The Broadway Gong Show Revisited

Back by popular demand, the Broadway gong show.

Broadway Transit Follies ai??i?? TransLink Does The Gong Show ai??i?? Part 2

Want to know how TransLink spends taxpayer’s hard earned money? It is easy, TransLink studies transit options for Broadway. TransLink’s Broadway “Rapid Transit” (which means metro) study for Broadway is dated and extremely misleading, but what else would one expect from an organization that has done little, but to waste time, justifying their existence. TransLink’s seven options are studies in mediocrity, nothing more. It is time TransLink get out of the planning business and let real transportation experts have go at it, at least we would get something resembling a 21st century public transit.

Memo to South Fraser Politicians: Dump this turkey called TransLink and form a new South Fraser Transportation Authority,Ai??asAi??TransLinkAi??couldn’t even plan for an outhouse, let alone understand its function.

The following are the seven transit options offered by TransLink with Zweisystem’s comments added.

Option 1: Street level Bus Rapid Transit ai??i?? cost $350 million to $450 million

The problem with Bus Rapid Transit or BRT, is that to be truly rapid, it must operate on either a guideway or a dedicated bus way. If the proposed BRT is to be BRT, it will cost almost the same for a simple streetcar or tramway to install. As there is much more benefits that come with a streetcar/tramway than BRT, it is natural to spend a little more and get a far greater bang for your buck.

Here lies the Achilles heel of BRT.

Option 2: Street level LRT- Cost $1.1 billion

Here we see TransLink at its finest, loading costs onto LRT to make it more expensive than it should be, but then by not doing so, it would make the SkyTrain and Canada line metros (they are two completely different metro systems) look like bad bargains. Modern LRT, either as a basic streetcar/tramway or light rail can handle capacities exceeding 20,000 persons per hour per direction, with just a basic there and back track design. The real costs for a light rail option:

1. Streetcar/tramwayAi??(not including vehicles and using existingAi??electrical overhead): ai??i?? $6 mil/km to $10 mil/km.
2. LRTAi??(not including vehicles and using existingAi??electrical overhead) with 60% reserved rights-of-ways and priority signaling at intersections: $15 mil/km to $25 mil/km.
3. Light Rail Vehicles: Used staring under $1 million to new (depending on size) $3 million to $6 million each.

Option 3:Ai?? LRT #2 ai??i?? Cost $1.3 to $1.4 billion

This LRT variant is just puzzling and one must ask the question why? Why go via the Great Northern Way? It seems TransLink is just up to its puerile games, not knowing what to do and hoping someone will come along and fund a SkyTrain subway under Broadway.

Option 4: Bored tunnel Rail Rapid Transit ai??i?? Cost $2.9 to $$3.2 billion

Here is the meat of the matter; here is what TransLink really wants to build ai??i?? a SkyTrain subway to UBC. The real cost for a bored SkyTrain subway to UBC is nearer to $4 billion and there isn’t the ridership today or in the future that would justify such an expenditure. To reduce costs, revisiting cut and cover construction would be a real option, but will the memory of the ruined Cambie Street merchants, still linger when the final decision is made?

Option 5: Street level LRT ai??i?? bored tunnel RRT ai??i?? elevated RRT ai??i?? Cost $2.4 billion

Here we have a plan to keep the LRT and SkyTrain types happy, silly and unprofessional, but then I would expect nothing lessAi??from TransLink. A planned forced transfer for UBC bound passengers at ArbutusAi??defies modern public transit philosophy of providing a seamless or no transfer journey.

Option 6: Street level BRT/Tunnel Elevated RRTAi??- CostAi??$1.9 billion

Here we have real silliness by TransLink, a plan to keep the bus boys and SkyTrain types happy. It’s not quite April Fools Day, but TransLink’s bizarre BRT planning could fund over 60 km of streetcar/LRT for the city of Vancouver.

Option 7: Best bus ai??i?? Cost $325 million

Here we come to the transit plan that will probably be implemented, the Best Bus option ai??i?? it is what TransLink can afford.

I try not to be tooAi??hard with my comments about TransLink, but really, when such rubbish is presented at public meetings it is hard to contain ones self. Not one of the plans addresses real transit problems, rather they seem to be a continuation of the Expo Line in one form or another and those bureaucrats in those ivory hall on Kingsway should hang their heads in shame. Not one plan will offer an attractive alternative to the car. Buses, in their various guises, have singularly failed to attract the motorist from the car and haphazard and meandering light rail lines will do likewise. forced transfers are well know to deter ridership and in Europe transit is so designed to minimize or eliminateAi??transfers altogether.

Why doesn’t TransLink use the simple term metro or subway, instead of using Rail Rapid Transit or RRT. Could it be that TransLink wants to play the old SkyTrain shell game once again by claiming that RRT is faster and carries more customers than LRT? Sad to say, TransLink played this game with the Evergreen Line, until US transit expert Gerald fox caught them out!

In 2008, noted AmericanAi??transit expert Gerald Fox, statedAi??in a letter to a Victoria transportation group,Ai??shredded TransLink’sAi??Evergreen Line business case, stating; “I found several instances where the analysis had made assumptions that were inaccurate, or had been manipulated to make the case for SkyTrain. If the underlying assumptions are inaccurate, the conclusions may be so too.”Ai??

FoxAi??later said; It is interesting how TransLink has used this cunning method of manipulating analysis to justify SkyTrain in corridor after corridor, and has thus succeeded in keeping its proprietary rail system expanding. In the US, all new transit projects that seek federal support are now subjected to scrutiny by a panel of transit peers, selected and monitored by the federal government, to ensure that projects are analyzed honestly, and the taxpayersai??i?? interests are protected. No SkyTrain project has ever passed this scrutiny in the US.”Ai??

Over 15 years ago, during the Millennium Line fiasco, Zweisystem had a long chat with a transit professional from Asea Brown Boveri, regarding the application of a successful light rail line on Broadway. His comments still ring true and show how dated TransLink’s present day efforts are.

He stated that a BCIT to UBC line with a second line from Main Street, through Vancouver’s downtown to Stanley park, would more than double present bus ridership on the two routes in two to three years, creating the ridershipAi??which fares would not only pay for the operational costs, but the capital costs of the new LRT. With such revenue, we could find an operator that would design, build and operate the new transit line at no cost to the taxpayer.

Maybe this is why TransLink has done so poorly in planning for transit, they are afraid that the private sector would show what TransLink really is, a ponderous bureaucracy whose only efforts is to create jobs for itself to pretend that it is actually accomplishing something. But then, there is no money for any of this, except for the last Best Bus option and what is planned for today, will be stale-dated by future events, when what ever option is implemented.

It is time that civic and provincial politicians put this expensive gong show out of its misery.