Millennium Line - Broadway Extension: Planning & Pre-Construction

[Jebby]

Originally Posted by Spork

I look forward to hearing your suggestion about how to address the funding gap. It's easy to criticize blindly, and significantly more difficult to be productive and propose a workable solution.

How does subsidizing more users = funding gap solution?

[jlousa]

The city will have a presentation on it's findings for the broadway corridor at council today, unlike normal pratice though they have not released it to the public one week prior. This is starting to become a pattern as of late with transportation issues at the hall and don't know where the blame lies but it certainly is unappreaciated to keep the public uninformed until the meeting as it limits the ablility for citizens to voice their opinions.
If and when the presentation does end up posted I'll share it with the forum.

On the same topic Frances Bula (unofficial spokeswomen for Vision ) has an article in todays Globe and Mail discussing UBC's displeasure with the Mayor's plan to call for the Broadway line to be built until Arbutus and buses to continue from there. UBC wants the line all the way to campus and states if it isn't done all at once it won't happen for another generation. They would rather have LRT all the way to campus then a half line if need be. Anyways I suspect we will see a lot of active discussion on this topic over the next couple of weeks.

[aberdeen5698]

Originally Posted by jlousa

...Frances Bula (unofficial spokeswomen for Vision )...

I actually find her to be one of the least biased bloggers on the civic scene, which I attribute to her journalism background.

UBC wants the line all the way to campus and states if it isn't done all at once it won't happen for another generation. They would rather have LRT all the way to campus then a half line if need be.

That's an incredibly selfish attitude, and AFAIK it discredits them. I'd far rather have half a line than no line at all, particularly when the most critical segment by far is between Commercial and Cambie to connect up to the Canada Line, followed by service to the hospital district as a close second.

[jlousa]

I think UBC is upset about finding out about the city's new plan from a remarks made by Gregor a couple of weeks ago. Mind you consulatation isn't the city's current strong point. The chances of the feds and even the province chipping in a significant portion is greatly reduced if the line doesn't go all the way. I have no doubt UBC would contribute a portion towards the cost as well if the line were to go the whole distance.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by jlousa

The city will have a presentation on it's findings for the broadway corridor at council today, unlike normal pratice though they have not released it to the public one week prior. This is starting to become a pattern as of late with transportation issues at the hall and don't know where the blame lies but it certainly is unappreaciated to keep the public uninformed until the meeting as it limits the ablility for citizens to voice their opinions....

No doubt that's the intention.

[nname]

I think its more like "I know you want to choose RRT. But if you're leaving us out out like that, I'm just going to choose an option you don't want to force you to make a compromise"...

But ultimately, neither of them gets to choose

[andasen]

Van city Staff's Powerpoint Presentation to council on broadway subway.

[trofirhen]

Originally Posted by andasen

Van city Staff's Powerpoint Presentation to council on broadway subway.

glad to see coucil endorses underground rail all the way to UBC. Expensive? Yes. But I think it would turn out to be the best investment in the long haul.

[Prometheus]

Originally Posted by jlousa

On the same topic Frances Bula (unofficial spokeswomen for Vision ) has an article in todays Globe and Mail discussing UBC's displeasure with the Mayor's plan to call for the Broadway line to be built until Arbutus and buses to continue from there.

According to page 29 of the presentation, the city is not clear about whether it wants to extend Skytrain to even Arbutus. The presentation uses the term "Central Broadway" and the map is ambiguous regarding whether Skytrain will reach Arbutus or stop at Granville Street.

The presentation claims the extension will be designed and completed within 5 to 7 years.

The madness of LRT has been unequivocally shot down.

[officedweller]

The reason the terminus is ambiguous stems from the Millennium Line Phase II project.
At the time the Province said it would fund the M-Line extension to Granville St. The last segment to Arbutus (at the time the preferred north-south rapid trasnsit RoW option was not known) would have had to have been funded separately.

The only significant comment I have on the presentation is the repeated use of photos of the St. Clair Ave streetcar in Toronto as LRT (after doing a good job of differentiating "LRT" and "Streetcar" in the graphics). i.e. St. Clair looks cluttered because it has close station/platform spacing.
I guess they couldn't find a precedent of a double tracked LRT on a main street? - Houston, Phoenix or MLK Way in Seattle come to mind.

They do a good job of highlighting the impacts on all users of Broadway (i.e. 80m trains on 120m long city blocks every 2 minutes) - something that was not done for No. 3 Rd. by the at-grade boosters who wanted LRT there.

[WarrenC12]

I like how the details and stats of the Portland system are mentioned. People somehow hold out Portland as the holy grail of LRT. A visit there earlier this year highlighted the unfortunate truths of LRT in a downtown/busy area:

1. Lack of capacity
2. "hogging the road" - ie: all one way streets, no parking, few lanes for cars, and in Portland's case, trains going opposite directions don't even fit on the same street.

[Metro-One]

Overall I am very happy with this presentation.

It displays all of the negative impacts / shortcomings LRT would have on Broadway that I have always advocated!

That said, at one point the presentation says they support subway to Granville or Arbutus and then rapid bus, but aster that the graphics support subway all the way to UBC it looks.

Hopefully UBC fights this in the right direction and demands skytrain al the way to the campus, instead of second grade LRT.

[amor de cosmos]

Originally Posted by andasen

Van city Staff's Powerpoint Presentation to council on broadway subway.

Originally Posted by trofirhen

glad to see coucil endorses underground rail all the way to UBC. Expensive? Yes. But I think it would turn out to be the best investment in the long haul.

besides all the data (p.7!), the slide that really stood out was p.35. case closed. why are they still talking about this lrt or streetcar seems more appropriate for kitsilano, say along 4th, but not broadway.

[jlousa]

Was going to link the presentation after lunch but I've been beaten to it.
What strikes me the how bad the presentation flows, the info in it seems great but there is no flow, not to mention the to Arbutus slides and the all the way to UBC slide. Just appears that either the whole thing was thrown together at the last minute or edited after the fact and no one took the time to go over it a final time.

[Prometheus]

They definitely mixed up a lot of the slides and failed to include some others. Not very professional.

I would have been interested in hearing the city's argument (assuming it had one) why a Skytrain subway should be extended all the way to UBC but not now. According to page 10 of the presentation, UBC is already the 2nd biggest transit destination in the city (and those are figures from 2008, before Wesbrook Village and the numerous other developments that have occured--and will continue to occur--around the campus). The Broadway Corridor is third biggest transit destination. If the extension is not built all the way to UBC in this phase, it will just transfer the choke point from Commercial Street to Arbutus or Granville Street.

[mr.x]

I liked the presentation overall, as it largely debunks the whole myth of LRT being doable...although the insane would argue otherwise. And unlike the Canada Line, we're not underestimating ridership demands this time round.

I was confused how it said "Thank You" on a slide toward the end with a neat rendering of the Broadway and Cambie intersection with the new station entrance in the Crossroads building (I think it would take up the Lululemon shop there)....only to keep scrolling and see more slides loll.

[bardak]

Originally Posted by jlousa

Was going to link the presentation after lunch but I've been beaten to it.
What strikes me the how bad the presentation flows, the info in it seems great but there is no flow, not to mention the to Arbutus slides and the all the way to UBC slide. Just appears that either the whole thing was thrown together at the last minute or edited after the fact and no one took the time to go over it a final time.

the slides was probably designed to help illustrate the point that the speaker was making not as a report. We're missing half of the information with out the speaker (does Vancouver city hall have video or audio recording?). That being said I think that the slides gets the point across if poorly.

[officedweller]

Originally Posted by Prometheus

They definitely mixed up a lot of the slides and failed to include some others. Not very professional.

I would have been interested in hearing the city's argument (assuming it had one) why a Skytrain subway should be extended all the way to UBC but not now. According to page 10 of the presentation, UBC is already the 2nd biggest transit destination in the city (and those are figures from 2008, before Wesbrook Village and the numerous other developments that have occured--and will continue to occur--around the campus). The Broadway Corridor is third biggest transit destination. If the extension is not built all the way to UBC in this phase, it will just transfer the choke point from Commercial Street to Arbutus or Granville Street.

That would just be funding and phasing.

Taking the subway to Granville or Arbutus would be aimed at serving the Central Broadway office district (the goal of M-Line Phase II (which was also before the UBC U-Pass ridership explosion) - so you have that office commuter ridership removed from the "bottleneck" that would be transferring to rapid bus to UBC (which may be manageable until the next phase).
i.e. if UBC draws 80,000 trips and Central Broadway draws 80,000 trips, current transfer loads at Broadway & Commercial, if shifted west to Arbutus, could be halved (since only the UBC 80,000 would remain).

[dreambrother808]

There is some senseless nitpicking going on here.

The slides seem to point out that the council is moving to support RRT all the way to UBC, while indicating that the current policy had been RRT plus rapid bus. So how exactly are they screwing over UBC?

Attempts to paint Gregor and Vision as the bogeyman are falling a bit flat.

[Zassk]

^^^ Agreed, everything about this presentation is positive.

It is remarkably rational, and its conclusions are pretty much beyond dispute.