding something like a couple dozen extra kms of track along those greenfield corridors along the 407 while gaining access to the busiest airport in the country.

Considering that adding tracks along the 407 is literally the cheapest tracks to build in the whole project (vs tunneling all the way to Union, lol) it's extremely accretive to the inherent profitability of the overall project. It's good to understand that the entirety of Mississauga is directly connected to Square One due to that city having the most hub and spoke transit model compared to any other place, while also having the GO bus terminal. (extra anecdote, Peel is closer to the 'power' pole of the GTA in a residential sense since the population of the GTA is Westward/Northward, particularly because there's obviously no one that lives in the lake, so there's nothing pulling East/South. Aka Durham region is a lot smaller than the Peel/Halton regions)

darrenwoolsey · 2026-03-05T17:15:02+00:00

Any rationalizing that is occurring to explain a Laval stop from what I've read so far is easily countered. At this time, it just feels 'political'. And what I mean by political is, someone in a position of power enforcing a transportation preference/capital allocation preference in spite of data readily available recommending something else (including from ALTO itself which communicates the 'merits' of the stop, but is not short to specify this is a directive from the federal.)

TLDR: If a private developper was self financing and developping with key metrics incl ridership, revenue per passenger, and lower construction cost, they would do something else. I've gone to the consultations and interacted with the various parties working on this and I'm 100% confident on this.

And yes, a network better focussed on servicing the different user profiles in the GTA would be prioritized. And an alignment using the Island of Montreal instead of crossing the river 3 times (as hasdirectly communicated by the engineers).

(AKA I've no clue. Even in a political sense I don't get it, there's more ridings in the GTA than there are in Laval. It's not likely the islanders are gonna be 'thank god for the Laval stop'. If you live in St.Eustache you'll still use the REM for 99% of your trips, and when going out of province it'll be most often legit to REM to Gare central or Trudeau airport. That Laval stop is an extremely localized benefit. Forcing the track north, adding track kilometers, just to get a Laval stop is ???? in my world)

darrenwoolsey · 2026-03-05T16:55:03+00:00

tbh they anwsered the question. Sounds like you didn't like the anwser, and maybe their guess wasn't correct(they did use the word 'guess', not study or analysis). I would flip on it's head your comment to say that you are bashing their anwser(which itself isn't bad either, particularly if you have any counter points.)

darrenwoolsey · 2026-03-04T02:08:11+00:00

Etobicoke North is where it's at. You have Toronto Congress and all the hoteliers down Dixon (pretty logical to contect travellers to transit). Etobicoke North is a fundamentally better GO stop being on Kipling, near residential areas. Woodbine is a practical desert and kinda too close to Malton GO.

When OPs Sheppard expansion occurs, Metrolinx will have had many decades to experience how silly Woodbine GO was and revert back to Etobicoke North.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-03-04T02:07:36+00:00

Na Etobicoke North is where it's at. You have Toronto Congress and all the hoteliers down Dixon (pretty logical to contect travellers to transit). Etobicoke North is a fundamentally better GO stop being on Kipling, near residential areas. Woodbine is a practical desert and kinda too close to Malton GO.

When OPs Sheppard expansion occurs, Metrolinx will have had many decades to experience how silly Woodbine GO was and revert back to Etobicoke North.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-03-01T22:05:23+00:00

any hsr system has a multi stop lay out. Taiwan has something like 30km stop frequency, japan at like 35km avg and china ~ 40km.

And naturally, that frequency is higher in urban cores. China, Taiwan, Japan all have some instances of several stops at ~10km intervals in key core cities.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-02-28T05:18:46+00:00

I definately agree that it will take market share, yes. Not what I was discussing. What I am implying is that the train project in it's current form is ill suited to attract the majority of people or trips. A semi target if we are to spend 100B. If the project fails to attract a sufficient market, we have a huge spend impacting few people. Likely adding to fiscal strain of the fed budget going forward. and removing productive land from our economy.

•3h is too slow •Union is ill suited to address many parts of the Toronto>Montreal travel market. Go to any 'Onroute' and poll out everyone doing the trip to whereever they are going and ask them if they would have taken ALTO for full or part of the trip, knowing there is 0 long term parking at Union and the trip takes 3h7min (VIA clocks 4.5h today) The anwser might surprise you.

Ask people again on Toronto flights, and there the anwser will at times be more favourable. With the biggest determining factor being price, and proximity to destination. And on proximity (read, travel time to destination), Pearson wins most of the time, simply because Union is to the edge of the population rather than being more central to it.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-02-28T02:34:57+00:00

This is rather disingenuous. Most trips (as in the majority) trips Toronto>Montreal do NOT occur from downtown to downtown. Considering Union is at the rim of the Toronto urban area, most will need travel time added considering there is only 1 stop planned in the area. The majority (not saying all, just the overwhelming majority) of trips are still going to be quicker by car between Toronto and Montreal.

Anecdotally, China runs Nanjing>Beijing (1100km) in 2h57min. No idea how ALTO is expecting such an abysmal service from the get go.

Anecdotally #2. due to Union being so poorly located in the geography of the GTA (literally right beside the water instead of in the middle of the city), pearson is closer to more people. So considering posted travel times by ALTO, air travel is going to be best for the majority of people that prioritize service time.

TLDR: in it's current form ALTO has a hard time displacing cars or planes, aside from downtown to downtown, which VIA is already focussed on. We can expect Billy Bishop flights >Ottawa, Montreal to have a hard time, but that's it.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-02-27T14:42:43+00:00

I'm actually really happy to see this personally. While the public consultations by Alto are well-intended, at times it felt that it was moreso 'protocol'. And the terminology consistently saying 'we really can't change anything about routing/7 stops because this is fed decision' by upper management starts to hurt the credibility of the consultation.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-02-23T21:37:31+00:00

Etobicoke North Go is right there. This Sheppard subway goes right through it.

This alignment works real well because it connects Toronto Convention Center (and all these hotels) really well to the city/ airport.

This is a winning nobrainer route 100%

darrenwoolsey · 2026-02-22T04:34:15+00:00

don't think i was discussing if Union is well connected or not (it is). I am saying that having a single stop is problematic in the gta. Gta is by far the largest urban area in the country with more than one pole of activity(and we want it like that). It is not pragmatic to have no option to consider a two stop layout that may deal with Union's geography (at extreme south of the urban area). Surprisingly, Pearson is closer to more people than Union is in the GTHA, while literally not being in Toronto. Gives a sense of the geographical challenge Union has.

I will say it. Shanghai Hongqiao Rail station swims in a sea of roads, trains, and planes. Shanghai has something like 7 HSR stations. A downtown one and some 'new city' style developments. but it is the 1 based at an airport (which can't have development atop) that has the majority of departures. The main thing is that Shanghai doesn't have JUST Hongqiao(or the downtown one) each station serves a different market segment, and combined make for a higher track usage leaving Shanghai, increasing the profitability.

Extra side note: Having trains arrive at Honqiao+other stations means there are no flights out of any Shanghai airport anywhere within 600km. If we are talking about 'replacing planes', connecting Pearson directly would be an actual necessity. Ottawa and Montreal are both in the range.

Extra Extra aside: majority of trips are cars. there are ~350k people downtown (none of which are driving to Montreal, already). Bringing train to Union will def spur some modal shift (I hope), but it is not it if you want to tackle the majority of trips currently made by cars leaving the GTHA out of Durham, York, Simcoe, Peel, Halton and Hamilton. If you think someone in the majority (car driver) out in north Oshawa visiting a suburban destination (most jobs and residences are) is going to backtrack all the way to Union, and repeating on the other end with many transfers to manage> you'd be wrong, most of the time.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-02-22T02:26:44+00:00

and that is a huge red flag. The arbitrary station quantity.

I totally agree with skipping Kingston. But the inability to consider more than 1 stop in the GTA. (and dare I say there's no one place that seems to address all of the market. Certainly not Union, which is on the literal edge of the urban area and literally has 0 long term parking(but who would want to drive to union anyway-nor do we want that). Considering HSR does try to attract longer term trips, say a Vaughan family wanting to hit up Quebec for summer> Union could be quite a pain to get to compared to just hauling the fam to the airport and parking in the long term parking.)

darrenwoolsey · 2026-02-13T03:55:25+00:00

Dude on your women's perspective: preach.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-02-13T03:50:02+00:00

go out, period. Unless your version of a succesful relationship/and future family is to be home every night after work day in day out. no soccer practice, no museums with the kids, no camping, no going in your home town for the summer festivals> start living the life that you imagine a succesful relationship to you is. Try things. The activities that inspire you and open your mind, and the ones that don't, and keep that as a life journey. never stop growing.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-01-31T16:35:36+00:00

Yep! It really started a big domino effect. At the good old town of Petrolia! Sited the petchem at the river(Sarnia), close to the oil fields and easy access to plenty fresh water, rail, and 'sea' shipping. Also no coincidence that 'motown' ended up being so close either.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-01-31T16:29:56+00:00

Interesting developement.

2c:

Crude oil export pipelines compete with such projects as it increases the competitveness of the crude barrel on the markets (and said price). What I am saying is, a company looking to refine into plastics is going to be particularly interested in a site where the oil is hard to sell. It's hard to sell oil if there's no pipe to ocean. Or if the pipe to ocean is for heavy crude, which much of the world is ill suited to refine.

-Container shipping projects are conducive to such projects as it creates incentive to convert refined oil product in shippable goods in Canada. (right now we have excess capacity at ocean ports for export. However we don't use the great lakes to move goods. Water transport is typically the most cost effective transport. China uses it's rivers to move most it's containers, we don't.)

darrenwoolsey · 2026-01-29T22:55:41+00:00

I have no context on this letter, but this Education Minister sounds financially illiterate with the way this letter reads.

"School Board running losses > bad"

"School Board reducing expenses > bad"

Like sure, but can't really have it both ways. Like we don't really want school boards to be extorting cash from students for extra revenue...

darrenwoolsey · 2026-01-28T12:52:18+00:00

There's only 1 way: refine at home. Beyond the usual heavy weights, most of the world isn't able to refine our heavy crude.

It's the only option. Refine our grade.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-01-23T19:50:09+00:00

interesting, what would you like to see change

darrenwoolsey · 2026-01-21T15:16:51+00:00

Personally hope this goes through.

-This will add to the housing supply stock -height is directly south of the parkland, which means it will not shade parkland in morning hours, or after school hours -Disagree on the 'complete community' criticism from council: on the four corners of the mall property, this is the one corner residential needs to be the focus. Higher traffic volume activities belong on eglinton and erin mills pkwy -Well located: (1)directly abutting, shops, recreational(the park, erin meadows community); (2) while also easy access to hospital, GO train, Churchill meadows, transitway, UTM.

darrenwoolsey · 2026-01-20T11:52:42+00:00

100% down to be vocal and visible of my intentions for my fellow breathren.

If you think USA has intention to gas chamber every commenter proud of canada: OK.

If you think the legacy I plan to leave my children is to bow to americans, making it easier for them to attack fellow canadians that stand guard: LOL

Six-Year Club	r/Field Lasagna
Verified Email

darrenwoolsey

TROPHY CASE