Is Mel Lehan suggesting that we replace our local service trolleybus system with a local service tram? What would be the purpose of that?

I understand the potential neighbourhood amenity of a slow tram, but it doesn't make sense for a regional destination like UBC and Central Broadway..

If Mel Lehan is prepared to densify and upzone Point Grey to accomidate new students and staff, then a tram may make sense. I think this is a shade of NIMBYism, though.

http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/planning/cpp/mountpleasant/factsheets/333ub... 

If people want to avoid what happened on Cambie St. with cut-and-cover, why would you want to build LRT on the street? There are going to be the same kinds of closures to install tracks and overhead wires and to reconstruct the entire street to accommodate platforms! I don't think anti-Skytrain activists realize how much street space will be given up in the end. You are probably going to lose on-street parking down Broadway to allow more than one through land of traffic which I think is going to upset businesses the most. 

Cadman is a media maven and has Little understanding of public transport, except for 10 second sound bites.

It is not technology that is the problem, it is mode - LRT or metro.

Rapid transit is in fact metro and not LRT thus already the planning has a bias favouring metro. It is metro that is driving up costs as it is both expensive to build and expensive to operate, and only to be built on routes with extremely high passenger loads - 15,000 pphpd or more.

Buses will fail because buses do not attract ridership, both the Essen and Adelaide guided (super BRT) bus systems have proven this in spades.

Before anyone seriously wants to debate transit on Broadway, I would strongly suggest reading Prof. of Urban Transportation, Carmen Haas-Klau's sis of international transit studies starting with: "Bus or Light Rail, making the Right Decision."

Though the original study is now 10 years old, it has been the handbook of modern public transport design, and is light years ahead of any study in North America.

Be informed, learn, then debate. 

It seems absurd to build a skytrain type system to UBC along the Broadway corridor and the absurding lies not in the possibility of building the system but in land use thinking at the beginning of the 20th Century to the mid 1960's when leaders in their great wisdom decided to place the two major post secondary institutions UBC and SFU in the far reaches of the region's core.

The Great Trek of 1922 saw UBC move from Fairview, VGH location, to Point Grey. At this time, 4th Avenue and Alma was a swamp with a bulldozer trail running through it and CPR was desperately trying to sell lots for residential dwellings. People still had summer camps at the northern end of Waterloo at this time.

SFU's location was decided by one person who had more than one choice. To Gordon Shrum, the top of Burnaby Mountain seemed a great place to situate this campus of the cloud gods. Lofting over the general population the campus of SFU would be a literal translation of 'higher' learning. Moving students up the hill has become a very expensive endeavour and has shifted public dollars from education to transportation. Can you say raise the tuition?

Both these land use decisions have been very expensive in terms of transportation costs. And I won't go into the details but building train lines and stations and freeways etc have taxed the public purse over the decades and it appears to continue to do so if we let the RedInk folks carry on with this absurd expensive Broadway-UBC study. (Is this study adding to the burden of RedInk's revenue woes...why are fares to increase yet again?)

So what are the solutions. UBC and SFU, as well as BCIT and VCC all have downtown campuses which I think have been positive moves. These locations were already well served by all modes of transit services: bus, boat and trains.

So is it time to have another Great Trek for UBC? I think so.
Is there a better way to utilize billions of dollars of taxpayers incomes?

A vision to move and build a new UBC general campus, not research labs, to another part of the city, which is already well served by bus and trains, would cost less than building yet another transit devastating SkyTrain project.

Surely we could have a new high rise campus at the underutilized lands where the old CN rail yards and commercial lands situated north and south of Terminal Avenue and east of Main exist. This area is already well served by both the Expo and Millenium Lines as well as several bus routes that pass through and around this corridor. The new Canada Line coupled with the streetcar system on southeast False Creek is another major transit infrastructure system that lends itself to servicing a new UBC campus at Main and Terminal. The flotilla of buses cruising down Broadway would no longer exist and Main and Terminal would be a significant new passenger transit hub in the region which wouldn't add to the liabilities of RedInk and our wallets and purses.

This initiative, the Great Trek of the 21st Century, would save RedInk hundreds of thousands of hours of service and millions of dollars that could be diverted to other areas of the region currently under-serviced.

Construction jobs, increased investment in rebuilding the area and a savings to the public. UBC could help finance the new campus by selling off more land for housing and retail businesses which would truly create a community in the far reaches of Point Grey.

Rather than waste more of our money on a study to build yet another RedInk SkyTrain lets look at the other option: The Great Trek of 2012!

Why funnel or tunnel more of the region's most valuable resources, our tax dollars, to mitigate a very poor outdated and gentry initiated land use decision made at the beginning of the 20th Century?

Let's start planning smart for the 21st Century. And let's end this current absurd Broadway-UBC plan. 

You'll never get yuppies out of their cars. They rely on them too much as 'status symbols'. Mind you if you ask anyone that has taken buses down that specific corridor, you'll quickly find out that a skytrain there would be appreciated by the riders, (but not by the whiny low-life yuppies) 

The 'Eye' wrote to a Nottingham councilor on the question of the LRT system construction causing problems with local merchants and the question of compensation.

In Nottingham, the construction contract stipulated that no merchant business was to have construction in from of his store or shop for more than two weeks or compensation would be paid on as scale determined by the estimated loss of business.

Compare this Susan Heyes, where she had a great big ditch in front of her store for about 4 years!

Also the 'Eye' contacted a firm with a good reputation building LRT tracks. The answer was interesting, depending on the type of track to be laid, construction could progress at a pace of 50 metres to 100 metres a day. the straighter the route, the faster the progress.

It seems to the 'Eye' that we should first consult with the experts, then tell the politicians what to do, who in turn order the bureaucrats to make it happen, instead of the politicians telling the taxpayer: "You are going to get SkyTrain whether you like it or not." 

Toronto's new St. Clair LRT line took 6 years to build and doubled in price.

I think these problems are not unique to either LRT or skytrain.

"When city council approved the 6.8-kilometre St. Clair line in September, 2004, it predicted the project would cost $48-million.

Now, six years later, the final cost is expected to be $106-million and the last 300 metres of the line won't open until June. "

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/toronto/how-the-price-tag-d... 

Evil Eye:

Cadman is a media maven and has Little understanding of public transport, except for 10 second sound bites.
===================================

That was his job with the GVRD, "communications", or PR for short.

He's usually presented to the public as an ex-GVRD official who was involved in developing the LRSP, and naive readers mistakenly take that to mean that he has some kind of urban planning background, or that he may be an engineer of some kind. That's the mistake they're intended to make!

Rod Smelser 

Support a light rail link to ubc, enough of these light metro/skytrain boondoggles.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=169753053447 

The province has plenty of money. The problem is they are wasting on roads. As well, we spend over $10 billion a year on automobiles. It is time we start taking transit seriously. We need a SkyTrain on Broadway and trams throughout the region. Instead of always arguing, we all need to work together to make sure both happen. 

Being a transit user, I am most concerned with the following: am I gaining valuable time and/or saving money vs. driving into work. With dedicated, right-of-way (ROW) systems like skytrain, the answer is yes. When factoring my costs and time to drive into work vs. a 3-zone month pass (with 15% tax credit remember), transit is a far better option for me. If skytrain was not in our region, I would be taking my car into work, guaranteed, or drive into Vancouver, park in a residential zone, and bus into work.

The reliability and ability to bypass street traffic is Skytrain's greatest selling point. Does it have to be 'skytrain' technology - to provide seamless service with existing modes, then yes it does. If that is not a concern, then you can have a different technology along Broadway. But the fact remains that it HAS TO BE GRADE SEPARATED from regular traffic in order to work. Otherwise, you will have to sacrifice the parking lanes all along Broadway (hear that business owners?), as well as restrict all left turns on Broadway, assuming centre lane placement (hear that drivers?), and placing vehicle traffic in the current middle and curb lanes. Once you get down to McDonald and Broadway, it'll become 1 lane vehicle direction each way.

If you don't provide ROW, anything you put on Broadway will not be an improvement over current systems. 

pwlg - you believe the answer to Broadway's transit needs is to move the whole UBC campus somewhere else? And you think that can be accomplished for less than 2.8 billion dollars... Do you work as an engineer? And if not... why not?? There are places around the world who will pay you very large amounts of money to head a project that can successfully build a new 50,000+ student campus for three billion dollars. 

Evil Eye, if buses are such a disaster, then please explain the 99 B-Line. 

The B-Line buses are the only Broadway buses that terminate at UBC, there is no record of a modal shift from car to bus on that route. The problem on Broadway is simple, TransLink is under-supplying capacity for the demand.

What I was going to say is the SkyTrain lobby is hard at it, selling there nonsense.

As stated before LRT (not to be confused with a streetcar), operating on a reserved or dedicated ROW, with priority signaling at intersections and with the equal amount of station will be just as fast as SkyTrain at a far cheaper price. The problem with metro is the widely spaced stations means longer total travel times than LRT, for many riders. That is why SkyTrain has failed to find a market. 

Thank you for your support of regional tranist for all of Metro Vancouver.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=73380534833 

Rapid transit on Broadway must be grade separated. For those that don't understand what that means - underground or above the street. Anything that is involved on the street and in traffic is a failure. Speed and ease of transfers with our existing system of Skytrain is a bloody no-brainer. Why build a bus-on-rails like LRT? This will not get people out of cars when cars will be faster.You might as well just stick with the 99. For crying out loud, isn't the Canada Line's enormous success enough proof for these delusional light rail fanatics?

Why build something now like LRT on Broadway that could barely handle passenger numbers quickly, when we'll need to rebuild a completely new system like a METRO line in the future. Where are you going to build a new train depot for the light rail trains? Broadway isn't wide enough to double track light rail at 60ft. This will only leave one lane of traffic on each side of the tracks. No parking on Broadway, ever again. ONE LANE for all cars and buses and bikes!! Any person that would go for that should be thrown in a funny farm. Ooops...I guess Mel Lehan should get first dibbs.

It's a familiar Canadian attitude, build cheap and inefficient now to save a buck, but don't think about the future. Take a cue from Europeans and East Asians, build a backbone metro system first, and THEN build feeder LRT lines into them. Much more intelligent than taking a US approach and make the LRT a backbone first. Broadway needs to be the last piece of our metro system for awhile and then the misinformed and provincial LRT fanatics can build their bus-on-rails to their hearts content. 

@Foxxe

Yeah, before the Canada Line opened, they said that the yuppies in Yaletown and the well off people in Richmond would not take transit. Well, Yaletown and all the Richmond stations are really busy. If you put quick transit on Broadway, everyone will use it. 

Regional transit slices through communities. Hostile to communities, regional transit by TransLink creates blight, crime, drugs and filth. TransLink is the Black Plague of the Lower Mainland. Misery and debt follow whatever TransLink touches.

The worst air quality in Vancouver exists on the 99 B-Line route. The planets revolve around the Sun. The 99 B-Lines pollute more than cars.
 

@Evil Eye

The station spacing for the Calgary LRT is only slightly smaller than the Expo Line and yet the Calgary LRT has almost as many riders as SkyTrain and pretty much the highest ridership of any LRT system in North America. So much for your theory that close station spacing increases ridership. 

@Nicolaus Copernicus, that was one of the most ridiculous posts I have seen in quite a while.

You might be interested that highways increase crime. The police were really worried when the Golden Ears Bridge opening. Crime plummeted on the North Shore when lanes on the Second Narrows Bridge were closed for repairs. Maybe we should just tear up all roads and transit lines and live in gated communities in houses with rubber walls. How about surrounding them with moats as well?

Given your comments about the 99 B-Line, I guess you support electric rapid transit on Broadway though. Oh, and the packed buses on Broadway pollute far less per passenger than all the cars with only one person in them. 

What's most likely to happen is skytrain to Arbutus, with B-line service to UBC from there. Then eventually the metro will be extended all the way to UBC. Light rail will probably first get built in Surrey and Langley. 

I see the SkyTrain trolls have corrupted this blog and the likes of Mezzinine, Mythbuster and the rest continue to pervert the truth about LRT in favour of SkyTrain.

In an age where elevated and underground transit systems have fallen out of favour with transit planners, unless there is sufficient ridership to warrant such construction, our local chapter of the 'Flat Earth Society' continue to preach nonsense.

LRT has made both the VAL and SkyTrain automatic light metro systems obsolete and 136+ new LRT/tram systems built in the past 3 decades, as opposed to under 30 metro systems built during the same period.

Mythy, the Calgary LRT system has about double the number of stations than the Expo Line (both lines being about the same length), thus is more attractive to customers. TransLink forces 80% of SkyTrain passengers from buses to inflate ridership.

As for this nonsense of at grade LRT being slow, this is utter crap, sorry to be blunt but with so much evidence to the contrary anyone who claims this is an utter and complete liar.

As for Mezzy, get off the speed kick before you get run over, speed is not the prime reason for people taking transit (even though the SkyTrain Lobby does everything in its power to make people believe this is so), it is the overall ambiance, ease of ticketing, lack of transfers and reasonable travel times that attract people to transit.

What we see here is a desperate rearguard action of the SkyTrain Lobby who have been overwhelmed by fact and common sense that they are making a pathetic attempt to do a Joseph Goebbels on the public, by repeating the SkyTrain lie ad nauseum, so that the the public will start believing that the SkyTrain lies are fact.

Who builds with SkyTrain? 

Mythbuster

Well, Yaletown and all the Richmond stations are really busy. If you put quick transit on Broadway, everyone will use it.
======================================

I haven't been to Richmond, but I have been through the Broadway, Olympic Stn and Yaletown Stns, and I would not describe them as overly busy. Utilized, yes, but hardly anything overwhelming.

As with Skytrain, the platforms are small, so that two dozen people looks like a crowd. If real crowds do materialize, I have to wonder what the safety implications would be.

Rod Smelser 

Work Together

The province has plenty of money. The problem is they are wasting on roads. As well, we spend over $10 billion a year on automobiles.
===================================

I guess it's part of "Vancouverism" that some people, usually very privileged people who have no intention of using public transit, keep peddling these doctrinaire myths and false dichotomies.

Anthony Downs of the Brookings Inst tried to tell GVRD planners in 2007 that their dream of accommodating three quarters of a million more people with NO increase in road capacity was delusional, but they wouldn't listen. They were beholden to established property owners, local politicians, and career environmentalists who do not get their paycheques from Mother Nature, but by dutifully representing the interests of the real estate lobby.

Rod Smelser 

The comment by "Campus" challenged the notion that one could not build a new large campus university of 50,000 for less than the cost of building a skytrain line to UBC - $3 billion.

In fact, a new large campus was recently built in California, the University of California, Merced Campus.

The California state construction cost contribution to date for this campus for 25,000 students was $500 million!!!

http://www.ucmerced.edu/about_ucmerced/history.asp

But in Vancouver this may be impossible given the previous rapacious attack on the public purse by our bloated engineering and architecture fraternities associated with the various urban rail projects in the Vancouver region. There is one thing Ken Dobell did before leaving his job at the Premiers Office, CEO of Translink, City and Engineering Manager in the City of Vancouver...he made sure his fraternity or at least some members of that fraternity would never have to eat hamburger again.

Lacking any sort of vision, wallets and bank accounts bloated with our borrowed dollars we must pay and pay and pay for, this fraternity should hang up its shingle to those younger and bursting with creative ideas. Young men and women that don't need to follow poor land use policies from the early 20th Century.

And dear Campus, I do work in the field of engineering. 

Evil Eye:

"the SkyTrain Lobby who have been overwhelmed by fact and common sense that they are making a pathetic attempt to do a Joseph Goebbels on the public"
----------------------------------------
Well, skytrain wins on Godwin's Law.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_law 

"The B-Line buses are the only Broadway buses that terminate at UBC"

Wow... that hasn't been true since at least 1988 (or longer, if you consider the #17 a "Broadway Bus"(which, as a resident of Kits, I do)) 

@Richard C

The 99 B-Lines get at best 1/10th the fuel mileage of the average car and are on the road approximately 20 times longer than the average driver's commute. Sure, the 99 B-Lines are overcrowded for a few hours each day but are empty lots of the time, also.

Can you do the calculation to show that the 99 B-Lines pollute less than if we had single occupancy vehicles instead of the B-Lines? Can you calculate the toxic emissions from the 99 B-Lines for me and show that they are less polluting than cars? The earth is not flat but people like you with limited understanding ridiculed people like me hundreds of years ago.
 

@Evil Eye, you really need to get your facts straight and start making arguments that actually are logical. It is not that difficult to do a bit of research on the Internet.

The Expo lines are a total of 49.2 km long and have a total of 33 stations. The Calgary LRT, is 48.8km and has 37 stations. So SkyTrain has an average station spacing of 1.49km between stations while the Calgary has a station spacing of 1.31 km. This is really not a significant difference.

You are also incorrect about the number of Metros built over the last 30 years. While I don't know the exact number built, in 1980 only around 70 cities had metros. Now almost 170 do. That is at least 100 more metros. http://mic-ro.com/metro/ If you look at the graph, metro construction did not really take off until 1970 and has continued at the same rapid pace ever since.

Anyway, you have obviously decided is best everywhere all the time and are not willing to objectively look at the facts and instead cherry pick data and ignore any information that counters your view. 

@ Nicolaus

You are taking the contrarian position. It is up to you to do the calculations to prove your point. That is what the real Nicolaus Copernicus would have done. Don't forget that if there were no buses on Broadway and everyone drove instead, the congestion would be much greater causing increased emissions due to stop and go traffic

Anyway, the solution is electric rail, which is what this debate is all about so your point is rather moot. 

"...[Cadman] said via cellphone."

Hope he wasn't driving at the time!! 

@ Nick Copernicus

"The 99 B-Lines get at best 1/10th the fuel mileage of the average car and are on the road approximately 20 times longer than the average driver's commute. Sure, the 99 B-Lines are overcrowded for a few hours each day but are empty lots of the time, also."

That's a spurious argument. Don't forget buses also run as a public service for transit-dependent people. Some, but not many, people will have to take the bus at 10pm.

"Meanwhile, back in the real world, transit agencies have to balance contradictory demands to (a) maximize ridership and (b) provide a little bit of service everywhere regardless of ridership, both to meet demands for 'equity' and to serve the needs of transit-dependent persons."

http://www.humantransit.org/2009/12/yet-another-transit-isnt-green-becau...

 

@plwg - you are dead right, but the SkyTrain trolls will never admit it. The real problem is that we are fighting a myth with SkyTrain and with a myth can change the facts to suit it.

If Vancouver wants a SkyTrain subway to UBC, so be it, BUT LET THE VANCOUVER TAXPAYER PAY FOR IT! As it stands, Vancouver is heavily subsidized by the Fraser Valley to fund over built, politically prestigious metro systems because people in Vancouver do not want cheaper LRT because it may offend their views.

It is time Vancouver grows up and pays it ow way.

Let see, a SkyTrain subway would increase city taxes by about 50% - yeah lets do it! 

Evil Eye says:

"As stated before LRT (not to be confused with a streetcar), operating on a reserved or dedicated ROW, with priority signaling at intersections and with the equal amount of station will be just as fast as SkyTrain at a far cheaper price."

There is no dedicated ROW between Arbutus and UBC in the Broadway corridor. It is possible to build LRT in the middle of Broadway/10th Avenue or even 16th Avenue between Arbutus and UBC, either in mixed traffic or in dedicated lanes, but not in a rail ROW separate from a road ROW. I think this is something that we can all agree on.

Because there is no dedicated rail ROW in the corridor separate from a road ROW, we need to compare and contrast the features of LRT in this type of ROW against alternative technologies, mainly Skytrain.

Evil Eye says:

"As for this nonsense of at grade LRT being slow, this is utter crap, sorry to be blunt but with so much evidence to the contrary anyone who claims this is an utter and complete liar."

At-grade LRT can be as fast as Skytrain. However, LRT running in the middle of a street, even with dedicated lanes, cannot be as fast as Skytrain. LRT operated in this type of ROW is limited by potential interactions between LRT trains and pedestrians and cars at intersections.

Evil Eye says:

"Also the 'Eye' contacted a firm with a good reputation building LRT tracks. The answer was interesting, depending on the type of track to be laid, construction could progress at a pace of 50 metres to 100 metres a day. the straighter the route, the faster the progress."

Laying the tracks is only one task in the construction of LRT, an important step but not a particularly time-consuming one. Before tracks can be laid for LRT, the road has to be torn up, utilities that lie beneath the ROW need to be moved, a trackbed needs to be built, ties need to be placed, and new curbs need to be poured. These are the steps that result in traffic being disrupted. It would be more meaningful to compare the timeline for completing all of these steps to the timelines for building a cut-and-cover tunnel or a cut-and-cover stationhouse on a bored tunnel.

There is a method of building tracks for streetcars that does not require so many steps, but it is meant only for lighter and slower streetcars, not for LRT vehicles running at the speed of Skytrain. 

pwlg - if you're an engineer, and indeed it is possible to rebuild UBC for less than 3 billion, then by all means, take this idea to the next level! Get involved with UBC and their planning process and table this option for their consideration. Write a proposal! And get the support of the students, staff, and residents of UBC to make this option a reality.

Don't waste your time here derailing a discussion about transit needs in an urban corridor, by proposing that we should forget about the transit and just move the corridor.

If you believe that is a far better option, then make sure YOU get this idea over to UBC where it might have a chance of happening! Even better, work with a firm, or start your own, uh, 'fraternity', that will do the studies and pursue the development that will make this project (and others like it) a reality. You are an engineer - you don't have to live and suffer with previous bad planning decisions - you are able to use your time and your expertise to fix the great wrongs of the past (such as building UBC on the headland of Point Grey) for the benefit of us all. Good luck to you! I wish you success.


Evil Eye - "I see the SkyTrain trolls have corrupted this blog and the likes of Mezzinine, Mythbuster and the rest continue to pervert the truth about LRT in favour of SkyTrain."

It's a debate about what kind of transit to build down Broadway. It's not an apocalyptic war between the forces of Truth and Falsehood. Besides, the Truth is one tough fellow: he'll outlive you and me, and he's more than strong enough to defend himself. He really doesn't need your tireless defense of his honour.


Copernicus - an empty 99 B-line bus? You don't take a bus down Broadway regularly, do you? 

map of Merced: http://www.ucmerced.edu/maps/#MAP
map of UBC: http://www.maps.ubc.ca/PROD/index.php

'nuff said on that. 

Evil Eye, you are forgetting the first SkyTrain line went to Surrey. All taxpayers in the region paid for that even though it likely benefited people in Surrey more than the people of Vancouver. As well, bus service in Vancouver pretty much pays for itself through fares while service in the Valley is heavily subsidized. The Golden Ears Bridge was just finished. $160 million of the $700 million was paid for by TransLink and thus taxpayers in Vancouver. As well, it will be years before the tolls cover the other costs especially now that usage is below what is expected. Then there was the Alex Fraser Bridge that was paid for by taxpayers including those in Vancouver.

So, I expect if you take the time to add everything up, I expect that people in the Valley are not getting such a bad deal and in fact, it maybe Vancouver taxpayers that are subsiding the transportation that people from the Valley use.

As there are many regional destinations including hospitals, workplaces and UBC along the proposed rapid transit line, as with other major transportation projects in the region, it is only fair that all people in the region help pay for them.
 

Evil Eye:

If you think that a Millennium Line extension westward to UBC will only serve Vancouverites you're even less informed than I thought you were.



 

Evil Eye: "If Vancouver wants a SkyTrain subway to UBC, so be it, BUT LET THE VANCOUVER TAXPAYER PAY FOR IT! "

Why make only vancouver pay for skytrain on broadway when people throughout the region commute along the broadway corridor?  

Mel Lehan thinks that a Broadway SkyTrain-like system would be a waste, compared to Patrick Condon's suggestion of building an extensive, bargain-basement-priced tram system. Well, if Condon is right, and Lehan is right, then we will have a large system composed of the cheapest trams money can buy. They'll perform about the same as our current bus system, and in the meantime, absolutely nothing will have been done to alleviate any of the problems facing transit along Broadway.

What is the waste of money here: building a vast system of cheap trams, not out of any real necessity, but simply because we can and they're cheap - or spending the money to build a system with the speed and capacity, and spending the money to do it right, in a place where the need is high and already so very clearly established? 

@ Mezzanine and Mythbuster, fine, let's calculate the difference in CO2 emissions between cars and diesel buses:

Approximately one-thousand diesel buses move 100,000 riders daily (200,000 boardings per day or 100 million boardings annually in the Lower Mainland, see TransLink web-site). Let x = the CO2 emitted per hour for the car. Then, the CO2 emitted for the diesel bus per hour is at least 10x. The average driver commutes 45 km daily (from the CBC, "Who Killed the Electric Car") for a duration of approximately one hour. The diesel bus, in contrast, operates many nearly empty hours and "Not in Service" hours along with a few hours of overcrowding for a duration of at least 18 hours daily.

For the miserable ride on the 1,000 diesel buses each day, the emissions are as follows:
(1,000)(10x)(18) = 180,000x

For the comfortable trip in the 100,000 cars each day, the emissions are as follows:
(100,000)(x)(1) = 100,000x

In other words, the B-Lines have almost doubled CO2 emissions in Vancouver so that UBC can sell luxury condos rather than build residences on campus for students and to make TransLink tons of money after the B-Line diesel bus is paid off after one or two years. Don't forget, cars also don't emit toxic levels of lung damaging emissions like the B-Lines, either. Simple, eh? May I see your calcs?
 

Lies, damned lies and the SkyTrain Lobby!

The SkyTrain trolls are so busy because the public is beginning to ask for trams and not SkyTrain. This means many in the SkyTrain lobby will cease growing fat off the taxpayers largess. That's right, all those billions of dollars more for SkyTrain, keep otherwise inept businesses and consulting firms afloat. The shrill scream of the SkyTrain lobby is the shrill scream of the money taps being turned off.

Modern track laying technique means you don't have to relocate utilities, but here is a fact - until the late 50's streetcars roamed the centre lanes of Broadway and the utilities are on the side, no relocating of utilities here.

Of course there is no dedicated ROW now, but if one wants LRT (as opposed to a tram) you create one in the median lanes of Broadway. Oh yes, the foundations is already in place, remember the old streetcar route.

It is so sad that so many people are perverting the truth to support a 1950's metro certainly shows why Vancouver will never be a world class city, just a third rate town.

The one question the SkyTrain lobby never ask (they never do) is "Why after being on the market for over 30 years, only 7 SkyTrain systems have been built and only in private deals, with Canadian government financial backing?"

The SkyTrain lobby fabricates myth, but never answers the real questions.

Troll on trolls! 

If anything, skytrain along broadway will serve the entire region.
Lrt, with its closer stops and street appeal, will serve the local Vancouverites.

I'm quite sure the people who commute to UBC and central broadway district are not just the wealthy westsiders. 

I agree with "Evil eye", everyone can see the lack of ridership on Broadway, I means if it was demand, buses could be standing room only, and it could be more than the 99B going to UBC...and those could be articulated buses running also evening and week-end, not only rush hour
Skytrain could make sense if it was plenty of line running parallel route to Broadway and see those route experimenting pass-up, but it is not the case

Evil Eye/Zweisystem could know it if it was...isn'it?



 

Wow. I didn't know that the 99 B-Line was "just a bus to UBC via Broadway." I can finally understand why misinformed the Rail For Valley Blog is. It's already been indicated, but for the record, let's just make things straight here. The Broadway corridor today carries over 80 000 passengers, more than most Light Rail Transit Systems in North America. This doesn't take into account for the passengers on the parallel bus routes such as the 84, 25, and 43, whom would other wise be using the 99 B-Line if not for its slow and packed ride. Don't forget the number of people who would be switching over to SkyTrain as it moves commuters two times faster than the car. Granted, if the Millennium Line is built as SkyTrain, it would pay for itself instantly, just like the Canada Line is today.

Then again, I understand how many people would deny this fact as they claim that "TransLink [...] [overstates] ridership maybe 30% higher than it actually is [on the Canada Line]" (Quoted from Rail For Valley blog at http://bit.ly/6OrCTT).

You know, instead of providing detailed sources and research information made available in my posts, maybe I should begin pulling figures out my ass and make myself seem credible.

Follow up the SkyTrain stories from our perspective at:
Website/Blog: http://www.ubcskytrain.co.cc/
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/ubcskytrain
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=73380534833 

How does TransLink ascertain SkyTrain ridership?

We don't know because TransLink has never told anyone and anyone who pursues an answer, like Stephen Rees, comes up empty. SkyTrain ridership numbers are fabricated.

Why would TransLink want to keep SkyTrain rolling along?

Well, they have fired all the LRT professionals and the massive amounts o money to fund SkyTrain planning and construction keeps one hell of a lot of bureaucrats employed.

There has been little detailed research on transit issues in the region as most are terribly biased against light rail, full of professional misconduct.

When SkyTrain is researched, it is quietly dropped and not one SkyTrain system built has been allowed to compete against any other mode.

The Canada Line was to be SkyTrain until the cost of the subway spiraled out of control and savings were made not using SkyTrain and SNCLavalin were quietly given the nod to build with cut-and-cover and not the more expensive bored tunnel method of subway construction.

There is a lot more.

American transit expert Gerald Fox, shredded the Evergreen Line business case and with comments like:

"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."

or

"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 taxpayers’ interests are protected. No SkyTrain project has ever passed this scrutiny in the US."

One can easily see that the planning process has been perverted to support SkyTrain.

For the full letter:

http://railforthevalley.wordpress.com/2008/12/26/can-translinks-business...

The Rail for The Valley folks have debunked the SkyTrain myth so many times but the SkyTrain trolls perseveres with their own alchemy of invented facts and gross transit ignorance to a point where they hope "a lie repeated often enough becomes truth."

http://railforthevalley.wordpress.com/2009/04/23/debunking-the-skytrain-...

Just who is buying SkyTrain old chums? Just who is buying SkyTrain?

No one? Well fancy that. 

Evil Eye says:

"Modern track laying technique means you don't have to relocate utilities, but here is a fact - until the late 50's streetcars roamed the centre lanes of Broadway and the utilities are on the side, no relocating of utilities here."

By arguing that LRT could be as fast as Skytrain, which it can, I assumed you were supporting an LRT line in the Broadway corridor. This method may be acceptable for streetcars, but you were supporting the construction of a line for heavier and faster LRT trains, not streetcars. Which is it that you are supporting in the Broadway corridor, the speed and capacity of LRT or the low cost and ease of construction of a streetcar line?

Evil Eye says:

"Of course there is no dedicated ROW now, but if one wants LRT (as opposed to a tram) you create one in the median lanes of Broadway. Oh yes, the foundations is already in place, remember the old streetcar route."

There was a double-tracked streetcar line in the middle of Broadway. There was never an LRT line down Broadway. 

You skytrain trolls are freaks! LIES LIES LIES. 

Campus has yet to put forward his own ideas or thoughts but would rather criticize and ask people to share their ideas elsewhere if they conflict with his own private thoughts. Rather sad actually.

The problem as I see it is transportation continues to be talked about as if it is the reason for our existence in urban environments; that it is a stand alone item.

A land use and economic plan is required and transportation is then integrated into such a plan as it is a part that services not drives the land use and economic plan. Land use and the economy should not be playing second fiddle.

Poor land use planning stemming back to 1920 still maintains a presence in today's thinking and minds of some urban transportation planners.

I think it was the city planner of Seattle that once remarked..you don't build urban rail for transportation purposes, you use it to shape growth. I always thought zoning was the way to shape growth.

But if you think funnelling more public tax dollars into the hands of the Bombardiers, SNC-Lavalins, Lafarge Cement and the money lenders instead of using a simple and effective urban planning tool like zoning, then there really isn't much hope in creating effective and efficient alternatives for what ails the urban experience.

What is the sense of spending $3 billion for yet another public revenue crippling urban rail line when it is far cheaper to move the general campus to an area already well served by more than $3 billion dollars of previously constructed urban rail lines. Or better yet, why not build satellite campuses throughout the region so students don't have to travel 1-2 hours a day to make it to the lofty environment of Point Grey. This is already happening by the way. I think SFU has been leading the way with this idea.

It's the 21st Century, why does it required thousands of undergraduates travelling long distances on very expensive infrastructure to sit in a theatre with hundreds of others to listen to a sage on the stage lecture for 50 minutes?

How to use teleconferencing, the internet, wireless communications, interactive technologies, social networks (sans tweeting)etc...to serve our education needs should be part of the discussion.

You cannot divorce land use planning from the mix nor ideas that question past logic. The conversation has been framed to keep you focused on whether the line should be at grade, below grade or above grade not about whether there are alternatives to moving the university to other areas of the region to reflect where students live....let's stop this insanity!

So please, lets gather our breathes and review other options and stop discussing the urban rail lobby agenda. It's time that we start our own discussion.

I have hope our young people will stand up and demand a world that protects the environment, creates opportunities and honours their intelligence and need for new effective and efficient 'soft' initiatives.

In the US, none of the urban rail lines could be built without first conducting a referendum to ask people to dig into their wallets. We need a device that opens up discussion and challenges the ideas of those acting on the wishes of the urban rail lobby who are fed quite well from the public trough.

Would you rather have lower tuitions, better access to courses or feed these insatiable fraternities. The money to pay for the proposed line would come eventually from the same pool of money that provides health care, education, public safety....etc etc.

Postscript:

Wasn't it rail in the 19th and early 20th Century that became the tool for urban sprawl? Didn't urban rail in those times provide options for people to live further distances away from where they worked? And doesn't building yet another foolish rail line to the furthest distance west in the region just help to create further sprawl? Isn't it time universities came to the communities in 21st Century. 

Eye - "Why after being on the market for over 30 years, only 7 SkyTrain systems have been built and only in private deals, with Canadian government financial backing?"

Obviously, the answer is that SkyTrain is a completely meritless white elephant that has been thrust upon a voting public who is completely powerless against the vast and evil conspiracy which enforces the funneling of money into a project which does nobody any good except to line the pockets of The Man and his rich friends. Clearly the number of people who dare to speak even slightly in its favor is just further evidence of the immense extent of this conspiracy and how it has penetrated and brainwashed the public into supporting the wholesale theft of their dollars and the continued and Evil repression of all that is good and right in the world. I mean, one can't even support the Truth on a little article comment thread without these vile minions of SatanTrain appearing out of the woodwork to spread lies and deceit for their own evil ends. Clearly this is the only possible explanation.

But I guess that there's not enough real problems in the world to get indignant about, so we might as well continue to tilt at windmills...

Meanwhile, the Olympic line demonstration is running, and pretty successfully. Given its largely segregated ROW and lack of intersections, we'll be able to use its operating performance as a generous upper bound on the kind of speed and capacity a Broadway LRT could get us. IMO it's still a little slow if used as a cross-regional transit solution...