http://votecalgary.ca/full_article.php?aid=47
From VoteCalgary:
Funding Prompts Southeast LRT Talks
Salvation for Seton? The McKenzie Towne miracle?
How about a Deerfoot Trail with 80,000 fewer cars making the daily drive?
Now that would be divine: If there's ever been an answer to Calgary's commuting prayers, it's a Deerfoot with rush-hour traffic reduced by half.
And suddenly, it's more than just wishful thinking: With the announcement of $800 million in provincial funding for local transit, the once far-off vision of C-Train service to southeast Calgary is now an imminent reality.
Even as crews toil on an LRT line into west Calgary, the southeast line -- once assumed to be decades away from construction -- is being seriously discussed as a go.
Among the movers-and-shakers giving a tentative green light to the southeast LRT is Calgary's mayor, whose legacy is already rooted in roads and new trains.
Mayor Dave Bronconnier, now in his final six months at the helm, says he'll push the current council and the politicians who follow him to start construction on the southeast leg.
"It's $800 million for the region, and it'll be just over $1.1 billion in total spending, whereas the southeast LRT is expected to cost between $1.2 and $1.8 billion," said Bronconnier.
"Could this mean starting the Southeast LRT? Well, I sure hope so.
"My advice to this and the future city council is the southeast LRT makes a whole lot of sense."
It's especially logical when the money to build a big chunk of that train is suddenly available, through the province's $2-billion GreenTRIP fund.
That cash, which requires cities and towns to contribute a matching third, was first announced two years ago, but the handout was put on hold as the recession gripped Alberta.
On Tuesday, the lock was finally removed from the GreenTRIP coffer, and the long-promised money doled out: The share for Calgary and district is $800,000,000.
Questions about what projects the cash might be spent on were also cleared up -- Alberta Transportation spokeswoman Tammy Forbes says a C-Train extension definitely qualifies as an environmental improvement.
"LRT projects are certainly eligible," said Forbes.
GreenTRIP is part of the province's greenhouse gas strategy, aimed at reducing the number of commuter cars on Alberta's roads, via public transit.
Edmonton is also in line for $800 million in funding, while $400 million will be split between the province's remaining municipalities.
Calgary can certainly use the money. Despite a decade of spending on interchanges, LRT and the entirely new west leg of the C-Train, there's still a long list of projects awaiting funding.
While Bronconnier favours the southeast LRT, he says there are actually two C-Train projects vying for cash.
The other is the downtown core, which is slated for underground tracks, and stations stretching to Eau Claire.
Until downtown's train system is finished, a southeast LRT line would terminate at 10 Ave. and Olympic Way -- but Bronconnier said a short walk to the downtown train is a small price to pay.
"It would mean walking a couple of blocks to the downtown station, until we have more money," he said.
The southeast leg will ultimately stretch to communities like Seton and the new south hospital, along 15 km of track.
The train will pass through Quarry Park and Douglasdale on its way south, with major stations at Ramsay/Inglewood, Crossroads, Ogden, Douglasdale, McKenzie Towne, Auburn Bay, South Hospital and Seton.
If the current mayor believes it's now time for the southeast LRT, one alderman running to replace him has been trying to convince council to fund the leg for years.
Ald. Ric McIver said the province's $800 million will buy convenience and a less frustrating commute for one of Calgary's fastest growing quadrants.
"It's well established that the next major project is the southeast LRT -- this money is enough to at least build the first half of that leg," said McIver, an aldermen for the area.
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http://votecalgary.ca/full_article.php?aid=46
$800M pledged for local transit
The Calgary region is receiving more than its leaders expected from a long-promised provincial transit fund that will bring intercity bus service and bolster Calgary Transit.
It also brings closer the dream of regional rail and a southeast C-Train line, but the $800 million pledged Tuesday to the Calgary region isn't enough to guarantee that future.
"I can assure you that we will have more projects available for you than there is funding available, and I think that speaks definitely to the need," Mayor Dave Bronconnier said in Edmonton at Transportation Minister Luke Ouellette's funding announcement.
What came out Tuesday was the long-delayed details of a $2-billion funding pledge the Stelmach government made two years ago in rosier economic times.
Calgary-area politicians had been expecting only a third of that fund, with equal portions going to the capital region and the rest of Alberta.
Instead, Ouellette devoted 40 per cent each to the province's two major centres, and less for smaller communities.
"We think that's reasonable, and we're happy to see the dollars actually rolling out," said Cochrane Mayor Truper McBride, whose city wants to purchase double-deckers for service to Calgary by 2012.
He had been steadily deriding the provincial Tories during the long wait for program details, saying they lacked leadership and understanding of regional transit needs.
Airdrie, Cochrane, Calgary and others in the Calgary Regional Partnership submitted a $153-million, three-year proposal to the minister last month, before he began taking project applications.
It pitched commuter-bus routes to Cochrane, High River, Okotoks, Strathmore and Chestermere, in addition to bolstering the forthcoming Airdrie connector.
The preliminary proposal also includes 15 new light-rail vehicles and 100 extended buses for Calgary, to handle the city's growth and stream of out-of-town passengers.
McBride said that plan might be reworked before it's resubmitted to Ouellette this fall, as the region mulls how to spend extra money.
Cities also have to pay for one-third the cost of any new buses or stations -- more than they wanted to -- which may also prompt some reworking of the plan.
On the other hand, that means the province leverages its $800-million transit investment into $1.2 billion worth of transit expansions.
Work on Calgary's southeast LRT and commuter trains to bedroom communities is also part of the longer-term regional transit plan.
But a new line to South Calgary Hospital will cost at least $1.6 billion. Bronconnier said it's a possibility with the "Green Trip" funding, but it will also require heavy investment from other sources.
"Maybe there's a strategic opportunity for this council or certainly a future council to link dollars that are coming from the provincial government to dollars from the (city) tax side," he said in an interview.
He noted the West LRT construction crews will be free after 2012. But with Bronconnier leaving office this fall, such a decision would likely come from the next mayor and council.
Intercity buses, already common around Edmonton, will mark huge progress in the car-dominated Calgary area.
"What we're missing right now in the region is transit culture," McBride said.
If ridership grows steadily -- and the province offers more money -- shifting to a regional rail system could be a decade away, he said.
Although the deficit-mired government has budgeted for only a fraction of that transit money in its current three-year spending plan, Ouellette pledged the Conservative government would have the cash as transit systems need it.
"This is a pay-on-progress program," he told reporters in Edmonton.
"Most things that you do, bills won't be coming due until down the road a ways. And that's when we'll be paying the money out."
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Actually, thinking about it a little more, maybe it would be a better idea to have the regional transit (and future HSR) station over in rail town, where it could connect to the SE line and possibly a future tram. Finding a suitable regional train station somewhere along 9th avenue is a difficult task.
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