The Silence of TransLink Speaks Volumes
Since Rail for the Valley released the RftV/Leewood TramTrain report in September, there has been a silence from TransLink and the government's two favoured media outlets, the Vancouver Sun and CKNW radio on the valley rail project. All the TV stations did reports, as did all the regional (semi)weekly newspapers, which is credit to their profession; but from TransLink – silence.
This was not unexpected as RftV has done what TransLink cannot or will not do, which is to produce a modern transportation plan based on light rail. It is no secret that TransLink treats LRT as a 'poorman's' SkyTrain and all the light rail planning done by TransLink has made LRT look inferior to SkyTrain, both in service and ability. TransLink's well paid mandarins just can't accept the fact that modern LRT had made SkyTrain obsolete before the first ALRT train operated on the Expo Line. The evidence is plain as one's face; no one builds with SkyTrain – well virtually no one as there are only seven such systems operating around the world (soon to be six when Toronto's Scarbough Line is dismantled and replaced by light rail).
Since SkyTrain was first marketed in the late 1970's, over 150 mew light rail lines have been built or are under construction, with many more in various stages of planning, yet listen to TransLink or BC's various Minister's of Transportation, one would think the opposite was true!
TransLink still claims and advises the Minister of Transportation and Metro Vancouver Board, that LRT can't carry more than 10,000 persons per hour per direction, yet in the real world, modern LRT can carry more, over double the capacity claimed by TransLink. This alone should bring charges of professional misconduct against TransLink's planning bureaucrats and managers, yet the mainstream media, because of a lack of transit savvy reporters, ignores TransLink's grand economies of the truth. If TransLink is fibbing about light rail's potential capacity, one wonders what else they are fibbing about.
Of course, this why TransLink is silent on the RftV/Leewood report, for if they admitted what is stated in the report about light rail was true, then they would have to admit that their claims about modern light rail are not true and it seems that TransLink's planning mandarins would rather collect six figure annual salaries and generous car allowances, rather than admit that their transit planning was based on a foundation of misinformation and pixie dust.
In BC and especially the Metro Vancouver region, misinformation and pixie dust planning are the hallmark of regional 'rail' transit planning.
