The Great Canadian Transit Thread

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by tkoe

While Redford may have campaigned from the left, she was anything but once elected. With the right dominated by the Wildrose and the progressives burned from Redford's heavy-handed labour legislation, it will be difficult for the Tories to win again (especially in light of their current polling numbers).

So you think it's actually likely Wildrosers could win next election? That would be just horrible for AB right now, with such rapid growth healthy government spending growth is critical especially in infrastructure.

It's interesting that the Alberta PCs have essentially become Liberals. Its sort of like how here in Ontario our Liberals have become like New Democrats under Wynne.

[caltrane74]

Originally Posted by caltrane74

The Lakeshore line inside the city Toronto, doesn't carry much freight (I believe the rails are owned by Metrolinx within the City) , and the Kitchener Line/ Airport Line are being separated from freight as we speak as the upgrades are completed for opening of the UP Express in 2015 (Again the new commuter corridors totally separated from freight)

The province is moving fast to electrify the airport line, likely within 10 years, same for the Lakeshore line. Once the lines are electrified, sleek EMU commuter trains from Bombardier, Sumitomo, Seimens or Alstrom can take the rails

Looks like John Tory has been reading Skyscraperpage.


http://m.thestar.com/#!/news/redirect/12e5130dd7cad0ba11f2050323d2fb06

[Chadillaccc]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

So you think it's actually likely Wildrosers could win next election? That would be just horrible for AB right now, with such rapid growth healthy government spending growth is critical especially in infrastructure.

It's interesting that the Alberta PCs have essentially become Liberals. Its sort of like how here in Ontario our Liberals have become like New Democrats under Wynne.

Similar to how the BC Liberal Party has become the sole viable conservative party for the province.

[nname]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

although to be fair, that includes a 3.5km stretch through the Greenbelt where there will be no stops (the longest distance without stopping of any Canadian RT possibly? Would be cool if someone could verify this)

What comes up in my mind:

Vancouver Evergreen - Burquitlam to Moody Centre - 4.1km (a station could be added in the future, which will split this into 3.2km + 900m)
Calgary Northwest - Crowfoot to Dalhousie - 3.8km

[Innsertnamehere]

The Scarborough subway will have a stretch of something like 3.5km without a stop as well.

[Mikemike]

Originally Posted by ssiguy

While it's nice to see Edmonton get better transit, it certainly won't be rapid like it's current line. Seriously, 13km has 28 stations and is going to take 30 minutes.....that's absurd. Edmonton maybe getting better transit but at that speed it's not getting one foot of rapid transit.

13km that are getting built now will have only 9 or 10 stations, the west leg of the same line will have more than one per km if it's built as currently planned. it's not as bad as all that, but not as good as it could be.

Most of the local complaints seem to be over a couple missing grade separations at key points rather than too many stations as the problem.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

The Scarborough subway will have a stretch of something like 3.5km without a stop as well.

Originally Posted by nname

What comes up in my mind:

Vancouver Evergreen - Burquitlam to Moody Centre - 4.1km (a station could be added in the future, which will split this into 3.2km + 900m)
Calgary Northwest - Crowfoot to Dalhousie - 3.8km

Huh. So extremely high station spacing in areas is not that unusual.

The 3.5km St. Joseph-Jeanne D'Arc gap in Ottawa will be a really cool trip to take. The Confederation Line has a stupidly high top speed. Trains will accelerate to 110km/h between stations. Going a full 3.5km at that speed will be exhilarating, definitely one for the railfan books.

The city's talking about possibly removing St. Joseph station from the plans, as its in the middle of the Greenbelt with the only nearby development being a small business park and a few detached houses, both on the other side of the highway. (The station is there largely because it would make a very convenient transfer point for the area's local bus routes, and could potentially serve as a park & ride site although the Greenbelt designation of the area makes that politically difficult). If the city does take it out, that section will be a 6.6km gap, going from Blair all the way to Jeanne D'Arc.

Now, imagine doing 6.6km at 110km/h in an LRT car!!! WHEEEEE!!!!!

[Innsertnamehere]

currently the furthest distance between stops in Toronto is 2.5km, but there are 5 (soon to be 7 with the Scarborough subway) portions with distances over 2km.

Furthest distances between stops in Toronto, with the Scarborough extension in brackets:
(Lawrence East - Kennedy: 3.5km)
1. Kennedy - Warden: 2.5km
(Lawrence East - Scarborough Town Centre: 2.3km)
2. St. Clair West - Eglinton West: 2.3km
3. Sheppard - York Mills: 2km
4. York Mills - Lawrence: 2km
5. Lawrence - Eglinton: 2km

[1overcosc]

I've always thought it really weird that the middle part of the Yonge subway in Toronto has such extremely far apart stations. Are there any plans to add in infill stations?

[ssiguy]

Originally Posted by Mikemike

13km that are getting built now will have only 9 or 10 stations, the west leg of the same line will have more than one per km if it's built as currently planned. it's not as bad as all that, but not as good as it could be.

Most of the local complaints seem to be over a couple missing grade separations at key points rather than too many stations as the problem.

Thanks for the clarification, that makes a lot more sense. So if there are only 10 stations and the line is only 13 km, how the hell will it take 30 minutes?

[nname]

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

currently the furthest distance between stops in Toronto is 2.5km, but there are 5 (soon to be 7 with the Scarborough subway) portions with distances over 2km.

Vancouver SkyTrain's longest station spacing actually seems quite similar to Toronto's. Despite people says its more like commuter service with very long distance between stops, there are only 9 segments with spacing greater than 2km...

(Burquitlam - Moody Centre: 4.1km)
1. 22nd Street - New Westminster: 2.9km
2. Main Street - Commercial Broadway: 2.7km
3. Columbia - Sapperton: 2.6km
4. Royal Oak - Edmonds: 2.5km
5. Columbia - Scott Road: 2.5km
6. Scott Road - Gateway: 2.4km
7. Commercial Broadway - Nanaimo: 2.1km
8. Edmonds - 22nd Street: 2.1km
9. Marine Drive - Bridgeport: 2.0km
(Lougheed - Burquitlam: 2.0km)

Interestingly, 7 of the 9 segments are from the Expo Line - the line with highest ridership. None of the segment from the North Burnaby section of Millennium Line (where people regard it as being running through the middle of nowhere) made the list...

[Innsertnamehere]

Toronto also has a ton of really short distances between stops though, on the bloor line the typical station is around 700 meters from the past one. The shortest is something like 350m.

[Daveography]

Originally Posted by ssiguy

Thanks for the clarification, that makes a lot more sense. So if there are only 10 stations and the line is only 13 km, how the hell will it take 30 minutes?

Doesn't sound right to me either, but looking at the details, I think they basically looked at the 60-minute estimate for the end-to-end line and halved it for the first leg of the line. But the first segment will be shorter and have fewer stations. I would put that estimate at more like 20 minutes.

In any case, it's just an estimate.

[1overcosc]

Is it being built as a P3? If so the travel time might not even be known yet.

In Ottawa, Confederation is being built as a P3 with design & construction overlapping as much as possible to speed up the process--we're going from tender award to full revenue service in just five and a half years. Even though many components of the project are well into construction (we already have 600m of tunnel bored) many design details, like station blueprints and track design, are still nowhere near being finished, with only a rough shell of these outlined to allow other components to continue. As a result, we do not yet know what the travel time will be. The contract stipulated that the travel time from Blair to Tunney's is not allowed to exceed 24 minutes (average speed of 33km/h) with a goal to make it substantially faster than that, however how much faster is unknown. As a result, all press releases, speeches, etc. all say "less than 24 minutes" when pressed on travel time.

[Daveography]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

Is it being built as a P3? If so the travel time might not even be known yet.

Yes, and bingo. Major transit projects have to be P3 to qualify for federal funding now.

[Chadillaccc]

Originally Posted by nname

Vancouver SkyTrain's longest station spacing actually seems quite similar to Toronto's. Despite people says its more like commuter service with very long distance between stops, there are only 9 segments with spacing greater than 2km...

(Burquitlam - Moody Centre: 4.1km)
1. 22nd Street - New Westminster: 2.9km
2. Main Street - Commercial Broadway: 2.7km
3. Columbia - Sapperton: 2.6km
4. Royal Oak - Edmonds: 2.5km
5. Columbia - Scott Road: 2.5km
6. Scott Road - Gateway: 2.4km
7. Commercial Broadway - Nanaimo: 2.1km
8. Edmonds - 22nd Street: 2.1km
9. Marine Drive - Bridgeport: 2.0km
(Lougheed - Burquitlam: 2.0km)

Interestingly, 7 of the 9 segments are from the Expo Line - the line with highest ridership. None of the segment from the North Burnaby section of Millennium Line (where people regard it as being running through the middle of nowhere) made the list...

People say the same thing about the C-train. Even though there are only a few places with distances greater than 2 km.


Crowfoot - Dalhousie: 3.8 km
(Tuscany - Crowfoot): 2.4 km
Anderson - Canyon Meadows: 2 km


The only other two I can find that are close are Sunalta to Shaganappi, and Canyon Meadows to Fish Creek which are both about 1.8 km.

[nname]

Originally Posted by Chadillaccc

People say the same thing about the C-train. Even though there are only a few places with distances greater than 2 km.


Crowfoot - Dalhousie: 3.8 km
(Tuscany - Crowfoot): 2.4 km
Anderson - Canyon Meadows: 2 km


The only other two I can find that are close are Sunalta to Shaganappi, and Canyon Meadows to Fish Creek which are both about 1.8 km.

You missed a few:

1. Crowfoot - Dalhousie: 3.8km
2. Whitehorn - McKnight/Westwinds: 3.2km
3. Dalhousie - Brentwood: 2.8km
(Tuscany - Crowfoot): 2.4km
4. Chinook - 39th Avenue: 2.3km
5. Heritage - Chinook: 2.2km
6. Anderson - Canyon Meadows: 2.0km

Interestingly, the line that takes up half of that list is also the one with highest ridership...

[Chadillaccc]

Oh okay. Sorry about that, I was doing it just using google maps and memory.

Still less than what I was expecting when I first thought about it, considering how people talk on here. "The C-train only has such a high average speed cause all of the stations are so far apart."... I think not

[WhipperSnapper]

Above 1 kilometre can be considered far apart though

[GlassCity]

Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper

Above 1 kilometre can be considered far apart though

I don't think so. I'd say above 1.6 km, because then the 10 minute walk radii don't overlap so you have gaps in accessibility. I'd hate to have a system that consisted of predominantly 800-1000 m station spacing.