NC LRT Advocacy Group

[Policy Wonk]

Originally Posted by polishavenger

Its not repetition. Each time you've changed your position as you were shown to be wrong. Now you have shifted your argument again, finally to a point which can be debated and has some merit.

I have not changed my position. Capacity is the number of train movements supported by a given length of track in a given time. Lines for transit purposes are colored bars on maps and names on signs. When the costs are in the billions of dollars you can't just lay down track where it might be convenient to.

Yes there are many efficiencies that can be acheived with technology, the question is whether or not we need the future physically maximum capacity of a given line or not.

That is the wonderful thing about interlining, the capacity of the track can be allocated based on need. The great thing about technology is the headways provided for on modern grade separated track are ridiculous. It is criminal negligence to plan a modern grade separated line without provisions for interlining because the track capacity is so great. To argue that interlining diminishes potential capacity you first have to argue that a route has any probability of being impeded by track capacity in the modern grade separated environment we speak of. And I don't even want to imagine where headways will be in the future when the only living, breathing C-Train operator is at Heritage Park.

You have stated several times how much the north is growing, and I added the the NE is growing as well, so is it wise to build a solution that doesnt provide for the maximum possible future capacity? What happens in 50 years when both the NE and NCLRT are maxed out because of interlining?

Because 7th Ave will have been grade separated decades earlier to eliminate the surface traffic bottleneck affecting route 202 it won't be a problem.

My argument is that even though the center street line is significantly more expensive, you get disspraportionately more benefit for that additional cost.

1) You have a line that ties in with the SE leg creating efficieny that you would not have if they were two seperate lines.
2) You service far more people as you capture the central part of the city
3) The city has the opportunity to upzone all of the center street corridor due to added transportation capacity
4) A non interlined NCLRT allows for the full theoretical capacity to be utilized servicing the north growth corridor, and does not cut into the maximum capactity of the NE line.

There is no relative disproportionate benefit in favour of something that can't be built. Arguing about this sort of alignment is like some guys at the airport with a King Air contemplating a fleet of 777's.

1. / 2. You still have to be able to built it in the first place.
3. That is a whole other war in and of itself that is unlikely to be successful unless a virulent plague kills off the population of Centre Street North of 16th ave.
4. Grade separation is a marvelous and inevitable thing even if no North Central LRT is ever built.

In a future Calgary there will be many competing transportation priorities. Building a single LRT line for the price of two to serve the backwater that is most of Centre Street is going to be completely unsalable.