Confederation Line (Stage 1) | In Service 1.0

[zzptichka]

Today at Bluesfest gates. I dunno, looks like unpaid festival volunteers are able to handle the crowds better than trained men and women in uniform who we pay 6-figure salaries. Maybe we should fire them.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by skyscraperaccount

I'll bite...I'm one of those that will likely never or rarely on a week of Sundays take transit to an event at Lebreton. I agree...15 is better than 30 and that should be pointed out.

What also should be pointed out is that we are building this station in a empty field with the only constraint being good transportation planning...there is zero excuse other than short sightedness to have this be an issue. The constant keystone cops approach to managing this city's infrastructure just becomes a little too much at times, ya know? Build it for future use and capacity, not on a shoestring to a budget.

The city needs leaders that plan based on need and tax and budget accordingly...not the other way around where we set arbitrary budget constraints and build half assed solutions.

That is because transit is not designed by transit users. We need to push for people who ride transit to be in change of transit.

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

True, sort of. But if the island platform cannot handle enough people to fill trains in both directions, we have a major efficiency problem.

If people cannot get onto the platform, they aren't getting on the next train when it arrives. Does anybody know what the capacity of the platform is? That is a crucial question. If the platform capacity is substantially less than the train capacity, then the platform size is a bottleneck.

The question was just asked on radio about train frequency. What was the train frequency being offered? Do we even have the ability to run trains more frequently than every 5 minutes anymore. Are we being limited by subsequent agreements beyond the original agreement to operate 15 trains or about 3 min 15 second frequency? This starts getting at the issue brought up for race weekend when early opening of the Confed Line was refused. Are we really able to run trains at max capacity to clear crowds as efficiently as possible or do P3 agreements override what might otherwise be possible?

I look at the situation with buses running west and trains only running east and worry about long-term capacity issues.

I wrote about this years ago about the Confed Line and Canada Day. And this year, crowds were not as high because of the Lebreton location and weather conditions. I think back to when Prince William and Kate made their first post marriage international tour to Ottawa on Canada Day and the enormous crowds that came downtown. We are probably not ready for anything like that ever again.

A better option for larger stations is the "Spanish solution" which has an island and side platform for each train.

[DTcrawler]

Sounds like things went very smoothly after night one of Bluesfest. People saying that trains were emptying the platform before it even had a chance to fill up. Hope the media presses OPS and Heritage Canada for more answers about their ineptitude.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

That is because transit is not designed by transit users. We need to push for people who ride transit to be in change of transit.

Fortunately now that Glen Gower is transit chair, we actually have someone in charge who uses transit (at least on the council side of things).

[Richard Eade]

Realistically, how many people are going to board an eastbound train at Pimisi after the fire works? 6,000? 7,000? The 100,000 number is not going to happen at LeBreton.

Some free advice for those in charge – and probably worth every penny.

Try this: Since there will be NO WESTBOUND TRAINS running west of Pimisi, store 14 trains on BOTH TRACKS (10 on the eastbound track, 4 on the westbound track) west of Pimisi and feed them through Pimisi on BOTH SIDES of the platform as fast as possible. Each train carries up to 600 people, so ten trains move up to 6,000 people.

The trains (running the ‘wrong’ way) on the westbound track would switch to the eastbound track just east of Lyon Station (since there is unfortunately no switch between Pimisi and Lyon Stations). I expect that the trains could run about 2 minutes apart, heading east from Lyon.

According to the current Line 1 schedule, travel time from Pimisi to Lyon is two minutes. Having the trains load from both sides of the Pimisi platform allows for longer dwell time for loading, but still run 2-minute service east of Lyon.

Westbound trains would short-turn at Lyon Station, where they would ‘steal’ one of the slots from the trains coming from Pimisi. The westbound train would stop at Lyon’s westbound platform and then head east, switching to the eastbound track. This helps provide some near normal service for Blair to Lyon, although at 8-minute frequency.

A sample timetable for Pimisi and Lyon platforms is below. The number of people moved is based on trains leaving Pimisi (the left number) and westbound people up to Lyon (the number on the right). Normal service resumes about a half hour later (22:32 in the sample), with trains traveling completely between Blair and Tunney’s Pasture. (i.e., no more short-turning at Lyon for westbound travelers.) The arrows after the platform identifier indicate the direction of train travel from the eastbound (EB) or westbound (WB) platform, with left being west, right being east. Trains are named ‘Stored X’ if they were stored west of Pimisi, and ‘East X’ if they were westbound trains originating at Blair Station.

[J.OT13]

Is the local media this morning plastered with stories about how Pimisi Station handled the crowds last night? I don't think so.

[Lakeofthewood]

Originally Posted by DTcrawler

Sounds like things went very smoothly after night one of Bluesfest. People saying that trains were emptying the platform before it even had a chance to fill up. Hope the media presses OPS and Heritage Canada for more answers about their ineptitude.

Went extremely smooth. Tons of very clear signage that if you were going east you walked on the east side of Booth St into the station, if you were going west you walked on the west side of Booth St to buses on Albert. There were still westbound trains running too, although very few people on them. 3-5 minute headways in both directions

[Williamoforange]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Is the local media this morning plastered with stories about how Pimisi Station handled the crowds last night? I don't think so.

Nope and I doubt Menard is going to retract his blundering stupid statements from yesterday.

For a guy that constantly derides the police he was sure happy to take there word at face value when it allowed him to shit on the LRT....

[zzptichka]

Originally Posted by Williamoforange

Nope and I doubt Menard is going to retract his blundering stupid statements from yesterday.

For a guy that constantly derides the police he was sure happy to take there word at face value when it allowed him to shit on the LRT....

What did he say?

[Catenary]

Originally Posted by Uhuniau

There is a whole other level, though.

It doesn't really matter when we're discussing a crowd though - everyone wants to go up to the bridge to access the show, only a handful are going to try and go downstairs.

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

I look at the situation with buses running west and trains only running east and worry about long-term capacity issues.

Trains run in both directions at egress. They tried the "east only" thing for the first couple of days of Bluesfest last year as a precaution, but it wasn't necessary and they opened both directions without issue.

Originally Posted by acottawa

I am not sure this is rocket science. You put people in reflective vests at the entrance and on the platform. When the platform gets too crowded the people at the door let people in in groups until congestion on the platform eases.

This is exactly what they do (well maybe not the vests, it depends). OC has a bunch of their red vests and they bring in a bunch of security guards from a contractor to help.

Originally Posted by Lakeofthewood

Went extremely smooth. Tons of very clear signage that if you were going east you walked on the east side of Booth St into the station, if you were going west you walked on the west side of Booth St to buses on Albert. There were still westbound trains running too, although very few people on them. 3-5 minute headways in both directions

Pretty much the same as last year when they did it every night of Bluesfest without major issue. The fear mongering this year has been odd, nobody seems to recall that this has happened before.

Interestingly, the clear signage at the bottom of the hill is critical to ensure that people in wheelchairs get onto the sidewalk at the intersection where there is a curb cut, if they stay on street there is no way into the station until they cross the bridge to Albert and backtrack.

[OTSkyline]

Was at Bluesfest last night and was bracing myself for the shitshow post-concert to use transit. We parked on a sidestreet a few blocks away from Tunney's and took the train.

It went incredibly well! The street was packed with people but surprisingly all went smoothly and really fast. When we got to the station, all the turn things were automatically open, people were redirecting people down to the station and everyone was very well behaved - no pushing, shoving or craziness. The first train filled up before we could reach the stairs but the second train came by, I believe, 2 minutes right after and we were able to get on that one. Easy! Wow!

Looking forward to line 2 reopening and the east/west extensions opening so we can train to/from home in the future!

[TransitZilla]

Looking forward to the CTV News report tonight about how everything went so well.

[DTcrawler]

It’s truly great to hear about the O-Train’s success last night. But I wonder if there’s a bigger issue with our expectations as a city being drastically too high. Many people were reporting less than 10mins between leaving Bluesfest to getting on a train. That’s obviously insanely impressive and I applaud the staff who made it happen. However, I wonder if the reaction would’ve been as positive had the wait to get into the station been longer. Going back to my trusty Montreal example, for events at Jean Drapeau like the grand prix or osheaga, it’s often 45-60 min to get on a train from the time you get in line, usually about 50m-100m back of the station entrance itself. In Montreal, people still applaud the metro for moving so many people in “short” order, but I have a feeling the exact same scenario in Ottawa would be called a disaster. I think it goes back to that stereotype of our city’s somewhat entitled culture where any inconvenience is seen as a failure. Hate to be that guy who’s still finding negatives after a success story (in fact, kind of hypocritical considering the topic of my post) but it’s really been on my mind.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by Catenary

It doesn't really matter when we're discussing a crowd though - everyone wants to go up to the bridge to access the show, only a handful are going to try and go downstairs.

Which, again, is why the crowd control measures need to be outside the station, including at some distance from it, to direct the throngs in the right direction.

[J.OT13]

The centre north-south pathway at Bluesfest Park is aligned with the Broad Street Bridge over the Aqueduct, to the station. There's even still an intersection at Wellington and Broad Street. They could connect them together to provide a more direct path from Bluesfest Park to Pimisi.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/LeBret...!4d-75.7146744!16zL20vMDcwNGYy?entry=ttu

https://www.google.com/maps/place/LeBret...!4d-75.7146744!16zL20vMDcwNGYy?entry=ttu

[Truenorth00]

I've noticed some peeling/flaking concrete on the vaulted ceiling at Parliament station. Anybody else see that?

Build quality with this line is so disappointing.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

I've noticed some peeling/flaking concrete on the vaulted ceiling at Parliament station. Anybody else see that?

Build quality with this line is so disappointing.

In the concourse? They had the panels out a few weeks ago. Unsure if it was to do work on the ceiling of clean the panels.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

In the concourse? They had the panels out a few weeks ago. Unsure if it was to do work on the ceiling of clean the panels.

In the vaulting by the stairwell.

[DarthVader_1961]

So I have used several subway systems around the world: Japan, London England and China. In eac case, you tapped your card to access the platforms for train boarding and when you leave the stations at your final destination, you tap your card again.

Here in Ottawa, they dint do that.

From my way of thinking, would it not be better to tap at both ends of your trip? The biggest advantage to doing so would be to provide better data on trips so you could plan things better…. Maybe I am just naive here?

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by DarthVader_1961

So I have used several subway systems around the world: Japan, London England and China. In eac case, you tapped your card to access the platforms for train boarding and when you leave the stations at your final destination, you tap your card again.

Here in Ottawa, they dint do that.

From my way of thinking, would it not be better to tap at both ends of your trip? The biggest advantage to doing so would be to provide better data on trips so you could plan things better…. Maybe I am just naive here?

Zone fares in those bigger cities?

I hope in my lifetime that we will have regular transit running from Kemptville, Smiths Falls, Carleton Place, Almonte, Arnprior, Casselman (via Embrun, Russell, Metcalfe, Greely), and Rockland.