Sadly, the same is true in BC and Canada, where politicians fully believe the more money one spends on transit, the better is is.
We are currently spending around $11 billion to extend the SkyTrain light metro system a mere 21.7 km.
Current Cost Estimates:
Surrey Langley SkyTrain – $4.6 billion to $5.1 billion
Broadway subway – $2.7 billion to $3 billion+
Mid life rehab of Expo Line – $3 billion (More than $1.5 billion already spent, if one includes station rebuilding with longer platforms for 5 car trains)
(Needs to be completed before full operation can commence on the SLS and subway)
Total – $10.3 billion to $11.1 billion
Is this good value for money or would the following be a better investment?
RftV – Leewood Vancouver to Chilliwack passenger service – $1.5 billion
A BCIT to UBC/Stanley Park European style tram. $2 billion
A new multi track Fraser River rail bridge – $1.5 billion
A rebuilt E&N railway, offering the same service as the RftV/Leewood Plan $2 billion to $3 billion.
Each one of the aforementioned projects, would greatly benefit the region/province. A combined cost estimate of $7 to $8 billion, for over 400 km of rail transit would leave around $2 to $3 billion to be spent on other transit investments in the province.
The region and province still adhere to the tired old doctrine of investing billions of dollars on a grossly over engineered and hugely expensive, yet obsolete proprietary light metro system, which in the end does little to improve transit or mitigate the emissions of harmful pollutants that add to global Warming and climate change.
But ……. it certainty helps winning votes at election time!
NSW megaprojects are being over-engineered with tonnes of unnecessary, costly materials driving up the price and carbon footprint of the multibillion-dollar builds, Infrastructure Minister Rob Stokes has warned.
Stokes said NSW would fail to reach its goal of a net zero economy by 2050 without addressing overservicing in its $110-billion infrastructure pipeline, where concrete and steel are being superfluously added to projects.
NSW Infrastructure Minister Rob Stokes says the state must rethink how it approaches large infrastructure projects.Credit:Rhett Wyman
Carbon emissions from construction material – including concrete and steel – are estimated to represent up to 10 per cent of Australia’s carbon output. A new report produced by Stokes and Infrastructure NSW has flagged including those emissions in the business cases of future projects.
“We want things to be robust and well-built, but that shouldn’t mean just throwing more concrete and steel into our bridges, roads and railways,” Stokes told the Herald.
“There is an irony here. Because we’ve got very conservative design standards we’re actually putting more concrete and steel into roads and bridges and railways than anyone else in the world.”
Stokes pointed to the recent construction of the multibillion-dollar Metro rail lines as an example of a project that could have used less material without impacting design integrity.
Infrastructure Minister Rob Stokes says some Metro stations may have been over-engineered. Credit:Wolter Peeters
“I think there is a general awareness that we have been very conservative and over-designed some of our station boxes on Metro lines,” he said.
The government is spending tens of billions of dollars on the Metro, which will connect the CBD to the west and south-west of the city, as well as a line to service the new Western Sydney Airport when it opens in 2026. The projects have been hampered by cost blowouts.
Station boxes are excavated for underground platforms, concourses and facilities, while major developments are often installed above them.
Stokes said a “compliance culture” in NSW had led to an intense focus on mitigating risk and liability in both the government and private sectors.
“I think every engineer that touches a project on the way through … just wants to ensure that their responsibility is entirely mitigated by throwing a bit of extra concrete and steel at it,” he said.
“The sum total of all these little decisions where people are just effectively covering their back means that we’re paying way over the odds, and also contributing toward global climate emissions because of our innate design conservatism, so we need to challenge that.”
The senior minister, who will retire from politics at the next state election, said that more thoughtfully designing the state’s largest projects would cut emissions, save time and taxpayer cash.
“We should be very proud of the fact that we are designing very, very robust structures, but the question we need to ask is, ‘Are we over designing them?’. There’s a cost imperative to that for the taxpayer,” he said.
“But there’s also a climate imperative because every bit of extra design constraint that adds to the bulk of a structure is making it more carbon intensive.”
The Infrastructure NSW discussion paper, set to be released this week, recommends a whole of government approach to measuring emissions in infrastructure.
The Decarbonising Infrastructure Delivery report says multibillion-dollar investment decisions were being made without any understanding of carbon mitigation or management over the life of the asset. It warns that could result in potentially higher costs to retrofit projects to achieve net-zero in the future.
The report also recommends maximising the use of recycled material in building.
The United Kingdom, including the Glasgow Airport Investment Area, and Europe are cited as examples of governments including the carbon impact of projects when weighing up their benefits and cost.
The government paper follows a report produced by Infrastructure Partnerships Australia which earlier this year called for ambitious, lower-carbon outcome requirements in major projects.
Stokes said future state governments would need to rethink the way they approached big projects, and instead start by questioning whether they should even go ahead at all.
“One of the very best ways we can decarbonise infrastructure is actually asking whether we need such an expensive megaproject design intervention in the first place. Maybe there are other ways to achieve the same objective,” he said.
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The connection between the transit projects and the urbanism must be stressed. So let’s put some GAHP numbers to the transit lines.
(1) A regional transit line to Whistler (122 km) I have estimated, will support building GAHP houses for 1.2 million souls (GAHP—guaranteed affordable houses in perpetuity—see my comments to the previous post).
I’ve been told are grade issues for modern tram as we approach Alpine slopes. There are also grade issues at Burnaby Mountain, where the ‘gondola’ project looks pricey and low-capacity from a distance.
(2) The Fraser Valley Line (128 km; Granville Island to Chilliwack) will support GAHP products for 2.23 million.
(3) The Sasamat Arm Line (170 km; North of Fraser—Horse Shoe Bay to Hope, crossing a renamed Indian Arm on a new bridge) will house 3.1 million in GAHP products.
(4) A Burrard Inlet Tunnel (BIT 6 km, including Burrard Street subway) operating both Canada Line|Modern Tram tunnel connecting Waterfront to Lonsdale Quay will support additional housing for 30,000 living behind GAHP doors, walking distance from tramstops.
(5) UBC-Stanley Park Line (16 km)—160,000 people in GAHP products.
(6) Hastings-SFU-BCIT-Central Park Line—haven’t done the math on this one.
However, for estimating purposes, we can apply a population increment ratio of 15,000 souls per km, or 6,000 GAHP door per km of modern tram.
By combining modern tram with human scale urbanism (built from renewable, value-added forestry products) we achieve a New Urban Paradigm made guaranteed affordable for all Canadians in perpetuity.
BTW—with (4) we land the 2030 Olympics in the process, catapulting Whistler to the top skying destination in North America. Which is not too shabby, since tourism dollars, and forestry, mining, and salmon, are key drivers for our economy. Fly to YVR, hop on a modern train, and arrive at your Alpine hotel… 90 minutes later. Its got Olympic Gold written all over it!
In 2019 structural concrete was at an average price range of $400 – $420 per cubic metre in Canada. It’s know $465 – $488 per cubic metre according to the people at K.E.V., & SNC Lavlin. These are the consortiums building the expansion of both Line 1-Line-3 (KEV) and Line-2 & Line-4 (SNC Lavlin). It’s increasing at 9% per year.
The skytrain is not an over designed project. It is just right for Vancouver. The skytrain to Coquitlam is wonderful. It is much better than that old interurban railway to chiliwack that was discontinued due to low ridership. It was a money losing business. Skytrain has way more riders than that silly train to the dumps. Chiliwack is a dump.
Zwei replies: Actually SkyTrain or light metro is extremely over designed for what it does. Actually, I am of the opinion that the Leewood/RftV project would carry more customers than the SLS Line after 5 years, simply because it serves a lot of destinations, where the SLS realistically only has one.
A regional transit line to Whistler (122 km) I’ve been told are grade issues for modern tram as we approach Alpine slopes.
What is wrong with the existing rail line? BC Rail operated successfully on it for many decades. The rocky mountain tourist train still use it.
You have never been to Switzerland that have trams going up mountains.
Zwei replies: You have been told wrong. The maximum grade on the line to Whistler, I believe is 2% and the industry standard for a tram (and TramTrain) is 8%. The reason BC Rail used the Budds as every car was powered, thus the train was able to tackle the grades at speed. As for Switzerland, they have rack and pinion vehicles, some derived from trams that can ascend extremely steep gradients. The only “rack” tram that I know of is in Stuttgart, Germany.
Most mainline railway grades max out between 4.1% and 4.5%. Some very special areas will see 5%. A modern Light Rail Vehicle ( LRV) can handle up to 5.5%, with standard equipment, up to 8% if you choose spealized motors and other higher current, electrical traction equipment on each truck. Using highly specialized nonstandard equipment designs on your LRV’s however, greatly drives up the cost and is rarely done today. If the line to Whistler was already using standard mainline railway equipment, then just about any LRV on the market is just fine. Concerns about grade is political speak for, “we really don’t want to do it because it will favor one area, or in this case, one specific resort, too much.”
Any “rebuilt or reopened” existing mainline railway must go through an expensive process where each pre-existing bridge, culvert, retaining wall or building must be assessed, brought up to modern standards with modern materials, which is time consuming and expensive. Most importantly all the negative externalities and liabilities (legal and financial risk) must be quantified and covered by some type assurances whether they be a simple government policy or by a physical entity, like insurance.
One of the main reasons we have P3 (public private partnership) agreements are because governments don’t want to have these long term liabilities on the financial books, they count as budget deficits. So it’s cheaper to get someone else, a private company for example, pay them a yearly fee, so they can have the potential deficits on their books, instead of the government’s. This is why, unless a private company wants to run a railway to Whistler, it will never happen. Governments just don’t want to accept financial or legal liabilities anymore (aka Risk Management).
Oh yes, it’s the highly specialized, nonstandard electrical traction equipment (the LIM Propulsion Units) that makes the Skytrain so expensive too maintain and run. Far higher maintenance levels in both personnel and budget than just standard electrical motors on LRV’s, with no difference in lifespan between the two. When I worked for Bombardier these LIM propulsion units were often the first in a series of “deal killers” that drove customers away from the MALM (Skytrain) product towards anything else.
On our side of the pond, most major transit projects have gone over budgeted estimates and comes to this, is the planned transit good value for money?
In the 50’s, 60’s into the early 80’s subways were the de rigueur , then came the mid life rebuilds and this paupered many of the transit agencies who had not budgeted for such costs. Generous government funding enable politicians to build theses edifices and now the taxpayer must pay to keep them in good order.
This is one of the reasons, French planners were strongly motivated for the modern tram, being much cheaper and just, if not more effective.
Across the boarder in Germany, transit ridership dropped when subways were built because the abandoned tramways served a broader clientele.
From what we have been reading in Vancouver, your streetcar planning is based on extremely dated information, some going back to the 1930’s.
During our unhappy episode with the RAV Line, we reminded the transportation authority that we could build a much larger tram network so designed to give quick access to YVR, for less than one half the cost of the RAV Skytrain Line. The argument was as it still is, that trams do not have the capacity, but we reminded the TransLink CEO and your minister of transportation, I believe was a Mr. Falcon, that in Europe, even the simplistic of tram lines could carry in excess of 15,000 persons per hour.
We find it strange that the maximum capacity of your present RAV Line is 9,000 per hour, with huge investment needed to increase this.
We also shake our head when it is claimed that the Canada line is successful, here we use it as an example of bad transit planning or worse.
The connection between the transit projects and the urbanism must be stressed. So let’s put some GAHP numbers to the transit lines.
(1) A regional transit line to Whistler (122 km) I have estimated, will support building GAHP houses for 1.2 million souls (GAHP—guaranteed affordable houses in perpetuity—see my comments to the previous post).
I’ve been told are grade issues for modern tram as we approach Alpine slopes. There are also grade issues at Burnaby Mountain, where the ‘gondola’ project looks pricey and low-capacity from a distance.
(2) The Fraser Valley Line (128 km; Granville Island to Chilliwack) will support GAHP products for 2.23 million.
(3) The Sasamat Arm Line (170 km; North of Fraser—Horse Shoe Bay to Hope, crossing a renamed Indian Arm on a new bridge) will house 3.1 million in GAHP products.
(4) A Burrard Inlet Tunnel (BIT 6 km, including Burrard Street subway) operating both Canada Line|Modern Tram tunnel connecting Waterfront to Lonsdale Quay will support additional housing for 30,000 living behind GAHP doors, walking distance from tramstops.
(5) UBC-Stanley Park Line (16 km)—160,000 people in GAHP products.
(6) Hastings-SFU-BCIT-Central Park Line—haven’t done the math on this one.
However, for estimating purposes, we can apply a population increment ratio of 15,000 souls per km, or 6,000 GAHP door per km of modern tram.
By combining modern tram with human scale urbanism (built from renewable, value-added forestry products) we achieve a New Urban Paradigm made guaranteed affordable for all Canadians in perpetuity.
BTW—with (4) we land the 2030 Olympics in the process, catapulting Whistler to the top skying destination in North America. Which is not too shabby, since tourism dollars, and forestry, mining, and salmon, are key drivers for our economy. Fly to YVR, hop on a modern train, and arrive at your Alpine hotel… 90 minutes later. Its got Olympic Gold written all over it!
In 2019 structural concrete was at an average price range of $400 – $420 per cubic metre in Canada. It’s know $465 – $488 per cubic metre according to the people at K.E.V., & SNC Lavlin. These are the consortiums building the expansion of both Line 1-Line-3 (KEV) and Line-2 & Line-4 (SNC Lavlin). It’s increasing at 9% per year.
I would also like to point out that, the price of structural reinforced concrete actually dropped overall about 5% during the height of the pandemic.
The skytrain is not an over designed project. It is just right for Vancouver. The skytrain to Coquitlam is wonderful. It is much better than that old interurban railway to chiliwack that was discontinued due to low ridership. It was a money losing business. Skytrain has way more riders than that silly train to the dumps. Chiliwack is a dump.
Zwei replies: Actually SkyTrain or light metro is extremely over designed for what it does. Actually, I am of the opinion that the Leewood/RftV project would carry more customers than the SLS Line after 5 years, simply because it serves a lot of destinations, where the SLS realistically only has one.
A regional transit line to Whistler (122 km) I’ve been told are grade issues for modern tram as we approach Alpine slopes.
What is wrong with the existing rail line? BC Rail operated successfully on it for many decades. The rocky mountain tourist train still use it.
You have never been to Switzerland that have trams going up mountains.
Zwei replies: You have been told wrong. The maximum grade on the line to Whistler, I believe is 2% and the industry standard for a tram (and TramTrain) is 8%. The reason BC Rail used the Budds as every car was powered, thus the train was able to tackle the grades at speed. As for Switzerland, they have rack and pinion vehicles, some derived from trams that can ascend extremely steep gradients. The only “rack” tram that I know of is in Stuttgart, Germany.
Most mainline railway grades max out between 4.1% and 4.5%. Some very special areas will see 5%. A modern Light Rail Vehicle ( LRV) can handle up to 5.5%, with standard equipment, up to 8% if you choose spealized motors and other higher current, electrical traction equipment on each truck. Using highly specialized nonstandard equipment designs on your LRV’s however, greatly drives up the cost and is rarely done today. If the line to Whistler was already using standard mainline railway equipment, then just about any LRV on the market is just fine. Concerns about grade is political speak for, “we really don’t want to do it because it will favor one area, or in this case, one specific resort, too much.”
Any “rebuilt or reopened” existing mainline railway must go through an expensive process where each pre-existing bridge, culvert, retaining wall or building must be assessed, brought up to modern standards with modern materials, which is time consuming and expensive. Most importantly all the negative externalities and liabilities (legal and financial risk) must be quantified and covered by some type assurances whether they be a simple government policy or by a physical entity, like insurance.
One of the main reasons we have P3 (public private partnership) agreements are because governments don’t want to have these long term liabilities on the financial books, they count as budget deficits. So it’s cheaper to get someone else, a private company for example, pay them a yearly fee, so they can have the potential deficits on their books, instead of the government’s. This is why, unless a private company wants to run a railway to Whistler, it will never happen. Governments just don’t want to accept financial or legal liabilities anymore (aka Risk Management).
Oh yes, it’s the highly specialized, nonstandard electrical traction equipment (the LIM Propulsion Units) that makes the Skytrain so expensive too maintain and run. Far higher maintenance levels in both personnel and budget than just standard electrical motors on LRV’s, with no difference in lifespan between the two. When I worked for Bombardier these LIM propulsion units were often the first in a series of “deal killers” that drove customers away from the MALM (Skytrain) product towards anything else.
On our side of the pond, most major transit projects have gone over budgeted estimates and comes to this, is the planned transit good value for money?
In the 50’s, 60’s into the early 80’s subways were the de rigueur , then came the mid life rebuilds and this paupered many of the transit agencies who had not budgeted for such costs. Generous government funding enable politicians to build theses edifices and now the taxpayer must pay to keep them in good order.
This is one of the reasons, French planners were strongly motivated for the modern tram, being much cheaper and just, if not more effective.
Across the boarder in Germany, transit ridership dropped when subways were built because the abandoned tramways served a broader clientele.
From what we have been reading in Vancouver, your streetcar planning is based on extremely dated information, some going back to the 1930’s.
During our unhappy episode with the RAV Line, we reminded the transportation authority that we could build a much larger tram network so designed to give quick access to YVR, for less than one half the cost of the RAV Skytrain Line. The argument was as it still is, that trams do not have the capacity, but we reminded the TransLink CEO and your minister of transportation, I believe was a Mr. Falcon, that in Europe, even the simplistic of tram lines could carry in excess of 15,000 persons per hour.
We find it strange that the maximum capacity of your present RAV Line is 9,000 per hour, with huge investment needed to increase this.
We also shake our head when it is claimed that the Canada line is successful, here we use it as an example of bad transit planning or worse.