A comment from Zwei (2021): The Daily Hive has become the mouthpiece for TransLink and the Hive prints news releases as if they were news, without any fact checking.
Really, can’t the SkyTrain Lobby do any better?
The following is so silly and juvenile because it is all hearsay and opinion, not fact. But facts have never bothered the SkyTrain Lobby as they try once again try to fool the public about SkyTrain. They treat everyone like rubes at a country fair.
This is from the Daily Hive, written by anonymous. Forgetting the fact no one builds with SkyTrain anymore and only seven such systems have ever been built in the past 40 years, Zwei is going to explore the following claims.
Offer a low ultimate capacity that is only 27% that of the Canada Line’s
Be much slower and less frequent than SkyTrain
Potentially be unreliable and prone to collision
Cost comparable to a SkyTrain extension to build but generate less ridership, and
Have operating cost shortfalls for decades
1)Offer a low ultimate capacity that is only 27% that of the Canada Line’s
Not true.
Capacity is a function of train size and headway’s the Canada Line’s station platforms are a mere 40 metres long, it can only accommodate trains 41 metres long.
The capacity of the Canada Line is extremely limited, around 9,000 pphpd.
Modern LRT can carry in excess of 20,000 pphpd and in extreme circumstances much more.
In Karlsruhe Germany, due to the success of the regional tramtrain system, the traffic flows along Kaiserstrasse to trams and tramtrains operating at 40 second headway’s, offering a capacity in excess of 35,000 pphpd.
More local to home, in Toronto in the 1950’s, couple sets of PCC trams, were carrying 12,000 persons per hour on the old Bloor – Danforth route.
Currently, the operating certificate for the ALRT/ART proprietary light-metro lines limits capacity to 15,000 pphpd, one third that was carried on Kaiserstrasse in Karlsruhe Germany.
LRT operating on a reserved R-o-W, offers the benefits of a metro at a fraction the cost.
2)Be much slower and less frequent than SkyTrain
Not true.
LRT operating on-street, in mixed traffic, has it’s speed limited by posted speed limits and we call this a streetcar in North America. Not so, if LRT operates on a reserved rights-of-way, with no interfering traffic, LRT can match if not surpass the commercial speed of SkyTrain.
In Europe, peak hour headway’s can be as much as 30 seconds, on major routes.
3)Potentially be unreliable and prone to collision
Not true, but with a caveat.
LRT is extremely reliable when compared to automatic railways like SkyTrain.
LRT does have collisions with cars and or trucks, but 99.9% of tram auto/truck accidents are the fault of the car/truck drive, disobeying signs and signalling. In many European countries there are harsh penalties for drivers who are found at fault causing an accident with a tram.
More people die by SkyTrain in Vancouver annually, than by tram in Calgary.
4)Cost comparable to a SkyTrain extension to build but generate less ridership
Not true.
If LRT is being built as a light-metro on a segregated R-o-W, then yes the costs are comparable, like in Seattle where their LRT is being built as a light-metro with over 90% of its route operating on viaduct or in a subway. But then it is not LRT, but a light metro.
Costs for LRT start as low as $5 million/km for tramtrain; $15 mi./km to $25 mil./km for a streetcar; and $25 mil./km to $45 mil.km for LRT. Now if extra engineering for LRT includes complete street reconstruction and landscaping or new road construction, the costs will escalate.
The last cost estimate for SkyTrain (elevated) is $200 million/km. ; the cost of the proposed 7 km. Broadway SkyTrain subway is now well over $600/km!
At-grade transit has proven to generate more new ridership than elevated or underground transit and one of the reasons LRT is so popular!
In1992, the annual subsidy for SkyTrain was $157 million, more than the bus system!
5)Have operating cost shortfalls for decades
Not true.
As LRT is much cheaper to build and operate than SkyTrain, will have much less operating and cost short falls than SkyTrain.
The subsidy to operate the ALRT/ART/MALM SkyTrain system, is now over $350 million annually and then there is the Canada Line.
The Canada Line is not ALRT/ART/MALM, but a conventional heavy-rail metro built as a light metro, the result of a Gordon Campbell, BC Liberal faux P-3 project. The SNC Lavalin lead consortium receives about $110 million annually from TransLink to operate the line, about three times more than a conventional LRT line to operate.
What stands out with the SkyTrain Lobby’s cacophony of deceit, massive exaggerations of the truth, fake news and alternative facts, is the number seven (7), because only 7 SkyTrain type systems have been built under three names in the past 40 years, compared with over 200 new LRT systems built during the same time, adding to the already existing 350 tram/LRT networks operating around the world.
What is the SkyTrain Lobby really up to? Who are the SkyTrain Lobby working for? Who benefits with hugely expensive SkyTrain construction and operation; certainly not the transit customer or taxpayer.
As the saying goes , with SkyTrain “follow the money!”
Vancouver politicians live in “The Land of the Lotus Eaters”, when it comes to transit.
In Greek mythology the lotus-eaters, were a race of people living on an island dominated by the Lotus tree. The lotus fruits and flowers were the primary food of the island and were a narcotic, causing the inhabitants to sleep in peaceful apathy.
As TransLink, Vancouver Council, UBC, and the Mayor’s Council on Transit sleep in peaceful apathy, the realities of the real cost of the subway are ignored.
According to Metrolinx’s study, the real cost of the 5.8 km Broadway subway will be more like $6 billion over 50 years.
As costs mount ever higher elsewhere for subways, our politicians and bureaucrats remain ignorant of escalating costs for subway construction, continue to misinform the public as to the real cost of Broadway’s subway.
In Metro Toronto, Metrolinx has finally admitted that:”
“……the Scarborough subway costs simply aren’t worth it,” he said. “It’s been years that Scarborough subway advocates haven’t been telling the truth to Scarborough residents and people across the city.”
And for years now, Translink: the City of Vancouver, UBC, the Ministry of Transportation, the Minister of Transportation, the Minister responsible for TransLink, the Mayor’s Council on Transit and the subway lobby haven’t been telling the truth about the high costs of subway construction to taxpayers in metro Vancouver. Is the $6 billion. plus, cost over 50 years, giving good value?
Is it not time that the province steps in for a fiscal reality check? Is there the moral fibre in Victoria to do this?
Interesting that the numbers for LRT came via the TTC and the numbers for the subwaycame from the provincial government who wanted the subway.
The subway project in Scarborough has been hotly debated in Toronto since 2013, when its backers won council support for cancelling a light-rail line in the area and replacing it with an extension – the Toronto-York Spadina Subway Extension seen here in 2016 – of the subway to Scarborough Town Centre mall.
Kevin Van Paassen/The Globe and Mail
Two of Ontario’s marquee transit projects have costs that far exceed their benefits, according to a pair of analyses prepared for the regional transit agency Metrolinx.
The reports, released Friday afternoon, show that the Scarborough subway extension proposed for east-end Toronto and the westward extension of the Crosstown Eglinton light rail line across the city could, together, cost nearly $10-billion to build while producing benefits amounting to billions less. In spite of this, Metrolinx has recommended both projects be advanced.
The analysis deliberately errs on the side of caution and Metrolinx hopes to improve the benefits of these projects over time, agency CEO Phil Verster said in a statement.
The benefits are calculated by assigning a monetary value to such things as removing cars from the road and saving commuters time.
Shelagh Pizey-Allen, spokesperson for the advocacy group TTCRiders, said the projects were examples of proposals pitched with a modest price tag, but costs rose and value diminished over time.
The Metrolinx board received these reports at an in-camera meeting in January and, at the time, quietly approved pushing ahead with the projects. The agency refused to release the reports when asked earlier this month.
Both projects are being overseen by the provincial government, which struck a deal with the city of Toronto that handed over control and financial responsibility for major rail construction to Metrolinx.
A spokeswoman for Transportation Minister Caroline Mulroney said the government would continue to support both projects.
“These [reports] represent Metrolinx’s best understanding of the projects at a given moment in time and are inevitably subject to change during the projects’ life cycles,” Christina Salituro said in an e-mail.
“These documents are key elements in ensuring Metrolinx continues to make the most informed decisions going forward and are just one of a number of factors used in making a final decision.”
The subway project in Scarborough has been hotly debated in Toronto since 2013, when its backers won council support for cancelling a light-rail line in the area and replacing it with an extension of the subway to Scarborough Town Centre mall.
The analysis released Friday of the subway extension concluded it would bring $2.8-billion in benefits over a 60-year period, and cost about $5.5-billion to build. The Ontario government had last year pegged the cost at this level, which is about $2-billion more than the amount budgeted by the city when it was in charge of an earlier version of project.
“That subway is not going to be cost-effective,” said Brenda Thompson, with the advocacy group Scarborough Transit Action, adding that such a high price tag would preclude building anything else in that part of the city.
“I think this is going to suck up all of the money and I think politicians should be upfront about that. This is what we’re going to end up with, if at all.”
Toronto Councillor Josh Matlow, who has long advocated for the original plan for light rail instead in Scarborough, said that the report is another example of the claims of subway boosters being proved wrong.
“Today Metrolinx finally admitted that the Scarborough subway costs simply aren’t worth it,” he said. “It’s been years that Scarborough subway advocates haven’t been telling the truth to Scarborough residents and people across the city.”
The city had budgeted $3.56-billion for a one-stop Scarborough subway extension. During the last election campaign, now Premier Doug Ford pledged to add two more stations. The version being studied by Metrolinx includes the additional stations.
The newly released analysis for a light-rail extension of the Crosstown to Pearson International Airport shows that it will cost up to $4.4-billion, net present value, in 2019 dollars, if it has nine stops and is substantially below ground. In that form it would bring benefits of $1.4-billion over 60 years.
The project’s capital cost could be reduced to about $2.8-billion if most of the stops were removed, the analysis notes, or to as little as $2.1-billion if it was built on the surface.
Mr. Ford has pledged to bury as much of the Crosstown extension as possible.
Trondheim’s Gråkallbanen, is the worlds most northerly tramway in the world and golly gee whiz, it doesn’t need reindeer to enable to operate in the snow!
Interesting, that an Alberta University is doing a study about how Covid affects transit use.
All we hear from TransLink is yesterday’s ridership records, which were mainly for “subway propaganda” than anything else.
TransLink’s ridership claims are based on boarding’s and as boarding’s inflate actual ridership numbers, means ridership assumptions and predictions are inflated and over optimistic.
Instead of concentrating on making the transit system user friendly, TransLink does nothing. With Covid, all TransLink and the Provincial government has done was to ensure that that the Union bus drivers received full wages driving empty buses, through the pandemic.
The problem seems to be that the transit system is operated as a social service, with a few billion dollars spent here and there for politically prestigious ribbon cutting photo-ops at election time at new SkyTrain lines. Transit systems operated as a social service tend to be user unfriendly or non user-freindly, as they system operates to the lowest common denominator, trying to please everyone and in the end pleasing no one.
Covid-19 forced businesses and universities to adapt to new ways of conducting their affairs. Working at home, Zoom-meetings, and remote learning are just some of the few changes society has faced and met with Covid-19.
As fewer people commute and may former transit customers have reduce traveling, transit becomes less and less of an option and the car once again becomes the preferred transit vehicle.
A 45 minute commute by car trumps a 90 minute commute, two transfer journey by bus.
In the 21st century, user-friendliness of a public transit has been deemed the main reason people use transit and in Europe, the survival of city tramways and regional passenger train services can be attributed to the user-friendliness of the system. In Vancouver, the opposite is true where transit and political bureaucrats literally do not give a damn about the transit customer and continue to build extremely expensive monuments for themselves that will be of little incentive for transit customers to move.
Today in Germany, public transit is treated as a product and if the product is good, the customer will use it, but if the product is not so good and customers avoid it, managers will find the problem and improve the performance very quickly.
In Vancouver, politicians and bureaucrats just do the same thing over again, ever hoping for different results and with Covid-19, the transit customer is now voting with their feet, and the result could be ugly for 2021 and beyond.
The lawned rights-of-way is both user-friendly and non user-friendly.
Study probing whether and how TransLink can rebound from COVID-19 ridership woes
Researchers at the University of Alberta and TransLink want to hear from the public about what it will take to get them back on transit.
Around this time last year, the transit agency was smashing ridership records.
TransLink recorded more than 41 million boardings in October 2019. That’s all changed under the COVID-19 pandemic — in September, it recorded just 16.5 million boardings.
Emily Grise, an assistant professor of earth and atmospheric studies is leading a probe into what commuters’ anxieties are about using the system, and what they want to see change.
“What we’re looking to do is better understand how people’s perceptions of transit, particularly their safety and perception around crowding, are changing through the pandemic,” Grise told Global News.
“We’re trying to better understand how people will feel taking crowded transit vehicles in the future, and we want to better understand also what sort of safety measures and policies might be most effective in order to bring people safely and comfortably back.”
hose changes could range from things TransLink can do, such as alter routes or bus frequency, or what other stakeholders could do.
How TransLink and stakeholders respond could have major implications for the future of transit in the region, which Grise said risks falling into a vicious cycle.
“Service is a big predictor of ridership. So if revenues are falling and service levels have to be cut, we can expect then to see declines in ridership (and) service levels go down,” she said.
n that absence of fare revenue, without having subsidies from different levels of the government, transit agencies are essentially in jeopardy of further ridership losses.”
The survey is now live and will run until Christmas. The research team will launch a second wave of public engagement later in the winter to see how people’s perceptions change, along with the pandemic conditions.
Grise’s team will then produce a report which they will share with TransLink and other major Canadian transit agencies facing the same woes.
“Have we forever changed our ability to feel comfortable in close proximity to strangers?” she asked.
“Or are we sort of going to revert back to normal as a pandemic sort of fades away? Those are the sort of questions that we would like to be able to answer.”
Zwei has been a member of the Light Rail Transit Association for over 35 years and with membership comes a subscription to the most excellent magazine Tramways & Urban Transit.
The following will be of most interest for those wanting an affordable rail connection from Vancouver to Chilliwack using the existing and former BC Electric passenger line connecting to Chilliwack or reinstating passenger service on the E&N Railway.
Today six years after the this article was published in T&UT much has happened with TramTrain. today there are over 30 TramTrain systems operating around the world, with a further 30 plus systems being planned.
TramTrain is evolving and with newer, Greener propulsion systems and cheaper and safer signalling systems, TramTrain is no longer a niche transit system, but a safe, affordable and user friendly transit mode, that can expand ones transit system into lower population areas, providing an efficient and cost effective public transport service.
There are several candidates for a TramTrain service in BC, yet the provincial government and civic politicians still want massively expensive and financially ruinous extensions to the current light metro system as they love to cut ribbons in front of mega-projects at election time.
The time has come to seriously consider TramTrain in BC, but I am afraid with Horgan and the NDP, the affordable transit train has long left the station.
From Tramways & Urban Transit
Tram-train / JUNE 2014
www.tramnews.net.www.lrta.org
TRAM-TRAIN:A PROMISE UNFULFILLED?
Micheal Taplin
Prologue
“On 25 September 1992 dual-voltage LRVs began running between Karlsruheand Bretten… within a year passenger numbers were up 400%, and today the model works over nearly 500km (310 miles) of track.”
TramTrain and regional passenger train at station.
During 125 years of electric tramways, the tram as we know it has generally been developed as a vehicle suited to alignments on, or based on, city streets. Of course there were interurban lines that ran across country, particularly in North America, where they reached their apogee in 1915, before being decimated by the inexorable rise in motor vehicles. Some of these originated as steam railroads, and others entered cities on the tracks of urban tramways or rapid transit lines. In Europe, particularly Switzerland, such interurbans were called light railways (to distinguish them from their mainline cousins), and again running on to city streets was, and is, quite common. The former NZH in the Netherlands is another example.Japan, with its plethora of private railway companies, followed the US interurban pattern, though the boom there coincided with the decline in North America, and Michael Taplin gives a brief overview of the tram-train concept and asks if political and institutional issues form a greater barrier to its further implementation than technical concerns.
During 125 years of electric tramways, the tram as we know it has generally been developed as a vehicle suited to alignments on, or based on, city streets. Of course there were interurban lines that ran across country, particularly in North America, where they reached their apogee in 1915, before being decimated by the inexorable rise in motor vehicles. Some of these originated as steam railroads, and others entered cities on the tracks of urban tramways or rapid transit lines. In Europe, particularly Switzerland, such interurbans were called light railways (to distinguish them from their mainline cousins), and again running on to city streets was, and is, quite common. The former NZH in the Netherlands is another example.
Japan, with its plethora of private railway companies, followed the US interurban pattern, though the boom there coincided with the decline in North America, and Michael Taplin gives a brief overview of the tram-train concept and asks if political and institutional issues form a greater barrier to its further implementation than technical concerns.most lines survive today as rapid transit operations, with some penetration of city streets or subways. None of the above models were referred to as tram-trains, though the principle is not dissimilar.
Germany The modern tram-train concept, which saw its inauguration at Karlsruhe in Germany, uses a tram-based vehicle capable of operation on both mainline railway tracks and city tram tracks. Track-sharing between trams and trains was not unknown before, but the railways involved could hardly be deemed mainline.Karlsruhe had its own interurban operation, the Albtalbahn, which had track-sharing with Deutsche Bahn (DB) on its northern arm.
The possibility of travelling to the city centre without a change of vehicle was very attractive to passengers. Thanks to the German concept of the Verkehrsverbund joint tariff area, the financial consequences could be uncoupled from the commercial interests of the operators (AVG and DB), and work concentrated on the legal and technical hurdles to be overcome to permit through operation.On 25 September 1992 dual-voltage (750V dc and 15kV ac) light rail vehicles began running between Karlsruhe and Bretten, switching between city tram tracks and DB tracks at Grötzingen.
Within a year passenger numbers were up by 400%, and today the Karlsruhe model works over nearly 500km (310 miles) of track. There are 151 dual-voltage cars, 121 from Siemens, and 30 just being delivered by Bombardier (with options for up to 45 more). The tram-train model was truly a success, and good business for the Karlsruhe-based consultants involved.
Other German examples followed, in Saarbrücken, Chemnitz, Zwickau, Kassel and Nordhausen, though not exact copies. Saarbrücken runs 28 Bombardier Flexity Linkdual-voltage cars through the streets and then on DB tracks south to Sarreguemines,
Despite the hype and hoopla of regional mayors, five very important facts about our SkyTrain light metro system are glossed over in Metro Vancouver, by metro mayors, bureaucrats and transportation planners:
The Expo and Millennium Lines operate a dated proprietary railway, now called Movia Automatic Light Metro.
Only seven of these proprietary railways were sold and in operation and when the Scarborough Rt closes down, there will be only six.
There has been no sales of the Linear Induction Motored MALM for the past 15 years.
In January, MALM will have a new owner, as Alstom absorbs, Bombardier’s rail division and has history discontinuing production of unsalable transit systems.
Several of the ART (the fourth name for the now called MALM) systems have embroiled Bombardier and SNC Lavalin in legal cases stemming from corruption charges.
The Expo Line is aging and needs billions of dollars in upgrades and rehab, with many spare parts scarce because there is no market for mass production as the system is very dated.
*
Another unpleasant truth is that with Covid-19, peoples travel habits have changed and the expensive rapid transit systems not satisfy peoples travel demands, thus will face a drought of ridership, further increasing subsidies. The inherent inflexibility of light-metro means longer commutes and more unpleasant journey times for transit customers, as the entire regional transit system is based on feeding the light metro system.
When travel habits change, unlike light rail the light-metro cannot.
A second ICTS/MALM system in Detroit is on its last legs and probably will not survive the next five years, again spare parts are hard to come by and are expensive to maintain a safe operation. When Detroit shuts down, then there will be five.
*
The Scarborough ICTS, will soon be a page in the history books and Vancouver a very strong political subway lobby is forcing the TTC to build a costly subway, to serve fewer customers at a billion dollar or more higher cost.
*
As always, Metro Vancouver politicians would rather spend three times more for a dated light metro system, purely for photo ops and happily raise taxes to cover their myopic vision for Metro Vancouver of towers and high rise condos.
Unfortunately, the clock is ticking with MALM and the years are aging the light-metro. The past flows, the future ebbs. As the proprietary MALM ages, costs climb expansion declines and then there were six.
Scarborough RT will shut down before subway is finished, mayor says
The beleaguered Scarborough RT will fail before the long-awaited Scarborough subway is built, leaving residents on the bus — possibly for years — Mayor John Tory confirmed Thursday.
Council, meanwhile, will once again be asked to consider the alternative — a cheaper, more robust plan to build LRTs across the eastern part of the city.
Speaking to reporters at city hall, Tory said he had been briefed on the lifespan of the SRT ahead of a delayed report to the TTC board.
“There are very active discussions going on now between the TTC and Metrolinx with respect to exactly how long we have to provide that alternate transit service for, because it will not be the case that we can keep the SRT going until the Scarborough subway is finished.”
That news — after a decade of promises to Scarborough residents about improved transit — undercuts one of the central arguments for building a subway instead of the cheaper light-rail transit option preferred by some on council.
When first pushed under former mayor Rob Ford’s administration, proponents of the subway said it was, in part, a superior option because the SRT could continue running while the subway was built and not cause any disruptions in regular service.
The TTC refused to answer questions on Thursday, saying its report to the board would now be tabled in February.
“The seven-stop Scarborough LRT that I advocated for, along with being approved, funded and able to serve more neighbourhoods, would’ve already been built and operating by now,” said Coun. Josh Matlow, who has long questioned the lack of evidence for a subway.
He plans to move a motion at council next week asking councillors to request the province stop work on the three-stop subway and instead build the originally planned seven-stop LRT, while using any cost savings to build a second LRT along Eglinton Avenue East.
“Today, the worst outcome has happened and Scarborough residents are being left on a very long bus ride. When we cautioned this would happen, subway proponents falsely promised it wouldn’t. Scarborough deserves so much better than this.”
A three-stop subway, loosely estimated to cost $3.56 billion with zero design work done was first confirmed by council under Ford in October 2013 — more than seven years ago.
Campaigning for the mayoral seat in 2014, Tory himself promised to build the three-stop version of the subway until ballooning cost estimates forced him to pivot to a revised one-stop option.
At the time, he and then-chief planner Jennifer Keesmaat promised that the cost savings from that switch would allow the city to also build an LRT along Eglinton Avenue East to the University of Toronto Scarborough campus.
However, emails uncovered by the Star showed that the cost had never been verified as claimed, and city staff believed it could actually be much higher but didn’t tell council that ahead of a crucial vote. Later, the cost of that subway option grew to overtake the available funds, pricing out any additional LRT.
When Doug Ford, the late mayor’s brother, became premier of Ontario, he resurrected the three-stop option approved years earlier, scrapping ongoing plans for the one-stop version. Construction of that estimated $5.5-billion subway — which has not been fully funded — has not yet started. The province estimates it could be completed in 2029 or 2030.
In TTC reports to the board to be discussed next week, staff note that the SRT is not currently fully functional, with only four of five cars in service and a plan to return to full service in October had been delayed. Though a future service plan assumes all five cars will be operational through 2025, the report notes that the SRT’s lifespan is “currently under review.”
In 2012, the city, TTC and Metrolinx signed an agreement to build a seven-stop LRT in the SRT corridor, replacing that service which at that time was said to be nearing the end of its life. Back then, Metrolinx was contractually obligated to pay the cost of the bus replacement service.
The TTC would not say Thursday who would cover the cost of any alternate transit now.
In a 2016 business case on the subway, city staff said “replacing the existing SRT vehicles with buses is not a desirable option.”
It outlined that bus replacement for the SRT during construction would require 63 additional buses and other infrastructure requirements such as a new bus facility to accommodate the additional fleet and expansion of the bus terminals at Scarborough Centre and Kennedy stations at a cost estimated at that time to be $171 million.
Give the gift of trusted news.
If you refuse to settle for second hand news and think that your loved ones shouldn’t either, give them the gift of the Star.
“The SRT shutdown would also result in slower and less reliable transit service,” the business case said, “which would be likely to deter users from using public transit.”
At executive committee Thursday, a report updated members that the cost of the Eglinton East LRT has nearly doubled, further pricing it out of the city’s transit expansion plan as it is not a provincial priority project.
Glenn de Baeremaeker, a former Scarborough councillor for the area and the mayor’s appointed “subway champion,” told the Star Thursday that closing the SRT before the subway is built is a “worst case scenario.”
“I would encourage the TTC and Scarborough councillors … to keep that SRT going if at all humanly possible,” he said, calling the SRT cars that have needed extensive repairs “literally Dinky toys.”
“I think the continuation of the SRT is essential, and if we can put people on the moon we should be able to figure out how to keep that dedicated line operating.”
One of my favourite railways, the Zilleralbahn, which I visited in 1983.
There is really nothing to compare this to in BC, though there could be some candidates, if our tourist authorities stop skiing at Whistler and actually craft a product other than winter skiing.
Running through a valley in a well to do rural area, the line is used by tourists and for commuter transport by local people. Railway enthusiasts from all over the world are attracted to it because of its use of steam engines on the narrow gauge railway.
Most of the passenger train services operate using modern diesel locomotives and railcars but the Zillertal Railway also has several steam locomotives which are used with heritage rolling stock for special trains targeting tourists. Goods traffic is carried; standard gauge wagons to and from the main line network are carried on transporter wagons.
In Jenbach the Zillertal Railway meets the ÖBB standard gauge line between Salzburg and Innsbruck and the metre gauge Achenseebahn. Jenbach is the only location in Austria where railways of three different track-gauges meet.
This is big news as Bombardier is the sole supplier of the proprietary, linear induction motor powered Movia Automatic Light Metro system used on the Expo and Millennium Lines. Alstom may or may not continue the production of the now stale dated Movia Light Metro and give notice to its customers that they will wind down production.
As Alstom will own the patents, the cost for MALM vehicles and spare parts may increase significantly.
The aged Movia family of light metro is now more expensive when compared to more modern transit mode, including light rail and only seven of the LIM powered light metros have been built since the late 70’s; with only three seriously used for urban transport.
So unpopular is MALM that its marketing name has been changed at least six times, over the past 40 or more years it has been on the market.
Vancouver is now the sole customer for MALM and if Alstom abandons production future planning for SkyTrain extensions will not be possible.
Does TransLink have a plan B? Do they really care?
2021 maybe the trigger that puts the carnival ride, called SkyTrain, into the history books.
Alstom-Bombardier deal to complete in January
INTERNATIONAL: Alstom and Bombardier announced on December 1 that they had received ‘all necessary regulatory approvals’ required to complete the sale of Bombardier Transportation to Alstom.
As a result the two companies expect the transaction to close on January 29 2021.
Alstom announced its intention to acquire 100% of Bombardier Transportation from Bombardier Inc and Caisse de Dépôt et Placement du Québec on February 17.
After Alstom offered a number of product and factory divestments to ensure competition in key market segments, the deal was approved by the European Commission on July 31.
Signing of the formal sale and purchase agreement was announced on September 16, when Alstom said the terms had been ‘adapted to the current situation’, reducing the anticipated price range to between €5·5bn and €5·9bn.
Under the deal, the acquisition is to be funded through a mix of cash and new Alstom shares. Around €2bn is being raised on the market, with CDPQ contributing €2·6bn to €2·8bn through a reserved capital increase. The Canadian investor currently holds 32·5% of Bombardier Transportation, and would become the largest shareholder in the enlarged Alstom group with a stake of approximately 18%.
TransLink, the Mayor’s Council on Transit and the provincial government should take serious note of the following, but they won’t. Riding in their cars, subsidized by generous car allowances and more, politicians remain oblivious to current issues and pretend nothing has happened.
For politicians it is “Do as I say, not as I do.”
In the spring, Zwei wrote a letter to the Premier and Ministers for Transportation about how Covid is changing ridership habits of people and that there would be better uses to spend $4.6 billion than for 12.8 km of rapid transit.
Zwei got no answer.
$4.6 billion to build 12.8 km of light metro won’t take cars off the road, will not reduce greenhouse gas emissions and will not be “green” transit.
Vancouver’s public transit system is just average; there is nothing special about it and now with Covid, people are changing their commuting habits.
Remote working from home is now growing in popularity, as well as staggered work hours and, of course, driving is the safest way to commute in our Covid stricken world.
My big fear is that there will be little money for transit fro the next decade and when the current Broadway subway and Fleetwood extension are finished, there will be little appetite for further transit improvement, as the taxpayer just will not have the money to pay for it.
Sadly, political ennui and political prestige have become the raison d’être for transit planing and not customer satisfaction and with public transit, as with any other consumer protect, if the customer thinks he/she gets good value for money, he/she will use it, but if the customer thinks that the transit product is substandard, he/she will avoid it. Former customers are avoiding our regional transit system in droves.
The transit customer is voting with their feet and the politicians remain blind, deaf and dumb at the results.
From the BBC
Why our reliance on cars could start booming
Although many have been off the road during lockdown, research is showing that the desire to drive may surge in a post-pandemic world.
Until earlier this year, Alley Vandenbergwas a regular bus rider. She’d wake up each morning and take line 15 from her apartment in the City Park neighbourhood of Denver, Colorado, to her office at a financial institution in the bustling Civic Center Plaza. Because the commute was just 2.5 miles (4km), the investment supervisor left her car at home so she could avoid the hassle of driving through the heart of downtown at rush hour. It also saved her the $200 cost of monthly parking. Then, the pandemic threw a major wrench into her seamless commute.
“In May, when my office started asking people to return, my bus route had been cut to fewer runs, and capped at 15 riders per bus,” she says. Pre-Covid-19, the bus was always standing room only by the time it got to her, “so I knew I would just end up sitting at the bus stop for an hour or two, watching buses go by because they were already at capacity”.
This, coupled with news of riders not following guidelines for mask-wearing and social distancing, led her to swallow the additional costs and commute to work by car.
She’s hardly alone in making the change. Ridership on public transport has plummeted to historic lows both in the Americas and Europe, including on the London Underground and New York City Subway. Meanwhile, recent reports suggest that, despite our apparent embrace of biking and walking during the pandemic, many people can’t wait to get back into their vehicles. And they might even use them more after Covid-19 passes. Transport planners warn that this rapid shift back to the comfort of cars may be setting the stage for post-pandemic gridlock that could hamper economic recovery in cities across the globe.
A November report by automotive-services company RAC claims that the pandemic may have set the UK back decades in attitudes of driving versus taking public transport. Out of the 3,000 car owners surveyed, 68% considered their vehicles essential for daily errands, up from 54% last year.
The pandemic had the effect of making drivers who already had cars realise that they would depend on them more – Rod Dennis
Reluctance to use public transport was at its highest in 18 years. Some 54% of respondents said safety was a top consideration, but only 43% agreed that they would use their cars less if public transport was improved, which was the lowest figure since 2002. “The pandemic had the effect of making drivers who already had cars realise that they would depend on them more than ever,” says Rod Dennis, a data-insight spokesperson for RAC. “The million-dollar question is whether or not this is a deep-rooted change.”
The generation that has been historically least interested in car ownership, Gen Z, may offer some clues. Auto Trader, a digital marketplace for cars, says 15% of its website audience in the UK between June and September was aged 18 to 24, compared to just 6% during the same period in 2019. Rory Reid, Auto Trader UK’s YouTube director, noted that “the pandemic has shifted young people’s views of car ownership and gotten them to hit the road earlier than usual, as they look to rely less on public transport and try to minimize risk of spreading coronavirus”.
The technology is coming, whether we acknowledge it or not.
The “Green” challenge is not taxing people out of their cars or airplanes, rather it is providing a reliable and user friendly “Green” transportation alternative.
Our politicians have not done that, on the contrary they still opt for “rubber on asphalt” politics, including hugely polluting light metro (the pollution from cement manufacture) and ignore using existing railways.
Currently the provincial NDP, Liberals, and Green parties and their civic acolytes are not “Green” at all, using the “Green” moniker as an election gimmick and tax grab.
What political party or politician is up for the challenge to make truly BC Green?
As it stands all we have talking heads: all talk the talk, but none walk the walk.
The future is friendly, sadly in BC, our politicians and bureaucrats cannot see 20 minutes into the future.
Fuel cell Mireo Plus H to be trialled in Baden-Württemberg
26 November 2020
GERMANY: Deutsche Bahn and Siemens Mobility are to trial a fuel cell powered regional trainset in revenue service between Tübingen, Horb and Pforzheim in 2024, along with a green hydrogen fuelling plant.
Siemens and Deutsche Bahn plan trial of hydrogen-powered train in Germany
Published Thu, Nov 26 2020
Siemens Mobility and Deutsche Bahn have laid out plans to develop and trial a hydrogen fuel-cell train, in the latest example of major firms turning to a technology which could have a significant effect on the environmental footprint of transportation systems.
According to a joint announcement issued earlier this week, the trial is slated to commence in 2024 and will see a train travel between Tübingen, Horb and Pforzheim in the southwest German state of Baden-Württemberg.
The prototype train, known as Mireo Plus H, will use a fuel-cell and lithium ion battery. Made up of two carriages, its range will extend to as much as 600 kilometers, or a little under 373 miles. It will boast a top speed of 160 kilometers per hour.
When the year-long pilot gets underway, the hydrogen train will take the place of a diesel one. It’s hoped the trial will save approximately 330 tons of carbon dioxide.
The collaboration will also look to work on the associated infrastructure the train will need.
To this end, Deutsche Bahn is to partially refit one of its maintenance shops to service the train and will also develop a fueling station for the vehicle.
Using electrolysis, water will be split into oxygen and hydrogen, with the latter compressed then stored in a mobile unit. The electricity used in this process will come from renewable sources.
Support for the initiative is coming from the state government of Baden-Württemberg. Funding is due to come from Germany’s Federal Ministry for Transport and Digital Infrastructure.
At the moment, Deutsche Bahn has approximately 1,300 diesel-powered trains being used on regional routes. In addition, around 40% of its sprawling 33,000 kilometer network is not yet electrified.
“Especially on non-electrified routes, hydrogen fuel cell propulsion can become a climate-friendly alternative to diesel propulsion,” Winfried Hermann, who is Baden-Württemberg’s minister of transport, said in a statement Monday. “Whether powered by overhead line electricity or hydrogen – the decisive factor is that the energy comes from renewable sources,” he added.
One of many projects
The partnership between Siemens Mobility and Deutsche Bahn comes at a time when a number of projects focused on hydrogen-powered transport are taking shape.
In comments sent to CNBC via email a spokesperson for Transport & Environment, a campaign group focused on clean transport, emphasized the need to ensure hydrogen was used in a mixture of transport options.
“Rail in Europe is already largely electrified, so it is not where the big environmental gains are to be made,” they said.
“We need hydrogen in transport where batteries aren’t possible,” they added. “First and foremost, that means shipping and aviation. For long-haul trucks, the race is wide open.”
The spokesperson went on to state: “The biggest obstacle facing us is making sure that hydrogen is made from clean electricity. Producing hydrogen from fossil gas is not clean. We need to make sure it’s based on additional, renewable electricity.”
Interest in green hydrogen — a term used to refer to hydrogen that’s produced using renewable sources such as wind and solar — has started to increase in recent years.
A number of major players such as Orsted and BP are undertaking projects looking at the sector, while the European Union has laid out plans to install 40 gigawatts of renewable hydrogen electrolysers and produce as much as 10 million metric tons of renewable hydrogen by 2030.
To put the EU’s goals into context, the International Energy Agency says global hydrogen production currently amounts to roughly 70 million metric tons per year.
Interesting that the numbers for LRT came via the TTC and the numbers for the subwaycame from the provincial government who wanted the subway.
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TramTrain and regional passenger train at station.
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