Halifax Transit

[Dmajackson]

BTW fellas I was slightly off. Route 1 is on ten minute frequencies from 6am-3pm then twenty (3pm-450pm) then ten (450pm-6pm) then fifteen (6pm-1215am) from Mumford-Dartmouth. The other direction is just odd scheduling.

[Jstaleness]

I thought I read somewhere that Metro was thinking of buying some new Articulating buses. Anyone know if that's true?

[hfx_chris]

Originally Posted by Halifax Hillbilly

Hopefully Metro Transit will go for a more serious route review when the new garage opens. hfx_chris any chance this might happen?

Metro Transit had a few open houses a couple weeks ago, I unfortunately was unable to attend any of them, but I was told that a major overhaul of the routes was in the works. I believe the plan is to move toward a more proper hub and spoke system, with high capacity and high frequency routes between the hubs. An example that was supposedly given was for routes like the 59, 61 and 68 in Dartmouth to terminate at Portland Hills, and have a high frequency high capacity new route running between Portland Hills and downtown Halifax.

Originally Posted by Jstaleness

I thought I read somewhere that Metro was thinking of buying some new Articulating buses. Anyone know if that's true?

A tender was put out and awarded for three 60-ft diesel-electric hybrids for a downtown shuttle service, dunno what the status on that is.
Also a much larger tender was put out (not sure if it's been awarded yet) for up to 45 regular diesel artics. Dunno if some of them might be put aside for MetroLink or if they're all slated to be for conventional service.

[Halifax Hillbilly]

Originally Posted by hfx_chris

Metro Transit had a few open houses a couple weeks ago, I unfortunately was unable to attend any of them, but I was told that a major overhaul of the routes was in the works. I believe the plan is to move toward a more proper hub and spoke system, with high capacity and high frequency routes between the hubs. An example that was supposedly given was for routes like the 59, 61 and 68 in Dartmouth to terminate at Portland Hills, and have a high frequency high capacity new route running between Portland Hills and downtown Halifax.

Probably a decent idea - the length and twistiness of the current system makes it impossible to get anywhere quickly, plus the frequencies stink. It will be interesting to watch as this unfolds.

A tender was put out and awarded for three 60-ft diesel-electric hybrids for a downtown shuttle service, dunno what the status on that is.
Also a much larger tender was put out (not sure if it's been awarded yet) for up to 45 regular diesel artics. Dunno if some of them might be put aside for MetroLink or if they're all slated to be for conventional service.

45 articulated buses - quite a big order. That would be in the $30 million plus range probably, if the buses are $700,000 each. We're getting pretty good expansion of conventional services, hopefully this order helps push MetroLink into Clayton Park and Spryfield.

[someone123]

Sounds like good news, because an overhaul is really in order. Halifax is a smaller city but it still has plenty of routes with high demand that should have much better service levels.

I live near a major but secondary road in Vancouver's West Side (4th). It has two express buses (one downtown, one crosstown - 8 min frequencies) and a comparable local bus. The main bus 5 blocks from here runs every 2 minutes at peak hours.

Halifax should have at least one or two main routes that have something like 5-10 min frequencies but go up to about 2 minutes at peak times and run largely along dedicated lanes. Transfers would become much easier and the smaller routes could feed into those.

Beyond that the city should start on elevated, automated LRT with small trains and high frequencies. Imagine how useful that would be if it even just went 1-2 km around the downtown area (or, better yet, served the downtown, Spring Garden Road, hospitals, and universities from connections with downtown ferries and express buses).

[Halifax Hillbilly]

Originally Posted by someone123

Sounds like good news, because an overhaul is really in order. Halifax is a smaller city but it still has plenty of routes with high demand that should have much better service levels.

I live near a major but secondary road in Vancouver's West Side (4th). It has two express buses (one downtown, one crosstown - 8 min frequencies) and a comparable local bus. The main bus 5 blocks from here runs every 2 minutes at peak hours.

Halifax should have at least one or two main routes that have something like 5-10 min frequencies but go up to about 2 minutes at peak times and run largely along dedicated lanes. Transfers would become much easier and the smaller routes could feed into those.

Beyond that the city should start on elevated, automated LRT with small trains and high frequencies. Imagine how useful that would be if it even just went 1-2 km around the downtown area (or, better yet, served the downtown, Spring Garden Road, hospitals, and universities from connections with downtown ferries and express buses).

I agree we need some higher order routes with higher frequencies and capacities, and with some work you could sell me on an on-street LRT system, but a Sky-Train - not at all suited to Halifax. Unless you're moving ten or fifteen thousand people per hour in one direction its simply overkill. In a metropolitan area of 380,000 people (300,000 or so in the urban parts of HRM) those numbers simply don't exist. Plus construction costs would be likely 100 million per km. That's big city transit and I doubt Halifax will ever hit half a million urban residents, let alone two million like in Vancouver. I really think it's an apples-oranges comparison.

[someone123]

Vancouver has three rapid transit lines, two of which have underground segments, that cover on the order of 70 kilometres. Most people here think that the city is underserved by rapid transit, and I agree - they should also build the Evergreen line and an extension along Broadway to UBC.

There is nothing even remotely analogous to this kind of investment in Halifax, nor is there the same spirit of seriously tackling the problem of building proper infrastructure and exploring the introduction of novel technology.

I find the "big city transit" argument really tiresome, along with its not-yet-dead ancestor, reverse Maritime exceptionalism (no matter how things actually look, they must be worse than everywhere else!). Having lived in Vancouver and Toronto and having been to places like New York and Los Angeles I am aware of the fact that Halifax is not a large metropolis, but people there are too quick to reject the experiences of other cities.

Instead of offhandedly rejecting elevated trains (and, let's remember, the city's not even there - they reject all rail transit), it makes a lot more sense to look at the actual costs vs benefits. The infrastructure is more expensive, for example, but it can be easily automated so that drivers and not needed and so that it is feasible to run smaller trains. This is very significant for a line that will exist for 50-100 years, and in Halifax it's the kind of thing people never even think about because it's supposedly too rich for the city's blood or whatever.

I don't think that Halifax will stop growing before it hits 500,000 people. The last StatCan estimate was that it added something like 6,000 people in 2008, making it one of the faster growing cities in Canada, probably comparable to Vancouver. Again, the attitude that the bottom is always about to fall out is poorly supported exceptionalism. A more reasonable explanation is that growth will more or less continue as it has for the past 250 years or so, and that if nothing is done now then the city's infrastructure will be lacking in 15-20 years. Of course, if the good old Maritime attitude holds then people at that point will tell themselves that that's to be expected there and that the city's about to stop growing at any moment anyway - why build transit in a little town of 500,000 that will never hit 750,000?

[Halifax Hillbilly]

Originally Posted by someone123

I find the "big city transit" argument really tiresome, along with its not-yet-dead ancestor, reverse Maritime exceptionalism (no matter how things actually look, they must be worse than everywhere else!). Having lived in Vancouver and Toronto and having been to places like New York and Los Angeles I am aware of the fact that Halifax is not a large metropolis, but people there are too quick to reject the experiences of other cities.

Why is this a tiresome argument? Big cities and little cities operate very differently and have very different transit needs. One of the biggest reasons you build rail in dedicated right-of-ways (whether at grade, elevated or underground) is to get a combination of speed, high frequency and train length to move a lot of people. The experience of other cities seems to be that you have to be much larger than Halifax to support this kind of system.

[Dmajackson]

I don't want to restart this debate but I'm not in favour of rail-transit.

I much prefer the ferry idea with using Halifax as the hub and having terminals in Burnside, Purcells Cove, Mill Cove, Birch Cove, and Eastern Passage initially.

[hfx_chris]

May I ask why you are not in favour of rail?

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by Bedford_DJ

I don't want to restart this debate

Well, you just did... ;-)

but I'm not in favour of rail-transit.

I much prefer the ferry idea with using Halifax as the hub and having terminals in Burnside, Purcells Cove, Mill Cove, Birch Cove, and Eastern Passage initially.

And I'm just the opposite. I think it is asinine that we have a potential rail corridor around virtually all of the peninsula, with the exception of the area of downtown between the Casino and the Westin, and yet it is being totally ignored.

I remain convinced that ferries are never going to be a viable option for the majority of commuters.

[Dmajackson]

Originally Posted by hfx_chris

May I ask why you are not in favour of rail?

Well for one it would require purchasing land from CN to build a dedicated line out past Birch Cove (only one line out here and CN is very greedy) at the very least and believe me Bedford has tried purchasing or leasing land for overpasses and other stuff and CN won;t budge so its useless to waste thousands of dollars on.

Two, the cost would run into the hundreds of millions and won't even get people to the heart of dowtown. And in case you're wondering I do not consider the Westin part of Downtown because most people work up towards the financial district.

Originally Posted by Keith P.

Well, you just did... ;-)

Oh well these Bedford vs. HRM fights are always fun

And I'm just the opposite. I think it is asinine that we have a potential rail corridor around virtually all of the peninsula, with the exception of the area of downtown between the Casino and the Westin, and yet it is being totally ignored.

I remain convinced that ferries are never going to be a viable option for the majority of commuters.

The same could be said for ferries. Hallifax has a huge harbour with tonnes of potential and only two measly ferry routes on it. The downtown is on the waterfront along with other high density areas like Mill Cove, Birch Cove, Eastern Passage, Fairview, and Purcell's Cove and some of those areas have little to no transit service and no rail lines.

Don't forget that if rail were built HRM would want to make its money back so the fares would skyrocket while the ferry fares could stay low as long as the terminals aren't overly fancy.

Besides here in Bedford, for example, if you want to take the rail or bus you have to walk down to the waterfront area so why not take the option that gets you closer to your work?

One thing I should make clear is I'm in favor of rail-transit once we get decent service on proven modes in place first (ie Ferry, BRT). Also for anyone who might think theres a benefit for ferry over rail for me remember this; the ferry terminal would be a 30min bike ride while a Sunnyside rail-terminal would be a 5min bike ride.

[Dmajackson]

Oh and one other thing Eastern Passage and Burnside would be very unfeasible to get rail transit to from Downtown.

So at the very least Eastern Passage should get a ferry terminal.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Halifax Hillbilly

Why is this a tiresome argument? Big cities and little cities operate very differently and have very different transit needs. One of the biggest reasons you build rail in dedicated right-of-ways (whether at grade, elevated or underground) is to get a combination of speed, high frequency and train length to move a lot of people. The experience of other cities seems to be that you have to be much larger than Halifax to support this kind of system.

It is tiresome because it is a reductionist straw man argument. First of all, it's just not true that dedicated ROW rail transit is exclusively used in large cities (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_light-rail_transit_systems). Light rail is common in mid-sized cities, which Halifax is on the verge of becoming. More elaborate underground systems tend to be found in large cities with millions of inhabitants, but even then it's not exclusive (Edmonton, for example, had 445,000 people when construction started on an underground segment in the 70s - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmonton_Light_Rail_Transit#History). Rennes, population 210,000, has a subway - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rennes.

It cost under $20M per mile to build light rail in cities like Salt Lake and Buffalo, and Halifax could totally handle this cost (remember how the HRM was okay with the CWGs until they ballooned past $750M or so...). It's significantly smaller but it is also much more densely built up and has a much better-used transit system (kind of impressive given its poor quality - US systems by comparison are gold-plated and yet nobody takes them). It is also important to note that many mid-sized or small cities are currently planning or studying the possibility of creating rail-based rapid transit and as the technology becomes more common costs will come down.

The reality is much more complicated than "big cities get rail, and in Halifax you have to take the bus". Halifax isn't stuck with buses because it's small, it's limited to buses because of a lack of ambition and creativity. The demand and tax base is there but the transit services are not, sadly.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Bedford_DJ

Two, the cost would run into the hundreds of millions and won't even get people to the heart of dowtown. And in case you're wondering I do not consider the Westin part of Downtown because most people work up towards the financial district.

This is just not true. The original commuter rail proposal called for a budget on the order of $15-30M. An extension along Hollis or Water Street would cost a few million dollars extra. This is in the same ballpark as the cost of the express buses to Dartmouth.

The rail debate in the city has been very confused.. for some reason people talk as if this is the only option for rail in the city, and as though it will cost an arm and a leg. I wish we'd see a real, worthwhile study of rapid transit options for the entire region and their respective costs and projected ridership.. maybe then we would see real debate about actual possibilities.

[Dmajackson]

^Remember that $30 million will get all of the miles done between Halifax and Bedford via ferry while via rail there are many miles between them.

Oh and here's a correction to your last sentence:

The reality is much more complicated than "big cities get rail, and in Halifax you have to take the bus or ferry".

[Dmajackson]

Originally Posted by someone123

This is just not true. The original commuter rail proposal called for a budget on the order of $15-30M. An extension along Hollis or Water Street would cost a few million dollars extra. This is in the same ballpark as the cost of the express buses to Dartmouth.

The rail debate in the city has been very confused.. for some reason people talk as if this is the only option for rail in the city, and as though it will cost an arm and a leg.

It will cost a lot more since CN doesn't sell or lease land so a brand new line would have to be built along with the stations and purchasing the trains. Also due to proximity of the water infilling would have to occur to connect it to Bedford and Sackville.

[someone123]

The original cost estimates included the cost of the trains and platforms.

Building a new line is a totally different prospect from using the CN rail cut. I don't think anybody would propose constructing a new line through the South End with a terminus at the Westin hotel.

Ferries are fine but are only a partial transit solution, and at any rate "ferry vs rail" is a false dilemma. If the ferry for Bedford is best then great, run a ferry out to Bedford and then do something different for Clayton Park.

It's also wrong to think of development as a zero-sum game where the city has X dollars to spend. If transit development in Halifax were more ambitious it would be easier to leverage federal dollars and there would be serious spinoffs in terms of increased infill, etc. The biggest advantage of rail transit would be that it would shape the way the city is built; buses don't do this because they don't require permanent infrastructure and ferries only do it in a very limited way.

Even just a North End streetcar project would produce huge dividends but I've never heard it proposed...

[someone123]

Here's a project somebody did on the possibility of creating a streetcar network on the peninsula: http://www.slideshare.net/cresthalifax/a...modern-streetcars-in-halifax-nova-scotia

They suggest a 7.4 km system that would serve 30,000 residents in the downtown, North End, and Dalhousie areas. It would also be very useful for everybody else getting around the peninsula without a car, and of course there's plenty of opportunity for infill, particularly in the North End.

[hfx_chris]

Originally Posted by Bedford_DJ

It will cost a lot more since CN doesn't sell or lease land so a brand new line would have to be built along with the stations and purchasing the trains. Also due to proximity of the water infilling would have to occur to connect it to Bedford and Sackville.

Why exactly would a brand new line need to be built? The trains themselves wouldn't be that expensive, they could purchase second hand diesel units. And as for the stations, how expensive is it to install a concrete platform with a few benches and shelters?
The O-Train in Ottawa was setup at a cost of under $30M.