Real Light Rail For Surrey – The WKW Line

It has has been five years year since I entertained the idea of the Whalley ai??i?? King George ai??i?? White Rock LRT Line and in 2016 the WKW Line is still superior to what TransLink is planning for Surrey.

Surrey needs a bold new vision for modern LRT and I believe the Whalley ai??i?? King George ai??i?? White Rock or WKWAi?? LineAi?? would provide the vision to implement a strategic and affordable light rail network for Surrey and communities south of the Fraser river. Failure to plan and build sustainable light rail and to continue to plan and build with the hugely expensive SkyTrain light-metro, will beggar the region with ever escalating taxes, driving out business and residents out of the region.

The goal of the new light rail line is to serve customer needs and offer the ability to provide an attractive alternative to the car, it also must serve a multitude of destinations. Building LRT as an extension of the SkyTrain light-metro system will fail to meet expectations as LRT will not be designed to its best advantage. It is not ai???rocket scienceai??i?? to design a transit line to be an attractive alternative to the car.

The Light Rail Line

The 22 to 24 kilometer Whalley ai??i?? King George ai??i?? Rail for the Valley ai??i?? White Rock line (WKW Line for short) would be a solid foundation for an attractive light rail system in Surrey. The proposed light rail would be a classic LRT, operating on a ai???reserved rights-of-wayai??i?? (RoW) in the median of the roads involved.

The route of the WKW Line would start at at 108th Ave. & the King George Hwy. and would continue South to the Southern RR of BC (formerly the BC Hydro R.R.)Ai?? This portion of the route would service the Central City shopping district; Surrey Memorial Hospital; Queen Elizabeth Secondary School; Bear Creek Park; and the Newton shopping district.

The WKW Line would then network south-east along 4 km of the former BCE interurban line and proposed Valley Rail Vancouver to Chilliwack TramTrain route to 152nd. Traveling mainly through industrial lands, which would provide the ideal location for the Light Rail storage and maintenance yards. This portion of track would be double tracked and adequately signaled for safe freight/Interurban/tram operation.

There is the possibility of futureAi??joint operation with the RftV/Leewood interurban, enabling South Surrey and White Rock transit customers the option of a direct or no-transfer service to downtown Vancouver.

From 152nd Street, the KWK Line would go straight south to White Rock crossing the Nicomakle /Serpentine River valley basin. Along here, the line must be raised above flood plain and three new bridges across the Super Port Railway Line, and the Serpentine and Nicomakle rivers must be built. It is this portion of line that will be the most expensive.

Rising out of the small river valley the KWK Line would continue south along 152nd Ave., terminating in downtown White Rock

In the summer, the light rail line would bring congestion relief to White Rock by providing a quality transit alternative for the many thousands of people who come in cars to the popular beaches. Also close to the KWK Line is the South Surrey Athletic fields, which many fields and arenas are constantly busy with hockey, baseball, soccer, rugby, and football games, twelve months of the year. The KWK Line would also provide an excellent transportation access for the burgeoning housing estates, such as Morganai??i??s Crossing in South Surrey and White Rock.

An approximate map of the WKW route as Google maps do not use existing rail lines.

http://goo.gl/maps/jbOmS

The Cost

The the total cost of the KWK Line, including bridges and/or viaducts should cost no more than $1 billion, based on comparative LRT lines now being built The high cost of major engineering in the Nicomakle/Serpentine valley, would be mitigated by simple on-street construction on 152nd and the King George Highway and track sharing for 4 km on the Southern Railway of BC Line bisecting Surrey .

It is interesting to note that the total cost for the 98 km RftV/Leewood Chilliwack to Scott Road Interurban using Diesel LRT and the 23 km KWK Line would be about $1.6 billion or put another way we could build 121 km of modern LRT lines in the Fraser Valley for just a little more than the 11 km Evergreen Line!

Unlike present light rail planning, where development is encouraged to take place along a LRT/SkyTrain route, the KWK Line can pass through sensitive agriculture and ecological areas, without the need for land development. Building the KWK Line would provide a potential capacity ofAi?? around 20,000 persons per hour per direction on the route, well able to handle future passenger demands, yet still can be built much cheaper than its SkyTrain/light-metro competitors. The cost for a SkyTrain along the KWK Line? About $3 billion at a conservative cost of $130 million per km to build!

A modern LRT Line in Madrid, Spain ai??i?? A template for the WKW Line?

Using low-floor trams, with convenient stops, ensures an obstacle free journey for all transit customers including the mobility impaired, without the need of expensive stations and equally expensive to maintain elevators and escalators.

The KWK Line can provide traffic calming where needed, yet still supply ample capacity for future transit needs. By providing a regular and efficient transit service from White Rock to Surrey Central and by servicing many destinations along its route the proposed LRT line would attract ample ridership, including the all important motorist from the car. The KWK Line would also easily integrate with the RftV TramTrain interurban service from Vancouver to Chilliwack and could provide in the not too distant future a direct White Rock to Vancouver TramTrain service, faster than the present bus and Canada line service.

The WKW Line would bring 21st century transit solutions to Surrey, transit solutions that are too long overdo.

Toronto Signalling Study Of Great Import For Rail for The Valley

With thanks to Mr.Cow!

Signalling, the fine art of keeping trains from crashing into each other, is very important for the Fraser Valley TramTrain project and developments in Ontario are very relevant here.

Toronto, is now planning to have GO Train’s new RER system integrating with the new Smart Track surface subway proposal. The report was done by City of TorontoAi??Transit Planning Staff & MetrolinxAi??presented andAi??delivered to the City’s of Toronto’s Executive Committee. This is a very important study because this will most likely be the test case for theAi??eventual choice of how the interlining and scheduling of two different transit operating technologies operating in the same corridor should be done. This will greatly determine the structure and how the TramTrain concept must be planned, if it is to be legal for Transport Canada. If they can get this to work in Toronto, this will be the planning model the Valley TramTram must follow.

The study link.

Must see videos

This is one of Zwei’s favourite tram photos.

Lawned rights-of-way; simple stations; and pedestrian friendly light rail in Grenoble.

Reprinted and re edited from 2009.

The two videos from Karlsruhe are a must see, to fully understand TramTrain!

All the links work, unfortunately the few that no longer exist, have been deleted.

Trams climbing grades –

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWMaCGnLKCE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YiHO5jZYY4

Diesel LRT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TizfWStIy-M

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWATecifoFQ

Karlsruheai??i??s TramTrains

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXsIRUEeZts

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NsdJPaih0Fw

Lawned rights-of-ways

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6ucG-9fGU4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgzuarkGTYA

Tram/streetcars ai??i?? on-street operation

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gckN2ANG_zc

 

LRT in the snow

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJ-0MlxWSEk

 

Massey Tunnel Mystery – Solved!

Ah, the truth comes out. It’s not congestion or traffic gridlock that is driving the $3.5 billion Massey Tunnel replacement, it is Port Metro Vancouver and Fraser Surrey Docks, as they want a massive subsidized bridge to replace the Massey tunnel so Panama max and Cape max vessels can venture up the Fraser River to their docking facilities.

No rapid transit; no extension of any rail transit, as it is rubber on asphalt all the way, as the taxpayer dances to the tune of Port Metro Vancouver and Fraser Surrey Docks.

Well, I say if Port Metro Vancouver and Fraser Surrey Docks want to replace the Massey Tunnel, with a ten lane, $3.5 billion bridge, let them pay for it!

 

Traffic moves in and out of the George Massey Tunnel in Richmond. Richard Lam/PNG files

Photograph by: RICHARD LAM, PNG

METRO VANCOUVER — Richmond politicians want to know how a tunnel under the Fraser River that was deemed ai???good for 50 yearsai??? is to be filled in and replaced with a 10-lane bridge.

Coun. Harold Steves said council has sent a letter to the provincial government seeking all documentation around its September 2013 decision to remove the George Massey tunnel and replace it with a $3.5-billion toll bridge.

The request comes after Freedom of Information documents showed Port Metro Vancouver and the Fraser Surrey Docks company lobbied hard in favour of scrapping the tunnel, a move that would allow larger ships to ply the south arm of the Fraser River.

ai???This bridge decision caught us totally unawares,ai??? said Steves. ai???We had a lot of meetings with (former) Transportation Minister Kevin Falcon in 2006 when he told us the tunnel was good for 50 years.ai???

Steves said FOI documents show messages from Port Metro Vancouver and Fraser Surrey Docks to government planners in 2012-13, at a time when the bridge-vs.-tunnel debate was taking place in Christy Clarkai??i??s government.

A memo from the port in March, 2013 ai??i?? six months before Clarkai??i??s announcement ai??i?? showed the portai??i??s preferred option and noted officialsai??i?? sensitivity to premature disclosure of their choice: ai???Option No. 2: Replacing the tunnel with a new bridge in the same location. Not publicly confirmed yet, but this is (Port Metroai??i??s) preference.ai???

A month later, port president Robin Silvester wrote ai???established terminals upriver of the tunnel (like the Fraser Surrey Docks) are at risk of becoming obsolete.ai??? His letter was addressed to Geoff Freer, provincial director for the tunnel replacement project.

For the complete story………..

City of Vancouver Buys the Arbutus Corridor

Well kiss any thought of affordable transit goodbye, as the City of Vancouver will never agree to have trams operating on the former interurban line, the Arbutus Corridor.

They may talk the talk, but will never walk the walk.

The Canada Line is extremely capacity constipated and light rail on the Arbutus would be a good deal cheaper to build than the estimated $1 billion to $1.5 billion needed to upgrade and increase capacity on the subway!

In fact it would be cheaper to build a stand alone LRT, from Vancouver to Steveston and Ironwood Mall, using the Arbutus Line, than just upgrading the Canada Line light-metro and extending it!

If Vancouver uses the Arbutus corridor for anything except but for transit, Metro Vancouver mayors should withhold any approval of all transit monies for the city, including the large subsidies needed for the trolleybus system.

LRT with a lawned rights-of-way would make the Arbutus corridor a real greenway

while providing an affordable transit option.Ai??

Pedestrians walk along the Arbutus corridor. The City of Vancouver and CP Rail have reached a deal — $55 million for the strip of land from milton Street near the Fraser River to 1st Avenue near False Creek, in Vancouver, BC., March 7, 2016.

Photograph by: NICK PROCAYLO, PNG

VANCOUVER ai??i?? The City of Vancouverai??i??s $55-million purchase of the Arbutus Corridor from Canadian Pacific Railway has put to rest a long-standing battle, but its intention to use the route for transit could reignite a dormant fight.

The deal was filed Monday and before it was even announced, city staff had a new purpose for what theyai??i??ve already dubbed the Arbutus Greenway. The cityai??i??s plan is to turn the 9-km route from Kitsilano through the west side into a transportation corridor featuring walking and cycling paths as well as light rail or streetcars.

Mayor Gregor Robertson said final purchase price was a fair market valuation because the land is committed to be an active transportation corridor in the future.

ai???Thereai??i??s no question thereai??i??s an enormous city benefit here,ai??? Robertson said.

ai???Itai??i??s impossible to acquire a strip of land like this through basically anywhere else in the city, east or west, where rapid transit could be installed at a very reasonable cost.ai???

City staff plan to set up a new project office to oversee the design of the greenway and public consultations.

The Arbutus Corridor cuts through a few pricey neighbourhoods including Arbutus Ridge, Shaughnessy and Kerrisdale. Counted among the residents are dentists, doctors, lawyers, professionals and chief executive officers of companies, ai???the crA?me de la crA?me in Vancouver,ai??? as Pamela Sauder, a member of the Arbutus Corridor Residents Association, infamously stated in a 2000 protest of a plan to run rapid transit through the corridor.

The quote, which Sauder later apologized for, made for an explosive and memorable moment in the debate, but it was far from the only utterance residents have opposing the idea. The fight helped sway the decision to instead run rapid transit from Vancouver to Richmond underground along the Cambie Street corridor.

But the 17 hectares of now public land remains a tempting option for at-grade rapid transit.

Under the terms of the deal, any ai???excess landai??? in the corridor that is not needed for the greenway can be repurposed or sold, Robertson said. But he stated there is no development envisioned at this time and most of the space is expected to be taken up by transportation.

If any land is sold, CP Rail gets a share of the take. According to a complicated schedule provided by the city, the railway company would get 75 per cent of the first $50 million in profit, 50 per cent of the second $50 million, and 25 per cent of the third $50 million. Any profit beyond $150 million goes directly to the city.

But the deal also leaves CP the chance to exercise option on lands between West 1st and 5th avenues. Under that alternate scheme, the city would get 50 per cent of any proceeds CP raised beyond $75 million, and CP would cease to share in the profits from any corridor land sold outside of those few blocks.

CP pressured the city in 2014 in the midst of discussions over the sale of the land when it brought in work crews to dismantle community gardens that had sprouted along the unused line. The railway claimed it intended to store railway cars along the corridor. The city filed an injunction to block the railway from reactivating the line, but that bid was dismissed in B.C. Supreme Court.

The city had offered the railway $20 million for the land, but CP wanted an undisclosed amount more, reported to be a figure five times higher.

The mayor and Keith Creel, president and chief operating officer of CP, announced the agreement together Monday morning with the rail line and a community garden in the background.

When asked if the company ever had any serious intention to store railway cars in the corridor, Creel said it did.

ai???Actually, we were serious,ai??? he said. ai???Thereai??i??s just a shortage of locations to store cars today, and so it is definitely something we would have used had we not come to this agreement.ai???

ai???We certainly regret any inconvenience that was caused,ai??? Creel said, adding he was elated a deal was reached.

As part of the deal, CP agreed to remove its railway lines and ties from the property within two years.

The mayor described the deal as a ai???fair agreementai??? and a ai???historic development that will create a destination greenway from Vancouver coming off of our world-renowned seawall.ai???

Robertson asked community gardeners to hold back on expanding their plots of land.

ai???Itai??i??s up to the community engagement to decide whether some more gardening space could be allocated somewhere along the corridor. Obviously it has to work with the transportation and the walking and biking paths.ai???

Is It Time To Get Back To Basics?

Perusing many transit oriented blogs, there seems to be a common thread appearing, we are changing our travel and commuting habits. This poses a very important question; “Is it time to get back to basics with transit planning?”

This is a valid question because as driving and commuting habits change, expensive transit infrastructure just may become redundant infrastructure or monuments of gross over expenditures political vanity project. We cannot afford another Canada Line White Elephant; Even the much touted Evergreen Line is far to expensive for the job it will do.

Many European cities have kilometres of disused tramways, because as demographics change, peoples travel habits change too. The rails are kept in situ because travel habits may change again and what was a disused tram route, is again a functioning route.

A few cities have abandoned subway lines and/or stations because travel habits change and the route is abandoned; which is a far more expensive proposition, than with tram tracks.

We must rethink the Broadway subway altogether, even if traffic flows double within twenty years, traffic flows won’t even be near the traffic flows that requireAi?? a subway.

An European style tram service from UBC to BCIT, would be a fraction the cost to build and would attract more ridership than a stub Millennium Line subway only to Arbutus.

The proposed LRT in Surrey, estimated to cost $80 million/km to build is far too expensive for current or future traffic flows along the route.

Instead of “head in the sand” TransLink planning for light rail, would it not be better to actually hire professionals who have experience building with LRT, Even an European style tram service, with lawned rights-of-ways, would be far cheaper than what is being planned!

Regional transit planners should dust off the the Leewood/Rail for the Valley transit study and implementAi?? A starter route from Langley to downtown Vancouver, with two trains an hour each way would cost around $10 million/km. and would provide a faster trip to Vancouver than using the present SkyTrain!

Lawned rights-of-way makes traffic calming

an easier sell to local residents.

It’s time to get back to basics and build affordable transit on transit routes.

Example:

Traffic flows 0 to 5000 pphpd – bus.

Traffic flows 2,000 to 20,000 pphpd – tram.

Traffic flows exceeding 15,000 pphpd – metro.

Apologies to the SkyTrain light-metro crowd because as we all know, light-metro is all but obsolete in today’s transit world and building light-metro is building a vanity project.

It is no good planning transit as we would have in the 70’s and 80’s, with the advent of new technology, would it not be better to build viable transit network, rather than a very expensive vanity project here and an equally expensive gadgetbahnen there.

On-street operation may not please motorists, but it makes transit very handy and easy to use.

Toronto council lacking critical transit information ahead of key decisions

Sound familiar?

Vancouver Councillors utterly clueless about subways and transit in general.

Surrey Councillors completely naive about light rail.

TransLink blunders along, without a clue what they are doing.

Bureaucrats kowtowing to political whims, with no thought about the negative effects on the taxpayer.

“We’re OK Jack, coz we all have six figure salaries.”

Yet over $6 billion has been earmarked for a Vancouver SkyTrain subway and Surrey’s LRT.

One word sums up current transit projects – fiasco!

Ottawa’s new LRV’s Are Arriving

News from Ottawa.

The picture is of the front end of the new 49 metre trams arriving in Ottawa.

 

SkyTrain for Surrey Implodes

Being an advocate for better transit in the region is no easy task, made all the harder by those who pretend they know better.

Zwei has spent thirty years in the transit wars, starting with the aborted Vancouver monorail scheme in 1986. Since then I have consulted with real transit experts from companies such as Siemens, AdTranz, ABB, and with transit operators in Toronto, Calgary, Edmonton, Portland and overseas, about various transit issues in Metro Vancouver. I also have been a thirty-two year member of the Light Rail Transit Association, drawing on the expertise of the many professionals who belong to that organization.

I was mentored by the late Des Turner, a retired chemical engineer who returned to university and earned a Masters degree in Planning and who, by dogged research, got to the bottom of many transit issues.

From my knowledge and connections, I was able to get the Leewood Study for the Rail for the Valley group in their quest to reinstate the former Vancouver to Chilliwack interurban.

I have been a supporter of light rail using fact and current news and much to many people’s dismay, able to dispel many erroneous assertions that have been made about LRT. So much so that it has not earned me many friends, especially with civic politicians and bureaucrats.

To this end I have been threatened with libel in two instances. The defense for libel is “truth” and with the facts at hand, those threats disappeared very rapidly.

I find the following very disturbing.

Daryl Cruz: And the end of the day, we are here as a voice for citizens to raise.

Reporter: So, you do not think it’s irresponsible of you to put out information that’s just not true without double checking your facts?

Daryl Cruz: Well, we are an advocacy group.

To be a credible, an advocacy group needs to be honest, not only with the public and media, but with themselves.

Unlike Rail for the Valley, SkyTrain for Surrey has lost all credibility.

 

Surrey transit blog shares misinformation on LRT and B-Line plans

Vancouver, BC, Canada / News Talk 980 CKNW | Vancouver’s News. Vancouver’s Talk

Charmaine de Silva

Posted: February 25, 2016

 

You can not always believe what you read on the internet.

A blog titled SkyTrain for Surrey has been getting a lot of attention after claiming that plans for bus rapid transit to South Surrey and White Rock have been axed.

Medical Emergancy – TransLink Speak For Another Death