Thanks to Robert Wightman for helping to update this post.

For the third day in a row, cold weather is affecting the TTC’s CLRV (Canadian Light Rail Vehicle) and ALRV (Articulated Light Rail Vehicle) streetcars, making many of them unavailable for service.

The TTC says it’s again deploying buses to replace the all of the cars along the 502 Downtowner and 503 Kingston Rd routes. It will reassign the streetcars that usually serve these routes to bolster the service along other routes.

In article Wednesday, Toronto Sun reporter Don Peat quoted TTC spokesman Brad Ross, who, in turn, explained the situation:

“We only put that service out for rush hour anyway so we’re going to replace those two routes with buses and that will allow us to then redeploy streetcars to the other routes.

“We had this issue last year as some may recall. (The extreme cold) has an impact on the cars because of the pneumatic lines they use — moisture gets trapped in the air lines and then freezes.

“It is just old cars, aging equipment and one of the reasons why we’re replacing them.”

According to the Sun, the problem can impact the doors, brakes and even the sanding mechanism on the streetcars.

Today, the TTC will also replace some of the streetcars that would usually operate along the 511 Bathurst route.

The streetcar shortage may also affect TTC passengers who use TTC buses for their daily commute. The TTC doesn’t have too many spare buses lying around, so, if it will likely “rob Peter to pay Paul”, meaning it may take a bus off your route to replace the streetcars.