VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) — Close to half of bus riders have not returned to transit as TransLink resumed full services this past summer after limiting them in the early days of COVID-19.
Even fewer riders got back onboard the West Coast Express and TransLink is expecting revenue losses of $2 billion to $4.5 billion over the next 10 years, CEO Kevin Desmond said during a quarterly board meeting on Monday.
Overall, ridership is still down compared to pre-COVID levels, he added.
“These are probably a lot of people that can very easily work from home and continue to work from home,” Desmond said.
On buses — the most used transit service — ridership is down 43 per cent compared to before the pandemic.
“It has responded somewhat more quickly than the other ones, all the way down to West Coast Express, which has had the weakest ridership return,” Desmond said of buses.
Only 17 per cent of riders returned to the West Coast Express, while that for SkyTrain is about a third of what it was before.The Expo and Millenium lines are at 38 per cent ridership compared to that before COVID-19. The Canada Line is at 31 per cent ridership.
Seabus ridership is down 27 per cent, while that for HandyDart is down 35 per cent.
Ridership varies by region
According to TransLink, ridership varies by region to region, with fewer people in centralized areas — such as Vancouver — returning to transit, compared to the suburbs.
Ridership overall is down 39 per cent in the Vancouver-UBC area. That in Burnaby and New Westminster is down 37 per cent.
Ridership is down 42 per cent in the southwest area, 51 in the southeast, 37 in the northeast, and 55 in Maple Ridge and Pitt Meadows.
TransLink sought financial assistance from governments in April as revenue losses totalled about $75 million a month after introducing several measures to curb transmission of the virus, including read-door boarding and waiving fares.
Mayors look to increase ridership
TransLink initially planned to lay off about 1,500 employees, reduce senior executive salaries, and suspension of transit services, including buses, SkyTrain, SeaBus, and West Coast Express to cope with the revenue losses.
The federal government then provided about $540 million in direct aid to public transit in B.C.
TransLink then announced in August that masks or face-coverings are mandatory onboard transit vehicles.
With more people opting-out of taking transit and getting back into cars amid the pandemic, Metro Vancouver mayors are poised to consider how to increase ridership and decrease traffic.
A report set to be tabled at the Oct. 1 meeting of the Mayors’ Council on Regional Transportation points out some of the challenges TransLink is facing due to the pandemic.
Trams Having Limited Capacity On Broadway? – SURELY NOT!
- A repost from May 2019.
- With the the City of Vancouver and TransLink continued telling big porkies about LRT, the following is enlightening!
- Leipzig Tram
The ongoing planning charade currently being played out by the cities of Vancouver & Surrey, and TransLink with the proposed Broadway SkyTrain subway, is being fueled by professional misconduct, by all professionals and most politicians involved.
A notable exception is Vancouver City Councillor Colleen Hardwick.
Today, the message being relayed around the world is that the city of Vancouver lacks any modicum of professionalism, which is both a dark message for companies wanting to locate here, but also it sends a welcoming call to money launders, flim-flam artists and alike.
- A coupled set of trams in Leipzig.
Question) It is not possible to operate 36 trains per hour as traffic signals
will hold them back.
Answer) That’s the whole point of traffic light pre-emption. Which does not
*increase* the green phase for streetcars, but *shift* it in time. So
automobile traffic does not wait longer, it’s just different drivers who
wait, statistically.
If there’s no significant automobile traffic parallel to the
streetcar/light rail tracks (as typically the case in those “transit
malls”), you can even dynamically reduce the green phase for the trains
to the strict minimum required to clear the crossing (less than ten
seconds, even for a four-car set), which will actually *increase* the
green phase for crossing automobile traffic.
Right here next door, Leipzig is easily running 40 trains per hour on
sections shared by several routes. And the infrastructure is not
nearly at capacity, neither concerning trainset length (platform
length would allow 60m instead of 42m), nor concerning frequency. Other
operators do as well or even better. Karlsruhe’s 80 trains per hour are
running through a pedestrian street. Calgary’s transit mall precisely
seems to suffer from a lack of traffic light pre-emption, judging form
the videos.
Another example, from Czechia, the streetcar at Prague. The section
from Karlovo Namesti east to I.P.Pavolova carries the routes
4: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
6: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
10: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
16: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
22: 4 min 15 trains/h
That’s 45 trains per hour.
The tracks from Karlovo Namesti to the north carry the routes
3: 4 min 15 trains/h
6: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
14: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
18: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
22: 4 min 15 trains/h
24: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
That’s 60 trains per hour.
The tracks from Karlovo Namesti to the south carry the routes
3: 4 min 15 trains/h
4: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
10: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
14: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
16: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
18: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
24: 8 min 7.5 trains/h
That’s 45 trains per hour as well.
All figures given are for the morning peak. There are various other
networks in Europe that have similarly dense operation on sections
shared by several routes. 40 trains/h is not uncommon.
Question) In a subway, 31 trains are possible per hour with 14,640 passengers.
Answwer) Boston’s green line is running 40 trains per hour, 90 second frequency. On
sight in the tunnel, without ATC. Four branches, six minutes frequency
each. They are running four-car trainsets for events so the platforms
would be long enough.
HST Madness!
When boys and girls play trains, especially high speed trains (HST) it is best they read a book on the subject before they embarrass themselves.
Obviously, the “academics and urban planners, who believe such an infrastructure investment” have not read a book on the subject and are completely ignorant of the massive construction needed for HST! No wonder they remain nameless!
Could this be a sop to obtain government funding to plan for the impossible?
Nice if you can con the government for cash!
Could it be nothing more than a simple scam, like a pyramid scheme?
A pyramid transit scheme, been there done that with the Broadway subway!
No knowledgeable academic, bureaucrat or professional would ever endorse such a scheme before asking themselves the following questions:
- The cost for such a scheme. High speed trains require straight track with both very wide horizontal curvature and very long vertical curvature which would require tens of billions of dollars in tunneling and viaducts. You are looking at $200 million to $600 million/km. to build, extending the SkyTrain light-metro network, the cost for HST would easily be more.
- Is there the ridership demand for this? Will there be full trains traveling every 15 minutes, seven days a week, 352 days a year?
- Where is the funding coming from?
HST Madness!
How much will it cost to build, greenfields construction, a 250 km plus, HST route, which demands complete grade separation, built on viaduct or tunnel?
It is common knowledge that TransLink does not like any affordable rail link for the Fraser Valley.
Sadly, with our gullible lot of politicians at the helm, they may succeed.
Over 200 km of viaduct or tunnels will be needed for a Chilliwack to Whistler HST route. What will the cost be?
60-minute train: High-speed rail proposal linking Whistler, Vancouver, and Fraser Valley
Oct 5 2020
Imagine performing an end-to-end trip between Whistler and Chilliwack, and the destinations in between, within an hour on a regional high-speed rail line reaching up to 300 km/hr.
That is the connectivity vision for Mountain Valley Express (MVX) by a new local advocacy group comprised of academics and urban planners, who believe such an infrastructure investment — linking the Sea to Sky Corridor, Metro Vancouver, and the Fraser Valley — will provide a lasting economic engine and a “leaner, greener restart” for BC after COVID-19.
For the rest of the story, please click here
The Same Sad Old Story
Again, one just has to shake ones head.
Our politicians, abetted by TransLink do the same thing over and over again, ever expecting different results.
The very sad thing is, our politicians and news media do not have a clue what light rail is as evidenced by the banner photo, which is of a diesel multiple Unit, used on the Duetsche Bundesbahn or German railways and not light rail at all.
Baffling’ light rail not considered needed, says Delta MLA
It makes zero sense the growing south of Fraser region has no prospect for light rapid transit.
Delta South Liberal MLA Ian Paton had to say following the New Democrat government’s announcement last week that a $1.7 billion contract has been awarded for the Broadway subway project in Vancouver.
That contract is to design, construct and partially finance the project. Construction will begin in fall 2020, with the line in service in 2025.
The 5.7-kilometre extension of the Millennium Line from VCC-Clark Station to Broadway and Arbutus in Vancouver has a total budget of $2.83 billion.
Meanwhile, the transportation minister contends there’s no foreseeable need for light rail south of the Fraser, an area not well served by transit, complained Paton.
“It has always been understood that a new crossing – bridge or tunnel – would include future capacity for light rail. With the forethought of extension into the Fraser Valley region, rail expansion was a central component of the previous B.C. Liberal bridge plan. It is baffling to me that Claire Trevena has insinuated that light rail will not be necessary for this crossing. For a government that claims to care about reducing GHG emissions and getting people out of their cars, this is extremely short-sighted,” said Paton.
“We are now paying more money for a smaller crossing that will be at capacity by the time it is built, which at this rate will be 2030 or beyond. We need to be bold in our approach to B.C.’s economic recovery from COVID-19 and I believe the shovel-ready George Massey Bridge replacement, with capacity for future light rail, is the project needed now to help re-invigorate our economy,” he said.
Transportation and Infrastructure Minister Claire Trevena’s in a CBC radio interview earlier this year was asked about the possibility of adding light rail with George Massey Tunnel replacement, answering there’s no foreseeable need.
Following her comment, Delta Mayor George Harvie said he was shocked.
“Insofar as no need for light rail, I’m shocked. I’m working with my fellow mayors. We’re looking at what the next 20-to-30 years is going to require, and light rail is needed south of the Fraser. With all the people that we have coming, most of them are going to be residing and relocating to south of the Fraser where the properties are a little less expensive. But again, I’m shocked. I just drove the tunnel, as you know, and it’s a tough drive….we need to get people out of their cars and if we’re not thinking in the future, we’re going to have problems here,” he said.
Talking about the progress of the tunnel replacement, Trevena was asked why consideration wasn’t being given to accommodate a rapid transit line.
“The bus route that comes from White Rock/South Surrey is a hugely, hugely popular bus route and TransLink is very clearly very pleased the way this works. But there really isn’t the need, and will not be the need. Transit planners have looked at this. There will not be the need for a light rail system, or anything like that, for the foreseeable future. I mean, they’re doing long-term planning. What they do see is frequent buses. They see that capacity. The opportunity is there and we can have the capacity for it. So, let’s get people into the buses, get people moving that way, because that is the way that sustainably we can move forward,” she explained.
Noting he has had a good working relationship with the minister, Harvie said he’s spoken with his fellow mayors, and the region’s transportation staff re aware of the need, while his staff have been looking at the future closure of the Vancouver Landfill and how it can be turned into a future transit hub.
Harvie added, “One of the reasons we’re in a mess is because politicians 20, 30 years ago were not brave enough to make a decision with regards to getting moving on these major projects.”
The Delta Chamber of Commerce expressed support for Harvie’s idea, saying it encourages TranLink’s Mayors’ Council and the province to continue exploring the concept.
Should We Convert The Canada Line to Light Rail?
Updated for 2020
With Covid-19, this becomes more important than ever.
Right now we have a Hobson’s choice for regional rail transit, extend the Millennium and Expo Lines and continue using the proprietary Movia Automatic Light Metro or nothing.
This must change and change soon, or the hugely expensive SkyTrain light metro system will become largely irrelevant; a museum piece dedicated to political corruption, professional ennui and public hubris.
The public just cannot afford throwing billions more at rapid transit for so little return.
First posted by zweisystem on Thursday, October 11, 2012
The proposed new tunnel that is planned to replace the George Massey Tunnel is on the back burner. Premier John Horgan cancelled the Liberal vanity project and a more reasonable solution has been made.
Replacing the tunnel with a larger a larger tunnel will only send the gridlock to the next choke point, Steveston Highway and ultimately the Oak Street & Knight Street bridges. This will cause massive congestion if traffic through the tunnel 
when highway traffic is expanded.
What is needed is a a rail transit solution that works and can be readily and affordably extended to meet the needs of the ever growing population South of the Fraser River.
The proprietary SkyTrain light metro system and the light metro philosophy of operation has done very little in attracting the motorist from the car. The light-metro’s high ridership can be attributed mostly to recycling of bus customers who are forced to transfer from bus to metro to complete ones journey to Vancouver/Burnaby.
SkyTrain has done little to ease congestion in the METRO Vancouver area.
The proprietary SkyTrain light-metro system is just too expensive to build and it just cannot be extended affordably into the outer suburbs to attract new customers. The extremely high costs of rapid transit has made rubber on asphalt solutions cheaper than improving regional transportation, as evidenced by the many highway expansion projects underway in the Metro Vancouver region. As new highways are built, auto use increases, with the only barrier against increased auto use being road capacity.
Extremely myopic regional planning, shows Metro Vancouver’s complete ineptitude when it comes to regional transportation as transit planning is based on 70 year old concepts, when fanciful monorails, metros and subways were all the rage.
What was “de rigor” in 1960 is not just passe in 2020, it is obsolete.
Sadly, this short sighted and extremely dated planning, will only lead to more gridlock and traffic chaos.
The Canada Line is a heavy-rail metro, operating ROTEM’s electrical multiple Units (EMU’s), but built as a light metro, with very limited capacity. The Canada Line’s automatic operation, complete with small stations and 40 to 50 metre long platforms gives roughly slightly more than half the capacity of the Expo and Millennium Lines, which stations have 80 metre long platforms. The capacity constrained Canada Line has hamstrung future attempts capacity to meet tomorrow’s transit demands.
To both increase capacity on the Canada Line and to increase its reach into Richmond in an effort to attract more ridership,would cost a minimum of $2 billion.
$2 billion would buy you about 80 km. (at about $25 mil/km.) of modern LRT!
That $2 billion would be put to better use by:
- Converting the Canada Line hybrid heavy/light metro to light rail.
- Increasing North/South capacity by using the Arbutus Corridor.
- With the money saved by much cheaper LRT construction, extend the the new Canada Line LRT across the Fraser river into Delta and South Surrey.
This is not whimsical musings, rather it very well may be a transit solution that TransLink or a future operating authority may seriously consider.
The Canada line is in a conventional railway and most modern light rail vehicles would easily operate within the Rotem EMU’s Kinematic Envelope.
(Kinematic Envelope: the space that a rail vehicle could potentially occupy as it moves laterally and vertically on its suspension.)
The expensive and complicated automatic signalling system should be replaced with much simpler and more robust signalling system, doing away with the higher operating costs of automatic signalling.
Retain third rail power pick on the elevated and underground portions of the line by equipping, as done before on other transit lines, the trams with retractable shoes to collect power from the third rail and using standard pantographs on non-guideway portions of the line. Simply, the first station the tram stops at on the guideway portion of the line the driver drops the pan and deploys the
power collection shoes. Several tram varieties on the market today have dual pantograph/shoe for power pick up on APS ground level contact-less power supply.
By converting the Canada Line to LRT would make the cost of extending the Canada Line, first to Steveston and Ironwood Mall an affordable option. It would also be much cheaper to build with LRT for a new crossing of the Fraser River to serve both Ladner and South Delta; then onwards to South Surrey.
The cost to extend the Canada line to Steveston and Ironwood Mall (about 11 .3 km.), should cost no more than $400 million and the CN rail line bisecting Richmond is reported up for sale for $65 million, probably much cheaper if it was used for transit. It is conceivable that for the cost of the Canada Line extending to Steveston and the Ironwood Mall, we could build LRT to both Steveston and the Ironwood Mall, then through a tunnel under the Fraser River to Ladner and the Tsawwassen ferry terminal!
To increase capacity of the capacity limited trunk line to downtown Vancouver, the Canada Line can branch onto the existing and seldom used former interurban route, owned by the CPR to New Westminster, To access downtown Vancouver, using the Arbutus corridor and Granville Street bridge, which was designed for trams. This could be done quite cheaply for under $20 million/km.
It is time for TransLink to start planning for light rail for the region. SkyTrain, with construction costs exceeding $200 million/km. just cannot be built economically into the burbs, but modern LRT, with construction costs as low as $6 million/km. (TramTrain) can. Regional politicians must be made to understand that building with SkyTrain and/or light-metro has been a mistake and that we must plan future transit on the light rail model. The regional politicians who make up METRO Vancouver should tell TransLink either change their transit planning direction and for a start, seriously look at converting the Canada Line to LRT and extend it through Richmond, with plans to build it across the Fraser River to Delta and beyond.
Flying a Trial Balloon
Trial balloon: A tentative measure taken or statement made to see how a new policy will be received.
As the Daily Hive seems to be the official organ of TransLink, it comes as no surprise that a trial balloon is floated regarding an elevated SkyTrain to UBC.
The first problem is that Vancouver City Council, horrified at the ugly elevated guideway in New Westminster, Burnaby and East Vancouver, passed a by-law banning an elevated guideways within the city.
An elevated light-metro guideway would be political suicide for MP’s and MLA’s in the riding’s it passed, it would also be political suicide for any Vancouver Councillor or mayor supporting this option.
What is of interest is the reposting of this almost year old story and I would surmise, it was done to take the spotlight off of the current subway controversy.
Other than a bureaucratic make work project for under employed Translink planners, an elevated SkyTrain trundling to and fro to UBC is a non stater.
SkyTrain, a nice fit over Broadway?
UBC SkyTrain route options examined along 8th Avenue and East Mall
Jan 24 2019
It’s a near certainty that if SkyTrain were to be extended all the way to the University of British Columbia, the section between Arbutus Street and Alma Street will be tunnelled under West Broadway.
There will be subway stations at Macdonald Street and Alma Street to serve the immediate areas and provide bus connections.
But west of Alma Street within Point Grey, the University Endowment Lands (UEL), and UBC, the route is far from certain and obvious at this early stage of planning.
According to the findings of the new detailed technical analysis released by TransLink earlier this week, rapid transit west of Arbutus Street to UBC needs to be SkyTrain to ensure the system is built with future-proof capacity. The final decision on rail technology lies with the Mayors’ Council.
However, if SkyTrain is chosen, the report reveals there are several route and built form options SkyTrain could take from Alma Street to the ultimate terminus at UBC’s Point Grey campus.
“The SkyTrain extension would be the one technology that would provide sufficient long-term capacity to meet the needs,” said Geoff Cross, the Vice-President of Planning and Policy for TransLink, during today’s Mayors’ Council meeting.
The main questions are now: “How much of it is elevated versus tunneled and what key land uses do you need to hit? Where are the stations located? What would the exact corridor be?”
Oh Where, Oh Where Has Our Customers Gone………………..
TransLink must soon face a very unpleasant truth, Metro Vancouver’s transit system is crap; it is strictly a commuters transit system, with, except for the core of City of Vancouver, there is little off-peak usage.
The transit system is designed to feed the light-metro system and because of this, TransLink, as BC Transit before. has been overstating ridership for decades.
Metro Vancouver’s transit system is user unfriendly, with nothing about the system that attracts ridership.
Then add the Covid-19 fact that people’s work habits are changing, with many working from home or commuting by car to satellite offices, not in the downtown.
People, for health reasons are still commuting by car and for the elderly, they are just avoiding transit altogether.
This is not going to change any time soon, but the politicians, who have drunk their own bathwater for so long, haven’t a clue to the realities of metro Vancouver’s public transit system.
The old finical model for the SkyTrain light-metro network was deferring costs for the next generation to pay, the problem now, the next generation doesn’t want to commute, nor take transit. Trying to shove a square peg into a round hole, best describes current transit planning and the next generation, burdened with the aftermath of Covid-19, will have little sympathy for those who demanded a hugely expensive, inflexible and now obsolete transit system.
By the way, notice how TransLink’s CEO uses percentage and not the real numbers?
My guess is, real numbers would illustrate how devastating ridership has fallen, so much so, to give politicians pause, to rethink $4.6 billion to extend the Expo and Millennium Lines a mere 12.8 km.
User-unfriendly, very expensive to operate and maintain and inflexible in operation will be the final epitaph of Vancouver’s light metro system.
Metro Vancouver transit ridership hasn’t recovered from COVID-19: TransLink CEO
by Paul James
Are You A Transit Expert? 15 Questions.
Here are ten questions to test the knowledge of political candidates about LRT & public transit in May’s provincial election. Passing grade is 70%.
- What is light rail transit?
- What Makes a tram or Streetcar Light Rail
- What is a metro?
- What is capacity?
- What grade maximum is now industry standard for light rail?
- What is the maximum grade that LRT/tram climbs (by adhesion) in revenue service today?
- What is the capacity of the Broadway B-Line Express Bus?
- Approximately what percentage of operating costs of a transit system can be attributed to wages?
- Approximately how much ridership is lost per transfer?
- Are automated transit systems cheaper to operate than non automated transit systems?
- What is the maximum capacity of the largest light rail vehicle today, calculated at all seats filled and standing passengers at four persons per square metre?
- How many names has the SkyTrain, as used on the Millennium and Expo Lines, been marketed under?
- Before the first subway was built in Toronto, what was the maximum capacity obtained by using trams on the streetcar system?
- What is the maximum legal Capacity of the SkyTrain system?
- What is considered the maximum capacity obtained by a streetcar or tram route?
A coupled set of PCC cars operating on Toronto's Bloor St.
Answers:
1) LRT is a transit mode, generally electrically powered, able to operate in mixed traffic, that can economically carry between 2,000 and 20,000 persons per hour per direction.
2) The dedicated or “reserved” rights-of-way, enables a modern tram to have an operation almost on par with a heavy rail metro.
3) Metro is a grade separated transit mode, electrically powered, built for average hourly ridership loads in excess of 15,000 pphpd. LRT can be operated as a metro, though a metro can’t operate as light rail!
4) Capacity is a function of headway and car capacity.
5) 8%
6) 13.8% (Lisbon, Portugal) – (Correct if one answers 13% or 14%)
7) Based on TransLink’s schedule of peak hour 3 minute headway’s (20 trips per hour per direction) and bus capacity of around 100 persons, the hourly capacity of the Broadway B-line Express bus is around 2,000 per hour per direction.
8 ) 70%
9) 70%
10) No, studies have found that LRT is cheaper to operate, when comparing equal systems.
11) 350 passengers; the 54 metre long ‘Caterpillar’ modular light rail cars used in Budapest, Hungary. (By comparison, four Mk.1 SkyTrain cars have a capacity of 300 persons!)
12) At least six: Intermediate Capacity Transit system (ICTS); Advanced Light Rail Transit (ALRT); Advanced Light metro (ALM); Advanced Rapid Transit (ART); Innovia Light Metro (ILM) ; Movia Automatic Light Metro (MALM).
13) The old Danforth Boor streetcar route, operating coupled sets of PCC cars obtained a peak hour capacity in excess of 12,500 pphpd.
14) The maximum legal capacity of the Expo and Millennium Lines, according to Transport Canada’s Operating Certificate is 15,000 pphpd.
15) Over 30,000 pphpd on Kaiserstrasse in Karlsruhe Germany. Due to the success of its regional TramTrain network, Kaiserstrasse saw peak hour headways of 40 seconds with coupled sets of trams and TramTrains. So congested was the route it was nicknamed the “gelbe wand” or yellow wall by locals (yellow being the predominate colour of the trams). Soon a new subway will replace the route.
The gelbe wand - Karlsruhe, Germany.
From September 2010 – The Groundbreaking Leewood Study
On September 20, 2010, Rail for the Valley unreleased the groundbreaking Leewood Study regarding the reinstatement of a passenger service using the former BC Electric, now Southern Railway of BC route.
Why Groundbreaking?
The Leewood Study was the first and only independent study done on passenger rail for the Fraser Valley, without political or bureaucratic bias.
The Leewood Study shows the way how passenger rail should be reinstated on the former passenger rail route.
Today, more passenger passenger rail services are being restored on previously abandoned passenger routes; more passenger rail services are being restored on routes long abandoned and now rebuilt. Today politicians and planners see both the wisdom and economy of using existing railway infrastructure as a means to affordably extend passenger services to areas otherwise unreachable due to cost.
The vision was there a decade ago and the vision remains for the Fraser Valley, the question is; “Do politicians and planners in Metro Vancouver have the vision beyond there own parochial politics?”
The following is the Leewood Study’s costs for reinstating passenger rail, adjusted to 2020 dollars.
Total:$1.171 billion!
$2.9 billion less than the estimated cost of the 12.8 km extensions to the Expo and Millennium Lines!
From 2010
Groundbreaking report on Interurban light rail – released TODAY
Posted by Rail for the Valley on Monday, September 20, 2010
UPDATE:
Major media coverage of the reportCBC News Video: Light rail recommended for Fraser Valley
Rail for the Valley – Breakfast Television on City TV
Langley Times editorial – Speed up transit decisions
Langley Advance: Study lauds light rail
Chilliwack Times: Report supports light rail: ‘An honest accounting’ of the potential transit system
Chilliwack Times: Mayor remains mum on latest rail system study
Abbotsford Times: Report supports valley light rail
Surrey Leader, Richmond Review, Delta Leader, Abbotsford News & Chilliwack Progress: More ammo for light rail service through Valley
Chilliwack Progress: Regional transportation needs ‘holistic’ approach
Surrey Leader Editorial: We should get on track (Frank Bucholtz)
North Shore News: Valley residents on track with light rail
Vancouver Province: Valley light rail all go, twin groups claim
News 1130: Commuter rail service to the Valley is affordable – study
Rail For The Valley is extremely excited to announce the release of a comprehensive independent analysis of the potential for light rail service on the existing and publicly owned Interurban Rail Corridor, connecting communities from Chilliwack to Vancouver with an affordable, sustainable public transportation system. The study, now complete, was performed by Leewood Projects.
About Leewood Projects:
Leewood Projects is a British-based company that has professional expertise in light rail solutions, providing comprehensive project management and planning services to the international railway industry. Leewood Projects has i the past had involvement in prestigious rail projects such as the Channel Tunnel.
Highlights of the the report:
- TramTrain technology: Track-sharing the existing Interurban rail line with freight operations.
- 20 minute (peak), 30 minute (off-peak) all-day service.
- An analysis of the track and needed upgrades.
- Railway stations designed as community gathering points. 10 full stations and 8 Tram Stops.
- A detailed Journey Time matrix for stops along the line.
- Total journey time between Surrey Scott Rd. SkyTrain Station and downtown Chilliwack: 90.5 minutes.
- Future proposed expansions of the line: Downtown Vancouver (Stage 2) and Rosedale (Stage 3).
- A detailed capital cost breakdown for the entire project.
Total capital costs (2010):Stage 1 Phase 1 (Diesel Light Rail) 98 km Scott Rd. – Chilliwack: $492 millionStage 1 Phase 2 (Electrification) 98 km Scott Rd. – Chilliwack: $114 millionStage 2 Proposal – 28 km Extension to Downtown Vancouver: $363 millionStage 3 Proposal – 12 km Extension to Rosedale: $28 millionThis is the most comprehensive light rail study ever undertaken in this province, performed by a company with professional expertise in light rail solutions. This report at long last provides us with an honest accounting of the potential for light rail service on the Interurban corridor.
-John Buker, Founder, Rail For The Valley
Transit lessons unlearned – A repost from Jan. 2009
First posted in 2009.
More than a decade later, these lessons have still not been learned. It is sheer negligence on the part of TransLink, the Mayor’s Council on Transit, and the Ministry of Transportation, that they remain ignorant of what was commonly known elsewhere, not just a decade or so ago, rather three decades ago.
Ignorance of the truth, is not a defense.
Lesson #1
In the very early 1980’s, the Ontario Conservative Party (the William Davis Government) tried to force the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) to build with the new Intermediate Capacity Transit System or ICTS, now known as SkyTrain; produced by the Urban Transit Development Corporation (UTDC) an Ontario crown corporation. The TTC commissioned a comprehensive study comparing streetcars/LRT and metro with ICTS. The results were not encouraging to those wishing to sell ICTS and even gave the City of Hamilton enough ammunition to reject the Ontario provincial government lead, construction of ICTS in the city. The TTC transit study, the Accelerated Rapid Transit Study or ‘ARTS’ found that:
“ICTS costs anything up to ten times as much as a conventional light-rail line to install, for about the same capacity; or put another way, ICTS costs more than a heavy-rail subway, with four times its capacity.”
ICTS was dead in the water as a product, so UTDC did what every other manufacturer does when faced with this dilemma, they changed the name from ICTS to ALRT or Advanced Light Rail Transit and sold the unsalable ICTS to some political rubes out West, namely Bill Bennett and Grace McCarthy, the leader and deputy leader of the British Columbia Social Credit Party and the rest, as they say, is history.
Toronto’s ICTS system, one of two built.
Lesson #2
In the 1980’s there was much debate between modern light-rail and many proprietary transit systems being offered for sale, which included the SkyTrain ICTS/ALRT automatic light-metro. Many claims were made by the owners of various proprietary transit systems being offered for sale, about the effectiveness of their transit systems. In 1991, Gerald Fox a noted American transit specialist, produced a study comparing light-rail and automatic guided transit (AGT) systems including SkyTrain and the French VAL light-metro system. The study concluded that despite the hype and hoopla of the promoters of AGT systems, there was no benefit in building with more expensive AGT. These conclusions were not lost on American and European transit planners, who wanted ‘the best bang for the buck’ and the desire to build prestigious and expensive light-metro systems waned from the mid 90’s until the present day.
Conclusions from Gerald Fox’s A Comparison Between Light Rail And Automated Transit Systems. (1991)
- Requiring fully grade separated R-O-W and stations and higher car and equipment costs, total construction costs is higher for AGT than LRT. A city selecting AGT will tend to have a smaller rapid transit network than a city selecting LRT.
- There is no evidence that automatic operation saves operating and maintenance costs compared to modern LRT operating on a comparable quality of alignment.
- The rigidity imposed on operations by a centralized control system and lack of localized response options have resulted in poor levels of reliability on AGT compared to the more versatile LRT systems.
- LRT and AGT have similar capacities capabilities if used on the same quality of alignment. LRT also has the option to branch out on less costly R-O-W.
- Being a product of contemporary technology, AGT systems carry with them the seeds of obsolescence.
- Transit agencies that buy into proprietary systems should consider their future procurement options, particularly if the original equipment manufacturer were to cease operations.
Today TransLink and the provincial government still make unfounded claims of superior operation for SkyTrain (if it doesn’t snow) and denounces LRT as a poor-man’s rapid transit system. Nothing could be further than the truth and it still seems TransLink and the SkyTrain lobby have failed to read and understand transit lessons, taught almost two decades ago!
France’s VAL system, a commemorate of today’s Movia Automatic Light Metro, a.k.a. SkyTrain.
Is TGV Coming To The North Shore?
Yesterday’s NDP pre election telly-op on local television stations of the standard TransLink fare of having five options for rapid transit to the North Shore showed some very strange animations.
Instead of animations of SkyTrain trundling through tunnels, it showed TGV style trains instead.
One wonders if the NDP are going to have surprise announcement of 300 kph TGV trains whisking transit customers from Waterfront Station to Lonsdale?
So, is the NDP secretly planning for TGV or high speed trains or was it all a pre election photo/telly-op, using cheap props because in reality any rapid transit to the North Shore is a minimum of 30 years away?
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