UBCx - Millennium Line Extension Arbutus to UBC | Proposed

[Tvisforme]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

so why is Langley before this one? this is way more important than Langley...

Originally Posted by chowhou

...On the other hand, there's definitely far, far greater growth potential in Fleetwood, Cloverdale, and Langley than in West Point Grey.

I'm not convinced that the UBC extension is more important than Langley. There's far more growth ahead for the Surrey-Langley neighbourhoods than what Point Grey is likely to see in our lifetimes. I'm not saying that UBC is unimportant - the line will be heavily used for sure - but the SLS extension will arguably do a lot more to shape traffic patterns and get people out of cars to use transit. (UBC SkyTrain will be better than UBC B-Line, but many of those riders are already using transit.)

[madog222]

Also both projects were supposed to be in two stages and built roughly at the same time (offset by a year or two). Then the province announced to build the SLS in one phase.

[chowhou]

Originally Posted by Tvisforme

I'm not convinced that the UBC extension is more important than Langley. There's far more growth ahead for the Surrey-Langley neighbourhoods than what Point Grey is likely to see in our lifetimes. I'm not saying that UBC is unimportant - the line will be heavily used for sure - but the SLS extension will arguably do a lot more to shape traffic patterns and get people out of cars to use transit. (UBC SkyTrain will be better than UBC B-Line, but many of those riders are already using transit.)

Could just as easily say many of the potential SLS riders are already taking the 502/3

[Migrant_Coconut]

By the time the extension is finished in 2028, the Surrey/Langley region could be larger than the entire CoV. Of course they have to go first.

Originally Posted by chowhou

Could just as easily say many of the potential SLS riders are already taking the 502/3

Maybe, maybe not - the SkyTrain tends to get 4-5x the ridership of its RapidBus, which tends to get 2-3x more riders of its local route. That's a potential 15x increase in transit usage.

[chowhou]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

By the time the extension is finished in 2028, the Surrey/Langley region could be larger than the entire CoV. Of course they have to go first.



Maybe, maybe not - the SkyTrain tends to get 4-5x the ridership of its RapidBus, which tends to get 2-3x more riders of its local route. That's a potential 15x increase in transit usage.

The 502/3 is more than a local route, and again, you could apply this same logic to the UBC extension (4-5x the ridership of its 99 B-Line)

[mcj]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

By the time the extension is finished in 2028, the Surrey/Langley region could be larger than the entire CoV.

Surrey/Langley is already bigger than the entire CoV

2021 Census numbers:
Surrey has a population of 568,322
Langley City has a population of 28,963
DM of Langley has a population of 132,603
Total = 729,888

CoV has a population of 662,248

Edited for correct numbers from 2021 census.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by chowhou

The 502/3 is more than a local route, and again, you could apply this same logic to the UBC extension (4-5x the ridership of its 99 B-Line)

Yes and no; the 502/3 is effectively the only direct route from Surrey to Langley, but the UBC extension will likely pull passengers from all the buses around it (4, 44, 84, 9, 14, 25, 33, R4, etc etc). Agreed that it's not just existing ridership though.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by mcj

Surrey/Langley is already bigger than the entire CoV

2021 Census numbers:
Surrey has a population of 568,322
Langley City has a population of 28,963
DM of Langley has a population of 117,285
Total = 714,570

CoV has a population of 662,248

DM Langley was 132,603 in 2021. (117K was in 2016)

But Surrey and the Langleys added together are 615 sq. km, while Vancouver is only 113 sq. km - so they're a lot bigger in size.

Vancouver in 2021 had five times the population density that the south of Fraser municipalities have.

[officedweller]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

so why is Langley before this one? this is way more important than Langley.

Growth-shaping versus growth-serving.

and this:

Originally Posted by Tvisforme

... There's far more growth ahead for the Surrey-Langley neighbourhoods than what Point Grey is likely to see in our lifetimes. ...- but the SLS extension will arguably do a lot more to shape traffic patterns and get people out of cars to use transit....

and see this (which doesn't even include Langley):

City of Surrey approves Fleetwood Plan of adding up to 100,000 more residents near future SkyTrain
https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/surr...roved-skytrain

[mcj]

Originally Posted by Changing City

DM Langley was 132,603 in 2021. (117K was in 2016)

But Surrey and the Langleys added together are 615 sq. km, while Vancouver is only 113 sq. km - so they're a lot bigger in size.

Vancouver in 2021 had five times the population density that the south of Fraser municipalities have.

Thanks for pointing that out. Shows the contrast even more though with the 2021 number for the DM of Langley.

Fleetwood and the City of Langley are more dense than the CoV west of Arbutus though. The biggest hurdle this project has to go through is the West Sides' unwillingness to upzone.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by mcj

Thanks for pointing that out. Shows the contrast even more though with the 2021 number for the DM of Langley.

Fleetwood and the City of Langley are more dense than the CoV west of Arbutus though. The biggest hurdle this project has to go through is the West Sides' unwillingness to upzone.

Yes, there's already density in Fleetwood and Langley to support transit. There's also a reasonable population density west of Arbutus already, as far as Macdonald (You can see the data for 2021 on Census Mapper).

With a decision to put a station in the new Jericho development, and the existing density (and very high employment and student numbers) at UBC, the extended UBC line seems likely to have more potential ridership than the Langley end of the Surrey/Langley extension. We need both, and I have no problem with the decision to go with the Surrey line first, but UBC already has the ridership using transit to make it worth building asap.

[bloomtronzero]

Originally Posted by Changing City

Yes, there's already density in Fleetwood and Langley to support transit.

Aside from that, the stations on the Fraser corridor will act as massively important "spokes" for a reconfigured bus service network in the area. Having, say, a 96 ave bus from a new station to Port Kells, or a bus from another servicing Willoughby, all with reasonable connections that didn't exist before, will do wonders for overall transit planning and adoption out there. Broadway/UBC might be more important in that it's overdue and the West Side needs an excuse to urbanise, but Fraser is going to be massive for the war on cars.

UBC will for sure have more ridership for a while, though. I mean it's UBC and CoV, transit users already exist there. It's the city.

[VancouverOfTheFuture]

i would think the extension to UBC would be more warranted than the one to langley. i dont see that one having more ridership for awhile. i do think both are needed, i just think the funding to UBC should have come before the funding to langley.

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

i would think the extension to UBC would be more warranted than the one to langley. i dont see that one having more ridership for awhile. i do think both are needed, i just think the funding to UBC should have come before the funding to langley.

I don't disagree that both lines are needed - it's just the reasoning I see here that I wonder about. There's a reason a lot of people in the CoV take transit and that's because there's a lot of it and it's very frequent (3 Skytrain lines and most of the bus routes are FTN). Once you leave the CoV a lot of that disappears.

Within the Delta / Surrey / Langley area there's the end of the Expo Line and the vast majority of bus routes are every 30 minutes or less, with a lot less service in the evening and only one night bus into Surrey Central. Is it any wonder why people living there are car dependent?

So the plan is to have an elevated (aka cheaper and faster to build than tunnelled) Skytrain line across Surrey into downtown Langley. Combined with the bus network adjusted to feed into the Skytrain stations this would be a massive improvement - and still be a lot less than the CoV has.

I honestly don't get why people would be arguing against this and it comes across to me as a version of 'I got mine' and screw everywhere else. If we want the region to be more environmentally friendly we should be aiming for the whole region to improve - not just one part of it.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Plus Langley doesn't have a mob of angry Karens ready to make TransLink's job harder.

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut

Plus Langley doesn't have a mob of angry Karens ready to make TransLink's job harder.

Surrey had some angry Karens when it was supposed to be LRT down Fraser Hwy and they wanted to know why they weren't getting Skytrain...

Half of the reason the Broadway subway is only going to Arbutus is there were less angry Karens in that section (the other half being about money).

[zahav]

I think UBC will be approved sooner than we think. Even if it were approved now, not sure if it's too late for the TBM to continue once it reaches Arbutus, or if that ship has sailed

[scryer]

Originally Posted by zahav

I think UBC will be approved sooner than we think. Even if it were approved now, not sure if it's too late for the TBM to continue once it reaches Arbutus, or if that ship has sailed

My theory is that it's going to be cut and cover from Arbutus to UBC.

I think that Cut and Cover would have similar levels of disruption with less traffic to contend with IMO because even with a TBM, Broadway is still shut down .

The busiest parts of Broadway has been TBM'd under so I don't see why they wouldn't Cut and Cover the rest of the way to UBC unless they get it contracted to continue onwards.

[Migrant_Coconut]

It'd be wise to continue the bore at least until Alma; unlike most of Central Broadway, Greektown has a pretty active streetscape.

[officedweller]

Other points to consider:
- aforementioned growth shaping versus growth serving
- South of Fraser pays the same Translink taxes that the City of Vancouver and Burnaby pay, but have a lot less value for money
- all UBC students are forced to pay for a discounted U-Pass (whether or not they use it), so even if ridership increases among UBC students, the amount of revenue to TransLink will only increase as the UBC student population increases, not as student ridership / U-Pass usage increases. However, others along the line who do not have U-Pass would add full fare revenue.
- the majority of Surrey - Langley passengers will be likely be full fare passengers.