Quote:
Originally Posted by J.OT13
lrt's friend,
1. I agree that the Airport should get direct to downtown service. We should have considered dual-mode trains to run diesel down south and electric between Bayview and the Belfast Yards to accommodate direct to downtown;
2. There were no tunnel plan following the N/S. The plan was to have a bunch of O-trains along existing rail lines running in suburban and rural areas of Ottawa, far from any urban areas;
3. The N/S might have been great for the south end, but they were planning on cutting service to the east and west end to accommodate your choo-choo train;
4. The current Confederation Line along with Stage 2 might not serve the suburban south end, but it will serve a huge swath of Central-Urban Ottawa, urban neighborhoods like Little Italy, Hintonburgh/Wellington West, Westboro;
5. The subway will be a HUGE improvement for downtown;
6. A good part of the south end (Barrhaven) is and will continue to be well served by BRT with a good transfer point to the future ORT;
7. A cheap, effective solution can be found for Riverside south. Either extending buses from Barrhaven to Riverside South or having bus lanes up to the O-Train.
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1. Whatever it would take to provide service to the primary transit destination. But our planners have already discarded this option.
2. Yes there was a plan to connect the N/S route to the Confederation tunnel. Originally, there were connections to be roughed in at Bayview Station in order to eventually connect the two lines. Those connections were eliminated in order to bring in the project at the $2.1B budget. I think this was at the same time that the station at Confederation Square was moved eastward.
3. Service to the east and west (and south) was cut anyways. Many expresses were converted into feeder routes.
4. Your point being? I have already indicated that we have already spent $200M+ that could have been avoided. That will continue to increase when we expand the O-Train again, which is the plan. I think we could have achieved just as much, just as fast on the desired route.
5. I will repeat again that I don't oppose the subway and I understand its importance.
6. Barrhaven would have even been better served with access to rapid transit both east and west of the Rideau River. This would have happened if the N/S LRT route had opened. As it stands, the lowest transit modal share is in the southern suburbs including Barrhaven. Are we really effectively addressing this? The fact also remains, that rail transit to Barrhaven was affordable on the N/S route and not affordable on the Confederation Line route.
7. The 94 bus will cross the Strandherd-Armstrong Bridge and turn around at the Park n Ride lot next to River Road. If you live in Riverside South, most will have to make another transfer to use it. An improvement over the status quo if you want to go to the west end, but to go downtown???? So you also recommend abandoning an O-Train extension? How much more money are we going to spend on a Transitway extension or bus lanes or whatever from South Keys to Riverside South. I still don't understand building all these park n ride lots that will lose direct service to downtown. It seems they will lose a good part of their effectiveness in attracting transit riders when direct service is eliminated. But according to the majority here, what's one, two, or even three transfers. After all, you will only wait 1 minute at each transfer or is it 5 minutes or 10 minutes or 15 minutes or 20 minutes depending on where you are transferring and at what time of day?