Confederation Line (Stage 1) | In Service

[Truenorth00]

Just to clarify. When I say "suburbs", I mean outside the greenbelt. The neighbourhoods may look similar, but the costs to service them are different. Thanks to the Greenbelt. Absent servicing intermodal hubs (like the airport and Fallowfield), there's not much of a case for going outside the Greenbelt if we don't have large budgets. And this was true before we ever got a shovel in the ground. Arguably extending into Orleans has substantially worsened the debate by making it one about fairness instead of ridership.

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

I'd argue that OC Transpo's problems aren't entirely to do with COVID. Other cities have substantially recaptured ridership. Their spotty reliability has driven away ridership.

Like I said earlier, there is no obvious fix. Only hard choices. If they insist on trying to put a chicken on every pot on a shoestring budget, they'll continue to have a crap feeder service.

What's the point of having the same debates here every 3 months? The choice is obvious. Increase the budget for feeder bus services or make difficult choices to stay within the allocated budget. There's no other obvious magical option.

Nobody wants a tax increase or service cuts but as you say only way to avoid that (or bother really) is magic.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Williamoforange

Lmao, you literally defended the original rail plan just mere days ago..... And still complain about the transitway being closed....

I don't think anything you have to say is going to be relevant, useful or factual if you continue to think that was a good plan.

This has me confused. How did the original plan close the Transitway?

We will see how good the revised Line 2 is soon.

[DTcrawler]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

This has me confused. How did the original plan close the Transitway?

We will see how good the revised Line 2 is soon.

How is this at all relevant? We know the new Line 2 will leave a lot to be desired. Most people could have predicted that before shovels went into the ground. That's because of the design being completely watered down to reach the boonies at a cost that's palatable to penny-pinching suburbanites.

Fundamentally, I do not understand what your stance is through your arguments. You clearly think service needs improvement, so how should we pay for it?

[kmcamp]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

I'd argue that OC Transpo's problems aren't entirely to do with COVID. Other cities have substantially recaptured ridership. Their spotty reliability has driven away ridership.

Like I said earlier, there is no obvious fix. Only hard choices. If they insist on trying to put a chicken on every pot on a shoestring budget, they'll continue to have a crap feeder service.

What's the point of having the same debates here every 3 months? The choice is obvious. Increase the budget for feeder bus services or make difficult choices to stay within the allocated budget. There's no other obvious magical option.

The one caveat in the numbers is Ottawa had a very high ridership per capita, one of the strongest in Canada/USA, before the pandemic. Other cities may have recaptured ridership, but they had a smaller hill to climb

\

Even post pandemic, the O-Train has higher annual ridership then several large American cities like Miami, Houston, or Minneapolis

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by DTcrawler

How is this at all relevant? We know the new Line 2 will leave a lot to be desired. Most people could have predicted that before shovels went into the ground. That's because of the design being completely watered down to reach the boonies at a cost that's palatable to penny-pinching suburbanites.

Fundamentally, I do not understand what your stance is through your arguments. You clearly think service needs improvement, so how should we pay for it?

He is here to complain. Not contribute. And he's trying to argue some weird, "Told ya so," by implying that if we just stuck with the old plan we wouldn't have any of the problems we have now.

And Line 2 is a great example of enshittification driven by a desire to serve the burbs. The desire to extend past the airport is why we have a transfer at South Keys. The cost of going all the way to Riverside South is why they decided against double tracking and electrification.

[rdaner]

Great points! I would just like to add that some of the benefits of rail systems is in how they affect the development of the city. Combined with the right mix of zoning there can be a noticeable change in development patterns that become apparent only after a few years of operation. Also I imagine that some sections/stations have seen higher recovery rates than others.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

First, considering 'urban Ottawa' is perhaps 250,000 people at most, how do we build an effective rail system for such a small population? Is it even possible?

As part of a network, any station or line of a rail system doesn't just serve the neighbourhood it's in.

At least, this is the argument I'm given whenever I question building urban transit that prioritizes the suburbs over the urbs.

It just doesn't seem to work in reverse. Then it becomes too expensive and a drain on precious infrastructure dollars and taxpayers have rights and so forth.

[ponyboycurtis]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

He is here to complain. Not contribute. And he's trying to argue some weird, "Told ya so," by implying that if we just stuck with the old plan we wouldn't have any of the problems we have now.

And Line 2 is a great example of enshittification driven by a desire to serve the burbs. The desire to extend past the airport is why we have a transfer at South Keys. The cost of going all the way to Riverside South is why they decided against double tracking and electrification.

My favorite part... The coming widening the Airport Parkway. Just shoot me.

Who on earth is the shotcaller here. Ridiculous.

[DTcrawler]

Originally Posted by ponyboycurtis

My favorite part... The coming widening the Airport Parkway. Just shoot me.

Who on earth is the shotcaller here. Ridiculous.

The majority of residents (i.e. voters) who don't know any better. They love to listen to CFRA and blame politicians for endless "boondoggles" and "bankrupting the city" when in reality spineless councillors simply pursue whatever projects are going to get the least amount of backlash from their constituents and get them re-elected.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

He is here to complain. Not contribute. And he's trying to argue some weird, "Told ya so," by implying that if we just stuck with the old plan we wouldn't have any of the problems we have now.

And Line 2 is a great example of enshittification driven by a desire to serve the burbs. The desire to extend past the airport is why we have a transfer at South Keys. The cost of going all the way to Riverside South is why they decided against double tracking and electrification.

Good grief!

It is more important to serve the few who will take the train to the airport, than the many thousands of ' paying taxpayers' who are living and will be living in the future in the south communities. This is a growing city and we already have a housing crisis.

I don't get your logic at all.

Of course, we would have problems because of Covid and the federal unions, who would rather move jobs to the exurbs than have people come to the city.

As someone who lives in South Ottawa, I have every right to complain about Line 2 and how it is worse than what was approved in 2006. It is almost 20 years, and we will likely end up with garbage. I am glad you and everybody else is pleased with the overwhelming success of Line 1.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by kmcamp

The one caveat in the numbers is Ottawa had a very high ridership per capita, one of the strongest in Canada/USA, before the pandemic. Other cities may have recaptured ridership, but they had a smaller hill to climb

\

Even post pandemic, the O-Train has higher annual ridership then several large American cities like Miami, Houston, or Minneapolis

Ottawa is no longer a poster child for transit. Will it ever recover? I doubt it.

[Williamoforange]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Good grief!

It is more important to serve the few who will take the train to the airport, than the many thousands of ' paying taxpayers' who are living and will be living in the future in the south communities. This is a growing city and we already have a housing crisis.

I don't get your logic at all.

Of course, we would have problems because of Covid and the federal unions, who would rather move jobs to the exurbs than have people come to the city.

As someone who lives in South Ottawa, I have every right to complain about Line 2 and how it is worse than what was approved in 2006. It is almost 20 years, and we will likely end up with garbage. I am glad you and everybody else is pleased with the overwhelming success of Line 1.

It is more important to properly serve the dense & intensifying areas of Ottawa then to serve far flung low density sprawl with what amount to token service, just so that the city can appease suburban voters like yourself who seem to only care about the service they receive and not the city as a whole.

Case in point your constant defense of the 2006 plan, which was for the city as a whole a terrible idea, but you don't care since it would have served yourself a single suburb, while screwing over much of the transit system in the rest of the city. (LRT & Bus on a single st)

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Williamoforange

It is more important to properly serve the dense & intensifying areas of Ottawa then to serve far flung low density sprawl with what amount to token service, just so that the city can appease suburban voters like yourself who seem to only care about the service they receive and not the city as a whole.

Case in point your constant defense of the 2006 plan, which was for the city as a whole a terrible idea, but you don't care since it would have served yourself a single suburb, while screwing over much of the transit system in the rest of the city. (LRT & Bus on a single st)

Case in point, I live inside the Greenbelt, so what is your point? Who is actually being well served? The plan now is to require two transfers to reach downtown. Before, there was an express bus and at most, one transfer. So you want to provide rotten service to everybody not within walking distance of Line 1? This is why American cities who have built expensive rail continue to have such bad ridership. We are falling into the same trap. The suburbs often now have higher density than what you find inside the Greenbelt.

Ottawans have voted on the post 2006 plan that you have said is so much better by using transit much less. Congratulations!

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Ottawans have voted on the post 2006 plan that you have said is so much better by using transit much less. Congratulations!

The same Ottawans who also voted in a council and mayor to cancel the old plan? You don't want to credit the public's wisdom there?

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Good grief!

It is more important to serve the few who will take the train to the airport, than the many thousands of ' paying taxpayers' who are living and will be living in the future in the south communities.

Quite frankly yes. The airport is probably more economically important to this city and a net revenue generator compared to Riverside South and Leitrim. You're like the guy who brings a sleeve of plastic cups to a party and then complains there isn't enough steak to match your appetite.

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

This is a growing city and we already have a housing crisis.

I don't get your logic at all.

I see we're just throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks. So "housing crisis" now. Cause they are really going to be building all kinds of cheap and dense housing in Riverside South right? Right now there's a ~1000 units under construction within a 10 min walking distance of Cyrville (the station you love to cite as an oblique personal attack). What station outside the Greenbelt has a similar level of development? Especially in the South and West?

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Of course, we would have problems because of Covid and the federal unions, who would rather move jobs to the exurbs than have people come to the city.

I fail to see the problem. In the long run, the federal government using less office space is great for the city. More for the private sector and redevelopment into housing. Ottawa will get a livelier core once all the dullards who only think of it as a place to work have their cubicle farms moved to the core.

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

As someone who lives in South Ottawa, I have every right to complain about Line 2 and how it is worse than what was approved in 2006. It is almost 20 years, and we will likely end up with garbage. I am glad you and everybody else is pleased with the overwhelming success of Line 1.

So when others vote in their interest (like the majority of residents preferring an East-West system) that's wrong? But when you do it, that's just righteous?

Quite frankly at this point, nobody cares about your old man whiney BS. It's a broken record that is neither honest or relevant.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by Williamoforange

It is more important to properly serve the dense & intensifying areas of Ottawa then to serve far flung low density sprawl with what amount to token service, just so that the city can appease suburban voters like yourself who seem to only care about the service they receive and not the city as a whole.

Case in point your constant defense of the 2006 plan, which was for the city as a whole a terrible idea, but you don't care since it would have served yourself a single suburb, while screwing over much of the transit system in the rest of the city. (LRT & Bus on a single st)

I moved to Ottawa in 2006. I didn't live anywhere close to rapid transit at the time. I started attending the transit consultations. And I instantly thought their plan was one of the dumbest ideas I'd seen given what I knew about the majority of traffic in Ottawa. I saw right through it, as nothing but a sop to developers. And happily voted for O'Brien to cancel that ridiculous plan. The idea of making the main trunk line through the core of a million person city at grade and unsegregated (while mostly using buses) was particularly laughable. All to replace what is marginal demand today. We still don't really need twin tracks.

[lrt's friend]

So when others vote in their interest (like the majority of residents preferring an East-West system) that's wrong? But when you do it, that's just righteous?

Yep, we build an east-west system and that is good enough for a city of 1.5M. If your trip is not on that corridor, use a car. Great idea! Look at Calgary and Edmonton. Single axis transit? Hardly.

I see we're just throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks. So "housing crisis" now. Cause they are really going to be building all kinds of cheap and dense housing in Riverside South right? Right now there's a ~1000 units under construction within a 10 min walking distance of Cyrville (the station you love to cite as an oblique personal attack). What station outside the Greenbelt has a similar level of development? Especially in the South and West?

The market for high rise living is quite limited. Great to build it somewhat close to rapid transit. That is not what the majority of Ottawans want. If we don't offer low rise residential, people will find it outside the city limits and then as we saw this week, demand that federal jobs be moved to them. Density is being built in the suburbs, probably more so than 100 years ago, but it is low rise, which is what the market demands. There are ways to have effective transit but we don't want to even try.

I fail to see the problem. In the long run, the federal government using less office space is great for the city. More for the private sector and redevelopment into housing. Ottawa will get a livelier core once all the dullards who only think of it as a place to work have their cubicle farms moved to the core.

I am all for diversity downtown and how it was a mistake to segregate office only use back in the 1960s and 1970s. However, making it mostly high rise residential with a couple of Farm Boy's, Shoppers Drug Marts, and coffee shops, is not going to make downtown Ottawa's meeting place. I have lived in Ottawa all my life, and the decline of downtown has been dramatic, continuous and has accelerated since COVID. Even the farmer's market is dead, something that has been part of Ottawa since it was founded. We even now see, by reading between the lines, that the Hudson Bay Company will likely eventually close its downtown store. Condos do not make a lively downtown and as offices move out of downtown, our several billion dollar transit plan is no longer sustainable. I have said it for years, transit has not been designed to match the increasingly suburbanization of employment. No wonder as Covid accelerated employment changes, transit ridership has declined by over 30%. We put on blinders and decided 15 years ago that our transit system needs to focus on downtown while even then, it was clear that employment was already leaving for cheaper suburban locations, even the federal government.

You criticize me for expressing my concerns about Line 2. It impacts me directly. Why would I not do this? I do not see the opening of Phase 2 being a big step forward for Line 2. It is not as if I am not concerned about the whole network. As I said, if our plans since 2006 were so great, why is transit not booming in this city. It is not just me.
There are thousands of people who have voted by quitting transit. And then we see Line 1 will be closing again for two weeks in July, and without real explanation.

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

Quite frankly yes. The airport is probably more economically important to this city and a net revenue generator compared to Riverside South and Leitrim. You're like the guy who brings a sleeve of plastic cups to a party and then complains there isn't enough steak to match your appetite.



I see we're just throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks. So "housing crisis" now. Cause they are really going to be building all kinds of cheap and dense housing in Riverside South right? Right now there's a ~1000 units under construction within a 10 min walking distance of Cyrville (the station you love to cite as an oblique personal attack). What station outside the Greenbelt has a similar level of development? Especially in the South and West?



I fail to see the problem. In the long run, the federal government using less office space is great for the city. More for the private sector and redevelopment into housing. Ottawa will get a livelier core once all the dullards who only think of it as a place to work have their cubicle farms moved to the core.



So when others vote in their interest (like the majority of residents preferring an East-West system) that's wrong? But when you do it, that's just righteous?

Quite frankly at this point, nobody cares about your old man whiney BS. It's a broken record that is neither honest or relevant.

Agree with all this and two additional points.

1. An effective airport link. (this is not) builds political support for transit. Many people only take transit for events. Taking it from their offices to the airport or getting dropped at neaerest LRT would expose them to the system and make them more inclined to support it. Maybe line two is so infrequent slow and the Bayview transfer lengthy that it wouldn't work anyway but it certainly isn't worth it for all but the extreme price concisous now.

2. Related to the last point. Line 2 is so bad that as LRTfriend points out it is not an improvement in service for almost anyone. It was political to bring LRT to as many wards as possible but ending it instead at the airport would have saved a lot of cash to either extend east or west or frankly just reduce the cost making it more sustainable. And I'd argue make for a better result for more people.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by YOWetal

Agree with all this and two additional points.

1. An effective airport link. (this is not) builds political support for transit. Many people only take transit for events. Taking it from their offices to the airport or getting dropped at neaerest LRT would expose them to the system and make them more inclined to support it. Maybe line two is so infrequent slow and the Bayview transfer lengthy that it wouldn't work anyway but it certainly isn't worth it for all but the extreme price concisous now.

2. Related to the last point. Line 2 is so bad that as LRTfriend points out it is not an improvement in service for almost anyone. It was political to bring LRT to as many wards as possible but ending it instead at the airport would have saved a lot of cash to either extend east or west or frankly just reduce the cost making it more sustainable. And I'd argue make for a better result for more people.

Great to build the airport link, but Ottawa's airport is relatively small. Who is taking the train to the airport? The biggest market will be visitors who are staying downtown. Ottawa residents will not be big users because the vast majority will have to take a bus to the train. Who is going to carry luggage on a bus to a train, to another train and perhaps to another train again. This market is quite limited.

We can complain about Riverside South, Findlay Creek, Barrhaven, but where were we going to build houses? Further and further east and west? I don't believe that is sustainable either. So, the cat is out of the bag since the 1970s in the case of Barrhaven, and the 1990s for Riverside South and Findlay Creek. We cannot turn back the clock. How do we move people? South of the airport, there are few roads. That is why the 2006 plan was prioritized, that and, expanding on the success of the original O-Train.

We cannot get around that we need to provide transportation to these new communities. If it was not a train, then we have to build roads, big roads. Is this what we want? One other posted the horror of twinning the Airport Parkway, and there would have to be other big roads to get around the airport, and those people are permanently not using transit. Good idea?

My thoughts are based on logic. I didn't plan new communities in the south end. It doesn't matter about my opinion on whether they should have been built. They have been built. We need transportation. Should we invest in an expressway, or spend the same money on a rail line?

It is great that we are building rail to the airport and to Riverside South, but both are designed in a poor fashion and the single track backbone is its downfall.

I don't agree that we should have priortized the airport link. Ridership potential would never justify it. It is a prestige project and nothing more. If we were to do something differently, we should have double tracked and electrified the original line as the starting point, but politics demanded it be extended. We already screwed around with people in 2006. Inaction again (in 2019) was not good enough. We are using diesel regional trains that are a misuse for this project. They are slow plodding trains designed for 5 km station spacing, not for an urban/suburban project. We are now stuck for the next 50 years with the wrong trains. Just as many here complained that we chose the wrong train for Line 1. We have repeated making a bad choice.