Take the Tram – From the AntonNews.com Long Island New York

Take the Tram By Michael Miller Friday, 11 June 2010 Why in 2010 does it often take twice as long to get from the North Shore to the Five Towns than it does to get from Mineola to White Plains? Cars are choking our roads, gas prices are threatening our economic viability. We need alternative […]

The Broadway Follies Part 4 – The Versatile Light Rail

TheAi??Ai??entire transit debate for the Broadway route has been defined by the SkyTrain Lobby as a quest for speed, as if speed was the only criteria for a successful urban ‘rail‘ line. Yet speed of a transit system is onlyAi??Ai??one ofAi??Ai??many factors that determine a successful ‘rail‘ transit line. From the Haas-Klau study (Bus or […]

Stephen Rees’s blog – Bond shies away from major TransLink reforms – well worth a read.

Many who read the Rail for the Valley blog also read Stephen Rees’s blog, but for the growing number of overseas visitors, his most recent post; “Bond shies away from major TransLink reforms” is well worth a read. http://stephenrees.wordpress.com/2010/05/02/bond-shies-away-from-major-translink-reforms/

Two Tram projects planned in northern France. What no VAL?

What is interesting about this announcement is that the new tram projects are planned near Lille France, which operates the VAL automatic mini-metro. The two approved tram or light-rail lines are very close to the City of Lille and the VAL mini-metro system. This poses the question: Why not build with VAL? French cities that […]

The Broadway Follies – TransLink does the Gong Show

Here we go again, TransLink’s famous planning exercises that in the end will please no one and achieve very little. There is no bold ‘grand plan’ but more of the same, a little BRT here; a little SkyTrain there, with a hint of LRT thrown in to keep the trolley-jolly types happy. With all the […]

Parry People Movers For Granville Island?

Ai??Ai??Granville Island was once a large industrial site, serviced with rail and when Granville Island was commercialized in the 1970’s the tracks were left in situ, with a promise of a (at the time) funky horse drawn tram. The tram service did not materialize, but the tracks and switches remain. With very little capital outlay, […]

Transit Agency Approves Cuts, and More Bad News Looms – From the New York Times

It seems that New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority is in dire fancial straights, just like our TransLink. What should not be forgotten is that even though New York has a vast subway system and massive daily ridership, mainteneace cost for that subway are massive and contributing to their finacial plight. For those preaching a subway […]

Clean, affordable light rail also delivers economic lift

Shades of the Broadway LRT/metro debate. It seems the metro lobby is hard at it to derail Toronto’s LRT plans, just like how the metro/SkyTrain lobby is trying to do the same in Vancouver. Ai??Ai?? Added to the metro/SkyTrainAi??Ai??debate is that our friends South of the boarder are trying reinvent light rail into light-metro, a […]

UBC SkyTrain Subway Gaining Steam – Is it An Unstoppable Train?

One year ago, with Cambie Street merchant’s Susan Heyes lawsuit against TransLink fresh in many peoples minds, any thought of a SkyTrain subway under Broadway was quietly ignored. Now, with TransLink teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, Vancouver’s political bloggists and mainstream media are gung-ho promoting a SkyTrain subwayAi??Ai??under Broadway to UBC. The tired old […]

In Seattle – Proposed First Hill streetcar is Broadway bound – The Seattle Times

While Vancouver council sweats over big decisions like ‘chickens in the backyard’ and ‘chicken shelters’ for unwanted chickens, Seattle’s politicians seem on the right track improving their urban and regional transportation. The first streetcar line, the ill-named South Lake Union Transportation or SLUT, was too small an effort for the investment and I think this […]