Shift: London's Rapid Transit Initiative

[HillStreetBlues]

Originally Posted by Dupcheck

LRT, sure that is no problem, classy and clean. Buses they suck. Ottawa removed most of the buses in favour of LRT.

Ottawa built out an extensive network of busways which resulted in province-leading ridership growth. It now has significant enough ridership to justify the expense of LRT (in some parts of the network).

There was no way it could afford to build LRT to serve as many people as their BRT network has.

MrSlippery519 is right, Wharncliffe is not downtown, and is too far from the destinations rapid transit should serve.

[Stevo26]

Originally Posted by HillStreetBlues

Ottawa built out an extensive network of busways which resulted in province-leading ridership growth. It now has significant enough ridership to justify the expense of LRT (in some parts of the network).

There was no way it could afford to build LRT to serve as many people as their BRT network has.

MrSlippery519 is right, Wharncliffe is not downtown, and is too far from the destinations rapid transit should serve.

When I was visiting Ottawa about 13 years ago, I had a chance to try out their BRT system. I was impressed by how fast and efficient it was.

I am disappointed by the actions of DownShift and their supporters. It is disturbing to see how a small group of people are trying to subvert the will of the people of London (remember that Matt Brown campaigned on a platform that included a BRT/LRT system), when they really don't know how much money their businesses might lose due to BRT construction. In a word, their behaviour is highly reactionary, to say nothing of based on a lot of speculation, supposition and emotion-based reasoning.

It seems to me that the businesses that were allegedly negatively affected by the construction of LRT lines in the K-W region somehow survived and are doing just fine. The tunnel portion of the BRT system in London aside, I doubt that BRT system construction elsewhere in London will cause nearly as much disruption.

It seems to me that there are factions within the business community that are all for progress and development only so long as it fills their coffers with money. Any other viewpoints are disregarded and criticized as unworkable, unrealistic, etc.

[database]

My guess is that council will vote to have alternate routes examined, and then decide that the King/Queen loop should be implemented, and the Richmond tunnel should stay.

They can walk away saying they compromised without losing too much of the initial plan.

I'm still trying to figure out how DownShift is surprised by all of this. If I was a business owner in the core, I would consider it prudent to stay on top of the municipal affairs that would potentially affect my business. Just another example of how apathetic Londoners can be, I guess?

[haljackey]

If the entire plan is to be cracked open, maybe the technology choice can be re-examined? With that Art Zuidema guy gone, maybe LRT has another long shot of being considered for the Masonville-Western-Downtown-Fanshawe-Airport route.

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EDIT: FM96 made a funny
• Video Link

Also
https://soundcloud.com/fm96-1/rappin-transit-jim-raps-on-a-london-city-bus

[manny_santos]

Originally Posted by database

My guess is that council will vote to have alternate routes examined, and then decide that the King/Queen loop should be implemented, and the Richmond tunnel should stay.

They can walk away saying they compromised without losing too much of the initial plan.

I'm still trying to figure out how DownShift is surprised by all of this. If I was a business owner in the core, I would consider it prudent to stay on top of the municipal affairs that would potentially affect my business. Just another example of how apathetic Londoners can be, I guess?

I don't get it either. There have been conceptual plans for rapid transit in London since 1973, if not earlier. Part of the plan included a link from downtown to UWO, with other branches along Springbank Drive and Dundas Street. (Notably absent was a line to Fanshawe College, which of course was brand new and much smaller back then.) One version included using the CP tracks.

While the plans sat idly for decades, and as I recall were entirely absent from the heavily car-focused Vision '96, it didn't really resurface until about 8-9 years ago when K-W started planning LRT. There was discussion around BRT in London during the 2010 municipal election - I remember council candidate Dale Henderson campaigned against it. Where were all these business owners back in 2010? Where were they in 2014?

Like many other urban planning projects, they are usually part of the Official Plan or at least are up for discussion, and nobody cares about it until it's too late. The owner of Joe Kool's ought to have known about the plans back in 2014, 2010, or if he was in business in 1973, he ought to have been aware in 1973. The rest of London shouldn't suffer because a group of business owners chose to ignore news stories about rapid transit proposals in the late 2000s.

[Blitz]

Originally Posted by Stevo26

When I was visiting Ottawa about 13 years ago, I had a chance to try out their BRT system. I was impressed by how fast and efficient it was.

I just used the Ottawa BRT earlier this month and thought the same thing.

[jammer139]

Ottawa CMA has a population of 1.3 million people.

Originally Posted by Blitz

I just used the Ottawa BRT earlier this month and thought the same thing.

[HillStreetBlues]

I think someone brought up Ottawa originally to illustrate some of the merits of BRT, or to compare it to LRT. Not to suppose that London should have a system as the same extent as Ottawa.

But Ottawa launched its Transitway system (eventually 26 kilometres of exclusive transit right-of-way) in the '80s, when the population of Ottawa-Gatineau was about a half a million (though OC Transpo only serves Ottawa, and downtown Gatineau at certain times). That's not much bigger than London today.

[Underground100]

http://www.lfpress.com/2017/03/31/federa...nding-for-london-transportation-projects

So Ottawa is giving out $37M in transit funds to London (for over 50 projects), with the first $8M in federal funds for Shift (mainly design and engineering).

Also in this article, Down Shift says that they were never against rapid transit, but just the routes. But in my perspective, if you move it off of Richmond and to Wharncliffe, you miss so many key destinations and people. Richmond bus commuters will be stuck with a rump express route and a level train crossing.

[manny_santos]

Originally Posted by Underground100

http://www.lfpress.com/2017/03/31/federa...nding-for-london-transportation-projects

So Ottawa is giving out $37M in transit funds to London (for over 50 projects), with the first $8M in federal funds for Shift (mainly design and engineering).

Also in this article, Down Shift says that they were never against rapid transit, but just the routes. But in my perspective, if you move it off of Richmond and to Wharncliffe, you miss so many key destinations and people. Richmond bus commuters will be stuck with a rump express route and a level train crossing.

Down Shift hasn't been very coherent with its messaging at times. On Twitter they ranted about London waging a "war on cars", and at least some of their supporters seem to be dead-set against any rapid transit. They really need to clean their platform up, because I'm not entirely sure what it is right now or what it will be next week.

[Underground100]

Originally Posted by manny_santos

Down Shift hasn't been very coherent with its messaging at times. On Twitter they ranted about London waging a "war on cars", and at least some of their supporters seem to be dead-set against any rapid transit. They really need to clean their platform up, because I'm not entirely sure what it is right now or what it will be next week.

Oh yeah true, and one of their latest manufactured controversies included that the RT didn't stop directly at the hospital beds of Parkwood, Victoria and University Hospitals.

But again, their latest pivot basically means "do RT, but not near us ever". Richmond RT is inevitable, and there is an EA on realigning utilities underground.

[kaiserLDN]

I only see the west bound buses to queen st being changed on here. Putting the Richmond line on wharncliffe would be a very dumb idea. Probably be worse for the people complaining because buses would avoid there stores. I can't at all see them cancling rapid transit either because we really need something to help the city. I think we need some big business people or companies come out from behind the scenes supporting rapid transit to drown out down shift. I'm sure there is some big companies that want to put some backing on this project.

http://www.lfpress.com/2017/04/03/london...espite-disputes-over-where-buses-will-go

[Underground100]

Originally Posted by kaiserLDN

I only see the west bound buses to queen st being changed on here. Putting the Richmond line on wharncliffe would be a very dumb idea. Probably be worse for the people complaining because buses would avoid there stores. I can't at all see them cancling rapid transit either because we really need something to help the city. I think we need some big business people or companies come out from behind the scenes supporting rapid transit to drown out down shift. I'm sure there is some big companies that want to put some backing on this project.

http://www.lfpress.com/2017/04/03/london...espite-disputes-over-where-buses-will-go

The most prominent businessperson at least I've seen support it is Paul Cocker of McKay-Cocker. He provided a quote to the Free Press last week. While he has concerns with the tunnel's impact regarding the soil, he says that he supports it, saying to "phase it in, the way they did in Ottawa".

During last Monday's Civic Works meeting, Matt Brown said any alternative featuring Western/Wharncliffe wouldn't get his support. Harold Usher has previously said something on the lines of there's no real alternative to the tunnel. Aside from that, Salih, Helmer, Ridley, Turner, and Zaifman also seem like councillors who want to get this stage of Shift done.

[database]

Originally Posted by Underground100

Aside from that, Salih, Helmer, Ridley, Turner, and Zaifman also seem like councillors who want to get this stage of Shift done.

I'd add Cassidy to that list, too. Her tweets suggest she's quite supportive of getting the plan going.

[Underground100]

Originally Posted by database

I'd add Cassidy to that list, too. Her tweets suggest she's quite supportive of getting the plan going.

Ah yes, that's right.

Anyway, business owners packed the council gallery earlier today. Council voted 10-1 to have staff report back on alternate routes. There was a timeline in which city staff would report on such routes, a public participation meeting on May 3, and voting on routes on May 15. If council endorses alternate routes, they would have to hold a 5th public information center. Routes and the master plan would be approved by late July at the latest in any event.

Steve Turner was the lone dissenting vote.

[haljackey]

Here's a rough idea I have:

For the north-south route, build a new bus-only road at the Wellington curve that joins up with Colborne street via a new bridge. This would eliminate the need to expropriate buildings on most of the existing 4-lane stretch of Wellington and wouldn't interfere with the heavy traffic use the road gets to downtown.
-Keeps 2 car lanes on the existing Wellington CN underpass, but would likely require building a new underpass at Colborne, possibly for both cars and buses.

For the east-west route, use King and Queen from Colborne to the Thames, and build a new bridge connecting Riverside and King. This keeps Dundas free for closures for festivals and whatnot.
-King and Queen would still be one way roads, 1 lane with parallel parking during off peak times, 2 lanes with no parking during peak times.
-Use Dundas east of Colborne. This stretch is wide enough to accommodate this, but parallel parking through Old East Village would need to be eliminated. Sacrificing a lane on King east of Colborne for parallel parking wouldn't impact traffic much, Queen was already reduced to 1 lane from Quebec to Adelaide for more parking and it works fine.

[kaiserLDN]

Would be nice for a few big developers with a lot of money to come in and help build the underground station at oxford and Richmond to build some towers there.

haljackey I like the route all the way down on wellington because the area between baseline and Horton is prime spot for redevelopment. Some people with some big bucks could buy some of the beaten down homes along this stretch, ugly retail buildings and make a really nice entrance to our downtown.

I'm sure everyone on these forums can think of the possibilities of redevelopment along both of the rapid transit routes with a tunnel included.

[Doady]

Originally Posted by Stevo26

When I was visiting Ottawa about 13 years ago, I had a chance to try out their BRT system. I was impressed by how fast and efficient it was.

The problem with articulated buses is they don't function in the snow. This is a well-documented disadvantage of these type of buses.

From being a transit rider in Mississauga I know that their articulated buses stay in the garage when its snowing. In the past, I have personally seen articulated buses getting stuck in the snow.

London is in the Snowbelt, I think the potential of BRT will always be limited by that fact. LRT might be the better choice for London. Although the upfront cost of LRT would be higher, the long-term costs could be lower compared to BRT.

[Dupcheck]

Originally Posted by Doady

The problem with articulated buses is they don't function in the snow. This is a well-documented disadvantage of these type of buses.

From being a transit rider in Mississauga I know that their articulated buses stay in the garage when its snowing. In the past, I have personally seen articulated buses getting stuck in the snow.

London is in the Snowbelt, I think the potential of BRT will always be limited by that fact. LRT might be the better choice for London. Although the upfront cost of LRT would be higher, the long-term costs could be lower compared to BRT.

It is very true. Good point.

[HillStreetBlues]

It's true that articulated buses don't handle snow as well as conventional buses, but OC Transpo operates more of them than any other transit provider in the country (probably by a very wide margin), Ottawa's about as snowy as London, and these problems don't happen very often. That picture was from over a decade ago and, since then, Ottawa has taken precautions like better tires, and keeping the articulated buses off the roads during heavy snowfalls. As you say, Doady, that's what Mississauga does, and what Vancouver does, too (that's not as snowy a city, but they operate a lot of articulated buses).

Is there any information about how much service disruption OC Transpo's buses experience as a result of snowy weather? I'm not saying that winter weather is not a consideration, but I don't think it's a significant one.