Metro Vancouver Transit Discussion

[troublemaker]

So the 2008 Provincial Transit Plan envisioned 6-car trains, but now even the more modest goal of 5-car trains is in doubt. Is that it in a nutshell?

Doesn't that just maximize the upgrade costs by kicking them down the road, not to mention maximize inconvenience to passengers by doing upgrades piece by piece instead of all at once?

[Bcasey25raptor]

I heard from the gentlemen in the orange vests at main street station that that Train2Main will end on Friday December 5th.

Does anyone have any official information?

[Kisai]

Originally Posted by troublemaker

So the 2008 Provincial Transit Plan envisioned 6-car trains, but now even the more modest goal of 5-car trains is in doubt. Is that it in a nutshell?

Doesn't that just maximize the upgrade costs by kicking them down the road, not to mention maximize inconvenience to passengers by doing upgrades piece by piece instead of all at once?

No, I think you're misreading something.

6-car MKI or 5 car MKII
They start retiring the MKI's in 2019 and should be phased out by 2023 regardless. We could run the MK I's into the ground but that just needlessly consumes OMC space.

If it's cheaper to buy the "C" cars that fit between the A-B pairs of MKII's it may be cheaper to buy those and make each trainset into a a A-C-C-C-B configuration. But I don't know what Translink has in mind.

[Metro-One]

Originally Posted by Kisai

No, I think you're misreading something.

6-car MKI or 5 car MKII
They start retiring the MKI's in 2019 and should be phased out by 2023 regardless. We could run the MK I's into the ground but that just needlessly consumes OMC space.

If it's cheaper to buy the "C" cars that fit between the A-B pairs of MKII's it may be cheaper to buy those and make each trainset into a a A-C-C-C-B configuration. But I don't know what Translink has in mind.

I would love for them to do the ACCCB approach. I think seeing ACB-AB train sets would really urk me.

PS, they have been running 6 car M1s for years now.

[aberdeen5698]

Originally Posted by Kisai

They start retiring the MKI's in 2019 and should be phased out by 2023 regardless. We could run the MK I's into the ground but that just needlessly consumes OMC space.

Incorrect - the Mark I fleet is being refurbished to add an expected 15 more years to their usefulness. expect them to be around until 2030 or so.

[VancouverOfTheFuture]

how will the Mark II 5 train cars work? i envision AB-C-AB from what i understand of the Mark II's. but i could very well be wrong. i heard somewhere that the Mark II's had to be AB-AB connected? also, why didn't they buy Mark III versions back when the Mark II's were out? wouldn't it make more sense to buy ACCB in the first place? it seems really dumb to have AB-AB instead of ACCB.

[Kisai]

Originally Posted by aberdeen5698

Incorrect - the Mark I fleet is being refurbished to add an expected 15 more years to their usefulness. expect them to be around until 2030 or so.

Take a closer look at the chart where they included refurbishing the Mark I's.
http://www.translink.ca/~/media/document...e%20strategy%20%20project%20summary.ashx

Exhibit 13
2019:
Partial Replacement of MKIs with MKIIs in 3‐car Units
(36 MKIs + 228 MKIIs)
Partial Replacement of MKIs with MKIIs in 2‐car Units
(36 MKIs + 216 MKIIs)

They have to retire all the MKI's by 2026 based on those projections. Projections aren't certainty. Even if they refurbish them, that adds very little additional capacity. Hence they may refurbish them now, but they're not going to stick around for another 30 years, maybe 10 at the most. The parts won't be around forever.


Also take a look at http://www.translink.ca/~/media/document...n/2014_base_plan/2014%20base%20plan.ashx

Unfunded Needs
The 2012 Moving Forward Plan included several priority investments that could not be funded last year
and are not included in the 2014 Base Plan. They include:   
 Increased bus service hours to reduce overcrowding, accommodate population growth, and
meet U‐Pass demand
 Extending 15‐minute SeaBus service to seven days a week, year round
 Upgrading Lonsdale Quay bus terminal and SeaBus terminal passenger amenities  
 Station area improvements
 Increased funding for Major Road Network and cycling upgrades
In addition, TransLink has identified the following as population growth‐related priority items:  
 Additional SkyTrain cars to meet demand
 Increased West Coast Express capacity  
 Improved capacity and reliability of the Broadway 99 B‐Line
These remain priority items that will be considered for funding should TransLink’s revenue picture
change within the Base Plan and Outlook period.

[Kisai]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

how will the Mark II 5 train cars work? i envision AB-C-AB from what i understand of the Mark II's. but i could very well be wrong. i heard somewhere that the Mark II's had to be AB-AB connected? also, why didn't they buy Mark III versions back when the Mark II's were out? wouldn't it make more sense to buy ACCB in the first place? it seems really dumb to have AB-AB instead of ACCB.

No, you're misunderstanding how the rolling stock works.

An A car, for all intents is the car that always faces West, the B car is the one that always faces East, and a C car is one that is placed in between the A and B cars to make it a 3 car unit. The A car and B car are essentially the same, except facing the opposite direction.

The Mark II's didn't exist until after Vancouver ordered them. That is how all Rolling stock work. There's no "Mark III"'s, the next version is just outright called Innovia Metro 300. The Mark II's were called Innovia ART 200. Bombardier retroactively calls the Original models Innovia ART 100 in their marketing information about the Vancouver Skytrain.

Adding "C" cars to the Mark II's is probably more involved and expensive than ordering A-C-B configuration from the start. Every vehicle is made-to-order, so if the plan is to add C cars to existing A-B cars to extend the length, be it one or 3, then there is no hindrance in doing so. It's just a question of lifecycle. Why would you add a C car to cars that are already past their mid-life expectancy?

[Large Cat]

Originally Posted by aberdeen5698

Incorrect - the Mark I fleet is being refurbished to add an expected 15 more years to their usefulness. expect them to be around until 2030 or so.

Damn it. It's so hard to take wheelchairs and bikes on these cars.

Does anyone think they could possibly, conceivably, think about taking a few seats out of every trainset during future refurbs to make a better accessible area?

[dpogue]

Originally Posted by Large Cat

Damn it. It's so hard to take wheelchairs and bikes on these cars.

Does anyone think they could possibly, conceivably, think about taking a few seats out of every trainset during future refurbs to make a better accessible area?

They are in fact doing that, making the ends of each vehicle single seats on either side rather then a mix of singles and doubles. It definitely adds more standing room, but I think it's still not going to be great for bikes.

The worst ones are the 1992-era Mark Is with double seats on both sides at the ends. Such a pain squeezing down the narrow space between them

[cabotp]

Originally Posted by Kisai

No, you're misunderstanding how the rolling stock works.

An A car, for all intents is the car that always faces West, the B car is the one that always faces East, and a C car is one that is placed in between the A and B cars to make it a 3 car unit. The A car and B car are essentially the same, except facing the opposite direction.

The Mark II's didn't exist until after Vancouver ordered them. That is how all Rolling stock work. There's no "Mark III"'s, the next version is just outright called Innovia Metro 300. The Mark II's were called Innovia ART 200. Bombardier retroactively calls the Original models Innovia ART 100 in their marketing information about the Vancouver Skytrain.

Adding "C" cars to the Mark II's is probably more involved and expensive than ordering A-C-B configuration from the start. Every vehicle is made-to-order, so if the plan is to add C cars to existing A-B cars to extend the length, be it one or 3, then there is no hindrance in doing so. It's just a question of lifecycle. Why would you add a C car to cars that are already past their mid-life expectancy?

To add to this.

The C car is also open ended (accordions) on both ends. While the A car and B car are open only one end each. The other end being closed. A C car must be between a A-B car. And you have more than one C car. But only on A and B car.

Right now the configuration is A-B,A-B.

I believe they could co A-B,A-C-B. In this case the doors will be on the platforms. But the ends of the train will be past the platform.

The other option would be A-C-C-C-B. This is probably the best train as it allows a full walk through from one end to the other. So if you ran to catch a train and there were no seats where you got on. Then you could walk the train to possibly find a seat. As well it allows you to move to a different door when you want to disembark.

[Large Cat]

Originally Posted by dpogue

They are in fact doing that, making the ends of each vehicle single seats on either side rather then a mix of singles and doubles. It definitely adds more standing room, but I think it's still not going to be great for bikes.

The worst ones are the 1992-era Mark Is with double seats on both sides at the ends. Such a pain squeezing down the narrow space between them

That's excellent, I didn't know that! Still not ideal, but it's something. And looking at the Expo Line Upgrades Document, I'm more confident about the Mark I's being taken out of service within the next 10 years anyway.

[VancouverOfTheFuture]

Originally Posted by Kisai

No, you're misunderstanding how the rolling stock works.

An A car, for all intents is the car that always faces West, the B car is the one that always faces East, and a C car is one that is placed in between the A and B cars to make it a 3 car unit. The A car and B car are essentially the same, except facing the opposite direction.

The Mark II's didn't exist until after Vancouver ordered them. That is how all Rolling stock work. There's no "Mark III"'s, the next version is just outright called Innovia Metro 300. The Mark II's were called Innovia ART 200. Bombardier retroactively calls the Original models Innovia ART 100 in their marketing information about the Vancouver Skytrain.

Adding "C" cars to the Mark II's is probably more involved and expensive than ordering A-C-B configuration from the start. Every vehicle is made-to-order, so if the plan is to add C cars to existing A-B cars to extend the length, be it one or 3, then there is no hindrance in doing so. It's just a question of lifecycle. Why would you add a C car to cars that are already past their mid-life expectancy?

ahh that makes sense. thanks. so, is there any reason why TransLink didnt originally order 4 car trains? ie A-C-C-B? i always thought it was really dumb being A-B-A-B.

[Metro-One]

Because during those times ridership was much lower, and many times only single A-B cars were used (mostly on the M-Line) and being able to decouple a married pair (A-B + A-B) meant that all cars could be used for either the M line or the E line.

[VancouverOfTheFuture]

it still seems weird that they didn't buy even one middle car. you'd think they'd buy at least a handful or something. then they could have run 3 car trains. it seems like really bad planning that they didn't buy any. hopefully these new middle cars, "c" cars, could be added to those new, what i will call, Mark III trains. (I'm sure you can figure out what im talking about by saying Mark III).

[troublemaker]

I'm still having trouble connecting the dots between official documents on Skytrain upgrades.

The Provincial Transit Plan (2008) allocates $3.1 billion for doubling the capacity of the Expo line, including lengthening platforms at all stations to handle 6-car trains. Presumably they are talking about MKII trains, since no lengthening would be required to handle trains consisting of 6 MKI cars. MKI cars are obsolete, and don't have the potential to double system capacity.

http://www.th.gov.bc.ca/transit_plan/Provincial_Transit_Plan_LR.pdf

The Expo Line Upgrade Strategy (2010) makes no mention of 6-car MKII trains. Instead it recommends upgrading the system to trains of 5 MKII cars, requiring platform extensions at some stations.

http://www.translink.ca/~/media/document...e%20strategy%20%20project%20summary.ashx

The Translink Base Plan and Outlook (2014) outlines a $156 million program for station upgrades. It claims to be "consistent" with the Provincial Transit Plan and the Expo Upgrade Strategy, but includes no provision for lengthening station platforms.

http://www.translink.ca/~/media/document...n/2014_base_plan/2014%20base%20plan.ashx

Where is the consistency in dialing back from 6-car MKII trains to 5-car MKII trains, and then to no platform extensions at all?

[urbancanadian]

I think there's a little bit of misinformation going around, most of which has been corrected by the more senior forum members. Just thought I would add a little to help clear any confusion.

The plan to lengthen platforms by 20 metres was part of the "Provincial Transit Plan" which was announced before an election, and has never really been considered a serious/formal "plan". It was essentially something that sounded better than just "capacity improvements" to the general public during election season. I would say that any current documents that mention of a relationship to the Provincial Plan is essentially just "politically correct", and to simply just ignore them...

In reality, the studies have shown that any platform extension is unnecessary beyond 2041. In fact, platform extension would not add any capacity until all of the current planned upgrades are complete.
For example, say 20 metres of extra platform adds space for 100 people to wait for a train. Basically, since trains come as frequently as they do/will do (every 90 seconds-ish), you need to be able to move an additional 100 passengers up to/down from the platform every 90 sec, on top of the current load.
From what I understand, this means upgrades such as extra sets of stairs/escalators/elevators, wider walkways, more (and larger) station entries, etc.

From what I can recall, here are some of the capacity upgrades planned before any platform extension takes place:
* = Future upgrades not currently funded.

Waterfront:
* Massive new HUB planned (see appropriate thread)
Burrard:
* New entrance from the east side of Burrard Street (Park Place)
Stadium-Chinatown:
* platform lengthened to bring the east entry across Expo Boulevard (incl. escalators/elevator)
Main Street-Science World:
- under construction
Commercial-Broadway:
- site prep underway for phase 2 upgrades
* future developments will likely add a 6th platform/3rd passarelle
* new entrance from Grandview Highway
* potential additional entrances within adjacent developments
Joyce-Collingwood:
- expanded east station house (incl. escalators/elevator)
- more details should be public Dec. 01
Metrotown:
- complete station overhaul (I recently posted about the improvements in the station renos thread)
- more details should be public Dec. 01
Royal Oak:
* new escalators
Edmonds:
* likely a significant overhaul (incl. escalators/elevators, better weather protection, etc.)
* better neighbourhood connections (I think you will see new entrances from the south)
New Westminster:
- improved integration with other recent upgrades
Columbia:
* likely a significant overhaul (incl. escalators/elevators, who knows but it needs lots of work)
* perhaps a 3rd platform for a "Millenium Line shuttle" - discussed previously.
Scott Road:
- recently completed
Surrey Central:
- in the design phase... I can't remember exactly was the plan is here

And there are lots of other less-glamourous works to most stations such as improved emergency exits, electronics/software upgrades to the system, etc.

Okay, I'm sure I missed some things but that was getting super long anyways. Hope it made sense!

[officedweller]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

Because during those times ridership was much lower, and many times only single A-B cars were used (mostly on the M-Line) and being able to decouple a married pair (A-B + A-B) meant that all cars could be used for either the M line or the E line.

Yup - having the smaller trains sets allows costs to be reduced by running shorter trains while maintaining high frequency.

Honolulu just changed there trainset order because of a fixation on "length". So they are getting the same number of cars, but half the number of trains, which will double the headway between trains. Stupid move.

[xd_1771]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

ahh that makes sense. thanks. so, is there any reason why TransLink didnt originally order 4 car trains? ie A-C-C-B? i always thought it was really dumb being A-B-A-B.

The ability to decouple the cars resulted in the same 108s headways between Columbia and Waterfront you see today with the longer trains (from 2009-2010). At the time, given the ridership patterns, it was much better to take advantage of system flexibility to give a high frequency with shorter trains - other systems have longer trains with shorter frequency, generally due to imposed limits by drivers. I like to think that was the heyday of SkyTrain in terms of demonstrating what it can do. No city this size in North America has those sorts of headways - neither back then nor now - on the trunk portions of their rail transit lines (without quad-tracking or more).

[officedweller]

Originally Posted by xd_1771

- other systems have longer trains with shorter frequency, generally due to imposed limits by drivers.

I think you mean lower frequency.
"Shorter" doesn't make sense (since frequency is not a measure of time), and could suggest shorter headway (since headway is a measure of time).