The Great Canadian Transit Thread

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by Andy6

That's good I guess. The Bloor-Danforth platform at Yonge Street is one of the most cramped spots in the whole system. On the other hand its grubbiness is one of the few remaining reminders of the sleazier, funner, non-condo-infested Toronto for which a certain nostalgia is developing. The upper part they already expanded once, but I suppose that must have been nearly 30 years ago now. At that point I seem to remember they were talking about having a centre platform as well, with doors opening both sides, but that would have been very expensive.

I wonder how much work would it take to make it a "Spanish solution" and whether it would be worth it.

[jamincan]

I guess it will be 2/3 of the way there once this is done.

[p_xavier]

https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/public-trans...-cdpq-subsidiary-given-mandate-1.5152523

[Dengler Avenue]

In Richmond, B.C., the long overdue bus loop under Brighouse Canada Line Station is finally open.
https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/richmond-brighouse-bus-exchange-opening

[J.OT13]

Ridership pandemic stats OC Transpo.


https://twitter.com/KatePorterCBC/status/1318915474168647681

[Chadillaccc]

Ooof that is rough. Calgary Transit slipped back above 50% of normal at the end of September. Probably won't improve much from there for a while.

[J.OT13]

Our economy is largely based on the Federal Government and High-Tech. Both these sectors easily switched to work-from-home. Huge hit to transit and the downtown economy. Office vacancies have climbed as well, with some companies shifting to wfh or "digital by default" long term. I'm a little worried about how things will look post-Covid.

[CityTech]

I don't think digital default will catch on.

Talk to almost anyone in high tech who has been working remote since March and they'll talk about how they are sick of WFH and want the office back. And the federal government will never do it obviously.

[ssiguy]

That drop in OC Transpo's numbers is not unique as every system in the country has seen it's ridership number collapse and none are even close to be back at pre-COVID levels.

The real question will be is when the pandemic is over and the economy back on it's feet, will we see the riders return and ridership exceed pre-COVID numbers? As Canadian cities continue to grow so, I think, we will ridership grow as well but I am doubtful we will see a return to per-capita ridership increases of any magnitude which we had been seeing.

In terms of ridership per-capita, has COVID resulted in a plateauing of transit use? Has it so fundamentally changed our work, social, and educational environments that it will never fully recover?

Added to the above is the impact of high housing prices that once forced people into the suburbs are now making many younger people question the entire viability of big city living especially in Vancouver and Toronto. Older people too are cashing out and moving to smaller cities and these places do not have the transit infrastructure or operations comparable to the big cities.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by ssiguy

That drop in OC Transpo's numbers is not unique as every system in the country has seen it's ridership number collapse and none are even close to be back at pre-COVID levels.

The real question will be is when the pandemic is over and the economy back on it's feet, will we see the riders return and ridership exceed pre-COVID numbers? As Canadian cities continue to grow so, I think, we will ridership grow as well but I am doubtful we will see a return to per-capita ridership increases of any magnitude which we had been seeing.

In terms of ridership per-capita, has COVID resulted in a plateauing of transit use? Has it so fundamentally changed our work, social, and educational environments that it will never fully recover?

Added to the above is the impact of high housing prices that once forced people into the suburbs are now making many younger people question the entire viability of big city living especially in Vancouver and Toronto. Older people too are cashing out and moving to smaller cities and these places do not have the transit infrastructure or operations comparable to the big cities.

If anything, this has given the governments a chance to catch up on transit projects that are desperately needed.

[Dengler Avenue]

How about this:
On a biweekly basis, go to office only on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, upcoming Tuesday then upcoming Thursday, or Tuesday, Thursday, upcoming Monday, upcoming Wednesday then upcoming Friday?
There are 52 weeks in a year so we can pull this off.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

If anything, this has given the governments a chance to catch up on transit projects that are desperately needed.

Well, ya. One of the few silver linings of Covid I guess. The contractors responsible for the Confederation Line were able to fix almost all of the issues over the Spring/Summer. Reliability is now within the range of wat was expected. The true test will be this winter and again post-Covid once the ridership returns.

[Dengler Avenue]

While browsing SSP, I saw this ad:

[J.OT13]

The long standing dream of a rail loop around downtown Ottawa and Gatineau is is gaining some traction once again now that Gatineau is proposing a rail line that would terminate in Ottawa.

The group calling themselves the "Supporters of the Loop" have created a new website providing arguments in favour of the loop along with renderings and routing.

[hipster duck]

^I'm quite critical of that plan, and not because of the aesthetics along Wellington*.

For starters, building the ROW along Wellington is like building a ROW along a seawall - you're only getting trip generators on one side (to the south), so it makes more sense to move the alignment to the centre of the downtown office district rather than on the edge.

Secondly - no matter what you do - surface right of ways are slower and less reliable for transit operations than grade-separated. In many cases it's still worth it to do so because there are huge upfront costs to tunneling but there is a tunnel already, and it runs along a better alignment. Why not find a way to interline this tram with the existing O-train tunnel 2 blocks south? If the O-train line has ATC, you should be able to squeeze the Gatineau-bound trains (which would come less frequently) in and still maintain a decent frequency on the Confederation line.

That leads to the final issue, and that's that this proposal is sold as if there are convenient connections to the O-train when, really, you have to walk 2 blocks on city streets and then descend into an underground station to make a connection. Not exactly seamless.

*EDIT: I wasn't bothered by the aesthetics until I saw catenary wires in the last rendering. Overhead wires on the street in front of the Parliament buildings? Come on, guys.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

^I'm quite critical of that plan, and not because of the aesthetics along Wellington*.

For starters, building the ROW along Wellington is like building a ROW along a seawall - you're only getting trip generators on one side (to the south), so it makes more sense to move the alignment to the centre of the downtown office district rather than on the edge.

Secondly - no matter what you do - surface right of ways are slower and less reliable for transit operations than grade-separated. In many cases it's still worth it to do so because there are huge upfront costs to tunneling but there is a tunnel already, and it runs along a better alignment. Why not find a way to interline this tram with the existing O-train tunnel 2 blocks south? If the O-train line has ATC, you should be able to squeeze the Gatineau-bound trains (which would come less frequently) in and still maintain a decent frequency on the Confederation line.

That leads to the final issue, and that's that this proposal is sold as if there are convenient connections to the O-train when, really, you have to walk 2 blocks on city streets and then descend into an underground station to make a connection. Not exactly seamless.

*EDIT: I wasn't bothered by the aesthetics until I saw catenary wires in the last rendering. Overhead wires on the street in front of the Parliament buildings? Come on, guys.

Couple of points. At this time, the STO's proposal would either use surface Wellington or underground Sparks. The undergrounds Sparks option would include direct links to the Confederation Line concourses at Lyon and Parliament stations.

Using the existing tunnel for the STO is a no-go for several reasons:

• It would eat-up capacity from Ottawa's investment and force earlier expansion of the train and platform lengths;
• STO trains are shorter because they run on the street in Gatineau, which limits the tunnel's ultimate capacity;
• STO trains would need to turn around at some point, further impacting capacity and operations in the tunnel;
• The entire Confederation Line's designed max capacity would be limited;
• Gatineau's manual trams would not be compatible with Ottawa's ATC (similarly to Edmonton's issues with the Metro Line);

It's true that Wellington could cause reliability issues, especially with parades, protests and events.

As for the esthetics, STO's plan is to run the trams battery powered from the Portage Bridge to Elgin, eliminating the need for overhead wires.

[biguc]

Nice, that's exactly what Ottawa should have. With supercaps instead of caternary wires in front of Parliament Hill, of course. And I'd run the trams along the north side of Wellington to limit interactions with cross streets.

The loop is key. Key for getting around the centre of the combined cities, key for seeing the sights of the capital, and key for opportunities to expand tram service down Allumettieres and to Vanier. I don't especially care if it's tunneled or not, but I'd lean towards the street-level option. Besides the expense of tunnels, whatever inconvenience walking to transfer poses would be more than made up for by the twin-benefits of redundancy and service saturation provided by having two lines through the centre of the city. Besides, Gatineau commuters would get better Confederation Line transfers out of a Trillium Line that just crossed the river.

[JHikka]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Couple of points. At this time, the STO's proposal would either use surface Wellington or underground Sparks. The undergrounds Sparks option would include direct links to the Confederation Line concourses at Lyon and Parliament stations.

Underground Sparks would make a lot more sense than surface Wellington, especially for the closer connections to Confederation Line on Queen. You could probably loop some station entrances onto Wellington south side.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by biguc

Nice, that's exactly what Ottawa should have. With supercaps instead of caternary wires in front of Parliament Hill, of course. And I'd run the trams along the north side of Wellington to limit interactions with cross streets.

The loop is key. Key for getting around the centre of the combined cities, key for seeing the sights of the capital, and key for opportunities to expand tram service down Allumettieres and to Vanier. I don't especially care if it's tunneled or not, but I'd lean towards the street-level option. Besides the expense of tunnels, whatever inconvenience walking to transfer poses would be more than made up for by the twin-benefits of redundancy and service saturation provided by having two lines through the centre of the city. Besides, Gatineau commuters would get better Confederation Line transfers out of a Trillium Line that just crossed the river.

Originally Posted by JHikka

Underground Sparks would make a lot more sense than surface Wellington, especially for the closer connections to Confederation Line on Queen. You could probably loop some station entrances onto Wellington south side.

The loop makes sense, but if you really want to make it work well, it should cross Line 1. Maybe the loop runs under Laurier, or further south.

[scryer]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

That leads to the final issue, and that's that this proposal is sold as if there are convenient connections to the O-train when, really, you have to walk 2 blocks on city streets and then descend into an underground station to make a connection. Not exactly seamless.

That is actually my biggest gripe when it comes to the surface option. It is a completely missed opportunity to seamlessly connect with some Confederation stations underground.

The loop makes sense to me from looking at most of the routing but a piece of transit infrastructure of this magnitude, in our modern times, needs to seamlessly connect to other major transit stations. The Wellington surface option is very reminiscent of Calgary's downtown corridor - and not in a good way! How many LRT mistakes do we need to make before we learn the lesson that street integrated LRT does not equal to rapid transit? Not only that but putting this LRT underground along Sparks street to run congruently with the Confederation line looks like it would capture more transit users since it's deeper within downtown Ottawa (therefore appealing to a more diverse amount of users). I just think that the Sparks street alignment would capture slightly more transit users and be perceived less as a tourist line. I could be wrong because I have never lived in Ottawa (or visited, sorry; don't take away my citizenship ).

And would the loop serve as a natural extension from the Gatineau tram? Because to me that would make sense instead of having a separate line operating in the loop independent of the Gatineau tram. Maybe I misunderstood the idea ?