Calgary Stoney Trail [Ring Road]

[Innersoul1]

Originally Posted by speedog

And every one of those communities has an entry/exit point that doesn't involve any travel on the ring road either. Now I'm not for a toll on the ring road but no one would be forced to pay a toll to enter/exit their community if such a toll were to come to pass.

Sorry, I did't really put an adequate explanation into my response. I would suggest that as a result of the proximity to the ring road (built with no toll) the arterial roads surrounding those communities would struggle with volume.

[CalgaryAlex]

Originally Posted by milomilo

Do you honestly think roads and personal vehicles will ever go away? You may want them to, but the freedom to go wherever you want whenever you want is one of the best things about living in the modern world. People aren't going to give that up just because it's 'an outdated infrastructure model'. Transit is an OK way to get downtown to work, but it's usefulness outside of that even in cities with great transit is extremely limited.

That's not to say cars can't get way more efficient with different power sources and automation, but personal vehicles are never going to go away whether you like it or not, so there has to be roads in our future.

Damn, I wish I could unread this infuriating post. Ruined my morning.

Summary: High mobility is 100% reliant on the personal vehicles, and the only possible improvement is more efficient vehicles. Welcome to the 1950s.

[fusili]

Originally Posted by CalgaryAlex

Damn, I wish I could unread this infuriating post. Ruined my morning.

Summary: High mobility is 100% reliant on the personal vehicles, and the only possible improvement is more efficient vehicles. Welcome to the 1950s.

It's a false dichotomy. We can plan for better mobility without doing so by exclusively funding and planning for automobile movement. Encouraging transit and other modes of travel does not mean we are eliminating cars.

It is also a confusion of mobility and access. Access is what people desire, and we can achieve it through a variety of means, not just automobile mobility.

The fundamental problem with automobiles is that every person who chooses to drive reduces the efficiency of the system and slows everyone else down. Transit works in the exact opposite way.

[CalgaryAlex]

Originally Posted by fusili

It's a false dichotomy. We can plan for better mobility without doing so by exclusively funding and planning for automobile movement. Encouraging transit and other modes of travel does not mean we are eliminating cars.

It is also a confusion of mobility and access. Access is what people desire, and we can achieve it through a variety of means, not just automobile mobility.

The fundamental problem with automobiles is that every person who chooses to drive reduces the efficiency of the system and slows everyone else down. Transit works in the exact opposite way.

The thing that irked me above is the assumption that even great transit systems don't offer its users the ability to go wherever they want, when they want. I'm sure people who live in cities with incredible transit systems have no problem getting to where they want to be in an efficient amount of time. It was a ridiculous statement. Not every transit system in the world is primarily focused on providing service to the CBD.

There are a dozen different ways to plan transit, but Calgary's "catch-all" system spreads the limited funds too thin, feeding the attitude that you need a car to get around. It's frustrating and does nothing to reverse attitudes towards the personal vehicle in this city. You can give people their vehicular access while promoting and prioritizing transit, but that isn't happening.

[The Chemist]

Originally Posted by milomilo

Transit is an OK way to get downtown to work, but it's usefulness outside of that even in cities with great transit is extremely limited.

You do realize that in most cities with great transit many people can and do live car-free, right?

You think a system this extensive is designed to do nothing but serve downtown?

[yyc_engineer]

Can anyone confirm the location of the SW Ring Road Open House tonight? I want to say that I saw a sign saying it is as the "Bethany Chapel Of Calgary" which is down by Mount Royal. Would like to stop off on the way home and am trying to plan my commute.

EDIT: Yes it is, just called them.

[fusili]

Originally Posted by The Chemist

You do realize that in most cities with great transit many people can and do live car-free, right?

Amen. In many cities (Europe and Asia), transit is in fact more convenient that driving to the vast majority of the City.

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by CalgaryAlex

Damn, I wish I could unread this infuriating post. Ruined my morning.

Summary: High mobility is 100% reliant on the personal vehicles, and the only possible improvement is more efficient vehicles. Welcome to the 1950s.

That ruined your morning? OK...

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by fusili

It's a false dichotomy. We can plan for better mobility without doing so by exclusively funding and planning for automobile movement. Encouraging transit and other modes of travel does not mean we are eliminating cars.

It is also a confusion of mobility and access. Access is what people desire, and we can achieve it through a variety of means, not just automobile mobility.

The fundamental problem with automobiles is that every person who chooses to drive reduces the efficiency of the system and slows everyone else down. Transit works in the exact opposite way.

It is a false dichotomy, you're right. But one that is presented from both sides of the argument. There are people on one side vehemently against any single piece of road infrastructure that might possibly be beneficial to personal vehicles, and on the other who are against any public money being spent on public transit. There is a middle ground.

The piece of road infrastructure we're talking about here goes around the city, it is designed to take people off of city roads, yet we still have plenty of people opposed to it. Not building it will do nothing to force people on to transit, it will just make the city roads more unpleasant and congested.

The way to get people to use transit is to build better transit. Right now we have two LRT lines that only go downtown, and chances are you don't live near a station.

[craner]

Originally Posted by yyc_engineer

Can anyone confirm the location of the SW Ring Road Open House tonight? I want to say that I saw a sign saying it is as the "Bethany Chapel Of Calgary" which is down by Mount Royal. Would like to stop off on the way home and am trying to plan my commute.

EDIT: Yes it is, just called them.

I am unable to attend the open house so a report back to SSP would be appreciated.
I'm particularly interested when shovels will be in the ground.
Thanks in advance.

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by The Chemist

You do realize that in most cities with great transit many people can and do live car-free, right?

Frankly, that's not a lifestyle I'm interested in living. There are a few reasons:

• I like to be able to get to the mountains often
• Despite living in the inner city, there is no grocery store within walking distance (though if there was I would definitely walk there most of the time).
• I need a vehicle for my work
• My office is in an industrial area which would be near impossible to service by transit
• Getting furniture from IKEA etc would be much less easy (though probably not an issue if you're in a 300sqft studio)

That doesn't mean I don't want transit to be improved though, I definitely would like to use transit more than I do. But right now there are few cases where it is the best option for me, and it wouldn't change much even if congestion was twice as bad, because there are very limited destinations to go by train.

[sim]

Originally Posted by MalcolmTucker

I am stating otherwise. Generally stats about the Highway Trust Fund in the USA aren't applicable here.

Check out the provincial budget: budget.alberta.ca

You'll want to compare the department of transportation estimates with the fuel tax amount in the fiscal plan tables.

Thanks for the link. Unfortunately, that's rather unconvincing.

You're basing the assertion off of a Capital Plan. From what I'm seeing in it, as pertains to this discussion one that has the following, and to an extent aligns with what you've previously said:

- 2015-2016 capital expense at 1300 million:

- 2015-2016 Fuel tax estimated revenue: 1,434 million. 2014-2015 actual: 944 million.

Best I can tell is that they applied the fuel tax increase linearly to the actual, perhaps assuming a modest increase in driving to arrive at the number. Without all the details, it's hard to tell if they considered any elasticity of demand with that or the fact that in a recession/hard economic times people generally drive less and that vehicles continually get more fuel efficient. Let's call it a wash, but the tax increase is a small step in the right direction and a pretty tacit acknowledgement that roadway expenditure is indeed being subsidized. Dodge seems to allude to this in his report as well.

But let's be clear, we are talking about something that hasn't happened yet. It's a bit bold to fix an assertion around something that hasn't happened yet and backward project it.

That exactly being said, the budget is for one year. It has no historical context and costs included, so it could easily just be a one-off that reflects a period of lower capital expenditure (it's well known AT hasn't really had any money recently). It also doesn't capture all the municipal spending on roadways (who don't get their own gas tax.. yet).

It does state that it covers municipal grants. Assessing just Calgary, a rough share of the 270 million is about 100 million. Since this does include a good share of transit funding I won't be too hard on the number, but it's a rather safe bet that Calgary spends more on roadway maintenance and operations than that number, even if it were all to be allocated to roads would not be enough: Roads (2014 Net Operating Budget - $142.3 M) and has a good chunk of additional capital costs (between 100 to 300 million Roads and TI). Yes, some of this is funded through fuel tax transfers - which unfortunately was already spoken for above.

Obviously this calculus gets rather complex, with a bunch of cross-subsidization, transferring and subjective accounting.

What I can conclude is that when it gets greyer, I'd tend toward aggregate numbers that endogenize the layers of money movment and an academic study on the subject and not an annual Capital Budget. There are not too many jurisdictions in the world that can say their public roadways aren't subsidized to some extent - in a way that's the point, and Canada is not leading the way on that front. While we aren't quite the US, it's not like we differ vastly in spatial patterns and infrastructure. They might have a 50% user pays shortfall, and we might have something more like 40 to 30% if I'm being generous.

Quote from linked report:

"Governments in Canada spend almost $29 billion on roads every year – far more than they spend on transit, rail, air, marine and all other transportation modes combined. Fuel taxes, licence fees and all other motor vehicle payments cover only a little over half of that cost; $13 billion is subsidized by other sources."

Again, I'd just like to reiterate that we haven't even begun to account for negative externalities. And as already pointed out, these tend to increase the more we favour roadway infrastructure and decrease if we favour other modes. In that same vein, let's also remember that subsidizing roadways perversely causes us to then have to subsidize public transit to a greater degree. That is most definitely not included an a Capital Plan.

[The Chemist]

Originally Posted by milomilo

Frankly, that's not a lifestyle I'm interested in living. There are a few reasons:

• I like to be able to get to the mountains often
• Despite living in the inner city, there is no grocery store within walking distance (though if there was I would definitely walk there most of the time).
• I need a vehicle for my work
• My office is in an industrial area which would be near impossible to service by transit
• Getting furniture from IKEA etc would be much less easy (though probably not an issue if you're in a 300sqft studio)

That doesn't mean I don't want transit to be improved though, I definitely would like to use transit more than I do. But right now there are few cases where it is the best option for me, and it wouldn't change much even if congestion was twice as bad, because there are very limited destinations to go by train.

Yeah, but this is almost all Calgary specific. You claimed that even in cities with great transit, the usefulness of transit outside of bringing people downtown for work is extremely limited, which is objectively untrue.

[Fuzz]

Good to see pathway underpasses. The worst part of the greenway on the east side is the repeated overpasses you have to detour 1km or more to get around. It goes from nice pathway, to sidewalks, crossing multi-lane roads etc.

[MalcolmTucker]

Originally Posted by sim

Quote from linked report:

Who cares about cross Canada numbers. We have Alberta numbers, and this is an Alberta road.

Motor vehicle licenses more than cover any difference at $525m, then there is the 4% sales tax on auto insurance.

Would you dismiss a future toll as "something that hasn't happened yet. It's a bit bold to fix an assertion around something that hasn't happened yet and backward project it."?

The government is pretty good at projecting tax revenues, you might say it is one of their core functions. Plus the tax has been at that level for 7 months now, if you want to see the revenue flows from it go into the first quarterly report issued at the end of August.

The PCs decided (partly because this project is so expensive!) to line up spending with revenue. The NDs are continuing this.

How is it so hard to support good policy? You can argue against building this project without using a factually incorrect subsidy argument.

[outoftheice]

Originally Posted by 5seconds

The City has released the boards that were presented at the Open House last night:

http://www.calgary.ca/Transportation/TP/...W-ring-road/ring-road-boards-oct2015.pdf

and includes some more detail on some of the connections (but not all), like the new Westhills Way:

Just curious if all of these improvement projects by the city are fully funded already or if they are dependent on money being found in future budget cycles?

[fusili]

Originally Posted by milomilo

It is a false dichotomy, you're right. But one that is presented from both sides of the argument. There are people on one side vehemently against any single piece of road infrastructure that might possibly be beneficial to personal vehicles, and on the other who are against any public money being spent on public transit. There is a middle ground.

The piece of road infrastructure we're talking about here goes around the city, it is designed to take people off of city roads, yet we still have plenty of people opposed to it. Not building it will do nothing to force people on to transit, it will just make the city roads more unpleasant and congested.

The way to get people to use transit is to build better transit. Right now we have two LRT lines that only go downtown, and chances are you don't live near a station.

The rationale for the SWRR (if I understand correctly) is to remove non-city bound traffic from using city roads- i.e. freight traffic bypassing the city. It's purpose is not to serve intra-city traffic. If that is the purpose, all the SWRR would do is move congestion from 14th street to congestion on Crowchild. Doesn't solve anything. I buy the freight argument, I sure as hell don't buy the easing commuter congestion argument.

Yes, we have 2 LRT lines right now. We also have one more planned (Green Line) on the way, 4 existing BRTs (301, 302, 305, 306), several more planned and hundreds of bus routes. In fact, we have a plan to implement a BRT from the SW to downtown via MRU and Rockyview that will begin construction next year, which serves the exact purpose that many SWRR proponents claim to be a benefit of the road.


As for freight traffic, I don't think there is a lot of freight traffic going from Nanton to Golden (obviously a hyperbole, but there isn't a large amount of industrial traffic headed from the south to the west that wouldn't use the #3 instead). There is a considerable amount of freight traffic headed from the SE (Foothills Industrial) to the west, which, let's admit it, will be primarily using Glenmore or Anderson to get to the SWRR. One thing that is barely mentioned is that with the construction of the SWRR, it basically forces the City to upgrade Anderson to free flow.

So if this is a piece of infrastructure designed to improve freight traffic, let's treat it as such. If European toll roads are any indication, freight traffic would gladly pay tolls any day of the week. So why not toll the ring road? It will get freight traffic diverted to the ring road and off inner city roads, vastly improve travel times and costs for freight traffic, as well as reliability.

Intra-city traffic, wherever possible, should prioritize transit. Urban mobility is a problem of space, and transit is 10 times more space efficient that cars. You cannot build your way out of urban commuter congestion. The only places that have succeed have used toll roads and extensive transit.

[CalgaryAlex]

fusili: A+ post

[fusili]

Originally Posted by 5seconds

This is an odd one, and I think that viewing the SWCRR purely as a bypass road is a mistake. While it is called that by some, and it will certainly function that way, in my opinion it's simply the latest in a series of arterial roads that cross the Elbow river. It's location at the jurisdictional edge of the city is forcing the road to be two-roads-in-one.

We began with the Macleod Trail in pre-railway days as the primary N-S road that crossed the Elbow, then got 4th street (I believe in the latter part of the 19th century) and Elbow Drive in the early 20th century. With the completion of the Glenmore Causeway in the 1960s, the next logical crossing as the City grows is 37th street/Sarcee.

If the Tsuut'ina reserve was not located where it is, I have no doubt that we would have already seen an expansion of the Sarcee Trail as an arterial road more akin to 14th street or Glenmore trail, and then an 'actual' ring road along 101st street functioning as a true bypass (if required). The location of the reserve has forced the City and Province to accept a bypass road that is located in large part along 37th street, only 37 blocks from the central axis of the City. Given the growth of the City to the south, I think this road will be used as much for intra-city travel as anything else. Whether that makes the most sense or not is of course up for debate.

Bypass traffic is only a small projected use of the SWRCC. This was noted as far back as the 1950, and again in the 1970s. This was also noted as recently as 2011, when nearly 2/3rd of projected traffic was said to originate in SW communities (only 11% from the SE and 25% external), and only 8% of traffic destined to terminate outside of the city.

That's not to say that the road should be excluded from any discussions around tolls or other funding/management tools, but that the road cannot be considered only, or even primarily, as a bypass route. Rather than removing cars from arterial routes, I believe it will be used as an arterial route just as much as 14th street or Glenmore trail is now.

Because of this, I think that the downstream impacts towards downtown will be significant, and I think that the concern of moving congestion from 14th to Crowchild is a real one. I'm interested in seeing what kind of downstream impacts will occur, and how the City will deal with them.

One of the concerns that was raised last night, for instance, was Richmond Road. It provides a direct link between the SWCRR and Crowchild, and it was noted that if drivers want to bypass Glenmore, there might be the temptation to use Richmond to get downtown. I will be interested to see how this is handled by the City, whether improvements will be made to that road to handle increased traffic, whether other roads like 17th or Bow will be improved to provide a 'better' route to discourage traffic on Richmond, or whether other transit options will be implemented to try to reduce traffic there.

Is it possible that the SWCRR can open up new transit/BRT opportunities for the SW, ones that can take advantage of the new road and encouraging transit ridership?

Definitely fair points. But if it is just an arterial, it is one hella expensive one. And if it's purpose is to serve SW commuters, transit options are much better than roads as the destinations (Downtown, MRU and Foothills/UofC/ACH) are very concentrated, which makes sense for transit.

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by fusili

So if this is a piece of infrastructure designed to improve freight traffic, let's treat it as such. If European toll roads are any indication, freight traffic would gladly pay tolls any day of the week. So why not toll the ring road? It will get freight traffic diverted to the ring road and off inner city roads, vastly improve travel times and costs for freight traffic, as well as reliability.

I don't share your optimism of users of the road gladly paying tolls, when they can use every single other road for 'free' (yes, I know...). It would be better to do the opposite - toll Deerfoot, Glenmore, Sarcee etc to even more encourage use of the ring roads. Or as I've said before, toll all of them.