Will you miss the Transitway

[Dado]

Originally Posted by waterloowarrior

I have to wonder what the cost recovery ratios are on the OC Transpo express and rural express routes... the fares seem much lower compared to the surrounding communities and comparable GO Transit fares.

IBI (iirc) did a study in the late 90s and already back then the express routes were costing an arm and a leg for OC Transpo. Express users seem to think that because they're paying a higher fare that they are paying their share, but in fact that's not the case (although one imagines that the portions of the 90-series routes going to the suburbs, especially Kanata, must be a bit of a money loser as well). Add in other factors like the labour issues it creates (pressure on the length of the work day, leading to more overtime and the abortive attempt to force drivers to work fewer hours over a longer day - remember that strike...? The City likes to think it won but on that issue - the issue that really costs the City money - it lost) and the express routes are a real liability.

European countries would likely think us nuts to run such large numbers of buses across such large distances - they do that kind of distance hauling with trains, but we're not contemplating that before 2031.

[Richard Eade]

Originally Posted by Dado

.... For years they've been routing all sorts of local routes onto the transitways for short stretches, probably to bump up usage stats (seriously - take a look at the #151 and explain to me why it is that this bus needs to go on the Transitway)....

Oh, oh, oh, I know! Ask me.

OC Transpo has been moving buses onto the Transitways to get them out of general traffic, there-by making the bus movements more reliable.

Let's take the # 151, since you brought it up: The alternative for that bus to get from Lincoln Fields Station (the closest Transitway station to Carlingwood) to Iris would be for it to travel along Carling (again!) and then south on Woodroffe. Because of the car commuters to/from Barrhaven, Woodroffe can get quite congested. Thus, moving the # 151 onto the Transitway from Lincoln Fields Station to Iris allows it to by-pass road congestion to better maintain its schedule. Q.E.D.

And, yes, it does inflate the statistic of 'The number of people who use the Transitway for all or part of their trip' but I'm fine with making more use of infrastructure that we (the taxpayers) have already paid a lot for.

And let's just reiterate what you've written here:

the Transitways were created in order to move buses between the suburbs and downtown quickly

The transitways were not created to increase ridership. And they didn't. Overall ridership fell while the Transitway was built (for what are probably unrelated reasons). It's possible that commuter ridership increased, but if it did it did so only at the expense of an even greater loss of non-peak ridership (which does seem likely).

One of Bonsall's favourite diagrams in the early years used in BRT promotion efforts elsewhere was one that showed how many fewer buses OC Transpo needed to operate compared to a non-Transitway network.

I think you are correct in the strictest sense; the Transitways were not built to increase ridership numbers but to move buses more reliably. However, it was hoped that by making the bus movements more reliable ridership would increase. You point out that transit ridership dropped during the period when a lot of the early Transitway was being constructed. As you correctly also point out, this was likely due to unrelated reasons since it was a phenomenon which seems to have struck most transit systems in North America. However, there is no way of knowing if the new Transitway actually reduced the drop which would have otherwise occurred in Ottawa.

The Transitway was built as a kind of expressway for buses. It was built in un-used transportation corridors and along Hwy 417 because these were route away from people. There were fewer complaints about the initial building, and fewer complaints about the operation. The contentious sections, such as along the Byron Corridor and the connection between the Western Transitway and the S-W Transitway are the sections which pass close to developed neighbourhoods and because of that they are the missing links in the system. When the going got tough, it was easier to defer the work. The downtown section is another excellent example of deferral. The system's implementers simply didn’t have the strength to impose years of disruption and the huge cost to construct the planned tunnel; it was left for later.

New neighbourhoods are being designed with a transit corridor in mind so homes are shielded from what will be a noisy, dirty busway. The new link through Barrhaven from Fallowfield Station to the Barrhaven Town Centre is a good example of this. Another good example would have been the Riverside South development had the original N-S LRT plan been implemented. (Although most people on this forum will probably agree that there were sufficient flaws in the N-S LRT plan to cause its demise, I think most can also agree that the concept of planning a dense neighbourhood around mass transit would have been a great change for this city.)

However, dado's comment about losing local ridership due to Transitway construction is probably a valid one. In the case of the new Barrhaven link, when it is operational, the buses which currently leave the Transitway at Fallowfield and travel along streets within the community will hence forth remain on the more limited access Transitway.

There is also disappointment that the ‘expected’ Transit Oriented Development (TOD) didn’t materialize along the Transitway. My question would have to be ‘What, and where, was TOD expected?’ The Baseline area was owned by the NCC until the City finally bought it and gave it to Algonquin College; the S-W Transitway runs along the NCC’s Pinecrest Creek corridor; the ‘temporary’ routing along the Ottawa River Parkway offers no options; the Scott Trench is inhospitable since the City won’t allow building over huge sewers or in its linear parks; the NCC was working on a plan for the LeBreton Flats but that took MUCH longer than anticipated; through downtown is already built up and where it isn’t is probably a park; the Lees Avenue site is contaminated and can’t be developed until after a very costly clean-up; Hurdman is under the control of the NCC and is also contaminated; the VIA Station is under Federal control; St. Laurent was already developed, as was the Gloucester Centre; so maybe something at Cyrville. On the S-E Transitway, the Riverside Hospital was able to build over the Transitway but that is the only example I can think of. There will be no TOD along the Sawmill Creek Corridor.

It turns out that a bright spot for future TOD is at Billings Bridge (BB). Apparently the BB folks are planning to infill the parking lot between the current mall and the Transitway Station with office towers and multilevel parking. Of course, since Staff has rendered the conversion of the S-E Transitway to eLRT impossible with their Hurdman design, our N-S LRT will miss this opportunity. (Which is probably why they will need the multilevel parking structure at BB.)

So when the existing W-E Transitway is converted to rail, and the O-Train is upgraded to twin track electric LRT, are we really expecting there to be a lot of new TOD? Perhaps there will be some development along the O-Train route north of Carling, but most of the land along Champagne is being developed now. I can't see the building owners wanting to tear down or modify a relatively new building just to integrate the LRT in 10-15 years. Maybe it will take the Federal Government 20 years to decide to redevelop Confederation Heights; that timing might work out.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by Richard Eade

The downtown section is another excellent example of deferral. The system's implementers simply didn’t have the strength to impose years of disruption and the huge cost to construct the planned tunnel; it was left for later.

Basically, though, they didn't have the money.

Maybe it will take the Federal Government 20 years to decide to redevelop Confederation Heights; that timing might work out.

If the NCC is involved in any way, it'll be at least 75 years, and about 16 different multi-year studies, before they figure out a way to preserve all of the precious heritage open green space of historic Confederation Heights.

[lrt's friend]

If we really were interested in TOD, we would be building rail transit along or underneath our major commercial streets with aging building stocks and underutilized properties.

Confederation Heights will be difficult to intensify substantially unless we are prepared to prioritize and improve our cross-town suburban transit links. A rapid transit link between Confederation Heights and downtown is not good enough to entice most commuters away from their cars. The current road network will not be able handle the desired intensification.

I will agree that the Transitways have lost some transit riders as local service was rerouted onto the Transitways. I am one of them. I do not believe that it is a factor of it being a busway as opposed to a rail line. It is a result of locating rapid transit so that it runs around the outside of communities instead of through them. It ended up being a choice to serve commuters versus general transit riders. A choice of the cost of running rapid transit along the Queensway instead of under Montreal Road and Rideau Street.

Switching a busway to rail does not really address the fundamental problem. On the contrary, it makes it worse because the reach of the rail system will be less than the equivalent busway. It actually makes it more of a commuter system than ever since off-peak service will involve even more unreliable transfers than previously.

Really, the solution to attracting a better mix of transit riders and increasing ridership, is to build a transit system that has both commuter routes and enhanced urban transit lines. Are we really going in that direction significantly?

[Richard Eade]

In my opinion, no, we are not attracting a mix of transit riders. But do we have the option of ignoring the downtown bus congestion? Again, I think the answer is no. Can we do both, attract a mix of riders and help the buses downtown, at the same time? To this I would answer yes.

I think that there are a number of things which could be done to reduce the bus problem downtown, but most are not being done. Most of these things (fewer Express buses, better station layouts, pre-paid fare boarding, etc.) have been discussed in other threads so I am not going to repeat them here. I think all of these things should be done, and the sooner the better. However, there is a limit to the number of buses which can be pushed through the core. Diverting people who are not destined for the core is another option, and I don't think that this has really been explored thoroughly by Staff.

If relatively inexpensive ways can be found to extend the useful life of the commuter bus system then this would free up resources for creating other routes through the city. These routes might follow single roads, like the 417, or they could meander a bit to cover more destinations; for example, from Orleans South a bus could be in dedicated lanes (or HOV lanes if taking over general traffic lanes) following the Blackburn By-pass, Innes (Big-box Stores), St. Laurent (Sci-Tech Museum & Elmdale), Walkley, Heron (Heron Gate), Data Centre, Billings Bridge, Data Cantre, Heron (Confederation Heights), Baseline (Merivale & Clyde), Navaho (College Square & Algonquin), Baseline Station, Baseline (Queenway-Carleton Hospital), new Transitway to Bayshore, and finally the Western Transitway to Kanata. Routes could also be devised using Smyth, a new bridge across the canal at fifth (Helping the Lansdowne transit problem), and carling to Kanata North. There would also be south-north routes to the east and west of downtown, say along Blair, Riverside, Bronson, Merivale, and Greenbank. There should also be routes between the suburbs; from Barrhaven's Strandherd to Kanata's Terry Fox, for example. There is >$100M being wasted at Baseline to provide a continuous bus route from Barrhaven to Kanata which forces riders to cross the Greenbelt twice!

My opinion at this point is that the Commuters have their rapid transit routes from the suburbs to downtown, so let's modify them to get some breathing room and then fill in the rest of the web to allow other riders to have reasonable transit service. Having those alternative routes might just lighten the load on the commuter lines as well. Once an entire network of transit is in place, then work can again shift to the commuter routes, if that is what is needed.

[lrt's friend]

Thank you Richard for your thoughtful response.

[Kitchissippi]

Express buses = downtown bus congestion. What part of that equation is so hard to understand?

The LRT plan is simple, terminate the express buses in the extremities of the LRT line and have one train go into the city instead of a convoy of buses. if the frequency of both is at 5 minutes during peak hours wait times in the transfers should be anywhere from 0 to 5 minutes. The long afternoon wait times downtown will be eliminated, virtually equalizing morning and afternoon overall commute times. All this freaking out about how we are dismantling the BRT is such an overreaction. We are fixing its downside with an LRT patch.

Diverting people who are not destined for the core IS being done. The 10x routes do exactly that and ridership is quite low.

[Aylmer]

I think that it would be great if they replaced the Transitway lanes Downtown with a segregated bike path, larger sidewalks and greenery.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by Aylmer

I think that it would be great if they replaced the Transitway lanes Downtown with a segregated bike path, larger sidewalks and greenery.

And some nice terrasses where we could admire the view of the Bell Telephone exchange on Albert, or the hydro substation on Slater.

Surely they are historic sites by now.

[rodionx]

Originally Posted by Aylmer

I think that it would be great if they replaced the Transitway lanes Downtown with a segregated bike path, larger sidewalks and greenery.

If they remove lanes downtown after the tunnel is built, I'd like to see them remove the extra lanes that were added to North-South streets like Kent and Lyon in the 60s, and then convert them back to two-way streets. The only reason those lanes were added was to facilitate mass commuting by car. If the new model is to be LRT, then there is no further need to be running multiple Queensway off ramps through downtown neighbourhoods.

[miketoronto]

Why has Ottawa not take another set of streets in the core, for the express routes. Why does everything have to run on Albert and Slater?

[Kitchissippi]

Originally Posted by miketoronto

Why has Ottawa not take another set of streets in the core, for the express routes. Why does everything have to run on Albert and Slater?

Because Albert/Slater is the only east-west corridor with a bridge across the canal and continues on to Lebreton Flats and the western Transitway. Laurier has a bridge but ends after Bronson. Even if other streets were used, there would eventually be bottlenecks either at the Mackenzie King bridge or Lebreton.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

Express buses = downtown bus congestion. What part of that equation is so hard to understand?

The LRT plan is simple, terminate the express buses in the extremities of the LRT line and have one train go into the city instead of a convoy of buses. if the frequency of both is at 5 minutes during peak hours wait times in the transfers should be anywhere from 0 to 5 minutes. The long afternoon wait times downtown will be eliminated, virtually equalizing morning and afternoon overall commute times. All this freaking out about how we are dismantling the BRT is such an overreaction. We are fixing its downside with an LRT patch.

Diverting people who are not destined for the core IS being done. The 10x routes do exactly that and ridership is quite low.

First of all, you are not going to see 5 minute frequency on the express bus replacements in the suburbs. Passenger loads will never justify this in most cases. If you look at Calgary, most of the local routes connecting to LRT run every 15 minutes during peak periods.

Second, as I pointed out, LRT as we are designing it will be even more a commuter service because there will be more transfers to reach the suburbs during off-peak hours. And you can guarantee, the suburban locals will continue to run at 30 or 60 minute frequencies during off-peak hours. So why use it, if you have to transfer twice to get downtown? And that is exactly what will happen with the possible exception of Orleans.

Just remember that 10x and 11x buses make use of parts of the Transitway. Once LRT replaces the Transitways, most of those passengers will have to travel through downtown (and transfer twice) or the replacement routes will run significantly slower in mixed traffic.

Many of the suburban business park routes presently terminate at Lebreton or Hurdman in order to provide single transfer connections with most parts of the city. This will be replaced with double and triple transfers which will make them a lot less attractive.

[Suzie]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

Because Albert/Slater is the only east-west corridor with a bridge across the canal and continues on to Lebreton Flats and the western Transitway. Laurier has a bridge but ends after Bronson. Even if other streets were used, there would eventually be bottlenecks either at the Mackenzie King bridge or Lebreton.

The key problem is that Laurier does not join up with Scott (or to be precise Albert/Wellington/Scott). If it did, it would take a lot of the car traffic load off Albert and Slater, and we would be able to provide an extra lane to buses on these two streets (at least during peak periods). If we did that and put in place measures to minimize dwell times and traffic inteference, we’d have enough capacity to accommodate both the Transitway and Rapibus bus traffic on those two streets

As well, parking is allowed during peak periods on most of Queen Street. Put in a peak period prohibition and that street would be able to accommodate the OC Transpo buses that currently use Wellington.

With two lanes each way and tons of room for station platforms, the Mackenzie King Bridge, if entirely reserved for transit and with the crosswalk in the middle removed, could accommodate all bus traffic that needs to cross the Canal (i.e., Albert, Slater and Queen traffic).

Doing the above would not cost a lot of money. The barriers are mainly political.

[Suzie]

Originally Posted by Uhuniau

It's hard to have an opinion about whether the buses are backed up from Laurier to Lebreton or no.

On many given days, they are. That's not opinion or even exaggeration.

No, but I take 1.5 to 2 hours to take a NON-express bus chain from downtown to the suburbs, many times each month, because the "expresses" have the system clogged, both on the roadway and at the stations.

There are recurring backups at some of the stations in the PM peak, but to have the backup anywhere close to what you talked about, you need a major disturbance such as a major snowfall (the Lebreton section, with its two sharp 90-degree curves and its eastbound stop on an incline, is particularly troublesome), construction (usually the City makes no effort whatsoever to complete projects that impact the Transitway as quickly as possible – witness the current slow pace of rebuilding most of the downtown stops), an accident at a major intersection, a bomb threat, or a window falling off a downtown hotel.

Even during the PM peak, I am almost always able to get from downtown to Westboro Station in around 15 minutes.

As for the recurring backups during the PM peak, they are caused by a range of factors and express buses are not at the top of the list. Poorly designed stations (e.g., Mac Bridge both directions, Metcalfe/Bank/Bay on Albert and Lebreton are prime examples) is a big factor. In particular, putting a station right next to a traffic light is the worst thing you can do. This problem is solvable with a very small investment.

The fact that we don’t have fare collection prior to boarding and all-door boarding on all busses is also a more important factor. It’s nice to see increasing recognition of this – http://communities.canada.com/ottawa...ransitway.aspx

Unless these issues are addressed, I don’t think that removing the express buses would not get you much improvement. There could be scope though to adjust the headways of some of lower-volume express routes in order to achieve a higher load factor. And we are still waiting for real-time displays.

[Suzie]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

When I spoke to my brother yesterday about this, his immediate comment, wasn't Larry O'Brien in conflict of interest when the line ended up with a station right outside his million dollar condominium?

Studies have shown that proximity to a rapid transit station increases property values. So, yes, whether he uses the DOTT or not, the mayor is expected to derive a financial benefit from its construction because the value of his condo will go up.

[Suzie]

Originally Posted by waterloowarrior

I usually go between stations that will be on the DOTT, so the train will be great in that way....

To your knowledge, has the City ever produced an estimate of how many people would live within walking distance of the LRT stations? I suspect that the number would be quite low, but would like to see some data to confirm. For the vast majority of us, I think this system will require the use of a feeder bus to access the stations.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by Suzie

And we are still waiting for real-time displays.

I would scrap the real-time displays if the budget could be deployed to a system of releasing real-time data out into the wild.

Third parties would allow the public to access that information, usefully and timely-ly, much sooner, and at less expense, than Cludgy Transpo ever will.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by Suzie

To your knowledge, has the City ever produced an estimate of how many people would live within walking distance of the LRT stations? I suspect that the number would be quite low, but would like to see some data to confirm. For the vast majority of us, I think this system will require the use of a feeder bus to access the stations.

The website draws 600m "walking distance" circles around the stations, but there are no numbers associated with it (although I guess it would be an easy task for a staffer with the property tax records).

I think it would actually be fairly high - between Tunney's and Lees the population density is quite high, maybe 40k in those circles???, which is pretty much as high as you're going to get for a transit line anywhere in Ottawa.

I think the more important statistic is the number of workers/students within walking distance, which is probably well over 100k.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by acottawa

The website draws 600m "walking distance" circles around the stations, but there are no numbers associated with it (although I guess it would be an easy task for a staffer with the property tax records).

If they bother doing that, they should use actual walking distances, and not crow-flying circles as the standard. I see those circles, and all I think is someone was too lazy to do real research.