Ottawa Rapid Transit Network developments

[Richard Eade]

Does it come as a hybrid?

Was that big 'Crash' Franky fainting? You really shouldn't tease him like this.

[waterloowarrior]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

hahaha

[Dado]

Originally Posted by Richard Eade

Another thought:

The conversion of the Bus Transitway from Hurdman to Blair is going to cost about $160M. (Actually it might cost considerably more if the Blair Station rail terminus transfer station is not a simple one - which I doubt it will be.) The TMP Update also includes a plan to build a new Bus Transitway from Hurdman to Blair ($88M), plus the extension past Blackburn Hamlet ($20M) plus the stretch to 10th Line (less than the distance shown in the TMP Update) ($40M). This is a new Transitway of about 16 Kilometres.

But note that the funding request doesn't include the Hospital (Hurdman-Blair) portion... a pretty important missing element if you're trying to make the case for LRT in that corridor...

Interestingly, the premium for new rail construction over new busway seems to be about $10M/Km:

Are you counting the design and contingency escalation factors in there? Without them I get an LRT premium of about $6M/km (since I include drainage systems as well, which are more costly for busways) in a grade-separated transitway (there are further variable RoW savings for LRT if it doesn't follow BRT RoW requirements of near-complete grade separation, but that's a more complicated issue to address). With the design and contingency escalation factors the premium for LRT is about $9M.

If the roughly $160M being used to convert the Bus Transitway from Blair to Hurdman were instead used to lay rail along 16Km of new train line from Hurdman, through the Hospital Complex, along the Cumberland Transitway route to 10th Line, the cost would be roughly the same.

Where did you get that cost from? Last year it was $96M.

You're also forgetting that while the Hospital Corridor is in the TMP, it's nowhere to be seen in the funding request, so a transfer of funds isn't quite so simple because while you'll have your rails, ties and power cables, you won't have a RoW to put it all in.

PS Isn't it interesting that there is a Hydro substation at the east end of the Browning Corridor. It will have to be moved for a busway, but could be used for the train.

There's a similar situation in the 174 corridor in Orleans. The old Canadian Northern corridor south of the 174 is the prospective corridor for the East Transitway, except it's got hydro poles in it. Naturally, these have to be moved for BRT (since they're in the middle and sending two lanes plus two shoulders either side if them wouldn't work) but for LRT they could just be left where they are and run the tracks either side of them; in fact, you could probably even suspend the overhead electric wire supports from some of them.

[Dado]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

According to our experts, it is heresy to suggest investing in a new LRT corridor instead of converting the Transitway.

Sigh.

I have said it before, and I'll probably have to say it again:

The heavy costs in any transit (or transportation) corridor are those with respect to establishing the RoW in the first place. That includes everything from acquisition to surveying through utility relocations to cutting and filling, building bridges, putting in any services (sewers, electrics) establishing the roadbed itself and finally laying down the running surface. Unless you're in unusual circumstances, the last - the running surface - is amongst the least expensive items.

So, if you've got two corridors that roughly serve the same area/purpose, one which is already a busway and the other that exists solely as a conceptual line on a map, then the quickest and cheapest way to get LRT is to convert the busway that already exists. If the overriding goal is LRT as soon as possible for as little as possible, that is your best option under the circumstances.

With respect to LRT corridors in the east end of the City, the choice of which corridor to make use of depends a lot on the goals one is trying to achieve and when and also what else is being contemplated. If the goal is to go further east than the edge of the Greenbelt, we also have to consider the costs of establishing LRT in the new corridors beyond the Greenbelt as well.

As it happens, I did some estimation calculations on the relative cost of Hospital+Cumberland as LRT vs East Transitway conversion + extension to Orleans last year because I was curious as to which would actually come out as the cheaper option - I truly did not know and you can indeed find posts on here by me in which I have argued for Cumberland+Hospital as LRT first before converting the East Transitway (this was under the premise of doing both, which adds a further wrinkle to the question because then it's a question of what order to do them in and not which is cheapest/quickest). The East Transitway conversion and extension does comes out slightly ahead because of the relatively low cost of conversion of the East Transitway. However, and this is kind of interesting, the new segments in Orleans in the two corridors have vastly differing costs. The 174 corridor is a lot more expensive than the Cumberland corridor because of all the interchange bridgework that is required, so much so that the total costs of East Transitway conversion + extension to Trim as LRT vs Hospital-Cumberland as LRT came to within $10M.

Another element in the question of which corridor to use in the current circumstances - East Transitway conversion and extension or Hospital-Cumberland as new LRT - depends on what other expenditures are contemplated at the same time. That is, are we committing to busway expenditures that can be avoided? It may seem pedantic, but it is an issue nonetheless. Is it convert the East Transitway to LRT vs build a new LRT line in the Hospital corridor? OR, is it convert the East Transitway AND build BRT in the Hospital corridor vs build LRT in the Hospital corridor and leave the East Transitway as it is?

As it happens, the Hospital corridor is not on the funding request list but the Blair to Navan and Navan to Millennium portions of the Cumberland corridor are while converting the East Transitway as far as Blair is on the list but extending it further (in any form) is not. Great combinations, aren't they? There's no request for funding a new busway in the Hospital corridor, so arguing for a switch of LRT from the East Transitway to the Hospital corridor is more difficult because of the costs of establishing a new RoW. And since there's also no extension of busway on the 174 corridor either arguing for a shifting funding around of funds for BRT on one corridor to pay for LRT in the other is impossible. A cynical person, say one more so than I, might say this was done to make the case for extending LRT to Orleans on either corridor a lot more difficult by giving no easy options for moving money around.

[Franky]

Originally Posted by Richard Eade

Does it come as a hybrid?

Was that big 'Crash' Franky fainting? You really shouldn't tease him like this.

lol. No damage.

[Franky]

Originally Posted by Dado

So, if you've got two corridors that roughly serve the same area/purpose, one which is already a busway and the other that exists solely as a conceptual line on a map, then the quickest and cheapest way to get LRT is to convert the busway that already exists. If the overriding goal is LRT as soon as possible for as little as possible, that is your best option under the circumstances.

It may be YOUR goal: "LRT as soon as possible ", but the city's goal should be increasing transit use, efficiency and ridership. Converting BRT to LRT doesn't achieve that goal.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Franky

It may be YOUR goal: "LRT as soon as possible ", but the city's goal should be increasing transit use, efficiency and ridership. Converting BRT to LRT doesn't achieve that goal.

This has been my ongoing point for the last 2 years.

I will be delighted to get LRT in Ottawa, but please build it on new corridors so we also get new ridership. It is a huge investment and there has to be a significant payback and this is what the feds and the province expects and demands.

As far as 'LRT as soon as possible', we already said no to that thanks to a small group of influential people who swayed public opinion. We could have had operating LRT this year! Do you not think this would have built enthusiasm for future LRT expansion? Instead, we have delayed LRT by at least a decade and many are now doubting whether we really can afford it.

CFRA, starting this morning, is now second guessing LRT in its entirety and suggesting that we look at a bus tunnel again. This does not bode well for the future of LRT in this city when more and more influential commentators start opposing it.

I think that Dado's points are all reasonable, but it also points to the stupidity of what we are presently doing, funding part of one route and part of another instead of funding one route in its entirety. Again, what is missing from it all, is whether a route actually delivers benefits to the public. A cost/benefit analysis without comparing benefits doesn't really give us the whole picture. LRT ridership is only part of the story. What is the impact on overall transit ridership? Are we really making progress in making it possible to live without a car or a second car in this city?

[Suzie]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

Except in the Central Transitway, buses do not run every 2 minutes now outside of rush hour. My guess for the frequency would be if fully built out:

East LRT (to Orleans) - 6 minutes at rush hour, 12 minutes at most other times

West LRT (to Kanata) - 6 minutes at rush hour, 12 minutes at most other times

Southwest LRT (to Barrhaven) - 6 minutes at rush hour, 12 minutes at most other times

Southeast LRT (to Airport) - 6 minutes at rush hour, 12 minutes at most other times

Cumberland LRT (Millennium to downtown) - 7/8 minutes at rush hour, 15 minutes at most other times

Combined sections:

Lincoln Fields to Bayview - 3 minutes at rush hour, 6 minutes at most other times

Bayview to Hurdman - 2-3 minutes at rush hour, 5 minutes at most other times

Hurdman to Blair - 3-4 minutes at rush hour, 7 minutes at most other times

Shorter trains would be used on weekends if demand is lower.

I think some of these headways will need to be lower. For example, current mid-day headways for Orleans are 4 minutes with the 95. An increase to 12 minutes would be a definitive downgrade.

City reports have never been up-front about peak and off-peak headways on the various LRT segments even though these are needed to calculate operating costs, an indicator that figures prominently in the reports.

The MRC/Delcan report does provide a hint, however, if you are willing to do some math. It suggests that headways with the LRT system would be more than nine times higher than with the bus option:

• During the peak periods, daily bus service would be reduced by 1,960 bus-hours and replaced by 842 car-hours of LRT service. With four-car trains, this would translate into 211 train-hours of service to replace 1,960 bus-hours.

• During the off-peak periods, daily bus service would be reduced by 1,666 bus-hours and replaced by 715 car-hours of LRT service. With four-car trains, this would translate into 179 train-hours of service to replace 1,666 bus-hours.

Such a drastic increase in headways would never fly, especially during the off-peak periods. In fact, as far as I’m concerned, anything more than a doubling of headways during the off-peak would be unacceptable. Perhaps, the operating costs of the LRT option should be recalculated using more realistic headways. While they are at it, they could double-check the LRT operating costs estimates from Calgary to make sure they are accurate. I think that, overall, the operating cost estimate for the LRT system would go up.

As an aside, isn’t it strange that an LRT system with headways that are more than nine times higher (leading to much longer waits, which users particularly dislike) and with vastly more transfers (which are also disliked by users) was forecast by the model to garner much higher ridership than the competing bus option? I smell a rat here.

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by Suzie

I think some of these headways will need to be lower. For example, current mid-day headways for Orleans are 4 minutes with the 95. An increase to 12 minutes would be a definitive downgrade.

Just to tell. Right now, the problems with the bus, is that you have no way of knowing when it will arrive, the schedules are not respected. With LRT, it should arrive exactly on time. So why would you go to your stop 10 minutes earlier? (this is how it works in other cities, I don't know how well it will work with the bus transfers).

[lrt's friend]

Susie is right when she says that off-peak service has never been explained to the public. The emphasis has always been on peak service levels. I have always been very doubtful about service connections during off-peak hours. What happens to people living in Orleans, Kanata, and Barrhaven when trains only go to Blair and Baseline? I frankly cannot see the city spending money to extend local buses to the rail terminals during off-peak hours, while today they only run to Place d'Orleans, Fallowfield and Eagleson. So, it can be far worse than less frequent trains during off-peak hours, but also that second transfer to get to the suburbs.

In the case of the N-S project, they were proposing 5 minute peak and 7 minute off-peak service, 10 minute and 14 minute beyond Leitrim. I highly doubt that this much more expensive plan will provide those service levels.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

Just to tell. Right now, the problems with the bus, is that you have no way of knowing when it will arrive, the schedules are not respected. With LRT, it should arrive exactly on time. So why would you go to your stop 10 minutes earlier? (this is how it works in other cities, I don't know how well it will work with the bus transfers).

Schedules are irrelevant when service frequency is 10 minutes or better. You just go and wait. It doesn't matter if its buses or trains. Trains may adhere to schedules better but buses are more likely to get you directly to your destination without a transfer.

Your assumptions suggest that the user is making his or her entire trip by train. With the Ottawa plan, most commuters will need to transfer, therefore the length of wait time does become very relevant.

[Suzie]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

Just to tell. Right now, the problems with the bus, is that you have no way of knowing when it will arrive, the schedules are not respected. With LRT, it should arrive exactly on time. So why would you go to your stop 10 minutes earlier? (this is how it works in other cities, I don't know how well it will work with the bus transfers).

Actually, right now, service is so frequent that I (and many people I know) arrive randomly at stations. There is little wait. Generally speaking, the only time I have to wait long is on Sunday during the summer months when the closure of part of the Ottawa River Parkway throws the schedule and reliability completely out of whack because westbound buses must use city streets (e.g., Scott and Richmond) as a detour.

And as I’ve noted many times before, the City could address a lot of the other reliability issues if it wanted to.

[Richard Eade]

Originally Posted by Dado

But note that the funding request doesn't include the Hospital (Hurdman-Blair) portion... a pretty important missing element if you're trying to make the case for LRT in that corridor...

I think you are only looking at the first increment of the first phase; if you look a little further on, there is an $88M cost tagged onto the hospital BRT.

But that is irrelevant; in the long term there is a plan to run a BRT from Hurdman to past 10th Line and that has to be paid for regardless of the Eastern Transitway and its conversion. I should not have complicated the issue by putting the costs onto the BRT route: My point is that, in addition to whatever it costs to create a completed BRT, an extra $10M/Km would give us LRT along that route. I was mearly pointing out that if the cost of converting the East Transitway was used to create a new LRT line instead of a new BRT route, the cost would be roughly the same; we would have an LRT and a parallel BRT (as we will with the TMP Update plan); but in addition, the rail would extend all the way to 10th Line.

Are you counting the design and contingency escalation factors in there? Without them I get an LRT premium of about $6M/km (since I include drainage systems as well, which are more costly for busways) in a grade-separated transitway (there are further variable RoW savings for LRT if it doesn't follow BRT RoW requirements of near-complete grade separation, but that's a more complicated issue to address). With the design and contingency escalation factors the premium for LRT is about $9M.

Sorry, I rounded up for simplicity and safety.

Where did you get that cost from? Last year it was $96M.

The $160M I used came from a rough proportion of the $227M listed as the cost from Blair to Tunneys. Since the tunnel is listed as a separate $600M, I simply took the whole $227M and broke it into distances; Blair to Hurdman, and Hurdman to Tunneys less the tunnel portion. It was an estimate based on those proportions.

You're also forgetting that while the Hospital Corridor is in the TMP, it's nowhere to be seen in the funding request, so a transfer of funds isn't quite so simple because while you'll have your rails, ties and power cables, you won't have a RoW to put it all in.

My point doesn't need to know the exact amount the Hurdman to 10th Line BRT will cost - whatever that cost is, it will be paid from whatever account. My point is the incremental cost of building it in rail in the first place instead of building BRT. If it costs $Y for 16Km of BRT, then $Y + 16xIncremental to build it as LRT. If the incremental cost is roughly $10M/Km, then for an extra $160M we could have rail instead of buses.

There's a similar situation in the 174 corridor in Orleans. The old Canadian Northern corridor south of the 174 is the prospective corridor for the East Transitway, except it's got hydro poles in it. Naturally, these have to be moved for BRT (since they're in the middle and sending two lanes plus two shoulders either side if them wouldn't work) but for LRT they could just be left where they are and run the tracks either side of them; in fact, you could probably even suspend the overhead electric wire supports from some of them.

Good point.

OK, if the goal is to throw money at getting rail - any rail - as fast as possible with a plan that is politically acceptable, then the Staff have succeeded in that. If the plan is to generate a transit system which will serve this city well for the next 100 years, then they have failed. There are better options than the ones they have presented that will provide more rail, in an expanded transit network, for about the same cost.

[Dado]

I had started writing a message last week, but then the browser crashed and got rid of everything. When that kind of thing happens, I tend not to return to what I was doing until the annoyance at it all has worn off.

Originally Posted by Suzie

The 3000 pphpd threshold is based on what? Where is the analysis showing that this is the right threshold from a cost-benefit perspective?

A rapid transit study was done by Winnipeg (I had the link before but laziness has now set in...) citing work from a consultant who mainly does BRT that put 1500 pphpd as the threshold at which LRT was more cost effective to operate than BRT. The N-S LRT was premised on a corridor getting no more than 2500 pphpd when it started service (now downgraded to 1900 in 2031...) and it pegged the cost of operating an LRT system at 88% of the cost of the equivalent BRT system using one-car trains and at 83% using two-car trains. The data was based on Ottawa for BRT and Denver and Pittsburgh for LRT (so not even low-cost Calgary).
http://ottawa.ca/calendar/ottawa/citycouncil/trc/2005/07-06/Document%202%20-%20Bus%20vs%20Rail.pdf

As I wrote earlier, Calgary seems to have used something that worked out to about 3000 pphpd peak hour when the lines were established, though where along the line that would be is not clear. My admittedly not-great understanding is that they use annual boardings/km and since 1990 until the end of the data in 2005 that number has been at or above 1M boardings/km. It should be noted that the boardings/km goes up and down above 1M because every time an extension opens it lowers boardings/km initially and then it trends back up as ridership increases due to the extension. Blair to Place d'Orleans would add about 10 km and nominally require that there be 10M annual boardings from east of Blair - except you're allowed to average out all boardings over the entire length of the line, which lowers the threshold somewhat. Either way, I don't think we'd have any trouble meeting that threshold: already (2006) at the Green's Creek screenline it's above 5300 pphpd during the peak hour. Using the formula* for estimating daily ridership from peak hour, we get a number just shy of 53000. Annualize that over 300 average service days and ridership from Orleans is approaching 16M, or 1.6M/km. In other words, just the section of Blair-Place d'Orleans is already above the historic Calgary average, Greenbelt penalty and all; indeed, it could go all the way to Trim and still be within the Calgary norm. By any measure of a threshold for LRT, we're well above it. Lincoln Fields to Terry Fox is also close today; we're above 3800 at Lincoln Fields, or 11.38M annually. Spread that across the 12 km to Terry Fox and it works out to 950k boardings/km so by the time we'd be in a position to build it there'll be over 1M boardings/km on that corridor as well. What becomes apparent is that it's shocking we haven't already converted the Transitway and shocking that we're not looking at suburban extensions for another generation.

What would be the peak and, more importantly, the off-peak frequencies on these outside the Greenbelt extensions?

That would depend somewhat on the length of train used in off-peak periods, but somewhere in the 5-10 min range seems likely.



*Formula is from MRC/Delcan from last April
Peak hour * 2.7 for peak period
Peak period * 2 for both peak periods
Rest of day = 85% of peak periods
-> [peak period] * 2.7 * 2 * 1.85 = daily ridership

[Dado]

Originally Posted by Richard Eade

I think you are only looking at the first increment of the first phase; if you look a little further on, there is an $88M cost tagged onto the hospital BRT.

Oh, well, I'm working off the projects listed in the funding request, and BRT in the hospital corridor isn't there. My assumption is that the funds sought there are likely all we'll be able to get in the foreseeable future, so then it becomes an issue of how best to allot the funds committed there.

But that is irrelevant; in the long term there is a plan to run a BRT from Hurdman to past 10th Line and that has to be paid for regardless of the Eastern Transitway and its conversion. I should not have complicated the issue by putting the costs onto the BRT route: My point is that, in addition to whatever it costs to create a completed BRT, an extra $10M/Km would give us LRT along that route. I was mearly pointing out that if the cost of converting the East Transitway was used to create a new LRT line instead of a new BRT route, the cost would be roughly the same; we would have an LRT and a parallel BRT (as we will with the TMP Update plan); but in addition, the rail would extend all the way to 10th Line.

The $160M I used came from a rough proportion of the $227M listed as the cost from Blair to Tunneys. Since the tunnel is listed as a separate $600M, I simply took the whole $227M and broke it into distances; Blair to Hurdman, and Hurdman to Tunneys less the tunnel portion. It was an estimate based on those proportions.

I see what you're saying but there's something not adding up here and what's not adding up is the increased cost of converting the Transitway itself from last year. It's gone from $96M to ~$160 in a year! The cost of converting a generic kilometre of transitway is about $10M according to last year's numbers, along with station rehab costs and the usual escalation factors that bring the average up to $18M. Most of that basic $10M cost is rail infrastructure costs and they are the same on a new corridor as on an existing one. So where the problem is coming in is that you're using last year's numbers for the marginal rail infrastructure costs (as am I) but you're using this year's total numbers for the conversion and then using it to calculate how much new LRT you can get based on the former. However, since most of the cost of conversion is direct rail infrastructure (or should be!) then presumably the rail infrastructure cost has also gone up to give the increase in conversion cost - and that will apply regardless of which corridor type it is placed on. What that means is that you and I can't readily estimate how much rail infrastructure (distance-wise) you can lay down anymore. Either that or something else is causing the cost increase, but, if so, you again can't use that figure until it's determined what that cause is.

To put this another way, last year's $96M was actually $64M inflated to $96M by design and contingency costs. That $64M / $96M bought 5.3 km of transitway conversion but it would also have bought approximately 7.8 km of new LRT on an otherwise prepared RoW at $8.23M/km. So, how do you know that the $160M, which is now apparently buying what $96M bought last year in conversion, won't also only build 7.8 km of new LRT on a fresh RoW, rather than the 16 km you estimated? What I'm saying is we need to know why the cost of this portion has apparently increased from $96M to $160M in a year. Does it now include a pricier-than-envisioned Hurdman Station, for example? If it does, then you'll need Hurdman for the Hospital corridor as well. The way you calculated it also means that the costs of Tunney's Pasture, for example, are being "averaged out" along the entire corridor. Perhaps Tunney's (and LeBreton) are going to be such costly endeavours that they vastly increase the cost, in which case it's not correct to apportion their costs along the eastern parts of the line by a simple division. We need to break out as many of the "one-offs" like Tunney's, Bayview, LeBreton, Hurdman to find out what the actual cost of converting the East Transitway is.

My point doesn't need to know the exact amount the Hurdman to 10th Line BRT will cost - whatever that cost is, it will be paid from whatever account. My point is the incremental cost of building it in rail in the first place instead of building BRT. If it costs $Y for 16Km of BRT, then $Y + 16xIncremental to build it as LRT. If the incremental cost is roughly $10M/Km, then for an extra $160M we could have rail instead of buses.

Well, as above, we no longer know what either the incremental cost is because we don't know for sure what the $160M is either. In other words, things just got a lot more complicated.

OK, if the goal is to throw money at getting rail - any rail - as fast as possible with a plan that is politically acceptable, then the Staff have succeeded in that.

I don't think they have. They've only succeeded on one corridor at that: the East Transitway. They're busy making a mess of the west end at both Tunney's and Baseline (and probably Lincoln Fields too) and in the south end the way to get more rail is to convert the SE Transitway. The insistence on getting rid of the O-Train and leaving the SE Transitway intact is actually going to prevent getting to Riverside South sooner as well as taking away funds that could be put to better use, such as LRT in the Hospital corridor.

If the plan is to generate a transit system which will serve this city well for the next 100 years, then they have failed. There are better options than the ones they have presented that will provide more rail, in an expanded transit network, for about the same cost.

Do you think we should use surface LRT initially?

[p_xavier]

Again, a simple grouping resulting in a paralysis of the entire transit system.

I had to walk from Hurdman to my apt. It is no way acceptable, seriously, why is there no contengency plan for such a situation? It's not the first time... sigh...

[Richard Eade]

Originally Posted by Dado

... So, how do you know that the $160M, which is now apparently buying what $96M bought last year in conversion, won't also only build 7.8 km of new LRT on a fresh RoW, rather than the 16 km you estimated?

I don't. I am using 'back-of-envelope' estimates based on the numbers I have.

What I'm saying is we need to know why the cost of this portion has apparently increased from $96M to $160M in a year. Does it now include a pricier-than-envisioned Hurdman Station, for example? If it does, then you'll need Hurdman for the Hospital corridor as well. The way you calculated it also means that the costs of Tunney's Pasture, for example, are being "averaged out" along the entire corridor. Perhaps Tunney's (and LeBreton) are going to be such costly endeavours that they vastly increase the cost, in which case it's not correct to apportion their costs along the eastern parts of the line by a simple division. We need to break out as many of the "one-offs" like Tunney's, Bayview, LeBreton, Hurdman to find out what the actual cost of converting the East Transitway is.

I see what you are saying, and it is quite valid, but look less at the trees and more at the forest: If my $160M is off by $10M or $20M it is not overly significant. The average cost, including average station cost, gives me a rough idea of the amount of money which should be available. If the Tunneys station skews the ratio by $20M, then I can only build 14 Km instead of 16 Km of track - so I stop at the edge of Orleans and not at 10th Line. At least I am across the Greenbelt.

Remember that there will be stations along the Eastern Transitway which will not need to be rebuilt if there is no conversion and the BRT stations being built along the Hospital Corridor would be built as rail stations directly. Hurdman would factor out since it would be a bus/train transfer station regardless of which line was rail and which was BRT. Sure, it would be great to have final estimates for every component of the TMP Update, but I don't so I am using 'ball-park' numbers.

All of the numbers I am using come from the Ammended Scenario 3 Plan maps which were accepted in Nov. 2008. I am not comparing different year values so it doesn't matter if the cost has risen from $96M to $160M; everything for me is relative to the $160M.

...I don't think they have. They've only succeeded on one corridor at that: the East Transitway. They're busy making a mess of the west end at both Tunney's and Baseline (and probably Lincoln Fields too) and in the south end the way to get more rail is to convert the SE Transitway. The insistence on getting rid of the O-Train and leaving the SE Transitway intact is actually going to prevent getting to Riverside South sooner as well as taking away funds that could be put to better use, such as LRT in the Hospital corridor.

Actually I said "OK, if the goal is to throw money at getting rail - any rail - as fast as possible with a plan that is politically acceptable, then the Staff have succeeded in that." I think politically, Staff feel that they need to stay within the Greenbelt and, thus, need large transfer stations; and that they need to convert the O-Train because that is what Council told them to do. I think Staff are trying to stay within the bondaries they think have been set up politically and this is mainly what is driving this project.

Do you think we should use surface LRT initially?

I think that a tunnel is in the plan so that is the basis we need to work from. I suggest things like lengthening the tunnel to Hurdman, and adding stations because these things are, to my knowledge, still 'tecnically' undecided. Whether there is to be a tunnel or no-tunnel, I think, has been determined. Thus it doesn't matter if I think surface LRT would be a better option or not.

[Richard Eade]

I see the Hospital Link/Cumberland Corridor study is getting under way.

Study area


There will be an Open House on Wed. April 29, 18:00-21:00 in the Ellwood Hall of the Jim Durrell Rec. Centre

[Cre47]

Not sure if it was the correct thread but seems there could be a settlement regarding the old N-S LRT mess

http://www.ottawasun.com/News/OttawaAndRegion/2009/04/08/9054916.html

LRT lawsuit settlement might be in works

Firms suing city for $217M over cancelled light rail plan

By DEREK PUDDICOMBE, Sun Media

There could be an offer in the works to settle the $217 million Light Rail Transit lawsuit.

The Sun has learned that Siemens Canada and St. Lawrence Cement Inc., who are suing the City of Ottawa after council cancelled it $1 billion north-south LRT line two years ago, might be willing to settle out of court if the city agrees to move forward with building its new transit line plan.

When contacted by the Sun, a spokesman from Siemens didn't deny there is a settlement offer being drafted, but said because the lawsuit is still before the court they can't comment. One City Hall source told the Sun that there is a good chance a settlement offer will be on the table soon.

During a council meeting this morning Capital Coun. Clive Doucet sent a note to colleagues asking them to lobby city solicitor Rick O'Connor to release information regarding any possible settlement offer to council.

In his letter Doucet said councillors Alex Cullen, Jacques Legendre, Marianne Wilkinson, Doug Thompson and Gord Hunter don't want O'Connor to release any information regarding a possible settlement "via a re-animation of part of the north/south line."


"This is a matter of considerable financial importance to the city and would like to meet with anyone who has doubts about the wisdom of relying solely on the courts to resolve this matter," said Doucet.

In his reply, Cullen said council should tread carefully when pursuing the issue.

"One is the stakes involved in this lawsuit, and the other is the potential for undermining an important council initiative," said Cullen.

"This is not meant to foreclose any private discussions, but I don't think the political process is the best means for resolving this issue."

[Franky]

Originally Posted by Richard Eade

I see the Hospital Link/Cumberland Corridor study is getting under way.

Study area


There will be an Open House on Wed. April 29, 18:00-21:00 in the Ellwood Hall of the Jim Durrell Rec. Centre

Haven't found any ottawa.ca link to this, any pointers would be appreciated.