Calgary Public Transit II

[rajuncaucasian]

That is very exciting news, good week to be in the SE. Ring Road open, SWRR officially signed, 10 years until bus transitways.

[MasterG]

Originally Posted by Calgarian

I can imagine the comments sections now

don't read it, it's bad for you. I know its hard but resist!

[simster3]

Does this mean they can leverage this money to get work started on SETWAY? If so, how soon could they get building the needed infrastructure?

[You Need A Thneed]

Originally Posted by simster3

Does this mean they can leverage this money to get work started on SETWAY? If so, how soon could they get building the needed infrastructure?

I hope they leverage the money by waving it front of the Federal and Provincial governments and say, "Hey, we are serious about building this infrastructure, now chip in your portion. Matching amounts from each would be huge.

[Calgarian]

$1.5B would be awesome! if they did this would they move forward with a transitway or just start moving forward with the LRT?

[You Need A Thneed]

Originally Posted by Calgarian

$1.5B would be awesome! if they did this would they move forward with a transitway or just start moving forward with the LRT?

1.5B would be way more than needed for simple transitway. I think that would get LRT started.

[fusili]

Originally Posted by Calgarian

$1.5B would be awesome! if they did this would they move forward with a transitway or just start moving forward with the LRT?

Originally Posted by You Need A Thneed

1.5B would be way more than needed for simple transitway. I think that would get LRT started.

Yup, passed at Council just now. 2014 will see us get the $52M back as a tax decrease, but from then on, it will be dedicated to transit. Great, great news!

[RyLucky]

Originally Posted by fusili

So basically Chu is the absolute worst representative for North Central Calgary. almost his entire ward is served by the 301 and the centre street corridor that carries 90 buses per hour. And Chu decides that nope, his constituents don't need transit.

Chu actually campaigned on NOT improving transit in his ward. Actually.

[RyLucky]

Great news about the transit way. Can't wait to hear specifics.

[5seconds]

Did anything happen with the SW BRT that needed new lanes along 14th street? IS that still unfunded?

[mellbell416]

Oh, that is just fabulous news! Getting a NC SE LRT is going to be a total gamechanger....Right now, I loooooove Shane Keating.

I am really looking forward to seeing how the plans get fleshed out - if money is only coming in 2015, does that mean that construction of the SETWAY only starts in 2016 or something?

[outoftheice]

Well today was definitely a good day for residents living along the SE/NC LRT corridor. That being said, the real challenge will be how the City can leverage this money to actually create a Green Line that delivers large scale improvements to people's lives. The Route Ahead plan states that the cost of the SETWAY is projected to be $667 Million. That is only for the South East portion of the transit-way and will do nothing to improve transit in the North Central Corridor. The money committed today only totals $520 Million and over a ten year period to boot. This new money is meant to fund the "green line" transit-way and bring improvements to the entire corridor. The only way this new cash brings about a large scale improvement on the Green Line is if it can be used to bring about investment on a grander scale.

To me this says that the timing has never been better to examine an alternative funding solution to make-up for the short fall. As I mentioned before, our SmarterCity.ca group has been advocating for a plebiscite to have Calgarians vote on using alternative funding to begin immediate construction on the SE/NC LRT line. We have modeled our case around using an $0.08/L fuel surcharge and a $0.35 transit surcharge to fund construction of the LRT from North Pointe to Douglas Glen (approx. $4.2 Billion construction cost). We had been projecting the 2 surcharges to collect $141 Million in the first year. With the new $52 Million funding commitment from the City, this only leaves an annual funding gap of $89 Million to bring in the same amount of revenue. While I haven't been able to do the math yet, it would mean that both surcharges could be dramatically reduced, easing the burden and making it easier for Calgarians to bare.

We have been moving forward with our #councilchallenge (http://www.smartercity.ca/Project.html) asking City Council to pick an alternative funding proposal and put it forward to Calgarians to let them have their say. With today's announcement, I honestly believe that the timing for this initiative has never been better and that by next year we could be seeing construction begin on LRT for the green line instead of just BRT improvements.

[DizzyEdge]

So how much of the expected SETWAY cost is simply acquiring land/building the road, etc no shelters or anything fancy. How many 52 millions would it cost to build a dirt road

(I'm kidding about the dirt road, but curious how much it would cost the get the minimum usable route built)

[Policy Wonk]

How exactly does plunging the NCLRT and SELRT further into La La Land make this "a good day"?

Yeah, a mile long tunnel connecting two lines that probably wouldn't generate more than a handful of transfers between the two in the first place. Yeah, that is a couple billion dollars well spent.

The SELRT proposal should be moving towards running at grade along the old Station Grounds as far west as 10th Street. Not falling into the same fanciful quagmire the NCLRT has been sucked into.

This is a stupider idea than the Centre Street subway.

[DizzyEdge]

Interesting comment about lack of transfers. Unlike say Toronto where Bloor goes east west north of downtown so you have to transfer to get downtown, in Calgary all lines head downtown anyway, so you'd only transfer to go from one suburban area to another. Seems like most transfers would just be people from the W, NC or NE heading to Chinook, Fish Creek Park, etc, and back. Maybe W,NE, NC to Kensington.. maybe. Probably not a ton of transfers.

[RyLucky]

Originally Posted by Policy Wonk

How exactly does plunging the NCLRT and SELRT further into La La Land make this "a good day"?

Yeah, a mile long tunnel connecting two lines that probably wouldn't generate more than a handful of transfers between the two in the first place. Yeah, that is a couple billion dollars well spent.

The SELRT proposal should be moving towards running at grade along the old Station Grounds as far west as 10th Street. Not falling into the same fanciful quagmire the NCLRT has been sucked into.

This is a stupider idea than the Centre Street subway.

No offense, but it would be an absolute waste of money to NOT connect new routes to our existing system. There are far more transfers than you think. Already during morning rush hour you will see busy trains LEAVING Downtown heading S, NW, and NE (although not as full as heading into downtown), indicating that many people do in fact transfer. Keeping NC/SE on one line also provides a ton of benefits related to maintenance and emergencies, not to mention sharing infrastructure Downtown. People in the NC will be able to go directly to the Stampede Grounds or Inglewood without a transfer. Don't forget those poor Imperial Oil and South Hospital Employees! People in the SE will be able to get to the University (or basically anywhere in the city) with one transfer. I predict a SE/NCLRT will have a ridership comparable to existing lines from the day it opens.

Any word on where exactly the money is to go? I assume it's not enough for a Downtown tunnel, and unless the infrastructure can be upgraded to rail, the cost is not worth it. Perhaps securing a ROW between Ramsay and Ogden would be a good start? Creating a bus-only road along the existing SE ROW to the South Hospital? Securing a transit lane in the NC ROW?

Hopefully if Calgarians embrace the transitway, provincial and federal governments will kick in some money to make it LRT in 10 years. It seems unlikely now, but a lot could change in politics by 2024.

[Policy Wonk]

My elderly and frail mother walks further than 9th Ave to 7th Ave to check the mail every day. When you're talking about multiple billions of dollars (that don't exist) there are compromises to be made.

[Wooster]

One practical reason to connect the two legs is the desire to have only one transit garage, which is a big expense. I think it's also desirable to have both legs go into the heart of the downtown core (including touching 7th Avenue) for connections to other lines.

With regard to the downtown segment and compromise, one question to folks, curious what people would think of the idea (just my own random thought) of going above grade through a segment of Beltline and Downtown? It would be much less expensive than underground, but would need to essentially sit at the plus 30 level. It would require probably 2-3 stations. I wonder whether it might be possible to retrofit or design some buildings that could tie in to such stations (to provide elevator infrastructure and such). It also has the potential to be a bit ugly, but maybe at the same time an interesting design opportunity?

Design is still very early days, and funding availability will certainly drive alignment and other decisions on this.

[DizzyEdge]

What would be the route through downtown of connected lines?

[RyLucky]

Originally Posted by Wooster

One practical reason to connect the two legs is the desire to have only one transit garage, which is a big expense. I think it's also desirable to have both legs go into the heart of the downtown core (including touching 7th Avenue) for connections to other lines.

With regard to the downtown segment and compromise, one question to folks, curious what people would think of the idea (just my own random thought) of going above grade through a segment of Beltline and Downtown? It would be much less expensive than underground, but would need to essentially sit at the plus 30 level. It would require probably 2-3 stations. I wonder whether it might be possible to retrofit or design some buildings that could tie in to such stations (to provide elevator infrastructure and such). It also has the potential to be a bit ugly, but maybe at the same time an interesting design opportunity?

Design is still very early days, and funding availability will certainly drive alignment and other decisions on this.

I'd like to see design specs and cost estimates for all the options, but I think your +30 idea is at least worth entertaining. I would imagine it would be less expensive than a tunnel. An important thing to consider is how a potential 8th ave tunnel would interact. In theory, I have no problem with an at-grade line on or beside 10th ave, because blocks are plenty long and traffic is relatively low. It would also be nice to consider future spurs into Forest Lawn and into the Beltline/Bankview/mardaloop/MRU and to YYC from the NCLRT.

By the way, those analyses that were done for the SELRT and WLRT back in the mid-2000s are some of the finest, most transparent, publicly available civic documents I have ever read. Other cities haven't been as lucky; RouteAhead may look like a high school student made it (no offense); But the LRT project studies from the mid-2000s were top-notch. Hopefully, further cost analysis strives for the same quality of study, with balanced, unbiased, clearly-communicated methodology.