It is puzzling that TransLink would waste valuable money on an express bus to, transit wise, nowhere. It’s like the Broadway subway stopping at Arbutus and it just does not make sense.
The 99-B “Rapid” (Express Bus) is successful because it largely serves UBC and Metrotown is no UBC! Though the new “Rapid” bus will serve BCIT, one wonders if there is the actual ridership to warrant the hype and hoopla about the new service.
Is this TransLink’s answer to the shocking 3.2% drop in ridership in 2025 from 2024?
If it is, it is way too little way too late.
With now over $16 billion being spent to extend the Expo and Millennium Lines a mere 21.7 km, one must now understand that the huge costs needed for “SkyTrain” expansion is leaving crumbs for the rest of the network.
A tarted up express service, being marketed as “RapidBus” and vague promises of “SkyTrain” to the North Shore sometime in the future gives the answer.
Until TransLink plans for customer needs in 2026 and beyond and not follow a questionable transportation doctrine, based on density cobbled together in 1998 to sell the public on SkyTrain, ridership on Metro Vancouver’s extremely expensive regional transportation system will continue to see a decline. Rapid Bus is merely a Band Aid solution while the ridership hemorrhages.
R2 RapidBus extension to Metrotown ahead of schedule, ready in September
An R5 RapidBus is seen in Burnaby, B.C. on Monday November 18, 2024. (CityNews Image)
Taking transit between the North Shore and Metrotown will soon be much easier and faster.
TransLink announced on Wednesday that the extension of the R2 Marine Drive RapidBus will be completed ahead of schedule.
Commuters will be able to ride the bus from Park Royal in West Vancouver all the way to Metrotown in Burnaby in September this year.
Originally, the extension was scheduled to open in early 2027.
Currently, the R2 stops at Phibbs Exchange, just north of the Iron Workers Memorial Bridge.
This means transit passengers going to Metrotown must transfer to either the 130 or 222 bus line. After the extension’s completion, the 222 will be discontinued while the 130 will continue.
The extension will route along Hastings Street and Willingdon Avenue, connecting passengers with Burnaby Heights, Brentwood, and BCIT along its path.
The service will run all day, seven days a week.
According to TransLink, the R2 will decrease travel time between Phibbs Exchange and Metrotown by 20 to 30 per cent.
“This project will also increase capacity along the Willingdon corridor and on the North Shore,” TransLink said in a statement.
“While increase at peak periods is expected to be modest, off-peak capacity on Willingdon is expected to rise by at least 50 per cent.”
Investments funded by tax and fare increases
The transportation authority also adds that it will indirectly benefit Capilano University students travelling along the North Shore corridor.
The project was spearheaded by the District of West Vancouver, District of North Vancouver, City of North Vancouver, City of Vancouver, and the City of Burnaby and is part of TransLink’s 2025 Investment Plan.
The additional investments are funded by a 0.5 per cent property tax increase in 2025, generating a $44 million in revenue.
Additionally, a higher parking sales tax and transit fares carry the financial expenses of the extension.
……….. or cutting through the BS about Local Transit.
The following is a guide plus definitions.
ALM: Automatic Light metro, the fourth marketing name given for the SkyTrain family of light-metros, when Lavalin briefly owned SkyTrain before going bankrupt.
ALRT (1): Advanced Light Rail Transit, the second marketing name after ICTS for the trains used on the Expo Line. erroneously called SkyTrain.
ALRT (2): Advanced Light Rapid Transit, the third marketing name for SkyTrain, when Advanced Light Rail Transit failed to find a market.
ART: Advanced Rapid Transit, the fifth marketing name for SkyTrain, used by its then owners, Bombardier Inc.
Alstom: The forth owner of the proprietary SkyTrain light-metro system (MALM).
Automatic (Driverless) Operation: A signaling system that permits train operation without drivers. Contrary to popular myth, automatic operation does not reduce operating costs. Instead of no drivers, attendants must be hired instead to permit safe operation. Automatic signaling was designed to reduce signaling staff, not operation staff.
Bombardier: The third owner of the proprietary SkyTrain light metro system (ART & Innovia)
Bus Rapid Transit (BRT): Generally means Express Buses, a true BRT needs a very expensive and land consuming busway or highway or be guided.
Bored tunnel: A tunnel boring machine also known as a “mole”, is a machine used to excavate tunnels with a circular cross section through a variety of soil and rock strata. They can bore through anything from hard rock to sand.
Busway: A route needed for BRT. Busways can be conventional HOV lanes or exclusive roads for buses. Busways can be equipped with raised curbs or rails for bus guidance.
Canada Line: Vancouver’s third light metro line which is a grade separated EMU operation and is not compatible with the rest of the SkyTrain light metro system in operation.
Capacity: A function of headway multiplied by vehicle capacity, which in turn is dependent on station station platform length measured in persons per hour per direction (pphpd).
Community Rail: a government strategy supported by the rail industry. It engages local people in the development and promotion of local and rural routes, services and stations. Community Rail routes remain connected to the national rail network, and train operating companies run the trains and stations.
Consultation: To sell a transit decision to the public after the decision has been made.
C-Train: The Calgary light rail system, modeled after German Stadtbahn.
Cut and cover: A method of building a tunnel by making a cutting, which is then lined and covered over. (Civil Engineering) designating a method of constructing a tunnel by excavating a cutting to the required depth and then backfilling the excavation over the tunnel roof
DMU: Diesel Multiple Unit – A diesel multiple unit or DMU is a multiple–unit train powered by on-board diesel engines. A DMU requires no separate locomotive, as the engines are incorporated into one or more of the carriages. Diesel-powered single-unit railcars are also generally classed as DMUs.
EMU: Electrical Multiple Unit – An electric multiple unit or EMU is a multiple–unit train consisting of self-propelled carriages using electricity as the motive power. An EMU requires no separate locomotive, as electric traction motors are incorporated within one or a number of the carriages.
Evergreen Line: The 11.4 km newly finished portion of the old Broadway/Lougheed Rapid Transit Project. When the NDP forced the SkyTrain Millennium Line onto TransLink, there was not the money left order to complete the line to the Tri-Cities. Now completed. The Evergreen Line is now known as the Millennium Line.
Expo Line: The first SkyTrain line built, completed in late 1985. The Expo Line was built in three sections. The Waterfront to New Westminster section (cost a much as LRT from Vancouver to Whalley, Lougheed Mall and Richmond Centre), the Skybridge, section across the Fraser river to Scott Road Station, and the final section to Whalley in Surrey. The Expo Line is now being extended 16 km to Langley at an estimated cost of $6 billion
Grade: The vertical rise of a railway track, normally given in a percentage (1% grade = a 1 metre rise in 100 metres). Industry standard grade for LRT is 8%; Sheffield’s( LRTA) operates on 10% grades; the maximum grade for a tramway is located in Lisbon, where the streetcars operate, unassisted, on 13.8% grades.
Flip-flop: Make an abrupt reversal of policy. Common with Light Rail/SkyTrain planning in Metro Vancouver.
Garage Sale: The Detroit ICTS People Mover operators went to the TTC Garage Sale to get cars and parts to keep their system in operation.
Goebbels Gambit: The fine art of repeating a lie often enough that it is perceived as the truth, TransLink is very good at!
Greenfield Construction: A greenfield site is undeveloped land with no previous construction on it, offering a blank canvas for building.
Guided Bus: A BRT that is physically guided by either a raised curb or a central rail. Some guided buses are considered monorails.
Headway: The time interval between trains on a transit route.
Hybrid: A transit system that is designed operated as a LRT/light metro mix. Generally very expensive as it uses the most expensive features of both modes.
Innovia: The sixth name SkyTrain was marketed by (no buyers).
ICTS: Intermediate Capacity Transit system, the first name of what was renamed ALRT, erroneously called SkyTrain was marketed by.
Interurban: An early streetcar which operated at speed on its own R-o-W connecting urban centres.
Lavalin: The second owner of the proprietary SkyTrain light metro system. Went bankrupt building a system in Bangkok. Later amalgamated with SNC to become SNC Lavalin.(ALRT, ALM) Siemens built a conventional metro system for Bangkok, also known as SkyTrain, but there is no relation.
Light Metro: A transit mode, generally a proprietary transit system, that has the same or less capacity than LRT, at the cost of a heavy-rail metro.
Light Rail Transit (LRT): A steel wheel on steel rail transit system that can operate economically on transit routes with traffic flows between 2,000 pphpd to over 20,000 pphpd, thus bridging the gap on what buses can carry and that which needs a metro. A streetcar is considered LRT when it operates on reserved rights-of-ways or R-o-Wa’s for the exclusive use of the streetcar/tram. Number of LRT/tramways in operation around the world over 500; light railways (many use LRV’s) and over 120; heritage lines over 60.
Light Rail Vehicle (LRV): A vehicle that operates on a LRT or streetcar line. Also called a streetcar, tram, TramTrain or interurban.
LRT(1): Light Rail Transit (see above).
LRT(2): Light Rapid Transit – Light Metro (see above) Light Rapid Transit (LRT) is used by politcans and bureaucracy to confuse the public, when selling them the virtues of light metro instead of light rail.
Lysenkoism: used metaphorically to describe the manipulation or distortion of the scientific process as a way to reach a predetermined conclusion as dictated by an ideological bias, often related to social or political objectives.
Mass Transit: A generic term for heavy-rail metro. See rapid transit.
MAX: The Portland Tri-Met LRT system.
Mayor’s Council on Transit: Metro Vancouver mayors pretending to be experts, rubber stamping provincial transportation decisions. Locally know as the “Ship of fools”.
Metro: An urban/suburban railway that operates on a segregated R-o-W, either in a subway or on a viaduct, due to long trains (5 cars+) and close headway’s. There are 174 heavy/light metros in operation around the world.
Millennium Line: The second SkyTrain Line built, using the new Bombardier ART cars.
Medical Emergency:TransLink Speak for a suicide.
Monorail: A transit mode that operates on one rail. There are two general types of monorail: 1) hanging monorail and 2) straddle beam monorail (not a true monorail). Some proprietary BRT systems are also classed as monorail.
Movia Automatic Light Metro: The seventh and last name that SkyTrain has been Marketed under, with Linear Induction Motors a customer add on.
Priority Signaling: A signaling system that gives priority to transit vehicles at intersections.
Proprietary Transit System: A transit system who rights are exclusively owned by one company. Transit operations who operate proprietary transit systems must deal with only one supplier.
Rapid Transit: A generic term for metro. See mass transit. Rapid Transit is not Light Rail Transit.
Reserved Rights of Way: An exclusive R-o-W for use of transit vehicles, can be as simple as a HOV lane (with rails for LRT) or as elaborate a a lawned boulevard or a linear park complete with shrubs.
SkyTrain: The name of metro Vancouver’s light metro system, chosen via a radio contest in 1985. The SkyTrain light metro system consists of two very different systems: 1) The proprietary ALRT/ART/MALM system which operates on the Expo and Millennium Lines and 2) The Canada line which operates standard conventional EMU’s and built as a light-metro. The two systems are not compatible in operation.
Streetcar: A steel wheel, on steel rail electric (also can be diesel powered) vehicle that operates in mixed traffic, with little or no priority at intersections. Also known as a tram in Europe. Streetcars become LRT when operating on reserved R-o-W’s.
Subway: An underground portion of a rapid transit line. Subways may either be bored or cut and cover or a combination of both construction methods.
TTC: The Toronto Transit Commission.
Tram: European term for streetcar, as the Europeans do not use the term LRT.
TramTrain: A streetcar that can operate on the mainline railways, operating as a passenger train.
TransLink Speak: The lexicon used by TransLink to mask problems.
The Urban Transportation Development corporation (UTDC): A former Ontario Crown corporation responsible for the development and sales of ICTS and ALRT, Sold to Lavalin.
Viaduct: A viaduct is a bridge composed of several small spans.
The West Lyon tram-train is a French light rail network, whose ticketing is integrated into the TER Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes service, connecting the center of the metropolis of Lyon to the west of the city The service was partially inaugurated from Lyon-Saint-Paul to Sain-Bel on September 22 and from Tassin to Brignais including the Tassin shunt, Saturday, December 8, 2012.
The network will eventually have three branches departing from Saint-Paul station and serving twenty-three stations in the direction of Brignais, Sain-Bel and Lozanne.
The operation is carried out by Alstom Citidis Dualis tram-trains. The Citidis Dualis tramtrains have a maximum speed of 100 kph and the service is signaled for 15 to 30 minutes headway’s, with frequent stops, most served by buses.
Like all modular tram, the Citidis Dualis tram can grow to accommodate increasing ridership by adding another module.
The continued misinformation from the usual sources about SkyTrain being cheap to operate, must be again, refuted. When compared to light rail, SkyTrain has cost much more to operate ad maintain. According to TransLink from information in 2020, the operational costs of both the Expo line extension to Langley and the Broadway subway would add at least $80 million to TransLink’s operating budget. Accounting for inflation, this cost has now risen past $96 .5 million annually!
This cost is based on 2020 figures.Adjusted for inflation the cost would be $4 million per km in operating costs and $4.7 million per km in capital costs every year; for a total of $8.7 billion per km.
If one took the ‘Way-back’ machine to the late 1980’s, the argument that SkyTrain was cheaper to operate than LRT, would show the massive propaganda campaign to give the public a positive view of the proprietary ALRT light-metro. This is because it was forced upon the region by the Social Credit government of the day.
There were no comparative studies done as the orders came directly from the Premiers Office.
The reality was, building the Expo line with ALRT was a horse-trade with the government of Ontario (the UTDC was their Crown corporation) to both sell an unsalable R/T system and to obtain the services of the then Ontario Conservative governments ‘Blue Machine’ to win the next BC election.
This is the base for Vancouver’s love affair with light-metro.
The SkyTrain light-metro system has been portrayed as a wonder system, which over time has built up to the current SkyTrain myth. Like Robin Hood or King Arthur, the SkyTrain myth is nothing more than cobbled together claims and cherry picked facts and a myth often repeated tends to become fact in the people’s minds.
It is all “repeat a lie enough times and the people will come to believe” shtick.
It also be remembered that both BC, Transit and TransLink were in partnership to sell Advanced Rapid Transit (ART) or SkyTrain, abroad. This meant that there would be no way for LRT to be built in metro Vancouver.
The Calgary C-Train has traditionally carried more customers than the Expo Line (both being about the same length) and costing less than half to build and much less to operate.
Today, many of the “old gang” at TransLink have retired and the new lot of bureaucrats (many earning six figured salaries”) repeat the old porkies actually believing they are true.
Sadly, it never was.
The print and electronic media also fell into this trap as those reporters who did investigative reporting have long retired, with the new crop of reporters,eager to please their corporate bosses, treat TransLink news releases as real news, instead of a well planned propaganda campaign.
Even in the 90’s, then huge subsidies for ALRT, made the mini-metro not cost effective in operation.
Vancouver’s SkyTrain light-metro system has had the transit eyes of the world on it for almost 40 years, yet no one has copied Vancouver and that is a question that the SkyTrain Lobby prefer not to deal with.
In an era of unprecedented investment in public transport, no one has copied the Vancouver model, the exclusive use of a light metro, including a proprietary light-metro system, for urban transport.
Why?
The per km cost of LRT and light-metro, 1981 to 1987.
A Comparrison Of Operating Costs – SkyTrain & Light Rail
The late Des Turner was meticulous with his research with the SkyTrain light metro system and in 1988, embarrassed the then Social Credit Government to release the real costs of the mini-metro.
What is more interesting is comparing the operating costs of the Calgary C-Train light rail and SkyTrain.
Thought the operating costs are a year in difference, it must be noted that the Calgary C-Train has historically carried more customers than the Expo Line, yet its operating costs are more than $12 million less than that of SkyTrain.
BC Transit knew this, but continued the myth that SkyTrain was cheaper to operate. This is called professional misconduct; others may call it more.
TransLink, which was mostly made up of BC Transit bureaucrats jumping ship, knew this, but continued the myth that SkyTrain was cheaper to operate.
COMPARISON OF OPERATING COSTS
The total 1988/89 budget for SkyTrain:
Operations………………… 5,483,863
Maintenance……………. 14,243,092
Administration………….. 7,931,834
Total: $27,658,789
(Rick Krowchuck, Executive V.P. Finance)
Calgary C-Train 1990 Operating Budget
Operators……………………… $2,332,000
Maintenance………………….$4,804,000
(Labour, parts, materials)
LRV Power……………………. $1,384,000
Fixed Operating …….Costs $6,815,000
(administration, cleaning facilities/buildings)
Total: $15,335,000
(Niel Mckendrick Coordinator of Transit Services, Calgary Transit)
There are those who are still taken with the SkyTrain myth and firmly believe that the proprietary railway is the best, yet evidence clearly shows, that once out of the SkyTrain bubble of Metro Vancouver, what we call SkyTrain is nothing more than a dead branch on the public transit tree of evolution.
Today, in BC, funding for hospitals, care homes for the aged and many more public services are being curtailed, mainly to source funding for the $16 billion plus, 21.7 km expansion of the Expo and Millennium Lines and will be legacy for a government’s refusal to admit, that building with SkyTrain was strictly a politcal decision and not a practical one.
The birth of what we call TramTrain or a streetcar that can operate on the mainline railways, came about after much research and public consultation, to provide the the city of Karlsruhe and region with a ‘user-friendly’ public transit system. In the 1980’s cities with trams or streetcars were seeing a steady decline in patronage and seemed doomed to the history books. With tram management being given a simple diktat: “Get people to use the tram system or loose it“. Much time was spent consulting with current transit customers and potential transit customers on what type of service would retain or bring the customer to public transit.
In Vancouver, the transit customer is seldom consulted with, nor is the customer listened too, with any real enthusiasm.
Light metro is built with the provincial government telling the taxpayer, “You are getting SkyTrain whether you like it or not!” Added to this, the region has invented a pseudo science of densification which is a smokes screen for government to inflate property values to reward land speculators and land developers. This ‘Densification‘ pseudo science or Lysenkoism has proven not to attract much new ridership to the public transit system. Ridership on the public transit is kept seemingly high, with over 130, 000 of U-Pass deep discount ‘ride at will’ tickets for students in post secondary institutions, which flood the transit system at peak hours.
Meanwhile back in Germany, the public wanted a ‘no-transfer‘ service, with reasonable travel times and the TramTrain was conceived to provide a doorstep to downtown service, omitting a 20 minute transfer from commuter train to tram at the main railway station.
A city tram with a TramTrain in the rear.
The success of the TramTrain operation in Karlsruhe was an instant success as the following table shows. In seven months ridership on the new TramTrain service, replacing a commuter train, providing a direct, no transfer service to downtown Karlsruhe saw 479% increase in ridership, from5 33,600 to 2,554,976 customers a week.
Compare to our now almost $17 billion, 21.7km extension of SkyTrain, where TransLink is all but hiding the fact that there will be little or no increase in ridership on both the Expo Line extension to Langley and the Broadway subway once both lines are in operation, as fundamental transit issues are not dealt with!
The failure dealing with transit issues are no seeing an ever steepening decline in ridership as the regional transit system offers 1980’s transit solutions for 2026 transit issues.
Currently the various levels of government seem to reward failure and ignore success, which is a recipe for financial disaster.
The concept is simple and in earlier times it was called the “interurban”.
TramTrain is a modern streetcar or tram, so configured that it can operate on the railway mainline, thus very affordably servicing distant destinations, otherwise far too expensive for an independent tram/LRT line.
First conceived in Karlsruhe Germany, the first TramTrain Line, from Karlsruhe to Bretten was wildly successful, with ridership going from 533,600 per week to 2,554,976 per week; a staggering 479% in ridership in just seven months!
Today, there is now over fifty TramTrain operations around the world with many more in various stages of planning.
Also, many manufacturers offer TramTrain vehicles, unlike the trains used on Vancouver’s Expo and Millennium Lines, where there is only one supplier.
Stadler’s City Link TramTrain, is just one of many TramTrain vehicles on the market and is an articulated rail-car, which can have up to four sections, has a maximum capacity of 250 persons and comes with a washroom section (needed for longer distance routes) if desired.
The train can be powered electrically, with a battery, or with diesel operation.
The Trains can be operated in multiple units, up to three trains in length.
The City Link TramTrain is operated in Austria, Denmark, Germany, Hungary, Mexico, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States.
For BC, TramTrain could economically solve several transportation issues, including Rail for the Valley’s Vancouver to Chilliwack project and the E&N railway debates.
Ral for the Valley would like to ask:
Is it not time to stop building with extremely expensive 1970’s light-metro and instead invest in a proven and economic 21st century solution? The Expo Line’s Langley extension is now costing more than $400 million a km, yet a TramTrain solution could see over 20 km of TramTrain built for the same cost. Put another way, the Expo Line extension to Langley is now said to cost $7 billion, yet for the same cost we could build over 350 km of TramTrain , which could fund both the restoration of the E&N into a viable regional railway and restore a regional; railway on the former BC Electric route to Chilliwack, carrying far more customers than what the Langley SkyTrain extension will carry.
TransLink- Metro Vancouver & BC Transit -Greater Victoria ridership 2025
According to statistics Canada TransLink ridership,
in 2025 was 235.12 M journeys
vs 2024 239.36 M journeys ( 3.1 % less )
Where has the ridership gone?
We have now invested, including the current $16 billion, full program, to extend the Expo and millennium lines a mere 21.7 km, is over $30 billion, ridership is decreasing at an alarming rate.
Why?
I don’t have the answer but I would guess it is the transit system itself and decades of politcal interference where trying to design a transit system to please every one, in fact has pleased no one!
User-friendliness is the keyword describing a successful public transit system, but Translink and the service it provides is far from being user-friendly.
When SkyTrain was first imposed on the GVRD, now metro Vancouver, downtown Vancouver was the main destination for many transit customers, but in 2026, there are many main transit destinations but with the bus services designed to feed the light-metro system, many of the new customer destinations are near impossible to timely access by transit and taking the car is just so much easier.
A good example was just last Saturday, where a scheduled bus failed to show and began an 2 hour ordeal to get from Vancouver to Tsawwassen. Taking the car would be just 30 minutes.
Lack of any customer care by TransLink and senior management means ridership will further decline until there is a complete change in direction by TransLink, the mayor’s council on Transit and the Premier’s Office.
First posted by zweisystem on Wednesday, March 4, 2020
This was posted almost six years ago and the realities of subway construction are today, hitting home. The Broadway Subway, the 5.7 km continuation of the the Millennium Line, first pegged to cost $2.7 billion and open in 2024, has now well passed the $3 billion mark and is projected to cost near $4 billion when it opens, probably in early 2028.
Already 80 businesses have gone bankrupt due to the road closures along Broadway from subway constructionist, which politcans and bureacrats had promised would not happen. many more businesses are due to go bankrupt in 2026 due to the complete closure of Broadway.
Also it must be remembered that according to Thales, who is doing the $1.47 billion re-signalling program on both the Expo and Millennium Lines (not included in the cost estimates for the Broadway Subway), the maximum capacity pf the Broadway Subway will be a mere 7,500 pphpd!
The government of Canada, the government of British Columbia, and the region have committed to investing $C 1.47bn ($US 1.1bn) in the Expo and Millennium Line Upgrade Programme until 2027.
When the programme is fully implemented, the Expo Line will be able to accommodate 17,500 passengers per hour per direction, and the Millennium Line will be able to handle 7500 passengers per hour per direction, a 32% and 96% increase respectively.
Sadly, the realities of subway construction remain unlearned in Metro Vancouver, as the politicians at all levels of government sell porkies to the taxpayers and Broadway merchants..
The realities of subway mania.
Vancouver politicians live in “The Land of the Lotus Eaters”, when it comes to transit.
In Greek mythology the lotus-eaters, were a race of people living on an island dominated by the Lotus tree. The lotus fruits and flowers were the primary food of the island and were a narcotic, causing the inhabitants to sleep in peaceful apathy.
As TransLink, Vancouver Council, UBC, and the Mayor’s Council on Transit sleep in peaceful apathy, the realities of the real cost of the subway are ignored.
According to Metrolinx’s study, the real cost of the 5.8 km Broadway subway will be more like $6 billion over 50 years.
As costs mount ever higher elsewhere for subways, our politicians and bureaucrats remain ignorant of escalating costs for subway construction, continue to misinform the public as to the real cost of Broadway’s subway.
In Metro Toronto, Metrolinx has finally admitted that:”
“……the Scarborough subway costs simply aren’t worth it,” he said. “It’s been years that Scarborough subway advocates haven’t been telling the truth to Scarborough residents and people across the city.”
And for years now, Translink: the City of Vancouver, UBC, the Ministry of Transportation, the Minister of Transportation, the Minister responsible for TransLink, the Mayor’s Council on Transit and the subway lobby haven’t been telling the truth about the high costs of subway construction to taxpayers in metro Vancouver. Is the $6 billion. plus, cost over 50 years, giving good value?
Is it not time that the province steps in for a fiscal reality check? Is there the moral fibre in Victoria to do this?
Interesting that the numbers for LRT came via the TTC and the numbers for the subwaycame from the provincial government who wanted the subway.
The subway project in Scarborough has been hotly debated in Toronto since 2013, when its backers won council support for cancelling a light-rail line in the area and replacing it with an extension – the Toronto-York Spadina Subway Extension seen here in 2016 – of the subway to Scarborough Town Centre mall.Kevin Van Paassen/The Globe and Mail
Two of Ontario’s marquee transit projects have costs that far exceed their benefits, according to a pair of analyses prepared for the regional transit agency Metrolinx.
The reports, released Friday afternoon, show that the Scarborough subway extension proposed for east-end Toronto and the westward extension of the Crosstown Eglinton light rail line across the city could, together, cost nearly $10-billion to build while producing benefits amounting to billions less. In spite of this, Metrolinx has recommended both projects be advanced.
The analysis deliberately errs on the side of caution and Metrolinx hopes to improve the benefits of these projects over time, agency CEO Phil Verster said in a statement.
The benefits are calculated by assigning a monetary value to such things as removing cars from the road and saving commuters time.
Shelagh Pizey-Allen, spokesperson for the advocacy group TTCRiders, said the projects were examples of proposals pitched with a modest price tag, but costs rose and value diminished over time.
The Metrolinx board received these reports at an in-camera meeting in January and, at the time, quietly approved pushing ahead with the projects. The agency refused to release the reports when asked earlier this month.
Both projects are being overseen by the provincial government, which struck a deal with the city of Toronto that handed over control and financial responsibility for major rail construction to Metrolinx.
A spokeswoman for Transportation Minister Caroline Mulroney said the government would continue to support both projects.
“These [reports] represent Metrolinx’s best understanding of the projects at a given moment in time and are inevitably subject to change during the projects’ life cycles,” Christina Salituro said in an e-mail.
“These documents are key elements in ensuring Metrolinx continues to make the most informed decisions going forward and are just one of a number of factors used in making a final decision.”
The subway project in Scarborough has been hotly debated in Toronto since 2013, when its backers won council support for cancelling a light-rail line in the area and replacing it with an extension of the subway to Scarborough Town Centre mall.
The analysis released Friday of the subway extension concluded it would bring $2.8-billion in benefits over a 60-year period, and cost about $5.5-billion to build. The Ontario government had last year pegged the cost at this level, which is about $2-billion more than the amount budgeted by the city when it was in charge of an earlier version of project.
“That subway is not going to be cost-effective,” said Brenda Thompson, with the advocacy group Scarborough Transit Action, adding that such a high price tag would preclude building anything else in that part of the city.
“I think this is going to suck up all of the money and I think politicians should be upfront about that. This is what we’re going to end up with, if at all.”
Toronto Councillor Josh Matlow, who has long advocated for the original plan for light rail instead in Scarborough, said that the report is another example of the claims of subway boosters being proved wrong.
“Today Metrolinx finally admitted that the Scarborough subway costs simply aren’t worth it,” he said. “It’s been years that Scarborough subway advocates haven’t been telling the truth to Scarborough residents and people across the city.”
The city had budgeted $3.56-billion for a one-stop Scarborough subway extension. During the last election campaign, now Premier Doug Ford pledged to add two more stations. The version being studied by Metrolinx includes the additional stations.
The newly released analysis for a light-rail extension of the Crosstown to Pearson International Airport shows that it will cost up to $4.4-billion, net present value, in 2019 dollars, if it has nine stops and is substantially below ground. In that form it would bring benefits of $1.4-billion over 60 years.
The project’s capital cost could be reduced to about $2.8-billion if most of the stops were removed, the analysis notes, or to as little as $2.1-billion if it was built on the surface.
Mr. Ford has pledged to bury as much of the Crosstown extension as possible.
First published on July 8, 2022 under the title “The $1.47 Billion Solution”, recent comments about the Broadway subway need clarifying.
The following quote sums up the capacity issue for the Millennium Line (Broadway subway).
When the programme is fully implemented, the Expo Line will be able to accommodate 17,500 passengers per hour per direction, and the Millennium Line will be able to handle 7500 passengers per hour per direction, a 32% and 96% increase respectively.
Please copy this this to Transportation Minister Mike Farnsworth, who seems to confuse the Millennium and Expo lines.
The following news release came to Zwei via Montreal and Germany and answered one very important question, which TransLink is ashamed to reveal locally.
The cost of the signalling rehab is $1.47 billion!
This is not chump change, but serious coin, which must come from somewhere.
Well, I can guess: a little from the Ministry of health; a lil from the Lytton rebuilding program and most, if not all funding that maybe would have gone to the E&N or even the Rail for the Valley project. come to think of it, $1.47 billion could fund the “full meal deal” Leewood Study, with three trains per hour between Chilliwack and Vancouver.
We now will have to wait for the other shoe to drop, multi billion dollar plus cost to refurbish and enhance the electrical supply for the light-metro.
TransLink awards Thales SkyTrain train control contracts
Contracts enable a 22km extension of the fully automated SkyTrain system.
TransLink has awarded two contracts to Thales for upgrading the train control technology on the Expo and Millennium lines of Metro Vancouver.
TRANSLINK has awarded Thales two contracts to provide train control technology under the Expo and Millennium Line Upgrade Programme for the SkyTrain network in Vancouver.
The contracts include a new Operations Control Centre and a new fully automated depot, Operations Maintenance Centre 4. These two new facilities are key components of the upgrade programme.
The system will be expanded from 80km to 106km by 2028, with 41 new trains expected to be in service by the end of 2027.
TransLink says that in 2018 the Expo and Millennium lines saw on-time performance of 96.38% – the best punctuality on record for SkyTrain and higher than that achieved by most major metros in North America.
The government of Canada, the government of British Columbia, and the region have committed to investing $C 1.47bn ($US 1.1bn) in the Expo and Millennium Line Upgrade Programme until 2027.
When the programme is fully implemented, the Expo Line will be able to accommodate 17,500 passengers per hour per direction, and the Millennium Line will be able to handle 7500 passengers per hour per direction, a 32% and 96% increase respectively.
1. lack of success: “an economic policy that is doomed to failure”
2. the neglect or omission of expected or required action: “their failure to comply with the basic rules”
A rather intense phone call has prompted me to post this.
The caller irately stated: “SkyTrain is not proprietary” and “Vancouver has the most successful transit system in North America”. He went further but his rant became a salad of gish gallop.
It has been a long time since I have entertained such a call, but my name has been in the local media of late so it was to be expected.
The problem I think is that TransLink is spending huge amounts of money, now over $16 billion to extend the Expo and Millennium Line a mere 21.7 km, combined with the fact that the Broadway subway (As I predicted as early as 2016) has sterilized business along Broadway (now with over 80 bankruptcies) has got a lot of local politcans very worried.
Also very worried is the provincial NDP, who have been gaslighting taxpayers as to the costs and benefits of the SkyTrain light metro system.
The problem is that TransLink’s ridership has been in a steady decline since 2018; 2025 ridership numbers declined 1.5% from 2024!
With civic elections this year and a tenuous majority in Victoria, combined with an extremely unhappy electorate both the provincial government and TransLink ar extremely worried, but not worried enough to do the same things over and over again, ever hoping for different results.
TransLink’s failure to attract new customers after about $30 billion has been spent on the SkyTrain light-metro system alone, does not an election winner make!
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