An Independent Audit Of TransLink Needed – NOW!

What TransLink wants, TransLink gets as fiscal responsibility is not in TransLink’s lexicon. Public scrutiny of TransLink is non existent. The Mayor’s Council On Transit invests in Transit to secure future elections and reelections and the public is left with a largely 1950’s bus system, tarted up with a now obsolete 1970’s light-metro system. Positive […]

Court Case? What Court Case?

The following comment from Mr.Cow has raised eyebrows. “By the way it’s not 205 Mk 5 Cars, its 41, 5 section vehicles, at approximately 17.63 Million per 5 section vehicle. With entirely new sub systems not the longer versions of the Mk 3 trains with similar equipment that the BCRTC thought it was getting. You […]

Škoda ForCity Smart 38T -Trams Get Longer

As the modern tram evolves, companies offer longer trams to cope with ever increasing ridership demands. With a modular design, this easier to do than a complete new design for a tram. It also should be noted that Mannheim’s tram system is metre gauge, thus the kinematic envelope for trams is very constricted and the […]

A Pre Election Band Aid

When the provincial government spends in excess of $16 billion to extend the somewhat obsolete Movia Automatic Light Metro (a.k.a. SkyTrain) system a mere 21.7 km, the regional transit system as a whole suffers. The federal government is partly at fault for this growing financial debacle by compelling the provincial government to continue building with […]

$7 Billion to Move 56,000 (or less) Persons A Day.

If one wishes to know why emergency rooms are being closed on weekends in hospitals around the province, the NDP are spending $7 billion to move 56,000 people a day. 56,000 thousand riders a day? According to Wikipedia, the Broadway 99-B Line bus to UBC, averages 39,900 customers a day (2023)! One thinks that the […]

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 […]

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 […]

Is a real Tramway (Read: Light Rail) Coming to Canada?

A Bordeaux tram on a lawned and hedged R-o-W.

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 […]

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 […]