Transit Fantasies

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by fredinno

At least the passengers can get out easily.

The doors are driver-operated too.

[fredinno]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

The doors are driver-operated too.

Emergency doors.

You're not allowed to use them on Skytrain if the train is not in a station.

[cganuelas1995]

Originally Posted by chowhou

I imagine the same thing that happens when the Skytrain server and backup craps out mid-afternoon.

https://globalnews.ca/news/1458720/massive-skytrain-disruptions-blamed-on-a-computer-glitch/

Hopefully they learned from that and put in redundancies instead of having one control centre.

[chowhou]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

The doors are driver-operated too.

Is this strictly true? I swear I've seen drivers stick their hand in between the rear doors and force them open before.

Originally Posted by cganuelas1995

Hopefully they learned from that and put in redundancies instead of having one control centre.

A new data centre is being built right now, but something tells me there isn't any current redundancy.

[cganuelas1995]

Originally Posted by chowhou

A new data centre is being built right now, but something tells me there isn't any current redundancy.

If they're still using that system that uses floppy disks and that requires timed out trains to be reprogrammed into the system manually, then my doubts approach 100%

[Dave2]

Opinion: TransLink's SFU Gondola should be further extended to North Vancouver

[fredinno]

Originally Posted by Dave2

Opinion: TransLink's SFU Gondola should be further extended to North Vancouver

While this may be useful as a secondary transit crossing, I doubt you could get that thing to Belcarra proper- probably not Deep Cove either, especially since there's no density (or even a lot of suburbs, without the Mountain Forest being developed) up there east of Ironworkers.

The closest thing planned is Maplewood, and it's too far from Deep Cove.

Also, I doubt either Deep Cove or Belcarra residents would support this. That's probably the biggest problem.


It would be cool, but I think gondolas going east-West from SFU (ie. Westridge-Douglas Street) would be more useful.
The Hastings-SFU section of the R5 sees some decent demand, and the current Lochdale Plan could be upgraded to support a future FTDA, especially if they can somehow get Shell to vacate their lands (it's a minor terminal anyways and could probably consolidate with the Petro-Canada substation.)

Then you could connect a future Hastings Line to the Millennium via a Gondola.

Even without the Hastings Line, it would probably require a Douglas St. Station (at least) to make it viable, pushing the project cost to ~$0.5B range.

So that probably isn't happening until we get the aforementioned Hastings Line.
If Hastings tries to turn 180* towards North Van, it would be a problem, though.

[chowhou]

Originally Posted by Dave2

Opinion: TransLink's SFU Gondola should be further extended to North Vancouver

With all due respect, this is not a good idea. A Duthie -> SFU gondola could be justified decades before this. Hell, a future Clarke Station -> SFU gondola could probably be justified decades before this.

More connectivity is always good, but those dollars can be better spent elsewhere.

[fredinno]

Originally Posted by SFUVancouver

Apologies, I got us derailed (pun intended). I'm not from the Valley, for what it's worth. I just got caught up in a moment of map reading-fueled speculation.

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

On the other hand, you've got a distinct lack of service and demand for Terminal Avenue or Bridgeport; the 104 and 116’s ridership seems to be more due to Queensborough and Suncrest than Big Bend or Annacis.

Yet the Fraser SkyTrain ended up being cheaper overall than the Surrey LRT project. Light metro can run at-grade (e.g. Sea Island), just not on a street; grade-separation is kind of necessary for any rapid transit worth the name. And it’s not just Langley City in the SLS' catchment, it’s Brookswood, Willowbrook and the neighbouring communities too (to say nothing of Fleetwood, Clayton and Cloverdale). For the rest of Fraser Highway? Aldergrove, Murrayville, end of story.

Let’s say your train uses the interuban from Chilliwack, jumps onto the TCH, then Fraser and 56th and then finally back onto the interurban to Scott Road. 22.1 km of off-road rail and 61.7 km on-road for $70m and $157m/km (GO and Surrey LRT, respectfully) comes up at around $11.2 billion. At-grade down the Chilliwack interurban and TCH median and then a bored tunnel through Guildford into Surrey Central gets me ~$9 billion for construction, though design/overhead/inflation/scope creep probably make that number higher.
Either way, there isn’t exactly a “cheap” option, so unless Langley-Aldergrove gets a better business case than 27k residents and maybe 1-2k farmers, BC Transit’ll probably just skip it and head straight to Abbotsford.

640 is almost entirely industrial demand, and is nearly at 1Mil/year despite going almost entirely on SOF industrial land. Or Lander.

From the TSPR for 116:


The stations with the lowest demand is actually in Suncrest.
It's the exact opposite of what you suggest.

Note also that bus service hours have barely increased, and demand on 116 has nearly doubled from 2015 to 2019.
This is why it was one of the few routes immediately after the pandemic to see service increases.
It's almost at FTN levels post-pandemic.

It's not as dramatic for 104 (less new developments there) but demand growth is still pretty good.

Hence why I proposed a 'spine' on Fraser using tram-train.
116, 104, and 640 have higher ridership than literally every bus in Langley and Clayton except those that are transits to other hub stops (Cloverdale, Guildford, Newton, Carvloth, etc.)
The bus routes that are collectors for the residential suburbs (like 370 and 562) are pretty barren (and use mini-buses, not full-size buses.)
116, 104, and 640 are not hub transits, but collectors (640 is, but how many people are going from Scott Road to Lander by bus?)
Though, by comparison, 310 (Scottsdale-Lander) gets 270k annual riders.

Any new industrial areas in East Langley should get decent demand- comparable to those from Willowbghy or Clayton, at least. Possibly higher.



The Campbell Heights are kind of an exception, as they are far too remote- and neither Brookswood or South Surrey are anywhere near filled out, so it's just an 'island' of demand in a sea of otherwise vacant lands.
BTW, 'smart' R-buses are more in the 2mil+ annual boardings category. So no Brookswood R-bus.
That's still dumb.


Pretty sure that was just for the SkyTrain to Fleetwood, though.


The thing is that the 1A corridor (South Fraser Way and Old Yale Road) are the primary transit corridor through Abbotsford anyways).
https://laws.abbotsford.ca/civix/document/id/coa/coabylaws/ocp77

IMO the TCH sections are more off-road rail than on-road rail.
So that's 23.7 km from Whatcom Rd. to Vedder Rd (and you'd go on-road from Whatcom to South Fraser Way exit using the old 1A corridor).

The problem is not so much demand as distance.
I don't think the section to Chilliwack would be viable anytime soon anyways.
So 35km on-street rail + 25 km off-street rail, or $6.7B (that includes a transit system on Abbotsford from Highstreet to UFV).
Costly?
Yes.

Worth it?
I think there should at least be provisions to make it happen, because it's not ridiculous.
At least bus lanes on the corridor (or at least roughly following it, since there are no roads right next to it past Cloverdale - so I guess an extension of R6 with full HOV lanes across Hwy 10 and Hwy 1A to Abbotsford?)

Yes, it is on the higher end of current transit projects, though, TBF.

There are probably 4 or 5 projects higher up on the priority list.


Note also that SRY also meets Cloverdale T. Center- the 4th of the 5 Surrey Town Centers, and one of 3 town centers not proposed to be connected with major transit in Transport 2050 (the others being Ladner and Aldergrove).

SkyTrain to Langley was $4B, and a ton of the land nearby to that is underdeveloped or vacant (eg. Clayton).

Originally Posted by mcj

Acknowledging that this thread has once again been derailed into a fantasy thread, I can never get passed the fact how folks from rural Langley and the valley simply don't understand that you need to build up demand to justify large capital projects.

The FVX had a ridership of 253,000 in 2019. Even ignoring the steep drop-off during the pandemic, that's a yearly ridership comparable to the daily ridership of the Expo Line.

Yes, the hillbillies don't get it.

No, but seriously, though, Abbotsford has a comparable # of people to Coquitlam, and comparable amounts of actually developed land.
It's not shocking they want better transit.

No one is asking you to try to serve Stave Lake, but Abbotsford and Chilliwack are major cities on their own right by NA standards.

If TransLink was responsible for the Fraser Valley as a whole, demand for transit would be much higher.
BC Transit is a disaster.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Nope, SLS all the way to Langley came out cheaper than both light rail lines. And back then, the 96/R1 was getting 17,510 boardings a day; the 116 last year got 3,830, the 503 (Langley-Aldergrove) got 5,770, and the 501 (Surrey-Carvolth past Port Kells, which you’d established as impractical) got 4,500... those don’t even justify a RapidBus, let alone a tram line.

Future expansion into the ALR isn’t even a guarantee; Murrayville may or may not justify an Expo stop one day, but the rest is running into the law of diminishing returns. TransLink’s CEO is probably going to make an R15 - or whatever number we’re on by then - for Aldergrove and call it a day.

If it’s just Surrey-Abbotsford, then 5km of bored tunnel, 40km of at-grade track and 7 stations for an REM down Highway 1 (two underground, five above) comes out at $4.45 billion; cheaper, and definitely faster and less prone to disruption than a tram. Cloverdale’s probably getting more frequent bus service to the nearest Expo station, and there’s no reason Langley or Aldergrove couldn’t get the same for the REM.

---

A train up the Valley will have to wait in line behind all the other municipalities that’re easier to connect, and that would yield much higher ridership. Should it be done? Yes. Right This Instant ahead of UBC, North Van, Willingdon, 41st, Scott Road or Port Coq like some other posters want? Absolutely not.

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by fredinno

No, but seriously, though, Abbotsford has a comparable # of people to Coquitlam, and comparable amounts of actually developed land.
It's not shocking they want better transit.

No one is asking you to try to serve Stave Lake, but Abbotsford and Chilliwack are major cities on their own right by NA standards.

If TransLink was responsible for the Fraser Valley as a whole, demand for transit would be much higher.
BC Transit is a disaster.

All this talk about transit out to the Fraser Valley - which as you noted is BC Transit and not TransLink. I seem to remember that Abbotsford was asked and opted to stay within BC Transit territory instead of becoming part of TransLink (and paying the associated taxes for improved bus service). So they're getting the transit service they're paying for.

I'm old enough to remember a time before TransLink when BC Transit was in charge here. Route decisions being made out of Victoria that were all about getting people into / out of downtown Van and pretty much no cross regional connections - yeah disaster would be the right word.

[fredinno]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Nope, SLS all the way to Langley came out cheaper than both light rail lines. And back then, the 96/R1 was getting 17,510 boardings a day; the 116 last year got 3,830, the 503 (Langley-Aldergrove) got 5,770, and the 501 (Surrey-Carvolth past Port Kells, which you’d established as impractical) got 4,500... those don’t even justify a RapidBus, let alone a tram line.

Future expansion into the ALR isn’t even a guarantee; Murrayville may or may not justify an Expo stop one day, but the rest is running into the law of diminishing returns. TransLink’s CEO is probably going to make an R15 - or whatever number we’re on by then - for Aldergrove and call it a day.

If it’s just Surrey-Abbotsford, then 5km of bored tunnel, 40km of at-grade track and 7 stations for an REM down Highway 1 (two underground, five above) comes out at $4.45 billion; cheaper, and definitely faster and less prone to disruption than a tram. Cloverdale’s probably getting more frequent bus service to the nearest Expo station, and there’s no reason Langley or Aldergrove couldn’t get the same for the REM.

---

A train up the Valley will have to wait in line behind all the other municipalities that’re easier to connect, and that would yield much higher ridership. Should it be done? Yes. Right This Instant ahead of UBC, North Van, Willingdon, 41st, Scott Road or Port Coq like some other posters want? Absolutely not.

Nope, SLS all the way to Langley came out cheaper than both light rail lines.

[Citation needed]


There's an argument to at least get the Expo out to Murrayville to hit the Hospital and prevent buses from the east to try to cram into Langley Central, which right now increases travel times to Aldergrove by 5 mins, though.


Once you get Skytrain on 1A and 99A/104th, you do create a major east-west transportation gap (and gap on accessing the Cloverdale T. Center) on the southern part of Surrey and Langley- and in this case, we have an existing rail line that works ok (like with the Expo and Evergreen Line tracks) as a ROW.
This has to be an entirely new line, and it's largely already traffic-separated, so there's not much loss by going LRT.

Once you have that section, it makes sense to just extend it to Aldergrove and Abbostford.

SRY also hits N. Delta pretty directly from Scott Road (unlike its connection to Newton), so IMO, the extension to Abbostford will be after all those you listed above (with the exception of maybe SkyTrain to Maple Ridge or Semiahmoo, depending on how development shapes out in the future, as I explain below.)

That doesn't provide any increased benefits over Hwy 1 itself.
Millennium probably could have saved a lot of money building inside the Hwy 1 corridor- but that's a dumb idea unless you plan to capturing minimal/no demand in that area.


It's not really guaranteed- but there's not really any other options.

The industrial land supply for the next few years is probably dependent on whether or not the ALR accepts the proposal to add the federally-owned farmlands in Campbell Heights into the ALR.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/campbell-heights-farmers-1.6482106

If that passes, most of the remaining 'open' vacant industrial lands (ie. open for new development in the short-term) is gone.

Which leaves a few options:

Maple Ridge has reserved Blue Mountain (east side of the Alouette River) to 'industrial reserve', and is planning on converting increasing amounts of the land originally slated for suburban development east of Alouette and 240 St. (between the ALR parcels, which are mostly empty) into industrial lands (leaving only Silver Valley for suburban residential development.)
https://www.mapleridge.ca/2670/Thornhill

South Port Kells would be viable- had Surrey not already zone those mostly-residential (because Surrey City Council is dumb, as usual).

The only other big (non-reserve- Kwikwetlem First Nation apparently wants to take over Colony Farm Park... lol) place with flat land and non-ALR (or at least largely vacant (ie. likely to be allowed to be removed, historically speaking) ALR) parcels in the Metro Vancouver region is the ToL, at the Salmon River Uplands.


So you're either going to see buses, cars, and trucks funnel in from East Maple Ridge from around 248 and 268 St, which are extremely far from... anything (which is why Maple Ridge has not fully opened the Blue Mountain area and has kept it in reserve), or the Salmon River Uplands- which is actually close to other things.

The former would need far more infrastructure than the latter to be appealing (including SkyTrain to Maple Ridge and an upgrade of Golden Ears Way into an expressway).


TBH, though, if we're talking about the path of least resistance, the East Maple Ridge Industrial lots will probably go first (it not needing any ALR exclusions.)
It will also result in a traffic and transportation disaster that has been noted by Maple Ridge itself and is perfectly foreseeable, and will be far worse for Transport/Metro 2050.

[fredinno]

Originally Posted by Sheba

All this talk about transit out to the Fraser Valley - which as you noted is BC Transit and not TransLink. I seem to remember that Abbotsford was asked and opted to stay within BC Transit territory instead of becoming part of TransLink (and paying the associated taxes for improved bus service). So they're getting the transit service they're paying for.

I'm old enough to remember a time before TransLink when BC Transit was in charge here. Route decisions being made out of Victoria that were all about getting people into / out of downtown Van and pretty much no cross regional connections - yeah disaster would be the right word.

TBF, people were asked if they wanted to pay more taxes to give to TransLink to accelerate the plans for new transit.

Metro Vancouver said no.

People like better transit, they just don't want to have to pay for it.

[Vantage]

Originally Posted by fredinno

From the TSPR for 116:

How did you get to that page that breaks down bus line usage by stop#? I cant seem to find it in the TSPR.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by fredinno

- snip -

Right here. RRT1 came in cheaper than LRT1 by $400 mil... and the real cost of the tram kept getting higher and higher, so Surrey's electorate got fed up and picked SkyTrain instead.

1A is in the Cowichan Valley, and 99A leads to a cul-de-sac; if you mean Newton-Guildford, there’s not enough demand from there to Langley that a RapidBus can’t solve it. Of the Valley’s commuters, 35% go to Langley and 22% to Surrey, so it’s fair to say that with the Expo fully extended, just getting them to Langley or Whalley in less than an hour is enough and they’ll figure it out from there.

Still hearing about a lot of hypotheticals that could basically all be solved with bus service. A train needs speed, frequency, reliability and tens of thousands of riders to justify all that, and a hybrid interurban doesn’t provide any of those.

[fredinno]

Originally Posted by Vantage

How did you get to that page that breaks down bus line usage by stop#? I cant seem to find it in the TSPR.

The Visualization map of its data:
https://translink.maps.arcgis.com/apps/MapSeries/index.html?appid=482ed47ba3bd47c3a24262c7c5810275

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Right here. RRT1 came in cheaper than LRT1 by $400 mil... and the real cost of the tram kept getting higher and higher, so Surrey's electorate got fed up and picked SkyTrain instead.

1A is in the Cowichan Valley, and 99A leads to a cul-de-sac; if you mean Newton-Guildford, there’s not enough demand from there to Langley that a RapidBus can’t solve it. Of the Valley’s commuters, 35% go to Langley and 22% to Surrey, so it’s fair to say that with the Expo fully extended, just getting them to Langley or Whalley in less than an hour is enough and they’ll figure it out from there.

Still hearing about a lot of hypotheticals that could basically all be solved with bus service. A train needs speed, frequency, reliability and tens of thousands of riders to justify all that, and a hybrid interurban doesn’t provide any of those.

Note that LRT1 is Langley-Whalley-Newton-Guildford... RRT does not have the Newton-Guildford segment.
So it's actually saying RRT would be (actually less than, as track length is lower for Newton-Guildford vs Langley) double the LRT for the entire system.
Did that make it worth it? No.
But still, LRT is still substantially cheaper.

The entire purpose of the town center system is to be "complete communities around the region that are well-served by transit".

If this was purely a demand question, you'd see 41st, UBC, and 16 Bus be covered by rail before any NS or Langley rail.
But here we are.
NS wouldn't even be in consideration before most of the other lines on that list, considering the low growth rates of NS centers and relatively low ridership.
Even 410 (Richmond-22nd St.) has higher ridership than any NS bus line.
NS has been shafted for most of the older transportation plans for this reason, but TransLink finally gave into the pressure- even though technically, buses would be enough to meet demand.
Even PoCo and Maple Ridge T. Center has faster growth and densification than every NS town center other than Lonsdale, despite all the towers going up.
http://www.metrovancouver.org/metro2040/urban-area/grow/growth-ftda/Pages/default.aspx
Even Ladner's beating most of them- despite it basically being a better-connected Aldergrove.

Yes, it's not as bad as Cloverdale, but it's still clearly not demand.
It's speed and connectivity and politics.



Many of these lines are being bumped up because we want to connect the entire region and for future demand, not because there's an immediate demand.

Langley was bumped up from the LRSP to get train service first because Langley/Clayton had higher growth than Newton/Guildford.
Development patterns change- and I'm looking at the way demand patterns are moving, not current demand.
TransLink/Metro can't put these into consideration until all the layers of bureaucracy go through in a decade, despite the path being pretty linear and obvious.

The only solution to have fast service in the southern part of the SoF corridor is trains, because there's no expressway there, unless you go full BRT (with overpasses and such.)
Even Ladner is better connected than Cloverdale, even with an R-bus.

[madog222]

Originally Posted by fredinno

The Visualization map of its data:
https://translink.maps.arcgis.com/apps/MapSeries/index.html?appid=482ed47ba3bd47c3a24262c7c5810275

Ah ok, so we don't have that available for 2022 data.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by fredinno

... If this was purely a demand question, you'd see 41st, UBC, and 16 Bus be covered by rail before any NS or Langley rail.
But here we are.
NS wouldn't even be in consideration before most of the other lines on that list, considering the low growth rates of NS centers and relatively low ridership.
Even 410 (Richmond-22nd St.) has higher ridership than any NS bus line.
NS has been shafted for most of the older transportation plans for this reason, but TransLink finally gave into the pressure- even though technically, buses would be enough to meet demand.
Even PoCo and Maple Ridge T. Center has faster growth and densification than every NS town center other than Lonsdale, despite all the towers going up.
http://www.metrovancouver.org/metro2040/urban-area/grow/growth-ftda/Pages/default.aspx
Even Ladner's beating most of them- despite it basically being a better-connected Aldergrove...

Yet the CNV alone has added 10k new residents in the past decade, while all of Delta combined hasn’t, nor Port Coq or Maple Ridge, let alone Aldergrove; don’t get growth rate (which favours smaller towns that jump from, let's say, 2k to 4k, which works out to 100% growth) confused with actual population increase.

And the SeaBus, 130 and R2 are the 11th, 26th and 38th busiest non-train lines in the metro, while the 503’s ridership effectively falls off a cliff east of Langley. I’ve made the “build for the future” argument before, but the North Shore has both present and future demand. Aldergrove doesn’t.

Originally Posted by fredinno

- snip -

That’s what the Newton-Guildford BRT upgrade is for. LRT and BRT are effectively one and the same when on-road, so RRT1a gets you equal or better service than LRT1 for the same cost.

Another reason why it died was that there’s more to train service than a line on a map through a catchment. Remember that an urban tram has to slow down to a urban tram speed; too fast, and it becomes a road hazard. Surrey’s light rail was planned for 22 km/h on average, so if you’ve got the interurban running down the street from Aldergrove to Cloverdale:

• Langley City: 64 minutes along Fraser Highway, vs 25 minutes to Carvolth or TWU, then a bus transfer; there could be a spur line to Langley, but probably not at launch. Winner – none.
• Aldergrove: 25 minutes along Fraser, vs 10 minutes to Highway 13 interchange, then a bus transfer. Winner – interurban.
• South Langley Township: Easier to bus from Langley City than Carvolth, if not direct. Winner – interurban.
• North Langley Township: Easier to bus from Carvolth than Langley City. Winner – REM.
• Pitt Meadows/Maple Ridge: Same as above. Winner – REM.
• Whalley: 99 minutes to Scott Road, then an Expo transfer, vs 44 minutes along TCH. Winner – REM.
• Fleetwood, Guildford: Same as above, but add more time on the Expo to each. Winner – REM.
• Newton: 90 minutes along Fraser, 57th and interurban, vs 44 minutes by TCH and 21 by R1. Winner – REM.
• White Rock: Same as above, but with another bus transfer or longer ride. Winner – none.
• North Delta: Depending on execution, 99 minutes to Scott Road plus R6 transfer (or with tram speed and stop spacing, 105 minutes direct), vs 66 minutes to Whalley and 5 Expo plus R6 transfer. REM’s tunnel could be extended to 160th, but probably not. Winner – REM.
• Vancouver/Burnaby/New West/Tri-Cities/North Shore: Probably taking the Expo, so 99 minutes, or 66 + 5, then they’re on their own. Winner – REM, slightly.
• Richmond/Delta/YVR/Sea-to-Sky: Probably still driving. Winner – none.

Long story short, the 35% of Valley commuters going to Langley are evenly split between the two options, but most of the 22% going to Surrey would prefer the REM... as would the 36% going across the Fraser, and the 37% of Metro Vancouverites going to Abbotsford or Chilliwack (yes, for sanity’s sake, this one adds up to 137%).

A Valley Express needs every commuter it can get in order to justify the cost. Sure, you win the riders trying to get from Cloverdale to Langley and Newton, but the loss outweighs the gain; run a RapidBus from one end to the other and give up on trying to make the train be a local service AND a regional service at the same time.

[mcj]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Yet the CNV alone has added 10k new residents in the past decade, while all of Delta combined hasn’t, nor Port Coq or Maple Ridge, let alone Aldergrove

Agree with your point here but, Maple Ridge grew by 14.7k over the last decade.

Aldergrove has 13,105 total as of the 2021 census, up from 12,083 in the 2011 census. Meaning Maple Ridge alone grew by more than a whole Aldergrove! (but they totally still deserve a train because reasons... /s)

[Migrant_Coconut]

Huh. So they did. Guess that's why there's a RapidBus and a future SkyTrain extension to Port Coq.