Better TTC

As Toronto wrestles with its transit future, the Beijing subway system did something stunning last week: it cut the ribbons on five new lines and 108 kilometres of new track — all in a single day.

That's equal to one and a half times Toronto's entire Toronto subway system.

The new lines and dozens of sparkling new stations came on stream last Thursday to broad acclaim.

In Toronto, the TTC might claim to be “The Better Way,” but here in Beijing the operative slogan seems to be “Just do it.”

There's nothing tentative about Beijing's approach.

Faced with serious gridlock — just like Toronto, but on a monumental scale — Beijing has decided to move aggressively. There is a sudden sense of urgency about public transport here.

The new lines, with a price tag of $9.4 billion, were not supposed to be completed until 2012. But with a transportation crisis on their hands, transit authorities moved that date forward.

They wanted these feeders from the suburbs completed so that they can turn their attention to building more lines in the city centre, where they're most crucially needed.

With last week's new additions, the subway network grew to 336 kilometres from 228 overnight. At the same time, a single fare costs 30 cents — a tenth of the cost of a trip on the TTC.

And there's more expansion in the works, the Beijing Mass Transit Railway Operation Corp. says. The network will grow to more than 700 kilometres — 10 times that of Toronto's current system — by 2020.

“We intend to bring on more new track every year for the next five years,” says Jia Peng, chief spokesman for the transit corporation. “We have the technology, we have the funds; the only thing we don't have much of is time — and time is crucial.

Read more story here http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/918664--beijing-tackles-trans...