Let's talk about Stadia

Are the Xbox, PS4 and PC gamers paying attention? No? Okay. Let's talk about Google Stadia.

Image Source: Flickr user dronepicr

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What is Stadia?

Unlike console and PC gaming, where the game is running on a device inside your house, Stadia is a cloud gaming platform where the games run on Google's servers. The inputs from the controller are sent to the cloud, and the visuals are sent back down to your screen in what is essentially a YouTube video. The benefit of this is that you can play AAA games on devices that have very little processing power.

The service comes in two flavours:

Stadia Pro is the paid tier, which costs $11.99 CAD per month and includes playback at up to 4K, HDR, 60 FPS, with up to 5.1 surround sound. As well, you get Destiny 2: The Collection included with the pro subscription, a voucher to get at least one "game of the month" for free (for December it was Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition and Farming Simulator 19 - yes, you read that right), and discounts on many other games.

Stadia Base is the free tier, and it includes playback at up to 1080p.

You might have noticed that Stadia Pro offers some free games and discounts on others. This hints at the fact that you'll have to buy all of the games you want to play. The refund policy is pretty generous (30 days or 2 hours of gameplay, whichever comes first), but Stadia isn't the Netflix of video games. Rather, it's like playing Xbox - except you're renting a console in the cloud instead of buying one outright.

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Where can you play Stadia?

The beauty of Stadia is that you're able to play games on devices that you probably already own. At the time of writing, if you want to play on a TV then you'll need a Chromecast Ultra - but eventually you'll be able to play directly on an Android TV device like a smart TV or a streaming device (note: not all smart TVs are Android TV devices - some run Roku OS, Tizen, or WebOS - and not all Android streaming boxes are running the official Android TV operating system - some run a modified version of Android for phones. It's more complicated than it has to be, but the Chromecast Ultra is always an option).

At the time of writing, if you want to play on your phone you'll need a Pixel 2, 3, 3a, or 4 - but eventually you'll be able to play on any recent Android or iOS device. You're also able to play in the Chrome browser on Windows, Mac, or on a Chromebook. You might have noticed that I've said "eventually" twice. I'll come back to that.

The official Stadia controller uses Wi-Fi instead of Bluetooth to connect directly to the internet and reduce lag, but right now wireless play only works with the Chromecast Ultra. If you want to play on a phone or on a computer you'll need to use a USB cable, but eventually wireless play will be available on all devices. The Stadia controller has a built-in screenshot button so you can capture your maximum pwn4ge and share it from you phone immediately, and it has a Google Assistant button that lets you launch games with your voice, and ask the same questions you can ask your phone. Eventually you'll be able use the assistant to help you if you're stuck on a level. It will be smart enough to know where you are in the game, search YouTube for walkthroughs, and skip directly to the correct spot in the video.

That's two more "eventually”, if you're keeping score.

If you don't want to buy a Stadia controller you can use many USB controllers on a device with a USB port (or tough it out with Bluetooth if the controller supports it), or even use a keyboard and mouse on a computer.

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Why did Google create this product?

As much as I live in their universe, I'm not a Google employee - so I can only speculate as to why they've brought this product to market:

1) Many industry players, including Microsoft, are working on cloud gaming. It's probably the future of gaming, though when we'll get there is anyone's guess. Google, given the power of their data centres, probably feels that they can deliver a competitive product in this space.

2) Google's business model means that they make more money when everyone consumes more internet. It's possible that Stadia is a tool to force internet service providers to improve speeds and remove data caps by making them look bad if they appear to be hindering a popular online platform.

3) Google is an ad company, and they serve you tailored ads based on what they know about you. Let me be clear: They don't sell your information to advertisers. Rather, they say to advertisers "If you give us your ad then we can target it to Caribbean-Canadian males, in the Toronto area, in their 30s, who like trains." Stadia lets them collect more data about you, which means they can command a higher ad price from the people who want to reach you.

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How well does it work?

"Does cloud gaming even work?" is a legitimate question. Any lag in the system will make the game unplayable, and there are a million uncontrollable variables in the internet connection that Xbox and PlayStation gamers simply don't have to deal with for offline play. So, does it actually, in the real world, work?

Yes.

I've been mainly playing Destiny 2, which is a first-person shooter when you need fast reflexes - and the game runs great for hours on end. Even when someone is in the next room watching Netflix it continues to run fine. Now, we have a 35 Mbps Unlimited fibre connection, and an 802.11AC router - so my setup is probably faster than the average household. So, your mileage may vary. The minimum connection for 720p, 60 FPS, 2.0 stereo sound is 10 Mbps, while you need 35 Mbps for 4K, 60 FPS, HDR, 5.1 surround sound. We don't have a 4K TV (but Christmas is coming...) so I'm probably maxing out at 1080p on the Chromecast and slightly less than 2K on my Pixelbook. Still, it performs as advertised.

You can't play Stadia on LTE right now, and frankly, I think it would be irresponsible of Google if they allowed it. 1 hour uses almost 5 GB of data, which means two hours per month on my Rogers plan assuming I did nothing else with my phone that month. Honestly, I would strongly caution anyone who has a data cap on their internet plan from seriously considering this - though perhaps this supports the theory that Google is trying to shame ISPs for creating an artificial scarcity.

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When can you buy Stadia?

Right now, if you want to play Stadia, you'll need to buy the Premier Edition for $169 CAD. This includes a Chromecast Ultra and a controller, as well as three months of Stadia Pro included. In February Stadia Base will become available, and you'll be able to buy a controller unbundled for $89 CAD. You can buy one unbundled now, but the minimum price of admission at the time of writing is the Premier Edition.

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Who is Stadia for?

I don't subscribe to the idea that a gadget has to be for everyone to be good. The forthcoming $6,000 USD Apple Mac Pro and $5,000 USD Apple Pro Display XDR will be objectively amazing, but unless you're editing 8K video and colour correcting for feature films it will probably be overkill. Similarly, Stadia isn't for everyone - and that's okay.

If you're the type of person who is perfectly fine playing a few levels of Candy Crush on the subway to pass the time then Stadia isn't for you. If you're the type of person who builds your own gaming PC from parts purchased at six different College Street computer stores then Stadia isn't for you. But, if you want to play AAA games but don't feel like you can justify the expense of a console (because, like me, you feel like you're too busy to really make use of it), or you want to play AAA games but don't have a TV because you figure you can watch Netflix on your iPad if you really wanted to, then maybe Stadia might be for you. Stadia aims for the middle ground between casual and hardcore gamer, and it delivers something that works well for the those in its crosshairs.

Now, I said "eventually" no less than six times in this post and it's time to talk about that. Stadia is, as of early December 2019, really an open beta product. Many of the teased features are future additions, which makes it difficult for me to recommend without caveats. So, here's what I'll say:

If Stadia is for you, then I recommend that you wait until Stadia Base is available in February. Without a monthly fee the product becomes fairly easy to recommend, as the only cost will be the game you want to play, and a controller if you want the ability to play wirelessly or on a big screen TV - otherwise you can just use any USB controller. I would only recommend Stadia Pro if 4K 60 PFS, HDR and 5.1 Surround Sound is important to you; and if there are several games you want to buy and the discounts would be handy.

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Those are my thoughts on Stadia, but if any hardcore gamers ask then we were talking about bricks.

VIA Rail Canada's High Frequency Rail

VIA Rail

Presently, VIA Rail Canada service runs from Toronto to Montréal along the North Shore of the St. Lawrence River, and service onward to Québec via the south shore of the St. Lawrence. Service through Ottawa diverges at Brockville and rejoins at Coteau. This proposal would add two new routes to the network - Toronto to Ottawa via Peterborough, and Montréal to Québec via Trois-Rivieres. Modest service improvements would come to the existing routes, but these new routes would be largely free of freight train traffic and excellent service levels could be offered.

This would be really good for passengers travelling between the largest cities (Toronto, Ottawa, Montréal and Québec), while still preserving service to medium-sized cities like Kingston and Brockville. This is key, as a seat that turns over at Kingston is a seat that is being paid for twice.

This isn't French-style high-speed rail, but given that Q2 2018 was VIA Rail Canada's 17th consecutive quarter of ridership growth, it's clear to me that mega-projects aren't always the right tool to build ridership and shift people onto more sustainable means of travel.

If you need to get from, say, Toronto to Windsor - a route I know very well - as fast as possible then flying is an option. There are 4 daily Porter Flights from Billy Bishop, and 4 daily Air Canada Flights from Pearson. The train's strengths are in its ability to serve multiple travel markets in one run. The Toronto - London business traveller, the Woodstock - London - Chatham day-tripper, and the London - Windsor student traveller are all served by one train. All this is in addition to someone going all the way from Toronto to Windsor.

Why not play to your strengths?

 With all that said, there is one issue that needs to be mentioned. The Mount Royal tunnel in Montréal used to be how passenger trains along the north shore of the St. Lawrence accessed Gare Central, but it is being converted to accommodate automated light rail trains. This means that in the interim, north shore VIA Rail trains won't be able to get downtown - passengers will have to change at an uptown station. This will be resolved as we complete the move towards a next-generation signalling system, but this underscores the need for a national transit strategy.

The Google Pixel Slate

On October 9th, 2018, Google had its annual hardware event, and one of the things they announced was the Google Pixel Slate - a 12" tablet with a detachable keyboard that runs Chrome OS. Also announced were the Pixel 3 line of phones and the Google Home Hub (which adds a screen), but I think the Pixel Slate is the most important product of the year. Here's why:

Source: About Chromebooks

Tablets worth buying come in two flavours - mobile-first and desktop-first. The iPad is the undisputed king of the mobile-first tablet, but it falls short when it comes to productivity. Apple is getting there with the iPad Pro (and the rumoured October 30th product refesh will take it even closer), but iOS really is a mobile-first experience that simply can't replace a PC quite yet. On the other side of the spectrum is the Microsoft Surface, which is king of the desktop-first tablet. Lessons learned from Windows 8 has made Windows 10 very touch-friendly - but the device still lacks the simplicity and the app selection of a mobile-first experience. The Pixel Slate is a compelling product because it finds the gap between the two kings and spreads out fairly far into both directions.

Chrome OS was originally just the Chrome browser and all of the plugins and extensions that come along with it. Chromebooks (and also Chromeboxes and Chromebases) work well for the education market because the devices are cheap, all of the data on them lives in the cloud, they are easy to manage, and kids can't download sketchy software onto them. This also makes them a great choice for people who want a want a desktop-first computer to surf the internet and keep in touch with loved ones - but don't need all of the complexity that comes along with Windows or MacOS. The addition of Android apps to the mix was a huge leap forward in terms of capability, bringing the platform roughly in line with what the iPad can do. The much more recent addition of Linux apps to the platform brought the ability to run complex programs just like the Surface can do.

Computers and laptops with desktop operating systems for consumers are not a growth market. Microsft has seen the writing on the wall and has pivoted pretty elegantly towards software-as-a-service, "we don't care what device you're using" company. At the same time, Apple has really slowed the pace at which they improve their consumer Macs to the point where many tech journalists are questioning if the product line even has a future. When you step back and look at the big picture, it's pretty clear that the future of computing for the average consumer is going to resemble something that rises from where the iPad and the Surface would intersect - something that does away with the complexity of Windows, but can still run software that is much more complex than what iOS can handle. It's going to be a touch-friendly or even touch-first device, but it will have to support a mouse and keyboard as well. With the Pixel Slate, Google is trying to get to the future of computing and is bringing something to the table that Apple and Microsoft haven't been able to do thus far.

How well the device sells has yet to be seen, but comparing it to iPad or Surface sales misses the point. This device moves the needle on innovation, and that is why I believe that the Chrome OS tablet is the most important product announced last week - possibly all year.

Humber Bay Transportation Photo Essay

As many of you know, I've been getting to know Humber Bay (the Park Lawn and Lake Shore area). Plenty has been written about the transportation issues in the neighbourhood, but my sense of it is that the "GO station will solve all of the problems" is narrow thinking. People aren't automatons who only go to work in the financial district and then come home right after. People have diverse travel needs, and a more comprehensive solution is necessary. Here's a photo essay of a few things that I think would, when bundled together, improve the transportation landscape for people living here.

For the last few forevers, there has been no streetcar service west of Roncesvalles Avenue. Passengers wishing to travel further west had to change onto the replacement bus for stops along The Queensway and Lake Shore. For a long time, the bus ran to Queen and Dufferin, then down Dufferin to the CNE. This was really convenient because it could take me to Queen West and to Liberty Village. When they cut it back to Queen and Dufferin it was still convenient because I could at least get to Queen West. Even a replacement bus to Roncesvalles would be convenient because I could change to travel along King, travel along Queen, or travel up Roncy. 

Standard operations on the Queen streetcar is to split the route in two at Humber Loop so that delays on Queen don't spill over onto Lake Shore. There is plenty of local travel (just a few blocks versus going all the way downtown), so regularly spaced services are probably more important than end-to-end runs. That said, Humber Loop is where it is because it's where the old municipal border was and you had to change to go further. That's not the case anymore, and since there's nothing around Humber Loop it's not a great place to force a change - and neither is Ellis Avenue.

Having a one-seat ride everywhere for everyone on transit is unreasonable. That said, forced changes should be carefully designed - ideally, so that they happen at places where people are coming and going in all directions.

If we are going to continue to split the Queen streetcar into a Lake Shore segment and a Queen segment, then what I would suggest is to run Lake Shore segment to Dundas West Station. Lake Shore riders would be able to change at Queen and Roncesvalles to continue further along King or Queen, or could stay on to access local shopping on Roncesvalles and the budding transit hub at Dundas West subway / Bloor railway station.

Longer term, running the Lake Shore segment to Dufferin and Queen and then down to the CNE is another suggestion. This would provide all of the connections I found useful when the bus took this route and would connect with the future Parkdale / Liberty Village railway station that would stretch from Queen and Dufferin to King and Atlantic. But, new track at Queen and Dufferin would be needed to make this happen.

The TTC has proposed to build a streetcar loop at Lake Shore and Legion Road, roughly where the U-haul vehicles are parked in this photo. This would allow the Queen segment of the streetcar to turn around here, meaning that Humber Bay residents would not have to change at Humber Loop in order to travel to Queen West and further downtown. 

If this happens I would still recommend that Lake Shore segment cars continue eastward into the city. Essentially, no one should be forced to change at Humber Loop!

Speaking of Legion Road, currently there is no connection across the railway tracks to connect the Humber Bay side of Legion Road to the Mystic Pointe side of Legion Road. A pedestrian connection, at least, would make for a more useful grid and would improve access to the lake and to east / west transit on Lake Shore.

Unlike Mystic Pointe, Humber Bay only has the 66B Prince Edward bus running north and south between the lake and the subway at Old Mill. The Prince Edward bus is the gateway to places like The Kingway and Bloor West Village - both of which have much better shopping options than currently exist in Humber Bay - in addition to any number of places accessible by the Bloor-Danforth subway. Not everyone wants to go downtown, and connections to these areas mean more travel options for people taking transit.

The route is usually crowded, despite suffering from less-than-optimal route design:

- The segment along Prince Edward Drive is of comparably low productivity (few ons and off), with most of the ridership being generated in Humber Bay (at the end of the 66B), at the apartments in the Berry Road & Stephen Drive area (near the end of the 66A), and at Old Mill Station. Routes are most productive when they have ons and offs all along the way so each seat can be occupied by multiple passengers per run.

- The low-productivity segment along Prince Edward Drive sees the most service, with each high-ridership residential area only seeing half of the total service offered. If you're going to design a route with a split tail then ideally the higher ridership areas would see the most service.

A lot of this routing probably came out of necessity given the incomplete street grid, so let me switch from a problem-identifier to a solution-maker. I would suggest more frequent service, but I would question if the 66A and 66B need to be paired. They each run every 12 minutes during the peak hours (to combine for every 6 minutes along Prince Edward), but would the world end if the 66A ran every 12 minutes and the 66B ran every 6 minutes? Another suggestion would be to run the 66A down to Lake Shore instead of to Humber Loop after serving Stephen Drive. This would give Humber Bay riders access to both branches.

Off-peak service is rarely crowded, paritally because service is infrequent. Strategic increases in frequency would help grow ridership and let people truly live a car-free lifestyle.

Behind where the Mr. Christie plant once stood is where the Park Lawn GO Station is proposed to be built. Personally, I prefer the name "Humber Bay railway station" for a few reasons:

- The trend within the GTA has been to name railway stations after communities. The last three to open were Gormley (not Stouffville Road), West Harbour (not James Street North), and Allandale Waterfront (not Essa Road).
- I envision a future where each station could have multiple services using it. Why limit it to just GO trains?

The City of Toronto's position is that this station is critical to the transportation future of the neighbourhood. This is true, but they say it as if this will solve all of the neighbourhoods transportation problems. That, as you probably have guessed by the tone of this essay, is probably not true. This station will make travel into the downtown core incredibly convenient, but that is just one of many travel markets that need improved service.

GO Transit and Metrolinx's position is that this station would be too close to Mimico station for both to coexist, and they have already decided to spend quite a bit of money to upgrade Mimico. This is true if we are married to the current way GO Transit operates its service. But, what if we weren't?

Today, all local trains stop at all stations - so if a train stops at Mimico and it stops at Exhibition then it would have to stop at Humber Bay as a matter of policy. Electric trains might mitigate the increased travel times from adding a new station, but they are not the unicorns of the transportation landscape - slower end-to-end travel times would result (of course if you took that logic to its conclusion then we shouldn't have any stations...). But, what if every other train skipped Mimico for Humber Bay? Or, what if most trains only stopped at the larger, strategically important stations (Port Credit, Oakville, Burlington, Hamilton, etc) and a less frequent stopping service called the smaller stations in between? I'm not advocating one over the other, necessarily, but my point is that the idea that Mimico and Humber Bay are too close together is only an impediment in the "business as usual" scenario.

As for the future of the Mr. Christie lands, the community doesn't want more residential - but every neighbourhood ever says this. Some form of mixed-use better than the "technically a Subway in the lobby is mixed use" kind would be nice, as the shopping and food options are good but not nearly plentiful enough.

Active transportation in the community is actually pretty good. Bike share now goes as far west as Humber Bay Park East, though I would suggest extending the coverage further west along Lake Shore into the Mimico by the Lake BIA.

The Humber Bay Park extends the Martin Goodman trail along the lakefront to Norris Crescent at the west end of the BIA, and a separated bike lane is opening this spring to connect the end of the off-road section with the quiet neighbourhood street section of the Waterfront Trail at First Street. There are also bike lanes on Lake Shore through the core area of Humber Bay, and sharrows on Park Lawn. Upgrading those sharrows to some sort of protected solution to get up to Queensway would be great for network connectivity, as there are a number of designated routes to get to Bloor from there.

Since the community is on the lake, could paddling as a form of transport could work? The shoreline is protected by breakwaters all the way from the mouth of the Humber River to Ontario Place so it could be a great alternative on a summer morning...

I didn't really talk about parking because there isn't much to say. There's next to no free parking in the area, and there will never be enough parking of any kind to satisfy everyone. What parking there is should be priced appropriately to encourage people to make good transportation choices, and to allow everyone who wants to drive a fair shot at finding a spot.

Railway Map Project: Western Power Company of Canada