Canadian LRT/RT projects U/C

[Base]

Certainly an upbeat and positive tone to the video but can't help but be amazed and jealous sitting here in Edmonton following our Valley line woes.

• Video Link

[SpongeG]

Broadway extension - Vancouver

• Video Link

[swimmer_spe]

https://beta.ctvnews.ca/local/winnipeg/2023/1/3/1_6216704.html

This was posted on the Great Canadian Transit thread.

Winnipeg is looking at LRT.

If this happens, by the 2030s, all top 10 CMAs in Canada will have some sort of higher order rail transit.

[J.OT13]

Some progress on Ottawa's east extension from a Stage 2 East update.

https://mailchi.mp/31a22e5e795a/stage-2-...-lrt-o-train-east-extension?e=f37f60b514

Guideway



Montreal Station



Jeanne d'Arc Station



Convent Glen Station



Place d'Orleans Station





Trim Station

[Nouvellecosse]

^ That first pic looks almost rural. Like an urban transit line running alongside a farm field.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

^ That first pic looks almost rural. Like an urban transit line running alongside a farm field.

That first pic is through the Greenbelt. That said, Stage 2 East and South serve a lot of under used land.

Between Blair and Montreal, the line skips over a dense, low-income community tp stop at Montreal where it serves empty fields on one side and light industrial on the other. Terrible pedestrian/cyclists environment, but we're promised some improvements.

Jeanne d'Arc is mostly sfh, but with some potential for TOD.

Convent Glen is all sfh and townhomes with no potential for TOD.

Place d'Orleans is a major bus transfer station with plenty of TOD potential, but for now mostly just serves the mall and parking lots (including park-and-rides), with something of a small "entertainment" district a few hundred meters away (past the mall's surface parking).

Trim again serves a park-and-ride only. On the other side with no bridge, you have a beech and high-density development along with a francophone trades college. With a bridge to the north, the walk would be 1.2 kilometers to the beech, 500 meters to the high density and 300 meters to the college. Without the bridge, it's 1.6 km, 530 meters and 1.2 km roughly.

That said, the Line 2 extension south is mostly just woods and empty fields with park-and-rides and bus loops. Even new proposals near the stations are modern suburban retail strip malls with giant parking lots.

The west extension is the only one with an urban fabric with much more TOD actively u/c and proposed between Tunney's and Lincoln Fields. It also serves the Ottawa's largest college and a few 70s era high-density, low-income areas at Pinecrest and Bayshore. But that's not by design; it only follows the old Transitway (which itself was built on former rail lines) and the Queensway, so the cheapest possible route to eventually get to the suburbs.

[JHikka]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

^ That first pic looks almost rural. Like an urban transit line running alongside a farm field.

Can't think of anything more depressing than seeing that LRT trundle through unused suburban greenbelt.

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

That first pic is through the Greenbelt. That said, Stage 2 East and South serve a lot of under used land.

Between Blair and Montreal, the line skips over a dense, low-income community tp stop at Montreal where it serves empty fields on one side and light industrial on the other. Terrible pedestrian/cyclists environment, but we're promised some improvements.

Jeanne d'Arc is mostly sfh, but with some potential for TOD.

Convent Glen is all sfh and townhomes with no potential for TOD.

Place d'Orleans is a major bus transfer station with plenty of TOD potential, but for now mostly just serves the mall and parking lots (including park-and-rides), with something of a small "entertainment" district a few hundred meters away (past the mall's surface parking).

Trim again serves a park-and-ride only. On the other side with no bridge, you have a beech and high-density development along with a francophone trades college. With a bridge to the north, the walk would be 1.2 kilometers to the beech, 500 meters to the high density and 300 meters to the college. Without the bridge, it's 1.6 km, 530 meters and 1.2 km roughly.

That said, the Line 2 extension south is mostly just woods and empty fields with park-and-rides and bus loops. Even new proposals near the stations are modern suburban retail strip malls with giant parking lots.

The west extension is the only one with an urban fabric with much more TOD actively u/c and proposed between Tunney's and Lincoln Fields. It also serves the Ottawa's largest college and a few 70s era high-density, low-income areas at Pinecrest and Bayshore. But that's not by design; it only follows the old Transitway (which itself was built on former rail lines) and the Queensway, so the cheapest possible route to eventually get to the suburbs.

Will be interesting to see what kind of ridership it attracts. I'm not necessarily against building something cheaper and less optimal in order to get something built. It's just a matter of whether the trade-offs are the right ones.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

Will be interesting to see what kind of ridership it attracts. I'm not necessarily against building something cheaper and less optimal in order to get something built. It's just a matter of whether the trade-offs are the right ones.

WFH could throw a massive wrench into the ridership projections for Stage 2, but especially Stage 3, yet the City refuses to pivot (on Stage 3, obviously, we're shouldn't stop Stage 2). Hopefully, ridership along the urban stretches show the City the way for future projects.

[Wigs]

Originally Posted by Base

Certainly an upbeat and positive tone to the video but can't help but be amazed and jealous sitting here in Edmonton following our Valley line woes.

• Video Link

Very Impressive, Montréal

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by JHikka

Can't think of anything more depressing than seeing that LRT trundle through unused suburban greenbelt.

A necessity based on Ottawa's urban design.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Base

Certainly an upbeat and positive tone to the video but can't help but be amazed and jealous sitting here in Edmonton following our Valley line woes.

• Video Link

The proof in the pudding will be on how REM deals with freezing rain events that are common in Montreal.

Ottawa's system failed last night because of freezing rain with no idea a full day later on when full service will be restored. It was not a major storm by Ottawa standards.

[Kilgore Trout]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

The proof in the pudding will be on how REM deals with freezing rain events that are common in Montreal.

Ottawa's system failed last night because of freezing rain with no idea a full day later on when full service will be restored. It was not a major storm by Ottawa standards.

There have been discussions about this and it seems like the REM is doing just fine. The tests don't seem to have been affected by this morning's freezing rain, and somebody on another forum pointed out that the Deux-Montagnes line also handled freezing rain without any problem for many decades. The O-Train seems uniquely fucked.

[Dengler Avenue]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

WFH could throw a massive wrench into the ridership projections for Stage 2, but especially Stage 3, yet the City refuses to pivot (on Stage 3, obviously, we're shouldn't stop Stage 2). Hopefully, ridership along the urban stretches show the City the way for future projects.

With the federal government mandating back to the office 3 times a week by April, though, the ridership should be there.

[Doady]

If there is any city in North America that needs LRT, it's Ottawa, no matter how many farm fields there are. That disaster with the articulated buses getting stuck during the snowstorm should never happen again. Likewise, London located in the Snowbelt needs to prioritize LRT fast. Articulated buses are not going to work there, so BRT is not an option for future growth. I have personally seen artics get stuck here many times even here in Mississauga, and now they keep them in the garage when it is snowing. That why the Hurontario LRT was needed.

Winnipeg, located in a much dryer climate, with around half the snowfall annually as London, more articulated buses and BRT can be option and so LRT and articulated LRVs in multi-vehicle trains are not as necessary. You can see a hot and dry and much bigger city like Las Vegas able to handle high ridership without need for rail (Las Vegas is one of the leaders of transit in the US). Even Seattle did not build LRT until recently. LRT should not be a concern unless the riders gets too high for articulated buses.

Winnipeg has a 635 bus fleet and a mere 19 of them articulated. 19 articulated buses. Just think about that. It suggests to me that capacity is not even close to being a problem yet in Winnipeg. They have yet to switch even to articulated buses, and so to think about LRVs and trains doesn't make any sense at all.

Don't be like all those US cities that build LRT where is not needed and no ridership justify it. And don't be like Toronto either trying shoehorn LRT into places where it is not appropriate (e.g. Eglinton Crosstown). The anti-bus or anti-subway approach, LRT for the sake of LRT, never has good results.

[Luisito]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

The proof in the pudding will be on how REM deals with freezing rain events that are common in Montreal.

Ottawa's system failed last night because of freezing rain with no idea a full day later on when full service will be restored. It was not a major storm by Ottawa standards.

Ottawa is running what are basically trams like a metro system. So it should be no surprise it has so much trouble.

The REM will be fine.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by Dengler Avenue

With the federal government mandating back to the office 3 times a week by April, though, the ridership should be there.

It's 2 to 3 days and the Unions are fighting this tooth and nail instead of working on the collective agreement that's perpetually 2-3 years behind.

[thebasketballgeek]

Originally Posted by Doady

If there is any city in North America that needs LRT, it's Ottawa, no matter how many farm fields there are. That disaster with the articulated buses getting stuck during the snowstorm should never happen again. Likewise, London located in the Snowbelt needs to prioritize LRT fast. Articulated buses are not going to work there, so BRT is not an option for future growth. I have personally seen artics get stuck here many times even here in Mississauga, and now they keep them in the garage when it is snowing. That why the Hurontario LRT was needed.

Winnipeg, located in a much dryer climate, with around half the snowfall annually as London, more articulated buses and BRT can be option and so LRT and articulated LRVs in multi-vehicle trains are not as necessary. You can see a hot and dry and much bigger city like Las Vegas able to handle high ridership without need for rail (Las Vegas is one of the leaders of transit in the US). Even Seattle did not build LRT until recently. LRT should not be a concern unless the riders gets too high for articulated buses.

Winnipeg has a 635 bus fleet and a mere 19 of them articulated. 19 articulated buses. Just think about that. It suggests to me that capacity is not even close to being a problem yet in Winnipeg. They have yet to switch even to articulated buses, and so to think about LRVs and trains doesn't make any sense at all.

Don't be like all those US cities that build LRT where is not needed and no ridership justify it. And don't be like Toronto either trying shoehorn LRT into places where it is not appropriate (e.g. Eglinton Crosstown). The anti-bus or anti-subway approach, LRT for the sake of LRT, never has good results.

Well actually Winnipeg has the highest transit ridership out of any North American municipality under a million residents. Higher then QC and double Hamilton’s while destroying US city ridership numbers of similar size. The reason we don’t have many articulated busses is because the city is cheap as hell and the current provincial government has no intention to fund transit because they are idiots.

The only rapid transit line we have is full to the brim on weekdays and still busy on weekends. The Blue line is actually so busy I remember that I was at a bus stop on Main/Assiniboine which is the last Downtown bus stop trying to go back to campus. This stop is even before the actual Transitway and it was already FULL and wouldn’t let me in. So to reiterate the blue line at certain segments of the day is so busy it doesn’t even let people on the actual rapid transit line get on due to capacity issues. There’s a lot of examples in Winnipeg where busses will simply miss out on ridership numbers because we don’t invest in more frequent service and as a result is surprises ridership numbers. We should have built LRT from day 1.

Furthermore, should Winnipeg actually build LRT it would never doing something as ridiculous as go through a bunch of farm land. Why the hell isn’t Ottawa trying to cover its urban population before going out all the way too low density sprawl showcases lack of planning logic.

Besides the Main/St. Mary’s stretch Portage Avenue, Provencher Blvd, Grant Ave, Anne’s Road, Notre Dame, Henderson Highway, Kenaston Blvd, Osborne Street, Pembina Highway, and hell even Leila Avenue for christ sakes are just some streets that not only deserve BRT but would justify LRT service based on existing ridership figures. This is because there is high density housing as well as access to amenities such as universities, parks, high schools, and shopping centres while having huge tracts of land available on these streets for transit oriented development.

Realistically if Winnipeg were to get similar levels of federal investment that QC and Hamilton are getting for their LRT expansions we would probably have ridership numbers competing with Calgary and Edmonton. It’s too bad the federal government doesn’t give a damn about us though.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by thebasketballgeek

Well actually Winnipeg has the highest transit ridership out of any North American municipality under a million residents. Higher then QC and double Hamilton’s while destroying US city ridership numbers of similar size. The reason we don’t have many articulated busses is because the city is cheap as hell and the current provincial government has no intention to fund transit because they are idiots.

The only rapid transit line we have is full to the brim on weekdays and still busy on weekends. The Blue line is actually so busy I remember that I was at a bus stop on Main/Assiniboine which is the last Downtown bus stop trying to go back to campus. This stop is even before the actual Transitway and it was already FULL and wouldn’t let me in. So to reiterate the blue line at certain segments of the day is so busy it doesn’t even let people on the actual rapid transit line get on due to capacity issues. There’s a lot of examples in Winnipeg where busses will simply miss out on ridership numbers because we don’t invest in more frequent service and as a result is surprises ridership numbers. We should have built LRT from day 1.

Furthermore, should Winnipeg actually build LRT it would never doing something as ridiculous as go through a bunch of farm land. Why the hell isn’t Ottawa trying to cover its urban population before going out all the way too low density sprawl showcases lack of planning logic.

Besides the Main/St. Mary’s stretch Portage Avenue, Provencher Blvd, Grant Ave, Anne’s Road, Notre Dame, Henderson Highway, Kenaston Blvd, Osborne Street, Pembina Highway, and hell even Leila Avenue for christ sakes are just some streets that not only deserve BRT but would justify LRT service based on existing ridership figures. This is because there is high density housing as well as access to amenities such as universities, parks, high schools, and shopping centres while having huge tracts of land available on these streets for transit oriented development.

Realistically if Winnipeg were to get similar levels of federal investment that QC and Hamilton are getting for their LRT expansions we would probably have ridership numbers competing with Calgary and Edmonton. It’s too bad the federal government doesn’t give a damn about us though.

I would assume that if Winnipeg wanted it, and the MB government supported it, that the federal government would chip in something. The one thing to make it a mess would be the fact that a major bus manufacturer is based in Winnipeg and could see an LRT as a loss of business.

[swimmer_spe]

With the talk of Winnipeg, does anyone know where a phase 1 would be built? What would it connect?