Expo Line - Surrey Langley Extension: Planning & Pre-Construction

[ClaytonA]

Originally Posted by Sheba

...For the moment there's not much point in Surrey looking at zoning along Fraser Hwy as any variety of rail transit is far enough in the future to make it pointless. I wouldn't be surprised for them to start working on it when there's serious planning and funding in place for that line. ...

Disagree; they should start now. If anything the planning and zoning should definitely precede the rapid transit investment. There is already a B-Line or express bus and very good transit service already there today, right now.

This would give the community time to adjust to change, developers less opportunity to speculate as developers are generally less willing to hold onto property for years waiting to see if a catalyst develops, but if zoning is there then they can build and residents and developers have certainty.

You also get better communities because the development is more organic and happens over a longer period of time. For example you get a bit more diversity in the building age, and therefore things like rents for both businesses and residents.

Surrey should have completed the zoning around future stations or the corridor five years ago.

[Reecemartin]

[Deleted]

[Reecemartin]

[Deleted]

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by Reecemartin

A question: what do people see happening with the Surrey Central Bus Loop in the future? It takes up a ton of space and is pretty unsightly, any chance of the air-rights being sold to a developer or building an underground one in the future? Bus loops of a large size are fairly uncommon in dense urban areas.

I highly doubt that it - or any other loops - are going away. Bus lines are always going to need a place to terminate.

They might move the passenger bay off to the side and indoors, though. (link)

[jsbertram]

Originally Posted by xd_1771

For anyone curious about the projected numbers on 104 Avenue and the other Whalley-Guildford corridors, the city did release a corporate report outlining their traffic modelling results for 104 Ave with the LRT system.

Here's the important bit:

Basically, the congestion would have been unmanageable without the 105 Ave corridor they're now ramming through the Hawthorne Park.

Now that they're building 105 Ave (expected to handle around 10-12k vehicles per direction, which I actually find really high for a "minor collector" road) 104 Ave is expected to operate within "acceptable levels of congestion", whatever that means. My take is that means it will still be very congested, but the big reveal I think is the line that admits that 100 Ave (with 4 lanes) and 108 Ave will be approaching capacity only around 7 years after LRT opens. Essentially saying that even after 7 years to build ridership and adjust travel habits, it will still be difficult to manage congestion without spending even more to widen roadways in the area.

Considering that the city's original plans had LRT going through to 156th St (taking way the 2 lanes there too) I'm quite certain that they have little if any concern for the congestion that will be created by the LRT project and loss of traffic capacity on 104th. I find "road diet" to be a really poor excuse. Downtown Surrey is growing, the Fraser Valley is growing, and traffic volumes will grow significantly by virtue of that alone. Clearly, to the city LRT is the #1 priority even if the congestion is so bad it limits the economic potential of both Guildford and downtown.

i'm a bit surprised that there has been so little outrage that after spending billions on this toonerville trolly, reducing 104 to a single-lane in each direction with fewer left turn lanes, widening 100 and 108 to compensate for lower capacity on 104, and ramming 105 through a park ...... in 15-20 years 104 will have to be widened back to 4 lanes again with the lrt in the middle,

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by jsbertram

i'm a bit surprised that there has been so little outrage that after spending billions on this toonerville trolly, reducing 104 to a single-lane in each direction with fewer left turn lanes, widening 100 and 108 to compensate for lower capacity on 104, and ramming 105 through a park ...... in 15-20 years 104 will have to be widened back to 4 lanes again with the lrt in the middle,

Probably because they haven't spent billions on it *yet*

[Reecemartin]

[Deleted]

[Envder]

Originally Posted by Reecemartin

A question: what do people see happening with the Surrey Central Bus Loop in the future? It takes up a ton of space and is pretty unsightly, any chance of the air-rights being sold to a developer or building an underground one in the future? Bus loops of a large size are fairly uncommon in dense urban areas.

the bus loop will be gone and turned into a road and bus will use the new road and central ave as the loading and unloading areas in the future. there is a map out there some where of this

[Reecemartin]

[Deleted]

[Trainguy]

9 March 2018
Surrey Mayor Still Hopeful LRT Deal Will be Reached by the End of the Month

Vancouver British Columbia

Surrey mayor Linda Hepner has high hopes a deal will be finally reached in the coming weeks for the light rail transit project.

Hepner said she is optimistic the federal and provincial governments will soon strike a funding agreement for the construction of Surrey's proposed Light Rail Transit (LRT) system.

"I am confident that hopefully by the end of this month we will have something concrete to say to everyone that we finally closed that gap," Hepner said.

The LRT is expected to span 27 kilometres and be constructed in two phases.

The first phase is a Surrey-Newton-Guilford LRT that will be linked to current Expo Line stations, and the second phase will connect the King George Station to 56 Avenue and 203 Street in Langley.

In early 2016, the City of Surrey altered the cost of the project from $2.14 billion to $2.6 billion.

Even though the mayor says she expected a bilateral agreement between the federal and provincial governments to be reached by December 2017, she said she's not worried the project has gone off the rails.

"I think that we're so close now and the gap is so small compared to where we started," Hepner said.

The federal government has committed up to 40 percent funding for the project, while the province has indicated it will match that same amount of support.

Other than the Pattullo Bridge replacement project, Surrey transit was not mentioned in the 2018 provincial budget released on 20 Feb 2018 but Hepner said she was not alarmed.

"I had already known the commitment by the province was there," Hepner said.

"I wasn't surprised that it didn't appear in their speeches."

Janet Brown.

They are talking like the line to Langley is a done deal. Far from it!!

[Metro-One]

Man, they are really pushing it as if the Langley line has been decided.

A really annoying tactic to say the least.

You can bet that they know that the technology for the Langley extension hasn’t been decided yet, but they probably think that if they keep speaking as if it has been decided as LRT that it will push it towards their favor??

I kind kind of understand their desire for the L-Line (as misguided as that is) this be LRT from their postition, but the desire for LRT down Fraser to Langley over extending the Expo Line is beyond me.

[Firebrand]

Well, there are people (that I have talked to) who say that Langley does not deserve SkyTrain because nobody there uses transit on a frequent basis.

[Metro-One]

Haha, then Sirrey’s case for mass transit also falls apart on that assumption.

If that’s the case, then why does that change the technological preference? Especially when they will cost nearly the same along that corridor?

That argument seems more fit for a “train or no train” argument than the “LRT or Skytrain” argument we are having.

[Firebrand]

In my case, someone did an "LRT for Surrey and no SkyTrain" approach. I was reading something on the Daily Hive about the Surrey LRT, and one user said that a forced transfer at Surrey's "downtown" is beneficial for Surrey, and he also said that the LRT will take cars off the road, making Surrey more "livable".

It's at that point where I facepalmed.

[Metro-One]

That was the appropriate reaction, haha. That idea of a forced transfer is the worst of all and completely contradicts the second comment about taking cars off the road... (In how the first comment completely works against creating an enticing transit option that would lead to fewer cars).

[Firebrand]

It doesn't just stop there. I made a response to that guy in the comments, and that discussion ends to the point where I stopped bothering because he would repeat the same thing.

The thing that I noticed among LRT supporters is that they willfully ignore problems like the odd S-shaped design along 102nd Ave, and they constantly bash on SkyTrain despite the evidence to the contrary. Talking to them is like talking to flat-earthers: they always fabricate, spread, and repeat their lies that the round Earth is a conspiracy even though a simple google search for facts contradicts their beliefs. Of course, LRT supporters don't go to the extremes (except for zweisystem), but the parallelism is still there.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Problem is, zwei/RailfortheValley/EvilEye/DonaldMalcolmJohnston (exactly how many sock puppets does this prick have?) is easy to ignore because he's just an internet troll. There's plenty of not-so-douchey people like Ron - who also frequents Pricetags, so stay away if you want to avoid conflict - who genuinely think that "if you make transit slower, people will make shorter commutes, and that will create tighter communities;" the entire argument for LRT to Langley is that if you make it hard enough for Langley residents to get across the Fraser, then they'll give up and shop in Surrey. "Something, something, induced demand" is a popular one too.

Since it's late, and we're all on the same page, let's just agree that said rationale is garbage. Nevertheless, get used to hearing it from a VERY vocal minority (Patrick Condon, Adam Fitch, Surrey's businesses and City Council, etc) for the foreseeable future.

[Firebrand]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

"if you make transit slower, people will make shorter commutes, and that will create tighter communities;" the entire argument for LRT to Langley is that if you make it hard enough for Langley residents to get across the Fraser, then they'll give up and shop in Surrey. "Something, something, induced demand" is a popular one too.

See, that’s the thing. I’m going to BCIT in Burnaby this Fall, so I’m going to have to leave my house really early in the morning so that I have enough time to study when I’m there. I will have no time to “shop around” in Surrey—I’m not a shopping person—which is why I don’t understand Surrey’s mentality of trapping people within itself. With that mindset, they could’ve forced Pitt Meadows to close the Pitt River Bridge, forcing Maple Ridge and Mission commuters to drive through Surrey. It’s preposterous!

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Since it's late, and we're all on the same page, let's just agree that said rationale is garbage. Nevertheless, get used to hearing it from a VERY vocal minority (Patrick Condon, Adam Fitch, Surrey's businesses and City Council, etc) for the foreseeable future.

I strongly agree. However, someone who isn’t aware of the LRT fiasco would potentially succumb to these people, so you’ll have to step in and counter them. It’s a vicious cycle that has been dragging along since it’s inception.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by Firebrand

I strongly agree. However, someone who isn’t aware of the LRT fiasco would potentially succumb to these people, so you’ll have to step in and counter them. It’s a vicious cycle that has been dragging along since it’s inception.

Yup, join the club. Oh, and by the way, welcome to the forum.

[Trainguy]

In early 2016, the City of Surrey altered the cost of the project from $2.14 billion to $2.6 billion.

That was 2 years ago...

What are the costs now?

Once the shovels hit the ground?

Phase 2 won't be approved until phase 1 is complete. That is years away. Governments change... let's see what happens...