West Gatineau Tramway & Downtown Loop | Proposed

[Multi-modal]

I agree with Alymer. If we are taking this project in isolation, then the tunnel makes more sense, surface rail is a vanity project, and the loop doesn't have enough of a use-case to warrant its development.

However, if you take a long-term perspective on this, the loop effectively doubles capacity and provides a number of tie-in points for future surface LRT lines to integrate the downtown core. Potential projects could be a converted Rapibus via Allumettières/Alexandra, Bank Street, Rideau-Montreal, or Carling via Queen Elizabeth/Elgin. None of these projects are politically or financially feasible within the next 30 years or so, but they become much more attractive as potential projects with a downtown circulation system already built and ready to support additional demand.

As for why not surface on Sparks or Queen?

- Surface sparks is a challenge to get from the Portage/Wellington intersection to at-grade at Bay Street. You have to destroy Sparks Street west of Bay and/or the Garden of the Provinces and Territories. You could also go Wellingto -> Lyon -> Sparks, but that involves a back-to-back 90 degree curves that would be loud and have maintenance issues.

- Surface Queen Street would also have issues with getting to it at-grade, but it has additional challenges with maintaining access to multiple parking garage entrances, as well as the fact that we JUST rebuilt it.

[OCCheetos]

Originally Posted by Multi-modal

As for why not surface on Sparks or Queen?

- Surface sparks is a challenge to get from the Portage/Wellington intersection to at-grade at Bay Street. You have to destroy Sparks Street west of Bay and/or the Garden of the Provinces and Territories. You could also go Wellingto -> Lyon -> Sparks, but that involves a back-to-back 90 degree curves that would be loud and have maintenance issues.

- Surface Queen Street would also have issues with getting to it at-grade, but it has additional challenges with maintaining access to multiple parking garage entrances, as well as the fact that we JUST rebuilt it.

I don't think there's really any problem with getting to Sparks. I think the problem is really just how small of a corridor it is. It's only 18m wide which isn't a lot of space to put two LRT tracks, platforms, pedestrian space, and all of the other amenities that you might expect from a pedestrian mall (patios, spaces for buskers, etc.)

Assuming they offset platforms to maintain as much pedestrian space as possible, from this diagram here you're left with only about 4.5 metres to fit in a sidewalk and whatever else you can next to the LRT track. That's like, half the width of the sidewalk on the North side of Wellington, and not even wide enough to fit some of the existing patios that are on Sparks.

[Aylmer]

Wellington also offers one crucial advantage rarely available to surface routes: no cross-traffic.

Usually, the major disadvantage of surface rail is that the capacity is throttled by the need to still operate significant cross-traffic. At some point, you can't have both a tram coming ever 60 seconds in either direction AND a functioning light cycle for cars. Usually, it ends up at some unhappy medium - not all the traffic can get through a cycle, and trams still end up waiting at intersections.

Wellington - and the Loop more generally - largely avoids this issue. There is no major cross-traffic on the route. There's a handful of parking access lanes and service vehicle entrances, but nothing remotely approaching the flow of an actual downtown street.
Trains will be able to run close to each other without any lights to stop at.

[Richard Eade]

OK, I could agree that there might be a valid case for a high-capacity loop IF the STO AND OC TRANSPO completely re-vamped the transit plans for both Gatineau and Ottawa – AND if there were plans to SIGNIFICANTLY increase the need for cross-border transit, in both directions.

What we are talking about here is a TRAM LINE, predominantly for commuters – and it was chosen to be a tram line because, for the foreseeable future, the capacity can easily be handled by a tram line. This is not the Confederation Line and it will never have that kind of volume. There are about 14 thousand people who currently (pre-CoViD-19) cross the river FROM ALL OF GATINEAU. The Aylmer Tram will only carry a portion of that. Even once the tram ridership doubles, a tram will have the capacity to handle it – without needing to have through-stations.

If you want to start talking about the STO changing its Rapibus system to something with a huge transfer station so that only trains cross the river, etc., then you really need to move your discussion to the Transit Fantasy Thread. This thread is to discuss, as the title states, the West Gatineau LRT Project. It is fine to suggest ‘tweaks’ and revisit decisions that have been discussed, but this project does not, currently, involve how the STO uses the Rapibus corridor. This is a project that gets people from the western portions of Gatineau to downtown Ottawa in the morning and back in the evening. Adding on a discussion of whether the tram line could be extended and looped back is valid – but there are limits. And you would need to ask questions; such as ‘who would want to go to Aylmer by taking the longer direction around the loop, past the Canadian Museum of History?’

As for the cost of the tunnel; think about whether the $500M-$900M additional cost is a reasonable estimate. The 2.5 km mined tunnel of the Confederation Line, with three HUGE station cavities, ran about $600M. The STO's tunnel would be less than half that length and it would be a shallow, cut and cover, tunnel. The tunneling should be in the $300M-$350M, with another $50M-$100M for handling the problems at its west portal. Once you add in all of the rail systems for that length, the cost will jump by $200M-$300M, but those would be the extra costs regardless of which route was chosen. And, expect to add another $50M-$100M for modifying the Portage Bridge, again, for either option. I expect that a curved tunnel under the river to Bank Street would cost about the same, or slightly less.

[Aylmer]

Keep in mind that Ottawa's $600M is in 2014 dollars. The $500M is 2026 dollars, or around $350M in 2014 dollars. And construction costs tend to inflate at a faster rate than general goods.

__

I think that it's much wiser to build things which can be improved upon. To do otherwise is to assume that nothing will change in the next 50-75 years. We are as far from that as the Gréber Plan is from us today. And that plan has some famously poor predictions. My problem biggest problem with the tunnel idea is precisely that it's literally carved in stone - no matter what Ottawa looks like in 2050, 2075, or 2100, it will be exceedingly difficult and expensive to modify. In most cases, that's an acceptable price to pay for increased capacity future-proofing, but that's not true of the Sparks tunnel. So you have a more expensive, less flexible option that can't be expanded or improved in the future. I just don't see the sense.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by Aylmer

To understand the value of the loop for the STO, you have to think about capacity. Whatever gets built is likely to be the single downtown connection for all of Gatineau's rapid transit lines for the 50-75 years. It needs to be a piece of infrastructure which can carry the demand of a third of the metro area.

An in-and-out tunnel, although undeniably faster, actually underperforms in terms of capacity. Trains can't run through, trains have to dwell longer at the station to switch cabs, and the station itself becomes a potential capacity problem. All three of these problems compound each other: longer dwells at the station decrease the train throughput, decreased train throughput increases crowding in the station. Crowding in the station increases the dwell time.

The loop, although not perfect, performs better from a capacity perspective. Through-running in both directions allows for both more trams and a more even distribution of passenger loads. More stations on the surface means that they don't face the same capacity issues as a single underground station, and can be easily expanded.

THIS. With a tunnel that ends at Elgin, we can only cross, say, 30 trains into Ottawa per hour. With the loop, we can cross 30 on each bridge, for a total of 60. It's double the capacity, essential for future consideration, including the eventual conversion of the RapiBus which will plug-into the tram loop.

If it's somehow feasible to build the loop with a tunnel, then have at it, but I highly doubt the Feds are ready to put in an extra $1B-$2B for a far more complicated project that will do little to improve reliability and speed. Remember, the STO tram will be running on the street on the Gatineau side, so a full grade separation in Ottawa won't make a significant difference.

Ottawa needed to cancel the original N/S rail and build the DOTT because streets would not have had the capacity to handle the heavy bus traffic from E/W and trains from N/S. The numerous cross streets and traffic lights, the parking lanes to the right of the transit lanes, the taxis and delivery trucks blocking the transit lanes (buses can go around, but not trains). These were/would be everyday problems.

The STO Wellington option has fewer cross streets (fewer still if we close Bank to Elgin), few to no delivery trucks and the trams would have their own RoW, not shared with buses and not crossed by cars. Comparing the old N/S with the STO Wellington option is a non-starter because they are very different. The dozen or so protests, parades and festivities are not that big of an issue in the grand scheme of things. As Aylmer mentions, trains could terminate at Lyon crossing the Portage and Rideau crossing the Alexandra during these events.

That said, I personally would prefer a surface Sparks option, but Wellington is fine by me nonetheless.

[J.OT13]

To get from Portage to Sparks, a tunnel could be built. Just make is a short tunnel from the Wellington/Portage intersection to just east of Lyon, maybe even built Lyon station underground for a direct passageway to Line 1's Lyon concourse. Far cheaper than the full 1.2 kilometers with two subway stations and offers the best of all the options.

Aylmer brings up a good point about cross streets, but we could close off Metcalfe and O'Connor* between Queen and Wellington and only allow delivery and garbage trucks. Kent could be closed between Sparks and Wellington. Bank and Elgin would the the only intersections left.

*The Promenade (or Valour) Building is the only one with a parking garage entrance, but the Feds could shut it down as part of the upcoming redevelopment of that block.

[OTownandDown]

I've been daydreaming about the new Alexandria Bridge.

What do you think the possibility is of a train running underneath pedestrian/traffic lanes heading to Ottawa, and then taking a sharp right along the old rail bed on Major's Hill Park cliff, then diving under the Senate's committee rooms (where the train used to run thru) in order to tunnel under the canal, turning westwards, paralleling the Confederation Line with combined stations, before popping out again to cross back to Gatineau somewhere along Wellington? Elevated tracks thru Zibi, anyone? lol

[PHrenetic]

Originally Posted by OTownandDown

I've been daydreaming about the new Alexandria Bridge.

What do you think the possibility is of a train running underneath pedestrian/traffic lanes heading to Ottawa, and then taking a sharp right along the old rail bed on Major's Hill Park cliff, then diving under the Senate's committee rooms (where the train used to run thru) in order to tunnel under the canal, turning westwards, paralleling the Confederation Line with combined stations, before popping out again to cross back to Gatineau somewhere along Wellington? Elevated tracks thru Zibi, anyone? lol

Good Day.

No daydreaming required. Roger1818 and I have both speculated on just how possible extending the STO's under Sparks tunnel option to the Chateau and to the Alexandra is. (Ref: posts 767, 766, 762, 759, 748, 714.) , The posts by Kitchissippi refer to the Lyon and Portage end of the STO Sparks tunnel option. These all only discussed the Ottawa side of the proposal - no assumptions of what the Gatineau side would look like were made. Roger1818 did post other concepts discussing the Alexandra bridge replacement that include prompting all of us to consider a bridge allowing all modes of transport and transit.

No 'sharp' turn off the Alexandra is required; it was, after all, a railroad bridge with smooth curves into that Chateau tunnel, which, IMHO, no longer needs those Senate conference rooms - replace them with a station - no brainer. And it could well be passageway connected to C-Line's Rideau station. This 'Chateau' station may need be more conveniently placed deeper than the old railbed was, so as to better continue to dive, and curve under the canal (this tunnel does not need to be nearly as deep as the C-Line, and it is in rock - not sand) and rise to connect to the Metcalfe/Sparks STO station. This Metcalfe station needs to be designed for the proper depth in mind for this connection, which is why this discussion is best held now, so as to not preclude the possibilities.

All this is eminently possible with little difficulty, as per the previous posts mentioned.

As you can see, I personally am in favour of the STO's Sparks tunnel option, and definitely prefer leaving open, or including, the option of the 'loop' via Alexandra. The last from Penaud-Jobin and STO seems to indicate that they are open to including planning their proposal with the 'loop' in mind, and if NCC/Feds can get it together with the Alexandra replacement planning by PSPC, it could potentially all work together - IF everyone gets along, and expedites cooperation.
And, similarly, you can also rightly assume that I do not really favour the Wellington surface option, for many of the reasons already discussed above, and that I brought up previously. And the Sparks surface option some have brought up (including myself) works only if (IMO) we abandon any 'loop' proposal connecting to STO's proposal. Any connection becomes just so difficult and awkward as to be simply untenable - the 'loop' would have to be a separate system from STO Sparks surface.

EnJoy!

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by PHrenetic

As you can see, I personally am in favour of the STO's Sparks tunnel option, and definitely prefer leaving open, or including, the option of the 'loop' via Alexandra. The last from Penaud-Jobin and STO seems to indicate that they are open to including planning their proposal with the 'loop' in mind, and if NCC/Feds can get it together with the Alexandra replacement planning by PSPC, it could potentially all work together - IF everyone gets along, and expedites cooperation.
And, similarly, you can also rightly assume that I do not really favour the Wellington surface option, for many of the reasons already discussed above, and that I brought up previously. And the Sparks surface option some have brought up (including myself) works only if (IMO) we abandon any 'loop' proposal connecting to STO's proposal. Any connection becomes just so difficult and awkward as to be simply untenable - the 'loop' would have to be a separate system from STO Sparks surface.

EnJoy!

Why do you believe a Sparks surface would not allow for a loop? The old streetcars use to go down Sparks to Rideau and up Sussex to New Edinburgh. We would just need to sever Confederation Square as it was for a few decades in the early and mid-20th Century. I realize that new LRT trains are much longer than the old streetcars, but that's just as much of an issue with surface Wellington.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by Aylmer

Keep in mind that Ottawa's $600M is in 2014 dollars. The $500M is 2026 dollars, or around $350M in 2014 dollars. And construction costs tend to inflate at a faster rate than general goods.

__

I think that it's much wiser to build things which can be improved upon. To do otherwise is to assume that nothing will change in the next 50-75 years. We are as far from that as the Gréber Plan is from us today. And that plan has some famously poor predictions. My problem biggest problem with the tunnel idea is precisely that it's literally carved in stone - no matter what Ottawa looks like in 2050, 2075, or 2100, it will be exceedingly difficult and expensive to modify. In most cases, that's an acceptable price to pay for increased capacity future-proofing, but that's not true of the Sparks tunnel. So you have a more expensive, less flexible option that can't be expanded or improved in the future. I just don't see the sense.

Well put.

Also, I'd argue that the tunnel option only made sense when removing traffic from Wellington wasn't an option. If it is..... That's a whole different tradeoff.

[Kitchissippi]

Despite going past Parliament and being embellished by the NCC, Wellington remains the property and jurisdiction of the City of Ottawa. It is a major arterial, and I doubt the city is going to make sudden sharp turns in its established plans and agree to close it to traffic without lengthy analysis/debate/objection. It greatly impacts access to the Portage bridge, the parkway and the western side of the core in general, and it would cost the city quite a bit in additional infrastructure to mitigate where the traffic volume would go. Simply put, this idea of a STO transit mall/loop has no sound business case for Ottawa, doesn’t fit into its long range transportation plans, and doesn’t properly link with its biggest investment, the O-Train. I don’t even understand what the public is supposed to do in a pedestrianized Wellington, stroll up and down and look at buildings they mostly don’t have access to?

[Gat-Train]

Originally Posted by PHrenetic

Good Day.

No daydreaming required. Roger1818 and I have both speculated on just how possible extending the STO's under Sparks tunnel option to the Chateau and to the Alexandra is. (Ref: posts 767, 766, 762, 759, 748, 714.) , The posts by Kitchissippi refer to the Lyon and Portage end of the STO Sparks tunnel option. These all only discussed the Ottawa side of the proposal - no assumptions of what the Gatineau side would look like were made. Roger1818 did post other concepts discussing the Alexandra bridge replacement that include prompting all of us to consider a bridge allowing all modes of transport and transit.

No 'sharp' turn off the Alexandra is required; it was, after all, a railroad bridge with smooth curves into that Chateau tunnel, which, IMHO, no longer needs those Senate conference rooms - replace them with a station - no brainer. And it could well be passageway connected to C-Line's Rideau station. This 'Chateau' station may need be more conveniently placed deeper than the old railbed was, so as to better continue to dive, and curve under the canal (this tunnel does not need to be nearly as deep as the C-Line, and it is in rock - not sand) and rise to connect to the Metcalfe/Sparks STO station. This Metcalfe station needs to be designed for the proper depth in mind for this connection, which is why this discussion is best held now, so as to not preclude the possibilities.

All this is eminently possible with little difficulty, as per the previous posts mentioned.

As you can see, I personally am in favour of the STO's Sparks tunnel option, and definitely prefer leaving open, or including, the option of the 'loop' via Alexandra. The last from Penaud-Jobin and STO seems to indicate that they are open to including planning their proposal with the 'loop' in mind, and if NCC/Feds can get it together with the Alexandra replacement planning by PSPC, it could potentially all work together - IF everyone gets along, and expedites cooperation.
And, similarly, you can also rightly assume that I do not really favour the Wellington surface option, for many of the reasons already discussed above, and that I brought up previously. And the Sparks surface option some have brought up (including myself) works only if (IMO) we abandon any 'loop' proposal connecting to STO's proposal. Any connection becomes just so difficult and awkward as to be simply untenable - the 'loop' would have to be a separate system from STO Sparks surface.

EnJoy!

I like this idea, but I think OC Transpo and STO have to merge into a single organization to make it come to fruition.

[PHrenetic]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Why do you believe a Sparks surface would not allow for a loop? The old streetcars use to go down Sparks to Rideau and up Sussex to New Edinburgh. We would just need to sever Confederation Square as it was for a few decades in the early and mid-20th Century. I realize that new LRT trains are much longer than the old streetcars, but that's just as much of an issue with surface Wellington.

Good Day.

All valid, BUT.

The curve directly from Wellington into the alignment aside the Chateau is very sharp - IMO way too sharp for acceptability to our 'discerning' clientele.
You are correct in the note that this is far less of an issue in an alignment from Sparks, cutting off the south triangle extent of the plaza, and curving north, along the east side, across Wellington, into the Chateau alignment.

The BUT is for the cutting of the plaza in front of the Cenotaph.
My read of public acceptance to that is way more than any NIMBY movement ever seen before - amounting to nationwide rejection of even considering the idea.
I do not believe any politician is going to come close to it, even if it is only the southern triangle. Yes, it does not get actually used very much at all, but still, the visibility and perception of it. Just my opinion.
Conversely, I could see from the STO Wellington proposal coming down from Wellington southward along the west side (with a station platform)(at Sparks),
curving eastward around the south tip (maybe, just barely maybe, with a tiny nip off the tip), back northward up the east side, and across Wellington into the Chateau alignment.

Finally, from the political angle of it all, I see only the Sparks tunnel being the acceptable option - no NIMBYs, either local or nationwide, no view impediment of LRVs or wires (yes, i see wires constantly being argued up, despite STO saying battery drive), no vehicular disruption (as Kitchissippi well summarized above), no political or social demonstrations interruptions, no dumbass vehicle drivers (car or truck) blocking or colliding with the LRVs (yes, all too common, IMO), no heavy snow or ice buildup in street tracks which we would get blamed for service interruptions, no questioning (even with Sparks) why we went C-Line tunnel but then allow STO to bung us up on surface.

Yes, the tunnel costs more, but most of the politicians will see it as a bargain to avoid all the negatives (and yes, some will see that far down the rails).

My view. Your mileage may differ. EnJoy!

[J.OT13]

City of Ottawa Transportation Committee on the STO downtown options audio and pdf are on O-Train Fans.

https://www.railfans.ca/otrain/news/tran...for-gatineau-s-west-end-november-16-2020

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by OCCheetos

From the Ottawa staff report:



It seems to suggest they've settled on all-tram.

Edit: though in the rest of the report they do bring up hybrid options anyway..
Edit2: "STO has confirmed that an all-tram solution can be supported." whatever that means.

In the presentation, they confirm that the cost estimates are for the all tram options.

[rocketphish]

Sparks Street tunnel for Gatineau LRT gets committee's OK
Councillors leave door open for rail on Wellington Street if tunnel plan falls through

Joanne Chianello · CBC News
Posted: Nov 16, 2020 4:19 PM ET | Last Updated: 1 hour ago

Ottawa city council's transportation committee has approved a plan to allow Gatineau to connect its future light rail system to the Confederation Line through a tunnel under Sparks Street, but left the door open to running rail in front of Parliament Hill on Wellington Street.

The Société de transport de l'Outaouais (STO) has plans for a rapid transit system to bring residents from the growing Aylmer and Plateau areas to its downtown by 2028, as well as connect with Ottawa's LRT. Earlier this year, STO confirmed it wanted to bring its electric trams over the Ottawa River using the Portage Bridge.

STO presented Ottawa with two options once the trams arrive on this side of the river: through a tunnel running under Sparks Street, or along the north side of Wellington Street, alongside existing traffic. In both instances, the STO trams would stop at a dead end or transit "stub" near Elgin Street, then return west toward Gatineau.



On Monday, the transportation committee approved the Sparks Street tunnel as its preferred option as it presents fewer disruptions.

However, councillors heard for the first time that the tunnel would cost $500 million more than the Wellington option. Given the additional expense, the committee also approved the Wellington Street option "should the funding for the Sparks Street tunnel not materialize."

Much of Monday's committee meeting was spent discussing the concept of a rail loop that would connect the downtowns of Ottawa and Gatineau, running along Wellington Street and Sussex Drive on the Ottawa side, and connecting to Queb

The Loop, as it's being called by its supporters, grew out of a call from local economist, writer and former National Capital Commission board member Bob Plamondon for Wellington Street to be turned into a pedestrian mall. Now, a group is advocating for a rail loop to be part of STO's light rail plan, too.

"Now is the time to do this as one project rather than to do it piecemeal," Plamondon told committee members Monday.

The Loop is not currently part of the light rail plan being proposed by STO. Instead, the committee passed a motion asking the federal government to fund a study on the feasibility of a transit loop and turning Wellington Street into a pedestrian mall.

For its part, the federal government has not yet committed any funds to STO's light rail plan.

"We've had discussions with the federal government, we've had enthusiasm … but we have to get beyond words as soon as possible because we're investing a lot of time of energy," Gatineau Mayor Maxime Pedneaud-Jobin told reporters after the meeting. "But the federal government is still not putting anything concrete on the table."

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/tr...e-sto-light-rail-sparks-street-1.5803392

[Jamaican-Phoenix]

There's also talk about the "downtown loop" now, but why not this as an alternative? Use travel patterns and as much existing infrastructure as possible to create a different kind of "loop"?

[Multi-modal]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

City of Ottawa Transportation Committee on the STO downtown options audio and pdf are on O-Train Fans.

https://www.railfans.ca/otrain/news/tran...for-gatineau-s-west-end-november-16-2020

Man, City staff was very deceptive with Council on what they were voting on. As I noted before, the report wasn't clear that it was NOT endorsing the STO option that allowed for pedestrianization of Wellington Street. Most of the councilors stated that they were supportive of pedestrianization. Leiper even directly asked whether the staff report would preclude pedestrianization, and Vivi Chi said something to the effect of "well future Council could vote to pedestrianize Wellington in the future". Vivi didn't make it clear that by voting for the staff report Councilors were effectively NOT endorsing STO's pedestrianization option.

Council was supportive of pedestrianization, yet voted for the staff report that recommended against pedestrianization. Why? Because staff was incredibly confusing with the presentation of their staff report.

*Edit - Menard and McKenney also asked again why the staff report seemed to be not recommending pedestrianization (which is true) - and Vivi/Manconi mislead council AGAIN. They were super confusing - its maddening. If I was a STO consultant trying to interpret this meeting/direction I would be super unsure about what Council wanted. The approved staff report does not reflect the priorities stated by Council.

[Multi-modal]

Originally Posted by Jamaican-Phoenix

There's also talk about the "downtown loop" now, but why not this as an alternative? Use travel patterns and as much existing infrastructure as possible to create a different kind of "loop"?

This isn't great because of how long it would take to get from downtown Ottawa to downtown Gatineau and points further west. The Alexandra bridge is the long way around - that's why Gatineau proposed Portage in the first place.