Ottawa Rapid Transit Network developments

[Dado]

Originally Posted by Franky

So you are basing the need for $5B transit system on anecdotal evidence?

Not all of that is for LRT and I've been front and foremost here pointing out all the overpriced stuff. And your question was how I knew people were sick of BRT, not what my rationale for it is. You're a superb manipulator, I'll give you that.

And Calgary is just about the most successful LRT example on the planet so maybe that's not the best comparison and how can you be sure it's not due to other factors? Other cities have LRT and aren't doing as well as Calgary, so what does that tell you? That you can't compare like you are trying to.

I'm making a specific comparison of high volume rapid transit operation in downtown Calgary and downtown Ottawa. The throughputs are still similar but one works a lot better than the other. The system's overall success or not is not the issue, just how its downtown component works at high passenger volumes.

Off-board ticketing, better stations, lack of traffic and lights would all improve transit significantly.

You offer no proof that cross traffic and lights are an actual problem, whereas I offer a counter-example - Calgary - that shows that cross traffic and lights are not a significant problem there. Your only claim against that example is because it is successful it's somehow not comparable.

There is no room for better stations downtown, short of going into a tunnel, and even there if they're "online" stations chances are it won't work much better than now.

Off-board ticketing is the only one where I can see some improvement, but it may not be as significant as you want to believe.

Again, we don't have LRT and we can't turn back the clock. Switching now is a very costly mistake.

Not switching is the costly mistake. See, that was easy.

Good god! A simple overpass or underpass would go a long way to solving some of the problems. Off-board ticketing would also help a lot.

Ah yes, grade separation: the BRT solution to all problems. But just how would it help? As bad as the intersection is, the intersection isn't generally failing since the buses from the left are flowing through fairly well. The queues are from lack of space at the station. How would a "simple" bridge fix that? Off-board ticketing might help, depending on how significant a problem that is.

Off-board ticketing would be possible in the tunnel and stations would be better. BRT can handle the relatively small demand we are projecting for 2031.

Calgary has off-board ticketing on the surface, and so can we, whether it is BRT or LRT. As for the second sentence, well, if we keep using BRT a relatively small increase in demand is all we'll have.

We never did get to the bottom of the O&M cost for BRT vs LRT. Delcan put the costs pretty close.

Delcan's numbers don't correspond to what Calgary Transit posts on their website

That is such a crock. If a BRT tunnel was wanted, the engineers would have made it look pretty and the public would have gone with the "preferred" solution. The fact is O'Brien said a tunnel was needed and he wants rail, so that what the engineers gave him. The parameters are arranged to get LRT and a tunnel as an answer when a number of solutions would be workable is they were given proper consideration.

Did you miss when the 4 options were put forward? Did you miss the public sessions where just about everyone poured cold water on the idea of a bus tunnel? Some ideas are unsaleable no matter how good the sales pitch, and a bus tunnel in Ottawa is one of them.

Not exactly. Bus to LRT is a feature/failing of the system. The need for rather large, heated and cooled stations is a result of the transfer introduced by LRT limited coverage and need for bus feeder systems. BRT allows passengers to be picked up at their nearest stop and taken directly to the city core. LRT introduces a transfer point for practically every trip.

There is absolutely no need for the configuration of Baseline Station that Richard has posted. It features BRT and LRT travelling in parallel to points north of Baseline. That is not a transfer - that is two systems operating in parallel. The basic designs at Hurdman and even Blair are both simpler than the one at Baseline (though they need winterizing).

Moreover, the further LRT is extended the less need there is for a major transfer station. Most of the existing regular Transitway stations can serve as local transfer stations without substantial modification and we can make newer ones that are simpler still. I can design a simple but functional at-grade station with LRT and bus platforms sharing a single heated station area that would serve as a local station. We could have dozens of those for the price of one Baseline megastation.

[lrt's friend]

The fact of the matter is that a bus tunnel will double capacity immediately. Why? Because you can continue to use Albert and Slater as well for certain routes. With a rail tunnel and Transitway conversion, the Albert/Slater corridor becomes mostly unusable.

How can the Calgary 7th Avenue corridor outperform Albert/Slater for passenger traffic? Easy! It is because trains are packed like sardines during peak periods. Now, this is the kind of improvement that we can all look forward to!!!!!!!!!

Why are we foolish enough to run the Transitway and LRT parallel at Baseline Station? Perhaps the public demanded that we should not have to transfer twice at Baseline and Lincoln Fields. I guess the public is stupid.

Why has the C-Train done so well? Could it be that Calgary has decided to concentrate much of its employment downtown? Is Ottawa doing the same? No! This is why the hub and spoke model in Ottawa will not perform as well, and we need to develop a transit web as the original plan was starting to do.

Why was the Barrhaven extension useful in the original plan? Because it was an inexpensive extension and it provided a substantially different route from Barrhaven into the city. This is how to attract new transit riders by making more destinations easier to get to. The whole Barrhaven to downtown time issue was always a red herring and was greatly overexagerated. For Dado as a rail advocate to suggest that BRT to Barrhaven is preferred is amazing especially when the cost of eventual extension of LRT from Baseline to Barrhaven will be much higher than from Riverside South to Barrhaven. Clearly Riverside South to Barrhaven LRT is a doable project while Baseline to Barrhaven is not likely to happen in our lifetime. Why do we continue to prefer pie in the sky ideas?

[Dado]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Why was the Barrhaven extension useful in the original plan? Because it was an inexpensive extension and it provided a substantially different route from Barrhaven into the city. This is how to attract new transit riders by making more destinations easier to get to. The whole Barrhaven to downtown time issue was always a red herring and was greatly overexagerated. For Dado as a rail advocate to suggest that BRT to Barrhaven is preferred is amazing especially when the cost of eventual extension of LRT from Baseline to Barrhaven will be much higher than from Riverside South to Barrhaven. Clearly Riverside South to Barrhaven LRT is a doable project while Baseline to Barrhaven is not likely to happen in our lifetime. Why do we continue to prefer pie in the sky ideas?

Where did I suggest that BRT to Barrhaven is preferred? All I said was that the [City's own] timing estimates gave the Southwest Transitway corridor a shorter trip and that the City was planning to go ahead with the Southwest Transitway from Fallowfield to Barrhaven Town Centre anyway. That was part of the problem of the entire concept - BRT was continuing to be the main radial line and LRT was being used as a feeder or secondary service when the reverse is what should be happening.


Baseline to Barrhaven is an interesting question. If we assume that the aforementionned SW Transitway within Barrhaven (i.e. Fallowfield to Barrhaven Town Centre) is going to go ahead regardless (and they have the budget authority to do so), then we can calculate the additional cost of making it LRT and finishing the rest of it to Baseline. With the overpriced terminal at Baseline already including everything up to Norice, and with the Southwest Transitway already existing beside Woodroffe across the Greenbelt, all that remains is the section from the Sportsplex to Norice, with a bottleneck between Hunt Club and Knoxdale.

That bottleneck is supposed to be addressed by means of a cut-and-cover tunnel under Woodroffe for about $22M plus about as much again for approaches, utilities, road reconstruction and whatnot. If the tunnel were for LRT, it could be narrower and a bit cheaper. But there's also the possibility of doing it at grade, and this could be done by (1) expropriating a long line of townhouses (given the City's willingness to do it on Roman, I wouldn't put it past them) or (2) taking out two lanes of Woodroffe (the bus lanes) and running it along the west side of the RoW behind the townhouses of (1) with a shift of the centreline of Woodroffe to the east. An at-grade alignment would likely still require an underpass of Hunt Club though. My guess of the cost of this, using the bus lane removal option and based on looking at the costs of the tunnel and retaining walls in the same corridor, is that it would be about $20M to establish a mainly at-grade RoW from Norice to the Sportsplex. Add in a couple of $4M stations and it'll be in the order of $30M.

To that we need to add the cost of LRT infrastructure all the way from Baseline to BTC. The cost of that is about $90M, so we're at $120M total. Insert the usual price escalators of 15% design/management and 30% contingency and we get $180M.

For the Riverside South (~Limebank & Earl Armstrong) to BTC LRT line, the base cost I estimate in the order of $93M, which escalates up to $140M. It might be a bit lower depending on the park and rides (do they get built anyway?) and how one treats the bridge (same question). That said, the transit component of the bridge is said to be $5M and frankly that seems low when all the underpasses of the current extension to Bayshore are more than that and I've seen the number $105M bandied about for the combined Strandherd bridge.

Anyway, at the end of the day the difference between extending LRT to Barrhaven Town Centre from Riverside South and from Baseline is going to be on the order of a few tens of millions of dollars given a context in which much of the rest of the Southwest Transitway is to be built anyway. So higher, yes, but not much higher. It's close enough that the decision would have to be taken on grounds other than cost, so that would include trip times, ridership, effect on operating costs, and, this may be the deciding issue, whether or not the Ottawa Hospital Civic campus relocates or builds a mini-campus (or whatever you might call it) at Hunt Club and Woodroffe. If that project goes forward, the logic of extending LRT to it from Baseline will be quite compelling and from there southwards it becomes a no-brainer compared to extending from Riverside South.

[Suzie]

I’m catching up on posts from the past few weeks, so I'm touching on a number of issues.

Baseline: According to the City’s forecast, during the morning peak hour in 2031, passenger traffic levels at stations are expected to be: Baseline (9,090 passengers), Lincoln Fields (4,300 passengers), Hurdman (8,600 passengers) and Blair (11,930 passengers). In terms of bus-LRT transfers, traffic would be as follows: Baseline (3,960 transfers), Lincoln Fields (2,640 transfers), Hurdman (4,700 transfers) and Blair (8,580 transfers). The rest would be bus-bus transfers and walk-on/walk-off traffic. It looks like Baseline will be a lot busier than Lincoln Fields, although I’m a bit surprised at the difference. However, I agree with everyone that the Baseline project has spiralled out of control and would absorb funds that could be much better spent elsewhere. The current design would perhaps make sense in a place like Hong Kong, where space is at a premium. It is not justified for suburban Ottawa.

Tunney’s Pasture: I was under the impression that during/after the construction of the Blair to Tunney’s Pasture segment, buses from the West would get off the Transitway at Tunney’s Pasture, continue downtown using Scott Street and then somehow end up at Hurdman. This arrangement was to continue until the segment from Tunney’s Pasture to Baseline became operational. Was I mistaken? Or has the City changed course and decided to terminate the Western buses at Tunney’s Pasture Station? I can understand why the City would want to do that since it would reduce duplication of service, avoid congesting Scott Street and make the downtown business lobby happy.

I still prefer extending the initial LRT segment to Westboro Station and spreading the bus traffic from the West between Westboro Station and Tunney’s Pasture Station. The former could serve all-day bus routes (e.g., 95, 96 and 97). The latter could accommodate peak-only, express and rural routes, which would bypass Dominion Station and Westboro Station by staying on the Parkway all the way to Tunney’s Pasture.

Extensions to the suburbs: These extensions would cost a lot of money and essentially replicate existing rapid transit service. I don’t think there is a strong business case for this. What road and Transitway projects would we have to sacrifice to obtain what may be negligible benefits?

Extension to Bayshore: I’m not sure what an extension to Bayshore would get us. Kanata riders bound for downtown would be worse-off since they would have access to only half of the number of trains than at Lincoln Fields, assuming half the trains went to Bayshore and the other half to Baseline (a reasonable assumption). This would mean more waiting time. For someone going from Kanata to Baseline or somewhere farther the south, the extension would result in at least two more transfers, unless some other less direct, and more congested route is chosen.

Blair vs. Place d’Orleans as the eastern terminus: What would really be gained by extending the LRT line to Place D’Orleans, other than getting more kilometres of rail line built? In between, you have empty fields (thanks to our sacred cow, the Greenbelt), one “station” at Montreal Road with insignificant traffic (buses often bypass it) and another station at Jeanne d’Arc, with a small, albeit non-negligible, amount of walk-on traffic and transfers. Even at Place D’Orleans, what you have is a large suburban mall, various strip malls and a Park & Ride. No doubt the Place D’Orleans Station would need to be expanded to accommodate all of the new transfer activity. You could easily end up with station costs similar to Blair. The extension would capture most, but not all, of the Orleans traffic, as the Cumberland Transitway traffic would still terminate at Blair. I do agree though that the Blair Station should be designed to at least allow for a future extension eastward.

Cost estimates: I understand that there are large contingencies built into the cost estimates for the LRT segments, particularly the tunnel. However, costs have a nasty tendency of being underestimated. Further, I still think the Western segment will cost more, even if it’s on the Parkway. Expect strong pressure to add various overpasses for the rail line and the Parkway in order to allow folks better access to the River. If the Byron corridor is chosen, costs will rise noticeably (by up to $260M more according to City reports). Then there’s the issue of severance payments when we layoff all those surplus bus drivers.

Open house: I was unable to attend last month’s open house on the DOTT. I was wondering whether suggestions were made to add an additional station downtown and, if so, what the reaction was. Also, have they modified the alignment of the “Cross-Town” route or is the Eastern Station still on Queen Street?

[waterloowarrior]

The cost in the contract for the Barrhaven town centre extension was $24 million (including an extra vehicle and two stations) for 2.2KM. the cost of the strandherd bridge transit was $28 million (although this estimate was not from the contract).. not sure what the woodroffe station to standherd bridge cost was

[Suzie]

Originally Posted by Dado

Asking about floor heights is very rich. Of course there is level boarding in Calgary's LRT, but that says more about BRT than LRT. Non-level boarding is a fundamental problem with buses. The only ways it can be solved are with guidewheels and guideways or with the use of extending ramps from the buses. Either way, you can't use buses off-the-shelf and in the former the busway needs heavy alteration as well (which then has to be kept clear in the winter). There's a reason they haven't built the platforms higher even in the transitways where there's nothing to stop them from doing so.

I’m not sure guidewheels or ramps would necessarily be required. Perhaps, there is a simpler way. For example, the higher platforms could be staggered. At the lower level (the bottom 4 inches or so), they would be the same as today with steel curbs (this means that steel curbs would need to be added to the downtown stops). At the upper level (this level would be 10 inches or so in height), there would need to be a setback of a few inches to avoid damaging the bumpers and doors of buses. Under the best-case scenario, this could remove the need to deploy the ramps to load/unload wheelchairs. Under the worst-case scenario (the most likely in my opinion), boarding/getting off for everybody else (including the elderly) would be faster and much more comfortable (e.g., you would not have to jump out of buses anymore). They could test the concept by building a temporary high-level platform over an existing low platform using plywood and 2*4s at one lightly-used station during the summer. It would be an interesting experiment that would not cost much to implement. Feedback from users could be obtained.

The weaving is likely a non issue at peak periods since anyone with any sense stays well away from Albert and Slater during that time due to the buses. As for the rest, by all means, implement them in Ottawa. It won't gain you much because you're still dealing with too many buses on too many routes leading to passenger confusion and delays on the platforms.

Weaving and right-turns are the biggest problem during the morning peak. Believe me I speak from experience. Most mornings, I can count on my bus being forced to stop or slow down at least once, usually more, because of a car or truck blocking two lanes to turn into a parking lot or onto a north-south street, or a car hogging the reserved lane for a couple of blocks to pass other vehicles from the inside. It is difficult for the older articulated buses, in particular, to recover from such interference, although all bus types are affected. Also, on more than one occasion, I’ve been nearly been thrown to the floor because the bus driver had to suddenly slam on the brakes to avoid a collision with a weaving car. Enforcement is utterly non-existent. We also have other things to deal with. One of my favourites is the delivery trucks using Kent station on Slater as a parking lot during the morning peak. When you get off the bus, you often find yourself nose-to-nose with a parked Pepsi/Coke truck. I will acknowledge that weaving and right-turns are less of a problem during the afternoon peak, but it’s still an issue.

Also, where is the real-time bus display system that we’ve been promised for many years to reduce rider confusion?

We might just catch up to Calgary's throughput if we do all these other changes, but then we've still got no response to Calgary lengthening their platforms and increasing capacity by another third.

Addressing deficiencies at current stations (e.g., poor alignment) would also help. Last year, they did a decent job of fixing Metcalfe Station on Slater, although it took them months to do it. However, it looks like after doing that, they declared victory and went home. They’ve forgotten about the other stations.

Further increases in capacity could be obtained but would require major changes. They could be obtained by building widely-spaced double platforms (and I emphasize the words “widely-spaced” – I don’t want tightly-spaced platforms like we currently have at Tunney’s Pasture). For example, on most of Albert/Slater, you would have a platform on every block to serve, on an alternating basis, regular and express routes. This would require an extra bus lane in each direction during the peak periods only (to act as a passing lane), but I think both streets could handle that as long as there were no illegally parked cars or trucks. The barriers towards implementing that are political in nature. The alternative is of course building a bus tunnel with widely-spaced double platforms while keeping some bus traffic on Albert/Slater. If you did both, you would have capacity in excess of 20,000 pphpd.

I also find the asking questions thing amusing. Just why are patrons asking so many questions? What is the topic of these questions? Are they asking where the bus goes? Could it be they can't understand the insane route structure and need more help than in a hub-and-spoke system like that in Calgary?

If people have a choice between consulting a map or asking a driver, they will generally choose the latter. Even for simple for questions like “do you stop at Baseline”. A “hub-and-spoke” system would reduce but certainly not eliminate questions. Personally, I would place phones that connect to a help line at Transitway stops.

[Suzie]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

The question is, was Toronto five times Ottawa's current population when they started to build a good network? No. That is what gave Ottawa's soon to be rebuilt Transitway. A 2G$ investment scrapped.

Where does the $2 billion figure come from? I thought the Transitway (not including vehicles) cost about $500 million. Much of this investment would not be scrapped. It would be used by the LRT line that would replace it.

[Franky]

Originally Posted by Dado

Not all of that is for LRT and I've been front and foremost here pointing out all the overpriced stuff. And your question was how I knew people were sick of BRT, not what my rationale for it is. You're a superb manipulator, I'll give you that.

"The approved TMP’s Implementation Schedule (amended version of Implementation Scenario 3) determines the priority for investment to be developed in three distinct increments. Overall, the City will invest approximately $2.5 billion in 40 km of new light rail transit (LRT) track and vehicles to services these lines. The schedule also determines that a further $500 million be spent on bus rapid transit (BRT) technology and additional bus lanes."
http://www.ottawa.ca/residents/public_consult/beyond_2020/tmp/index_en.html

This was back in Nov. 2008, I think we may be up $200M since then (I see a more current $3.2B total for phase 1).

No need to be a labeller, the LRT "option" is to cost $6B (and rising), but as you say, the LRT portion is "only" about $2.7B.

So the LRT-only phase 1 cost is creeping up to $3B and the total project cost I saw numbers reaching $6B. The point is that the BRT option was priced at under $4B (for everything) when the options were presented:


http://www.ottawa.ca/residents/public_consult/beyond_2020/tmp/transit/phase1/160_costs_en.html

If the real cost had been presented, the BRT option would have been chosen.

Originally Posted by Dado

I'm making a specific comparison of high volume rapid transit operation in downtown Calgary and downtown Ottawa. The throughputs are still similar but one works a lot better than the other. The system's overall success or not is not the issue, just how its downtown component works at high passenger volumes.

I won't argue with you here but a BRT tunnel would fix the problem. I'm not as opposed to a surface rail solution with new track being laid (along Carling for example) instead of replacing the Transitway with expensive LRT.

Originally Posted by Dado

You offer no proof that cross traffic and lights are an actual problem, whereas I offer a counter-example - Calgary - that shows that cross traffic and lights are not a significant problem there. Your only claim against that example is because it is successful it's somehow not comparable.

I've personally seen traffic lights hold up a row of buses so that trailing buses can't reach the stop, so yes, traffic lights are a problem.

That is one of LRT's strengths, cross-traffic, unfortunately, what we are building is light-metro with no cross traffic at all! It's ridiculous.

Originally Posted by Dado

There is no room for better stations downtown, short of going into a tunnel, and even there if they're "online" stations chances are it won't work much better than now.

Obviously off-board ticketing in the tunnel stations would be needed.

Originally Posted by Dado

Off-board ticketing is the only one where I can see some improvement, but it may not be as significant as you want to believe.

We don't need a very big capacity increase. Ottawa has height limitations in the city core and there seems to be more taller buildings being built outside of the core, spreading demand around so we will likely never need light-metro capacity.

Originally Posted by Dado

Not switching is the costly mistake. See, that was easy.

Funny, but untrue, see the first point.

Originally Posted by Dado

Ah yes, grade separation: the BRT solution to all problems. But just how would it help? As bad as the intersection is, the intersection isn't generally failing since the buses from the left are flowing through fairly well. The queues are from lack of space at the station. How would a "simple" bridge fix that? Off-board ticketing might help, depending on how significant a problem that is.

Well yes, grade separation is needed to improve BRT capacity but it's grade-ability makes these structures less expensive. That video didn't show what was actually causing the delay (that I saw - didn't sit through the whole 10 minutes of buses going by).

Originally Posted by Dado

Calgary has off-board ticketing on the surface, and so can we, whether it is BRT or LRT. As for the second sentence, well, if we keep using BRT a relatively small increase in demand is all we'll have.

You are making a claim (that ridership will be lower with BRT) that you have not substantiated. The double-deck buses are out and they look pretty cool. More seating, interesting view...

Originally Posted by Dado

Delcan's numbers don't correspond to what Calgary Transit posts on their website

Somebody needs to explain this.

Originally Posted by Dado

Did you miss when the 4 options were put forward? Did you miss the public sessions where just about everyone poured cold water on the idea of a bus tunnel? Some ideas are unsaleable no matter how good the sales pitch, and a bus tunnel in Ottawa is one of them.

Colin Simpson (City emp.) basically told the table we were sitting at that the BRT option would not work. Don't give me any bull about impartiality and fairness. If the BRT option had been presented as under $4B and the LRT option at over $6B, I think the results would be different.

"Costs. The cost of building and operating the transportation system identified in this Plan is about
$8.36 billion through 2031, including $7.24 billion for capital costs ($5.11 billion for transit and
$2.11 billion for roads) and $1.12 billion for operations and maintenance ($938 million for transit
and $180 million for roads). "
http://www.ottawa.ca/residents/public_co...al_draft_plan/images/exec_summary_en.pdf

Originally Posted by Dado

There is absolutely no need for the configuration of Baseline Station that Richard has posted. It features BRT and LRT travelling in parallel to points north of Baseline. That is not a transfer - that is two systems operating in parallel. The basic designs at Hurdman and even Blair are both simpler than the one at Baseline (though they need winterizing).

Moreover, the further LRT is extended the less need there is for a major transfer station. Most of the existing regular Transitway stations can serve as local transfer stations without substantial modification and we can make newer ones that are simpler still. I can design a simple but functional at-grade station with LRT and bus platforms sharing a single heated station area that would serve as a local station. We could have dozens of those for the price of one Baseline megastation.

Now we're starting to agree, more NEW LRT tracks, smaller stations, leave the existing BRT alone.

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by Suzie

Where does the $2 billion figure come from? I thought the Transitway (not including vehicles) cost about $500 million. Much of this investment would not be scrapped. It would be used by the LRT line that would replace it.

How is that not scrapped, what % of the cost is recoverred by converting the Transitway to LRT, to just build new LRT in a dedicated ROW?

The $2G is in actual dollars and includes Transitway vehicles. That's what it costs to run the backbone system.

[Suzie]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

For Toronto and Vancouver, giving prices 3 times higher than LRT or BRT, people chose subways. You get what you pay for. Anyways, for Ottawa the concept plans are starting to look good, except it still doesn't resolve the lack of stations in the core, plus the flimsy structures of the stations.

Those Toronto and Vancouver lines (I presume you mean the Spadina extension and Evergreen) were pushed on the premise that senior levels of government would cover the majority (e.g., two-thirds) of project costs, which eventually turned out to be the case. (I'll acknowledge that provincial politics were also at play). With expectations like that you end up, not surprisingly, with gold-platted projects. If someone had offered me to pay two-thirds of the cost of purchasing a house, I would have purchased a much more expensive one than I ultimately did. Putting it in a different way, if the people of Vancouver and Toronto were forced to pay directly for the entire costs of these lines (either in the form of higher fares, higher property taxes, or through a municipal sales/gas/income tax), I doubt the choice would have been subways to service a university and suburbs. I think options that are much more modest and cost-effective would have been chosen.

[waterloowarrior]

edit: misread post

[Suzie]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

How is that not scrapped, what % of the cost is recoverred by converting the Transitway to LRT, to just build new LRT in a dedicated ROW?

The $2G is in actual dollars and includes Transitway vehicles. That's what it costs to run the backbone system.

Are they going to scrap (or fill in) the Scott Street trench for example? I doubt it, although they will need to repair/improve its drainage system. Under the current plan, are they going to scrap the Southeast Transitway? Even if they ultimately convert that section, they would reuse a lot of the existing infrastructure. The only place where there is no overlap between the Transitway and the LRT route is downtown, which is ironically a place where they spent little money, even though it is the busiest section (I think the only thing that really cost money in that area is the Mackenzie King Bridge station). I guess there may be significant scrappage near the Train Station as well.

I'm still not sure where the $2B comes from. Has the City spent $1.5B on backbone buses over the past 25 years?

Even with an LRT backbone, you still need to run a lot of buses (two-thirds as many according to the City). Thus, I doubt that many buses will be scrapped before the end of their useful lives, as the LRT segments come online.

[Suzie]

Originally Posted by kyle_olsen

Yeah, there are lots of little things Ottawa could do to provide interim relief to the transitway. Unfortunately for some reason there seems to be no appetite for it.

Likely because some people (like the Slater/Albert coalition chief amongst them) would complain to City Council, while there is little public upside for the politicians (ribbons to cut, press conferences, etc.). Even without transit exclusivity of roads, I am sure some people would find reasons to complain about all the other changes.

You are correct about the barriers. What I find really frustrating is that even if you pursued the conversion to LRT with a tunnel (which is now a foregone conclusion), it would still be in the City's interest to make these little changes since they would not cost much and have a quick payback.

An interesting thing would be for the city to propose moving all transit way operations to one street downtown, making it bus only from 6 am-7pm. Tell businesses that if their street is selected that there will be $50 million of pedestrian space improvements, and of course more people on their street. I wonder if the streets would then jump at the chance to host the transitway?

I wish we could implement this, but a number of buildings depend on access points that are either on Slater or on Albert. At a minimum, compensation payments would be required and there would need to be some sort of access for delivery trucks between say 9:30AM and 3:00PM. Some hotels (there's one on Slater and at least two on Albert) would also have to be bought out. Still, at the end of the day, the cost would still be much less than a tunnel and/or conversion, and the timelines would be shorter. However, given the prospect of a tunnel, there would be little incentive for business owners to go for this.

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by Suzie

Are they going to scrap (or fill in) the Scott Street trench for example? I doubt it, although they will need to repair/improve its drainage system. Under the current plan, are they going to scrap the Southeast Transitway? Even if they ultimately convert that section, they would reuse a lot of the existing infrastructure. The only place where there is no overlap between the Transitway and the LRT route is downtown, which is ironically a place where they spent little money, even though it is the busiest section (I think the only thing that really cost money in that area is the Mackenzie King Bridge station). I guess there may be significant scrappage near the Train Station as well.

I'm still not sure where the $2B comes from. Has the City spent $1.5B on backbone buses over the past 25 years?

Even with an LRT backbone, you still need to run a lot of buses (two-thirds as many according to the City). Thus, I doubt that many buses will be scrapped before the end of their useful lives, as the LRT segments come online.

The trench would have cost less with LRT in the first place... I think the complains here are that the end-result will be a half-assed system, you will required to take a bus to get to a suburb. The city dosn't save money, as it requires to destroy infrastructure before building new one. This is reflected in the construction costs, which are higher than Calgary and Edmonton.

The city spent more than a billion on the Transitway so far. Plus, yes, the buses will be scrapped, as it was showed in the official plan, they will need to be replaced entirely on the 25 year plan. Diesel buses just don't last long compared to trolleys.

[Dado]

Originally Posted by Suzie

I’m catching up on posts from the past few weeks, so I'm touching on a number of issues.

Baseline: According to the City’s forecast, during the morning peak hour in 2031, passenger traffic levels at stations are expected to be: Baseline (9,090 passengers), Lincoln Fields (4,300 passengers), Hurdman (8,600 passengers) and Blair (11,930 passengers). In terms of bus-LRT transfers, traffic would be as follows: Baseline (3,960 transfers), Lincoln Fields (2,640 transfers), Hurdman (4,700 transfers) and Blair (8,580 transfers).

[...]

The rest would be bus-bus transfers and walk-on/walk-off traffic. It looks like Baseline will be a lot busier than Lincoln Fields, although I’m a bit surprised at the difference.

I saw these numbers earlier and shook my head in complete disbelief at the Lincoln Fields numbers. They make no sense whatsoever. Currently, there are 3500+ passengers travelling inbound in the morning peak hour between Pinecrest and Queensway Station. So, already there are more passengers travelling along here than they are projecting to transfer at Lincoln Fields in 2031. Something is simply not adding up here. We would have to be losing ridership big time for this projection to be true. That, or I wonder if there isn't some idea floating in the background to keep running express buses from Kanata to downtown Ottawa on the Parkway.

Tunney’s Pasture: I was under the impression that during/after the construction of the Blair to Tunney’s Pasture segment, buses from the West would get off the Transitway at Tunney’s Pasture, continue downtown using Scott Street and then somehow end up at Hurdman. This arrangement was to continue until the segment from Tunney’s Pasture to Baseline became operational. Was I mistaken? Or has the City changed course and decided to terminate the Western buses at Tunney’s Pasture Station? I can understand why the City would want to do that since it would reduce duplication of service, avoid congesting Scott Street and make the downtown business lobby happy.

Western buses - allegedly (see above on LF inconsistency) - are supposed to terminate no further in than Lincoln Fields once the Tunney's-Baseline section is operational. Until the Baseline section is complete, some buses will continue on beyond Tunney's into downtown Ottawa (and Hull I guess) on Scott while others will indeed terminate at Tunney's Pasture. That is what we were told at the DOTT open house.

Extensions to the suburbs: These extensions would cost a lot of money and essentially replicate existing rapid transit service. I don’t think there is a strong business case for this. What road and Transitway projects would we have to sacrifice to obtain what may be negligible benefits?

Anything above 3000 pphpd is more than good enough for full LRT, even across greenspace. If Ottawa were Calgary, they'd be looking at LRT extensions to Orleans and Kanata already. The N-S LRT was - and still is - justified on less than two thirds of this, nor does Carling hit 3000 and we're going to put LRT there as well. What there isn't justification for are trans-Greenbelt transitway projects (like the Southwest Transitway a few years ago) where bus lanes can provide the interim capacity. We should not be building any more radial transitways unless there's no chance they'll exceed 3000 pphpd or so in the next 20 odd years.

Extension to Bayshore: I’m not sure what an extension to Bayshore would get us. Kanata riders bound for downtown would be worse-off since they would have access to only half of the number of trains than at Lincoln Fields, assuming half the trains went to Bayshore and the other half to Baseline (a reasonable assumption). This would mean more waiting time.

Your logic escapes me. If this line of thought applies to extending to Bayshore, then it applies equally to extending to Baseline because what I heard one of the officials say is that they would park half the trains at Lincoln Fields (for people from Kanata) and send the rest to Baseline.

So what you're going to have at LF is a mess: Kanatans will be alternately heading for fullish trains from Baseline or empty trains just coming out of the train parking area, so I'm not too sure how having access to fullish trains actually constitutes an advantage. Another possibility though is that a third platform area - serving a stub track - would be built next to the bus terminal so Kanatans can head for a waiting empty train instead of heading to the regular Transitway platform. But if this is the case - and it would avoid a mess on the Transitway platform and delays to patrons already on the train from Baseline - then Kanatans are no better off than if they were able to get on a train at Bayshore. Indeed, they are worse off since they've had to suffer an extra few kilometres on a bus. Of course, given the curiously low projected transfer numbers compared to current actual numbers, they may be scheming to keep the expresses running right on past Lincoln Fields thus maintaining our high-cost BRT system in addition to running an LRT system.

What Bayshore gets us (who live inside the Greenbelt) is LRT access to the biggest shopping centre in the west end and it gets us LRT access to the retail and office space along the Queensway near Pinecrest, all without one of those extra transfers that you're usually so concerned about. It can also be done without blowing away two dozen houses.

For someone going from Kanata to Baseline or somewhere farther the south, the extension would result in at least two more transfers, unless some other less direct, and more congested route is chosen.

This is supposed to be addressed by bus priority improvements on Baseline with buses from Bayshore or indeed Kanata itself.

Blair vs. Place d’Orleans as the eastern terminus: What would really be gained by extending the LRT line to Place D’Orleans, other than getting more kilometres of rail line built?

Umm, it'll cost less to operate and it'll be a better ride for more of the trip while supporting the goal of establishing a town centre in Orleans.

In between, you have empty fields (thanks to our sacred cow, the Greenbelt), one “station” at Montreal Road with insignificant traffic (buses often bypass it) and another station at Jeanne d’Arc, with a small, albeit non-negligible, amount of walk-on traffic and transfers.

I think Montreal Rd gets bypassed due to it being a long way (by walking) from anywhere. If the station were on the north side of the 174 near the Canotek business park with a shuttle bus doing a circuit, that low traffic count could be improved.

Even at Place D’Orleans, what you have is a large suburban mall, various strip malls and a Park & Ride. No doubt the Place D’Orleans Station would need to be expanded to accommodate all of the new transfer activity. You could easily end up with station costs similar to Blair. The extension would capture most, but not all, of the Orleans traffic, as the Cumberland Transitway traffic would still terminate at Blair. I do agree though that the Blair Station should be designed to at least allow for a future extension eastward.

The Cumberland Transitway will only terminate at Blair until the Hospital Transitway is built, after which point most traffic will head that way (maybe one regular route will head to Blair). I just can't see how the Blair Rd interconnection transitway can be justified in the long term.

Cost estimates: I understand that there are large contingencies built into the cost estimates for the LRT segments, particularly the tunnel. However, costs have a nasty tendency of being underestimated. Further, I still think the Western segment will cost more, even if it’s on the Parkway. Expect strong pressure to add various overpasses for the rail line and the Parkway in order to allow folks better access to the River. If the Byron corridor is chosen, costs will rise noticeably (by up to $260M more according to City reports).

That "estimate" is rubbish unless the City carries on with its BRT-mentality of trenching everything everywhere (just wait for the Hospital and Cumberland Transitways). LRT doesn't require grade separation nearly everywhere like BRT does due to fewer vehicles, better adherence to schedule and tying-in to the signalling system. If they stick to a mainly at-grade alignment, it could probably be done for $50M.

Then there’s the issue of severance payments when we layoff all those surplus bus drivers.

Now there's a problem we won't have. We're having trouble keeping the drivers we already have and we require lots of overtime from them. Suburban feeder routes could be increased in frequency as well. Combine that with attrition from retirements that will be coming fast and thick when the tunnel finally comes online and we're not going to have to layoff any bus drivers. This really is a non-issue.

Open house: I was unable to attend last month’s open house on the DOTT. I was wondering whether suggestions were made to add an additional station downtown and, if so, what the reaction was. Also, have they modified the alignment of the “Cross-Town” route or is the Eastern Station still on Queen Street?

There were a number of comments about the lack of a third station in the downtown. I would judge that most people in the audience were in agreement. The general response was that nothing was decided yet, but that wasn't convincing.

[eternallyme]

Well, there is a savings to be made by converting the LRT over a new alignment - the land acquisition costs (which aren't cheap) is eliminated as the City of Ottawa already owns the land (and much of it is also grade separated right now). That is especially true on the West-Central Transitway from Bayview to Dominion which is in a trench right now and that eliminates a grade separation expense as well.

I do think the part of the north-south line south of the Airport (to Bowesville and Riverside South) should be put off indefinitely as it serves a low population compared to extensions to existing larger suburbs (which should be the second priority once the current plans in the urban area are completed).

[Franky]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

The trench would have cost less with LRT in the first place... I think the complains here are that the end-result will be a half-assed system, you will required to take a bus to get to a suburb. The city dosn't save money, as it requires to destroy infrastructure before building new one. This is reflected in the construction costs, which are higher than Calgary and Edmonton.

The city spent more than a billion on the Transitway so far. Plus, yes, the buses will be scrapped, as it was showed in the official plan, they will need to be replaced entirely on the 25 year plan. Diesel buses just don't last long compared to trolleys.

"scrapped"? Only if they are at the end of their useful life otherwise they can be sold. Lots of places need buses.

[Dado]

Originally Posted by Franky

I won't argue with you here but a BRT tunnel would fix the problem.

You can't run buses every 15 seconds or less and expect not to have queues at stations if you're running with one lane in each direction (which is comparable to one track in each direction for rail). There is no example of such a system in operation anywhere at those volumes.

I've personally seen traffic lights hold up a row of buses so that trailing buses can't reach the stop, so yes, traffic lights are a problem.

What you're missing is what happens next. That time allows the station to clear of *ALL* buses, so that a full platoon of three buses can hit the station at once (sort of like a train). The dwell times of the three buses can then be "shared" without causing delays. The traffic lights are in fact introducing a bit of time separation and forcing platooning, which is overall more efficient, even if there are individual occasions where it appears not to be.

We don't need a very big capacity increase. Ottawa has height limitations in the city core and there seems to be more taller buildings being built outside of the core, spreading demand around so we will likely never need light-metro capacity.

Suppose we get more office development at Tunney's Pasture or Westboro without any decrease in office space downtown. We still would need at least as much capacity from the west as we have, but now we also need more capacity from the east so that people from the east can get to Tunney's Pasture. To do so, they have to go through downtown, where more capacity is required.

Colin Simpson (City emp.) basically told the table we were sitting at that the BRT option would not work.

He probably couldn't convince himself that one bus every 15 seconds is feasible. Once the bus ahead has left the stop and leaving 2 seconds for following time, you're down to 13 seconds before you even stop. It takes another 2-3 seconds for a bus to clear its own length when leaving, so now you're at 10-11 seconds. It'll take another second or so for the doors to open, so we're looking at no more than 10 seconds to carry out all passenger movements. Good luck with that.

Now we're starting to agree, more NEW LRT tracks, smaller stations, leave the existing BRT alone.

No we're not. Converting busways to light rail is still cheaper than making a new RoW for LRT because all the hard work involved in establishing a new RoW has already been done. The major cost for any transportation corridor is establishing the RoW; generally the running surface is a small component of the cost so if the RoW is already there to use then away you go.

It is true that it is cheaper to build LRT directly than to first build BRT and then convert it, but if BRT already exists (say due to a poor decision in the past) then it is easier to convert it to LRT than to build LRT in a new corridor. It all depends on your starting point. 25 years ago the correct decision would have been to build LRT rather than building BRT with a notion of converting it later. But as some are fond of saying, we are not 25 years ago. Now the correct decision is to convert where we can and not to build any more busways and only build LRT as new projects.

[Franky]

Originally Posted by Dado

You can't run buses every 15 seconds or less and expect not to have queues at stations if you're running with one lane in each direction (which is comparable to one track in each direction for rail). There is no example of such a system in operation anywhere at those volumes.

Sure there are:
"Measured Peak Hour Passenger Flow (Passengers / Hour)
Designated Lane: Ankara, Istanbul, Abidjan 7,300 – 19,500
Designated Lanes with Feeders Curitiba, Brazil 13,900 – 24,100
Designated Lanes with Bus Ordering (Travelling in Clusters) Porto Alegre 17,500 – 18,300
Designated Lanes with Overlapping Routes, Passing at Stations and Express Routes
Belo Horizonte, São Paulo 15,800-20,300
Bogotá 35,000-40,000 [4]"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_rapid_transit

Originally Posted by Dado

What you're missing is what happens next. That time allows the station to clear of *ALL* buses, so that a full platoon of three buses can hit the station at once (sort of like a train). The dwell times of the three buses can then be "shared" without causing delays. The traffic lights are in fact introducing a bit of time separation and forcing platooning, which is overall more efficient, even if there are individual occasions where it appears not to be.

There is no theory here, it's been done.

Double-deck buses also make the stops more compact improving service.

Originally Posted by Dado

Suppose we get more office development at Tunney's Pasture or Westboro without any decrease in office space downtown. We still would need at least as much capacity from the west as we have, but now we also need more capacity from the east so that people from the east can get to Tunney's Pasture. To do so, they have to go through downtown, where more capacity is required.

A bus system is flexible so other routes can be used (if necessary). If buses bypass stations (an advantage of BRT), direct to Tunney's express service buses can run. Any hypothetical situation can be created to overload a design. How about we stick with what's likely.

Originally Posted by Dado

He probably couldn't convince himself that one bus every 15 seconds is feasible. Once the bus ahead has left the stop and leaving 2 seconds for following time, you're down to 13 seconds before you even stop. It takes another 2-3 seconds for a bus to clear its own length when leaving, so now you're at 10-11 seconds. It'll take another second or so for the doors to open, so we're looking at no more than 10 seconds to carry out all passenger movements. Good luck with that.

Don't need luck, just a good system.

Originally Posted by Dado

No we're not. Converting busways to light rail is still cheaper than making a new RoW for LRT because all the hard work involved in establishing a new RoW has already been done. The major cost for any transportation corridor is establishing the RoW; generally the running surface is a small component of the cost so if the RoW is already there to use then away you go.

It gives you nothing (no new riders) for a boat load of money - how is that "cheap"? Building new LRT lines means you get more riders for the money spent - that's value for money.

Originally Posted by Dado

It is true that it is cheaper to build LRT directly than to first build BRT and then convert it, but if BRT already exists (say due to a poor decision in the past) then it is easier to convert it to LRT than to build LRT in a new corridor. It all depends on your starting point. 25 years ago the correct decision would have been to build LRT rather than building BRT with a notion of converting it later. But as some are fond of saying, we are not 25 years ago. Now the correct decision is to convert where we can and not to build any more busways and only build LRT as new projects.

Converting BRT to LRT is a big waste of money. BRT and LRT are just as bad solutions to transit problems. Converting one to the other makes no sense.

[lrt's friend]

Oh my the 25 years ago debate. Groan! When Ottawa was a considerably smaller city and consequently had a considerably smaller tax base.

We all have to remember history. How did cities get subways, Skytrains, and LRT? Toronto = massive TTC war surpluses, Montreal = Expo 67 and Summer Olympics Vancouver = Expo 86 and now the Winter Olympics, Edmonton = Oil boom and Commonwealth Games and Oil boom again Calgary = Oil boom and Winter Olympics and Oil boom again, Ottawa = none of the above

Extraordinary events have always been the source of additional funding required to get rail transit off the ground in this country.

We could have had that extraordinary event for this city because of special federal and provincial infrastructure funding, but our choice is to say NO now as we also said NO 2 years ago.

And then we say that best choice is to just lay track on the Transitway because it is the cheapest way to get LRT in this city. Who cares that nobody new gets better transit service as a result. The general assumption is that the trains themselves will have people rushing in droves to get on the new trains. Oops! We forgot that most people will still have to take a bus to reach the train. If you are the poor schmo not going downtown, well bye bye Transitway, who cares about you, prepare for longer trip times. Maybe you should buy that 2nd car after all.