We Are Back

  Memo to all Rail for the Valley is back! We have resolved our technical issues and now back on course bringing needed comment on metro Vancouver’s controversial transit scene.

Is The SkyTrain Lobby, Really The Auto Lobby In Disguise?

I have always wondered about the true intentions of the stout supporters of the SkyTrain light metro system and TransLink. Despite overwhelming evidence that the proprietary Movia Automatic Light Metro (MALM) system is dated and extremely expensive to operate, they champion the museum piece with invented issues like delaying cars at intersections or even worse, [...]

Adios Bombardier. Adios Movia Automatic Light Metro (SkyTrain)?

As predicted, Alstom is now buying Bombardier Transportation for CAD $10 billion. The question, which may worry Translink and the hapless Mayor’s Council on Transit is: “Will Alstom keep MALM (SkyTrain) production or abandon the proprietary light metro altogether? Will Alstom keep already expensive replacement parts available or discontinue production altogether?” I reached out for [...]

The Master Agreement Allowing Passenger Service On The Interurban Line

For those who are interested in reinstating a passenger servcie on the former BC Electric interurban line from Vancouver to Chilliwack, this is essential reading. Highlights: “The Railway Operations Easement Area shall encompass the Tracks and an area sufficient to enable C.P. Rail to double track, construction of such double track to be at the [...]

Life With SNC Lavalin

SNC Lavalin own engineering patents for the MALM (erroneously called SkyTrain) system used on the Expo and Millennium lines. SNC Lavalin leads the consortium operating the Canada line. The BC Liberal government inspired Canada Line (faux) P-3 saw SNC Lavalin, bidding against SNC Lavalin. On May 27th, 2009, after four years of litigation, BC Supreme [...]

Canada Line Hype and Hoopla

One wonders why all the hype and hoopla is about with the new cars for the Canada Line? The recently delivered cars are standard ROTEM electrical multiple units, used by several transit systems, unlike the proprietary Movia Automatic Light Metro cars, used on the Expo and Millennium Lines. Also, very explicit is that there are [...]

The SkyTrain Dream Collapsing

So, despite the hype and hoopla of SkyTrain being a driver for increased density, it is now being seen as the harbinger of urban sprawl as affordable housing is demolished and in its place unaffordable condos in towers are built. As rents exceed income and combined incomes of families (one now needs an income of [...]

Trams At The Heart Of The 21st Century Metropolis

With nearly 600 tram and light rail systems in operation around the world, this is hardly surprising. With Vancouver being the odd-ball city, insisting that the light-metro is the way to go, taxpayers have to have extremely deep pockets, to pay for the politicians  foolish financial excesses. During an era of record investment in urban [...]

No, It Does Not Make Sense

It is as I predicted, the people in the Fraser Valley are awakening to the realities of TransLink, poor transit and high taxes. Politicians have such poor memories of the 2015 plebiscite. For too long TransLink has done what the City of Vancouver’s wants, continuing the city’s perverse desire to have a gold plated, Edsel [...]

Vancouver Will Need To Adopt Lower-Cost LRT In Its Lesser Corridors

But, eventually, Vancouver will need to adopt lower-cost LRT in its lesser corridors, or else limit the extent of its rail system. And that seems to make some TransLink people very nervous. Gerald Fox, 2008.   Here is the big crunch which TransLink seems deathly afraid of, do they continue with the now obsolete and [...]