Off The Rails – Part 2
I have issues with all of these projects as most have wandered from being light rail and instead become a light-metro.
Part of the 19km Eglinton Crosstown LRT is in a 6 km subway and the costs of subway construction is huge. Though the line does operate as classic LRT on portions of line a 6 km subway puts it in the much more expensive ‘light-metro’ category.
The 10.3 km Finch LRT has two underground stations and with subway access for trains, would add to the already bloated costs.
Calgary’s 19 km Green Line also included 4km of subway and as we all know, once you start going underground costs rise exponentially.
The Expo line extension Langley started as a $1.65 billion LRT project and now has climbed to a $7 billion (including OMC#5) light-metro project.
The article did not delve deep enough, as the entire 21.7 km extension package of both the Expo and Millennium (Broadway subway) Lines has now climbed beyond $16 billion!
Ottawa’s fiasco is strictly politcal in nature and I am puzzled at calling the light rail vehicles used in Ottawa, “unproven technology” as the tram has evolved over a time span of 150 or more years. This sound more like blaming “that mysterious other person” routine from six year olds, rather than trying to honestly understand and fix the situation.
In Canada, light rail is rather a novelty, as there are only three actually in operation (Toronto being a classic streetcar system), with Edmonton’s and Calgary’s LRT being modeled on German Stadtbahn, before the term LRT came into general use.
Most bureaucrats, planners and engineers, tend to use extremely dated information about light rail and most confuse it with a streetcar and make assumptions based on ignorance.
Until Canadian Universities have faculties in “Urban Transport” and offer degrees in Urban Transportation, I think we will continues to see huge costs for what should be much simpler light rail installation. Except for a small cadre of transit specialists, like our Mr. Cow, many transit projects design teams will base their planning on faulty assumptions, based on dated information (example: a local transportation engineer recently told me that LRT cannot travel faster than a bus and holds back traffic, yet he failed to take into account of the tram using a dedicated R-o-W which LRT operates on) and studies 40 to 50 years ago, with the resulting high costs and disappointing operation.
Six transit projects that went off the rails
Eglinton Crosstown LRT, Toronto
When construction on the 19-kilometre light-rail project across midtown began in 2011, the project was budgeted at $11-billion for building it and a generation of operations, and expected to be complete in nine years. However, just over 13 years in, estimated costs have risen to $12.8-billion and the date it will enter service remains elusive.
What went wrong? The list is lengthy and includes some huge issues, such as the COVID-19 pandemic and attendant supply chain shortages and labour constraints, as well as small ones, such as fixing work that wasn’t done properly. Throughout, a fractious relationship between Metrolinx and the consortium of international companies that are actually building the line has brought the two parties to court repeatedly.
Finch LRT, Toronto
A surface light-rail line on Finch Avenue, running about 10 kilometres west from a subway station at Keele Street, began construction in 2019 and appeared to be on track to open in 2023.
However, Metrolinx announced in 2023 that the opening for the $3.4-billion project had been pushed to the first half of 2024, and then the second half of the year.
Then, in August, 2024, the companies building the line filed suit against Ontario Infrastructure and Lands Corp. and Metrolinx. The suit has spawned a flurry of counteractions and Metrolinx does not currently have a public target date for the line opening.
Hazel McCallion LRT, Peel Region
The Hurontario-Main LRT became the 18-kilometre long Hurontario LRT when city council in Brampton, Ont., voted in 2015 to keep it out of downtown. Instead, the line will end more than three kilometres south of the city-centre GO train station.
A project originally described as costing $1.2-billion to build was by 2019 expected to run $5.6-billion, including 30 years of operations and maintenance. It was later renamed after former Mississauga mayor Hazel McCallion and was scheduled to open in 2024.
But in June, the builders reported delays owing to track procurement and construction issues. And then S&P Global Ratings warned in October the builders risked being downgraded over the prospect of the project not finishing this year.
There is no official opening date.
Green Line LRT, Calgary
In 2021, the city, Alberta and Ottawa agreed to fund the first part of an LRT line eventually planned to stretch 46 kilometres. But this past summer, facing growing costs, city council voted to reduce the length of the line and boost its budget by $700-million, to about $6.2-billion.
The province, which had earlier promised its $1.53-billion funding commitment was secure, dismissed the short version as too expensive and serving too few people. It pulled its money, effectively killing the project.
But then, early in October, the province and the city announced a new deal. The scope of the project scope has changed again and there is no longer an opening date. The two levels of government were still haggling over the route, and who would handle cost overruns, with a January provincial deadline looming for city council to approve the plan.
Surrey Langley SkyTrain, British Columbia
This project would extend the subway-like Expo Line 16 kilometres past Surrey, through a fast-growing area of suburban Vancouver, to terminate in Langley. The elevated route was intended to open in 2028 and cost $4-billion.
The extension has been formally on the books since 2014, but its business case was not approved until 2022, when the pandemic was still front of mind and inflation rising. Despite that, the provincial government blamed unforeseen circumstances for a 50-per-cent cost increase revealed last year.
In the same release, the B.C. government announced that the project, as well as costing nearly $6-billion, would also open a year late.
Confederation Line LRT, Ottawa
The line was budgeted at $2.1-billion, including 30 years of maintenance. It was a fixed-price contract, putting the builders on the hook for cost overruns. The line was expected to open in May, 2018, a promise that was modified four times before the line began operating in late 2019.
After a public inquiry, Justice William Hourigan issued a scathing report in 2022 that called out serious failures by the builders and city government.
He blamed the city for choosing “an essentially new vehicle based on unproven technology.” He found deadlines were unrealistic, that problems with testing were hushed up and that political pressure pushed the line into service.
Off The Rails Part 1
The following is from the Globe and Mail and attempts to address costly issues building rail transit in Canada.
I think three issues are paramount. First major transit projects in Canada are built to win elections and tend to be gold plated, with little consideration about actually providing a user-friendly transit service. Second, there is no standard for transit systems, thus in Canada, most light rail systems tend to be much more expensive light-metro systems and the term light-metro has all but but disappeared from the Canadian transit lexicon. Third, lack of due diligence as the government shovels out billions of dollars for transit, but there is zero due diligence as to what the politician’s and transit authority wants and the actual product they will get.
A good example is now the $16 billion investment extending the Expo and Millennium Line 21.7 KM, yet both extensions will attract very few new customers to transit, catering to traffic loads that buses can easily carry.
We hear all sorts of terms such as rapid transit (heavy rail metro) rail rapid transit (anything you want it to be) light rapid transit (again can mean anything you want it to be), which adds to the public’s and most politician’s confusion.
Calling Montreal’s REM light rail instead of being called what it really is, a light-metro is a classic example.
The current BC NDP government and TransLink’s spiel about new BRT lines, which are really BRT “light” or just tarted up B-99 Express buses is another example of a “bait and switch” transit planning.
A final note; the Canada Line is used as an example of a good transit project coming in on time and on budget, yet the Canada Line is the only heavy-rail metro in the world, built as a light metro, having less capacity than a modern tram or streetcar costing a fraction to build. Also the now around $150 million annual operating fee charged by the SNC Lavalin lead consortium, operating the Canada Line has greatly added to is initial cost.
I doubt this system would have passed any true due diligence or independent peer review.
Dud on the tracks
Across Canada, much-needed transit projects are indefinitely delayed and way over budget. Why? Political micromanagement and public-private partnerships each play a big role.
Canadians waiting for new transit could be forgiven for feeling like Charlie Brown having the football snatched away. The opening dates for major projects slip repeatedly, and sometimes disappear entirely. When will the $13-billion Eglinton Crosstown LRT line in Toronto open? No one knows.
These difficulties are not unique to Canada. The English-speaking world is rife with examples of hugely expensive and delayed transit projects. But the problems pose a challenge to political leaders as cities grow rapidly, straining already clogged roads.
Building more roads doesn’t reduce congestion, decades of research shows. The only way to do that is to give people options that don’t require driving. Transit is far more efficient at moving people than personal automobiles. But first it has to get built, and people have to have enough confidence that will happen to be willing to support the disruption and cost of construction.
As Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservative government touts Toronto’s new Ontario Line subway project, part of the biggest transit-building effort in provincial history, the government is undermined by the awkward fact that it has opened no Toronto-area transit lines during the party’s more than six years in power.
The provincial government announced in early December that Phil Verster, the embattled chief executive officer of Ontario’s public transit agency, Metrolinx, would be resigning. However, he will be replaced by the CEO of a Crown agency that has worked closely already with Metrolinx on transit delivery, suggesting that the switch does not portend a radical change in direction.
Also in December, a report from four researchers at the University of Toronto’s School of Cities shows that the cost per kilometre to build rail transit in Canada is more than 60 per cent higher than the global average. The authors, who blame this on factors including designs that are overbuilt and the heavy use of consultants, warn that soaring costs are undercutting efforts to create meaningful transit capacity.
They note that Canadian officials have reacted to cost increases by shrinking transit projects to make them cheaper, rather than by tackling the reasons for price inflation. “If construction costs can be meaningfully reduced, more ambitious projects with greater benefit and larger scope can be built at lower costs,” they wrote.
Not all Canadian transit projects go sideways. The Canada Line SkyTrain project in Vancouver was completed on time in 2009, albeit under the looming deadline of the city hosting the 2010 Winter Olympics. Montreal’s 16-kilometre Réseau express métropolitain had a few teething problems when it opened last year, but nothing like the issues seen on other projects. And other transit expansions have begun to look better as they recede in the rear-view mirror. Although the extension of Toronto’s subway to the suburb of Vaughan, Ont., that opened in 2017 went over budget, and was one reason Queen’s Park took responsibility for transit construction away from the Toronto Transit Commission, its price per kilometre was far lower than for the Ontario Line now being built by the province.
But there is also a long list of projects that have limped into service late, been delayed indefinitely and seen their budgets surge. While the problems with each one are different, there are some common themes.
Experts say that transit approvals and design are highly politicized. There’s also been so little transit built in the last generation in Canada that governments have lost the knowledge needed to oversee a project, even one built by the private sector. And methods used on some early projects held up as success stories would no longer fly politically. Toronto transit watcher and blogger Steve Munro notes that much of the city’s east-west subway line was built in the 1960s using a method called cut and cover. This involves digging a trench, building subway infrastructure in it and then capping it. “The entire Bloor line was built north of Bloor [Street] and demolished everything in its path,” he said. “You can’t do that any more.”
Another development is that city transit agencies no longer do their own expansion work. In recent decades, governments in Canada and elsewhere have relied heavily on arrangements known as public-private partnerships. These were once lauded, but in the public transit world, they have now fallen from favour, for governments and the private sector.
A recent Canadian project that showed off problems with the P3 model was in Ottawa. The public inquiry into that city’s troubled light-rail project found the approach contributed to an adversarial relationship between the city and the companies building the line, leading to litigation. This poisoning of the well may have long-term effects, inquiry commissioner William Hourigan noted, with the same private partners contracted to maintain the line for 30 years.
“The people of Ottawa now face the prospect of a rail system being maintained in circumstances where the relationship between the City and the maintainer is largely dysfunctional (and bearing the costs of any disputes that result),” he wrote.
Before the age of the P3, transit agencies generally designed projects (either in house or with a hired firm) and then picked construction companies to build them. The new P3 model was meant to rein in costs while also transferring more of the risks of a project to a contractor, which is often tasked not just with building a transit line, but with designing it, borrowing the money required up front, and even operating and maintaining it for decades. Vancouver’s Canada Line was the first major transit project in the country to embrace this P3 model.
Matti Siemiatycki, a geography and planning professor who heads the Infrastructure Institute at U of T, said P3s swept Canada as an unassailable orthodoxy for governments for all sorts of building in recent decades, and remain common. But the model faltered as it ran up against the sheer size and unpredictable complexity of large public transit projects.
“It started with hospitals, and it moved into other types of social infrastructure, and in those instances worked generally okay. And then it came over to transit, and it just hit a wall,” Prof. Siemiatycki said. “And you can see it right across the country.”
Governments here and in other places, including once-P3-happy Australia and Britain, have started to back away from this approach for large transit projects, at least as they used to be conceived. So have big companies in the private sector that used to bid on them.
P3s generally have fixed prices, with financial penalties for contractors that miss deadlines, but would leave most of the details of construction up to the private sector. This has led, in some cases, to bitter legal disputes between governments and companies hired to build transit when things have gone awry.
Toronto’s Eglinton Crosstown LRT is among the projects that have ended up in court. It remains in limbo without an opening date, long after its proposed 2020 opening day came and went, and is among the botched projects that have forced a P3 rethink. Andrew Hope, the chief capital officer for rapid transit with Metrolinx said lessons have been learned from the Eglinton Crosstown experience and put into practice with the Ontario Line subway now under construction. Instead of a massive, risky P3 contract – in which private-sector bidders were no longer interested – the latest line was broken up into several more manageable pieces.
Parts of the Ontario Line, including its main operations and maintenance contract, are conventional P3s. Other chunks, however, use what the industry calls a “progressive” or “negotiated” model, which sees governments and contractors collaborate in the early design phases to iron out problems and anticipate cost overruns before a final price tag is set. This avoids a key issue with P3s, which generally force contractors to lock in pricing before they are able to do a fully costed design – a situation that set the stage for delays and lawsuits.
“The world has changed pretty dramatically,” Mr. Hope said. “We’ve learned a lot. Contractors have learned a lot.”
These lessons have not kept a lid on price increases. In 2019, Ontario Line construction was pegged at $11-billion. Three years later and the cost, now including trains, signalling and 30 years of operations, was up to $19-billion. In 2024, it was up again, according to Global News, to $27-billion.
Although eager to offload risk through the P3 model, politicians have remained keen to insert themselves into transit planning – which doesn’t help keep prices down or projects on time.
In Calgary, the planned Green Line has changed scope repeatedly and nearly died after the province pulled its funding. Only after recent talks was there an agreement to preserve the provincial investment and find a new way to move forward with a shorter version of the light-rail project.But its fate still remains unclear.
In Toronto, residents with long memories remember that the Eglinton Crosstown LRT was not the first time the need for underground transit in midtown was recognized. A subway there was part of a plan called Network 2011, and was approved by Bob Rae, Ontario’s NDP premier in the early 1990s. But it was killed by his PC successor, Mike Harris. It wasn’t until 2011 – the year the original subway would in theory have opened – that construction began on the Eglinton Crosstown, a partly buried light-rail line.
Politicians also throw sand in the gears by micromanaging aspects of design, said Marco Chitti, a fellow in the transportation and land use program at New York University who has studied Canadian transit.
He noted that elected officials can be susceptible to hyperlocal concerns that complicate a project.
Drivers might want a transit line buried, so as not to interfere with traffic, increasing the price tag by billions. Residents might then complain about plans for an exhaust outlet for that line near their property, forcing a cascading series of design changes that add cost. And then homeowners might raise concerns about vibration, forcing very deep construction that costs massively more.
Mr. Chitti said that a loss of transit-building knowledge exacerbates these issues, as leaders make political decisions with little sense of the impact on a project.
“The people who are making choices are not fully aware of the cost and the implication,” he said.
Is a real Tramway (Read: Light Rail) Coming to Canada?
The question I have, will this be real light rail, operating real trams or another hybrid light metro/rail system, currently in operation in Ottawa?
In Canada, what is called light rail tends to be more light-metro, than LRT, with very expensive subways and grade separation.
Remember, Ottawa had a signed contract with Siemens to build a 27 km light rail system for Ottawa, only to be sabotaged by the Harper government. This cost the city of Ottawa, $34 million in punitive damages for breaking a signed contract and what was built instead was a much more expensive hybrid light metro/rail system which due to politcal, incompetence has come to grief several times.
I hope the good burghers in Ottawa-Gatineau get it right this time and without interference from the federal government.
Consultants picked to lead Ottawa-Gatineau tram project
A joint venture led by Systra has won a US$79m technical services contract to prepare a tram system linking the Canadian capital Ottawa in the province of Ontario to the city of Gatineau directly across the Ottawa River in the province of Quebec.
The Groupe Porteur JV was appointed by the Société de transport de l’Outaouais. French infrastructure group Egis and local construction consultant EXP are the JV’s other two members.
When finished in 2035, the 24km tramline – called TramGO – will stitch together the fast-growing western districts of Gatineau with its city centre and downtown Ottawa.
It will have 37 stations and four intermodal exchanges.
Planners chose a tram over a rapid bus system because the former has up to five times the passenger capacity, and the population of Gatineau’s west end is expected to grow 50% in the next 25 years.
Working with architectural firms Richez Associés and Provencher Roy, Groupe Porteur will help the TramGO project office with technical and environmental studies, procurement, construction work supervision, and commissioning.
Egis chief commercial officer in Canada, Jean Steenhouwer, said the JV would submit a work plan in the second quarter.
Technical and environmental studies for the route on Quebec territory will also begin then.
Systra Canada’s executive vice president Samuel Derosiaux said: “Together, we are committed to offering citizens an efficient, sustainable and innovative transportation system that is perfectly integrated into the urban environment of the cities of Gatineau and Ottawa.”
Eby’s Reality Check On Transit
From what I can read, Eby is playing footsie with the Broadway subway to UBC. Farnsworth, who is now minister in charge of transit is doing penance for his complete screw-up of the Surrey RCMP/police fiasco, which many in the NDP blame their poor showing in the recent election.
Subways are expensive, both to build and operate. Replacing a bus route, which has a maximum peak hour capacity of only 2,000 pphpd, with a subway, which maximum capacity of only 7,500 pphpd, boarders on politcal and fiscal insanity!
In the real world, subways tend to be built on routes where traffic flows exceed 15,000 pphpd!
The maximum capacity of the Millennium Line (Broadway subway) after the $1.47 billion rehab of the signalling system will be only 7,500 pphpd! According to Thales “When the programme is fully implemented, the Expo Line will be able to accommodate 17,500 passengers per hour per direction, and the Millennium Line will be able to handle 7500 passengers per hour per direction, a 32% and 96% increase respectively.“
The 16km extension of the Expo Line to Langley is now costing $6 billion ($7 billion if one adds the much needed Operations and Maintenance Centre number 5). The government has yet to release the updated cost for the 5.7 km extension of the Millennium Line (Broadway subway), which, according to sources, is now costing around $4 billion.
I have been told that TransLink is still trying to source $2 to $3 billion to complete the two projects.
The completion of the Broadway subway to UBC is now said to cost around $8 billion, by the time construction starts. There has been a rumour about that to reduce the cost to a more manageable $6 billion, is to build the line elevated from MacDonald to UBC.
Watch Premier Eby try to get elected with that!
But there is a joker in the deck and it is called Trump.
If the tariff war takes place between Canada and the USA, one will see two things, a dramatic revenue shortfall in tax revenues and an equally dramatic increase in the cost of cement and special structural steel.
The American CEO of TransLink may just pack his bags and return to the ‘land of the free’ because, all things concerning transit and TransLink will become ugly, far uglier than it is today.
I can draw two main conclusions; first, the NDP want Farnsworth gone by giving him a no win assignment and two, I think it may mark the end of “SkyTrain” expansion in Metro Vancouver because there is a second joker in the deck and that is SkyTrain itself.
SkyTrain is the name of the regional light-metro system and consists of a proprietary train which operastes on the Expo and Millennium Lines and a conventional train which operate on the Canada Line with both railways being incompatible in operation.
The Linear Induction Powered (LIM) trains are proprietary and is currently owned by Alstom, when the acquired Bombardier’s rail division. The now called Movia Automatic Light Metro system (the proprietary railway has been rebranded at least six times) uses the former Bombardier Innovia light-metro body shell. Indeed the new MK.5 cars are actually over twenty years old but were reconfigured to use LIM equipped trucks for the sale to TransLink.
MALM is dated tech, more expensive to build and operate than conventional light-metro’s and a lot more expensive to build and operate than light rail. As Alstom has two lines of successful light-metro systems, they will phase out production of the proprietary MALM system, after the last paid for car leaves the production line. Only seven systems have been built in the past fifty years, with six remaining in operation and to add to further embarrassment, each one of the Bombardier built examples (then called Advanced Rapid Transit or ART) have been mired in controversy and/or legal ills.
The EverLine, above, in Korea can only operate one car trains and has lead to legal action in Korea over claims of “success fees” paid to bureaucrats and politcans in Korea.
To be blunt, there may not be any SkyTrain compatible trains available for future extensions available as new cars would have to be designed and a new production line built, further increasing the cost of an already costly system.
Contrary to what is being said, there is no affordable or efficient expansion of the now obsolete proprietary SkyTrain light-metro system. In fact there never was.
‘No discussion of funding,’ as Mike Farnworth takes on B.C.’s transit deficit and difficulties
Extending the $3 billion Broadway subway, now under construction, was a key election promise in the transportation plank of David Eby’s election platform.
Author of the article: By Derrick Penner Published Jan 16, 2025
Premier David Eby tasked Transportation Minister Mike Farnworth with leading efforts to extend TransLink’s Broadway SkyTrain line to the University B.C. in a mandate letter that talked a lot about transit priorities but not so much about cash.
Extending the $3 billion Broadway subway, now under construction, was a key election promise in the transportation plank of Eby’s election platform and the premier’s mandate asks Farnworth to work with the federal government, UBC, the City of Vancouver and First Nations on planning the extension.
Farnworth also has Parliamentary Secretary George Anderson, MLA for Nanaimo-Lantzville, to handle co-ordination of efforts and relationship-building, as well as priorities related to transit oriented housing development.
Transit advocates, however, are worried that Farnworth’s mandate is short on the discussion of stable funding, when agencies such as TransLink and B.C. Transit are starving for more cash.
“There is no discussion of funding to increase service at TransLink or B.C. Transit, let alone filling the huge budget hole that we’re seeing at TransLink,” said Denis Agar, executive director of the advocacy group Movement.
Instead, at the same time that TransLink is warning about a looming $600 million per year deficit as early as 2026, Farnworth is being tasked with reviewing ministry programs, including in transit, to make sure services “remain relevant, are efficient (and) are responsive to the needs of commuters.”
The idea is that the review will help “protect key services that British Columbians rely on,” but Agar said that sounds like “classic deflection,” which indicates transit “isn’t a priority” for government.
Agar said such reviews or audits typically find “a handful of places to save” but “never in the order of magnitude that is needed to actually honour the people that are currently riding transit in this province.”
The broader scope of Farnworth’s mandate includes supporting improvements to road infrastructure, though balanced against opportunities to integrate better transit services and “work with B.C. Ferries” to reduce administrative costs “and ensure affordable, reliable and sustainable ferry service.”
It also talks about finding “ways to support taxi and ride hail operators, as well as working with Minister of Public Safety Garry Begg on using technology to improve transit safety.
Most of the letter, however, is devoted to other transit initiatives, including expansion of regional and intercity transit priorities, such as the Central Okanagan Regional Transit Plan and regular transit service on the Sea to Sky corridor, and identifying “affordable and efficient” expansions of SkyTrain, RapidBus and rail transit services.
As Eby’s government finalizes the budget it will table to support his cabinet’s mandates, however, the Transportation Ministry is going to need “stable long-term funding,” for transit, said planner Andy Yan.
“Not only from the province but it’s also from the federal government,” said Yan, an associate professor and director of the City program at Simon Fraser University. “It’s about how we’re going to get people where they’re going. It’s also about employment patterns and how economic development is spread out through the province and how (communities) can be serviced.”
Notes From The Past
The preceding graph is from the late 1980’s and adjusted for 2024 Canadian dollars:
San Diego: $10.25 million/km
Portland: $20.25 million/km
Nantes: $25.15 million/km
Calgary: $30.26 million/km
VAL: $56.7 million/km
SkyTrain: $66.82 million/km. Please note, the current 16 km Expo Line extension to Langley is now costing in excess of $375 million/km or put another way, the 16 km Expo Line extension to Langley is costing over five and half times more per km than the adjusted original Expo Line!
The 5.7 km Broadway (subway) extension to the Millennium Line, is now costing over $700 million/km or, again put another way, is costing ten and a half times more than the original Expo Line!
The following is from a German engineer who has worked in Vancouver and his take on our SkyTrain light metro system is more than interesting. The following is from an exchange of Emails from 2013.
The facts:
Skytrain is operated at a maximum frequency of 120s with trainsets of a
maximum length of 72m or 68m on the Expo and Millenium line, resp. just
42m (!) on the Canada line.
100m trainsets at 90s resp. 60s frequency are perfectly feasible with
light rail operated on sight. As demonstrated in the “real world”. By
examples given here on this list.
BTW: They claim that the Canada line would have a capacity of 15,000
pphpd. With platforms of 50m length (for 63m three-car trainsets?) and
a frequency of 120s, using the figure of 5 pass/m my pocket calculator
tells me it’s
50m/train * 5pass/m * 30trains/h = 7,500pphpd
NewMath. 2+2 equals 8 for them.
With the actually usable two-car sets it’s
42m/train * 5pass/m * 30trains/h = 6,300pphpd
With that strange idea to use 50m platforms for 63m trains it would be:
63m/train * 5pass/m * 30trains/h = 9,450pphpd
But that would be obviously impracticable in reality since the doors
at the ends of the cars wouldn’t be usable. Try to do that during rush
hour.
Conclusion: Like all of those driverless “mini metros” Skytrain is just
yet another ridiculous and hideously expensive gadget that’s unable
to cope with anything that deserves the designation “passenger volume”
in an agglomeration of 2.3 mio inhabitants.
Sincerely,
Jun 14, 2013
Zweisystem: “WHAT IS THE POINT OF DRIVERLESS RAIL CARS ?”
Good question. >;->
Back in the 60s and 70s of the last century, they had this idea to
reduce transit cost by replacing drivers with automation.
The operators and municipalities over here didn’t care for construction
cost for the required grade-free infrastructure (i.e. tunnels) because
these were highly subsidized (by 90%) by the federal and state
governments. Just like what you wrote about the case of the people
mover at Detroit.
Unfortunately for the taxpayers and farepayers, they didn’t
consider operating and maintenance cost of that infrastructure.
RATP (Paris) once admitted that their driverless subway line 14
(meteor) doesn’t require a single person less staff to operate than a
conventional subway line with manual operation. And I even doubt
whether they count in the maintenance staff for the platform screen
doors. Because I happen to have worked once for a company that did such
maintenance and it was a money-printing business for them.
Another operator once admitted that the electricity bill alone for all
those escalators and lifts, for lighting and ventilation of those tunnel
stations is higher than the electricity bill for the subway trains. The
same applies for maintenance of all that equipment. It’s a hopeless
money-sink, as numerous operators of “heavy rail”-style “light rail”
systems with tunnels and grade-free infrastructure over here now start
to figure out.
And now, quite a lot of that expensive equipment in those tunnels and
stations that was once paid with federal and state subsidies has
reached the end of its lifespan and needs to get replaced, while after
~40 years in operation, even the tunnel structure needs expensive
repairs in some places and at the same time, municipalities and
operators are broke.
Like in Lausanne (Switzerland), where they built a driverless
rubber-tyred mini-metro using “trains” consisting of single married
pairs of 24m*2.4m, based on the claim that streetcars/LRVs couldn’t
climb the 11.5% grade – which is nonsense as lots of examples cited on
this list have shown or are still showing. And then they had to install
electric heating of the rolling surfaces with a power of several kW per
m, over several km. At temperatures below 0°C, they’re wasting more
electricity for heating the guideway than for traction power.
BTW: That maglev gadgetbahn called Transrapid also would have required
electric heating of the guideway for operation below <0°C.
Zweisystem: “Detroit reports the same for their Sky-Train but they do not have rail to compare with. Sky Train costs more than buses.”
Which in turn cost more than streetcars or light rail.
Zweisystem: “Vancouver claims Sky Train costs no more than C-Train in Calgary but C-Train has operated well and cost far less to construct. Vancouver has very high ridership with no freeways allowed in the city so is a special case.”
A light-rail system running at grade would have at least as much
ridership. Already since for the same money, you could build a vastly
more extensive network.
Sincerely,
For Mr. B – Dealing With The Facts
Again, a SkyTrain supporter casts doubt on veracity of statements contained in posts.
So, to clarify any doubt, the following comes from a December 1983, article,The Direction of TTC Planning For the 1980’s by Phillip Webb, which appeared in Modern Tramways.
This interesting item certainly raised my attention.
For further clarification, ICTS was renamed ALRT for the sale to Vancouver and the proprietary cars still operate on the Expo and Millennium Lines, on the SkyTrain light-metro system.
Read and learn.
This little gem appears at the end of the article.
And remember a modern tram has two to three times the capacity of a PCC Car. Do the math!
Thoughts For 2025
If You Build a Better Mousetrap the World Will Beat a Path to Your Door.
TransLink would like the public to think that our transit system is world class and spends a lot of money on ‘spin-doctors’ to convince the taxpayer of this.
Sadly, the centerpiece of TransLink’s transit empire is the now obsolete and unsalable SkyTrain light metro system. Even more sad is that the light metro system has been one of the most studied, new-build transit systems in the world, yet no one has copied Vancouver. No one is beating a path to Vancouver’s door.
Strange that a world class transit system is unsalable as the world did not beat a path to our door.
2025, TransLink needs about $600 million a year more in subsidies to operate the transit system at its current levels and there is great public push-back, in an era of inflated costs for bare necessities of life.
TransLink and many local politcans remain deaf to this and continue promoting the expansion of our dated light-metro system.
Oh, we have a “foamer” from Toronto telling us that light-metro is good and subways are even better, yet he never mentions funding. Embarrassingly, the very same “foamer” disses Seattle’s rapid transit system for being light rail, when it is in reality a light-metro with 90% of its route grade separated, either on viaduct or in a subway, and is signaled to carry a maximum capacity of 18,000 pphpd. This is still more than after the Expo Line re-signalling program, which according to Thales, who is doing the the $1.47 billion re-signalling program, stated the maximum capacity of the Expo Line will be `17,500 pphpd after completion!
TransLink continues to plan for grossly over built light-metro lines on routes that just do not have the ridership to sustain them.
Example, on Monday Dec. 23, at 12:45 PM my wife, waited six minutes at Broadway Station for a Canada Line Train to Bridgeport Station. Now, 6 minute headway’s works out to 10 trains per hour, operating a maximum capacity of about 3,600 pphpd – really on a busy light-metro route?
The Broadway subway, upon completion will have a maximum capacity of only 7,500 pphpd, 5,000 pphpd less than what Toronto streetcars were carrying in the late 1940’s!
There is something radically wrong with our regional transit system, but those in charge just want more money and more money to make things better and the taxpayer is being held hostage.
TransLink is broke, yet no one will deal with this; not the premier, not the Mayor;’s Council on Transit; not anyone and this bodes ill for the future.
What do I see in my crystal ball for 2025.
I see the Expo Line extension to Langley deferred as this now $7 billion project and climbing is just not practical for several reasons, including lack of potential ridership.
The preceding sign is rather dated as the cost for Expo Line extension to Langley is now pegged at $6 billion or $7 billion including the needed Operations and Maintenance Centre #5.
I see planning for future ‘SkyTrain’ lines with great promises (all transit projects make good promises) but no real action will take place.
I see an expansion of B-Line (TransLink and the provincial government will call them BRT, but in fact they will not be) express bus routes.
I see a rationalization of bus services, especially suburban rush hour bus services.
I see higher compensation packages for the ossified TransLink bureaucracy much to the chagrin of the taxpayer.
I see higher fares for the commuter and cheaper fares for others, mostly those who would vote for the NDP.
I see former transit users, once again going back using the “electric” car.
I do not see any fiscal responsibility at TransLink continues to treat the taxpayer as a ‘milch cow.
I do not see any tangible improvement to our regional transit system, except higher subsidies, needing higher taxes, taxes the average person is finding hard to pay.
As politicians, pundits cheer for new projects, including the SFU Gondola, financial realities are going to bite hard and with only a one seat majority in Parliament, the current Eby government will not be so cavalier in spending.
Then there is the next federal election and with the current prime Minister Trudeau held in high odor with the voters a Conservative government is almost assured and the conservatives will halt many of the generous funding programs the Liberals have tried to vote buy for the past parliament.
My big fear is that we could be left with some very expensive, uncompleted projects, which like the previous “FastFerries”, will be were left to rot in full view of the taxpayer.
The built, but never used subway station in Chaleroi Belgium.
It is all about funding and I am afraid the “funding tap” is about to get turned off. TransLink has no plan “B”, in fact it really hasn’t had a viable plan for several years, they just do the same thing over and over again, ever hoping for different results, ever hoping the “government” will once again bail them out.
2025 is going to be an interesting year as TransLink will be living in interesting times.
A SkyTrain Carol – Apologies to Mr. Dickens!
Merry Christmas and it is time for Rail for the Valley’s “A SkyTrain Carol”, which, like a certain Mr. Scrooge, the lessons have not been learned.
We are doing transit all wrong, yet the government continues to blunder along, doing the same thing over and over again ever hoping for different results.
Metro Vancouver has become an island among itself, where real solutions are ignored and the taxpayer is treated as a rube with deep pockets.
The current $16 billion, and climbing, cost of the 21.7 km extension to both the Expo and Millennium Lines will not take a care off the road, yet TransLink plans for more “SkyTrain”.
Vancouver has now become the example of not how to plan and build transit. No one copies us or our exclusive use of light metro.
All, the NDP government has done is pave paradise, putting up parking lots.
Rail for the Valley
The SkyTrain Christmas Carol
STAVE1 (The Ghost of SkyTrain Past)
As TransLink still plans for SkyTrain even though it is almost universally known that it is a very expensive piece of kit and provides far less “transit” and “capacity“, than modern trams costing a fraction to build.
The old cliche, “follow the money” comes to mind.
The Province of Ontario’s former Crown Corporation, the Urban Transportation Development Corporation (UTDC) had a problem, its flagship proprietary mini-metro was a dud and no one wanted it.
For most, this is old news. The Intermediate Capacity Transit System/Advanced Light Rail Transit (ICTS/ALRT) version of this proprietary light metro was not only poorly built, but it was both expensive to operate and expensive to maintain. No one wanted it and of the three built, Vancouver’s and Toronto’s systems (Detroit was the third) were forced upon the operating authority by the provincial government. To fool the locals the name, ICTS, was changed to ALRT.
It Worked!
The name SkyTrain is a local name only and was chosen in a radio contest before the Expo line opened. The name SkyTrain is used by many transit systems, unrelated to our SkyTrain.
Almost forgotten, the Bill Bennett Social Credit Government did a horse trade with the Ontario government for Vancouver’s “rapid transit“, which was originally planned to use light rail a la Calgary and Edmonton. The Bill Bennett government bought the unsalable ICTS (renamed ALRT for the deal) and in return got the services of the then famed “Blue Machine”, to win the next provincial election as the Social Credit Party had a one seat majority in Parliament, in Victoria.
The CBC did a full documentary of this, but then prime Minister Mulrroney got wind of it and ordered the CBC not to air it and in fact had it shredded or “reduced to produce”. The reporter who interviewed me and the late Dez Turner (who was the most informed transit advocate in the 90’s), informed me. It was explosive as there were hints of plain brown manilla envelopes changing hands at the highest levels of provincial and federal governments.
The reporter was soon made redundant and the last time I heard from her, she was unemployed and seeking work down south.
Every extension of the Expo Line was designed to meet with a Social Credit election window, which was about every 3 years until the Van der Zalm saga.
STAVE 2
Lavalin purchased the UTDC, which was basically the ICTS/ALRT light metro system from the Ontario government and went bankrupt trying to build the system in Bangkok, Thailand. The UTDC was returned to the Ontario government, which promptly sold the remains to Bombardier at a fire sale price. SNC amalgamated with the bankrupt Lavalin to become SNC Lavalin and SNC Lavalin retained engineering patents for ICTS/ALRT from Lavalin.
STAVE 3
Bombardier Engineers soon found that ICTS/ALRT was unsalable; Bombardier rebuilt the cars using their universal Innovia light-metro body shell and redesigned the steerable axle trucks to support the longer and heavier Innovia body-shells.
The ICTS/ALRT system was rebranded as Advanced Rapid Transit or ART.
Only four were sold:
Korea, where Bombardier paid success fees to both bureaucrats and politicians to ensure a sale. The fallout from this was lawsuits and criminal investigations with the result of irreparable damage to Canadian Industries trying to do business in Korea with the scandal.
Malaysia, where Bombardier and SNC Lavalin paid success fees to bureaucrats and politicians including the prime minister to ensure the sale of ART for Kuala Lumpur for their second rapid transit system. This scandal started the whole SNC Lavalin and Bombardier bribery scandal, with hints that the Prime minister of Canada was involved.
The third system was built in New York, but in the USA all rapid transit systems being built, using federal funds must be peer reviewed and the JFK airTrain was duly peer reviewed and it failed badly, being far too expensive to build and not well designed. To keep Bombardier from “losing face” internationally with this fiasco, the Canadian Prime Minister authorized the Canadian Overseas Development Bank to fund the system.
China bought one strictly to obtain LIM technology and has never built another. Hint, ICTS/ALRT/ART use attractive LIMs, while Maglevs use repulsive LIMs and there is a technological void between the two.
STAVE 4
The ghost of SkyTrain past still haunts.
Both BC Transit and Metro Vancouver soon found out how expensive the ALRT system was to operate and was supported by a massive subsidy of $157.7 million annually or $302.7 million annually in 2024 coin of the realm. The next Rapid Transit project was the Broadway Lougheed Rapid Transit project and BC Transit and the GVRD did everything to plan for light rail.
The BC Government (NDP) did everything in its power to derail the project, first by hiring an international engineering firm with little interest in light rail (they were pushing for a proprietary personal transit pod sort of thing. I still have the video they sent me!) and finally forced Advanced Rapid Transit (ART) onto BC Transit and Metro Vancouver and in the process creating TransLink to exit BC Transit from the debate and making a one George Puil, Chair of Metro Vancouver, the Chair of TransLink to make sure.
But why the flip flop by the provincial government?
From many conversations with professionals and as well as former NDP types, unsavoury means were involved and money was also spent on UBC and SFU to pave the way for SkyTrain, such as the Bombardier Chair of Regional Transportation Planning.
Then there is the strange case of $1 million dollars found in a duffel bag in Clinton Park, in the late 90’s by an off duty police officer and according to a former VPD senior officer, now retired, the million dollars, was not a ransom for a kidnapping (the first investigation), nor wasn’t drug money, as there was no trace of drugs on the money, and it was assumed to be “spreading around money”, but for what or when they could not tell. Victoria did all it could to bury the story.
The postscript to this story is that the police constable who found the money, was able to keep it after much legal angst.
The now called ART Millennium Line was so expensive, it had to be built in two parts, the present Millennium line and the later Evergreen Line which became the Millennium Line. Thus the original Broadway Lougheed R/T cost about one half to one third the cost of the two completed SkyTrain lines.
STAVE 5
From 2005 to 2018 there was absolutely no interest in SkyTrain light metro and the ART system was folded into the Innovia family of transit with the LIM’s being a FREE add on and still no interest and finally, the Innovia line of light metros was folded into the Movia metro line.
Now we come to the strange case of Surrey’s flip flop from light rail to SkyTrain (now marketed as Movia Automatic Light Metro) and the former Surrey mayor’s exaggerations of the truth about building with SkyTrain, like it was going to cost only $1.63 billion and no one challenged him and the NDP government did everything they could to make this happen.
Today the cost for the 16 km Langley extension, including the Operations and Maintenance Centre #5 is now past $7 billion, with the cost further inching up with inflation.
Why did former premier, the late John Horgan agree to this? Could it be that both Bombardier and SNC Lavalin are still heavily invested with the current prime minister and that a promise of a nice job of being ambassador to Germany if Premier ordered TransLink to build what is now called MALM to Langley, to save jobs in Ontario and Quebec?
STAVE 6 (Ghost of SkyTrain Present)
Today, Alstom owns the MALM system when they acquired Bombardier’s Rail Division and all technical patents, but SNC lavalin still owns Engineering patents for the proprietary railway. Alstom is not actively marketing the system and by all appearances will phase out production altogether when the last paid for cars are completed for Vancouver.Vancouver is now the only customer.
The taxpayer has now estimated to have spent over $20 billion more for continued SkyTrain planning and construction, than if we built it with light rail as originally intended in the late 70’s.
Stave 7 (Ghost of SkyTrain Future and the end of it all)
The Broadway Subway will haunt taxpayers for years to come as the cost for this 5.7 km extension is now reaching past $4 billion and to complete it to UBC an additional $8 billion.
TransLink is now promising SkyTrain here, there and everywhere continuing the expansion of the light metro network, yet it has zero funding and much of the planning is mostly ghostly images on YouTube, promising nothing more than “sparkle ponies and fairy dust”.
If Alstom ceases production of LIM compatible vehicles means new cars must be designed and built by other manufacturers, further driving up the cost of the proprietary railway. Small orders will be cost prohibitive, yet the government still labours on pretending that SkyTrain is a world class transit system.
The only world class transit system no one wants to buy!
The poor Taxpayers because they have been totally Scrooged!
Rail for the Valley wishes all a merry Christmas and a happy New Year because 2025 will be ………… well let us not ruin the current festive spirit.
The SkyTrain Follies Continue – SkyTrain Everywhere!
This YouTube post has been creating a lot of local chatter, until I started fact checking, then the posts disappear. Strange that.
The SkyTrain Lobby hates “reality checks”.
Here is one of the many issue that the SkyTrain Lobby ignores, the province can afford only one light-metro line a decade.
Example:
1980’s – the Expo Line, built is 4 sections until the early 90’s.
1990’s – the Millennium Line – formerly the Broadway Lougheed Rapid Transit Project (formerly LRT).
2000’s – the Evergreen Line (the uncompleted portion of the Broadway Lougheed R/T Project.
2010’s – the Canada Line.
2020’s – the Broadway subway (now costing $4 billion).
2030’s – the Surrey/Langley extension – including the Operation & Maintenance Centre #5 – $7 billion (aprox. $3 billion short of funding).
2040’s – Broadway subway to UBC? (Cost in 2024 dollars, now $8 billion).
Both the Expo and Millennium Line’s extension costs have risen significantly and now are surpassing $16 billion. The Broadway subway to UBC is now pegged at $8 billion and that is in 2024 dollars!
Then there is the issue of the vehicle availability as the Expo and millennium Lines operate the now called proprietary Movia Automatic Light metro system now owned by Alstom and Alstom is the sole supplier of the trains operated.
Alstom has strongly hinted that they will cease production once the Vancouver fleet renewal order is finished as Vancouver is the only customer.
Alstom inherited MALM when they purchased Bombardier’s rail division and MALM, being a proprietary railway, with an extremely poor record of sales, with only seven systems built in almost fifty years, is seen a superfluous, especially since it conflicts with Alstom’s in-house products.
Yes, other companies can produce MALM compatible cars, but at a cost, as the new cars would have to designed and safety cased the new trains before they could offer the product.
As we do not know the transit vehicle market will be like 20 years from now, there is a possibility no company would produce cars for such a small market, leaving the cars being custom built, further adding to the costs.
As for the bridges mentioned, according to my sources, were not designed for SkyTrain extensions, rather for “rapid transit” which includes bus rapid transit or BRT.
The author of the post also mistook run-a-way tracks as proof of further extensions. Run-a-way track, several train lengths long, past the station are common on R/T projects and deal with trains with braking problems or a signal failure, prevents the train jackknifing onto the station platform, when it hits the buffer.
The preceding photo is not from a movie set, but the 2014 Chicago metro accident where a derailed train climbed the escalator at a station!
SkytTrain construction in Metro Vancouver is strictly done for politcal reasons and not practical reasons and those who want more SkyTrain, do not fully understand the financial and operational implications of continued building with a proprietary light metro system and that includes the provincial premier; Metro Vancouver; TransLink and the Mayor’s Council on Transit.
The real question that is never asked is simply; “What is the real costs and where will the funding for new SkyTrain extensions come from?”
The Transit Deficit Begins To Bite
Thursday night’s massive traffic accident on Highway 99 was to be expected, as it could not be otherwise.
Zwei drives this route twice a week for my cardio-rehab in White Rock and my eyes have been opened wide at the utterly poor driving habits by both car and commercial drivers.
Just on Wednesday, I witnesses no fewer than four commercial drivers, driving their ‘rigs’ at high speed, weaving in and out of traffic, rat racing to the boarder.
The posted speed is 100 kph and I was going 110 kph, keeping up with the traffic flow, yet these trucks were passing us at 120 kph plus!
Regular car drivers are no slouches either, regularity passing me at speeds I estimate at 130 kph or more!
What is very noticeable is the lack of public transit on the route, with very few buses connecting to White Rock from South Delta (Tsawwassen Ferry), Richmond and South Vancouver.
The current NDP government is hell bent increasing highway capacity with more traffic lanes and even new mini-highways as they firmly believe “rubber on asphalt” traffic solutions win elections and to hell with transit and public safety.
Currently the government is spending over $16 billion to extend the obsolete SkyTrain light metro system to Langley and to Arbutus in Vancouver, a mere 21.7 km, which with around $4 billion in funding yet to be sourced which means there is little or no money available to improve regional bus services.
With TransLink hidebound with “flavour of the month” transit projects and a complete disdain for a user-friendly transit service, the car remains the only real transportation alternative. Sadly, government at all levels do not care about the carnage on our public highways and continue doing the same thing over and over again ever hoping for different results. Sadly more accidents and deaths on our roads and highways will only increase
And do not get me started on the commercial trucking industry and the free pass they have been given by both the provincial and federal governments, with many drivers firmly believe they can break any law they wish, including the law of gravity!
2 critical after 9-vehicle crash on HWY 99 in Surrey; highway remains closed
By Emma Crawford and Charlie Carey
Posted December 12, 2024 5:58 pm.
Last Updated December 13, 2024 7:13 am.
Highway 99 is closed in both directions due to a multi-vehicle accident that happened on Thursday evening just south of the Highway 91 overpass.
Surrey Police Service (SPS) Insp. Finch tells 1130 NewsRadio on Friday morning that the accident involved nine vehicles, including a semi-truck and trailer.
Public Information Officer Ian MacDonald adds that six people were injured during the crash, two of who are in critical condition.
“It needs to be investigated, and regrettably, the location is one that normally is a regular commuter route. So, apologies for the inconvenience, but obviously this is a serious incident that has to be investigated,” MacDonald said Friday.
The closure runs southbound from the Highway 91 interchange and northbound from King George Boulevard.
According to the SPS, the northbound lanes will be the first to reopen, with southbound lanes reopening later in the day due to the nature of the crash.
“The balance that has to be maintained is to be able to gather evidence and not necessarily move all the vehicles around. I know that some of the vehicles have been moved out of the way, and certainly, we will endeavor to continue to do that,” MacDonald explained.
“But ultimately, our task is twofold. The primary task is to gather evidence and see what happened and determine if anything happened from a criminal nature, and then secondarily, obviously, is to remove anything that might be impeding traffic so we can reopen the roadway,” he added.
The BC Emergency Health Services (BCEHS) told 1130 NewsRadio on Thursday evening that it was called to the scene around 5:30 p.m.
“Four ambulances with primary care paramedics, three ambulances with advanced care paramedics, an air ambulance helicopter with critical care paramedics, and a supervisor responded to the scene,” EHS said.
“Paramedics provide emergency medical treatment to seven patients. Five patients were transported to hospital, three in stable condition and two in critical condition.”
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