Calgary Public Transit II

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by suburbia

Agree with socguy. Incremental maintenance and upkeep costs over a controlled period would pale in comparison to the cash flow implications of moving to all brand new units. What do these suckers cost each again?

You've got those numbers do you? Care to share them?

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by milomilo

You've got those numbers do you? Care to share them?

If you read Malcolm Tucker's post you would see they are about $4 million a car and that train delays are increasing do to old trains braking down. I would think they ran the numbers and found that turning a old 3 car train into a 4 car would increase the rates, as would make sense. They probably also found that the increase in broken trains causing delays would cause more harm than the benefit of 4 cars.

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

If you read Malcolm Tucker's post you would see they are about $4 million a car and that train delays are increasing do to old trains braking down. I would think they ran the numbers and found that turning a old 3 car train into a 4 car would increase the rates, as would make sense. They probably also found that the increase in broken trains causing delays would cause more harm than the benefit of 4 cars.

Oh I'm sure of that, I'm just not sure I agree with suburbia's 'fact' that 'Incremental maintenance and upkeep costs over a controlled period would pale in comparison to the cash flow implications of moving to all brand new units'.

[CTrainDude]

It's all moot anyway - at this point, CT has no plans to ever run 4-car U2 trains because of the traction power profiles. You'll only see SD160s, and eventually S200s, running as 4-cars.

[MalcolmTucker]

Originally Posted by milomilo

Oh I'm sure of that, I'm just not sure I agree with suburbia's 'fact' that 'Incremental maintenance and upkeep costs over a controlled period would pale in comparison to the cash flow implications of moving to all brand new units'.

Oh, the opposite is true. Because the oldest cars are getting close to 40 years old. They don't need incremental maintenance, or even the in shop overhauls that Calgary Transit can do (taking them down to the car bodies and putting them back together replacing everything that is broken). To stay in service they would need to be redone like Edmonton's were.

$1 million for 15 years max vs. $3.335 million for 35-40 years, compatibility with the rest of the system, and not having to keep another set of maintenance spares / DC? expertise.

Restoring LRT cars could save millions; Extra cash may help develop southeast line
Cuthbertson, RichardView Profile. Calgary Herald [Calgary, Alta] 31 Jan 2011
...
Last week, Bombardier Transportation met with a number of council members, and two aldermen say the company pitched the idea of refurbishing old LRT vehicles that are ending their service years.

If the option does prove worthwhile, it could add 15 years to the life of the aging Siemens U2 vehicles, and cost a fraction of the price of purchasing new cars.

Council urged to buy new LRT cars; Refurbishing old cars too costly: report
Storry, Lea. Calgary Herald [Calgary, Alta] 18 Apr 2011
...
Bombardier Transportation had pitched making over some of the 82 aging Siemens U2 vehicles for about $1 million each, while purchasing new would cost $3.5 Edit: (on tender turned out to be $3.3) million or more per car.

The administrative report, however, suggests making over old LRT vehicles is too expensive and wouldn't provide significant improvements in reliability.

[joe498]

Update: Both C-Train lines running after outage, Calgary Transit reports

http://calgaryherald.com/news/traffic/ctrain-service-limited-due-to-electrical-problem

[Fuzz]

So the massive chaos was caused by a pantograph tearing out the power lines. The CT guy didn't say, but I would guess it was one of the old cars that did this, since they have had these issues in the past. All the more reason to replace the old cars first, when you see what kind of crippling impact this has on the system. Good thing it wasn't -30 when this happened!

[MalcolmTucker]

One would think that the pantograph assembly would be easy, and cheap enough to replace with the same model that is on the new units (besides the controller for lowering and raising it which might be different DC vs. AC).

[Fuzz]

That's what I was thinking as well....

Sounds like there were more problems this morning on the NE line. With a Pantograph. Again.

[MasterG]

Recent high-profile rush-hour problems aside, there are bunch of small things I am liking that quietly have been implemented by CT over the past several months:

• Airport fare machine and improved signage / stop
• System map in the LRT cars includes labels of which stops access the Airport 300 bus
• Updated digital displays give better next train time and a variety of weather/delay information never possible before

I know these type of things are very flashy as new cars or a new BRT/LRT line, but they are cheap to implement and make a big difference in how the system is perceived and used. Subtle, but very "big-city" type improvements for places that take transit seriously.

[lineman]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

So the massive chaos was caused by a pantograph tearing out the power lines. The CT guy didn't say, but I would guess it was one of the old cars that did this, since they have had these issues in the past. All the more reason to replace the old cars first, when you see what kind of crippling impact this has on the system. Good thing it wasn't -30 when this happened!

9.5/10 times a teardown is caused by a U2. The sooner they get rid of those things, the better.

[Fuzz]

Looks like December for 4 car trains.
http://www.calgarytransit.com/news/four-car-service-preparations

[Calgarian]

I've been wondering when they were going to roll out 4 car service, thanks for that.

[MalcolmTucker]

My guess would be Transit, but could be flood.

Harper Government to Make Funding Announcement in Calgary
On behalf of Minister of Finance Joe Oliver, Minister of National Defence and Minister for Multiculturalism Jason Kenney, along with Minister of State (Western Economic Diversification) Michelle Rempel, and Mayor of Calgary Naheed Nenshi, will make an announcement on Friday, July 24, 2015.

The event will take place in Rotary Park, Centre Street N, in Calgary, Alberta, at 10:00 a.m.

A media availability will follow.

[suburbia]

Originally Posted by MalcolmTucker

My guess would be Transit, but could be flood.

Would love for it to be transit - yeah, the entire green line - but your second suggestion may be it, given location of the emergency operations infrastruction in the immediate vicinity.

Lots of pre-election scrambling, particularly given the way the race is panning out.

[Mazrim]

Assuming the Conservatives win the election...

[You Need A Thneed]

Any money set aside for the transit way will become part of the city's 1/3 share I imagine.

[Aegis]

This is awesome news. I'm really looking forward to this project going full LRT.

[MalcolmTucker]

Originally Posted by Mazrim

Assuming the Conservatives win the election...

The Liberals have committed to increasing infrastructure spending even more. And the NDP have signs pointing to that as well.

[fusili]

HUGE news. This means we are going full LRT right away, and starting construction possibly in 2017. This will be absolutely transformative, especially for NC Calgary.



PolicyWonk is going to have a heart attack. Or maybe he'll still fight and say "this is just some pipe dream that our council has that will be moved back to Nose Creek when more reasonable people get into council." Pretty sure this solidifies it.