Quote:
Originally Posted by Zassk
I really question the choice of this route. Yes, there is an existing track already present, but the report already admits that there is little ridership between Langley and Abbotsford. So why anyone would advocate extending a rail line past Langley is beyond me. On the other hand, Abbotsford is only 7 km away from the terminus of the existing WCE. Why not spend however many million to build WCE capacity from Mission to Abbotsford instead? Even if it cost $500 million, you would come out far ahead of this interurban proposal.
WCE would get Abbotsford people directly to downtown Vancouver. And if they need a transfer to SkyTrain, WCE would provide a shorter and faster route to SkyTrain than the proposed interurban route to Scott Road. If we spend the kind of money quoted in this interurban propsal, surely we can use that to renegotiate the WCE capacity from its current 10 trips/day, and extend it to Abbotsford.
Fundamentally, the "study" does nothing to justify the existence of this route. It provides no ridership estimates or justifications for each leg of the route, and no study into whether alternate alignments would produce superior service or ridership. And that leads to my last criticism - there is no justification offered for the inclusion of Chilliwack in the proposal. Extending the service to Chilliwack nearly doubles its length, and whom will it serve? Are residents of Chilliwack really demanding slow but frequent service into Metro Vancouver? How many Chilliwack residents will ride 90 mins to/from Surrey, or 125 minutes to/from Vancouver, or 150 minutes to/from Richmond? I would like to see the business case for that. |
100% agree.
Not only would it be cheaper, but it would be faster for travelers too, thus more able to attract new riders. Coupled with the Evergreen Line, it would give riders in Abbostford a much more direct route to anywhere on the Burrard peninsula than going through Langley and Surrey. And if you were to invest $500 million in capital expenditures along the ROW between Mission and Downtown, you could probably add enough track and signals to run more trains longer in the day. Not only that, but if downtown (or the Burrard peninsula in general) is the destination that can attract the most riders, then leasing track from CN along the south bank, would be even faster/cheaper for riders from Chilliwack. The CN track is even more direct than the freeway. And according to my books, CN owes the BC Tax payer a favor or two.
However, the Rail for the Valley proposal might work if there is a business case for TOD. There are a few virtually uninhabited areas along the line that aren't in the ALR (or at least offer no value to the ALR). If you could get Langley township to put their weight into rezoning and subdividing properties around proposed stations in the middle of nowhere, it could work as transit based Suburbs for a Surrey Downtown. But I think that's not possible until the next boom, when job growth in Surrey starts to explode again, and finding housing in Surrey is more difficult (as right now it's fairly easy to find a reasonably priced house, moving out beyond 232 doesn't save you that much over buying in Surrey Proper in the current marketplace).
But, as it is now, I think you would end up spending 5 or 6 times as much in capital costs per boarding as you would on building the Broadway Skytrain line. It might be cheaper overall, but Broadway Skytrain will be better bang for the buck.
I think using the BCER ROW is a good idea for a near term and affordable solution to get people from Langley City and Cloverdale to Scott Road (where they complete their Journey into Vancouver). But I think the detour through Langley, Newton and Nordel is horrible for people from Abbostford going to downtown, and not even worth it for Abbostford to Surrey Center (Rapid bus on Hwy 1 would be twice as fast at a fraction the cost).
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They even used google maps for images 
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