O-Train Line 2 [Stage 1 | Bayview to Greenboro] | In Service

[lrt's friend]

Subways should only be built when surface transit can no longer cope with passenger traffic. This is why we are building the Confederation Line underground downtown. this is why the Yonge Street subway was built in 1954. This is why the Bloor-Danforth subway was built in the 60s.

As I said before, if we need a bus every 2 minutes on Bank or Rideau-Montreal and having trouble keeping up, then we need a subway. Certainly, Bank Street appears to be a little closer to reaching that point than Montreal Road especially with event traffic at Lansdowne. But in both cases, under normal conditions, existing buses are coping without reaching that 2 minute threshold.

[FutureWickedCity]

If Denley had his way, nothing would ever get done in this city. He pooh-poohs everything.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Subways should only be built when surface transit can no longer cope with passenger traffic. This is why we are building the Confederation Line underground downtown. this is why the Yonge Street subway was built in 1954. This is why the Bloor-Danforth subway was built in the 60s.

Capacity is the primary reason to switch to rail, but isn't the reason to switch a grade separated system (buried or elevated, bus or train). The primary reason for that is congestion with insufficient room for (or ineffective) transit priority measures. The best metric for that is ability to provide reliable service. On that metric, Montreal Rd fails miserably and it is only going to get worse when they "upgrade" the street and reduce it from 4 to 3 lanes.

Now the two can go hand in hand: congestion can limit capacity. That is what is happening on Albert and Slater streets. We have reached maximum capacity on the streets because there isn't time for one group of buses to empty/load before the next group comes. Surface LRT could have worked if it was on a dedicated corridor, but no one could agree on which street to close to traffic and mixing the trains with other cars and buses downtown would have increased congestion, not decreased it.

As I said before, if we need a bus every 2 minutes on Bank or Rideau-Montreal and having trouble keeping up, then we need a subway. Certainly, Bank Street appears to be a little closer to reaching that point than Montreal Road especially with event traffic at Lansdowne. But in both cases, under normal conditions, existing buses are coping without reaching that 2 minute threshold.

The problem Rideau/Montreal Rd has is that it is the only corridor that connects the communities east of the Rideau River to Centretown north off the 417. That increases its congestion tremendously.

Bank St. has Bronson as a primary alternate and the combination of Queen Elizabeth Drive, Elgin and Main St as a secondary alternate. As a result, congestion from other vehicles isn't as bad.

[lrt's friend]

We can't justify building a subway based on passenger traffic that supports a bus every 15 minutes and even twice that number during peak hours. 800 to 1000 passengers per hour in the peak direction?

We are fools to turn Montreal Road into a major bicycle route that cripples transit. I thought Laurier-Donald was to be the major bicycle route.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

As I said before, if we need a bus every 2 minutes on Bank or Rideau-Montreal and having trouble keeping up, then we need a subway. Certainly, Bank Street appears to be a little closer to reaching that point than Montreal Road especially with event traffic at Lansdowne. But in both cases, under normal conditions, existing buses are coping without reaching that 2 minute threshold.

Yeah. And the capacity problems to that do exist on Bank and Rideau-Montreal are solvable by using higher capacity buses (the city is already leaning in that direction with increased use of double-decker buses on Bank), and upping frequency.

And there is room for some transit priority. There's room for queue jump lanes at most spots, and they can do transit signal priority with stops relocated to be after intersections instead of before. Those three things combined would help a lot. In fact they'd probably help more than dedicated bus lanes.

If we implement that, assign higher-capacity buses to Bank and Rideau/Montreal, and up frequencies to 10 minutes all day long (for combined 5 minutes on Bank between downtown and Sunnyside), that would be good enough for that corridor. Subway is overkill, unless suburban-to-downtown traffic was routed along them too (like if we had built the eastern leg of the Confederation Line on Rideau-Montreal instead of the old Transitway route, for example).

[lrt's friend]

People may be surprised (I was) when I noticed transit priority at Bank and Findlay Creek Drive, which is the very last intersection on Bank that has regular bus service in the south end. There is a special transit light for buses turning off of Findlay Creek onto Bank Street which allows buses to turn left from the right lane and therefore get around and past a line-up of traffic in the left hand turn lane at the intersection.

Traffic in the Leitrim area on Bank, Leitrim Road and Albion Road has become awful in the last couple of years.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

Subway is overkill, unless suburban-to-downtown traffic was routed along them too (like if we had built the eastern leg of the Confederation Line on Rideau-Montreal instead of the old Transitway route, for example).

As I previously posted, I estimate the Confederation Line will reach its ultimate capacity in about 30 years. At that point we will need to divert some riders off of it and onto a new downtown line.

One of the long term issues with the Trillium Line expansion is that currently east/west travel through downtown is reasonably balanced. An expansion of the Trillium Line will divert traffic away from the south-eastern transitway, thus increasing traffic to/from the west and decreasing traffic to/from the east. If the POW bridge is opened, it will further increased traffic to/from the west. This will throw off the east/west balance, making the line reach capacity sooner than necessary.

[lrt's friend]

We won't be doing much of anything until the Confederation Line is finished. Obviously, as the Confederation Line tunnel reaches near capacity, we need to start planning Line 2 through downtown. It better be a substantially different route than the existing line.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by roger1818

As I previously posted, I estimate the Confederation Line will reach its ultimate capacity in about 30 years. .

Why?

Population growth in Ottawa is about 1.1% (and may well decline as baby boomer deaths are not fully replaced by new arrivals and births). Not sure why you would assume confederation line usage will grow by 2.9% (which would be required to max out in 30 years).

[1overcosc]

The Confederation Line has a day-1 capacity of 12,000 (20 trains per hour x 600 people per train).

That can grow to:
-18,000 (by increasing frequency to 2 minutes)
-22,200 (by adding the 5th module to each train--increases capacity to 740)
-29,600 (by automating the line allowing for 1.5 minute frequency)

With ridership about 10,000 on day 1 (that's a number I've seen floated around a bunch) that means ridership will have to grow by 196% before the Confederation Line reaches its capacity.

Even if ridership grows at 3% a year (a generous amount), capacity won't be reached until 2055. A more realistic rate of 1% (given likely population growth in coming decades) means capacity won't be reached until the year 2128.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by acottawa

Why?

Population growth in Ottawa is about 1.1% (and may well decline as baby boomer deaths are not fully replaced by new arrivals and births). Not sure why you would assume confederation line usage will grow by 2.9% (which would be required to max out in 30 years).

I got a 3% growth rate from the first table in the DOWNTOWN TRANSIT OPERATING STRATEGIES 2007-2010 (it was the only information I had at the time). Obviously if this growth rate is not accurate, my results won't be accurate. Using your growth rate of 1.1%, it becomes 80 years.

That of course still assumes that only Ottawa residents are using the LRT and that growth is balanced in both the east and west. If the extended Trillium line diverts people off of the South-eastern Transitway and we open the POW bridge and start having Gatineau residents use the Confederation line to get downtown instead of buses, we could end up seeing almost twice as many people using the western Confederation Line to/from Downtown as the eastern line. If that happens, the ultimate capacity of the western line (24,000 pph) would be reached when the eastern line is at 50% capacity (12,000 pph), which would be in less than 20 years with a 1.1% growth.

[bikegypsy]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

The Confederation Line has a day-1 capacity of 12,000 (20 trains per hour x 600 people per train).

That can grow to:
-18,000 (by increasing frequency to 2 minutes)
-22,200 (by adding the 5th module to each train--increases capacity to 740)
-29,600 (by automating the line allowing for 1.5 minute frequency)

With ridership about 10,000 on day 1 (that's a number I've seen floated around a bunch) that means ridership will have to grow by 196% before the Confederation Line reaches its capacity.

Even if ridership grows at 3% a year (a generous amount), capacity won't be reached until 2055. A more realistic rate of 1% (given likely population growth in coming decades) means capacity won't be reached until the year 2128.

Ottawa-Gatineau has grown by nearly 400,000 people in only 20 years, which reflects similar growth rate numbers experienced during the previous 50 years. It's one of those cities that sees moderate/high but steady growth. It's also a hard place to leave, so the majority of retiring boomers are not going anywhere. (Let me add that only a fraction of Ottawans are aware of the mad quality of life they enjoy.) Growth numbers will probably be around 1.5 to 2%, but this doesn't necessarily translate to the same percentage usage increases on the line... let's note that the massive project(s) planned for LeBreton and being built at Zibi (which will add 10 to 20,000 residents within minutes of the line) are sure to positively influence ridership.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

-29,600 (by automating the line allowing for 1.5 minute frequency)

OC Transpo claims here that the ultimate capacity is 24,000 passengers per hour in each direction.

[lrt's friend]

Plans to connect STO to the Confederation Line will likely add 20% to ridership.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Plans to connect STO to the Confederation Line will likely add 20% to ridership.

That seems low considering Gatineau has about 1/3 (33%) the population of Ottawa? I would have thought a similar percentage of Gatineau residents would work in downtown Ottawa as Ottawa residents.

It is also likely the average overall increase. Since they are all travelling in the same direction, so if true, the increase would be 40% in that direction with a 0% increase in the opposite direction (averaging out to a 20% increase overall).

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Subways should only be built when surface transit can no longer cope with passenger traffic. This is why we are building the Confederation Line underground downtown. this is why the Yonge Street subway was built in 1954. This is why the Bloor-Danforth subway was built in the 60s.

As I said before, if we need a bus every 2 minutes on Bank or Rideau-Montreal and having trouble keeping up, then we need a subway. Certainly, Bank Street appears to be a little closer to reaching that point than Montreal Road especially with event traffic at Lansdowne. But in both cases, under normal conditions, existing buses are coping without reaching that 2 minute threshold.

Existing buses are NOT coping on Rideau-Montreal. Not at the 2-minute point, no, but regular bus transit is a failure along this corridor, especially during a.m. peak and outside peak hours. And to top it off, the current favoured Montreal Road redesign will actually further reduce the speed of bus movement.

Bank Street, as crappy as OC Transpo service is (and it too often is) is still getting much better treatment than Rideau-Montreal.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

We can't justify building a subway based on passenger traffic that supports a bus every 15 minutes and even twice that number during peak hours. 800 to 1000 passengers per hour in the peak direction?

We are fools to turn Montreal Road into a major bicycle route that cripples transit. I thought Laurier-Donald was to be the major bicycle route.

The bike lobby, despite how powerless they think themselves, is much better at pushing its pet projects than the disorganized transit lobby, such as it exists.

I fully support adding bike infrastructure wherever physically practicable and economically feasible, but some of the bike projects, like the Beechwood fiasco, have come at the expense of transit service, which is asbackwards.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

Yeah. And the capacity problems to that do exist on Bank and Rideau-Montreal are solvable by using higher capacity buses (the city is already leaning in that direction with increased use of double-decker buses on Bank), and upping frequency.

There are still too many runs of Rideau-Montreal routes (esp. the 12) running on 40-footers, and - possibly an even worse problem - OC Transpo, either by policy or by operators simply being jerks, too often won't allow rear-door boarding, which slows up the process and contributes greatly to bunching.

The Rideau-Montreal corridor is not only denied big, expensive transit fixes (LRT, subway), it is denied small, cheap ones.

And there is room for some transit priority. There's room for queue jump lanes at most spots

Even west of Notre-Dame Cemetery and along Rideau?

If we implement that, assign higher-capacity buses to Bank and Rideau/Montreal, and up frequencies to 10 minutes all day long (for combined 5 minutes on Bank between downtown and Sunnyside), that would be good enough for that corridor.

Ah yes, the old "good enough for Vanier" standard of public services.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

People may be surprised (I was) when I noticed transit priority at Bank and Findlay Creek Drive, which is the very last intersection on Bank that has regular bus service in the south end. There is a special transit light for buses turning off of Findlay Creek onto Bank Street which allows buses to turn left from the right lane and therefore get around and past a line-up of traffic in the left hand turn lane at the intersection.

Traffic in the Leitrim area on Bank, Leitrim Road and Albion Road has become awful in the last couple of years.

I am not surprised: every dime of transit-priority spending by the city has been in suburban locations, not in the inner urban area as defined by the city itself.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by Uhuniau

The bike lobby, despite how powerless they think themselves, is much better at pushing its pet projects than the disorganized transit lobby, such as it exists.

I fully support adding bike infrastructure wherever physically practicable and economically feasible, but some of the bike projects, like the Beechwood fiasco, have come at the expense of transit service, which is asbackwards.

Yeah, the bike lobby, combined with the parking lobby really does a number on transit on a lot of these streets.