Canada Line | Completed

[lightrail]

One of the problems is there are no additional trains in the peak periods - it's the same frequency all day. Seems to me they need to run 2-4 minute schedule to Richmond in the peak and a 6 min schedule to the airport, with a 2 min headway Waterfront to Bridgeport - or, run short-turn trains to Bridgeport. With a 34 minute return, including recover, 2 short-turn trains could add an additional trip every 17 minutes, increasing capacity.

Also, what is Canada Line crowd control like - is it over zealous and holding people back off the platform unnecessarily? If so, this slows the system too as the train loading is not as efficient.

Translink needs to disperse the South Surrey/White Rock traffic - a reintroduction of the express bus to 22nd Street, or more non-stop expresses to King George would help - give people an alternative to use the Expo Line as well.

Expo and Millenium are just as busy into Vancouver, but the difference is the trains on those two lines run a combined frequency of every 108 seconds in the peak, compared to Canada Line's 180 to 240 second frequency - in other words, Expo/Millenium trains are more than twice as frequent in the peak than Canada Line.

[lightrail]

Originally Posted by deasine

To that person who was complaining: I really can't imagine missing three trains at Bridgeport, considering there are trains coming from the Airport.

With regards to the City Centre one, from what I know, Canada Line staff were making sure there wasn't any sort of overcrowding at any of the stations, and were making sure trains weren't filled up to a point where they can't be filled up even more. But then again, I don't have first hand experience.

If that is true - then it is stupid. Canada Line seem to think they're running an amusement park ride.

[The_Henry_Man]

Originally Posted by CLC

M-line had seats available leaving Commercial in the PM rush hour at the first year; nowadays it is packed. But Canada Line, it is not even 1 month into service...

I still couldn't believe some politicans/commentators kept saying Canada Line being wrongly built in a low-density corridor. It won't surprise me if the ridership per km will exceed Expo line at some point.

I am not particularly worrying about the "crowd-control line-up" will defer too much riders, given that some Richmond residents have been able to tolerate with the much worse #98 for 7 years. A portion of south-of-fraser riders will be lost for sure, but they may choose to transfer to Expo (Surrey) if there is more capacity there.

I think many commentators/transit planners/politicians are totally sucked into the notion that Richmond is not part of the 1996 Livable Region Strategy Plan and therefore assumed that Richmond is never a dense city and it'll not see huge population growth and that population growth will occur in the east-west axis. And so, transit planners lowballed the capacity figure of the C-Line just because the corridor it serves will not see huge population growth in the future due to the assumption in the LRSP. Just before Richmond is highly vulnerable to earthquakes would people just automatically move out of the city. There are still a lot of people who loves living in Richmond (myself included) despite this. I think those politicans/planners/commentators rarely go to Richmond anyway.

And they've all got it all wrong. They've totally underestimated the potential ridership for the C-Line and this is what you get: long lineups to get into a C-Line station only weeks after it's open. I always thought they it'll be like this in around 5-6 years. BUT NO!! Richmond is nevertheless is a rapidly booming and maturing city. Remember, Richmond only trails behind Burnaby/Van/Surrey in terms of population. For all I care, the Evergreen line (if it's built) should've swapped the C-Line for 40m/50m platforms and C-Line getting the full 80m ones.

I think many people in Metro Vancouver totally underestimate Richmond's importance in Metro Vancouver and its potential as a dense and mature city (it's as if Vancouver/Burnaby/New West/Surrey is the centre of the universe. You can see it: When talking about real estate, economic/developmental potential and other demographics and city planning etc, those cities always get mentioned in the news, but not often for Richmond).

[NucksFanInVan]

Originally Posted by mr.x

Ridiculous.


Six years ago, when I supported RAV and wanted Translink to approve the project I was hoping for a line with muscle and a long-lasting solution to the corridor's transit needs...but this is barely even a band-aid solution for the corridor and to previously crowded routes like the 98 B-Line.

I think it's unheard of to have long lineups for a new system barely a month old.

Dude, you need to give the soapbox a breather. FWIW, I agree - they blew the ridership estimates. Most of us agree. But consider:

- the go / no-go decision was extremely controversial and highly political. Many people thought the ridership estimates too high. The project was almost voted under twice, even with the underdesign and revisions.

- what we've got is the backbone of an expandable system. It's easy to reintroduce the suburban direct busses if we have to (hopefully a WCE premium service - we should be so lucky!), and we can triple the existing CL capacity with relatively minimal investment.

As an engineer, I completely understand the decision-making rationale. "Let's build something while we have the $$ and momentum, even if its the minimum. But let's make sure it is expandable."

While I think we'll be well past 6,300 pphpd before the end of the Concession, I'll be quite surprised if we get near 15,000 without a western M-Line extension. Keep in mind that unlike the M-Line, much of the corridor will need to wait for re-development to densify significantly.

Even if they have to do some station expansion work once the M-Line is extended, it probably won't be the end of the world. Us engineering types are pretty smart that way. Keep the faith, we'll get there... eventually.

And remember, there's really not that much more they could have done to add capacity without killing the project before it was born.

Now if only I knew whether they intentionally low-balled those ridership estimates to get the project thru...

[The_Henry_Man]

Originally Posted by NucksFanInVan

Many people thought the ridership estimates too high

It's most likely because many people assumed that most of the C-Line will just go to YVR from Waterfront and they probably think that, well, there aren't a lot of people living in Richmond that the C-Line serves (which there are, in reality), compared to Surrey, Burnaby and New West for E/M-Lines and most people there probably drive anyway. Same for South Delta/Surrey and White Rock. And only a small part of COV's population is served by the C-Line. So they totally underestimated their predictions of potential ridership.

[The_Henry_Man]

Originally Posted by NucksFanInVan

Even if they have to do some station expansion work once the M-Line is extended, it probably won't be the end of the world. Us engineering types are pretty smart that way. Keep the faith, we'll get there... eventually.

What do you mean by that? Do you mean that despite what people say about the inability of the C-Line platforms to be extended beyond 50m, it can still somehow be done by some clever methods?

[deasine]

Originally Posted by NucksFanInVan

Dude, you need to give the soapbox a breather.

Mr X can work for FOX NEWS!!! =D

Originally Posted by NucksFanInVan

Now if only I knew whether they intentionally low-balled those ridership estimates to get the project thru...

I'm sure it wasn't intentional: more like they didn't expect ridership to be growing so much. What I hate about our transit system compared to many of the American Transit Agencies (actually... this goes for our roads too) is that we don't know our ridership information up to date enough and a lot of this information isn't easily accessible. Thankfully with the Canada Line and their so called "advanced" wayfinding, there are people counters which can give this information instantly.

[mr.x]

Originally Posted by CLC

M-line had seats available leaving Commercial in the PM rush hour at the first year; nowadays it is packed. But Canada Line, it is not even 1 month into service...

I still couldn't believe some politicans/commentators kept saying Canada Line being wrongly built in a low-density corridor. It won't surprise me if the ridership per km will exceed Expo line at some point.

I am not particularly worrying about the "crowd-control line-up" will defer too much riders, given that some Richmond residents have been able to tolerate with the much worse #98 for 7 years. A portion of south-of-fraser riders will be lost for sure, but they may choose to transfer to Expo (Surrey) if there is more capacity there.

Well, to be fair the Millennium Line was under ridership projections for 4 years and it had to be subsidized throughout that period until it reached the magic number of 75,000, and it did just that in 2007 and broke even. (Translink was expecting to do the same for the Canada Line, to subsidize it until 2013 which is when it was projected to reach 100,000, but it's much more likely to reach that magic breaking even figure within weeks - not years).

With all that said, the Millennium Line is a long-lasting and high capacity system that will serve us well for many decades to come.

We're only a month in and we're seeing lineups and people having to wait for multiple trains.

[mr.x]

Originally Posted by lightrail

One of the problems is there are no additional trains in the peak periods - it's the same frequency all day. Seems to me they need to run 2-4 minute schedule to Richmond in the peak and a 6 min schedule to the airport, with a 2 min headway Waterfront to Bridgeport - or, run short-turn trains to Bridgeport. With a 34 minute return, including recover, 2 short-turn trains could add an additional trip every 17 minutes, increasing capacity.

Also, what is Canada Line crowd control like - is it over zealous and holding people back off the platform unnecessarily? If so, this slows the system too as the train loading is not as efficient.

Translink needs to disperse the South Surrey/White Rock traffic - a reintroduction of the express bus to 22nd Street, or more non-stop expresses to King George would help - give people an alternative to use the Expo Line as well.

Expo and Millenium are just as busy into Vancouver, but the difference is the trains on those two lines run a combined frequency of every 108 seconds in the peak, compared to Canada Line's 180 to 240 second frequency - in other words, Expo/Millenium trains are more than twice as frequent in the peak than Canada Line.

I think they're already using all the trains they have, perhaps keeping 2 or 3 for spare. Peak and mid-day capacities/frequencies overlap; there's still a lot of demand during mid-day and it requires peak frequencies.

Simply said, they need more trains asap.

From what I gather, they certainly are being overzealous about train loading....about a week ago, i got off at Waterfront Station and there were maybe only 80 people waiting on the platform and they were still holding people back from entering the platform. There was a line of maybe 70 people even though the platform could have handled plenty more people.

[Metro-One]

But the fact remains we can still triple capacity of the line. I feel you never keep that in mind. Instead of pestering this thread with those worries write letters to Translink or local politicians about ordering more cars (and even running more of the cars we have! Right now during rush hour we have 4 idle) ASAP.

[mr.x]

Originally Posted by lightrail

If that is true - then it is stupid. Canada Line seem to think they're running an amusement park ride.

LOL, i said the same thing last week when i mentioned the lineup into the Waterfront platform!

It really is stupid, inefficient, and I'll even go as far as saying it sets a bad impression for the line. If I were at the end of a hundred person line, I would think there's a line because the platform is ridiculously crowded...but that simply hasn't been the case.

[teriyaki]

I was one of the many students scrambling to figure out the new bus routes and bus loops in Richmond this morning. The new placement of the stations, both boarding and unboarding threw many people off since a lot of stations were moved with no signage telling where the new placement was (only just telling that service was discontinued).

The road-work all around the 5 bus bays only added to the clutter that was no.3 road. With the bays directly on no.3 now (effectively taking up one whole lane of traffic), and people pouring into the station and crossing the road, the portion right outside of Richmond Centre will be gridlocked constantly I can foresee.

I'm sure things will settle as people get used to it, but the bus loop behind Brighouse station can't be built fast enough. The bus bays on no.3 and saba won't do traffic any favors.

[Metro-One]

I agree with that, they are causing more harm than good with their crowd management. All they should be doing is allowing people to enter and crowd the platform, but just ensure that people allow passengers to exit the trains before entering.

[deasine]

Proof from the CBC Article:

At one Canada Line station, long lineups were not the fault of full trains, but passengers who stopped at the single entrance to the platform instead of spreading out along the platform to allow people to quickly board the train at its various doors.

There you go. I agree, it's stupid too. I guess it's to guarantee that people can get on from different stations but what they are doing isn't smart.

[mr.x]

Originally Posted by The_Henry_Man

I think many commentators/transit planners/politicians are totally sucked into the notion that Richmond is not part of the 1996 Livable Region Strategy Plan and therefore assumed that Richmond is never a dense city and it'll not see huge population growth and that population growth will occur in the east-west axis. And so, transit planners lowballed the capacity figure of the C-Line just because the corridor it serves will not see huge population growth in the future due to the assumption in the LRSP. Just before Richmond is highly vulnerable to earthquakes would people just automatically move out of the city. There are still a lot of people who loves living in Richmond (myself included) despite this. I think those politicans/planners/commentators rarely go to Richmond anyway.

And they've all got it all wrong. They've totally underestimated the potential ridership for the C-Line and this is what you get: long lineups to get into a C-Line station only weeks after it's open. I always thought they it'll be like this in around 5-6 years. BUT NO!! Richmond is nevertheless is a rapidly booming and maturing city. Remember, Richmond only trails behind Burnaby/Van/Surrey in terms of population. For all I care, the Evergreen line (if it's built) should've swapped the C-Line for 40m/50m platforms and C-Line getting the full 80m ones.

I think many people in Metro Vancouver totally underestimate Richmond's importance in Metro Vancouver and its potential as a dense and mature city (it's as if Vancouver/Burnaby/New West/Surrey is the centre of the universe. You can see it: When talking about real estate, economic/developmental potential and other demographics and city planning etc, those cities always get mentioned in the news, but not often for Richmond).

Beautifully said.

I've been saying the same thing for years now, using the LRSP as a basis for determining ridership projections was a huge mistake. I've said over and over again: what part of all the developments we're seeing in Richmond has been part of the LRSP? None.

There were people here in this forum that were using both the LRSP and east-west axis of the region to justify the [underbuilt] design of the Canada Line. Some also used the corridor's population to justify the design, while ignoring regional growth.

The Vancouver-Richmond corridor is a vital corridor (or maybe it should be called the Vancouver-South of Fraser corridor as it's certainly also vital to Delta, Tsawassen, White Rock, South Surrey, and not just Richmond). The 98 B-Line's massive ridership numbers were also a testament to that at about 30,000 riders per day during the last two years.

[Gordon]

I think there was a traffic flow issue at Vancouver City Center Station.

People were crowding the end of the platform nearest to the stairs from the TVM lobby.

[Waders]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

I agree with that, they are causing more harm than good with their crowd management. All they should be doing is allowing people to enter and crowd the platform, but just ensure that people allow passengers to exit the trains before entering.

May be they were afraid some accident could happen if the platform was overcrowded.
I alway stand behind the crowd away from the yellow line as I am afraid being pushed onto the track.

[twoNeurons]

People in Richmond tend to be more used to rail transit as well, many coming from places in Asia with extensive rail systems.

[mr.x]

Originally Posted by NucksFanInVan

Dude, you need to give the soapbox a breather. FWIW, I agree - they blew the ridership estimates. Most of us agree. But consider:

- the go / no-go decision was extremely controversial and highly political. Many people thought the ridership estimates too high. The project was almost voted under twice, even with the underdesign and revisions.

- what we've got is the backbone of an expandable system. It's easy to reintroduce the suburban direct busses if we have to (hopefully a WCE premium service - we should be so lucky!), and we can triple the existing CL capacity with relatively minimal investment.

As an engineer, I completely understand the decision-making rationale. "Let's build something while we have the $$ and momentum, even if its the minimum. But let's make sure it is expandable."

While I think we'll be well past 6,300 pphpd before the end of the Concession, I'll be quite surprised if we get near 15,000 without a western M-Line extension. Keep in mind that unlike the M-Line, much of the corridor will need to wait for re-development to densify significantly.

Even if they have to do some station expansion work once the M-Line is extended, it probably won't be the end of the world. Us engineering types are pretty smart that way. Keep the faith, we'll get there... eventually.

And remember, there's really not that much more they could have done to add capacity without killing the project before it was born.

Now if only I knew whether they intentionally low-balled those ridership estimates to get the project thru...

Unfortunately for all of you, the audio CD is in replay mode.

Really though, one of my reasons of mentioning this over and over...and over again is to avoid repeating the same mistakes and mentality we had with the Canada Line with future projects.

Build it right or think twice about building it at all.

Expansion beyond more trains and the small 10-metre platform extension is quite limited without having to spend a billion plus on re-doing the line for platforms longer than 50-metres; expansion beyond 50-metres isn't impossible, it's just very, very costly with the way the line has been built. The expansion capabilities the line has been built with meets short-term needs, not long-term ones. You could build it to 40-metres just like today, but nobody would care if it's built to be expandable to 80-metres down the road.

As with regards to reaching 15,000 and the Millennium Line West, it really does depend on when Millennium Line West will be completed.

[mr.x]

Originally Posted by deasine

Mr X can work for FOX NEWS!!! =D

lol, in no way are my concerns equivalent to worrying about the roof of BC Place caving in from heat from the Olympic cauldron billowing up OR from an exploding natural gas cauldron. Just saying.

I'm sure it wasn't intentional: more like they didn't expect ridership to be growing so much. What I hate about our transit system compared to many of the American Transit Agencies (actually... this goes for our roads too) is that we don't know our ridership information up to date enough and a lot of this information isn't easily accessible. Thankfully with the Canada Line and their so called "advanced" wayfinding, there are people counters which can give this information instantly.

I see it two different ways:

1) It wasn't done intentionally.

2) It was done to entice the P3 concept and ensure the private operator a significant profit.