Wuppertal Schwebebahn – The 108 year old gadgetbahnen!

The Wuppertal Schwebebahn isAi??Ai??one of theAi??Ai??most unique public transit system in the world, a true monorail.Ai??Ai??Opened in 1901, the Schwebebahn operated overAi??Ai??98 years before it recorded itsAi??Ai??first fatal accident and thus quite correctly, can be called the safest public transit system in the world. What is also interesting is that the Schwebebahn was never copied […]

Time to Bell TransLink’s Cat

A letter that appeared in several lower mainland weeklies. Editor: TransLink is bankrupt, but as every bureaucracy knows, the taxpayer can be forced to ante up; in Canada, higher taxes cures all ills. TransLink may not know how to plan for affordable transit, but the ‘boys and girls in the ivory towers’ know how to […]

Bogota TransMilenio ‘BRT’ selling ‘carbon credits’ – From the Light Rail now folks

This is an interesting article, but badly marred by very poor research by the author.Ai??Ai?? It also should be noted that bus ridership figuresAi??Ai??for South American BRT’s have proven to be greatly overstated. What also isAi??Ai??not mentioned isAi??Ai??that BRT has been disappointing in operation in North America, India, Australia and Europe, failing to achieve projected […]

NYC: Transport chief pushes more livable city, but faces anti-rail BRT "booby trap" – From the Light Rail Now Folks

Ominous news for the Fraser Valley efforts to reinstate the interurban, as it seems New York City’s transit plannersAi??Ai??are going against the world trend in building with LRT and instead is planning for Bus Rapid Transit or BRT. What a coincidence that TransLink’s new CEO,Ai??Ai??comes from New York City and its long established transit bureaucracy. […]

Get ready, Seattle: You’re about to be a light-rail town – From the Seattle Times

Ai??Ai??Seattle’s LRT line is “four to six times costlier than other light-rail startups in western states“, as planners designed the light rail service as a light-metro, with miles of expensive viaducts and even more expensive subway tunnels. The same sort of nonsense happened with BC Transit’s LRT plans for Broadway and Translink’s light rail plans […]

Bus Raid Transit – A transit Panacea or a money pit?

Phileas woes in Istanbul. Ai?? Many politicians are calling for Bus Rapid Transit, but reallyAi??Ai??haven’t a clue what they are talking about. Internationally, BRT describes guided buses and/or large busway networks, but in Vancouver, BRT tends to mean B-Line style, limited stop, bus service. What is quietly forgotten is that BRT has not, except in […]

From Seattle – The end of the line, for now: Tukwila is the jewel in the crown of Link – Mike Lindblom – Seattle Times

Though Seattle’s light rail project has more in common with Vancouver’s light-metro system, it does have portions running on city streets. Through the Duwamish River valley, it operates as a light-metro, running on a 8 km. viaduct. As soon as light-rail trains head south out of Seattle, leaving the streets of Rainier Valley, the ride […]

The aging SkyTrain – Pitfalls of a gadgetbahnen

The major problem with automatic railways, is that they age poorly or should one say, the signaling and miles and miles of wiring needed for automatic operation, age poorly.Ai??Ai??A transit system that is well maintained, with lots of expensive preventative maintenance, preforms well as it ages, but if little or no preventive maintenance is done, […]

Rail reality grows with Hydro’s revelation – The Vancouver Province.

Ai??Ai??From the Vancouver Province and thanks for Brian Lewis for following this story! Advocates for establishing a light-rail passenger service in the Fraser Valley have found an ally in B.C. Hydro. And, not surprisingly, they’ve also found an opponent in mighty Canadian Pacific Ltd., the railway-based corporation that many have loved to hate throughout its […]

How green is my rapid transit?

By popular demand, another posting on ‘green’ or grassed light rail rights-of-ways. Grassed light rail lines bring a ‘cooling’ green park-like atmosphere to city tram lines. Lawned rights-of-ways are also used on heavier (fast) light-rail lines on suburban routes. Even in dense city centres, a lawned tram line is ascetically appealing. The appealing nature of […]