Copenhagen to get light-rail network by 2020: transport ministry
LRT in Copenhagen
One welcomes the announcement that Copenhagen will have its first tram/LRT line built by 2020.
In several transit oriented blogs, much has been made that the Danish capital, Copenhagen, opted to have a driverless metro, instead of light rail. Automatic metro is the way of the future, was the clarion call by many people supporting light-metro instead of LRT. Upon closer investigation with those who were nearer to the situation revealed that, like Vancouver, automatic light-metro was supported by city fathers, who thought a metro brought a modern image to the city. The same arguments are used to defend SkyTrain light metro system here in Vancouver as well.
SkyTrain's adherents, supported by TransLink's ramping up construction costs for LRT, ignoring the much greater cost for an automatic metro, claimed light-metro was better than LRT because it was faster than light rail, cheaper to operate than light rail and didn't disrupt auto traffic. Sadly none of which is really true.
TransLink's game has always been to design LRT to be an inferior , etc. than SkyTrain.
Meanwhile back in Copenhagen, financial reality soon took hold as it was soon found that the shiny new metro did not attract the motorist from the car and to build a metro network that would offer an alternative to the car would be cost prohibitive. Sadly the same lesson still remains unlearned by the provincial government and TransLink, who continuing doing the same thing over and over again, each time expecting different and much happier results.
The following is what one gets with about the same amount of money for 'rail' transit investment in Copenhagen. (From the Traffic group Letbaner. dk)
- For the same cost of a metro, one can build up to six light rail lines.
- There is a possibility of private finance for LRT, but not for metro.
- Passenger capacity about the same for both modes.
- With LRT there is a 500 metre distance between stops, compared with 1 km. with a metro.
- The light rail system is 30% faster than the buses, but a metro is only 2% faster than LRT.
- With the full build LRT there will about 180 stops compared with only 16 for a metro.
- LRT has a six times better utilization of road space. but with a metro there is no change.
- A LRT system will take 20% to 25% cars off the road, where a metro will take only 1% of cars off the road,
- With LRT, there will be fewer cars and buses on the road, but with a metro, only fewer buses.
One hopes transit sanity will soon happen in the METRO region, but with 'Metro Madness' still in full swing in Vancouver and Victoria, we will get more and more SkyTrain only planning until the local taxpayer is bankrupted.
out &
Copenhagen to get light-rail network by 2020: transport ministry
http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90001/90777/90853/7425187.html
Denmark will build a light-rail connection around its capital Copenhagen by 2020, at a cost of 723 million U.S. dollars, the Ministry of Transport said Wednesday.
The 28-kilometer-long railway, which will also link some suburban municipalities, will allow rapid, mass transport of commuters around the city, and help reduce traffic congestion.
The project is estimated to cost 3.75 billion Danish kroner (around 723 million U.S. Dollars), with the Danish government contributing 1.5 billion Danish kroner (around 289 million U.S. Dollars), the ministry said in a press statement.
The rest will be paid for by the Capital Region of Denmark, which includes Copenhagen, and 11 suburban municipalities who have all agreed to the project, it added.
Transport Minister Hans Christian Schmidt said the light-rail would "secure a sensible and future-proofed alternative to the car on an otherwise very trafficked area."
The rail is expected to run along Ring 3, a densely-populated stretch of homes and old industrial areas.
In theory, commuters will be able to switch between the light-rail and other existing public transport infrastructure such as buses and overland trains.
Greater Copenhagen, with around 1.2 million inhabitants, is currently served by trains, underground metro rail and buses. Moreover, some 55 percent of the city's population commutes by bicycle everyday.
Detailed proposals:-
http://www.letbaner.dk/docs/Radiallinie-folder3.3-uk.pdf
and
http://orbit.dtu.dk/getResource?recordId=190793&objectId=1&versionId=1
virtual tram ride
