Winnipeg City Transit/Rapid Transit

[bomberjet]

Oh, I see what you're saying. I was thinking the blue line buses on the transitway, not the local routes. They will have to stop on the local street. Which was/is already what the buses do. But I see your point. This will not work at Plaza Station unless people walk from Pembina. But I'm not 100% sure what the local routes actually look like. I'd have to check those again.

[LilZebra]

Are one of the stations - Markham, Chancellor, South (?) close enough to the Ft. Richmond Superstore, if McGillivrary (Seel) is too far from Ft. Garry Safeway?

If not, then is it possible that there could be at some hazy future, a FreshCo or something else that would be less than 5 mins. walk, if not adjacent to a nearby station?

[bomberjet]

Google says its a 17 minute walk from Markham Station to Superstore on Bison. Not too bad.

It'll be about the same to walk from Seel Station to Safeway on Pembina

[joshlemer]

It's also ~ 5 minutes to walk from the new Chancellor station to Safeway near Southpark dr.

[buzzg]

It's crazy to me that there's no transit priority (or turn) signals at the Southpark entrance to the road through Stadium Station. Like, insane. Going to the Banjo Bowl there were like 20 busses lined up to turn into the transitway, and max 2 getting through per light cycle. No cadets on site.

On the way out, there's so many pedestrians crossing (and again, no priority or right turn signal) that it was the same – 2-3 busses exiting per cycle, with dozens waiting. And it's too bad, because they got the loading down to a science now, it was a breeze even with 33,000 people. Seems like the perfect scenario for the TMC to have signals adjust on event days....

[cllew]

Originally Posted by buzzg

snip

Seems like the perfect scenario for the TMC to have signals adjust on event days....

Except TMC doesn't work evening or weekends according to the daily texts I get from them. They start 6am and finish at 7pm Monday to Friday.

When TMC was first started the idea was to have them do what you propose, but I guess the city is cutting back and does not want to have to pay o/t to have staff available to adjust traffic flow in real time after events either at IGF or BellMTS Place or any major event at the Forks.

[buzzg]

Originally Posted by cllew

Except TMC doesn't work evening or weekends according to the daily texts I get from them. They start 6am and finish at 7pm Monday to Friday.

When TMC was first started the idea was to have them do what you propose, but I guess the city is cutting back and does not want to have to pay o/t to have staff available to adjust traffic flow in real time after events either at IGF or BellMTS Place or any major event at the Forks.

I'm pretty sure the system let's them automatically set timers for signals. No different than signals that flash yellow/red at night.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by buzzg

It's crazy to me that there's no transit priority (or turn) signals at the Southpark entrance to the road through Stadium Station. Like, insane. Going to the Banjo Bowl there were like 20 busses lined up to turn into the transitway, and max 2 getting through per light cycle. No cadets on site.

On the way out, there's so many pedestrians crossing (and again, no priority or right turn signal) that it was the same – 2-3 busses exiting per cycle, with dozens waiting. And it's too bad, because they got the loading down to a science now, it was a breeze even with 33,000 people. Seems like the perfect scenario for the TMC to have signals adjust on event days....

Why is the City so reluctant to put in left turn signals in situations like that where it strikes me as a no-brainer?

Another obvious place for them is any undivided 4-lane street in the inner city... think Ellice, Salter, Osborne, etc. It is so common to get traffic backups and delays due to cars waiting to turn left, and without a left turn signal sometimes only one or two cars can get through per cycle. I don't get why left turn lights aren't used more commonly in those types of situations.

[cllew]

The idea of the TMC is they can dynamically override the "canned schedule" to change the signal timing as required.

If a sports event goes into overtime the could start and stop the alternative programming when the event gets out and not based on what the published/estimated end times.

[buzzg]

Originally Posted by cllew

The idea of the TMC is they can dynamically override the "canned schedule" to change the signal timing as required.

If a sports event goes into overtime the could start and stop the alternative programming when the event gets out and not based on what the published/estimated end times.

Right, but in the situation where they're not working during these events (which is most of them), it shouldn't be that big of a deal to just add/extend turn signals from 6–11 on event days, for example. Account for overtime regardless, it's not that big a deal if there's a long turn signal for an extra hour than needed because a game finished in regulation and not OT.

I'm sure traffic after Jets games could be drastically improved with event-day signal settings. Extend the north-south exits from downtown (Main, Donald, Osborne, Sherbrook) from 9:30–11:00 on Jets game days, for example.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by buzzg

Right, but in the situation where they're not working during these events (which is most of them), it shouldn't be that big of a deal to just add/extend turn signals from 6–11 on event days, for example. Account for overtime regardless, it's not that big a deal if there's a long turn signal for an extra hour than needed because a game finished in regulation and not OT.

I'm sure traffic after Jets games could be drastically improved with event-day signal settings. Extend the north-south exits from downtown (Main, Donald, Osborne, Sherbrook) from 9:30–11:00 on Jets game days, for example.

I always wondered about that too. Just doubling the green light time for outbound traffic on key commuting routes for that 90 minute period on game nights would make such a difference traffic wise.

[GarryEllice]

Originally Posted by esquire

Another obvious place for them is any undivided 4-lane street in the inner city... think Ellice, Salter, Osborne, etc. It is so common to get traffic backups and delays due to cars waiting to turn left, and without a left turn signal sometimes only one or two cars can get through per cycle. I don't get why left turn lights aren't used more commonly in those types of situations.

But on a 4-lane street like Ellice, there's no left turn lane. The cars in the left lane could be turning or going straight through. If you had a left turn phase and the first car wanted to go straight through, the whole phase would be wasted.

[buzzg]

Originally Posted by GarryEllice

But on a 4-lane street like Ellice, there's no left turn lane. The cars in the left lane could be turning or going straight through. If you had a left turn phase and the first car wanted to go straight through, the whole phase would be wasted.

Not if you put the turn at the end like it is in tons of places. There's also lots of places like the ones mentioned where most drivers know about getting stuck, and most through traffic just takes the right lane. So at worst, it barely improves, but more likely you'd have much better flow during most cycles.

[GarryEllice]

Originally Posted by bomberjet

Google says its a 17 minute walk from Markham Station to Superstore on Bison. Not too bad.

That's pretty awful actually. But surely passengers for Superstore will just stay on the Blue Line bus and exit right at Pembina & Bison. It's not as if exiting the bus at a "station" rather than a "stop" is some kind of pleasure that's worth a 17-minute hike.

Originally Posted by joshlemer

It's also ~ 5 minutes to walk from the new Chancellor station to Safeway near Southpark dr.

Or 1 minute from the new Southpark station/stop, which might actually be the most useful station on the entire Phase 2.

Originally Posted by buzzg

It's crazy to me that there's no transit priority (or turn) signals at the Southpark entrance to the road through Stadium Station. Like, insane. Going to the Banjo Bowl there were like 20 busses lined up to turn into the transitway, and max 2 getting through per light cycle. No cadets on site.

On the way out, there's so many pedestrians crossing (and again, no priority or right turn signal) that it was the same – 2-3 busses exiting per cycle, with dozens waiting.

I don't think it's that insane. It's a temporary situation. Once the transitway is operating, buses will be going straight across rather than turning, no special signals needed. (They should of course be doing something to manage the situation in the meantime, seems like a perfect job for traffic cops.)

[buzzg]

Originally Posted by GarryEllice

I don't think it's that insane. It's a temporary situation. Once the transitway is operating, buses will be going straight across rather than turning, no special signals needed. (They should of course be doing something to manage the situation in the meantime, seems like a perfect job for traffic cops.)

I'm pretty sure there will be some routes that still enter from Pembina, only RT routes are moving. Also with the city not taking part in the Bomber P&R anymore, it's not clear if they'll be allowed to use the transitway for events. An even then, some of the routes may not event make sense to use it.

[GarryEllice]

Originally Posted by buzzg

I'm pretty sure there will be some routes that still enter from Pembina, only RT routes are moving.

You talking about regular service or special event service? In regular service, only the Blue Line RT will be using that road at all, coming straight across Pembina from Southpark. The non-RT routes will enter campus using University Crescent or Chancellor Matheson as they currently do. So no need for any transit turn signals at Pembina & Southpark.

For special event service, who knows how they will set it up once the full transitway is operating.

[bomberjet]

Originally Posted by GarryEllice

That's pretty awful actually. But surely passengers for Superstore will just stay on the Blue Line bus and exit right at Pembina & Bison. It's not as if exiting the bus at a "station" rather than a "stop" is some kind of pleasure that's worth a 17-minute hike.

People walk all kinds of distances with their groceries. I see it all the time from the Sobeys/Fresh Co near my house.

[GarryEllice]

Originally Posted by bomberjet

People walk all kinds of distances with their groceries. I see it all the time from the Sobeys/Fresh Co near my house.

But again, it makes no sense to get off a bus 17 minutes away when you could get off the same bus much closer to your destination.

[cheswick]

https://www.facebook.com/caleb.dmytr...DM5NDczNDg2Mg/

Not sure if you need a FB account to see the video. Bus ride this morning, water flooding into the bus

[LilZebra]

^^^


Where is that? Hopefully not the Jubilee Underpass.


CTV News says that bus was operating as a rte. 180 at the time, so most likely.


https://winnipeg.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=1785236