Shift: London's Rapid Transit Initiative

[HillStreetBlues]

Originally Posted by ssiguy

London is not KW as it has a solid urban fabric and thin roads so any street level rapid transit system will require either the closing of lanes in an already congested city and/or the aquisition {ie demolition} of many hisotic homes and hundreds of trees. Going underground is financially impossible and the only alternative is elevated like a `metro mover` type system...

Obviously "London is not KW" is true. But they are so similar; London might not have a closer peer.

In KW, King Street has seen lane closures to make way for Ion. An adjacent (sort of) street, Weber, was widened to compensate for this, which resulted in the expropriation of land and demolition of a number of homes and several commercial buildings. Ion itself, in addition to closing lanes on King and elsewhere, resulted (of course) in expropriation and demolition.

The City of London is in the process of acquiring property to allow it to expand roadways. It does it as a matter of course. Just not for transit.

I think your ideas about improved bus service over larger areas of the sprawl might be good ones. I thought BRT was better than LRT for London because it could serve larger areas, since there are few areas of real density in the city. This BRT plan was not perfect, but it was what the City was supposedly moving forward with: Shift has taken up a lot of time and energy, and now might come to nothing. And London is still as far away from higher-order transit as four years ago. Terrible.

[MolsonExport]

would you be willing to forfeit your homes

Maybe 4-5 of them but not all of them.




the bank owns most of my home.

[ssiguy]

yes KW did have to acquire some properties but a lane reduction in KW is far less dramatic than one in London. KW already has an extensive freeway system and getting around the area is a breeze compared to London. Also KWC is shaped differently than London. KWC is very linear while London is more like a ball with roughly the same distances from downtown to the suburbs in every direction. This means that while KWC can have one or 2 long routes, London needs several smaller ones radiating from the downtown.

[kaiserLDN]

I feel if the BRT plan came out saying they would build a ring road, build rail overpasses and build BRT it would solve the whole problem. People in the burbs driving cars and people living inner city taking RT would both be happy. Liberals were forcing us with a bad plan. Like put 1 lane on King and queen streets because of them wanting bike lanes by bud gardens?? that's not going to fly in London. I live downtown and have lived in the burbs. I have seen the city from all different angles. Whoever says BRT instead of more cars is delusional to the fact of self driving electric cars coming out. We need a balanced mix between cars and RT. Only way this project will work in a place like London.

Doug Fords is giving us the money regardless for whatever plan we get. Unlike Liberal's shoving it down the throats of people that want other things and saying current plan cant be altered.

I am for BRT but you also have to be realistic of what other people want especially in a city where everyone argues about the littlest of projects and has a ton of NIMBYS. Like did we honestly think a tunnel was going to be built in London when Toronto needs several new subways?

To the points of KW which I travel to a lot. If you have to drive a car in KW then you're not going to complain as much about LRT being built when your city has an expressway system to bypass the construction and to get around for work. Which takes me back to my first point.

[MolsonExport]

I have traveled, lived, and worked in cities around the world, and among developed economies, North American cities are hands-down the absolute worst for transit, and have terrible traffic despite having the most highways, lanes, etc.

Compare the transit in Reims to London (similar sized cities).
Oslo to Ottawa.
Vienna to Vancouver.

I should think people that drive around the city all day (and demand an intensive road infrastructure that is completely subsidized) would be pro-transit, as this would take many cars off the roads.

EV/self-driving cars is a red herring.

[Underground100]

As a transit rider myself, the BRT system is not completely to my liking, but honestly, we can't be under the delusion that constructing this is going to be easy in a city with rivers, rails, and narrow streets like ours. If the city is going to widen Wonderland to six lanes, they have to deal with the Thames River and the CN and CP crossings. Are we to run away from that because it would look too hard? Also, if you were to look at implementation of rapid transit around the continent, you'll be surprised at the similarity of complaints in all projects.

Anyway....

Today, the SPPC (all council members) is voting on the Draft Environmental Report for London's BRT. Then, if it passes, it goes to full Council tomorrow to be ratified.

From there, it goes through the TPAP, a mandated 120-day "made in Ontario" Environmental Assessment for transit, with more consultation to go. After that, the plan is put up for public review for 30 days. Then, it goes to the provincial Minister of the Environment who has 35 days to say something or not. They can say nothing or they can say do more work on the TPAP, or go ahead subject to conditions, or go ahead period.

At the end of all that, it will be late October or early November. Council's term ends on November 30, with their final meeting several days before that.

[Dupcheck]

Awesome strategy. Kick the can down the road...

[Underground100]

Originally Posted by Dupcheck

Awesome strategy. Kick the can down the road...

Council literally did just that. Virginia Ridley moved to defer the vote on the EPR to May 7 SPPC, May 8 Council meeting and it passed 10-2 with Turner and Usher opposed. She said it was to "absorb" all the information. Matt Brown had the last words and said this was basically the last time you can defer a process like this.

[jammer139]

A "Study" claims there will only be 90 secs added to vehicle travel time between Oxford and the Richmond gate to the Univ.

Their assumption being that there will be fewer cars on the single north and south lanes because so many travellers will ditch their cars and board the bus.

http://lfpress.com/news/local-news/brt-s...e-90-second-delay-in-afternoon-rush-hour

What if there are NOT fewer cars? What then?

[Djeffery]

Are all the current LTC routes that use Richmond going to be replaced by BRT? BRT by its nature, doesn’t stop as frequently as the current buses do, so I imagine that local service will have to remain to some extent. That 90 seconds is probably not the guy stuck behind a bus stopping every few hundred feet, with no way around it.

Also, Richmond Row has a lot of businesses needing deliveries. Not a lot of them have big wide “accessible to trucks” parking lots behind them like The Ceeps or Joe Kools, so they get deliveries from the street. If the deliveries can’t be made like they currently are, costs to those businesses are going to go up.

[kaiserLDN]

The can will be kicked until after municipal election. All provincial leaders said the money will be there. This all depends on municipal election. Any decisions made now can be changed after the municipal election so I feel any of these council votes on this project wont matter and will not provide any clarity.

Adding to my points in my last post. I also think this BRT project would have been more liked if we had a strong mayor that was out campaigning for the project. But this mayor is tied up in several personal life issues. I like John Tory regardless if you agree or disagree with him he is out campaigning and standing up for the projects he believes in. I rarely seen our mayor standing up for this project and others except at the beginning before his personal life took over. He was hiding along with his personal issues. I think you guys can agree with that point.

And to be clear I feel the current plan isn't perfect but it has been altered enough by different communities in London for my liking. I just think we can't not build any roads or highways and just build BRT. Some people want roads some want transit but we all pay taxes. Past mayors should have been on top of all theses issues but we legit have scandal after scandal that distracts everyone.

[Dupcheck]

Originally Posted by kaiserLDN

The can will be kicked until after municipal election. All provincial leaders said the money will be there. This all depends on municipal election. Any decisions made now can be changed after the municipal election so I feel any of these council votes on this project wont matter and will not provide any clarity.

Adding to my points in my last post. I also think this BRT project would have been more liked if we had a strong mayor that was out campaigning for the project. But this mayor is tied up in several personal life issues. I like John Tory regardless if you agree or disagree with him he is out campaigning and standing up for the projects he believes in. I rarely seen our mayor standing up for this project and others except at the beginning before his personal life took over. He was hiding along with his personal issues. I think you guys can agree with that point.

And to be clear I feel the current plan isn't perfect but it has been altered enough by different communities in London for my liking. I just think we can't not build any roads or highways and just build BRT. Some people want roads some want transit but we all pay taxes. Past mayors should have been on top of all theses issues but we legit have scandal after scandal that distracts everyone.

I see your point. That said the city should fire all the current Councillors since what they do from now and on it will be useless in a few months. If they keep kicking the can down the road, what is the point of them being there?

[Underground100]

Was watching CTV News for the first time in a long time.

Downtown London (the BIA) sent a letter to city council (dated April 13) conditionally pulling their support for BRT (due to loading zone concerns), requesting the following:

• the lanes on King, Queens, Richmond etc become mixed traffic
• BRT to be re-routed to the VIA station instead (one block away)
• York Street to become the east corridor (because of possible high-speed rail)

Otherwise, they want a pause on the project. The owner of Doris Produce was interviewed for the segment. The news report, a "CTV news exclusive", was done by Daryl Newcombe.

[ssiguy]

Originally Posted by jammer139

A "Study" claims there will only be 90 secs added to vehicle travel time between Oxford and the Richmond gate to the Univ.

Their assumption being that there will be fewer cars on the single north and south lanes because so many travellers will ditch their cars and board the bus.

http://lfpress.com/news/local-news/brt-s...e-90-second-delay-in-afternoon-rush-hour

What if there are NOT fewer cars? What then?

Exactly.

This is why so many US projects are not extended after first opening.....City Halls, politicians, and transit planners make these ridiculous proclamations that these RT projects will reduce congested which, they know, is a categorical lie. In any growing city like London which is growing faster than it has in decades, will NEVER experience declining congestion. BRT or no BRT congestion will only get worse. Period.

Due to these ill informed/lying advocates expansion programs are often halted or not even fully completed due to the public not seeing the reductions in congestion they were promised so extra funding is legitimately viewed as spending good money after bad. The very most a city can hope for a slower growth rate in congestion. Yes BRT street level makes the service a little faster but certainly more reliable and can help shape development which are it's main benefits. Unfortunately political lies that it will reduce congestion are easily exposed by skeptics making the project less appealing to the general public and hence declining political backing while galvanizing opposition with facts on their side.

[warpus]

Originally Posted by ssiguy

It does look like the BRT is dead. The potential mayors are not gung-ho

For the project to crash we would have to elect a staunchly anti-BRT mayor but also replace at least half the council with anti-BRT candidates. Right now most of the council supports the project, because they all for the most part ran on pro-BRT platforms and all support the London Plan.

For all this to crash and burn we are going to need a NEW London Plan, we'd essentially be going back 15 years and starting from scratch. I don't see enough anti-BRT councillors elected either, as the last poll I looked at showed that the majority of the city supports BRT (It was something like 42% support it, 20% do not, the rest are undecided)

So no, it doesn't look like BRT is dead. It's just the LFP trying to convince you that it is

Originally Posted by Djeffery

Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t you say you live in the Hyde Park area? BRT isn’t going anywhere near that, so I’m curious why such a person is so in favour of it.

That's the thing about Rapid Transit, it would improve public transit in the whole city, whether you live right on the corridor or not

[MolsonExport]

So no, it doesn't look like BRT is dead. It's just the LFP trying to convince you that it is

I think so too, and I hope this is correct.

the LFP has fallen mightily from once-serious purveyor of news to one step above tabloid trash (and some sections on the weekends are basically just that, especially the billion letters published from pro-God, anti-youth/immigrants/taxes curmudgeonly seniors)

[Underground100]

From CTV News tonight:

At today's Western Board of Governors meeting, Michael Lerner, a City Council appointee to the Board, suggested that BRT negotiations between Western and the City (which haven't been completed) be delayed until after the election. They next meet in June, September, and November for 2018. The Mayor, an ex-officio member of the board, was absent today.

[MrSlippery519]

I still do not understand, tell Western to F off if they do not want RT through the campus. I am sure there is a lot behind the scenes but the fact that the University shut down LRT talks is confusing, they should have been pushing the city for it.

[GreatTallNorth2]

^Totally agree. Too bad someone on city council doesn't have the balls to say that.

[Djeffery]

Running BRT up Western Rd would have solved the whole Richmond St issue, both the rail crossing and the traffic bottleneck. Too bad they didn’t plan that ahead of the Western widening. They already are planning to use Wharncliffe south of Oxford for the west run.