A Cost Comparison of Transportation Modes. A study worth looking at.

The following study is well worth a look as it dispels many currents myths about transit, especially the SkyTrain light-metro system. ‘Zwei’ notes that Professor Condon has fallen into the light rail/streetcar trap. The difference between LRT and a streetcar is the quality of rights-of-way, where a streetcar operates on-street in mixed traffic, with little […]

View obscured from ivory tower – From the Chilliwack times.

The Light Rail Committee has been advocating TramTrain for the Fraser Valley since the mid 90’s, hopefully some positive news will be forthcoming soon! Sadly, in an age of financial frugality, regional and provincial transit planners still plan for hugely expensive metro and SkyTrain systems, yet with little or no method to pay for them. […]

More Light Rail Links

More links for research and general information. http://www.metromodemedia.com/features/Transitdensity0020.aspx http://netdensity.net/tag/lrt/ http://kiat.net/malaysia/KL/transit.html http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?p=4358531 http://www.examiner.com/x-11410-Fresno-Transportation-Examiner~y2010m5d2-In-the-know-series–Part-3-BRT–LRT-or-BRT-vs-LRT?cid=exrss-Fresno-Transportation-Examiner http://southwestlrt.wordpress.com/ http://lightrailjacksonville.webs.com/whylrti.htm http://www.raisethehammer.org/article/851/main-king_lrt_split_may_be_a_good_idea http://www.thespec.com/article/716331 http://www.lightrailnow.org/news/n_kc_2007-05a.htm Research. http://tris.trb.org/view.aspx?id=909553 Ai??Ai??http://ideas.repec.org/p/wiw/wiwrsa/ersa01p118.html Ai??Ai??www.britchammacao.org/download/201003MacauLRTintro.pdf Ai??Ai??http://www.jstor.org/pss/3551027 Ai??Ai??http://canadianaffairs.suite101.com/article.cfm/edmontons_light_rail_transit_issues Ai??Ai??www.edmonton.ca/…/LRTRouteEvaluationcriteriaMarch2009.pdf http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2008/09/why-phoenix-lig.html Ai??Ai??http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_light_rail_in_North_America

Shameful Media Reporting

The real story is, not the ever promised Evergreen Line, but the totally lack of research done by the reporter. If the reporter in question had any knowledge at all about transit, should would have known that SkyTrain was indeed onceAi??Ai??marketed asAi??Ai??ALRT or Advanced Light Rail Transit in 1980. TheAi??Ai??acronym ALRT was the second given […]

Late Friday Night’s Musings For Saturday Reading

Zwei, with a cup of tea in hand, has been reading the various transit blogs and answering emailsAi??Ai??from interested parties around the world, trying to get a read onAi??Ai??what direction public transit is going in the near and not so near future. Sadly, I see a trend in North America towards supporting building hugely expensive […]

Smart Growth. A look into Cities, Urban planning, and the Sustainable Movement.

A reader of this blog has kindly given ‘Zwei’ some links about Smart Growth around the world and they are very much well worth having a look. http://smarturbandesign.blogspot.com/2009/04/mall-of-america-and-minneapolis-light.html http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0BQQ/is_8_41/ai_81104210/ http://www.friends4expo.org/ltrail.htm http://www.drcog.org/documents/LRT%20and%20TOD.pdf http://www.thespec.com/article/717530 http://www.mindspring.com/~tbgray/lrtmaps.htm

LRT will motivate us to ditch cars, From the Hamilton Spectator

What I find interesting about this news item, is the statement, “…….a consultants’ report into the economics of LRT in Hamilton projected the system would need about 34,000 riders a weekday (8.9 million a year) to break even on its operational costs.“; which should put a stop to the SkyTrain’s lobby claims that light rail […]

If Cambie Street grows as hoped, City of Vancouver will lose big bucks – From The Vancouver Sun

As stated before many times, rapid transit development in Vancouver, especially the Millennium and RAV/Canada Lines, has been about development and not moving people. The hype and hoopla of TransLink and the mainstream media that the Canada Line is carrying 94,000 riders a day ignores the fact that all except about 10% of the Canada […]

Are SkyTrain Mk 1 Cars For Sale?

An interesting post in the Toronto Information blog. SRT: What To Look Forward To With the funding deferment pushing back the conversion of the SRT until after 2015, the plan includes buying some used ICTS Mark-I cars from Vancouver. Want a look at what is in store for us, take a look atAi??Ai??this article which […]

Texas’s Newest ‘Rail’ Transit line, the Red Line

This article for Mass Transit should prove interesting to supporters of the “return of the interurban“, in the Fraser Valley. What should be of interest is the cost of the 32 mile (51.5 km)Ai??Ai??line is less than $5 million per mile or $3.1 million per km. (CAD $ 3.24 million)! Let’s see, a Vancouver to […]