Quote:
Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture
personally i would like to see a replacement bridge, mimicking the original. i would do 6 lanes. 3 top + 3 bottom lanes. through stanley park i would keep the lanes stacked but have them go underground into a tunnel. get rid of the cars on the surface. have it go more straight onto georgia and come up to grade somewhere before denman.
on the north side a 3+3 tunnel that directly connects to the upper levels.
it would improve stanley park, traffic clam the streets in north van, improve the crossing, and give more clearance to the port. win-win-win.
though this will never happen.  |
I do like the idea of matching the number of lanes on the bridge and causeway to the number of lanes currently attempting to merge onto them. However, the ultimate issue is you will just create another bottleneck. Currently the traffic at times moves slow even after the merges on the north and south end of the bridge and causeway. That indicates to me that if you constantly feed three lanes of traffic onto Georgia in the morning, or Marine/Upper Levels /Taylor/Capilano in the afternoon, those streets will not be able to handle the additional traffic. So for southbound traffic, you'll just be left with cars backing up from Denman or Cardero all the way onto the bridge and back into North Van.
If we need to get more people across First Narrows faster, I would hope a rapid transit connection would be considered before an expansion of the road network because you'll just end up playing whack-a-mole with all the new bottlenecks that pop up.
Quote:
Originally Posted by fredinno
If Lions' Gate is a problem for Cruise Ships now, it'll be a problem for cargo ships in 10 years.
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The question isn't whether the LGB is too low for any cargo or cruise ships around the world, but rather if the height of the bridge blocks so many ships that the cargo or cruise terminals cannot operate at capacity. I mean, if our cruise terminal has no more capacity for ships, why would we worry about raising the bridge for larger ships we don't have capacity for? My other question is whether Vancouver's cruise and cargo facilities can handle mega ships. If not, not only will millions (billions?) need to be spent to raise or replace the bridge, but additional capital will need to be sunk into upgrading the terminals. And all those expenses may or may not be worth it depending on the marginal benefits of handling larger ships.
Obviously we need to balance current and future needs. If all ships are someday going to be too tall for the Lionsgate, we will need to raise or replace the bridge. Or if all those ships that have to wait for low tide suddenly decide to skip Vancouver altogether, something will need to be done. But it's not Vancouver's loss if a cruise ship has to arrive or depart a couple hours earlier or later than what would be optimal if the bridge's height wasn't a concern.