Metro Vancouver Transit Discussion

[Kisai]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

The problem is Translink has a mixed bag of extremely visible and unpopular tax options, like gas taxes and property taxes.

If instead they were just given a few hundred million of the province's general revenue every year to help with operating expenses, people would hardly notice a minuscule income tax increase and everybody would be happy.

It's all about perception.

Went over the Port Mann last weekend. Didn't see signage for where to pay the toll coming from the west side. It costs 3.00 per crossing, plus 2.30$ if you haven't signed up for an account. If they can put ANPR toll checkpoints up like this to control congestion on a bridge, they could probably do it everywhere else that gets congested and only charge drivers who pass through the congested points during rush hours. Then get rid of the gas tax. Though all this would do is get people who can't afford those charges to take other routes, and doesn't make them any more willing to take transit or change their driving habits.

It's hard to get a tax established, and even harder to get rid of it.

[st7860]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

Honestly I don't even think out transit is even that bad. I live in a low density neighbourhood fairly far from anything central and I still get a bus every half an hour. My only complaint is that it stops running at 7 PM...

And come on, the average UBC student doesn't own a Ferrari.

http://universityofbeautifulcars.tumblr.com/

[GlassCity]

Originally Posted by st7860

http://universityofbeautifulcars.tumblr.com/

I've seen the website. And I've been to UBC plenty of times. Yes there are quite a few of sweet cars like that in the parking lot, but do you really believe that there's a significant amount of students that own them? Very very few considering there are 54,000 students, most of which do in fact take transit to school.

[204]

Originally Posted by Kisai

Went over the Port Mann last weekend. Didn't see signage for where to pay the toll coming from the west side.

You can pay online after the trip: https://account.treo.ca/pay

[st7860]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

I've seen the website. And I've been to UBC plenty of times. Yes there are quite a few of sweet cars like that in the parking lot, but do you really believe that there's a significant amount of students that own them? Very very few considering there are 54,000 students, most of which do in fact take transit to school.

I'm not going to mention the name of a country but where would you find plenty of students willing to pay $25,000 a year for international tuition(UBC/SFU)

[squeezied]

Originally Posted by st7860

I'm not going to mention the name of a country but where would you find plenty of students willing to pay $25,000 a year for international tuition(UBC/SFU)

Yes everyone here knows in UBC there's a notable amount of spoiled rich kids from China driving fancy cars. The vast majority of UBC students are not spoiled rich kids from China driving fancy cars. Let's move on now.

[red-paladin]

Exactly, this tangent is warn out.

[logan5]

Originally Posted by aberdeen5698

80 individual automated vehicles will still take up far, far more room than a bus. Here the acid test: do you think that New York could eliminate it's transit system by switching to automated vehicles? Remember that you'd have to replace each of their over 6000 subway cars with over 200 individual vehicles. That's over a million MORE cars in the city than already exist. And that doesn't even include bus users.

All other forms of transit could easily be replaced in Vancouver when we reach the point where all vehicles are autonomous. Mode share into Downtown Vancouver is about an even 50/50 split between car and transit, so in order for autonomous vehicles to absorb Skytrain and bus passengers, an autonomous network would need to only double the capacity of the existing road network.

It's hard to say how much more efficiently computer control would raise road capacity, but it's easy to see a tripling or quadrupling of capacity. It's probably even higher than that. With vehicles likely being much smaller, and being able to run closer together, today's 3 lanes arterials could accommodate 5 lanes of AV's. Intersections will will be negotiated far more efficiently by AV's. I'm sure you've noticed that when the light turns green, one car will go, then the next car lags behind, and so on. With AV's communicating with each other, all vehicles will move in unison with each other. If each vehicle is 6 feet long with a 2 foot buffer between each vehicle, for every second of green, 6.25 vehicles can pass through the intersection (going 55 km/h) per lane. Traffic management efficiencies will increase capacity even further.

So yes, I think there's a good chance that even in Manhatten AV's could replace subways.

[SFUVancouver]

^ I'll believe it when I see it.

[logan5]

Originally Posted by aberdeen5698

"Inefficient"!?!?!? In terms of overall resources used to transport people, including the capital cost to build the vehicles/infrastructure, operating cost, and the impact on the environment, it's far, far more efficient than individual vehicles could ever hope to be. There's just no comparison.

And in urban New York, transit trips are as fast as or faster than car/taxi trips as often as not.

Autonomous vehicles will almost certainly be electric, so the impact on the environment will be minimal.

The cost of a fully autonomous network would be less than building rapid transit lines as well. AV's will be be much lighter and much simpler than today's 3000 lb behemoth's, so they are likely to cost less than private cars. Even if each vehicle costs a high estimate of $20 000, for the price of the Broadway/UBC line (3billion), you could buy 150 000 autonomous vehicles. That could easily serve 1 million people - Vancouver, Burnaby, and Richmond. The infrastructure for AV's is already in place, and operating costs are low... no driver.

I believe these are going to catch on fast once they're in place. A driverless taxi service will cost about a third of what taxi's cost today, and car sharing, which is a growing industry, has shown great interest in these vehicles. Even if only half the vehicles on the road are driverless, we can start to designate certain routes as AV's only, and realize the huge gains in efficiency as soon as possible.

I'll believe it when I see it.

You gotta at least concede the Vancouver scenario, right?

[cabotp]

Originally Posted by logan5

All other forms of transit could easily be replaced in Vancouver when we reach the point where all vehicles are autonomous. Mode share into Downtown Vancouver is about an even 50/50 split between car and transit, so in order for autonomous vehicles to absorb Skytrain and bus passengers, an autonomous network would need to only double the capacity of the existing road network.

It's hard to say how much more efficiently computer control would raise road capacity, but it's easy to see a tripling or quadrupling of capacity. It's probably even higher than that. With vehicles likely being much smaller, and being able to run closer together, today's 3 lanes arterials could accommodate 5 lanes of AV's. Intersections will will be negotiated far more efficiently by AV's. I'm sure you've noticed that when the light turns green, one car will go, then the next car lags behind, and so on. With AV's communicating with each other, all vehicles will move in unison with each other. If each vehicle is 6 feet long with a 2 foot buffer between each vehicle, for every second of green, 6.25 vehicles can pass through the intersection (going 55 km/h) per lane. Traffic management efficiencies will increase capacity even further.

So yes, I think there's a good chance that even in Manhatten AV's could replace subways.

Even with what you are proposing. It would still require more road space to accomodate 80 people. Than a bus needs to accommodate those same 80 people.

Think of it this way. Take a standard 60' bus. Pack it so that every seat is used and those standing have a 4 inch personal space around them. Will assume that is approx 100 people.

Now take those 100 people and put them in an AV unit. Even if these AV units were single occupancy. They would still require more in terms of 2D physical space than a person standing on a bus or even sitting on a bus would require. Or put another way could you take 100 AV units and place them in the exact same physical space of a one 60' bus.

[WBC]

Originally Posted by cabotp

Even with what you are proposing. It would still require more road space to accomodate 80 people. Than a bus needs to accommodate those same 80 people.

Think of it this way. Take a standard 60' bus. Pack it so that every seat is used and those standing have a 4 inch personal space around them. Will assume that is approx 100 people.

Now take those 100 people and put them in an AV unit. Even if these AV units were single occupancy. They would still require more in terms of 2D physical space than a person standing on a bus or even sitting on a bus would require. Or put another way could you take 100 AV units and place them in the exact same physical space of a one 60' bus.

I don't see why automated buses would not be a part of this scenario. You don't have to pay the driver and if battery operated the cost of "fuel' would go down. In addition, the cost of maintaining the electric vehicles is much lower due to less moving parts, breaks don't wear our quickly, etc. It does not give you the convenience of getting exactly from point A to point B but it would be dirt cheap to operate...

You could conceivably run automated transit system at profit and not at loss. At that point it can be moved from public domain to private...And bye, bye Translink...

[Genauso]

I'm almost sorry I raised the possibility of autonomous vehicles. Almost. The point remains that planning for the next 30 years to look like the last 30 years is a very bad practice.

This is a time when we should be excited for something new like an electric vehicle only tunnel freeway that can now be cheaper due to lower ventilation requirements, with a plan to make it autonomous only. That would be attractive to many globally and valuable in many different ways too. Unless we're solving today's inarguable problems, more of the same is no longer good enough.

It is true that the very next change will, and should, be similar to the last change. It's just that the question must keep changing periodically, otherwise all answers would have been exhausted by now.

We are four decades past the ALR creation in response to suburban sprawl, three decades since SkyTrain was created as a provincial government response to manufacturing layoffs and high interest rates, two decades since Yaletown or Metrotown urban renewal, one decade since 35 cent per litre gasoline prices, and are currently at the peak of the echo baby boom exiting university.

It is important to build for the future, but we don't know what that may look like. If it is a big investment, the demand on opening day must equal that commitment. Everything else should require the bare minimum spending until the demand is proven, with total costs minimized through planning by preserving right-of-ways above or below ground.
e.g. build a four lane bridge big enough to get started today, and then a twin bridge with six more lanes in 20 years
e.g. start at a bus line, then upgrade to a trolley bus line, and then upgrade to a lane separated signal priority trolley bus line, and then upgrade to a LRT line so that the costs and benefits are clear at each step of the way
There is no incentive for a city to minimize potential waste on a project in its own jurisdiction, that is no accountability for accepting a bad forecast and no reward for getting a project approved on a understated forecast.


Cautiousness is more important now because there won't be a demographic bulge that moves in to adapt and make use of transit investments if they were bad ones. What I'm suggesting doesn't stop transit investment, rather it has a bias to invest where it better integrates existing networks or better serves existing demand. The union won't like any of it in the short term because it would mean fewer jobs to serve the same ridership and that is a big change from their best decade ever on the back of increasing ridership and wasteful political investments where there was no demand.

[Genauso]

Originally Posted by logan5

All other forms of transit could easily be replaced in Vancouver when we reach the point where all vehicles are autonomous.

Could. There are intermediate alternatives today.

Minibuses that offer shared rides with dynamic routes and fares like South Africa or a smartphone and machine learning based pilot in Finland. I believe TransLink stops both here.

Part time cab drivers without the monopoly share cropping system we use today, and just using modern tech to offer smarter route planning and fare pricing Uber, Lyft, GrabTaxi. There is a provincial government taxi/limousine commission that imposed a minimum $70 order ride price. I'm sure that's on the level just like the Hell's Angels associate running the provincial boxing commission to designate UFC judges.

I'd expect the first implementation of autonomous vehicles in Vancouver would be a few personal luxury vehicles, or most likely trucks with the Port, railways, and airport playing a leading role. Make better use of roads overnight.

[cabotp]

Originally Posted by WBC

I don't see why automated buses would not be a part of this scenario. You don't have to pay the driver and if battery operated the cost of "fuel' would go down. In addition, the cost of maintaining the electric vehicles is much lower due to less moving parts, breaks don't wear our quickly, etc. It does not give you the convenience of getting exactly from point A to point B but it would be dirt cheap to operate...

You could conceivably run automated transit system at profit and not at loss. At that point it can be moved from public domain to private...And bye, bye Translink...

I do agree that automated buses would probably be more efficient. Same as skytrain is more efficient than a train with a driver. It would allow you to run more buses due to the lower labour cost. But automated single seat vehicles will never replace transit.

Transit run privately is far worse than transit run publically.

[logan5]

Originally Posted by cabotp

But automated single seat vehicles will never replace transit

Why do you say that? Do you think its not technically possible? If mode share is even between car and transit, then road capacity would only need to double. Every indication says this is easily achievable. People keep saying it can't be done, but no reasons why it can't be done.

[aberdeen5698]

Originally Posted by Genauso

This is a time when we should be excited for something new like an electric vehicle only tunnel freeway that can now be cheaper due to lower ventilation requirements, with a plan to make it autonomous only.

We already have a couple of those in Vancouver - they're called "Skytrain".

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by aberdeen5698

We already have a couple of those in Vancouver - they're called "Skytrain".

Except autonomous electric vehicles could be privately owned. That's a cost frequently ignored. Pivate vehicles move the cost of equipment and operator to the owner, government no longer has to foot that bill. All they remain responsible for is the infrastructure.

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by whatnext

Except autonomous electric vehicles could be privately owned. That's a cost frequently ignored. Pivate vehicles move the cost of equipment and operator to the owner, government no longer has to foot that bill. All they remain responsible for is the infrastructure.

How much lower would the cost of this "private autonomous transport" system be, compared to say, a taxi? Not much, if any.

[logan5]

Labour for taxis is 66% of the cost, so it will be muxh cheaper for autonomous taxis.