A Prediction: Huge property Tax Increases In 2023
For several years now, Mr. Cow and Zwei have been reminding people that there needs to be a $3 billion or so, rehab done to the Expo and Millennium Lines before any expansion can take place.
There was no budget for this.
Nonsense! Screamed the SkyTrain lobby. Fake news ranted the SkyTrain boosters.
Well, not any more as Zei and Mr. Cow seem to be bang on!
What is interesting, there is no dollar figure which is troublesome. What is TransLink afraid of?
What is a contract, without a dollar figure? Is TransLink afraid to tell the public, pre civic election, that huge tax increases will be needed to fund the rehab? Is TransLink afraid that pro SkyTrain politicians will fail to be elected or reelected?
It seems this well cobbled news release from TransLink is afraid to tell the taxpayer and voter, that there will be massive property tax increases in 2023 to pay for this.
Let me repeat this prediction: “THERE WILL BE HUGE PROPERTY TAXES IN 2023 TO PAY FOR THIS!
- Thales was awarded by TransLink two new contracts under the Expo and Millennium Line Upgrade Program to enable a 22 km expansion of the fully automated Metro Vancouver SkyTrain system, with 41 new trains expected to be in service by end of 2027.
- Thales will provide its SelTrac™ Communications-Based Train Control (CBTC) technology to deliver a new Operations Control Centre and a fully automated depot named Operations and Maintenance Centre 4.
- For almost 40 years, Thales has delivered state-of-the-art train control technology for the SkyTrain system. These new projects will directly support TransLink’s 2050 Vision to provide convenient, reliable, affordable, safe and comfortable, and carbon-free transit for Metro Vancouver. The system had over 114 million boardings in 2019.
- The SkyTrain has better on-time performance than the metros in most major cities in North America; the SkyTrain is also environmentally friendly – TransLink customers save 1.3 million kgs of GHGs by choosing transit over driving a car each day.
TransLink has awarded two contracts to Thales for the provision of train control technology for their new Operations Control Centre and a new fully automated depot, Operations Maintenance Centre 4. These two new facilities are key components of the Expo and Millennium Line Upgrade Program, necessary to support SkyTrain system expansions to 2045 and beyond to better serve Metro Vancouver passengers. The system will be expanded by 22 km, from 80km to 106 km by 2028, with 41 new trains expected to be in service by the end of 2027.
These two new contracts represent two new key milestones in the almost 40-year partnership between Thales and TransLink covering the entire history of the Metro Vancouver SkyTrain. Thales’ state-of-the-art train control technology will support TransLink’s 2050 Vision to provide convenient, reliable, affordable, safe and comfortable, and carbon-free transit for Metro Vancouver. The system had over 114 million boardings in 2019.
According to TransLink, in 2018 the Expo Line and Millennium Lines saw an on-time performance (OTP) of 96.38% — the highest performance level on record for SkyTrain and higher than the performance level of the metros in most major cities in North America. The SkyTrain is environmentally friendly – according to TransLink, its customers collectively save 1.3 million kgs of GHGs by choosing transit over driving a gasoline car each day.
“We are building on an over 35-year partnership with TransLink as we support their vision for the future of transit in Metro Vancouver. The provision of our SelTrac™ technology to these two new facilities represents the next page in our shared history with TransLink.” Alcino De Sousa, VP & Managing Director, Thales Urban Rail Signalling
The new Operations Control Centre (OCC2) includes a Control Room and the capacity for SkyTrain expansions into the future. Thales will provide the Automatic Train Control (ATC) elements for the new Operations Control Centre (OCC2), which will feature the latest in train control, network, and cybersecurity technology. Thales will be working with local partners and suppliers to deliver this project successfully.
To keep up with passenger ridership increases, the SkyTrain system expansions have driven a corresponding need for more trains, and, in turn, increased train storage and maintenance. Additional capacity will be available in the new Operations Maintenance Centre (OMC4). Thales delivered OMC1, the first fully-automated train storage yard (depot) in the world in 1986. OMC4 is a fully automated depot, allowing quick deployment of trains into service. This approach is both cost-effective and staffing effective, providing the best value for Metro Vancouver citizens. OMC4 will feature storage for 145 cars (29 trains), a vehicle interior cleaning and inspection facility, a train wash track, and maintenance shops.
This is the English version which was sent to us.
We are shocked at the low capacity of the Millennium Line, especially as it is being used for your Broadway subway. 7,500 pphpd is far to low to warrant a $3 billion subway. Again, Vancouver seems to be in the business of transit humour as their statistics are laughable.
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TransLink awards Thales SkyTrain train control contracts.
Contracts enable a 22km extension of the fully automated SkyTrain system.
TransLink awards Thales SkyTrain train control contracts – International Railway Journal (railjournal.com)
TransLink has awarded two contracts to Thales for upgrading the train control technology on the Expo and Millennium lines of Metro Vancouver.
TRANSLINK has awarded Thales two contracts to provide train control technology under the Expo and Millennium Line Upgrade Programme for the SkyTrain network in Vancouver.
The contracts include a new Operations Control Centre and a new fully automated depot, Operations Maintenance Centre 4. These two new facilities are key components of the upgrade programme.
The system will be expanded from 80km to 106km by 2028, with 41 new trains expected to be in service by the end of 2027.
TransLink says that in 2018 the Expo and Millennium lines saw on-time performance of 96.38% – the best punctuality on record for SkyTrain and higher than that achieved by most major metros in North America.
The government of Canada, the government of British Columbia, and the region have committed to investing $C 1.47bn ($US 1.1bn) in the Expo and Millennium Line Upgrade Programme until 2027.
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.
I don’t think a huge tax increase is coming but it will go up. I do think however, a big financial rationalization is going to take place. I hear billions being mentioned but is this project just a re-announcement from an earlier spending plan? Unless huge amounts of new money is announced by senior levels of government, I just don’t think that there will be enough money to do the Surrey to Langley Skytrain extension and the extension of the Millennium Line to UBC in one shot. In fact, by not building the SLS extension and delaying it past 2030, frees up large amounts of much-needed funding for other things. Especially when you consider the cost vs. how many passengers Translink really thinks will be using the SLS extension on opening day.
When more money is needed (because there is never enough) for “state of good repair” maintenance upgrades to just about everything at Translink. This line extension which was easily doable both financially and engineering wise as a surface LRT Line but not as a Light Metro, built mostly on an expensive above grade right of way, producing a situation where the cost is far too high and the number of potential passengers too small for what Translink has designed and wants to build. Add in the financial somersaults that Translink is being asked to do by the provincial government, to afford its share and you see the logic of further delaying the SLS extension project.
It’s never a good sign when an upper level of government completely takes over a infrastructure project, in both design and financial terms from an inferior level government body (Translink) that can’t afford its share or continued management of the project anymore, then turns around and says to that same inferior level government body, it took the infrastructure project from in the first place, that said inferior government body should have its borrowing level raised to help pay it’s share of this project. I predict the SLS extension project will be shelved “temporarily” when the cost benefit analysis is done (being used as an excuse to not do the project) later this year or early next year.
Just as predicted before, in the transit spending debate between the SLS extension vs. the Millennium Line extension to UBC, the SLS will loose.
Rapid Transit to UBC has been promised for 30 yrs.
Ridership vs SLS is way higher.
South of the Fraser need Regional Rail not an urban light metro. It will take 65 mins from Langley City to Vancouver while Regional Rail can do that in 40 mins.
Neither one should be built as planned. Although I agree a regional rail line should be built. The existence of said regional rail line would have to have its running rights and staffing rights negotiated by Translink with the existing railroads and its unions. Currently, Translink doesn’t want to do this, its too far outside its comfort zone. This is exactly what O.C. Transpo and the then Ottawa-Carleton Regional Government admitted when we were helping them to start the original O-Train line in the late1990’s (currently The Trillium Line or Line #2). In 2001 when the O-Train Pilot Project statred the line was still owned by the CPR.
According to Translink internal data, the SLS extension is planned to have between 25,000-31,000 passengers (pre covid figures) per day, when it opens. That is roughly between 24% to 30% of the average daily passengers/line-km for the network. My point is that it’s a really expensive line for the tiny amount of passengers its going to get, the latest inflation adjusted price estimate is between $4.2 -$4.8 Billion (wow, no tunnels too). A surface LRT line is 25% to 40% the price, for the same mileage and could easily handle the expected passenger levels long into the future.
Even the current Arbutus and planned UBC Millennium line Skytrain extension tunnel under Broadway is massively overbuilt for the number it will carry. According to Translink’s own figures, even with planned upgrades, the maximum capacity of the Millennium Line is only 7500 passengers/hour/direction. That’s less than 75% of the 10,500-10,700 p/h/d Ottawa’s Central Bus Transitway carried before conversion to LRT (running in a 2.5 km tunnel in downtown). Many said this number was too low for a downtown tunnel and that we should have waited until bus and or surface LRT passenger levels reached 12,000-13,000 p/h/d at the minimum.
Zwei replies: Transit friends in Europe are aghast at the 7,500 figure for the subway and question the need for light-metro Millennium Line!
Question: Is the Thales contract part of the estimated rehab of both the Expo and millennium Lines? How much will the rehabbed electrical supply cost?
Looking back at the previous 10 year plan (2018-2027), yes this Thales signaling contract was part of the “state of good repair” part of that plan and yes it was paid for. However, this was part of the 10 year plan that very squarely relied on not just federal and provincial money but Translink money as well. Yes its paid for but not everything on that list now can be paid for due to the big drop in available Translink finances. You will notice that they say in many articles,” when the program is fully implemented” meaning, there is a whole series of projects needing to be implemented to fully increase capacity and upgrade technology for the Skytrain Network. So I wonder which part of that older plan gets shelved until they can afford it fully. Its clear that this is the core part but not all, of a new operating system for ATC/Signaling, automation software/hardware control.
My guess is that the electrical supply system upgrade will be broken up into electrical system and component sub sections. I have never seen in any Translink report a single line item called Skytrain electrical supply system. So costs will most likely be broken up over many contracts working on its particular part, not a single massive one. For example “Track Work” can mean upgrading just the 3rd rail and its connections. A “Cabling” contract could and most likely will have, many parts of the electrical supply system in it as part of that upgrade.
The issue really is not higher taxes (although we can be sure they are coming too).
The real transportation issue IN CANADA is delivering affordable housing in sufficient quantities to meet or exceed demand.
That, folks, is a government responsibility. Government has been AWOL in Greater Vancouver since at least the early 1990s (Millennium Line) or as far back as 1980 (planning the Expo Line) delivering housing affordable to all Canadians. And things have been getting progressively worse over the past 15 years, not better.
Thirty years is ONE generation lost. We may not be able to hold on to our democratic system if we lose a second one.
There is nowhere for government, or transit engineers, to hide on this issue. We are spending like drunken sailors, sitting back and watching the price of houses going beyond the reach of the middle class with no signs of correcting.
The financialization of Canadian urban land is well underway.
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1.0 SUBWAYS-AND-TOWERS, ENHANCED GOVERNMENT REVENUES
Using the CMHC target for housing affordability, a house should cost 30% of median household incomes before tax. Today, in the major Canadian urban centers houses are priced multiples over this target:
• Vancouver 10-times over
• Toronto 9-times over
• Montreal 8-times over
• Calgary 4-times over
Land values have skyrocketed in Canada’s urban centers over the same period that government has been building the subways, LRT and ALRT systems.
• I was struck when visiting Edmonton last spring, just how much land is wasted along their LRT line due to the simple fact that it is designed to railroad standards. Crossing barriers, fenced-off rights of way, special stations, and platform-level boarding, all become unnecessary with the modern tram.
• Calgary looked to be more or less in the same pickle.
• Ottawa, from what I hear from Zwei, and others on this blog, is headed in the same direction.
• A brief review of the new line in Montreal last week returned the same problems: the system is automated. Therefore, grade separation is baked in. Track will either need to be in a tunnel (12-times cost premium) or elevated (4-times premium). Boulevard Renée Levesque is due to get an elevated transit line down the middle. It is NOT going to look pretty!
• In Vancouver Skytrain decimates neighbourhoods. First, it blights the areas it crosses in viaducts. Second, in the rich neighborhoods, it is put in a tunnel at a huge price premium. Finally, Skyrain has been leveraged by government to trigger tower construction. These things are not pretty. They create urban wastelands around their bases in areas already overshadowed by overhead viaducts.
It is no secret what having housing costing 9 and 10 times over affordability does to government revenues. It increases government revenue flows by 9 and 10 times. Canadian land is being sold off to the highest bidders in the global markets—Canadian families and Canadian neighborhoods be damned.
The population of Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver represent 34% of the national total. As the hyperinflation of Canadian homes continues apace, I expect a voter revolt to capture the nation.
Transportation projects will be scrutinized for their purpose: delivering affordable housing to Canadians hard-wired to the regional job centres.
I will explain below the outlines of such a program in the Vancouver-Fraser Valley region.
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2.0 THE MODERN TRAM ADVANTAGE: COST & CAPACITY
It seem to me that we have bought automation for the Lower Mainland transit system at too high a price.
After 40 years of building Skytrian we have to face the facts: the Skytrain is a people mover system with a footprint of operation limited to an area about 85% the size of the City of Surrey. Expanding beyond this boundary, the technology delivers smaller & smaller numbers in terms of capacity. Yet, the sticker price means that construction lags demand by decades. Hence, we have a Housing Crisis.
Transportation capacity, on the Expo and Millennium Lines, is a joke:
• 17,500 pphpd Expo (10 car modern tram can carry 75,000 or 4.3 times more passengers for 4 times less cost).
• 7,500 pphpd UBC Subway (typically subways carry 120,000 pphpd or 16-times more passengers for the same buck!)
Note the increase in maximum capacity for the Expo line is just 2,500 pphpd from the Transport Canada Operating Certificate. Upping certification is not an ‘automatic’ process.
Transit experts should explain why the UBC line caries half the capacity of the Expo line. Is the problem supplying enough power to run the LIM motors? Are longer trains just not possible? Is extending service to peripheral regions like Coquitlam and Langley kneecapped by ever decreasing capacity numbers triggered by the inability to deliver enough power to each station? Are we building a power grid problem?
Whatever the reason, the problem is that Skytrian cannot deliver regional levels of service. By design.
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3.0 A REGIONAL TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM
Regional rail operating on (mostly) government owned rights-of-way is possible today from Chilliwack to North Vancouver. It will require negations with rail operators and the construction of a new tunnel connecting Kitsilano with Lonsdale Quay. However, that is why we elect governments every four years: to get the job done.
The R.O.W. looks like this:
• BCER right-of-way: 98 km from Chilliwack to Surrey (Leeward Report).
• Government owns 30% trackage both on the Pratt-Livingston Corridor (184th – 232nd Street) and the Fraser River Rail Bridge.
• It is unclear how much of the corridor is owned by Government between the New West Rail Bridge and the Arbutus R.O.W.(Marpole).
The former Vancouver and Lulu Island Railway, a subsidiary of the CPR, operated the interurban track North of Fraser. It had seven stops between Marpole and Boundary inclusive.
What is clear is that government can acquire the rest of the V&LIR the same way it got the Arbutus Corridor.
• The V&LIR also operated a spur from the Arbutus Line along the south shore of False Creek which linked to the CN Mainline. The spur was acquired by the City of Vancouver, and a portion was used to run modern tram as a demonstration for the 2010 Olympics.
• The V&LIR spur can now be re-activated as a street car modern tram service from Waterfront Station, along Gastown, Chinatown, Quebec Street, the Olympic Village, and Granville Island all the way to UBC on 4th Avenue.
• Near Granville Island, trains could join the Arbutus line and head north downtown, or south to YVR and Chilliwack.
• The Arbutus Line and the Canada Line can share a new tunnel downtown, at levels appropriate to reach Lonsdale Quay under the Burrard Inlet (about 20 to 30 meters below the Dunsmuir tunnel according to Translink report).
• The Burrard Inlet Tunnel can be part of a 2030 Winter Olympics bid—just in time to solve the Housing Affordability Crisis and put a big dent on the Global Warming GHG-emissions Crisis.
With service to UBC on 4th Avenue using modern tram built for the same cost as 1 km of the Broadway Subway, let’s turn to detail the regional service leaving Chilliwack for North Vancouver:
• Riding the BCER line from Chilliwack to the Fraser Bridge (including the Pratt-Livingstone Corridor: 16 km; 30% trackage as terms of lease);
• Over the Fraser Bridge (30% trackage guaranteed as terms of lease)
• The V&LIR from New Westminster to Marpole (to be acquired from the CPR subsidiary);
• Marpole to Kitsilano (owned by the CoV);
• Entering a tunnel shared with the Canada Line to North Vancouver (built for a 2030 Olympic bid).
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4.0 THE SKYTRAIN CANNOT DELIVER
The capacity of the regional service dwarfs the Automated Skytrain system.
• Flexity – Bombardier cars carry 70 passengers seated and 181 standing;
• Using 2 minute headways (90 second headways are possible)
• One car delivers 7,530 pphpd.
• 10-car train set capacity: 75,300 pphpd.
• System operates on proprietary right-of-way, so longer trains are possible. Traffic signals tripped by the trains.
10 car train sets delvier 10-times the capacity of the Broadway Subway and about 4.5-times more service than the Expo line.
The cost difference in 2018 dollars is also staggering. Condon at UBC estimated construction costs for model tram as $50 million/km:
• 4 times cheaper than elevated Skytrain and
• 12 times cheaper than the Broadway subway.
Combining the two numbers, modern tram delivers 40 to 120 times more service for the same buck.
The cost of the Burrard Tunnel will be about the same for either technology.
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5.0 THE REASON WE BUILD TRANSPORTATION IN THE FRIST PLACE? DELIVERING AFFORDABLE HOUSING TO ALL CANADIANS.
The problem transportation folks are not thinking about is the fundamental reason why we build transit in the first place. I was in Chilliwack and Caltus Lake last week, and drove to Edmonton in the spring. In the Valley, on the Trans-Canada Highway, the HOV lanes stop at Langley (!).
The rest of the way is a standing still parking lot of cars stopped on a 1960s-era highway two times per day. It happens on the weekend too.
Unfortunately, this blocked artery was supposed to access affordable housing for the entire region.
The Skytrain cannot deliver service outside an area with a footprint 86% as large as the City of Surrey (as far as Coquitlam). And I agree that the SLS will not get built.
Transportation projects must be designed to solve the Housing Crisis. They must deliver affordable houses in sufficient number to meet or exceed demand.
Here is where we come face to face with the problem of the FINANCIALIZATION of Canadian urban land by building Skytrain-and-Towers.
Government has pushed housing at 8 to 10-times over the CMHC target for affordability for 34% of Canadians. And there are no signs of relief—quite the opposite.
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6.0 TRAMTOWNS AND NEIGHBORHOOD TRAMSTOP DISTRICTS
To combat the crisis we need a combined approach:
• Housing Guaranteed Affordable in Perpetuity (GHAP);
• Served by fast and efficient regional transit.
ON THE CMHC website we find the option of Guarantee Affordability Housing in Perpetuity (GAHP). Federal, provincial or local Housing Corporations develop and sell houses with contracts on title. The contract limits the resale value of the property in perpetuity. Land speculation and inflation is taken off the table.
Resale of property is capped at say COLA plus the interest on a 25-year government bond.
In Greater Vancouver and the Fraser Valley the land can be developed along the new regional transit system, from Lonsdale Quay to Chilliwack. In very conservative numbers:
• 500,000 Canadians can be housed within walking distance of regional transit stops in new tramtowns (ex-urban areas), and tramstop neighborhoods (urban areas).
A second regional line can link to Whistler and Mt. Currie:
• 500,000 Canadians can be housed from North Vancouver to Whistler. The first component of the line can be built as part of a 2030 Olympic bid.
Creating a new market sector where land valuation is capped (COLA plus 2%) Ends the Housing Crisis. The working number can be 1 million population and 400,000 houses. However, that number is very conservative.
Both urban and ex-urban components, are hard-wired to the regional centre by modern tram.
• In urban areas, neighbourhood revitalization projects at urban tram stops provide 1,000 housing units per stop.
• New tramtowns provide housing for up to 25,000 souls in ex-urban sites with tramstops.
Both infill and new towns are GHG-0 urbanism building out in the regional vernacular. That is hand-assembled, made from enhanced forestry products, in human scale (less than 4 stories high).
The mom-and-pop sector gets a big shot in the arm. The small business sector flourishes.
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7.0 HOW MUCH DID YOU SAY I CAN BUY A STARTER HOME IN A TRAMTOWN OR TRAMSTOP DISTRICT?
Houses would sell for 30% of median household incomes:
• $72,585 median before tax household income in Vancouver, or
• $242,000 per house, that is
• 1,200 square foot house, row house, courtyard house, or walk up apartment.
One cannot buy an apartment in a 50-year old building in Vancouver today for that price. Assessments for a 400 SF suite in a 3-story walkup hover at around $300,000 (That’s 400 square feet, not 1,200. And the assessment value, not the sale price).
Revitalization districts and Tramtowns would typically build on Crown Land, or parcels either already owned or acquired by local government. Vancouver owns most of the False Creek Flats, for example. Local Housing Corporations (Vancouver Housing Corporation) partner with provincial (BC Housing Corporation) and federal partners (CMHC) to deliver product to market.
This is not unlike the model used for transportation agreements. The land development side of the transit project is taken off the speculative markets. Costs are lowered for the transit lines by switching to regional transit systems. In the Vancouver-Fraser Valley districts the system operates in dedicated ROWs owned by government.
We can double overall population in the two regions over the next 72 years. It is a finer grain of growth, human scale and climate friendly, served by a regional transportation system.
This is the right alternative to the overpriced, under-capacity, light, automated people mover we are building today.
Costing 4 to 12 times less than Skytrain, and hard-wiring guaranteed affordable housing in perpetuity, transit will return to its original and most logical function: Making land accessible to all Canadians in the world’s largest democracy measured by land mass.