$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 56,000 customers a day (or is it 26,000 customers day counted twice?) a tad bit optimistic, considering that the 99-B goes to UBC, a major transit destination and Langley is hardly a major destination.

Also, has TransLink factored in their estimates, that transit trips of more than one hour, actually deters ridership? This makes me think the hype and hoopla about BRT Lines in Surrey/Langley are more to “fiddle figures”, especially travel times because of this unpleasant fact.

The article does not mention the $1 billion Operations and Maintenance Centre #5, needed for the new 5-car rakes of Innovia 300 cars or the $1.47 resignalling of both the Expo and Millennium lines or the yet to be tendered $1 billion plus electrical rehab needed to operate trains on the 16 km extension.

Actually the project’s cost jumped over four times from a $1.65 billion light rail project to a $7 billion plus light-metro project and this will further increase if countervailing tariffs are added on American cement and specialty steel needed to build the guideways.

Both the Broadway subway and the Expo Line extension defy modern public transit planning and showcases the NDP’s being stuck to the dated “SkyTrain” philosophy and begs the question: “Why?”

At best, the line will replace three bus routes (501, 502, 503) with a combined peak hour capacity of less than 1,400 persons per hour per direction, which translates to huge maintenance costs, operating near empty trains another 32 km per round trip.

Rail for the Valley’s $2 billion, 130 km Marpole to Chilliwack regional railway, servicing 12 major destinations, would certainly out perform the Langley extension by offering many more travel solutions. The Langley SkyTrain extension will only offer slower overall travel times by forcing transfers onto potential customers.

This what has happened with the Canada line service, which, by forcing transit customers to make an unwanted Transfer from train to bus at Bridgeport Station has seen a collapse of ridership on transit and an explosion of electric cars in South Delta.

Of course TransLink hides this unpleasant fact, but if one observes, once sardine style, crammed express busses that used to go direct to downtown Vancouver, now see 20 or less customers using each bus.

As there is no independent audit of ridership on our public transit system, one must take any ridership claims by TransLink as suspect, as it is in TransLink’s interest to overstate ridership to keep doing the same thing over and over again, ever hoping for different results.

Despite shrill claims by our local politcans, that Vancouver’s SkyTrain is a world class transit system, it is the only world class system I know of, where no one wants it or builds with it and has been shunned planners around the world for almost fifty years!

Major construction ramps up on Surrey-Langley SkyTrain project

By Simon Little Global News

Posted February 28, 2025

Construction on the new Surrey-Langley SkyTrain extension is ramping up, with the project to become much more visible in the months to come.

Transportation Minister Mike Farnworth said Friday that construction for nearly 200 piers and columns that will support the transit line’s guideway has begun.

“Together the Surrey-Langley SkyTrain, combined with the Broadway subway project in Vancouver, will expand our current SkyTrain network by about 27 per cent,” Farnworth said.

“We’re also working closely with TransLink to ensure efficient, reliable bus service that connects with the SkyTrain stations, including access to rapid transit for people who don’t live or work close to the alignment.”

The province says that work will continue through the spring, as crews begin casting more than 4,400 concrete segments that will form the system’s guideway.

Specialized cranes called “gantry launchers” will then begin to lift and install those concrete segments this summer at sites at 152 Street, Bakerview-166 Street and Hillcrest-184 Street stations.

Construction on two future stations, Green Timbers and Langley City Centre stations, is also scheduled to begin this year.

Last summer, the province revealed the cost to complete the project had jumped by almost 50 per cent, from just over $4 billion to just under $6 billion.

The timeline to complete the project was also pushed back a year from 2028 to 2029.

The province blamed inflation, supply chain issues and rising labour costs for the higher costs.

Once completed, the eight-station line is expected to take people from Langley City Centre to King George Station in 22 minutes, with an anticipated daily ridership of 56,000.