Starting yesterday,
GO buses will be able to bypass rush hour traffic
by driving on the shoulder lanes of the Don Valley Parkway between
Lawrence and just north of York Mills Road in both directions.
"This
initiative is aimed at improving transit reliability and making it more
attractive than the car," says Nazzareno Capano, manager of operation
planning and policy for the city's transportation services, "and for
the go transit customers, it will provide faster, more reliable service
to them."
At a cost of about $120,000, new signs and pavement
painting were added to the stretch of the DVP, which will enable GO
buses to zip over onto them when traffic is slow. They'll be allowed to
go as much as 20km faster than the speed of traffic.
It doesn't
impact the highway capacity of the DVP as it exists now," Capano says.
"We're not taking away a lane from motorists, we're just trying to
improve the efficiency for GO transit along this corridor.
Capano
says there are plans in the works to add two more sections of GO
express lanes to the DVP, between Pottery Road and Don Mills, and then
from Don Mills to Eglinton, though he says those projects, which are
currently being studied, will be much more extensive and expensive,
involving new lighting and widening shoulders and railway bridges.
Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Nazzareno Capano
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