Confederation Line (Stage 1) | In Service 1.0

[Dado]

Originally Posted by Norman Bates

For the benefit of those who don't remember the original - lost - plan, can someone provide a thumbnail sketch of it?

Probably the singlemost important image of the as-planned NS LRT is this one depicting how things would operate downtown:



What is (and was) the current bus lane - i.e. the second lane out - would become a shared BRT and LRT lane. Most of the current bus platforms, which are build-outs of the sidewalk into the erstwhile curb lane, would be pushed back to the sidewalk (as depicted above) and in the blocks that don't have currently have a bus platform they would have placed LRT platforms in the curb lane as build-outs.

This might have all been forgiveable if the general idea was to replace most buses with trains, with only local buses (the #7, #4, etc) on Albert and Slater. But it wasn't: they were only going for a 30% bus reduction and the trains would be limited to 30 m initially (one car long) and 60 m (two cars long) ultimately (compared to the c. 100 m trains we'll be getting with the Confederation Line). Buses would continue to be the major component of the rapid transit system. Very few Ottawans overall, and practically none of the then-existing ridership, would be riding LRT.

Now go back to my first paragraph and think about how those BRT platforms would work: it's crowded as it is with the platforms extended out one lane, but if they were compressed into the sidewalk? We'd have even more platform congestion. Next consider that the LRVs would block all the buses behind them when at a platform. Finally, given the bus queuing we see at BRT platforms (which would only be worsened by the more congested ones of the plan), it's quite likely that bus queues would extend into the shared lane, thus blocking the trains as well. It was a recipe for bus jams.

If all that weren't bad enough, there'd be no easy way to fix it, either. Replacing buses with trains would require longer trains, but the locations of the platforms constrained the effective length to trains two cars long. The only practical way to fix it without a complete rebuild would be to take over the third lane (i.e. on the left side of the train tracks, the one with the green truck in the above image) in the blocks with LRT platforms to build platforms there instead and then get rid of the curbside ones. But you'd then have LRT and its platforms in the middle of the street with lanes on either side, for better or for worse.


The immediately more obvious design - run trains on the left and buses on the right, shown below - was dismissed, apparently due to the whining of the downtown business community losing access (the Capital Hill Hotel (?) comes to mind, their defacto HQ). The idea of running LRT on just one street (with BRT, naturally, on the other) was also dismissed as it would create "complex crossovers" for BRT at one or other end of the corridor. Basically any kind of sane design got rejected due to the problems it would create resulting from trying to accommodate BRT as well, since BRT was planned to keep running as the backbone of the rapid transit network.



Here's a YouTube video of it all downtown:
• Video Link

[downtown_eddie_brown]

Originally Posted by acottawa

Most of the Montreal-Rideau Corridor is served by only one bus (the 12) which comes about 9 times an hour in rush hour. Even if every single bus is an artic loaded to crush capacity, it would be less than 1000 pax/hr.

Considering the increased frequency of an LRT line, I imagine that a Montreal Road LRT would draw passengers that would otherwise take the 14 or 1/7 routes, especially if their destination is west of downtown and would require an LRT transfer anyway.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by downtown_eddie_brown

Considering the increased frequency of an LRT line, I imagine that a Montreal Road LRT would draw passengers that would otherwise take the 14 or 1/7 routes, especially if their destination is west of downtown and would require an LRT transfer anyway.

Probably on the margins (people between Beachwood and Montreal would have a strong incentive to choose Montreal over Beachwood) but walking 15 minutes to get to Montreal when the bus on Beachwood takes less than 15 minutes to get to the Rideau Centre might not be a big draw.

[acottawa]

I like how there are only a handful of buses in the youtube video despite the fact that in real life buses are pretty much bumper to bumper along the entire route.

Adding streetcars to a bus lane that was already overcapacity was just an unbelievably bad idea.

[Harley613]

Originally Posted by roger1818

I thought 100 km/h was going to be slow for trains running beside the 417, but 80 km/h is ridiculous as cars will be flying past the train. It is also a further argument for not extending beyond the Greenbelt as it will be slower than the buses it is replacing. In the core, 80 km/h is plenty fast.

Not one car will be 'flying past the train' in peak hours when the LRT is most needed and used.

[White Pine]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

I really think the likelihood of building a subway down Montreal Road is next to zero in the next 100 years. There is simply not enough ridership there to fill a subway with the Confederation Line already built. The only hope of it being built was in place of Confederation Line and it would require the Orleans ridership catchment to make it work. That opportunity has now passed and was never considered. The only hope I see is for a semi-segregated streetcar that does not require enormous trains and huge expenditures.

In terms of usefulness, a Montreal Rd subway could be nice as the city's choice of rolling stock (tram, basically) really doesn't future proof the confederation line. However, the crowding would have to be REALLY bad to justify it politically, so you're probably right.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by acottawa

I like how there are only a handful of buses in the youtube video despite the fact that in real life buses are pretty much bumper to bumper along the entire route.

Adding streetcars to a bus lane that was already overcapacity was just an unbelievably bad idea.

Except that it would have forced the city to build the tunnel anyways. We would have had 30 km of rail already in place by 2010.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by White Pine

In terms of usefulness, a Montreal Rd subway could be nice as the city's choice of rolling stock (tram, basically) really doesn't future proof the confederation line. However, the crowding would have to be REALLY bad to justify it politically, so you're probably right.

Any future proofing would involve building another downtown tunnel. That will always be the choke point. That will not happen until it is absolutely necessary as we are seeing in Toronto.

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Any future proofing would involve building another downtown tunnel. That will always be the choke point. That will not happen until it is absolutely necessary as we are seeing in Toronto.

What is sad is after all costs assessed for, the current tunnel was a good investment. How much was spent on useless highway widening for the LRT?!

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by Harley613

Not one car will be 'flying past the train' in peak hours when the LRT is most needed and used.

From what I have seen, the 417 between Terry Fox and Richmond Rd was overbuilt so most of it is pretty free flowing. Things slow down on the Corkstown hill, but then speed up again. Regardless, the buses have dedicated bus lanes so can travel at 100 km/h, so an 80 km/h LRT will be a speed reduction even before considering the extra stops.

Either way, do we want a system that is only good in peak periods?

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Except that it would have forced the city to build the tunnel anyways. We would have had 30 km of rail already in place by 2010.

Try selling that to the public "sorry, this LRT system we just built is a total gong show and we need to spend a billion dollars to replace it with something else"

[TransitZilla]

Originally Posted by acottawa

Try selling that to the public "sorry, this LRT system we just built is a total gong show and we need to spend a billion dollars to replace it with something else"

Except they wouldn't have been replacing anything; the tunnel for the east-west line would have been in addition to what was already built and the N-S line could have remained on the surface.

Anyway, no sense debating it now. It's done.

[waterloowarrior]

My guess is that 80 km/hr is for the 12.5 km Confederation Line operations. Here are a couple of other links from Alstom discussing 100 km/hr top speeds specific to Ottawa's trains.

http://www.alstom.com/press-centre/2013/...es-and-maintenance-services-for-ottawa-/


http://www.alstom.com/press-centre/2016/...-begins-train-dynamic-testing-in-ottawa/

[Kitchissippi]

Originally Posted by bradnixon

Except they wouldn't have been replacing anything; the tunnel for the east-west line would have been in addition to what was already built and the N-S line could have remained on the surface.

Anyway, no sense debating it now. It's done.

Except the money being used for the Confederation Line is the same money that was slotted for the NSLRT with a bit more added on. There's a bit of "alternative facting" going on around here. The truth is, where we are at with the Confederation Line now would have never happened without the cancellation of the NSLRT plan. There was zero talk of an LRT tunnel before O'Brien came along.

Let's pretend the old plan had gone ahead and opened in 2009. The city would have muddled along for at least 5 years (2014) before taking on any major transit projects. I doubt someone like Jim Watson would have the vision to come up with anything remotely close to the Confederation Line, especially since he was ambivalent about the project when he was elected.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

Except the money being used for the Confederation Line is the same money that was slotted for the NSLRT with a bit more added on. There's a bit of "alternative facting" going on around here. The truth is, where we are at with the Confederation Line now would have never happened without the cancellation of the NSLRT plan. There was zero talk of an LRT tunnel before O'Brien came along.

Let's pretend the old plan had gone ahead and opened in 2009. The city would have muddled along for at least 5 years (2014) before taking on any major transit projects. I doubt someone like Jim Watson would have the vision to come up with anything remotely close to the Confederation Line, especially since he was ambivalent about the project when he was elected.

There was in fact a lot of money added on. The original funding was $400M, which was increased to $1.2B. The city has spent $36M to settle legal action, and how much for the Vimy Bridge and South Keys Bridge, which were to be part of the project? And how much more for upgrades to the Trillium Line and the additional trains? How much more will be spent for further upgrades and extensions to the single track Trillium Line in the next few years? How much for new EAs? How much to reconfigure the route in Barrhaven from LRT to BRT? How much was spent on all the Park n Ride lots that opened on the N-S route without rail being in place?

If we tally all of this up, both lines could have been built in the same time frame. Sorry, it may have been Larry O'Brien's vision to build the tunnel but it was also his foolishness to cancel a signed contract. He could have proceeded with the signed project and started working on the tunnel immediately.

[Kitchissippi]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

If we tally all of this up, both lines could have been built in the same time frame. Sorry, it may have been Larry O'Brien's vision to build the tunnel but it was also his foolishness to cancel a signed contract. He could have proceeded with the signed project and started working on the tunnel immediately.

Complete revisionist fantasy. The original funding was leveraged to ask for more money for a bigger project. The tunnel could not have been justified and built without E-W Transitway conversion. It was a lot of discussion and work just to get the city and its citizens to just to shift its thinking and get to what we are building now. Anyone who doesn't remember that has short term memory.

The city isn't pouring money into the Trillium line because as-is it isn't even at capacity. You can spend a billion upgrading it but it won't surpass a sixth of the Confederation line's volume.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by bradnixon

Except they wouldn't have been replacing anything; the tunnel for the east-west line would have been in addition to what was already built and the N-S line could have remained on the surface.

But a significant chunk of the N-S line was an E-W connection from Bayview to the Rideau Centre. That would have had to have been sold for scrap a few years after it was built if they decided to build a tunnel, and it would have been incredibly difficult to convince the public the city was capable of making sound decisions under that scenario.

[TransitZilla]

Originally Posted by acottawa

But a significant chunk of the N-S line was an E-W connection from Bayview to the Rideau Centre. That would have had to have been sold for scrap a few years after it was built if they decided to build a tunnel, and it would have been incredibly difficult to convince the public the city was capable of making sound decisions under that scenario.

Sounds like conjecture to me. But we could have easily had both a tunnel and a surface line.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by acottawa

But a significant chunk of the N-S line was an E-W connection from Bayview to the Rideau Centre. That would have had to have been sold for scrap a few years after it was built if they decided to build a tunnel, and it would have been incredibly difficult to convince the public the city was capable of making sound decisions under that scenario.

I think the thought bradnixon and lrt's friend had was they could have the Trillium line on the surface downtown and the Confederation line in the tunnel so nothing would have been scrapped. The problem is the federal and provincial funding for the 2006 plan was cut off when the city cancelled the project, so the funding for the Confederation line was as a replacement to that original funding. If they went ahead and built the Trillium line, they likely wouldn't have received the same level of funding.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by bradnixon

Sounds like conjecture to me. But we could have easily had both a tunnel and a surface line.

Who would have taken the surface line? Trillium Line users would have demanded their LRT be connected to the tunnel.