Clarity With Transit and TransLink ….. Ha, Ha, Ha!
The TransLink referendum continues to provide angst with politicians and TransLink and so it should, because both parties really haven’t a clue about public transit.
The new Chair of TransLink, Marcella Szel.Ai?? A former Canadian Railway executive and Port Authority director, has absolutely no background in urban transit and seems to have been chosen because, jolly gee-whiz, she was with a railway company and Skytrain is a railway, she must be an expert. Zwei thinks it just a patronage position and given so the “good ole’ porker” can feed off the public trough.
Here we demonstrate the real problem with Translink and the TransLink Board, they are not urban transit experts, nor do they seem to even understand urban transportation issues and are there to ‘rubber stamp’ the provincial governments desires.
Memo to Ms. Szel; “ The real problem is Skytrain and light metro and when Translink ceases planning for SkyTrain orAi?? heavy-rail metro designed as light-metro, or LRT designed as a light-metro, and only plan for light rail, only then will TransLink’s finical ills will ease.”
Until Szel and the rest of the TransLink board understand the problems, a fencepost with hair could do an adequate job as Translink Chair.
A fencepost with hair could do an adequate
job as Chair of Translink.
Waiting for clarity on transit referendum: TransLink Chair
Province has yet to give any details
Jason Howe January 16, 2014
VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) ai??i?? The longer we wait, the harder it gets, that is from TransLink, as we continue to wait for any sign of clarity about a plan by the provincial government to hold a transit funding referendum.
Publicly, itai??i??s mostly been a disagreement between the mayors and the province, from the date of the referendum, to the type of question, to whether we should even have a referendum at all.
Amid all this, Marcella Szel has come in to take over as TransLinkai??i??s new chair.Ai?? She says her group is on board with everyone else who wants details.
ai???I think itai??i??s frustrating for everybody who is waiting to try to understand what exactly the question might be and what exactly you have to think about.Ai?? What are the issues on the table that people are going to have to decide?ai???
Szel says timing is important.Ai?? ai???Waiting is not helpful because the more lead time you have in understanding what the issues are that you can deal with, the more time you have to make sure you understand those issues.ai???
The Transportation Ministry says details are still being worked out.Ai?? The mayors are meeting next week.
Hot topic
Meanwhile, the issue of transit on the Lower Mainland will be among the topics at the Vancouver Board of Tradeai???s annual economic outlook forum today.
Anne McMullin from the Urban Development Institute says politicians seem to be putting the cart before the horse when it comes to the funding referendum.
ai???We seem to be focusing so much on the referendum itself rather than what does transportation look like for the region and then perhaps a question comes out of that.Ai?? But itai??i??s difficult to say will it pass or fail when we donai??i??t even know what it is.ai???
She adds itai??i??s hard to get cities that are focused on their own needs to agree to a regional plan.
Reading your blog, I was curious how a real lightrail looks like. So in a recent trip to Seattle, got on the lightrail at Westlake station. It’s interesting while it’s labelled as lightrail, the first few miles it’s undergroung, just like our Skytrain! Why they did not construct it on the surface I have no info on, but looks like it must have affected the trafiic in downtown adversely? Then outside the tunnel, that’s what I needed to see. It’s fast but did not like the fact that it had blocked many many intersections and was prone to MVA. The last part of the line I think right before that tunnel bored in that hill, it’s not at grade again and looked just like our Skytrain.
Now I was trying to imagine this constructed on our Broadway corridor to see if at grade works there. Whereas it will definitely be cheaper to bulid lightrail but we will have to take out like three lanes from Broadway, and possibly make up for it by adding two lanes with no parking allowed all along Broadway. It will be a very hard decision to make as you can’t keep everyone happy.
Zweisystem replies: Seattle’s LRT is a hybrid light rail/metro system and as is common with both hybrid systems is carries the baggage of wrong decisions. The Seattle LRT was built to satisfy, those wanting a monorail, the Seattle transit subway, and big political donors who wanted a massive piece of the action and the result is a very expensive light rail system built on a route with questionable ridership. Seattle is more of an example of how not to build LRT.
LRT on Broadway would have to tracks in the centre, two auto lanes and two gutter lanes for traffic or parking. Capacity of Broadway would increase almost ten fold with LRT, the real question is it must be built properly, from BCIT to UBC and a line to Stanley park. It is this type of network that will work, not a sorta poorman’s SkyTrain from Commercial to Arbutus or extending the Millennium Line to Arbutus.
When we have the worst road congestion in North America, it seems silly to attempt to tax drivers further for more sky train lines. Sky train has been a failure for three decades – 57% trips by drivers, no change, but we do have 400,000 more cars on the roads, since 1999, when TransLink was formed to reduce the number of cars on the roads.
http://www.railforthevalley.com/latest-news/zweisystem/professor-warns-of-suburban-sprawl-%E2%80%98horrific%E2%80%99-congestion/
If the mayors are too dense to understand that building sky train lines for the few loons who travel 50 km from Surrey to Yaletown in Vancouver (100 km round trip) for their yuppie jobs is just making SNC Lavalin loads of money, that is truly sad. Maybe the mayors who favour more funding are co-conspirators and are in it for the loot, too.
http://www.theprovince.com/news/Failed+TransLink+referendum+could+imperil+economy+Metro+Surrey+Vancouver+mayors+warn/9396089/story.html
TransLink is a sham. Unless transit takes a new direction to cater to the majority of commuters whose median distance to work is 5 km in Vancouver, only one thing is certain – far greater gridlock, drivers will continue to drive. There has to be a switch to inexpensive tram or LRT lines which cater to the “majority” of commuters traveling 5 km to 15 km in Metro Vancouver and which reduce transit costs by removing buses. Fire everyone at TransLink and reboot.
TransLink is a wreck employing corrupt stooges – everyone is in it for a piece of pie and couldn’t give a crap about the environment or transit. Planners at TransLink are increasing both capital costs and operating costs to build very expensive sky train lines and then increasing service hours for buses to make the sky train lines operate – yet the commuting time is increased for the majority of transit users with sky train service.
Sack everyone at TransLink – 30 years of failure does not warrant more funding. Who is keeping score? TransLink is already spending $400 million too much every year on transit.
http://www.railforthevalley.com/latest-news/zweisystem/wisdom-from-ottawa/