Canada Line | Completed

[The_Henry_Man]

^I don't think a park-and-ride is needed within the COV proper, as they have excellent bus services (with buses coming at least every 10-15min) serving at around 80% of its areas. However, it should definitely be built at areas (at a Skytrain station) where it can serve residents who live farther away from regional town centres and where bus services is too uneconomical for their area.

[Metro-One]

Scott Road's MASSIVE park and ride would have a lot smaller footprint if it were built as a parking structure. Think of it this way, if one were to build a 10 level structure with 200 lots per floor it would use up only 1/10 the land area, or one could have 20,000 spots in the same footprint today.

There should be a park and ride at Braid and Marine. Most of the WCE stations have park and rides (the Maple Meadows one I use often). Without them I would probably only use the WCE 20% of the time I do currently, opting to drive instead, because the buses here are way to slow, are few and far between and it is hard to get someone willing to drop you off at the station so early in the morning. (that is another thing, my sleep time is precious, and I don't want to sacrifice 40 minutes or more sleep just to take a bus to the station).

I know a lot of people like me who would take skytrain a lot more often if there were more park and rides. Luckily I have found a secret free parking spot near a prominent station on skytrain that I use regularly, but i will never tell where it is because there is no room for competition, and throughout the last 5 years, it has always been available! And by right beside I mean right beside, I park my car, walk 10 steps, and I am at the station.

[Mac Write]

Would be really cool to put in a nice 6 story with retail maybe…?…robot parking lot at Braid. Pull in, pay, car is flown away by a robot and you can have 5,000 spots at Braid (pure guess) and design the outside of the building to look funky and nice looking.

[WarrenC12]

I am 2 blocks from Renfrew station. Anybody can come and park in my back driveway for $5 day. Room for 2 cars.

Monthly passes available!!!

[lightrail]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

[B] And by right beside I mean right beside, I park my car, walk 10 steps, and I am at the station.

I am now frantically searching google street views looking for that parking space

[kylemacmac]

Originally Posted by BCPhil

There are hardly any pictures to speak of on the TTC or STM websites.

The forums at www.metrodemontreal.com are chock full of various pics and such. It non official, and all in french, but some pretty good stuff in there.

[Metro-One]

I am now frantically searching google street views looking for that parking space

I wish you luck my friend, but my spot is not so simple to find from air

[Mac Write]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

I wish you luck my friend, but my spot is not so simple to find from air

Streetview, meaning it's from a car google drove around the entire city of Vancouver covering every single street, alley, etc.

[metroXpress]

Originally Posted by kylemacmac

The forums at www.metrodemontreal.com are chock full of various pics and such. It non official, and all in french, but some pretty good stuff in there.

not bad...thanks

[deasine]

Originally Posted by Mac Write

Streetview, meaning it's from a car google drove around the entire city of Vancouver covering every single street, alley, etc.

Not necessarily every alley... though oddly enough, there are times where vehicles on the main street enter an alley (off the side of the streets), then return back onto the road. A few bugs...

[Geof]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

Scott Road's MASSIVE park and ride would have a lot smaller footprint if it were built as a parking structure. Think of it this way, if one were to build a 10 level structure with 200 lots per floor it would use up only 1/10 the land area, or one could have 20,000 spots in the same footprint today.

Parking spaces are extremely expensive. From a review of the book The High Cost of Free Parking:

A recent parking garage project in New Haven, Conn., for example, cost more than $30 million for almost 1,200 spaces – that’s more than $25,000 per space. If you were to finance it using a mortgage, the actual cost would be over $40,000 per space. This breaks down to roughly $135 a month, or $1,600 a year per space

At $40,000 per space, your park and ride would cost $800 million. Assuming the money could be found the question then becomes, Which would you prefer: more parking, or more transit?

Also consider that the could instead be used for transit-oriented development.

You can actually do a back-of-the-envelope calculation yourself. Say a 6650 square suburban foot lot costs $500k for land alone. Wikipedia quotes parking space sizes at 275 (compact) and 325 (normal). At 300 sqft per space, that gives 22 spaces on your lot, or about $23k per space just for the land. Then you have to pay for asphalt, city services (even parking needs sewers and lighting), property taxes (even if forgone), maintenance, and so on. And you're not going to get land right next to a Skytrain station at that price (most lots in Burnaby, for example, cost more than $500k). Edit: and we're not even talking parkade here. Just a parking lot.

[Metro-One]

So strange that most train systems around the world can afford to build such structures. Also they are not "free" parking, you have to pay money to use a park and ride. Also, they already have the land for such a parking structure at Scott Road, some of the cost could be recovered simply by selling the land they no longer require after a multi level structure is built. Also, as someone added, these structures could even have some base level retail. These leases would also help recover the cost.

And we are only talking about 2 key stations, Braid and Marine, 60 million to be spent on creating two 1200 spaced parking structures at these stations is money well spent IMO. Not to mention $2 to $5 dollar day rates would offset the initial cost of constructing these facilities and in the long run could actually make money.

And remember, the more stories you add, the more bang for your buck considering the price for land.

I love how so many of the ultra transit bike people have no sense of mitigation. Cars are out, thats it, no middle ground.

[SFUVancouver]

Regarding my musings about park and ride spots at Oakridge, my thoughts were that Ivanhoe-Cambridge may consider rebanding some of their existing garage parking stall floors as park-and-ride lots. I cannot imagine they will purpose build park and ride spots for all of the cost reasons others have mentioned.

My hunch, based on observations over the years, is that Oarkridge rarely fills its garage parking lots. If I recall correctly the mall offers a couple hours of free parking to mall shoppers, so there is an opportunity to leverage the Canada Line to make new revenue off of an existing underused asset.

[Geof]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

I love how so many of the ultra transit bike people have no sense of mitigation. Cars are out, thats it, no middle ground.

If you are writing in response to me, please do me the courtesy of responding to what I have written, not imagined stereotypes of who you think I might be.

You proposed a 20,000 car parking structure. I simply showed that this would be extremely expensive, and asked whether the money might better be spent on transit. I did not answer that question. I am skeptical. My failure to immediately see the supposed rightness of your position does not mean that I see "no middle ground". If you want to convince me - more importantly, if you want to convince anyone who doesn't already agree with you (I don't matter), then you need to make a (courteous) argument.

You now say you think two 1200 space structures would be a good use of 60 million. It might well be (it certainly looks more realistic to me than $0.8 billion for 20,000). In response to the specifics of your claim:

1. I did not describe the parking as free. That is the title of the book.

2. "So strange that most train systems around the world can afford to build such structures." Thank you for the sarcasm. I lived in Switzerland for two years. I do not recall seeing any park and rides (I would think some exist, but I did not see them). What I do recall is that the intersection in front of the main train station in Basle was uncontrolled as traffic was so light (the Swiss have one of the world's best train systems, in my experience only Japan is competitive). I won't claim we will achieve that here: Vancouver is not Basle. Arbitrary comparisons are not meaningful. If you have a specific relevant example, you need to actually provide it and explain how it applies. I suspect there are many illuminating comparisons to be made, but I don't know what they are. Broad assertions don't cut it.

3. Would people pay $5 a day? I honestly have no idea. But I'll do the math. At $5 a day 5 days a week, 1200 filled parking spaces would generate 1.56 million per year. If your numbers are accurate (I see $50k/space, does that include financing?), you would pay off your structure in just over 19 years. That looks feasible to me. Still, that is not money in the hand, and TransLink is poor with many other pressing needs. Would another use of the money give more bang for the buck?

[Metro-One]

Here is my original quote;

Scott Road's MASSIVE park and ride would have a lot smaller footprint if it were built as a parking structure. Think of it this way, if one were to build a 10 level structure with 200 lots per floor it would use up only 1/10 the land area, or one could have 20,000 spots in the same footprint today.

If you read it more carefully, I first say that we could fit the entire 2000 spots on roughly 1/10th the land if it were built as a 10 level structure.

The second aspect, where I say the 20 000 spots, was not meant to be taken as a serious proposal, but more as a comparison of how many more spaces the same current amount of land can hold.

and this was in reply to earlier comments.

I actually think its hilarious you even took the idea of building a 20 000 space park and ride as a serious proposal

The first aspect (reducing Scott Roads park and ride's foot pint by re-placing it with a 2000 space structure) I was serious, but not the second part, as I just said, it was for mere comparison.

Portland has park and rides at many of its stations, as does the WCE for a local example (although these are all just surface parking because of the cheeper land), and when living in Japan I used parkades often near JR lines.

Currently the WCE park and ride I use charges 2.00 for the day, but I am sure there are many out there who would pay up to 5 dollars for the day (which is still far cheeper than any rate you will find downtown) to avoid traffic, reduce gas consumption and reduce wear and tear on ones vehicle.

And as for assuming you are one of the "no to everything cars" people, I am sorry, for I thought you were a different member that has been here for a long time, but i just checked your profile to see that you just joined this month, haha. So welcome to the thread!

[Geof]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

I actually think its hilarious you even took the idea of building a 20 000 space park and ride as a serious proposal

Come to think of it, that is pretty funny.

I do agree that TransLink's former opposition to park and rides on the hopes that this would drive bus use was misguided. My sole reason for responding to your original post was that you seemed to be assuming parking spaces are cheap. Plus, 20k sounded like a ridiculous number (though not ridiculous enough apparently).

Originally Posted by Metro-One

And as for assuming you are one of the "no to everything cars" people, I am sorry, for I thought you were a different member that has been here for a long time, but i just checked your profile to see that you just joined this month, haha. So welcome to the thread!

I have a car. My wife has one. I drive every day. I think that effective transit is important for vibrant cities and healthy communities. I believe that our over-emphasis on the car has led to social isolation. Never mind environmental impacts.

But I'm not interested in judging other people's preferences or choices (for cars, or bicycles, or what have you, even when they are dogmatic or fanatical - everyone is irrational about something, nor can I be sure that I am the reasonable one). Nor do I wish to constrain them unnecessarily. Telling people what they can or can't do is both paternalistic and politically ineffective. We need better transit, particularly in places where it's lacking (e.g. south of the Fraser, somewhere I seldom go). Many people (many - not all, maybe not even most, but many) would choose to live in denser communities, but our incentives make this difficult to the detriment of them and others. Where it is practical, just and effective for improving the life for all of us, we should ensure that those who benefit from cars pay the costs: but not one penny more. Then people should be able to make their own choices. Some of them will want to live in suburbs and drive cars. This is fine by me. I would be disturbed if different people did not make different choices.

[cabotp]

One thought I had on the whole Park and Ride thing and how shopping malls don't like people parking at their location and then jumping on the train. Although I constantly do that, when I know I'll be back before my 4 hour time limit.

But why don't these malls set up a system. So that if I go and park their I have to pay lets say $3 for the day. But if I go in and spend a certain amount maybe $5 in the mall then I get my $3 back if I have a parking stub. That way people who just park and run and never shop there will end up paying.

But alas I'm probably missing something and it probably would not work.

Originally Posted by twoNeurons

That's why the plan is to beef up east-west bus routes. This increases the catchment area a few thousand meters.

Not that I don't think they need extra busses on those routes. But what about the N-S routes. I live at Knight and 41st. Now 41st for years has had in regards to Metro Vancouver. Excellent bus service. Having the bus come every 5 mins peak and 7 - 10 mins mid day peak is great. Plus also the 43 at peak time.

But knight street is a whole different matter. I actually hate taking that bus because it only comes every 15 mins. And would love to see its frequency increased as well.

[CLC]

Originally Posted by cabotp

But knight street is a whole different matter. I actually hate taking that bus because it only comes every 15 mins. And would love to see its frequency increased as well.

Are you referring to #22? Certainly it does not come as sparse as every 15 mins, though it can be 15 mins or more if there's delay, just like every other busy routes in Vancouver Proper.

[WarrenC12]

Nobody has mentioned the Park and Ride at the River Rock. 1200 spots, construction cost of $33m. Translink is donating the land ($9.5m) and $4.5m cash to build. Parking will be $2, unclear if that is free for casino patrons or not.

$33m/1200 = $27,500 per spot. Not too bad. I think $2 is a great price.

Park and Rides certainly belong at or near the end of high speed lines, like the RR and Scott Road, not in the middle (like Oakridge). The RR is fairly priced and in a decent location. If it is full every day maybe we'll have something.

$2 seems like a bargain too, but I perhaps this is also casino overflow, and not free for casino patrons, like the current lot.

[cabotp]

Originally Posted by CLC

Are you referring to #22? Certainly it does not come as sparse as every 15 mins, though it can be 15 mins or more if there's delay, just like every other busy routes in Vancouver Proper.

I am mistaken it isn't every 15 mins but every 10-12 mins during peak . Even so it still doesn't have that feel of nice high frequency that the 41 has.