Confederation Line (Stage 1) | In Service 1.0

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by rakerman

It was in 2009. It was called the Light Rail Transit (LRT) Technology Forum. The entire website is gone now.

Here's the main page from the Internet Archive.

https://web.archive.org/web/201111020316...nts/public_consult/tmp/lrt/index_en.html

It's really unfortunate that the full presentations aren't online. I've only been able to find Kinkisharyo in the Internet Archive, but without the audio it's hard to tell what they're recommending just from the deck itself.

https://web.archive.org/web/200912290146...ublic_consult/tmp/lrt/kinkisharyo_en.pdf

There are fragments of the Alstom, Bombardier and City of Toronto presentations online. Ottawa was asking for over 20,000 passengers per hour per direction (pphpd) and Alstom, Bombardier and the City of Toronto all indicate light metro above 20,000 pphpd. Light rail (the kind of vehicles Ottawa specified and purchased) tops out around 10,000 to 12,000 pphpd in their three presentations.

That was it. I don't remember this specific slide deck. But I was at a very early presentation and the Kinkisharyo rep was the only one to really argue that medium capacity rail was the more appropriate solution for a city of Ottawa's size. Other reps took the line of "We'll build what you want.". I specifically remember that incident because of how distinct his idea was. And he basically had a slide of cities of similar size that had more than LRT.

[OCCheetos]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

R1 Express is so fast, it completes the trip from Blair to downtown faster than the train when it runs. Hmmmm. Just as I said, we built a train that runs slower than the buses that it replaced.

"Why is my train slower than the bus that skips 6 whole stations and drives straight down the highway?"

HMMM I WONDER WHY

Let me know how everyone at St-Laurent, Hurdman, Lees, and uOttawa are enjoying this express service.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by OCCheetos

"Why is my train slower than the bus that skips 6 whole stations and drives straight down the highway?"

HMMM I WONDER WHY

Let me know how everyone at St-Laurent, Hurdman, Lees, and uOttawa are enjoying this express service.

The R1 Express sounds like the Beacon Hill Bullet, that started express service in Ottawa with great success.

We needed rail that could run at maximum speed into downtown (like REM), so it could mimic express bus service. Those curves on either side of Hurdman appeared to be a compromise in order to avoid purchasing additional land from the NCC beyond the old Hurdman bus station and to prevent needing to build a new bridge over the Rideau. We see the end result. Even with an improved wheel assembly, trains will almost certainly have to run at reduced speed through that section, slower than buses on similar curves.

The problem with standard R1 service is the location of stations that are not nearly effectively served by public roadways compared to the rail line and the former Transitways.

Ridership figures following the latest fiasco will be interesting.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

Any service is going to be faster if you skip stops. Let's see how you like it if the Trillium stop near you gets picked to be bypassed. I get why they did it, but it doesn't really speak much to the performance of the Confederation Line.



Cool. So you should be okay with pedestrianizing Bank St then right? Nobody is going downtown after all?

Your views are always all over the place and ridiculously filled with grievance and glee. Hard to see you as a "friend" to LRT. Apparently the only LRT you're a friend to, is one that would come to your front door.

There is no Trillium Line station near me, which given the geography of my neighbourhood makes sense.

By all means, close Bank Street, Queen Elizabeth Drive, and Colonel By Drive and see the result.

I point out the failings of our rail project with deep sadness not glee. The situation has been an embarrassment to this city. The line has been open for almost four years and we now learn of major design faults that will take further years to resolve. Should any taxpayer or potential transit rider be happy with this outcome?

I think I have every right to have grievance with a line that clearly has serious problems. Even you wanted something better. So, do I. In that respect, our positions are the same. Our difference, is that I also care about the south end of the city where I live. Is that unreasonable?

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

I point out the failings of our rail project with deep sadness not glee. The situation has been an embarrassment to this city. The line has been open for almost four years and we now learn of major design faults that will take further years to resolve. Should any taxpayer or potential transit rider be happy with this outcome?

I think I have every right to have grievance with a line that clearly has serious problems. Even you wanted something better. So, do I. In that respect, our positions are the same. Our difference, is that I also care about the south end of the city where I live. Is that unreasonable?

Cheering on service that literally does not serve a whole bunch of riders doesn't speak to your "grievance" or "sadness" . It's glee at the misfortune of others. It's spiteful nonsense.

Also, for somebody who claims to want better, you sure spend a lot of time reminiscing on a project that was objectively worse in almost every way excepting for serving your area. That's not the same as me saying Ottawa should have built a proper metro.

[Tesladom]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

The R1 Express sounds like the Beacon Hill Bullet, that started express service in Ottawa with great success.

We can all agree that the previous Transitway system (Express + "9x" bus) was much quicker. I know it doesn't scale, but I would be curious to see how well it would work if they had a transitway tunnel as opposed to Slater/Albert

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

Cheering on service that literally does not serve a whole bunch of riders doesn't speak to your "grievance" or "sadness" . It's glee at the misfortune of others. It's spiteful nonsense.

Also, for somebody who claims to want better, you sure spend a lot of time reminiscing on a project that was objectively worse in almost every way excepting for serving your area. That's not the same as me saying Ottawa should have built a proper metro.

My grievance is that what we have built has not worked well. Nothing more. If we can fix it. Great! But we are almost at the fourth anniversary and look at the mess.

Your comments re-enforce a misperception that nobody lives south of Hurdman and Algonquin Stations. This represents at least 25% of the city's population, both inside and outside the Greenbelt. And we are building more and more houses every year. I look out on a new housing development under construction from where I work. Hundreds of new houses going up, that will have lousy transit service.

How are my comments spiteful nonsense. I want our transit system to work well for everybody, no matter where they live.

You make comparisons between the Trillium Line under construction and its original iteration. How is the current Trillium Line an improvement? The frequency is crap, transfers don't reliably work with local transit, the southern terminus is in a field instead of where people actually live. The train does not run downtown as originally planned. It doesn't run to Barrhaven as originally plan. There is little hope that Barrhaven and its 100,000 residence will receive an LRT extension in my lifetime. The airport spur could have been added with a one seat ride to downtown. That is not possible with the current plan. The current plan cannot be upgraded without another massive shutdown. No wonder I am nostalgic. If our new Trillium plan was actually better than the original plan, I would be jumping for joy, but it is crap and many others on this board realize this. Do actually know anything about the south end of this city? Your comments suggest not.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

The biggest mistake Ottawa made was forcing a technology. Virtually every problem with the Confederation Line flows from this decision. Likewise, a lot of the passenger comforts we lack flow from this decision. LRT is basically why we didn't build shorter fully enclosed stations like the REM.

Otherwise, the Confederation Line is fine. Stop spacing is okay for a metro. REM is a bit wider (2.6 km spacing vs. 1.5 Km for Stage 2 Confederation Line) but it's replacing a suburban rail service. The stations are decently designed. Fare systems are okay with Presto.

Agreed.

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

REM station spacing is affected by crossing a very wide river and in Phase 2, crossing beneath a mountain.

Unfortunately, we judge Confed Line against REM when REM choices were made after ours. None of us knew REM choices regarding technology and station design were realistic when our choices were made around 6 years earlier. Our choices were made based on the previous failed project. With this comparison, the Confed Line was a considerable upgrade. We probably made some bad choices but we couldn't have expected REM in Ottawa, REM is such an unexpected step forward in urban rail design.

Montreal also had a major advantage with a required fast replacement of the Champlain Bridge needed.

Vancouver had a fully automated metro in 1986. Linear induction and their track obstruction detection would not work here, but solutions existed for us in 2012. In fact, our trains are automated, but we still have drivers (and 4 cabs per train). There's no excuse.

Originally Posted by YOWetal

Yes you're right it's mostly unfair. But Panama to Du Cartier has a bunch of potential stations if the goal was 70% of people within 2 km or some other ridiculous metric. We chose Prom D'Orleans and Jean D'arc stations. Besides the waster $30 million. Every trip from Trim and points beyond will take an extra minute. The tunnelling and diversion to avoid inconveniencing anyone in Westboro is another example.

The Transitway worked as express buses could skip station. Can't do that with rail. We built something that acts as commuter rail AND urban transit, which doesn't compute. Inside the Greenbelt and in Orleans, Confederation Line is fine, but Kanata and Barrhaven would be better served by commuter rail.

I have nothing against Jeanne d'Arc, but Orléans Boulevard should not have been built (Jasmine should have). But the east is not the issue, it's the west, which is far more expansive.

I have nothing against the Byron tunnel. The linear park is well appreciated and an important greenspace. I think the moderately priced and very disruptive cut-and-cover was a good compromise. Look at Toronto's Vaughn extension, where they bored a huge tunnel under a TTC rail depot, vacant land and industrial areas. To boot, stations are ridiculously huge, Cathedrals of transit, where they have Pimisi/Lees/Grennboro level ridership. Now that was a waste, but of course, they get blank cheques and can do what they want, unlike us who have to nickel and dime.

Originally Posted by zzptichka

I heard they built REM at $100M/km.
How much is Phase 3 into Barrhaven that runs mostly through empty fields? $500M per km?

Can't compare. Transit inflation has been crazy all over North America. Stage 1, with heavy tunneling and large stations was only slightly more expensive than REM. Stage 2, a far simpler project, was moderately cheaper than REM. Anything pandemic/post-pandemic is through the roof.

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

We also bit off more than this city could handle with Phase 1 designed to end all commuter service in one step.

This was never about improving transit in Ottawa, which is shocking. It was more about getting rid of as many buses as possible. Trains designed to run slower than the buses that they replaced should have been a big red flag, but the politicians never understood this when they suggested a 15 minute time saving that was never in the cards. The politicians who approved the Confed Line never understood the capabilities or the lack of same when they approved the design including the trains chosen.

I expect that Phase 2 of the Trillium Line will be a shambles as well.

For sure, I think we went to far with the service rebuild once the train opened. Even before it opened in anticipation for dates that came and went. Re-routing the entire network to depend on the train was a mistake. I think we should have maybe at least kept the west and south express buses so that people didn't have to transfer for a short ride from Tunney's to Downtown.

Although I don't have a lot of faith in TNext, I think Line 2 reopening should go relatively well. We're talking big, heavy diesel trains. I do worry about Dow's Lake station's capacity, and the overall capacity, however.

Originally Posted by phil235

I'm sure that is the hope, but the massive elevated guideway and elevated stations won't attract that same kind of urban development that the O-Train will, as our stations are much more integrated/integratable into the urban fabric. You can conceivably get an island of towers around the station in the corner of the Fairview Pointe Claire parking lot (likely sitting on 6 stories of above ground parking so no one has to live under the tracks), but everyone else will be driving or taking the bus to the station.

I'd say Lees to Algonquin are well intergraded. Arguably to Pinecrest. But Bayshore might be worse than elevated, and certainly Moodie (though that's a location thing).

In the east, the problem with Hurdman is the offset bus loop that takes up a lot of space, towers that are far from the station. No sure how they'll ever develop TOD that's well integrated.

Tremplay's issue is the road/highway network. Same with Cyrville. Blair is Bayshore level terrible for anyone who lives north of the station. Montreal has nothing around it. The Orleans stations I don't think will be terrible (though quite an incline over the bridge to access), but they are not well intergraded by any stretch.

Originally Posted by phil235

Point taken. I'm not advocating for subways everywhere, but in true urban neighbourhoods, they are much more conducive to real urban growth. And in my opinion, something like the O-Train trench along Scott is preferable to an elevated line. Plus you can cover it at some point in the future when it makes sense.

I disagree. Scott would have been better as elevated (in a scenario where the trench was never built) as it would allow permeability under the guideway. Agreed though, that the trench is ultimately better if it's capped however, I don't see that happening. Even with a lack of greenspace in the Ward, no one is talking about it.

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

R1 Express is so fast, it completes the trip from Blair to downtown faster than the train when it runs. Hmmmm. Just as I said, we built a train that runs slower than the buses that it replaced.

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

Because there's no traffic. You can take any rapid transit line anywhere in the world and if there's no traffic you can beat it in a car.

Yup, cause summer. In September, the R1xpress could be quite different.

Originally Posted by OCCheetos

"Why is my train slower than the bus that skips 6 whole stations and drives straight down the highway?"

HMMM I WONDER WHY

Let me know how everyone at St-Laurent, Hurdman, Lees, and uOttawa are enjoying this express service.

Had the same thought. Lees and uOttawa probably not too bad with school being out, but St. Laurent and Hurdman serve dense urban populations (via bus transfers). I'd love to see a map with frequencies per station.

Originally Posted by Tesladom

We can all agree that the previous Transitway system (Express + "9x" bus) was much quicker. I know it doesn't scale, but I would be curious to see how well it would work if they had a transitway tunnel as opposed to Slater/Albert

Had we built the bus tunnel in the 90s as planned, I don't think we would have needed to convert the Transitway. At that point, the N/S line would have made sense.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Tesladom

We can all agree that the previous Transitway system (Express + "9x" bus) was much quicker. I know it doesn't scale, but I would be curious to see how well it would work if they had a transitway tunnel as opposed to Slater/Albert

We laughed at Andy Haydon as yesterday's man and automatically concluded that a bus tunnel would be at capacity on opening day forgetting that Albert and Slater was still there for some buses or urban tramways. But our priority was not improving transit service but getting rid of every bus off of Albert and Slater.

And with this comment, I will await the mudslinging at me. I am more of a transit advocate and we need to use either buses or trains to accomplish this.
The end result of whatever projects that we choose, should produce better service, but we didn't get this, and this was easily predictable. The people have spoken as our post-pandemic transit ridership recovery is much worse than many other Canadian cities. It is also no wonder that the PS wants to work from home. Getting around Ottawa by transit has really deteriorated.

[J.OT13]

Here are two things I think Ottawa did better. Our stations and wayfinding announce themselves well. The O pylon and signage outside, the distinctive roof lines. You can see them from a mile away.

Unpopular opinion, but I prefer our open stations (for rail, I do wish we had large enclosed waiting areas for buses). REM's enclosed stations look like indoor hallways. When the trains were down yesterday, that was a lot of people in an enclosed space. Compared to pics of Tunney's, it was tight, but at least you were outside where fresh air could reach waiting passengers.

All in all, I think REM is the superior system, but we do have a few wins.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

We laughed at Andy Haydon as yesterday's man and automatically concluded that a bus tunnel would be at capacity on opening day forgetting that Albert and Slater was still there for some buses or urban tramways. But our priority was not improving transit service but getting rid of every bus off of Albert and Slater.

And with this comment, I will await the mudslinging at me. I am more of a transit advocate and we need to use either buses or trains to accomplish this.
The end result of whatever projects that we choose, should produce better service, but we didn't get this, and this was easily predictable.

Bus tunnel would have made sense in the 90s, but I think we were too far gone by 2010. Capacity had been reached on the surface and the tunnel would reach capacity within a decade or two. Sure we could have also used Albert-Slater, but we would not have had the opportunity to rethink those streets for other modes (pedestrians and cyclists).

[phil235]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Bus tunnel would have made sense in the 90s, but I think we were too far gone by 2010. Capacity had been reached on the surface and the tunnel would reach capacity within a decade or two. Sure we could have also used Albert-Slater, but we would not have had the opportunity to rethink those streets for other modes (pedestrians and cyclists).

Also, the transitway had quite a few decades to prove its worth as a city-building tool, and it largely failed. It had advantages in terms of flexibility and express buses, but it would have been much more expensive for limited capacity upgrades. Our mistake wasn't moving to a train, it was moving to this train.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by phil235

Also, the transitway had quite a few decades to prove its worth as a city-building tool, and it largely failed. It had advantages in terms of flexibility and express buses, but it would have been much more expensive for limited capacity upgrades. Our mistake wasn't moving to a train, it was moving to this train.

Agreed. Ideally, we would have built LRT from the very beginning. Could have been surface Albert-Slater, which would have been enough for an extra decade. We then would only have needed to build the tunnel. Everything else could have been invested elsewhere.

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Here are two things I think Ottawa did better. Our stations and wayfinding announce themselves well. The O pylon and signage outside, the distinctive roof lines. You can see them from a mile away.

Unpopular opinion, but I prefer our open stations (for rail, I do wish we had large enclosed waiting areas for buses). REM's enclosed stations look like indoor hallways. When the trains were down yesterday, that was a lot of people in an enclosed space. Compared to pics of Tunney's, it was tight, but at least you were outside where fresh air could reach waiting passengers.

All in all, I think REM is the superior system, but we do have a few wins.

I got one more. Seems REM doesn't have redundant elevators. How in this day and age is that not code? Ottawa did not cheap out on that at least (other than Blair's one legacy elevator on Gloucester Centre side), which is more than can be said for many other systems.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by phil235

Also, the transitway had quite a few decades to prove its worth as a city-building tool, and it largely failed. It had advantages in terms of flexibility and express buses, but it would have been much more expensive for limited capacity upgrades. Our mistake wasn't moving to a train, it was moving to this train.

There is a lot of truth in what you say but TOD failure with the Transitways was more about zoning policy. Only with the train have we specifically chosen to up zoning densities near stations. Sadly, this also reflects a change in transit policy. We no longer want to bring transit to where people live and we need to reflect that only 10% of the population will live within walking distance of LRT stations regardless of TOD. I would argue that overall this is a planning failure, when 90% of the population will have degrading transit service. We need look at many American cities, where expensive LRT is not supported by good neighbourhood bus service and overall ridership lags as a result. Are we heading in that direction?

[phil235]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

There is a lot of truth in what you say but TOD failure with the Transitways was more about zoning policy. Only with the train have we specifically chosen to up zoning densities near stations. Sadly, this also reflects a change in transit policy. We no longer want to bring transit to where people live and we need to reflect that only 10% of the population will live within walking distance of LRT stations regardless of TOD. I would argue that overall this is a planning failure, when 90% of the population will have degrading transit service. We need look at many American cities, where expensive LRT is not supported by good neighbourhood bus service and overall ridership lags as a result. Are we heading in that direction?

Zoning may be part of the answer, but busways aren't drivers of development the way trains are.

There are lots of proven models for bus-train interfaces. We just need to start using them. Personally I would take the job away from OC Transpo entirely, as they have proven incapable at this point. They can run the system, but have someone else design it.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by phil235

Zoning may be part of the answer, but busways aren't drivers of development the way trains are.

There are lots of proven models for bus-train interfaces. We just need to start using them. Personally I would take the job away from OC Transpo entirely, as they have proven incapable at this point. They can run the system, but have someone else design it.

Tell that to Baseline. All you need is a line on a map with the letters B.R.T.

That said, there's a difference between the 1980s and 2020s.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Tell that to Baseline. All you need is a line on a map with the letters B.R.T.

That said, there's a difference between the 1980s and 2020s.

Look at Billings Bridge with 4 towers to go up soon. Rail is not necessarily the driver

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

There is a lot of truth in what you say but TOD failure with the Transitways was more about zoning policy.

I think the most fundamental problem was a local housing and building culture that was, and in many ways still is, permanently stuck in 1974.

[OCCheetos]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

The R1 Express sounds like the Beacon Hill Bullet, that started express service in Ottawa with great success.

We needed rail that could run at maximum speed into downtown (like REM), so it could mimic express bus service. Those curves on either side of Hurdman appeared to be a compromise in order to avoid purchasing additional land from the NCC beyond the old Hurdman bus station and to prevent needing to build a new bridge over the Rideau. We see the end result.

Before the temporary speed restrictions were put into place, the time it took to get from Blair to Rideau stations was about 14 minutes on the LRT.
The R1 express has been clocked at travelling from Blair to Mackenzie King(?) at just under 8 minutes.
We're talking about a difference of around 6-7 minutes between the LRT and the "express bus that skips several major stations". I highly doubt that those 6 minutes are the biggest contributors to people's travel times in the current network.

Even with an improved wheel assembly, trains will almost certainly have to run at reduced speed through that section, slower than buses on similar curves.

"almost certainly"? based on what?
Unless you know something that we don't, I don't think you can make that kind of assertion.

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

We laughed at Andy Haydon as yesterday's man and automatically concluded that a bus tunnel would be at capacity on opening day forgetting that Albert and Slater was still there for some buses or urban tramways. But our priority was not improving transit service but getting rid of every bus off of Albert and Slater.

Shoving rapid transit back onto street-level is just proof that the bus tunnel would be undersized and not fit for the city. How do you even split rapid transit between two parallel corridors like that?-- where one is at-grade, and the other is several meters underground? It's not like we've gotten rid of buses in the core at all. There are still many local and frequent routes that use them, and they're underserved as it is.

Compared to the approach that other cities with successful transit networks, what you're suggesting here just comes across as a city flailing to provide adequate capacity after building an insufficient bus tunnel and learning (admittedly in hindsight) nothing from cities like Seattle.

The people have spoken as our post-pandemic transit ridership recovery is much worse than many other Canadian cities. It is also no wonder that the PS wants to work from home. Getting around Ottawa by transit has really deteriorated.

I don't think anybody else would necessarily disagree with any of this, but I also don't think anyone else here would just baselessly assume that we're stuck with slow trains forever and then build their entire argument around a flawed assumption like you do.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

I am more of a transit advocate ....

It's kinda like saying you're a violinist because you watch others playing the violin.