All Quiet on the Transit Front?

With civic elections only weeks away, there has been a lull with transit issues and stories. The city of Vancouver, which considers itself the centre of the universe, provides us with some mirth as the elections draw near. The left leaning C.O.P.E. political party is proposing that all Vancouver residents should have universal transit for […]

Aubagne Tram – The Economy Tram

Light Rail can be built cheaply, if there is the political and bureaucratic will is there to ensure LRT is built economically. At first glance the Aubagne tramway is very expensive, costing ai??i??166 million or CAD $235 million to build, but only for 2.7 km., which works out to an expensive $87 million/km. to build. […]

Light Rail In Victoria Before Vancouver?

Interesting news from Victoria, BC Transit is recommending LRT for Greater Victoria. Though BC Transit doesn’t have much competence with modern LRT, the organization certainly has more experience than TransLink, with the historic LRT planning for the Broadway-Lougheed Rapid Transit project before the provincial NDP did their infamous flip-flopAi?? to SkyTrain. Zwei also questions the […]

Politics of Fear – Vancouver Earmarks $400K to Dismantantle the Olympic Line!

Vision Vancouver has earmarked $400,000 in their next capital plan to dismantle the False Creek heritage railway, commonly known as the Olympic Line. This should come as no surprise, as Vision Vancouver is afraid of the Olympic Line, because they are afraid of LRT. Vision is afraid of LRT because having an operating light rail […]

More sense from Ottawa

Our friend from Ottawa, Haveacow, is a transit consultant from Ottawa, he also has studied Vancouver’s transit scene and is a worthwhile read as he makes too much sense. The following is a reply from Mr. Cow, which I think deserves a post of its own! I agree that tunneling any rail based transit system […]

Roads & Rails = Dumb & Dumber

In BC, we are backward. In fact, we are not just backward, we are literally stone age when it comes to transit planning. Two stories; in Nevada the Boulder rail extension is part of the cost of a new highway and that the CNR sold Georgetown-Kitchener, Ont., rail line to Metrolinx for GO Transit commuter […]

Is Vision Vancouver’s Subway Fantasy Putting City Taxpayer’s At Risk?

Courtesy Light Rail Now Micheal Geller has an interesting item in the Vancouver Courier which indicates that Vancouver taxpayers maybe on the hook for a minimum of $500 million for demanding a SkyTrain subway under Broadway. Predictably, Geller still follows the local line about transit and growth, while ignoring the fact that transit use mainly […]

Arbutus Fail and Other Transit Thoughts

Contrary to TransLink’s claims, the Canada line has 40m to 50m long station platforms, which severely limits capacity. In today’s Sun, there is an article by Pete McMartin, bemoaning the current state of the Arbutus Corridor debate. What the Vancouver Sun and the City of Vancouver are dancing around, yet never mention is that that […]

The World’s Busiest Metro Systems And Then There Is Broadway

The world’s busiest metro’s, mostly operating in subways, in an ascending order. By comparison, the 68.6 km. SkyTrain mini-metro system carries a mere 361,500 passenger a day and TransLink’s ridership numbers are guesstimates with actual ridership about 10% to 15% lower. BC’s population is now just over 4.61 million and all the below metro systems, […]

Four Years Since the Release of the Leewood Study and the Silence is Deafening!

It now has been four years since the historic release of the Leewood/Rail for the Valley report, yet except for sparse political support, very few people actually know that the study exists, let alone that it is “shovel ready”. The Leewood study is just too simple, too cheap, and too practical compared to other politically […]