Confederation Line (Stage 1) | In Service 1.0

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by bikegypsy

How are high-floor trains higher in capacity than low-floor ones? Everyone is going with low floors... Edmonton, Calgary, Toronto, Montreal...

Montreal is having high floor metros for the REM.

[J.OT13]

1. We can certainly argue the decision to use low floor LRTs vs Light Metro, but I don't think it's that big of a deal. The fact of the matter is that the Confederation Line will be used mainly as a commuter train from the suburbs to downtown, so more seats are needed. We can't expect standing room only from Place d'Orleans to downtown. Low floor LRT also means cheaper infrastructure by requiring smaller tunnels.

If we ever build the Bank-Rideau-Montreal subway, then I would say definitely build Light-Metro.

2. Another one of the big complaints I see constantly is the open air stations. Closing them up would have added hundreds of millions of dollars while doing nothing for functionality or growing capacity. Putting aside the fact that these stations are already a huge improvement over the old Transitway Stations, and that passengers won't have to wait long for the next train, very few systems are built with enclosed stations. Look at Calgary and Edmonton. They seem to have large, enclosed spaces, but the platforms themselves offer 0 protection. Much worse than Ottawa's designs.



https://www.calgarytransit.com/news/how-are-you-getting-lrt-stations-wed-know


https://www.flickr.com/photos/raptortheangel/16904993587

https://www.flickr.com/photos/kurt-b/14449109833

3. To me, these are the biggest blunders with the Confederation Line;

• Not adding a third CBD station. When they moved Rideau Station further east, the City should have looked into adding a third station to the CBD. Having Lyon's east end of the platform just west of Lyon (maintaining the two PdV entrances and a second one closer to Bay), a station starting just under Bank heading east and a third with the east end of it's platform at Elgin with an entrance at Confederation Square (connected to NAC)
• Basic stations in the CBD. All three downtown stations should have been built to impress. Spacious, airy with large platforms and double escalators. As it stands, the City invested more in Rideau and left Lyon and Parliament seemingly utilitarian in nature with narrow platforms.

These measures (either one, or both) might have added 100-150 million to the final tab, but it would have ensured that the heart of the system would meet expectations for the next century. More like Montreal (lack of elevators aside) than Toronto.

[lrt's friend]

I just looked at a video of the new Siemens S200 cars being purchased for Calgary's C-Train. The cars are very open because there is virtually no seating. I guess Calgary is getting desperate for capacity, but I hope we don't need to go that far.

[eltodesukane]

What is CBD? A cannabis compound ?

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

1. We can certainly argue the decision to use low floor LRTs vs Light Metro, but I don't think it's that big of a deal. The fact of the matter is that the Confederation Line will be used mainly as a commuter train from the suburbs to downtown, so more seats are needed. We can't expect standing room only from Place d'Orleans to downtown. Low floor LRT also means cheaper infrastructure by requiring smaller tunnels.

If we ever build the Bank-Rideau-Montreal subway, then I would say definitely build Light-Metro.

2. Another one of the big complaints I see constantly is the open air stations. Closing them up would have added hundreds of millions of dollars while doing nothing for functionality or growing capacity. Putting aside the fact that these stations are already a huge improvement over the old Transitway Stations, and that passengers won't have to wait long for the next train, very few systems are built with enclosed stations. Look at Calgary and Edmonton. They seem to have large, enclosed spaces, but the platforms themselves offer 0 protection. Much worse than Ottawa's designs.

3. To me, these are the biggest blunders with the Confederation Line;[/LIST]
These measures (either one, or both) might have added 100-150 million to the final tab, but it would have ensured that the heart of the system would meet expectations for the next century. More like Montreal (lack of elevators aside) than Toronto.

If more seats are needed than LRT is not a good option because of the narrow nature of LRT and wheel protrusion...

I disagree completely about "not adding functionality". First of all comfort is a big deal in transit and having open stations is just awful in winter. Plus platform doors allows better train regulation.

[J.OT13]

CBD is Central Business District.

Ottawa's Citadis Spirit is actually wider than Montreal's Azur at 2.65 meters vs. 2.51 meters. Worth noting that Montreal went with narrower train-sets in the first place (back in the early 60s) in order to allow for narrower tunnels, thus reducing construction costs.

Wheel wells do reduce the potential number of seats, yes. But just like in Montreal 50-odd years ago, it makes for cheaper construction. Again, I can see both sides on the light rail vs light metro argument.

For the open station design, no one commented on the Alberta stations. Would anyone disagree that ours are better? In any case, would it be justified to have spent 3 billion on stage 1 for enclosed station, limiting funds for stage 2? Stage 2 probably wouldn't go any further than Baseline in the west with the limited funds left (not to mention more enclosed stations) with no extension south or east.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

For the open station design, no one commented on the Alberta stations. Would anyone disagree that ours are better? In any case, would it be justified to have spent 3 billion on stage 1 for enclosed station, limiting funds for stage 2? Stage 2 probably wouldn't go any further than Baseline in the west with the limited funds left (not to mention more enclosed stations) with no extension south or east.

And also considering the additional costs needed to make the necessary western LRT extension politcally palatable to the NCC and the NIMBYs along route.

[zzptichka]

If you are dressing in such a way that you are freezing waiting for a train for 2 minutes in a half-enclosed station then you will probably be dead waiting for your connection bus for 20 minutes in the same weather but without any shelter at all on the street anyway.

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by zzptichka

If you are dressing in such a way that you are freezing waiting for a train for 2 minutes in a half-enclosed station then you will probably be dead waiting for your connection bus for 20 minutes in the same weather but without any shelter at all on the street anyway.

In Montreal there are big sheltered buses exchanges exactly for people to not freeze... Biggest one is at Longueuil metro station, it looks much like Airport gates.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by zzptichka

If you are dressing in such a way that you are freezing waiting for a train for 2 minutes in a half-enclosed station then you will probably be dead waiting for your connection bus for 20 minutes in the same weather but without any shelter at all on the street anyway.

I think we are seeing an evolution of station design. REM is being designed after the Confederation Line was designed so additional amenities are being included.

There is no question that those additional amenities are costing extra. Ottawa's project was underfunded by the higher levels of government because of the 2006 fiasco and the rush to move forward with a replacement under great political pressure. Because of that, the costs of the Ottawa project had to be contained. This resulted in reducing the size and number of underground stations, and eliminating a future interlining connection at Bayview.

REM is piggy backing on the Champlain Bridge project which is costing about $4B and is being funded by the federal government. This gives Montreal more flexibility concerning amenities for the rest of the line including total automation of trains.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

In Montreal there are big sheltered buses exchanges exactly for people to not freeze... Biggest one is at Longueuil metro station, it looks much like Airport gates.

Montreal is three times the size of Ottawa. The needs are greater and the amount of money available is greater for this kind of thing. There is already the risk of overbuilding the Confederation Line at the expense of other transit projects.

[kmcamp]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

If more seats are needed than LRT is not a good option because of the narrow nature of LRT and wheel protrusion...

I disagree completely about "not adding functionality". First of all comfort is a big deal in transit and having open stations is just awful in winter. Plus platform doors allows better train regulation.

The whole low-floor vs high-floor thing matters when you *remove* seats. The reason a Mark III skytrain holds more people in less space is because it has far less seating and more room for standing passengers. Boston even tried removing *all* the seats on some of it's subway cars to increase capacity. With seats, the capacity difference isn't that big.

We should go back to the idea of running at grade out in the burbs to lower costs which is why we picked low floor in the first place. The whole viaduct thing they're planning out in Stittsville is ridiculous, and is a waste of money. The VIA rail crash was tragic, but the idea since then that we have to grade separate every little bit of rail (including a virtually unused dirt road on the Trillium line) is taking things way too far.

As for width, the 2.6m width is pretty standard for most metro trains around the world (light metro or not), we're just used to Toronto and NYC which at 3.2m is massive on the world scale.

[kmcamp]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

CBD is Central Business District.

For the open station design, no one commented on the Alberta stations. Would anyone disagree that ours are better? In any case, would it be justified to have spent 3 billion on stage 1 for enclosed station, limiting funds for stage 2? Stage 2 probably wouldn't go any further than Baseline in the west with the limited funds left (not to mention more enclosed stations) with no extension south or east.

We'd be complaining about the stations no matter what. If they were fully enclosed, why not air conditioned. If enclosed and airconditioned, why are we spending so much money on stations when we could have had a simpler design.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by zzptichka

If you are dressing in such a way that you are freezing waiting for a train for 2 minutes in a half-enclosed station then you will probably be dead waiting for your connection bus for 20 minutes in the same weather but without any shelter at all on the street anyway.

I fully expect people to dress for the winter weather, but on the flip side, OC Transpo really needs to moderate the heat aboard buses. There's almost nothing worse than riding a superheated bus in winter gear.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by McC

You suspect incorrectly; the newest high-floor trains in Vancouver hold an extra person and a half per metre:

Skytrain MarkIII: capacity 532 for a 68 m train
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SkyTrain_rolling_stock

O-Train Citadis: capacity 600 for a 96 m train (coupled pair of 48 m sets)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xnIbutbaqM

That isn't a fair comparison for the purpose of comparing low-floor to high-floor. Skytrain is driver-less so doesn't have cabs. Granted the cabs waste platform space when running double trains (you end up with 2 cabs in the middle of the train), but that is a totally different story.

A better comparison is with Calgary's C-Train. I am not sure about the new S200, but the older SD-160 cars (they run 3 or 4 car trains) are 24.8m long and apparently have a capacity of 173 passengers (60 seated and 113 standing), so that is almost 7 passengers per meter.

Since you didn't calculate it, the Citadis Spirit, will accommodate 6.25 passengers per meter, so lower, but not as drastic as Skytrain's 7.8 passengers per meter.

Note the even older U2 used by Calgary was the same length but had a capacity of 150 (64 seated and 86 standing) so it accommodated 6.05 passengers per meter, so less than the Citadis Spirit.

Also, according to Alstom, the 48m train we are using could have a seating configuration to accommodate 340 passengers. That would be 7.08 passengers per meter, similar to the SD160.

Plus the huge operating savings of not having to pay drivers overtime to ferry people home from games and Bluesfest and things.

The Confederation line could run driver-less, but we chose to have drivers for some reason.

[MountainView]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

For the open station design, no one commented on the Alberta stations. Would anyone disagree that ours are better? In any case, would it be justified to have spent 3 billion on stage 1 for enclosed station, limiting funds for stage 2? Stage 2 probably wouldn't go any further than Baseline in the west with the limited funds left (not to mention more enclosed stations) with no extension south or east.

I have lived in Alberta before and used Calgary's LRT extensively. Their stations are quite nice but as you pointed out there is limited shelter on the platforms. During the winter, everyone huddles inside the stations - which are of average size but get crowded during peak times if every passenger waiting is in them.

Their LRT cars on the system I used (early 2010s) was basically 2x2 with an aisle that people could easily walk down or stand in.

I am not a huge fan of the wheel-well getting in the way with Ottawa's LRT. It is going to be an articulated bus just after its bend all over again. Impossible to pass through...which can lead to the front of the bus being jammed with the back being quite empty. The good thing with LRT is that people can board from any door... which should leave to an evenly spaced configuration of people.

I am excited to try Ottawa's new system when it opens. I think when Phase 2 open's in 2023* it will be even more beneficial to the system, as Phase 1 has significant choke points at Blair and Tunney's

It will be interesting to see how that plays out during the first few weeks of the line opening for business.

[J.OT13]

Thanks for sharing your experience with Calgary's C-Train!

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by Uhuniau

I fully expect people to dress for the winter weather, but on the flip side, OC Transpo really needs to moderate the heat aboard buses. There's almost nothing worse than riding a superheated bus in winter gear.

And the AC. Some buses are uncomfortably cold in the summer from excessive AC use.

[passwordisnt123]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

CBD is Central Business District.

Ottawa's Citadis Spirit is actually wider than Montreal's Azur at 2.65 meters vs. 2.51 meters. Worth noting that Montreal went with narrower train-sets in the first place (back in the early 60s) in order to allow for narrower tunnels, thus reducing construction costs.

Wheel wells do reduce the potential number of seats, yes. But just like in Montreal 50-odd years ago, it makes for cheaper construction. Again, I can see both sides on the light rail vs light metro argument.

For the open station design, no one commented on the Alberta stations. Would anyone disagree that ours are better? In any case, would it be justified to have spent 3 billion on stage 1 for enclosed station, limiting funds for stage 2? Stage 2 probably wouldn't go any further than Baseline in the west with the limited funds left (not to mention more enclosed stations) with no extension south or east.

I can't speak to Rideau station but based on my experience with Continuum in the summer and riding both Edmonton and Calgary's LRTs, I'd say Lyon Station is better than Calgary but not as good as Edmonton's central stations under Jasper Ave.

[J.OT13]

Comparing downtown stations or stations in general?