Ottawa Rapid Transit Network developments

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by waterloowarrior

City Hall unveils updated LRT plans
Monday, 26 October 2009
By Jessica Sims
http://centretownnewsonline.ca/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1070&Itemid=126
Views : 64
Favoured : None
Published in : Centretown News, Breaking News

City Hall hosted an open house Monday night to show the public its most recent plans for light rail transit between Tunney’s Pasture and Blair Road.

On display were the final route, location and design for all 13 stations, including what the underground stops downtown would look like.

In total it showed 12.5 km of new light rail lines, including the 3.2-km tunnel stopping at four downtown stations (Downtown East, West, Rideau and the University of Ottawa).

Dennis Gratton, senior project manager, says this is a concept plan that still needs approval from the transportation committee in December, and then from city council.

The stations at Bayview, Lebreton, Hurdman and Blair would get some of the most remodelling, with platforms widened and new shelters built.

The underground stations would have two access points with escalators, elevators and stairs leading travellers 30 to 35 metres below street level. These stations are supposed to greatly reduce bus volume downtown, and the plan says the exclusive bus lanes along Rideau Street might even get converted for normal traffic.

Yet David Gladstone, a Centretown resident and founder of Friends of the O-Train, is not impressed with what he saw.

“It takes badness to new, new depths,” he says. “There’s absolutely no indications of value for money, there’s no estimates of ridership, there’s no description of what the problem was that this massive investment is actually going to solve.”

He also says the plan should have built on existing infrastructure, such as the railway lines that are already in place and the bridge over the Ottawa River.

Last week, city staff gave a new estimate of $2.1 billion for the transit plan, $400 million more than their previous estimate in December, 2008.

Gratton says the costs were raised because of factors that only became apparent in the new concept plan. These include the number of escalators and elevators needed, knowing what property to have to buy, and an art budget of around $10 million. The tunnel will also be 700 metres longer than first expected.

Build off railway lines already in place? That would not serve the downtown core at all, and that is the bulk of the ridership. The east-west OCR line should be preserved for long-term regional commuter rail.

I do agree that the tunnel is too deep, and the downtown section should be refined to a cut-and-cover tunnel much lower under Slater Street and a bored tunnel under the Mackenzie King Bridge which is much easier from a geotechnical perspective. It would still be very expensive, but not quite as expensive. The cost savings could allow for a longer tunnel all the way to Lees (emerging at the

As for Hurdman, that also needs further study. From what I can see, the options are:

1) As proposed, with space left for a branching south of the existing station to branch the line to the southeast on a separate platform (requires a walking transfer)

2) Shift the line on an angle and to the west to allow for a stationary transfer

3) Make the station 2 levels, with the southeast branch on a lower level (requiring a below-grade access for buses)

The north-south LRT should be cancelled due to costs and poor service potential for most customers, and the existing O-Train left alone. Any high-quality service to Greenboro and beyond should use the Southeast Transitway.

[MalcolmTucker]

Concerning costs, a bus tunnel will save us billions in capital costs (Transitway conversions) and you can pay a lot of bus drivers with that saving. Also, those bus drivers will be taxpayers funnelling their money back through the tax system. Train cars with no drivers do not pay taxes.

The city recovers very little of the drivers pay. A train car without a driver still has no driver.

Hopefully this will lead to a new plan once again, since bus tunnel seems to be off the table, but the current LRT tunnel is crazy expensive.

A sane LRT tunnel with eventual capacity up to 30,000 pdh with standard off the shelf LRT trainsets is more than enough. 125m stations as shallow as possible. No 'cross country' downtown. No automatic train control, no platform screen doors. No connections to businesses where the business does not at least pay marginal cost for the connection.

[Richard Eade]

I was looking at the 2009 OC Transpo Tactical Plan and noticed something interesting starting on page 21:

2008 Existing Bus cost per revenue Km = $275,981,000/47,182,000 = $5.85/Km
2008 Existing O-Train cost per revenue Km = $4,264,000 / 329,970 = $12.92/Km

2019 Branched operation cost / revenue Km = 498,904,000 / 81,623,000 = $6.11/Km
2019 Feeder operation cost per revenue Km = 393,058,000 / 66,412,000 = $5.92/Km
2019 Core Rail cost per revenue Km = 18,854,000 / 1,926,800 = $9.79/Km

Anyone else notice it too? A train needs to be carrying twice the number of passengers a bus carries to make it worth while. Thus, apart from two or three trips a day, the O-Train is not worth running. The most I have seen on the O-Train was 47 (including myself, but not the Operator). It would have only cost half as much to move those people by bus.

[Franky]

Originally Posted by Richard Eade

I was looking at the 2009 OC Transpo Tactical Plan and noticed something interesting starting on page 21:

2008 Existing Bus cost per revenue Km = $275,981,000/47,182,000 = $5.85/Km
2008 Existing O-Train cost per revenue Km = $4,264,000 / 329,970 = $12.92/Km

2019 Branched operation cost / revenue Km = 498,904,000 / 81,623,000 = $6.11/Km
2019 Feeder operation cost per revenue Km = 393,058,000 / 66,412,000 = $5.92/Km
2019 Core Rail cost per revenue Km = 18,854,000 / 1,926,800 = $9.79/Km

Anyone else notice it too? A train needs to be carrying twice the number of passengers a bus carries to make it worth while. Thus, apart from two or three trips a day, the O-Train is not worth running. The most I have seen on the O-Train was 47 (including myself, but not the Operator). It would have only cost half as much to move those people by bus.

So paving over the O-Train route, perhaps splurging on an overpass at the rail crossing would have saved us money. The buses might actually go somewhere increasing ridership and service frequency though.

[Richard Eade]

On another note: What do you think of OC Transpo's plan to remove the main West-East route, the 118, from Baseline Station?

In mid-November the Constellation Cr. intersection with Baseline Rd. will be finished. With the Nov. 22 bus changes the 118 will begin using Constellation-Station-College-Woodroffe-Navaho. (This is why the 118 stops are on the sides they are.) After 2011, the College access will be closed and the 118 will simply travel Constellation-Navaho, without actually going into the temporary Baseline Station.

When the final Baseline Station is built south of College, circ. 2016, the 118 will be about 250 metres away from access to all those North-South Buses. The West-East / North-South link will be permanently severed.

OK, if you want to go north from the 118 stop on Navaho, you could walk across the Algonquin parkette and go down to the train, but the train's platform will not extend all the way to Navaho. You will probably have to wait until 2023 before the train comes along, but that is a different story.

This is an excellent example showing how OC Transpo is designing a system which can efficiently move buses, but is not necessarily efficient for the passengers.

[waterloowarrior]

Originally Posted by Sir.Humphrey.Appleby

The city recovers very little of the drivers pay. A train car without a driver still has no driver.

Hopefully this will lead to a new plan once again, since bus tunnel seems to be off the table, but the current LRT tunnel is crazy expensive.

A sane LRT tunnel with eventual capacity up to 30,000 pdh with standard off the shelf LRT trainsets is more than enough. 125m stations as shallow as possible. No 'cross country' downtown. No automatic train control, no platform screen doors. No connections to businesses where the business does not at least pay marginal cost for the connection.

The tunnel is at $230 mil per KM... I don't think that's out of line with other transit tunnels. Calgary's proposed Stephen Ave tunnel is about $220 per KM according to http://www.calgarymayor.ca/files/pressreleases/2009/2009_economic_stimulus.pdf. Given the recent cost increases to $4.6 billion, Eglinton LRT tunel must be similar. How much would less would the cheap version cost? Building it right the first time will be much cheaper overall than having to just rebuild things in the near future. From what I can see the other stations are all 120m platforms, it's just the underground stations they're futureproofing the tunnel digging out the 180 metres now rather than the headaches of doing it later-on.

A tunnel is a permanent, 100 year plus investment... we need to do it right the first time, especially getting the alignment right.

[Kitchissippi]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Concerning costs, a bus tunnel will save us billions in capital costs (Transitway conversions) and you can pay a lot of bus drivers with that saving. Also, those bus drivers will be taxpayers funnelling their money back through the tax system. Train cars with no drivers do not pay taxes.

What an utterly inane point of view. It's like saying you can nourish yourself though regurgitation. Income taxes don't all go back to the city. Only about 10% might filter into the city's coffers, and most of that would be to pay for that person's or family's share of things other than transit.

The construction industry also pays taxes, and the peripheral construction that will come with the tunnel would probably contribute a hundred times more to the city's coffers through development charges, permits and higher property values more than bus drivers' taxes

[waterloowarrior]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

What an utterly inane point of view. It's like saying you can nourish yourself though regurgitation. Income taxes don't all go back to the city. Only about 10% might filter into the city's coffers, and most of that would be to pay for that person's or family's share of things other than transit.

The construction industry also pays taxes, and the peripheral construction that will come with the tunnel would probably contribute a hundred times more to the city's coffers through development charges, permits and higher property values more than bus drivers' taxes

Plus there's no guarantee the bus drivers even live in Ottawa, they may live in Gatineau, Casselman, Russell etc.

[Franky]

Assuming $735M for the 3.2 km tunnel of which $45M/km*3.2 km = $144M

pi*6*6*.707 (assume a 45 degree angle on the TBM?) = 80 m^2
2*pi*3^2 = 57 m^2
80/57*$45M/km*3.2 km - $144M = $58M more for an oval 12 m wide tunnel suitable for 3 vehicle lanes.

I think if we don't gold leaf the stations and stager them (as described before), it would be much less than $793M.

[MalcolmTucker]

^ Calgary's tunnel is viewed to also have 5 stations within that length, which brings the cost up considerably. Eglinton has a station every kilometer which brings up its projected cost aswell.

The Younge line in Toronto has 130m long platforms and only uses 120m worth. If Ottawa thinks it needs that much capacity in the next 100 years given the development restrictions downtown, I would be very surprised. New York City's longest trains use 180m platforms, while most are 130m trains.

The scope creep on Ottawa's transit tunnel is the problem, the cuts aren't really cuts at all, just a return to what is needed, instead of an aspirational system. The tunnel is longer today than when it was first proposed. It is deeper. The stations are longer - so long that no existing LRV trainset would need that length of platform! The tunnels have advanced signalling so that if you ever need more than 30,000 pdh you can go to sub 2 minute headways. Also added are platform screen doors (which is another justification for the advanced signalling).

An analysis would also likely move the Ottawa U station to at grade instead of in the tunnel. Every change that makes it cheaper should be done, as long as it does not restrict future capacity below a certain level (I would propose 30,000 pdh with 2 minute headways)

[Franky]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

What an utterly inane point of view. It's like saying you can nourish yourself though regurgitation. Income taxes don't all go back to the city. Only about 10% might filter into the city's coffers, and most of that would be to pay for that person's or family's share of things other than transit.

The construction industry also pays taxes, and the peripheral construction that will come with the tunnel would probably contribute a hundred times more to the city's coffers through development charges, permits and higher property values more than bus drivers' taxes

It would be interesting to see this studied. Depends on where stuff is manufactured, if workers are local, if the firms are local.

Chances are that bus drivers will stimulate the local economy unless they buy imported cars and big screen TVs with their income.

Hard to tell which is better. Automated systems tend to hire almost as many people to monitor systems as there are train conductors. No issues with bathroom breaks I would expect though.

[Kitchissippi]

BRT and the "trunk and branches" approach has failed to deliver TOD because the very important factor in TOD is the "friction" of passengers transferring or changing modes.

If this project is to follow the pattern of other urban rail, it will easily attract twice its value in TOD. I could see Gloucester Centre and St-Laurent alone spending hundreds of millions to expand, and more buildings being built downtown and all along the line. $5 billion in other related construction (entirely done by the private sector) is not inconceiveable, and at with a tax rate of about 1.5% to 2%, additional taxes equivalent to the cost of the tunnel could be returned to the city within 25 years.

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by Richard Eade

On another note: What do you think of OC Transpo's plan to remove the main West-East route, the 118, from Baseline Station?

In mid-November the Constellation Cr. intersection with Baseline Rd. will be finished. With the Nov. 22 bus changes the 118 will begin using Constellation-Station-College-Woodroffe-Navaho. (This is why the 118 stops are on the sides they are.) After 2011, the College access will be closed and the 118 will simply travel Constellation-Navaho, without actually going into the temporary Baseline Station.

When the final Baseline Station is built south of College, circ. 2016, the 118 will be about 250 metres away from access to all those North-South Buses. The West-East / North-South link will be permanently severed.

OK, if you want to go north from the 118 stop on Navaho, you could walk across the Algonquin parkette and go down to the train, but the train's platform will not extend all the way to Navaho. You will probably have to wait until 2023 before the train comes along, but that is a different story.

This is an excellent example showing how OC Transpo is designing a system which can efficiently move buses, but is not necessarily efficient for the passengers.

250m is not a long walk considering it involves high-frequency services (especially after the Baseline rapid route is introduced), that will only be slightly longer than some in-terminal transfers. If the entire route is wheelchair-accessible, it is quite reasonable IMO.

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

BRT and the "trunk and branches" approach has failed to deliver TOD because the very important factor in TOD is the "friction" of passengers transferring or changing modes.

If this project is to follow the pattern of other urban rail, it will easily attract twice its value in TOD. I could see Gloucester Centre and St-Laurent alone spending hundreds of millions to expand, and more buildings being built downtown and all along the line. $5 billion in other related construction (entirely done by the private sector) is not inconceiveable, and at with a tax rate of about 1.5% to 2%, additional taxes equivalent to the cost of the tunnel could be returned to the city within 25 years.

Not to mention the areas around Hurdman could become Ottawa's new mecca for very high-density residential (i.e. more 20 to 40 story residential towers)...it already is part way there...

[Richard Eade]

Originally Posted by waterloowarrior

The tunnel is at $230 mil per KM... I don't think that's out of line with other transit tunnels. Calgary's proposed Stephen Ave tunnel is about $220 per KM according to http://www.calgarymayor.ca/files/pressreleases/2009/2009_economic_stimulus.pdf. Given the recent cost increases to $4.6 billion, Eglinton must be similar. How much would less would the cheap version cost? Building it right the first time will be much cheaper overall than having to just rebuild things in the near future. From what I can see the other stations are all 120m platforms, it's just the underground stations they're futureproofing the tunnel digging out the 180 metres now rather than the headaches of doing it later-on.

I don't have any problem with the tunnel cost. If we remove $90M for each of the three mined stations and $55M for the cut & cover Campus Station, then the tunnel is ($735-(3*90)-55)/3.2Km = $128M/Km, combining the boring and the cut & cover. Remember, this has changed from a simple bored hole to a fully lined tunnel and linings add a lot to the price. I was hoping for about $100M/Km, but I can live with this.

I expect that the TBM launch site will be in the $10/day parking lot north of Albert, and east of the Transitway, with the excavation for the Campus Station used as the recovery pit. This would allow the Transitway to continue to operate while all the boring is done. (Of course, Colonel By will not be operating for most of the time.) Once the first bore is done, the TBM is partly dismantled and moved to the launch pit again for the second bore. I am guessing on about six months per bore. It is possible that they will push the TBM all the way to the tunnel's east portal, but I doubt it. That would shut down the Transitway with the first bore. I anticipate that there will be big disruptions later during a cut & cover operation back across Nicholas and Mann to the final portal.

Each of the bores will be generating about 70K cubic metre of muck at a cost of about $180M (assuming about 2.8Km per bore and 400m of cut & cover). Each underground station will be generating about 25K cubic metres for $90M, but the stations also have four 10-story escalators and four 10-story elevators, a mezzanine level, ventilation, etc. to build/install.

[Franky]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

BRT and the "trunk and branches" approach has failed to deliver TOD because the very important factor in TOD is the "friction" of passengers transferring or changing modes.

If this project is to follow the pattern of other urban rail, it will easily attract twice its value in TOD. I could see Gloucester Centre and St-Laurent alone spending hundreds of millions to expand, and more buildings being built downtown and all along the line. $5 billion in other related construction (entirely done by the private sector) is not inconceiveable, and at with a tax rate of about 1.5% to 2%, additional taxes equivalent to the cost of the tunnel could be returned to the city within 25 years.

We could use the casino model where you are forced to walk through the whole casino to get to your hotel. We could force transfers at the wal-mart so people would be enticed to do some shopping. It will be great - really.

I want to get to my destination without having to transfer or "friction" and the current system delivers.

[Richard Eade]

Originally Posted by Franky

Assuming $735M for the 3.2 km tunnel of which $45M/km*3.2 km = $144M

pi*6*6*.707 (assume a 45 degree angle on the TBM?) = 80 m^2
2*pi*3^2 = 57 m^2
80/57*$45M/km*3.2 km - $144M = $58M more for an oval 12 m wide tunnel suitable for 3 vehicle lanes.

I think if we don't gold leaf the stations and stager them (as described before), it would be much less than $793M.

Hi, Franky;

Can I assume that your $45M/Km comes from the Delcan report? Delcan was a bit low on some of their estimating so let's round that up to $50M/Km and let's make that a PER BORE value, so $100M/Km. (I know they estimated it at $22.5M/Km per bore, but they were a bit off, I think.)

As I calculated above, each 5.5m bore, assuming 2.8Km of length, generates about 90K cubic metres of muck. You need two of these so 180K cubic metres.

If we used three 7m overlapping cutter disks, we could cut a nice oval bore with 12m of clear width. A single pass would generate about 240K cubic metres of muck. Or 1/3 more than the two 5.5m single bores. The cost is closely related to this ratio, so your tunnel would cost about $133M/Km for the bored portion.

This is why I say that a bus tunnel could be had for about $1B. (About $375M for boring, plus $100M for the cut & cover, plus $90M x 5 for the stations. Yes, I slipped an extra station into the tunnel.)

[Franky]

Originally Posted by Richard Eade

Hi, Franky;

Can I assume that your $45M/Km comes from the Delcan report? Delcan was a bit low on some of their estimating so let's round that up to $50M/Km and let's make that a PER BORE value, so $100M/Km. (I know they estimated it at $22.5M/Km per bore, but they were a bit off, I think.)

As I calculated above, each 5.5m bore, assuming 2.8Km of length, generates about 90K cubic metres of muck. You need two of these so 180K cubic metres.

If we used three 7m overlapping cutter disks, we could cut a nice oval bore with 12m of clear width. A single pass would generate about 240K cubic metres of muck. Or 1/3 more than the two 5.5m single bores. The cost is closely related to this ratio, so your tunnel would cost about $133M/Km for the bored portion.

This is why I say that a bus tunnel could be had for about $1B. (About $375M for boring, plus $100M for the cut & cover, plus $90M x 5 for the stations. Yes, I slipped an extra station into the tunnel.)

I don't want to quibble too much on the cost, the difference is only about $200M. Certainly $1B should be enough for a bus tunnel.

I verified the $45M tunnel bore cost on the web, but everything seems to cost more in Ottawa. The Delcan report p. 139 has $55M/km for "tracks/electrical", so that may be where some of the cost comes from. For BRT, "Asphalt/ ventilation" cost $35M/km (might be cheaper for a single bore tunnel?). I forgot this bit of info, so that's another (35-55)*3.2 = -$64M for the bus tunnel.

My cost increase didn't reflect the 50% contingency tacked onto the cost of the tunnel nor the $20M/km difference in technology related costs (above). It isn't clear if the $735M still includes the 50% contingency or if the numbers are reliable enough to reduce that number.

The bus tunnel could be shorter, though for conversion sake, it might make some sense to keep it long. I remember arguing with people that rubber tired vehicles can handle steeper grades and was assured LRT could match them. Now that it comes down to it, a small hill results in an extra km or so of tunnel where a rubber tired vehicle currently runs.

I wasn't criticizing your numbers BTW, I had just done my own math. I would also add a station.

[Franky]

If the tunnel extends all the way to Lees ave., do you think there would be enough room now to run a tunnel from Nicholas to the Macdonald Cartier bridge using the same oval TBM resulting in 3 truck lanes to bypass King-Edward and centre-town? We've had a few deaths and close calls that could be avoided with a tunnel. About $100M/km for 2 km or about $200M, probably a bit more. Maybe Richard's idea of purchasing the TBM would make sense in this case or at least getting some sort of package deal?

4-lanes in a single bore:

http://blog.seattletimes.nwsource.com/northwestvoices/2009/04/23/tunnel_to_replace_viaduct.html

16.5 m diameter! 214 m^2; 214,000 m^3/km 214/140*45 = ~$70M/km (+$35M/km for ventilation, asphalt) more for the support structure, but 4 lanes.

[Rathgrith]

Originally Posted by Franky

The single 3-lane bus tunnel idea has some interesting possibilities. If the stations were staggered, such that the passing lane can be used for station bypass, the tunnel would be the complete paved section and only the platform box would be needed to complete a station.

My head hurts reading things like this.