Arbutus: Greenway & Future Streetcar | Proposed

[BCPhil]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

I wonder, after the Broadway line is constructed, will the demand go up or down.

Traffic pretty much always goes up on feeder routes of any major rapid transit project. They pretty much go up everywhere system wide, except the route that duplicates the new route (like the 015 right over Cambie, or discontinue the 99 to Lougheed after Millennium).

With the Broadway line in place, even to just Arbutus, demand on the existing 016 bus would probably push it past what it can handle as a regular bus route.

Originally Posted by officedweller

That's consistent with my view too -
start small, and gradually allow it to expand.

Even trams in London, UK are single track routes with dual track passing areas.

That's what should be done here.
(i.e. no use taking up more of the RoW than currently necessary.)
If double tracking is required later, lay a parallel track.


Have a look at this video of London Trams:

• Video Link

We are no strangers to single tracking. That's what the Oak Street streetcar used to be like
• Video Link

Oh, and the Arbutus corridor is by far wide enough for 2 tracks, as it used to have them:
• Video Link

[GlassCity]

Originally Posted by BCPhil

Traffic pretty much always goes up on feeder routes of any major rapid transit project. They pretty much go up everywhere system wide, except the route that duplicates the new route (like the 015 right over Cambie, or discontinue the 99 to Lougheed after Millennium).

With the Broadway line in place, even to just Arbutus, demand on the existing 016 bus would probably push it past what it can handle as a regular bus route.

If the 99 can handle 55,000 people/day, then there's no reason the 16 can't have a B-Line implemented as well to do the same while we "wait" for a SkyTrain line to be funded farther into the future. The 16 currently only carries 21,250 people/day and I'd be surprised if it ever got to 99 levels given their different contexts. To answer your earlier question, I would rather wait 30 years for SkyTrain than 10 for LRT and I think the bus network could handle that.

[BCPhil]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

If the 99 can handle 55,000 people/day, then there's no reason the 16 can't have a B-Line implemented as well to do the same while we "wait" for a SkyTrain line to be funded farther into the future. The 16 currently only carries 21,250 people/day and I'd be surprised if it ever got to 99 levels given their different contexts. To answer your earlier question, I would rather wait 30 years for SkyTrain than 10 for LRT and I think the bus network could handle that.

The B line is horrible. That's why we want to build the Broadway line.

And you can't run a true B line service on Arbutus anyway. There is no room for dedicated lanes for buses to pass traffic queues, and in parts there aren't even passing lanes on Arbutus street. Also, who wants rumbling articulated diesel buses running past their house if there is a way to avoid it? And if the existing bus service, while busy, is not attracting the city average ride share, just putting more, shittier buses on the route isn't necessarily going to attract more riders.

But, if you don't even think the corridor would need the capacity of the B line, then it would never need a Skytrain. Why bother waiting 30 years and spending like 6 times as much money on something when the cheaper solution would work perfectly in the near term?

Streetcars (especially in a segregated ROW), with the same number of operators can double capacity, decrease travel times, increase reliability, and attract new riders.

Why would you wait 30 years for anything when you could get something cheaper much sooner would get the job done just as well? It's absolutely insane!

I may as well not mow my lawn because I'm saving up to buy a ride on lawn mower for the tiny yard behind my townhouse!!!

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

If the 99 can handle 55,000 people/day, then there's no reason the 16 can't have a B-Line implemented as well to do the same while we "wait" for a SkyTrain line to be funded farther into the future.

Why a B-Line down the street, when there's a perfectly good rail corridor next to it?

The 16 currently only carries 21,250 people/day and I'd be surprised if it ever got to 99 levels given their different contexts. To answer your earlier question, I would rather wait 30 years for SkyTrain than 10 for LRT and I think the bus network could handle that.

But then that brings up another question: why build another north-south Skytrain when the Canada Line is right next door? Skytrain's expensive; as much as we'd like them to, TransLink can't and won't build it going to every neighbourhood, especially when as far as they're concerned, there's already a proper north-south RRT line in the area.

After the Broadway and (hopefully) Fraser Highway extensions are built, the next logical north-south Skytrain line is down Willingdon, possibly to the North Shore. Or First Narrows to downtown, then along Hastings to SFU. Maybe a second UBC line along 41st - basically, where all the proposed B-Lines are. And they're there because they service areas that are too far for Skytrain to reach.

Arbutus is too busy for Route 16, but not busy enough/too close to the Canada Line for Skytrain. And even if TransLink decides to eventually build one there, the waiting list means that 30 years is very optimistic.

That's what the LRT pitch is for - a permanent B-Line. Wait five minutes for a streetcar (as opposed to 20 for a #16), then travel at 30km/h independent of traffic. It's supposed to supplement Skytrain and extend its reach, not duplicate it.

[Migrant_Coconut]

... Phil, I think we gotta find some way to stop posting right on top of each other.

[Kisai]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

But then that brings up another question: why build another north-south Skytrain when the Canada Line is right next door? Skytrain's expensive; as much as we'd like them to, TransLink can't and won't build it going to every neighbourhood, especially when as far as they're concerned, there's already a proper north-south RRT line in the area.

The correct use of the corridor is not to duplicate the Canada Line, but to reach areas that the Canada Line is not part of. eg If/when the broadway line is built, you would either transfer to the Canada Line or transfer to the Arbutus line. Those are 2.4KM apart from each other. The catchment area for a subway line is 500 meters, by which Toronto's parallel downtown subway stations are 700 meters apart.

So would an Arbutus line have a Broadway, King Edward and 41st station as well? No. It would have no reason to, because that duplicates the Canada Line stations, by which you could then just take a bus for that 2.4km distance. You'd likely have have a Grandville, Broadway and a Marine drive station but stagger the other stations to be on the roads that the Canada Line is not on, eg 16th, 33rd, 57th, depending on what is there, or what is proposed to go there.

That's the circular argument in this thread
1. build a street car, thus preventing a skytrain extension, and removing the greenspace, the "cheaper and we can have it now" argument
2. build a subway/skytrain extension, thus leaving the greenspace under/over top, the "more expensive, but more long-term solution"
3. leave it alone until capacity requirements demand it. Thus causes blight like garden squatters and homeless camps.

If we use Toronto as an example,
http://coderedto.com/how-much-would-replacing-streetcars-with-buses-cost/

A low-floor street car has the capacity of 2.8 non-articulated buses, or 1.7 articulated buses. That is not really any kind of improvement over the bus, especially when you consider that a it's not 1940 and putting a street car back on busy roads would be opposed to those who live or work west of it. See the Edmonton light rail snarl.

But the largest argument against putting something slow and infrequent on it is that the Canada Line exists. Therefor people would avoid using it unless it was the last leg of their trip. People do NOT like multiple transfers to get to their destination, and since the Canada Line runs parallel to this line, it begs the question of why would anyone build anything with less frequency. There is no business case for building anything on the Arbutus line until the Canada Line hits a capacity limit.

I'm pretty sure there would be no takers for a private operator if they don't get to own the ROW. Developers want that land, and if they have to pretend to be interested in operating a streetcar to get it, they would.

The streetcar option assumes that Vancouver has stopped growing. Period.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by Kisai

You'd likely have have a Grandville, Broadway and a Marine drive station but stagger the other stations to be on the roads that the Canada Line is not on, eg 16th, 33rd, 57th, depending on what is there, or what is proposed to go there.

A) Why the <compound expletive> would you do that? That means that anybody taking the 25, 41 or 49 has to walk eight blocks to the nearest Arbutus station, and likewise for 16/33 passengers to the Canada Line. The point of rapid transit is to make it more convenient to get around, not less.

B) There's plans for Canada Line stations on 33rd and 57th (not 16th, due to terrain issues). Ideally, you want stations on every arterial to improve connectivity.

That's the circular argument in this thread
1. build a street car, thus preventing a skytrain extension, and removing the greenspace, the "cheaper and we can have it now" argument
2. build a subway/skytrain extension, thus leaving the greenspace under/over top, the "more expensive, but more long-term solution"
3. leave it alone until capacity requirements demand it. Thus causes blight like garden squatters and homeless camps.

4. Build half as a greenway, and reserve the rest for light rail - there's more than enough room for both. Garden squatters aren't determined enough to clear out an 8m wide lane of underbrush, and if the homeless really wanted to camp on the Corridor, they'd already be doing it.

A low-floor street car has the capacity of 2.8 non-articulated buses, or 1.7 articulated buses. That is not really any kind of improvement over the bus, especially when you consider that a it's not 1940 and putting a street car back on busy roads would be opposed to those who live or work west of it.

That's the point. Arbutus is/will be dense enough for rapid transit, but not enough for a Skytrain. And even if it might be dense enough for one, TransLink will think "no, they simply need a faster bus to the Canada Line," because they've got at least three other routes (not counting the existing plans for Broadway and Surrey) that need RRT more - it's an inter-city system, not an intra-city one. Same reason why there's no proposal for a Skytrain down Oak or Main. A B-Line is also out of the question, as observed, due to lack of road space.
Or, they could set up light rail... and hey, there's a perfectly track for one right next to the street!

See the Edmonton light rail snarl.

Edmonton LRT is broken because they went with a "down the middle of the road" option a la King George Blvd - which even zweisystem opposes nowadays, to say nothing of this forum - and failed to optimize the signal lights.
At the risk of sounding like a broken record, the tracks are independent of Arbutus Street. 10m away from the curb at the narrowest point, to be precise. Install a few level crossings at the arteries and close some side streets (6th, 11th-15th et all, like City Council does for every bike lane), or dig a short tunnel at the trouble intersections (41st?), and traffic is a non-issue.

But the largest argument against putting something slow and infrequent on it is that the Canada Line exists. Therefor people would avoid using it unless it was the last leg of their trip. People do NOT like multiple transfers to get to their destination, and since the Canada Line runs parallel to this line, it begs the question of why would anyone build anything with less frequency. There is no business case for building anything on the Arbutus line until the Canada Line hits a capacity limit.

Unless you live further west, in which case it's easier to wait 5-6 minutes for a tram. As opposed to 15-25 minutes for a Route 16 bus, or for an east-west bus that takes 15-25 minutes plus another 10-15 minutes to even get to the Canada Line, which takes 3 and 5 respectively.
If you're really in a hurry, that's what the 84, 99 and (future) 91 are for; wait 5 minutes, then travel another 5-10 (depending on traffic) to Cambie. Which is exactly how long it'll take with a tram, since it's a B-Line on rails - faster, since there's no traffic. LRT covers the entire stretch (minus downtown) in 22 minutes; Skytrain in 13. As a resident of the Corridor, I'd rather not wait 40 years to save 81 days.

And why assume that light rail would only serve Arbutus Street? If I gave that impression at any point in time, then I apologize - every Arbutus light rail proposal I've seen incorporates the Downtown Streetcar route as part of it.
A line that serves Stanley Park, Coal Harbour, Waterfront, Gastown, Chinatown, Science World, OV, False Creek, Granville Island, Kitsilano, Kerrisdale and Marpole, provides five connections to all three Skytrain lines, AND makes the tourists happy? That's more than enough of a business case.

[trofirhen]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

And why assume that light rail would only serve Arbutus Street? If I gave that impression at any point in time, then I apologize - every Arbutus light rail proposal I've seen incorporates the Downtown Streetcar route as part of it.

*A line that serves Stanley Park, Coal Harbour, Waterfront, Gastown, Chinatown, Science World, OV, False Creek, Granville Island, Kitsilano, Kerrisdale and Marpole, provides five connections to all three Skytrain lines, AND makes the tourists happy? That's more than enough of a business case.

Excellent point, IMHO. I hope that a number of you people keep that in mind. ... (... and you will ....)

[BCPhil]

Originally Posted by Kisai

See the Edmonton light rail snarl.

I've been checking in on the live traffic cameras in Edmonton the past hour while doing work, and there isn't a snarl to be seen (It's now 5:30pm there). At least not compared to traffic here.

http://www.edmontontrafficcam.com/

There is some heavy congestion near Kingsway and 111 Ave NW, but that's a super busy 5 way intersection that the LRT crosses twice. But I wouldn't call it a snarl. They are pretty busy 6 lane roads, that I wouldn't compare with anything in Vancouver west of Burrard.

There is some heavy traffic in their downtown core, but that's where LRT is buried.

Their LRT doesn't cause much more congestion than their intersections in other parts of the city cause. And it looks like a traffic free paradise compared to traffic on the streets in Vancouver. I think the "snarl" is most just oil patch working types driving F350s upset because they don't want their tax dollars to have anything to do with transit. Did it increase congestion: yeah; did it cause chaos: not as far as I can tell.

Even if there is a legitimate traffic snarl caused by LRT in Edmonton, their design is so radically different than what would be required by LRT on Arbutus that you can't fully compare them.

The Edmonton NW LRT crosses some of the busiest streets out of the downtown core connecting to a huge portion of the city in quick succession. It crosses 5 of the busiest streets, in less than 1km, and crosses them twice (TWICE!!!!) at their intersections. It would be like crossing our Clark and Kingsway intersection by first crossing Clark, then crossing Kingsway on either side of the traffic lights(it is insane). If there is a traffic snarl, it is a major concern to people who are not served at all by the transit line.

Arbutus isn't in the same boat. It is west of most of the city and most of the city's population doesn't cross it east-west, let alone many people from outside CoV. The lives it would impact negatively are the lives it would also benefit. The only major crossing points of the ROW are Broadway, Burrard and 4th. They are already fairly slow in those areas, and letting trains cross there doesn't introduce a longer wait than what already exists to let cross traffic through.

[Kisai]

Originally Posted by BCPhil

I've been checking in on the live traffic cameras in Edmonton the past hour while doing work, and there isn't a snarl to be seen (It's now 5:30pm there). At least not compared to traffic here.

http://www.edmontontrafficcam.com/

Did you miss this? http://news.nationalpost.com/full-commen...wn-transit-times-and-increases-emissions

That article put every light-rail supporter on the defensive of their own proposed and existing light rail projects.

The average at-grade system has a significant delay or accident every three days. Poorly designed systems, eg Houston Texas that don't segregate the ROW at all, have the most incidents. But when they do have accidents, what is the answer? "People need to read signs, be less stupid" rather than you know, actually spending the money to design the right thing to begin with. Portlands system is literately falling apart, and is the system that all these other light rail supporters look at as doing the right thing.

Seattle has one every 3-7 days
http://www.soundtransit.org/service-modes/light-rail

Calgary has one every 3 days
https://twitter.com/calgarytransit

Edmonton has a "bus replacement" for LRT every 11 days or so
https://twitter.com/takeETSalert

Which again back to the topic at hand. Build the right thing rather than a half-measure. If some private operator wants to take a go at running a tourist-centric street car, let them lease the ROW and see what happens. But don't put any tax-payer dollars on it, this is a money pit of the worst kind.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by Kisai

The average at-grade system has a significant delay or accident every three days. Poorly designed systems, eg Houston Texas that don't segregate the ROW at all, have the most incidents. But when they do have accidents, what is the answer? "People need to read signs, be less stupid" rather than you know, actually spending the money to design the right thing to begin with.

One more time: the Arbutus Corridor IS a segregated right-of-way; separate from the main road, separate from traffic, and easily separated where it isn't. And yet you insist on bringing up every poorly-implemented "centre-of-the-street" proposal as if they're the same thing.

Also, your Edmonton article is railing against badly-designed LRT and transit, not LRT in general.

Portlands system is literately falling apart, and is the system that all these other light rail supporters look at as doing the right thing.

When commenting on transit planning, it might be a bad idea to use a blog that's anti-transit AND anti-planning (and anti-everything-that isn't-cars-and-highways) to support your argument. Come on, you might as well have cited Bateman or the Fraser Institute.

Specifically, the Portland Streetcar fails because:
1) It shares the road with vehicle traffic, slowing it to 13 kph; Arbutus trams on a separate ROW would clock 25-30 kph, and if they have signal priority, no stopping at red lights like the buses.
2) It only has 17 trains for 11.6 km. Clearly, a lot more trams are needed to make a streetcar network function properly, and I hope our city planners take note.
3) Portland's planners designed it as a moving sidewalk - it's intentionally slow. Again, I hope our city planners take note.

Seattle has one every 3-7 days
http://www.soundtransit.org/service-modes/light-rail

Calgary has one every 3 days
https://twitter.com/calgarytransit

Edmonton has a "bus replacement" for LRT every 11 days or so
https://twitter.com/takeETSalert

And Skytrain has a breakdown or suicide "medical emergency" just as often. Transit networks suffer from a perpetual lack of maintenance and/or funding, that's a fact of life.

Which again back to the topic at hand. Build the right thing rather than a half-measure. If some private operator wants to take a go at running a tourist-centric street car, let them lease the ROW and see what happens. But don't put any tax-payer dollars on it, this is a money pit of the worst kind.

I'm sure you're getting as tired of this as I am, but it's not a half-measure, it's the only measure - a B-Line is a half-measure, and Skytrain is unnecessary. Arbutus is a dead-zone between the high-capacity RRT corridors which needs a medium-capacity LRT to open up the spaces that RRT can't reach.

[dpogue]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

And Skytrain has a breakdown or suicide "medical emergency" just as often. Transit networks suffer from a perpetual lack of maintenance and/or funding, that's a fact of life.

Just reviewing my notes here for the past 12 months: I count 8 cases of significant SkyTrain service disruption due to mechanical/electrical/etc. issues, and 5 cases of disruption due to medical emergency (4 were due to human entry into the guideway).

I'm considering a "significant service disruption" as anything lasting more than an hour that resulted in unplanned single-tracking, or any case in which stations were closed entirely for more than a few minutes.

[Aroundtheworld]

I was down at Granville Island today and I was amazed at the amount of space that is devoted to parking. I think one of the biggest benefits of LRT/streetcar would be making this area more accessible so that the parking can be used for better things like more public space or new buildings.

[logan5]

Originally Posted by BCPhil

I actually think laying rails would be cheaper than converting the ROW to road space for BRT. The ROW from Marine to the Olympic village is well graded and pretty much load bearing ready for new rails.

In Surrey, the cost of the BRT might be low because most of the ROW is already paved. They would convert existing lanes on 104 ave to BRT without widening the road, and much of KGB already has shoulder space wide enough to accommodate the extra lanes. Configuring the roads for LRT would require a lot of work to be done to the existing roads.

I also think you would need more space for the BRT lanes than using modern Streetcar technology would take up. The BRT lanes would just be more paved land in Vancouver whereas the streetcar ROW could be grassed.

I'm convinced LRT/streetcars will be obsolete in the next 20 years, so that's why I would go with BRT.

Even just building a transit-way that uses our existing fleet would provide a much faster service than normal - a B-Line that can average 30 km/h at all times of the day. That would certainly be super cheap to build, you just have to pave a 25 foot wide road. This is something that the City could easily build it on its own.

Operationally streetcars are very quiet, while operating diesel buses just ads to pollution. Streetcar vehicles can also have a much longer service life and on average can carry more people per operator than buses.

The newer buses are extremely quiet, but it's inevitable that buses will become battery powered, which solves the problem of pollution and noise.

[BCPhil]

Originally Posted by Kisai

Did you miss this? http://news.nationalpost.com/full-commen...wn-transit-times-and-increases-emissions

That article put every light-rail supporter on the defensive of their own proposed and existing light rail projects.

The average at-grade system has a significant delay or accident every three days. Poorly designed systems, eg Houston Texas that don't segregate the ROW at all, have the most incidents. But when they do have accidents, what is the answer? "People need to read signs, be less stupid" rather than you know, actually spending the money to design the right thing to begin with. Portlands system is literately falling apart, and is the system that all these other light rail supporters look at as doing the right thing.

Seattle has one every 3-7 days
http://www.soundtransit.org/service-modes/light-rail

Calgary has one every 3 days
https://twitter.com/calgarytransit

Edmonton has a "bus replacement" for LRT every 11 days or so
https://twitter.com/takeETSalert

Which again back to the topic at hand. Build the right thing rather than a half-measure. If some private operator wants to take a go at running a tourist-centric street car, let them lease the ROW and see what happens. But don't put any tax-payer dollars on it, this is a money pit of the worst kind.

A: Something to note: That was an opinion piece containing nothing but anecdotes. Is it worse than before, sure. Is Cambie street just as fast as before Canada line? For some reason it's not either. It's not the trains fault, but pedestrians. There are a lot more of them in the area and they get a lot more time to cross the road than they used to, so Cambie backs up like crazy now compared to pre-2005. Is that a failure of the Canada line, or actually a success (that it brings so many people to it, sidewalks can barely contain them?).

They were claiming the sky was going to fall before it opened, and it didn't happen. The story complains about people having a 6 minute delay, while claiming people can drive from one side of Edmonton to the other in 15 minutes. Their lives must be so miserable.

A route plan on Google maps from the furthest away northern home in Edmonton (the absolute furthest house north, worst commute) into MacEwan University (which takes you down Princess Elizabeth Ave) takes 18 to 30 minutes in the morning. Stop the presses, what a calamity!

B: A large part of the problem should be temporary. The signalling installed by Thales is all messed up and trains pretty much run at half speed. The trains take longer to cross the streets than they should and are given extra buffer by the gates in case of errors.

Now you can't say that that is a design element of LRT. It is a total fuckup by the contractor Thales, who so happens to work on our network. These errors aren't happening because LRT is implicitly overly complicated (or we would have similar issues as we are even more reliant on Thales), but most likely due to the quality of the contractors and workers available at the time (during the peak of demand for oil patch workers: who do you think is left for lowest bidder contracts in the city when everyone is off making 6 figures?).

They are currently conducting a safety audit and conducting upgrades which should get the trains running at full speed in May and shorten the amount of time the crossing gates are down.

But again, this isn't a common feature of LRT systems, it is a complete screw up by the contractors.

And what's the point of that second link? It's more just biased opinionated rubbish. Am I supposed to be shocked that light rail in Portland needs maintenance? So does Skytrain. So do roads for that matter. Heck, there were Skytrain delays of up to 15 minutes almost every day for months on end because the maintenance requirements are so intensive they stretch into service hours.

Now I just did a quick scan of Edmonton's tweets back to December, searching for Metro and Capitol and bus replacement.

It does not look as frequent 11 days to me. The most recent "bus replacement" was March 17. I guess they are having a remarkable month. Out of all the tweets of bus replacement in 2016, two were due to a traffic accident.

A lot of the closures are due to technical problems (talked about that earlier), medical emergencies, and police incidents; all of which happen here on Skytrain, so not a problem limited to LRT. We also get about 200 track intrusion incidents a month that affect service frequency.

A quick look at Calgary is the same. A lot of medical emergencies, police incidents and mechanical problems. A search for Shuttle Buses (their terminology for a bus bridge) are very infrequent, and are often on weekends because of planned track maintenance. There were about 4 shuttle buses set up because of accidents in 2016 so far.

All that means that either accidents with LRTs in Canada aren't that common, or they are so minor that they are swept aside in a few minutes.

The other difference between these LRT incidents and Skytrain is they are very localized. Most of the system still runs as normal with minimal delays. But because of the speed of Skytrain, any track closure can quickly stall things system wide once trains start to bunch up.

But again, we are comparing 2 different things. In Calgary, they are using light rail as a trunk main line that is supposed to transport vast numbers of people long distances at high speeds. Arbutus streetcar wouldn't be that, and it doesn't need that.

In Portland, the streetcar, that runs almost completely in traffic lanes shared with vehicles has less than an accident per week. In 2 years (2013 + 2014) there were 95 accidents with vehicles. None of the accidents resulted in death, and only 8 needed medical transportation. There were 4 accidents with pedestrians or bikes. 16 accidents with parked/parking cars (because Portland is insane and allows you to park on the other side of the ROW in places). That's on 11.6km of track.

In the same time frame, there were 100 MAX accidents, and 998 bus accidents in Portland (more than 1 per day).

http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.ssf/2015/03/portland_streetcar_collisions.html

Interestingly, in Calgary, since 1981 to October 2015, there have been 70 deaths due to C-Train. Skytrain has killed 75 people from 1986 to May 2015.

I think Skytrain is actually "safer" because a much higher percentage of the deaths are accidents in Calgary, but it blows away the myth that the C-Train is some rampaging out of control death machine murdering innocent pedestrians at whim. Accident or Suicide, their at grade system has been shut down less frequently due to the most tragic reason of all (loss of human life) than Skytrain.

[BCPhil]

Originally Posted by logan5

I'm convinced LRT/streetcars will be obsolete in the next 20 years, so that's why I would go with BRT.

Even just building a transit-way that uses our existing fleet would provide a much faster service than normal - a B-Line that can average 30 km/h at all times of the day. That would certainly be super cheap to build, you just have to pave a 25 foot wide road. This is something that the City could easily build it on its own.

The newer buses are extremely quiet, but it's inevitable that buses will become battery powered, which solves the problem of pollution and noise.

It is still a bus. I'm not any more inclined to take it than a bus today. It's still going to bounce and jerk around like a bus.

And that's putting a lot of hope on what the future might hold. And it still requires a road to be paved, something the LRT could avoid. There is something more enjoyable about being on the greenspace next to lawned streetcar ROW, than being next to a paved road that buses rumble past on.

A streetcar can still be longer and carry more people while still feeling more spacious than a bus while requiring a more narrow right of way.

Besides, trains are at the point where they basically drive themselves already. Driverless LRT could be easily achieved years before driverless buses (if that's what you mean by obsolete). A battery bus would need to be out of service a lot for recharging, so you would need a lot of spares, while streetcars are more than capable of being in service the entire day.

[Kisai]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

When commenting on transit planning, it might be a bad idea to use a blog that's anti-transit AND anti-planning (and anti-everything-that isn't-cars-and-highways) to support your argument. Come on, you might as well have cited Bateman or the Fraser Institute.

Because people keep pointing to Portland and go "we want what Portland has". But Portland's light rail and street cars are doing incredibly poorly.

Arbutus may be a Segregated ROW, but that doesn't make it any less expensive than any other LRT to operate, or the idea of running anything mixed with pedestrians any less bone-headed.

http://www.vancourier.com/opinion/streetcar-desired-for-arbutus-corridor-lands-1.2197593 via
https://pricetags.wordpress.com/2016/03/18/streetcar-desired/

I ask because buried deep in the city’s news release was a brief mention of reserving space along the corridor “for future light rail/streetcar.” Maybe you had the same reaction: Mixing streetcars with bikes and pedestrians sounds like more work for paramedics and firefighters.

...

“You’re actually pointing to the two sections that are the biggest challenge,” he said of the stretch. “From Sixth Avenue here and then going north from here are the narrowest sections. They’re might be some places there where we do things off-street.”

Off-street?

“We’ll look at all of our city holdings, not just the rail right-of-way that we purchased,” he continued. “So it may be that the streetcar runs in the street on Sixth Avenue in that section. That’s the thing about streetcars – in downtown Toronto or San Francisco – is you can run in and out of traffic. If you’re able to keep it separate from traffic, obviously you can move more quickly with less interruptions. But there’s no reason you can’t operate in traffic when you need to.”

And here we go with wanting to run street cars in mixed traffic.

[Jebby]

I ask because buried deep in the city’s news release was a brief mention of reserving space along the corridor “for future light rail/streetcar.” Maybe you had the same reaction: Mixing streetcars with bikes and pedestrians sounds like more work for paramedics and firefighters.

Fences don't exist?

[trofirhen]

Originally Posted by Jebby

Fences don't exist?

A most pertinent observation.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by Kisai

http://www.vancourier.com/opinion/streetcar-desired-for-arbutus-corridor-lands-1.2197593 via
https://pricetags.wordpress.com/2016/03/18/streetcar-desired/

And here we go with wanting to run street cars in mixed traffic.

Traffic? On Sixth?! As much as we all disagree with LRT on roads, they're talking about a quiet side street; there's a maximum of five cars on Sixth between Arbutus and Fir at any given moment. The City could close that stretch without any consequences.