Millennium Line - Broadway Extension: Planning & Pre-Construction

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by mr.x

After those four, we're done with our SkyTrain network...forever.

Hahaha the famous "forever". Although it's true that UBC and the airport are obvious ends, it could always be extended to Langley, Evergreen could continue to Maple Ridge, and the Canadaline could keep going south from the Richmond terminus. Nobody knows what this place will look like in 60 years.

[WarrenC12]

I'm not a UBC student. For all I care the skytrain could end at Alma.

I do live in east van on the M-Line, and I'd love to be able to go to Kits/West Broadway more often, but I don't mostly because of the method of getting there (driving, parking, etc.). My gf and I jump on the train and head downtown instead.

I'm sure those uppity west side businesses and residents are glad me and my dirty east side friends don't come over and spend our money.

[DKaz]

^^^ I used to frequent Broadway... the 99 is very fast in the evening and beyond because of reduced traffic, making it very attractive. Even the local 9 bus is pretty fast in the evening. You should try it one day, Broadway Station to MacDonald takes no more than 15 minutes at the slowest.

Originally Posted by mr.x

2016 - Double-tracking of West Coast Express for frequent bi-directional all-day service seven days a week
2020 - Fraser Valley LRT network
2026 - North Fraser DMU LRT (Marine Drive Station to New Westminster Station)
2028 - Main Street and Kingsway streetcars
2030 - Arbutus LRT
2032 - 41st Avenue LRT/streetcar (Joyce to UBC)

If I could comment, CP Rail owns the entire right of way so West Coast Express could agree to some sort of lease and build a third track on the right of way (CP Rail only have 2) which they have access to at all hours and lease track time on the general CP Rail tracks as needed during rush hour when they run trains at greater frequencies. If they run the trains hourly during the day, they could get away with a few passing tracks. A train would leave Mission say 10:27, get to Waterfront 11:40, dwell for 10 minutes, and return to Mission at 1:03. This train would pass a Mission bound train at 11:15 exactly at Port Moody Station, pass a Waterfront bound train at 12:15 at Port Moody Station, and pass a Waterfront bound train at 12:45 - exactly at Port Haney Station. My goodness this couldn't be any more perfect! The only problem is finding space for the extra tracks and platform at these stations.

Originally Posted by Spork

I think we need to take up a new name to represent our cause, playing off of the name that 'zweisystem' has given himself/herself. How about "dasrichtigesystem"? Implying that all that 'zweisystem' cares about is his/her own special interest.

zwei = two in Old High German... so twosystem? lol.

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

Hahaha the famous "forever". Although it's true that UBC and the airport are obvious ends, it could always be extended to Langley, Evergreen could continue to Maple Ridge, and the Canadaline could keep going south from the Richmond terminus. Nobody knows what this place will look like in 60 years.

Well more like a moratorium on any new or extended Skytrain (including Canada Line, lol) lines in favour of LRTs that will provide additional corridor connections to supplement our metro system which would include all the LRT and streetcar lines mentioned by mr.x. Once the LRT networks are done and additional ridership strains the transit system, new or extended Skytrain lines, commuter rail lines, and even heavy rail based Metro lines would be built. This is all piecework, a huge shift of modeshare to transit will not happen overnight. I'd be happy if the number reached 30% in my lifetime.

[WaxItYourself]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

Hahaha the famous "forever". Although it's true that UBC and the airport are obvious ends, it could always be extended to Langley, Evergreen could continue to Maple Ridge, and the Canadaline could keep going south from the Richmond terminus. Nobody knows what this place will look like in 60 years.

Personally, After these liens are all built and the Expo line gets extended into Langley, I'd like to see another line built from Scott Road station down 120th street and into delta then back to King George and down King George Highway to possibly Newton and beyond then curving back around and meeting up with the Expo Line again just before the treck into Langley.

[Metro-One]

And zweisystem finally responded to my Calgary thing saying "Who cares about Calgary?" *sigh*

Wow, that just shows how insightful this group is.

[twoNeurons]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

Hahaha the famous "forever". Although it's true that UBC and the airport are obvious ends, it could always be extended to Langley, Evergreen could continue to Maple Ridge, and the Canadaline could keep going south from the Richmond terminus. Nobody knows what this place will look like in 60 years.

Anyone can throw words like "forever" around, as long as they don't intend on living long enough to be embarrassed later on.

There are lots of lines which could happen.

1. An extension in Richmond
2. An Extension along Hastings as a Downtown Relief Line
3. A split in Surrey (depending on how they extend it) to Newton or WHite Rock.

And those are just extensions of existing lines. Add to that

• another East-west Line in Vancouver between Metrotown and the Canada Line
• a North-South Line along Willingdon, from Hastings to Metrotown (possibly extensions of a Hastings Line).
• extensions to the North Shore
• A loop line serving downtown (go monorail )

These lines or others are all within the boundaries of forever.

[officedweller]

FYI - from the Metro Vancouver Transit thread

Originally Posted by Xerx

hey has any one seen this from the Honolulu rail RFI? it has some pretty interesting stuff, especially page 80 on interoperable cars.

http://www.honolulutransit.org/library/files/rfi_info_0308.pdf

Nice find!

Here's the particular response - check out the complete Bombardier response (i.e. advocating a proposal for ART) starting at page 55 of the document - lots of "ammunition" in there (albeit from a biased source)(download the doc before opening):

[usog]

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090515.wtransit0515/BNStory/National/home
Hmm, something to compare to.

[Kwik-E-Mart]

Looks like some from the pro-LRT camp have nothing else to say but to resort to name-calling. Good job!

[mr.x]

^ that's a great example!

[twoNeurons]

Originally Posted by officedweller

FYI - from the Metro Vancouver Transit thread



Nice find!

Here's the particular response - check out the complete Bombardier response (i.e. advocating a proposal for ART) starting at page 55 of the document - lots of "ammunition" in there (albeit from a biased source)(download the doc before opening):

Very interesting. I had no idea that Kawasaki and Rotem were competing with Bombardier in Kuala Lumpur. I'd love to see Kawasaki or Rotem bid with Bombardier for a UBC Extension. Not because I don't like Bombardier, but because it would put people's minds at ease that SkyTrain is not a completely proprietary system.

[Metro-One]

What is that? 1 billion for 15 km of LRT rail in Toronto, well BC should send them some of our LRT experts, they could get Toronto over 100 km of rail with their super 10 mil per km engineering secret!

[twoNeurons]

Originally Posted by usog

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090515.wtransit0515/BNStory/National/home
Hmm, something to compare to.

950M$ for 15km along Sheppard.

Average cost/km of the new Sheppard LRT line = 63M$.

I don't know how it compares to the Broadway corridor, but I'm pretty sure it's a wider street, as it's further from Toronto's urban core. This would be somewhat equivalent to our Evergreen Line (except for the need for tunneling on the EG line)

This is probably somewhat close to what it would cost for a Broadway LRT, I'm guessing.

[Metro-One]

Can you imagine spending that much money for a marginal increase over the current trolly bus service?

[nname]

Originally Posted by twoNeurons

I don't know how it compares to the Broadway corridor, but I'm pretty sure it's a wider street, as it's further from Toronto's urban core. This would be somewhat equivalent to our Evergreen Line (except for the need for tunneling on the EG line)

Much wider.. and much less dense too

You can see it.. just start from here, and going eastward (right).

[nname]

Originally Posted by nname

Much wider.. and much less dense too

You can see it.. just start from here, and going eastward (right).

(Compare this to the Evergreen Line routing, and you can probably find some similarities - start from here and going north/up)

[officedweller]

Yeah, Sheppard would be more like Barnet east of Port Moody's downtown or Lougheed Highway through Burnaby and Coquitlam.

[twoNeurons]

Found some more interesting points from the Honolulu RFI:

Bombardier recommends to Honolulu that:
Max platform length be 240 feet (73m)
Max Line capacity be at least 15,000 pphpd
Highly recommends platforms screen doors
Highly recommends faregates

It also mentions that conventional Rotary systems can only handle 3.5% grade (according to some Japanese study) while ART can handle 8%-10%.

It also mentions: "SkyTrain is a trademark of BC Transit"

Page 79 item 5: "Local line headways of less than 1 minute are practical"

Item 11: "A platform length of 120 feet (37m) could be adequate to meet the ridership"
I don't know if this is the 9,000 pphpd in the RFI or the 15,000 that Bombardier recommended.

I have a feeling that once the newness of the Canada Line wears off and reports start coming in about cost comparisons, how often the trains runs, etc... you will have some people who were formerly against "SkyTrain" technology to have a change of heart.

SkyTrain is actually a pretty good system.

[twoNeurons]

Originally Posted by officedweller

Yeah, Sheppard would be more like Barnet east of Port Moody's downtown or Lougheed Highway through Burnaby and Coquitlam.

So, my guess is that LRT for 70M$/km is an absolute best case scenario... with more reasonable estimates closer to $100 M$/km.

If SkyTrain is elevated past Alma (or past Blanca if residents in that area want to pay for it to be tunneled) I can see construction costs being 125M$/km, but that's just a shot in the dark.

[Xerx]

Another misinformed blogger, this one seems to think we are too well researched to be ‘transportation enthusiasts’.

http://www.vancityguy.com/?p=1234