A recent spike: Canada’s abandoned railway lines given second life by search for cheaper transport

An interesting article from the National Post. Of course, Rail for the Valley has been advocating for this for the past four years! A recent spike: Canada’s abandoned railway lines given second life by search for cheaper transport Tristin Hopper Apr 27, 2012 One hundred and 26 years after Sir John A. Macdonald drove its [...]

Canucks Don’t Do Light Rapid Transit

  Certainly, Canada doesn’t do urban, interurban & regional rail based LRT, It used to be that the US was the most intransigent, obdurate & reactionary nation in the western world as far as transit, but the past ten years have seen a massive expansion of Light Rail, LRT, Tramways & Streetcar systems in America [...]

TramTrain – A lesson in Urban, Interurban and regional transportation implementation

Quality integrated public transportation planning & implementation is an eminence which is in short supply in Vancouver, the Fraser Valley And BC as a whole, due in part to the narrow vision of Translink & the BC government. Translink & their advocates, exhibit a worrying arrogance; Vancouver-centric planning Blind determination to continue the expansion of [...]

Myth: Viable public transport requires high population densities

Common Urban Myths About Transport Myth: Viable public transport requires high population densities Fact: Public transport runs successfully in many cities with similar or lower population densities than Melbourne. Any city with sufficient population density to cause traffic congestion has sufficient population to support a first-rate public transport alternative. This is probably the most widely [...]

Some Facts To Counter The Myths About Higher Density

   Reconnecting America http://reconnectingamerica.org/ Development & Redevelopment, Economic Development And TOD, Research, Smart Growth & Sprawl, Transit Supportive Density, urban, Urban Form http://reconnectingamerica.org/news-center/half-mile-circles/2012/some-facts-to-counter-the-myths-about-higher-density/ A 2005 report “Some Facts To Counter The Myths About Higher Density,” authored by the Urban Land Institute along with the National Multi Housing Council, Sierra Club and the American Institute of Architects, [...]

Transit corridor will be easily reached by walkers and cyclists, planner says

Not for the first time, the Cardinal has had to question the decisions of  provincial transit planners; BC & now Ontario. In the Record.com http://www.therecord.com/ David Fields, a transit-planning  consultant with Nelson\Nygaard Consulting Associates, told a daylong workshop in Kitchener Tuesday the experience with other light rail lines clearly demonstrates that people are willing to [...]

4 light rail lines expected to be running by 2020

Metrolinx favours provincial body taking control of projects posted: Apr 24, 2012 1:23 PM ET http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/story/2012/04/24/toronto-light-rail659.html Four new light-rail lines could be up and running in Toronto by 2020, as a modified version of the Transit City plan that Mayor Rob Ford has vigourously campaigned against comes to fruition. The provincial agency, Metrolinx, revealed the [...]

Eric Chris on Bi-Articulated Buses For The 99-B

A bi-articulated bus or double-articulated bus is a higher-capacity type of articulated bus. It is an extension of a conventional or single-articulated bus, in that it has three passenger compartment sections instead of two. This also involves the addition of an extra axle and a second articulation joint. Due to the extended length, bi-articulated buses [...]

A Canuck expat in Geneva on the virtues of light rail

from Now Toronto http://www.nowtoronto.com/news/story.cfm?content=186287 In the flap over Toronto’s transit future, we have to recognize that few have had any kind of exposure to light rail. For most of us, subways are our only experience of public transportation that works well and doesn’t get bogged down in traffic. I can see why there’d be a [...]

TransLink eliminates planning VP – The Sacrificial Lamb

It seems that transit planning is/was not a TransLink forte, in fact the move to remove the VP of Planning certainly indicates that the Premier’s office is in full control of Metro Vancouver transportation planning and no encumbrances from the TransLink bureaucracy is needed. TransLink’s VP of planning has been determined to be the sacrificial lamb with [...]