Quote:
Originally Posted by SOSS
LRT in Calgary has been successful for a variety of reasons including discouraging people from driving downtown with expensive and limited parking, taking a cheaper approach comparable with Edmonton by going at grade instead of underground, connecting important locations immediately upon opening, offering free downtown ridership etc. So what I'm getting at is that the reason Calgary is successful is because of the holistic approach they took. the at-grade technology selection has lead to train vs vehicle collisions, train vs pedestrian collisions, higher operating costs, slower top speeds etc.
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Actually it might also be important to note that the C-Train probably shares more features of a proper rapid train system (i.e. SkyTrain) than it does of an urban tram (Surrey proposal).
The 7th street section is no exception in terms of being "on-street" like an urban tram system - but outside of the downtown core, the C-Train gets its own right of way with no (urban) on-street running segments, runs faster than the 60km/h speed limit on arterial roads, and is more or less trying to achieve what SkyTrain is doing in servicing the metro area with rapid transit (with the exception, ofc, that the LRT technology limits train frequency and requires platforms to be longer to achieve similar capacities). Grade separation is increasingly being used on system expansions such as the West LRT and the proposed South East LRT.
The C-Train is indeed very successful for that and the aforementioned policy reasons, but it is still second to SkyTrain in terms of ridership per km (if not further behind). Based on APTA's
Q3 2015 numbers....
Metro Vancouver - SkyTrain:
Weekday daily boardings:
385,600
Daily boardings per mile:
9,168*
* This is the highest among all Canada & US LRT systems
Calgary - C-Train LRT:
Weekday daily boardings:
300,200
Daily boardings per mile:
8,222
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