Calgary Public Transit II

[MasterG]

Something like this, red (NW Hub tram/bus), Yellow NC BRT:

[url=https://flic.kr/p/q36xud][/IMG]

[VIce]

Originally Posted by MasterG

As long as we hold the line on the other improvements that a tram usually comes with I am all for it. Some dedicated RoW, proper stops (with shelter, map, lighting etc.), real-time next bus time information and all door boarding I am all for buses.

All that other stuff is really what makes trams often faster and more efficient. Trams are often just the flashy centre-piece that makes all that other stuff palatable to pay for.

There is something to be said for the quality of ride, overall capacity and quietness to better integrate into its surroundings - all big bonuses of having a tram, that usually do attract more riders than an identical bus system - but the real wins happen with the more obvious stuff like RoW.

So yes fine to put buses instead of trams, as long as we build with the goal of making this a fast, efficient and attractive service. The regular BS Calgary Transit shuttle strategy won't come close to giving this area the transit it deserves.

There is a real opportunity here to do it right from the start.

It'd be awesome if this were the case for the BRT routes we already have, also.

But yes. The University/Foothills/ACH area could really use a circulator of some kind. The current routes are all about commuting, as opposed to people going about their day.

[fusili]

Originally Posted by MasterG

Something like this, red (NW Hub tram/bus), Yellow NC BRT:

[url=https://flic.kr/p/q36xud][/IMG]

Why split this up? This can be the same route. It eliminates transfers. Just eliminate the stop at the west end of the hospital. Although it is a large facility, it isn't unreasonable to walk from South Tower to 16th ave.

[ByeByeBaby]

Originally Posted by MasterG

As long as we hold the line on the other improvements that a tram usually comes with I am all for it. Some dedicated RoW, proper stops (with shelter, map, lighting etc.), real-time next bus time information and all door boarding I am all for buses.

All that other stuff is really what makes trams often faster and more efficient. Trams are often just the flashy centre-piece that makes all that other stuff palatable to pay for.

There is something to be said for the quality of ride, overall capacity and quietness to better integrate into its surroundings - all big bonuses of having a tram, that usually do attract more riders than an identical bus system - but the real wins happen with the more obvious stuff like RoW.

So yes fine to put buses instead of trams, as long as we build with the goal of making this a fast, efficient and attractive service. The regular BS Calgary Transit shuttle strategy won't come close to giving this area the transit it deserves.

There is a real opportunity here to do it right from the start.

I'm all for dedicated ROW when needed, but in this case (with a small queue jump here or there aside) it won't help. The challenge in transit getting around within the NW Hub area isn't primarily because there's a lot of traffic in the way - the problem is that the area is filled with circuitous roads.

That's actually the secondary problem - the primary problem is that the major nodes here are constructed such that they can't be well served by transit passing by (transit needs to go into loops and the like), and that they are laid out so that they can't be served by one direct route.

All the ROW in the world won't fix the underlying land use problems.

[Bassic Lab]

Originally Posted by fusili

Why split this up? This can be the same route. It eliminates transfers. Just eliminate the stop at the west end of the hospital. Although it is a large facility, it isn't unreasonable to walk from South Tower to 16th ave.

16 Ave @ 29 St is a solid mile from ACH. That really starts eating into walking access. A stop in the vicinity of 16 Ave @ West Campus Drive could serve the southern half of the west campus development while the ACH stop serves the north half.

As long as frequencies are high the transfer wouldn't be a problem. I think there would be value in maintaining the 16 Ave crosstown as an east-west crosstown continuing on to Bowness and points west. Keeping the lines separate would help to establish a grid of routes.

My one suggestion for MasterG would be to eliminate the double back portion of the route. Move the U of C stop a little west so that it is a little north of in between the Olympic Oval and Kinesiology complex, then head to Brentwood more directly by following the 33 St alignment. The U of C would lose some parking along the way but it would cut about 3/4 of a mile of track out. So it would be cheaper, faster, and more frequent for a given number of vehicles. Also, seeing how West Campus isn't built yet, it might be prudent to pick a more direct route between the stations on a dedicated ROW. You could probably get the route down to about 2.5 km while yours looks to be almost 4.5 km of route on 4 km of track. 30 km/h is a reasonable estimate for speed. So it's the difference between a ten minute round trip (a decent evening and weekend frequency) and an eighteen minute round trip.

[MalcolmTucker]

the roads are going to evenutally be realigned with 33rd connected back up iirc http://www.ucalgary.ca/cp/campusmasterplan:
hosted by CREB. from the university of calgary

[MasterG]

Originally Posted by Bassic Lab

16 Ave @ 29 St is a solid mile from ACH. That really starts eating into walking access. A stop in the vicinity of 16 Ave @ West Campus Drive could serve the southern half of the west campus development while the ACH stop serves the north half.

As long as frequencies are high the transfer wouldn't be a problem. I think there would be value in maintaining the 16 Ave crosstown as an east-west crosstown continuing on to Bowness and points west. Keeping the lines separate would help to establish a grid of routes.

My one suggestion for MasterG would be to eliminate the double back portion of the route. Move the U of C stop a little west so that it is a little north of in between the Olympic Oval and Kinesiology complex, then head to Brentwood more directly by following the 33 St alignment. The U of C would lose some parking along the way but it would cut about 3/4 of a mile of track out. So it would be cheaper, faster, and more frequent for a given number of vehicles. Also, seeing how West Campus isn't built yet, it might be prudent to pick a more direct route between the stations on a dedicated ROW. You could probably get the route down to about 2.5 km while yours looks to be almost 4.5 km of route on 4 km of track. 30 km/h is a reasonable estimate for speed. So it's the difference between a ten minute round trip (a decent evening and weekend frequency) and an eighteen minute round trip.

I get what your are saying about increasing the length. I think it is worth the loss of overall speed, at least initially. The university's main hub is really something we would want to get close too, backing the track up is a good 300 - 400m to Mac Hall, and most students would be going farther than that. As a primary stop, I think that's a bit of stretch to have people walking. I guess it would all depend on the University expansion plans and the pace they come on. Eventually they would pull the centre of campus further west and reduce the loop stop's value. For now I would suspect it is worth it.

Macolm Tucker's map shows the long term plan nicely, so 33rd Street might make the most sense.

Half that parking is already gone I think with the new residences and engineering expansion projects.

[joe498]

Originally Posted by suburbia

Agreed that any suggestion of a gondola as an LRT replacement is uneducated. Need to leverage them where their advantages can be exploited.

But let us be honest, we are not getting a new LRT in the next 15 years let alone dedicated busways. Timetables are distant in addition to the fact that Prentice has stated many infrastructure projects will be under review and could be delayed further. Unless some major changes come in terms of the way cities are funded expanding LRT is a pipedream anyways.

Originally Posted by fusili

Gondolas:

- Can only operate in straight lines without utilizing turning stations.
- Cannot increase/reduce frequency to meet demand. The frequency at late night is the same as it is during the peak.
- Capacity is lower than a train (30K/hr vs ~2K/hr). In fact this capacity is equal to a single car lane. Not really mass transit.
- Require staff at all stations at all times, often more than one.
- Slow (generally)
- No possibility of at-grade boarding. Universal access requires elevators at every station

A few things to point out:

- In New York: "A New York City real estate developer wants to build a high-speed gondola that he claims could carry 5,000 people per hour in both directions between Brooklyn, Manhattan and, eventually, Queens."
**Being that this is just one gondola system and you could have many more in all directions it's actually quite decent. I would prefer to compare gondolas to buses. The places that would benefit most from gondolas are indeed areas restricted to bus routes for the next 20 years.
- "According to Fatzer, the fastest cable car system in the world operating at a top speed of 18 m/s (~ 65 km/hr). That’s fast. Light Rail fast."
- A very inefficient version of this is actually utilized during stampede with temporary gondolas.
- Gondolas are actually a much better user experience than riding a crammed bus with rapid starts and stops with strong smells of diesel.
- Costs of operating are much much cheaper and such a system can actually become profitable at a much quicker rate. The cost recovery can be used to further expand the network whereas rail takes many years to become even profitable.

I'm not saying this should be used rather than LRT but if nothing else I think this could be an excellent way to relieve the bus system and help network to LRT stations and transit hubs. Bus systems are subject to endless variables, delays and long term upkeep costs in addition to staffing costs. Gondolas are a method to relieve a costly, inefficient and finite method of transit that we know as roads.

[ByeByeBaby]

Originally Posted by joe498

But let us be honest, we are not getting a new LRT in the next 15 years let alone dedicated busways. Timetables are distant in addition to the fact that Prentice has stated many infrastructure projects will be under review and could be delayed further. Unless some major changes come in terms of the way cities are funded expanding LRT is a pipedream anyways.

A few things to point out:

- In New York: "A New York City real estate developer wants to build a high-speed gondola that he claims could carry 5,000 people per hour in both directions between Brooklyn, Manhattan and, eventually, Queens."
**Being that this is just one gondola system and you could have many more in all directions it's actually quite decent. I would prefer to compare gondolas to buses. The places that would benefit most from gondolas are indeed areas restricted to bus routes for the next 20 years.
- "According to Fatzer, the fastest cable car system in the world operating at a top speed of 18 m/s (~ 65 km/hr). That’s fast. Light Rail fast."
- A very inefficient version of this is actually utilized during stampede with temporary gondolas.
- Gondolas are actually a much better user experience than riding a crammed bus with rapid starts and stops with strong smells of diesel.
- Costs of operating are much much cheaper and such a system can actually become profitable at a much quicker rate. The cost recovery can be used to further expand the network whereas rail takes many years to become even profitable.

I'm not saying this should be used rather than LRT but if nothing else I think this could be an excellent way to relieve the bus system and help network to LRT stations and transit hubs. Bus systems are subject to endless variables, delays and long term upkeep costs in addition to staffing costs. Gondolas are a method to relieve a costly, inefficient and finite method of transit that we know as roads.

You're hilarious! I hope you don't mind that I fixed your bolding a little.

"We're not going to get the highest capacity technology built in 15 years, so therefore instead of incremental improvements leading to it, we should build any other arbitrary thing that might be cheaper, regardless of whether it makes sense." Why a gondola at all? Why not a pony ride? Forget 65, a pony can run 70 km/h. That's faster. Light rail faster.

"The standard technology we have lots of experience with is subject to endless variables; instead let's switch to some hypothetical gadget this Lyle Lanley fella drew on the back of this napkin. I'm sure there's no variables with that."

Okay, let's compare gondolas to buses.

• There's already a track for buses to run on all the way between any two points in the city.
• There are already all the infrastructure we need for stations for buses in the SE or anywhere else.
• We already have the maintenance facilities for buses. Buses can drive much faster than 65 km/h.
• When a bus breaks down, you pull another one up behind it and people walk between the two; the whole system keeps going.
• Buses can match demand; you could handle 10,000 people an hour or 10 (guess which one is closer to the SE BRT demand).
• Buses don't have a nasty habit of costing two or four times what they were supposed to.

[joe498]

Originally Posted by ByeByeBaby

You're hilarious! I hope you don't mind that I fixed your bolding a little.

"We're not going to get the highest capacity technology built in 15 years, so therefore instead of incremental improvements leading to it, we should build any other arbitrary thing that might be cheaper, regardless of whether it makes sense." Why a gondola at all? Why not a pony ride? Forget 65, a pony can run 70 km/h. That's faster. Light rail faster.

"The standard technology we have lots of experience with is subject to endless variables; instead let's switch to some hypothetical gadget this Lyle Lanley fella drew on the back of this napkin. I'm sure there's no variables with that."

Okay, let's compare gondolas to buses.

• There's already a track for buses to run on all the way between any two points in the city.
• There are already all the infrastructure we need for stations for buses in the SE or anywhere else.
• We already have the maintenance facilities for buses. Buses can drive much faster than 65 km/h.
• When a bus breaks down, you pull another one up behind it and people walk between the two; the whole system keeps going.
• Buses can match demand; you could handle 10,000 people an hour or 10 (guess which one is closer to the SE BRT demand).
• Buses don't have a nasty habit of costing two or four times what they were supposed to.

I don't know about you but I have never ever experienced a bus during commuter hours going faster than 65km/h aside from short stints on Glenmore. Most routes don't have that luxury in addition to the reality of every day accidents thus bringing traffic to a standstill. In most feeder routes you are faced with residential speeds, school zones, lights and left hand turns all bringing your average speed greatly down as well as time reliability. Snow is also a factor.

Calgary and the Setway plan is a distant plan. In the way it is proceeding you will either way lose more money ripping out the roads when it does come time to lay track. It's not as if we are saving vast quantities by sticking with buses.

The ideal would still be to have LRT in all directions but you still need a feeder system and most people in this city feel above buses. I don't see how adding further buses addresses the congestion of our roads.

[sim]

Originally Posted by joe498

I don't know about you but I have never ever experienced a bus during commuter hours going faster than 65km/h aside from short stints on Glenmore. Most routes don't have that luxury in addition to the reality of every day accidents thus bringing traffic to a standstill. In most feeder routes you are faced with residential speeds, school zones, lights and left hand turns all bringing your average speed greatly down as well as time reliability. Snow is also a factor.

Calgary and the Setway plan is a distant plan. In the way it is proceeding you will either way lose more money ripping out the roads when it does come time to lay track. It's not as if we are saving vast quantities by sticking with buses.

The ideal would still be to have LRT in all directions but you still need a feeder system and most people in this city feel above buses. I don't see how adding further buses addresses the congestion of our roads.

Surely you understand that it matters only a little that a ropeway can possibly achieve 65 kph (and the one you are referencing is only a test facility anyway), if you're actually supposed to have intermediate stations, and not just one or two.. I don't suppose you figured users would just make a running jump onto the cars themselves? Oh, surprisingly that particular concept isn't even new..

Contemporary urban transportation problems have more than enough technological solutions available, it's the politics and policies that aren't commensurate. I, for one, see exactly how adding more buses addresses congestion on our roads, just so long as more road space/signal time is allocated to them.

Anyway, CBC can help make this a bit more interesting and ironic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?x-yt-cl=85114404&v=jQfC6mKTErg&x-yt-ts=1422579428

[Full Mountain]

Originally Posted by joe498

I don't know about you but I have never ever experienced a bus during commuter hours going faster than 65km/h aside from short stints on Glenmore. Most routes don't have that luxury in addition to the reality of every day accidents thus bringing traffic to a standstill. In most feeder routes you are faced with residential speeds, school zones, lights and left hand turns all bringing your average speed greatly down as well as time reliability. Snow is also a factor.

Calgary and the Setway plan is a distant plan. In the way it is proceeding you will either way lose more money ripping out the roads when it does come time to lay track. It's not as if we are saving vast quantities by sticking with buses.

The ideal would still be to have LRT in all directions but you still need a feeder system and most people in this city feel above buses. I don't see how adding further buses addresses the congestion of our roads.

Actually the Green line Bus Transitway (Douglasglen to 78th Ave N) is mostly funded ($520M of $625M) and will begin construction in 2017 on the NC portion.

[andasen]

Interesting study coming to T&T committee regarding the potential for the Green Line to be Elevated through Downtown rather than tunneled. It is part of a larger item looking at four different options for downtown.

Preliminary Study of Elevated Green Line

Evaluation of City Centre Options

[suburbia]

Originally Posted by andasen

Interesting study coming to T&T committee regarding the potential for the Green Line to be Elevated through Downtown rather than tunneled. It is part of a larger item looking at four different options for downtown.

Preliminary Study of Elevated Green Line

Evaluation of City Centre Options

I've suggested this numerous times, on this forum, and to people who are influencers. We already have an above grade people network within the downtown, and it would make crossing the river much easier, instead of being way under and then needing a massive net altitude gain.

[milomilo]

The links above don't work; this one might:

http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub/mtgviewer.aspx?meetid=1627&doctype=AGENDA

Originally Posted by suburbia

I've suggested this numerous times, on this forum, and to people who are influencers. We already have an above grade people network within the downtown, and it would make crossing the river much easier, instead of being way under and then needing a massive net altitude gain.

Stantec have done a study (in the link) - according to them it has the same cost as the tunnel + bridge option with all the disbenefits of that bridge, as well as the cost to the public realm downtown associated with going elevated. The guideway and stations would be very similar in height and width to the Sunalta section.

It's a non starter really, I expect the city did the study just so they can say they have looked at all the options. Interestingly, the Stantec document has some more detailed maps of the Prince's Island bridge section - it looks much longer than I previously thought.

[suburbia]

Originally Posted by milomilo

The links above don't work; this one might:

http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub/mtgviewer.aspx?meetid=1627&doctype=AGENDA



Stantec have done a study (in the link) - according to them it has the same cost as the tunnel + bridge option with all the disbenefits of that bridge

That is not actually what they said. In general, elevated tracks are much cheaper than underground. They stated this. What they added though was that Calgary downtown context, EG road widths and the like, will add cost. They are not sure how much, however, it could become a wash as compared to underground.

What they didn't consider, is the impact to the portion north of the core. If the downtown portion is a wash, potential savings of not having to gain 100' of extra elevation, and limiting the amount that would need to be cored there, could result in a net major savings.

I would much prefer an elevated system, and wouldn't mind the wash in costs, if it can be integrated into the +15 and/or +30 at the stations. That would make for a pretty unique solution.

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by suburbia

That is not actually what they said. In general, elevated tracks are much cheaper than underground. They stated this. What they added though was that Calgary downtown context, EG road widths and the like, will add cost. They are not sure how much, however, it could become a wash as compared to underground.

What they didn't consider, is the impact to the portion north of the core. If the downtown portion is a wash, potential savings of not having to gain 100' of extra elevation, and limiting the amount that would need to be cored there, could result in a net major savings.

I would much prefer an elevated system, and wouldn't mind the wash in costs, if it can be integrated into the +15 and/or +30 at the stations. That would make for a pretty unique solution.

[suburbia]

Originally Posted by milomilo

My bad - but with these numbers you see that the price is tied for cheapest if you don't count eating up lanes on the Centre Street Bridge as a reasonable option. How then do you conclude:

Originally Posted by milomilo

It's a non starter really, I expect the city did the study just so they can say they have looked at all the options.

??

[93JC]

Originally Posted by suburbia

My bad - but with these numbers you see that the price is tied for cheapest if you don't count eating up lanes on the Centre Street Bridge as a reasonable option. How then do you conclude:

??

Because it's tied for cheapest with burying it, and burying it eliminates all of the disadvantages of elevating it.

[MasterG]

Originally Posted by 93JC

Because it's tied for cheapest with burying it, and burying it eliminates all of the disadvantages of elevating it.

Are there reasons why they cannot use the Centre Street bridge at grade, and plunge it below grade right in China town as it exits the bridge? Continue below grade beneath 4th Ave until 10th Ave (tunnel under the tower centre in some fashion). Combines the best of both options, keeps things cheap north of the river, crosses the river on the existing structure, bury on Centre rather than the awkward turn over to 2nd Street. Avoids bridging Prince's Island which would be a terrible shame to one of our best parks. An extra few hundred million to destroy an inner city gem isn't a great way to go.

Personally I prefer the fully underground option, but for an extra 700 million we could get 5-10km of LRT somewhere else (or bury the NW-S line). Much bigger bang for our buck out there.

Does anyone know why they are committed to 2nd Street?