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 [...]

Montpellier opens new lines – A lesson unlearned for TransLink!

What is very interesting about this news item from the Light Rail Transit Associations web site ( www.lrta.org ) is that the cost for Montpellier’s two new light rail/tram lines 3 & 4 (28.2 km) is about CAD $688.8 million or about $24.45 million/km. to build! The cost of Montpellier’s two new tram lines are less [...]

Utterly ignorant about transit, come to Vancouver and join the club!

The author of the following article in the Toronto Sun is utterly ignorant of transit mode and operation and would make a great addition to the Vancouver Sun newspaper. The very nature of modern LRT with the concept of “reserved rights-of-ways” or RoW’s that are exclusively for the use of streetcars or trams, has made modern [...]

Adiós Transit Improvements?

A hint of the shape of things to come. TransLink is imploding under its weight of inefficiencies and there is more to come; $30 million must be carved from the TransLink budget to cover the loss of the denied fare increases. Zwei has a few hints where these cuts could come from. Get rid of [...]

Vehicle registration fee eyed to generate cash for transit services

They just don’t get it. The lower mainland’s regional mayors just haven’t a clue about transit and just keeps the money pumping into the bloated TransLink bureaucracy, which has achieved very little since its inception over a decade ago, except that is, for giving Vancouver the hugely expensive Canada line subway, because Vancouver’s politicians did [...]

Kirkland city manager stumps for trail project along old rail line

Interesting news from just South of the border, a city manager actually eying a former disused intact railway for future transit use. Such thinking is so hard to imagine on our side of the 49th, where politicos and bureaucrats, mostly run and hide at the thought of using existing infrastructure. Here is the difference, in [...]

The Karlsruhe model of a dual-mode railway system

Karlsruhe: The Karlsruhe model of a dual-mode railway system Country: Germany Type: Policies Area: Entire City, Region Actors: Local Gov. Funding: Local Gov., Regional Gov., National Gov., Private Topics: Built environment Consultancy Mobility Objectives: Increase non-motorised mobility Increase use of public transport Reduce car mobility Reduce energy consumption Instruments: A coupled set of GT-8′s in [...]

Liberal government caves in on road pricing

Ha, ha, ha, it seems the Liberal government has caved-in at introducing road pricing or road tolls on the region, when they realized that the introduction of road tolls/pricing, would ensure a one way trip to political oblivion. To make road pricing or road tolls work, would mean the region would have to have a viable [...]

Why Is Victoria’s Proposed LRT So Expensive?

Why is Victoria’s proposed light rail so expensive? Our friends at Bring Back Our Trams in Victoria, like the Rail for the Valley folks on this side of the pond, are beginning to wonder aloud, why the proposed Victoria LRT is very close to being the most expensive LRT in the world, on a per kilometre basis. What [...]

Bring Back Our Trams – A New Website for Victoria Light Rail – A question About SNC

Our friends across the pond, in Victoria have a new website, Bring Back Our Trams http://www.b-bot.ca/index.html which contains some surprising information. Zwei has wondered why the cost of a simple streetcar/LRT line would cost over $62 million/km and BBOT may have supplied the answer: Canada’s favourite engineering group, SNC Lavalin did the initial cost study. Why then, would [...]