Chilliwack Progress – Message to transport minister
Message to transport minister
Published: August 20, 2010 9:00 AM
Updated: August 20, 2010 9:45 AM
Open letter to Chuck Strahl, federal minister of transportation.
I am concerned about congestion on Highway No. 1, and the need for a passenger service four times a day in each direction on the Southern Railway, from Chilliwack to Delta and on to Anacis Island. This will serve:
A?ai??i??A? Students attending all the universities and colleges south of the Fraser River,
A?ai??i??A? Passengers to Abbotsford Airport,
A?ai??i??A? Farmers who have no public transport south of Highway 1,
A?ai??i??A? Commuters, most of whom work south of the Fraser River.
A?ai??i??A? Besides it would connect with the Skytrain on Scott Road, and thus get people to Vancouver and UBC.
A?ai??i??A? Cultus Lake, Vedder River and Chilliwack Lake could become joyful destinations for tourists who could enjoy the scenery along the way, restfully on a train. Beyond Chilliwack, tourists could proceed to Harrison Hot Springs, and on their way Minter Gardens, Bridal Veil Falls, Aboriginal historic sites, Kirby, Agassiz, Hope, etc, etc. Minibuses could shuttle people here and there. Why not?
A?ai??i??A? The connection with the whole USA rail system, at Huntington/Sumas has great potential too. There are already refrigerator cars on the Southern Railway, so the import and export of fruit and vegetables has a great future that could cut down on huge dangerous trucks that fill our air with fumes and keep costs of highway maintenance unnecessarily high.
Myrtle Macdonald
via Chilliwack Progress – Message to transport minister.
Chilliwack Progress – A transportation vision for the future
A transportation vision for the future
Published: July 27, 2010 9:00 AM
Updated: July 27, 2010 9:50 AM
Re: Chilliwack not on board with commuter rail (Chilliwack Progress, July 20). Kudos to Mayor Gaetz for being patient and waiting for the results from the Fraser Valley transit study currently underway. But if sheA?ai??i??ai???s hoping to hear something new on utilizing the Interurban line for passenger rail, I can save her the wait. The results will be just like those from the report released last week that looked at the feasibility of utilizing the E&N Line on Vancouver Island for an upgraded passenger rail service. In short, the Fraser Valley will also be told that implementing a passenger service at this time is too expensive, and should be postponed until sometime in the future. The cost per passenger for each ride will be too much they will say, and the current population densities along the line donA?ai??i??ai???t support the investment at this time.
But the powers that be are looking at rail, and transit for that matter, without a vision for our future. They assume that the status quo never changes, that people will be driving for the majority of their trips 30 years from now just like they do today, and future ridership estimates for rail are made under this assumption. It is in effect a self fulfilling prophecy that allows investment in real transportation alternatives to the car to be avoided. Forget for a second that the baby boomers will be increasingly relying on public transit in just a few short years. Forget that despite all our wailing about air quality here in the Fraser Valley, more cars means more pollution. Forget that global oil production is projected to peak in the next few decades (if it hasnA?ai??i??ai???t already) and our increasingly desperate search for oil is causing untold destruction both here in Canada as well as in the Gulf of Mexico. Under the status quo, we are looking at more roads and overpasses to service an ever-increasing number of cars, and more importantly, more traffic and more congestion. Rather than plan for more of the same only bigger, we need to be planning our communities around a different way of living in this world. Our decisions here at the local level matter, and influence the bigger issues playing out across the country and the globe. If the communities of the Fraser Valley are serious about the issues they claim to be serious about A?ai??i??ai??? improving the environment and livability, air quality, aging in place for retiring boomers A?ai??i??ai??? then we need to look at a new way of doing business. We need leaders with a vision for the future, not leaders whose goal is just the status quo only bigger. If we follow the same path we are on now, growth will bring us the same problems A?ai??i??ai??? only more so A?ai??i??ai??? 25 or 50 years from now.
A few examples to think about for when the Province trots out its A?ai??i??Ai??too expensive per rideA?ai??i??A? number once the study is finished: when the West Coast Express (WCE) was implemented, the cost per ride was somewhere around a whopping $40 per person, much more than a ticket cost, and service was heavily subsidized. But as the service gained a reputation for a relaxing and comfortable ride (something cars will never provide by the way), ridership increased and costs per ride came down substantially. Today, no one could imagine getting rid of such a great service, and indeed it has shaped the way residents live and work north of the Fraser. (DonA?ai??i??ai???t forget to think about the low densities north of the Fraser in relation to the success of the WCE when they trot out the A?ai??i??Ai??not enough densityA?ai??i??A? argument also!)
Today, the automobile no longer represents that same freedom of mobility for our communities. In addition to air quality and pollution impacts, congestion and over-use has killed the automobile as the saviour of freedom of movement. Today, we are moving towards a world where public transportation systems, walking, and cycling are the real tools for improved mobility and health for all ages, and leaders with vision will recognize that and act accordingly.
James Watt
via Chilliwack Progress – A transportation vision for the future.
Transportation: TransLink dog and pony show selling snake oil
Transportation: TransLink dog and pony show selling snake oil
Langley Advance October 15, 2010
Dear Editor,
I see that TransLink is taking its well-honed dog and pony transit show to Surrey, and I hope residents watch out for the snake-oil that passes as transit planning.
TransLink doesnA?ai??i??ai???t care for modern light rail, and prefers to build with itA?ai??i??ai???s expensive, old standby, the bureaucratic and politically prestigious SkyTrain light-metro system.
To this end, TransLink pulls out all the stops to make LRT seem inferior to SkyTrain, which has worked well with the rubes on the north side of the river. One hopes Surrey folks and politicians can see through TransLinkA?ai??i??ai???s hype and hoopla, and see the slick-willies for what they are.
Despite TransLinkA?ai??i??ai???s claims that modern LRT canA?ai??i??ai???t carry much more than 10,000 persons per hour per direction, in the real world (beyond the GVRD), modern LRT is defined as mode A?ai??i??Ai??that can deal economically with traffic flows of between 2,000 and 20,000 passengers per hour per direction, thus effectively bridging the gap between the maximum flow that can be dealt with using buses and the minimum that justifies a metro.A?ai??i??A?
LRT, with its inherent high passenger-carrying capacities, combined with economic construction costs, made the SkyTrain metro system obsolete decades ago, but TransLink lives in the world of A?ai??i??Ai??Pixie-dustA?ai??i??A? planning, where facts are contrived to continue building with SkyTrain. Sadly, TransLinkA?ai??i??ai???s current transit plans are A?ai??i??Ai??fruits of the poisonous treeA?ai??i??A? and not worth the paper itA?ai??i??ai???s printed on.
Noted American transit specialist, Gerald fox, in a letter to a Victoria (BC) transit group, summed up TransLinkA?ai??i??ai???s mania for SkyTrain on the Evergreen line: A?ai??i??Ai??It is interesting how TransLink has used this cunning method of manipulating analysis to justify SkyTrain in corridor after corridor, and has thus succeeded in keeping its proprietary rail system expanding. In the US, all new transit projects that seek federal support are now subjected to scrutiny by a panel of transit peers, selected and monitored by the federal government, to ensure that projects are analyzed honestly, and the taxpayersA?ai??i??ai??? interests are protected. No SkyTrain project has ever passed this scrutiny in the US.A?ai??i??A?
TransLink, embarrassed by the Rail for the Valley/Leewood TramTrain report, is hoping once again to bamboozle Surrey residents with its anti-LRT rhetoric that has worked so well for them in the past.
Malcolm Johnston, Light Rail Committee, Rail for the Valley
Ai??Ai?? Copyright (c) Langley Advance
via Transportation: TransLink dog and pony show selling snake oil.
Rail readily beats SkyTrain
Rail readily beats SkyTrain
By John Buker, Langley Advance October 8, 2010
Dear Editor,
Premier Gordon Campbell announced a SkyTrain line to Langley, and rapid buses from Langley to Chilliwack, with no timeline for implementation and no funding arrangements.
Has the provincial government not yet read the independent 84-page Interurban study by Leewood Projects?
The report concludes that a modern, frequent light rail service for the entire Fraser Valley to Chilliwack is achievable in the near-term, for an initial $500 million investment – a far better investment than SkyTrain and rapid buses.
SkyTrain costs more than $100 million per kilometre to build, compared to $5 million/km for an Interurban light rail service.
John Buker, Rail For The Valley
Ai??Ai?? Copyright (c) Langley Advance
via Rail readily beats SkyTrain.
Better solutions save farms
Better solutions save farms
By Eric J. Bysouth, Langley Advance September 17, 2010
Dear Editor,
Obviously, Councillor Steve Ferguson [New road will benefit farms, Sept. 14 Letters, Langley Advance] did not, when he first voted yes, understand what is needed to resolve the problem at Mufford Crescent and Glover Road, and he still does not.
Further, he has not listened to the public debate on the issue, and has not considered the common sense, positive solutions that have been proposed.
There is no question that the Mufford/Glover intersection needs to be fixed, but it should consider where people, goods, and services need to go. They need to go to and from Mufford, Glover, and the Bypass.
They do not need to travel extra distances through good farmland, when there is already a connecting road between Glover and 64th Avenue.
The proposed new road will give added support to those wanting convert the farmland between the Bypass and Milner to Industrial/Commercial.
Farmers do not want their land divided by a road they will have to cross to get to both sides of their field. Those farmers on 64th Avenue do not want or need it being made a main road, as they use it for moving farm machinery between fields. Where we really need an overpass is to solve the worst problem, and that is over the tracks on the Bypass, just west of the Glover intersection. This handles ten times the traffic, and causes very serious problems when two-mile trains stop traffic.
I suggest Steve do what is right, cost effective, efficient, and solves the problem.
He states that the heavy rail traffic cannot be rerouted. This is not true. There is legislation in place that allows that to happen.
We need light rail up the Fraser Valley, using the existing track. Light rail makes it more efficient and cost effective to put the track on an overpass over the road.
Our main problem is elected officials and people who like to make unnecessary work.
Eric J Bysouth, Langley
Ai??Ai?? Copyright (c) Langley Advance
via Better solutions save farms.
TramTrain should steer us in the right direction
TramTrain should steer us in the right direction
By Malcolm Johnston, The Times September 28, 2010
Editor, the Times:
Last Monday, Rail for the Valley and Leewood Projects (UK) released a historic and revolutionary TramTrain report for Metro Vancouver and the Fraser Valley.
The TramTrain plan is historic, for it is the first time in over 30 years that a transit study, independent of political and bureaucratic influence, has been released to the public, giving an affordable option to TransLink’s expensive SkyTrain light metro planning.
The TramTrain plan is revolutionary because it gives economic 21st-century transit solutions for the region, instead of costly and dated 1950s metro and subway planning.
TramTrain is a reinvention of the Interurban and is part of the large light rail family, which sees over 450 such systems in operation around the world.
First operated in Karlsruhe Germany, in 1993, the new TramTrain proved so successful that ridership on the new TramTrain line (which replaced a commuter train and one transfer) exploded from 533,600 per week to over 2,555,000, (almost 480 per cent increase) in a few months.
Karlsruhe now operates over 410 km of TramTrain, including lines in the environmentally sensitive Black Forest, with the longest route being over 210 km.
As TramTrain is inexpensive to build, TramTrain lines do not need the massive densification needed by SkyTrain and the RAV/Canada Line.
TramTrain can pass through sensitive ALR lands, leaving farm lands as they are and prevent rampant land speculation and development that more expensive transit modes need to sustain them.
The RftV/Leewood plan also gives glimpsed into the future with the initial line expanding to Vancouver, Richmond and Rosedale.
Why build the 11-km., $1.4-billion plus SkyTrain Evergreen Line when we can build a full 138-km. Vancouver/Richmond to Rosedale TramTrain service for under $1 billion, with enough money left over to build a Vancouver to Maple Ridge TramTrain service, as TransLink planned for in the late 1990s?
Today there are 14 cities with TramTrain operation (only seven cities have SkyTrain), with a further 20 TramTrain operations being planned for.
One hopes the regions’ mayors board the TramTrain for better public transit. If not, they will be left behind at the station, waiting for a SkyTrain that will never come.
Malcolm Johnston,
Light Rail Committee
Ai??Ai?? Copyright (c) Abbotsford Times
via TramTrain should steer us in the right direction.
Uninformed about transit
Uninformed about transit
The Times October 19, 2010
Editor:
Each time the light rail issue has been brought up Mayor Sharon Gaetz hasn’t had any more insight than to say rail crossings would cost the city $500,000 each. Upper Prairie Road is shortly getting one of these new crossings and after the government’s contributions the bill to the city is actually $44,000.
I have nothing against Mayor Gaetz, but I also know that Chilliwack council is totally uninformed when it comes to rail.
There are already three studies recommending it. The Rail For the Valley one is just the most recent, and council hasn’t done anything positive. The experts have said to put together a pilot project and Surrey, Langley and Abbotsford are working toward this goal with the South of the Fraser Community Rail Task Force.
Meanwhile, Chilliwack council is ignoring this and we really risk being excluded from the eventual rail network.
Please, Mayor Gaetz, there is now more then enough data that firmly supports light rail. Chilliwack deserves a lot better transportation then you’re giving us.
Nick Wimpney
Chilliwack
Ai??Ai?? Copyright (c) Chilliwack Times
SkyTrain pie in the sky
SkyTrain pie in the sky
The Times October 8, 2010
Editor:
So Premier Gordon Campbell has promised SkyTrain to Langley, but does anyone believe him?
To refresh everyones memory, SkyTrain is a proprietary, automatic railway that is now owned by Bombardier Inc. First marketed in the late 1970s, what we call SkyTrain has gone through at least four official name changes and a complete redesign, yet only seven such transit systems have been built and are now relegated to the niche airport people-mover market. SkyTrain was even too expensive for the truncated Canada Line subway and a generic metro system was used and is incompatible with the proprietary SkyTrain Advanced Rapid Transit or ART.
Only Vancouver has expanded it SkyTrain system and is the only one of four cities in North America having SkyTrain to do so.
Why? The answer is simple economics; SkyTrain costs more to build and operate than comparable light rail systems and despite claims by TransLink, SkyTrain has yet to prove that it has a greater capacity than light rail!
The grade crossing argument used by the SkyTrain lobby, is a man-of-straw argument. Rail/road crossings are more than 10 times safer than a road/road intersections. The proposed TramTrain grade crossings will be protected by lights, bells, and a gate. Compare this to a typical light-controlled traffic intersection or the cheaper four-way stop intersection; the road/rail intersection is much safer. If a car driver disobeys a road/rail crossing and collides with a TramTrain, shouldn’t the car driver’s licence be revoked?
For the Premier’s proposed $2 billion SkyTrain line to Langley, we can build a “full build” (Vancouver/Richmond to Rosedale TramTrain) and a new multi-track Fraser River Rail Bridge and at least two 10-kilometre LRT/streetcar lines in Surrey and Langley.
It seems Premier Campbell is waiting at the station for a SkyTrain that will never come.
Malcolm Johnston,
Light Rail Committee, Rail for the Valley, Delta
Back in the ’40s rail worked well
Back in the ’40s rail worked well
The Times October 5, 2010
Editor:
(Re: Rail for the Valley)
I have been following the progress on this initiative since it was first announced with great interest. In the 1940s we lived in Surrey, and our nearest station for the BC Electric Interurban was at Hunt Road. Many trips were made to New Westminster and Vancouver as it was a primary mode of transportation. I had occasion to travel to Abbotsford and Chilliwack a few times.
I had a Vancouver daily Province paper route and my bundle of papers was dropped off at the Newton Station by the Interurban freight car. Clearly this mode of transportation got the newspaper through to Chilliwack, as well as other freight.
It has now been 60 years since there has been no passenger rail to the valley throughout a period of vast growth. Now with the mounted pressure of resurrecting this facility, I believe that there may be an important component, which is not being explored. The component is rail and tourism for the valley. As an example, think of the great attractions there are from Surrey to Chilliwack. There are museums, the history of various locations. Transportation could be provided to Fort Langley. Tourists could experience the history of Abbotsford and its present form of agriculture, Cultus Lake, historical Chilliwack, sturgeon and salmon fishing, Harrison Hot Springs, just to name a few.
From Chilliwack to Surrey there are many who would visit Vancouver as an alternative form of transportation and not have to fight the traffic or find a parking spot. We are all aware of the vast number of tourists taking cruise ships out of Vancouver. How many of those tourists would consider taking a side trip by rail to the valley and have the opportunity to visit the various areas of interest? At the end of the line in Chilliwack, how many might there be that would like to spend some time at the world-renowned Harrison Hot Springs, while the husband takes a day off for a day of sturgeon fishing?
Jerry Olynyk,
Chilliwack
Ai??Ai?? Copyright (c) Chilliwack Times
via Back in the ’40s rail worked well.
Dream bigger transit dreams
Dream bigger transit dreams
The Times September 28, 2010
Editor:
Re: Mayor remains mum on latest rail system study (Times, Sept. 24).
The report on revival and enhancement of the interurban rail line (Chilliwack to Surrey) by David Cockle of Leewood Projects is greatly appreciated. The benevolent interest in a neglected part of the country by a credentialed company is a lucky strike for the entire Fraser Valley.
The detailed cost-accounting adds a useful backdrop for arguments pro and contra rail travel. (I’m a supporter.) Even the cost ($12.8 M) of the proposed 12-km extension to Rosedale (phase 3) compares favourably to the cost ($48 million) of the Evans Road connector.
Besides the obvious benefit of a resulting better air quality, the rail line would introduce a more romantic flavour to travel in the Fraser Valley. Until you can dream larger than your present habits, what chance of progress?
Don Buker,
Rosedale
Ai??Ai?? Copyright (c) Chilliwack Times
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