O-Train Line 2 [Stage 1 | Bayview to Greenboro] | In Service

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

If I were to put a bit of money on the Trillium Line, I'd throw it at two stations, Carling and Heron (Confederation Heights) by building proper double track/platform stations beneath the roadway so they have entrances on both sides, integrated with platforms for BRT on Carling and Baseline/Heron.

Gladstone, Gladstone, Gladstone, Gladstone, Gladstone.

[ACmodels]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

The legend for that map indicates that there will only be isolated transit priority measures on the Bank Street corridor.

oh oops...

[Radster]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

This is the case for electric LRT. But for diesel vehicles which have slower acceleration, it's closer to a full minute.

The two-spur solution is really not worth pursuing unless the trunk is double tracked, for reasons that everyone seems to agree on. Pick one spur or the other with transit priority measures for the other route--airport spur + transitway extension to Bowesville, or Bowesville spur + bus lanes on the parkway. The city's TMP prepared by professionals in 2013 advocated the latter.

So can someone explain in detail why the two-spur solution is not worth pursuing? This seems like basic common sense and it would eliminate that transfer at South Keys. Its how the Canada Line works in Vancouver, no? I know Canada Line is double tracked. So just build a passing tracks near the EY Centre, and if there is more demand for riders in Bowesville, have more trains going there, ie. if trains run every 10 minutes, over the course of 1 hour, have 4 going to Bowesville and 2 to the airport and vice versa. I don't think the ridership demand is there to have trains every 8-10 minutes all the way to Bowesville anyway.

[silvergate]

Anybody going to the open house tonight?

[lrt's friend]

Bad news, I had a restless night and lots of time to think.

While the planners and councillors pat themselves on the back and the railroaders gleefully think of the train moverments, I think of the complexity of the proposal.

How is this all going to work and is it going to be reliable?

In order to do what they are proposing, we have to set up a complex set of switches and signals. Trains have to routinely switch tracks and wait repeatedly along the line. Yes, this is pretty routine railway procedure, but we also have to tightly follow a schedule. I have said that any sort of delay anywhere will have a cascading affect on schedules. Somebody mentioned that we have more passing tracks, but at the same time, we also have more trains as well. Part of the benefit of trains is more fixed scheduling but if this single track gets out of whack, we have limited options for getting the trains back onto schedule. We already have problems with the existing O-Train and I just get concerned that this could get worse with more passing tracks and more trains on the line. To make this system reliable, transfers have to work and that means that trains have to be on time almost all the time. Just remember the comment that at times people from Riverside South will have to ride on 3 or 4 different transit vehicles to reach downtown. That is something that a resident in Barrie doesn't need to do to reach downtown Toronto.

We have already seen a delay in implementing the new trainsets and this is at least partially related to the complexity of signalling required. What will happen when we try to make this line even more complex with shuttle trains as well as through trains?

Has anybody considered how these trains will operate? Where they have to be to make it work?

In my restlessness, it can only work one way as follows: There will be 8 trains. When 1 is at Bayview, 2 will be at the bypass track at Carleton. This is where it gets difficult. In order to make it work, there will have to be 3 trains at South Keys. One through train going north, one through train going south and one shuttle train going south. The two remaining trains will be at the airport and Bowesville. The only way South Keys can operate with the shuttle model is to have the two southbound trains back to back on the passing siding. This will allow the southbound trains to leave in tandem. But it seemed to me that the South Keys station platform was not going to be extended long enough to allow for two trains back to back, or are we going to make this even more complicated by making the southbound through train wait until the shuttle leaves? But that doesn't make sense if we want to facilitate transfers onto the shuttle train. So, have the planners screwed up by saying that the South Keys station platform will located only south of the pedestrian walkway. I think so.

Also think about this. The report suggests 8 minute frequency but the planner admitted that this might extend to 10 minute frequency. Is that even doable? Our new service model starting in February runs 4 trains between Greenboro and Bayview. As mentioned previously, we will be adding stations and additional stops at Walkley and Gladstone as part of the new proposal and each stop adds travel time. But we are also effectively adding another station. Under the new proposal, 4 trains will be running between South Keys and Bayview instead of Greenboro and Bayview adding another stop and more distance. Inevitably, this will take even more time than what will happen starting next month. So what will be the real possible frequency? It seems to me that we are drifting back towards the same service frequency that we have today. Are we really creating that much extra capacity to allow for growth in the future? This is of course the limitations of using a single track line.

[eternallyme]

Honestly, the Bowesville link should be removed as it provides no significant benefit at all - forced transfers in dead space. Instead, use that money for a much more valuable connection to Gatineau across the Prince of Wales Bridge. I think it should be built to the airport with a long-term option for a tunnel under the runway, then along the Limebank ROW, then into the existing ROW to Barrhaven.

[silvergate]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

Honestly, the Bowesville link should be removed as it provides no significant benefit at all - forced transfers in dead space. Instead, use that money for a much more valuable connection to Gatineau across the Prince of Wales Bridge. I think it should be built to the airport with a long-term option for a tunnel under the runway, then along the Limebank ROW, then into the existing ROW to Barrhaven.

We should focus on doubling the existing tracks first so that any future extensions can be added on seamlessly.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by Radster

So can someone explain in detail why the two-spur solution is not worth pursuing? This seems like basic common sense and it would eliminate that transfer at South Keys. Its how the Canada Line works in Vancouver, no? I know Canada Line is double tracked. So just build a passing tracks near the EY Centre, and if there is more demand for riders in Bowesville, have more trains going there, ie. if trains run every 10 minutes, over the course of 1 hour, have 4 going to Bowesville and 2 to the airport and vice versa. I don't think the ridership demand is there to have trains every 8-10 minutes all the way to Bowesville anyway.

In my opinion, the two spur solution is not worth pursuing so long as the Trillium Line trunk north of South Keys is not double tracked. Without double tracking that segment, two spurs requires the complicated shuttling arrangement that has been proposed, or very low frequencies. What I'm saying is that, so long as the money is not available to double track the Trillium trunk, we should pick one spur or the other.

The city's insistence on extending the line outwards without proper infrastructure in the interior is so typical of this city's transit planning: building grade separated transitways funnelling onto city streets downtown, then proposing to build electric LRT funnelling into a streetcar system downtown (2006 LRT plan). The Confederation Line, where a proper downtown tunnel scalable to very high capacities was built first before any extensions, is the one exception, the one example of proper transit buildout.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by silvergate

We should focus on doubling the existing tracks first so that any future extensions can be added on seamlessly.

Agreed.

[Aylmer]

In the meantime:

- Double-track as much as humanly possible. That means double-tracked stations (island platforms to save on cost?) and double-tracking the low-hanging fruit (south of the Rideau River. We'll have to do this anyways, so may as well do it now.

- O-Train to the Airport and cancel the road widening to help pay for it.

- Extend the SE Transitway to Bowesville and allow for a two-seat ride for RS residents (local bus + Metro at Hurdman) instead of a three-seat ride (local bus + Trillium + Metro at Bayview) while bypassing the traffic on Albion and Leitrim.

- Start making provisions for a future LRT extension under the runways to serve RS.

[MoreTrains]

Originally Posted by Aylmer

In the meantime:

- Double-track as much as humanly possible. That means double-tracked stations (island platforms to save on cost?) and double-tracking the low-hanging fruit (south of the Rideau River. We'll have to do this anyways, so may as well do it now.

- O-Train to the Airport and cancel the road widening to help pay for it.

- Extend the SE Transitway to Bowesville and allow for a two-seat ride for RS residents (local bus + Metro at Hurdman) instead of a three-seat ride (local bus + Trillium + Metro at Bayview) while bypassing the traffic on Albion and Leitrim.

- Start making provisions for a future LRT extension under the runways to serve RS.

Thank you! Some body else with a little sense.

[lrt's friend]

Of course my feelings have been expressed about electrification and double tracking and whether this can be achieved at any reasonable point in the future. It will be too costly and too disruptive and the majority of the city will make it clear that it is not a priority at any point. This has been expressed many times by posters here. Yet, at the same time, we complain about building a station in the forest.

I just feel that the city has botched this whole thing since the 2006 fiasco. The decision to split the southern route into LRT and BRT has never made any sense. We are creating an orphan busway.

Even if double tracking and electrification remains on the books, why would it ever get built? It is a reasonably short distance between Bowesville and the Riverside South Town Centre, so there will always be the feeling that it isn't worth. This is will be emphasized especially now that the link to Barrhaven will be buses. It won't serve that many people and therefore the extension and the enormous cost is not worth it.

We will end up with a rapid transit corridor in Riverside South that even under the best circumstances will lay abandoned for many years. What will inevitably happen is that a multi-purpose pathway will be built along it and it will become the next Byron Avenue linear park. It is inevitable and a planning disaster and will be a permanent monument in memory of Ottawa City Council who planned a whole community around transit and then failed to build it.

The idea of Riverside South Town Centre will also become a shadow of its potential and with the lack of rapid transit as originally planned will have to be the typical suburban big box centre with acres of parking. Once it is built badly, we are stuck with it.

End of rant.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Aylmer

In the meantime:

- Double-track as much as humanly possible. That means double-tracked stations (island platforms to save on cost?) and double-tracking the low-hanging fruit (south of the Rideau River. We'll have to do this anyways, so may as well do it now.

- O-Train to the Airport and cancel the road widening to help pay for it.

- Extend the SE Transitway to Bowesville and allow for a two-seat ride for RS residents (local bus + Metro at Hurdman) instead of a three-seat ride (local bus + Trillium + Metro at Bayview) while bypassing the traffic on Albion and Leitrim.

- Start making provisions for a future LRT extension under the runways to serve RS.

The snowball started to roll down the hill in the proposed direction starting in December 2006. It is too late.

The EA has set our course and it is too late to change it significantly.

We are being offered a bad option and the city has no appetite to push 'the reset button' again.

It is sad.

Meanwhile the politicians and planners continue to pat themselves on the back.

[1overcosc]

For the record, the 2006 LRT plan had only one fatal flaw: the downtown streetcar. The rest was great. They should have truncated it to Bayview and then built the remainder using the savings from eliminating the downtown section to pay for the airport spur that was originally left out.

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

For the record, the 2006 LRT plan had only one fatal flaw: the downtown streetcar. The rest was great. They should have truncated it to Bayview and then built the remainder.

STRONGLY agreed with you. I would have built it - and would revisit it and resurrect it - as far as Bayview, but the downtown at-grade alignment was a non-starter. It would have been prone to delays and accidents would have been frequent (with forced closures). Houston is having that major problem, they had accidents about every few days with a less intrusive alignment, and still 10+ years later have accidents quite frequently. If anything it would be worse in Ottawa.

[Aylmer]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

The snowball started to roll down the hill in the proposed direction starting in December 2006. It is too late.

The EA has set our course and it is too late to change it significantly.

We are being offered a bad option and the city has no appetite to push 'the reset button' again.

It is sad.

Meanwhile the politicians and planners continue to pat themselves on the back.

That is EXACTLY what the MTQ said about the Rapibus in 2004. And that didn't turn out great. The truth is that, as much as it sucks, it is actually possible to not build something even if an EA has been done, especially when that something is a bad idea.

It's the same route, same stations, but with fewer overpasses (because it isn't a DMU) and with asphalt, not steel. I'm certain that we could find a way to amend the EA to take these differences into account without starting from scratch.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

For the record, the 2006 LRT plan had only one fatal flaw: the downtown streetcar. The rest was great. They should have truncated it to Bayview and then built the remainder using the savings from eliminating the downtown section to pay for the airport spur that was originally left out.

Agreed, the downtown streetcar was flawed by itself. But, if we had built the tunnel as well (this was inevitable), then the end result would have been better than what we see in the future. Lopping off the downtown streetcar has really ended the possibility of converting the Trillium Line to double track electric service. It has made it just too easy to putter along with single track and DMUs and not upgrade the inner city trunk part of the line. It is only going to Bayview so why does it need to be double tracked?

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Aylmer

That is EXACTLY what the MTQ said about the Rapibus in 2004. And that didn't turn out great. The truth is that, as much as it —, it is actually possible to not build something even if an EA has been done, especially when that something is a bad idea.

It's the same route, same stations, but with fewer overpasses (because it isn't a DMU) and with asphalt, not steel. I'm certain that we could find a way to amend the EA to take these differences into account without starting from scratch.

There is a lot of people in power who are convinced that the proposal is good. It will take a lot of convincing of a lot of people to change the course. I am just being realistic. It really amounts to be the best consolation prize that is possible after the 2006 fiasco for politicians such as Diane Deans and Jan Harder.

If you go back years, you will see that I repeatedly said that it was not a good idea to extend the O-Train with DMUs. We need to do it right, which meant double tracking and electrification of the current route first and connecting to the Confederation Line at Bayview. As I said, we keep making mistakes all along this decision process.

The Southeast Transitway extension has come up at various times but there has never been enough people in power willing to promote it. Also, the environmentalists would have come out against it in droves. And the Riverside South town plan would have had to be significantly modified. The window for changing that plan is quickly closing as housing has started enclosing the right of way.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by Aylmer

In the meantime:

- Double-track as much as humanly possible. That means double-tracked stations (island platforms to save on cost?) and double-tracking the low-hanging fruit (south of the Rideau River. We'll have to do this anyways, so may as well do it now.

- O-Train to the Airport and cancel the road widening to help pay for it.

- Extend the SE Transitway to Bowesville and allow for a two-seat ride for RS residents (local bus + Metro at Hurdman) instead of a three-seat ride (local bus + Trillium + Metro at Bayview) while bypassing the traffic on Albion and Leitrim.

- Start making provisions for a future LRT extension under the runways to serve RS.

So something like this?


I like it. A lot, actually.

Would likely require some revisions to subdivision plans to keep a clear ROW from the airport to RS TC.

[Andrew_G]

Looks like the current plan (according to the new Citizen article) is to have the new expanded service begin Feb 21st barring any unforseen issues. Overnight “systems acceptance testing” will begin this Sunday with the new trains. Shutdown for the switchover will start Feb 14th.