Was Transit Planning run Like a Dictatorship?

[acottawa]

To me, it says a lot about the state of transportation planning at the time that a multi-billion dollar tram line was added to the official plan without a consensus about its purpose.

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

I wish those who state that this is 'one of the dumbest mass transit ideas ever proposed, anywhere' would look at a map of the city and look at where the current proposed east-west LRT line is proposed in relation to the built up area. There is a huge area that will continue to not have decent east-west transit connections.

I agree with you that east-west transit linkages south of the Queensway are poor. However, mass transit requires a critical mass of residents and/or workers to be viable and that simply does not exist near the rail corridor. That being said, I think there are ways to improve east-west transit linkages without spending billions on a tram line (bus lanes on sections of Baseline/Heron or Hunt Club would be a good start)

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by acottawa

To me, it says a lot about the state of transportation planning at the time that a multi-billion dollar tram line was added to the official plan without a consensus about its purpose.



I agree with you that east-west transit linkages south of the Queensway are poor. However, mass transit requires a critical mass of residents and/or workers to be viable and that simply does not exist near the rail corridor. That being said, I think there are ways to improve east-west transit linkages without spending billions on a tram line (bus lanes on sections of Baseline/Heron or Hunt Club would be a good start)

While I agree with you to a great extent, it seems to me that the measures you are suggesting that exist in the TMP are going to be the lowest priority and least likely to be built. Building bus lanes or transit priority measures is not going to be cheap and I am not sure how this will be accomplished with the existing bridges. In particular, the Hunt Club Road bridge is a terrible bottleneck and it cannot be expanded to allow bus lanes. At the same time, we have an underutilised rail line running parallel to Hunt Club and Baseline and we have proven with the O-Train that an existing rail line can be converted without breaking the bank. I know what you are saying that the cross-town rail route is not ideal as far as population and employment areas (it could provide service to a variety of Business Parks however with less than ideal transit service presently), but it offers the possibility of much faster cross-town service and over time TOD could be attracted to the route. With adequate headways, transfers do not have to be a headache. This routing could also draw some cross-town ridership away from downtown while the current project is actually going to have the opposite affect. Because of the loss of the flexibility of the Transitway when replaced with LRT, more people are going to be inclined to travel through downtown to reach a cross-town destination. Some cross-town bus routes not running through downtown will be truncated or require multiple transfers to access.

I guess what I am saying is that using the existing rail line could be accomplished quite quickly whereas improvements to Baseline and Hunt Club will take many, many years, and probably decades.

[acottawa]

If an O-Train type east-west line were possible (i.e. light diesel on existing track for 50 million) then I would be all in favour. The O-Train uses European trains that do not meet North American crash standards - I think they got away with it because it does not share track with North American trains. The east west line you're talking about is in use (including partly by frequent VIA service) so an o-train model is probably not possible. The old transportation master plan was talking about a tram service (double tracked, electrified, which Metrolinx ballparks at $100M/km) so to build the 40ish km east west line pictured in the map above would cost billions. Even if heavy rail on existing track were considered (e.g. a Budd car) I would doubt that the existing track could support a high frequency service without significant upgrades (via trains often have trouble getting out of town without having to stop to wait for something).

[Dado]

The Mayor's Task Force was chaired by a former federal minister of Transport. They met with Transport Canada officials on this issue (in particular, Luc Beaudoin, Director of the Rail Safety Branch). They were not about to propose something of this nature without ensuring that it was actually possible.

Here's the relevant passages from p. 23-24:

Mixing freight and passenger rail traffic
The Task Force’s recommendation to use existing rail corridors necessitates track sharing between passenger and freight trains. Task Force consultations with Transport Canada railway safety officials were fruitful and indicate that there should be no regulatory impediment to mixing freight and light rail passenger trains.

...

The Transport Canada Rail Safety Branch now takes the position that different combinations may be permitted as long as they are demonstrably safe. This performance-based criterion replaces former rigid divisions between types of operations. Transport Canada staff have familiarized themselves with European railway safety practices. This means that the federal regulator becomes a guarantor of a safe railway rather than a watchdog for a pure North American safety model. This in turn opens up
more options for Ottawa light rail, potentially allowing mixed operations of various combinations of freight, intercity and commuter passenger trains and light rail.

So perhaps we can put this fiction about mixing traffic behind us. The chief obstacle is the mindset at City Hall, not at Transport Canada.

Originally Posted by Mille Sabords

The suburbs will continue to have rapid transit: the Transitway. It works. And it is the right technology for areas that have less density, and where you want the flexibility of combining hub-and-spoke with perhaps some feeder service into major neighbourhoods without a transfter at the BRT hub, just one at the LRT hub. When the suburbs have the density to justify crossing the greenbelt with rail service, the City has said they will. What's so controversial about that? It's just sound fiscal management.

The suburbs don't have to densify - just their town centres. But it's doubtful that the existing zoning would in fact permit the mandated density increases. City planning staff, who are usually quick to recommend height increases in Westboro and the Glebe, for some strange reason put their foot down on the extra height requested for a mixed use proposal at Terry Fox and the Queensway alongside the future West Transitway and within the bounds of the Kanata Town Centre. This despite the fact that there was no community opposition to it, either, and the proponents are going to build us an underpass for the West Transitway to boot.

At any rate, it isn't sound fiscal management. The current Official Plan allows development to continue in the suburbs and continues to encourage transit use. Sending buses across the Greenbelt isn't free: in fact, it's downright expensive. Extensions of light rail should be considered based on density of ridership, not residential and employment density in the town centres because it is density of ridership that determines viability. Density of ridership (i.e. daily riders per km) is affected by not just land uses around the stations in the town centre, but also by the number of suburban riders who access the line by other means, such as transferring from buses, kiss/park & rides, bicycle parking, etc.

If you actually calculate the density of ridership using today's ridership levels of possible extensions to Orleans and Kanata, they turn out to be better than those of most American light rail systems, even with the Greenbelt to cross factored into the calculation. An extension to Barrhaven Town Centre from Baseline turns out to have about the same density of ridership as Portland's MAX LRT line!

Put simply, our OP & TMP commits us to a very high cost means of bringing literally thousands of suburban transit riders across the Greenbelt, only to have them transfer mid-journey once on the Ottawa side of the Greenbelt.

[lrt's friend]

Thank you Dado! I have long argued that density is not the determining factor in whether LRT will be successful in the suburbs but catchment population.

[Richard Eade]

Ditto, Dado. Local buses can be used to concentrate the riders on the outside of the Greenbelt just as easily as concentrating them at points inside the Greenbelt. Since no extra passengers are picked up through the Greenbelt, if there are enough passengers on the inside edge, then there are enough passengers on the outside edge.

[Kitchissippi]

There is no doubt that LRT should reach the suburban town centres eventually. That part of the current plan can be changed with a stroke of a pen. However, it cannot and should not happen before the downtown piece of the puzzle is solved.

This thread insinuates as if the current plan is some undemocratic, even corrupt fabrication of the last council. It is not. East-West LRT through downtown is EXACTLY what the majority of the public wanted.

In contrast, nobody asked for the southern part of the old N-S LRT plan, it was the construct of planners within city hall. It would have committed the city to untold billions more in spending and servicing for new suburban sewers and streets while compounding the downtown transit problem. The two major landholders/developers would have run away with untold profits from increased value to their greenfields, financed by the taxpayers, like of our own little version of the American bank bailout. If developers want to open up those lands, they should be the ones who pay for the LRT as part of their costs. If anything smacked of a dictatorship and backroom deals, that old plan did.

I suspect most people who lament the demise of that old plan live near South Keys as it would have put that neighbourhood in the bull's eye epicentre of transit.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

There is no doubt that LRT should reach the suburban town centres eventually. That part of the current plan can be changed with a stroke of a pen. However, it cannot and should not happen before the downtown piece of the puzzle is solved.

This thread insinuates as if the current plan is some undemocratic, even corrupt fabrication of the last council. It is not. East-West LRT through downtown is EXACTLY what the majority of the public wanted.

In contrast, nobody asked for the southern part of the old N-S LRT plan, it was the construct of planners within city hall. It would have committed the city to untold billions more in spending and servicing for new suburban sewers and streets while compounding the downtown transit problem. The two major landholders/developers would have run away with untold profits from increased value to their greenfields, financed by the taxpayers, like of our own little version of the American bank bailout. If developers want to open up those lands, they should be the ones who pay for the LRT as part of their costs. If anything smacked of a dictatorship and backroom deals, that old plan did.

I suspect most people who lament the demise of that old plan live near South Keys as it would have put that neighbourhood in the bull's eye epicentre of transit.

While there is some truth to what you are saying, this should not be a determining factor in making transportation decisions. Regardless, all transportation decisions will impact the value of land whereever transit or roads are built. I do not see why a decision to build LRT through South Keys is any different from a decision to build LRT through Blair. Both will have the same impact on the surrounding property values. Regardless of your personal opinion, the decision to open up land for development south of the airport was made years ago and the major expenses for building trunk sewers and water mains have already taken place. In this respect, building new housing there is no higher than building in Orleans or Kanata. The principle difference is the cost of delivering rapid transit and specifically LRT. The cost of doing so southward is lower than doing so eastward and much lower than trying to build a line to Kanata. From a planning perspective and if we want to promote transit use, it would make sense to encourage development where rapid transit is cheapest to build. Developers will profit from improvements to transportation infrastructure regardless of where they take place. You can bet if the Queensway wasn't opened to Orleans in 1960, Orleans would not have 100,000 people today and many people have profited from that decision.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

I wish those who state that this is 'one of the dumbest mass transit ideas ever proposed, anywhere' would look at a map of the city and look at where the current proposed east-west LRT line is proposed in relation to the built up area. There is a huge area that will continue to not have decent east-west transit connections.

And unless the magic transit pixies come along and build out a transit system in all directions, to the limit of the urban and suburban area, twill always be thus with ANY plan.

Except, perhaps, for the Super Secret Magical Plan that Mayor Dilton mused about during the nine weeks his pollster was telling him to be against the transit tunnel; the plan what would have built magic surface routes from Kanata to Barrhaven to Orleans by Christmas or whenever it was.

But, hey, as long as we keep killing our transit plans because this year's model doesn't go to [INSERT SUBURB OF CHOICE HERE], we'll never get one. That seems to be just fine by a lot of people for some reason.

[Dado]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

This thread insinuates as if the current plan is some undemocratic, even corrupt fabrication of the last council. It is not. East-West LRT through downtown is EXACTLY what the majority of the public wanted.

Undemocratic, sure, but I'm not sure who is insinuating that it was a corrupt fabrication of the last council. The last council did precious little other than largely rubber stamp what staff and their consultants came up with. Public input was ignored beyond the call to sort out the downtown. The core network was presented as a fait accompli; the public got to pick the one with the most red.

Compared to the 2003 TMP, it's sort of two-steps-forward-one-step-back: we finally get the centre addressed, but all the suburban extensions (other than Riverside South) have been pulled out.

[GoTrans]

Originally Posted by Dado

Compared to the 2003 TMP, it's sort of two-steps-forward-one-step-back: we finally get the centre addressed, but all the suburban extensions (other than Riverside South) have been pulled out.

Patience is a virtue. You cannot expect to correct the current situation overnight. The existing infrastructure such as the transitway, 417, Hunt Club and the 416 were not built overnight. Just look at how many time the 417 has been widened or extended since its inception. The biggest problem is in the core so it is only natural to build out to suburbs. That will take time but it is not an impossible task. Once the current proposal is built it will become much more difficult for politicians to ignore the public demand for extensions. The hardest section to build is the first section so it is crucial that we do it once and do it right.

[Dado]

Originally Posted by GoTrans

Patience is a virtue. You cannot expect to correct the current situation overnight.

We're discussing the transportation master plans here, not the situation on the ground.

The only fix we needed in the 2008 TMP was to take the 2003 TMP and paint most of the blue lines to red. Instead, the city went and painted most of the red lines blue (or removed them altogether) as well - hence my two-steps-forward-one-step-back line. Then, on top of that, they inserted suburban town centre density provisos for LRT extensions.

Once the current proposal is built it will become much more difficult for politicians to ignore the public demand for extensions.

I think the current crop of politicians is inclined to do just that. Unfortunately for them and everyone else, the planning is well ahead of them and going in another direction. We're currently planning BRT extensions left, right and centre (quite literally) based on the current TMP. If these projects get carried out (which I kind of doubt for most of them), they'll have to go through costly conversions. If not, they'll have to be replanned for LRT. If people thought the N-S LRT was wasteful, at least most of it can be reused in the future. The same will not be true of what is going on now.

[lrt's friend]

This thread insinuates as if the current plan is some undemocratic, even corrupt fabrication of the last council. It is not. East-West LRT through downtown is EXACTLY what the majority of the public wanted.

Yes, I was suggesting that the whole process was undemocratic and for many reasons that have been discussed on this and other threads. It has nothing to do with the choice of the east-west route, which is clearly the popular choice. It has everything to do with the sudden suggestion from almost every east end councillor that the Orleans LRT extension be built ASAP. Where was this when the plan was developing? I was suggesting that there was so much pressure to come up with a compromise to 'pacify' everybody but satisfy nobody, that councillors were being muted or simply didn't dare to express what was really wanted on behalf of their constituents or what they thought was good for the city as a whole.

I think the current crop of politicians is inclined to do just that. Unfortunately for them and everyone else, the planning is well ahead of them and going in another direction. We're currently planning BRT extensions left, right and centre (quite literally) based on the current TMP. If these projects get carried out (which I kind of doubt for most of them), they'll have to go through costly conversions. If not, they'll have to be replanned for LRT. If people thought the N-S LRT was wasteful, at least most of it can be reused in the future. The same will not be true of what is going on now.

And wasn't Clive Doucet about the only one who dared talk about this when decisions were being made? Everybody else (except Leadman I think) just followed along with the script. The TMP has us building more busways than LRT and since 2006, that is all we have built so far. Also, we have been developing the plans for busways faster than LRT. I have nothing against busways, but what is disturbing is that we are designing busways as extensions of LRT perpetuating conversion problems for generations.

[Kitchissippi]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

Yes, I was suggesting that the whole process was undemocratic and for many reasons that have been discussed on this and other threads. It has nothing to do with the choice of the east-west route, which is clearly the popular choice. It has everything to do with the sudden suggestion from almost every east end councillor that the Orleans LRT extension be built ASAP. Where was this when the plan was developing? I was suggesting that there was so much pressure to come up with a compromise to 'pacify' everybody but satisfy nobody, that councillors were being muted or simply didn't dare to express what was really wanted on behalf of their constituents or what they thought was good for the city as a whole.

You seem to forget that the Origin Destination study clearly showed that Orleans had a significant share of downtown commuters, about twice as many as Kanata. This was the ammunition that east end councillors had in jockeying for transit priority.

[Dado]

lrt's friend's point still remains though: the origin-destination data was available at the time, so why is it only recently that east end councillors began making noises about it rather than when the plan was being formulated?

To paraphrase the title of the thread, was transit planning run so much like a dictatorship that they kept their mouths shut?

[Ottawan]

This thread has been very interesting in that it has made me think alot about the 'Dictatorship' hypothesis for both the Chiarelli and O'Brien years. For a while I was almost convinced that Dictatorship applied (coming as much or more from Cullen than O'Brien) for the last four years. However, on reflection, I think the regime could more accurately be described as "floundering self-protectionism".

Council had cancelled the last plan, and was at a loss for what to do. No one wanted to be accused of stalling a new plan, no one wanted to put their career on the line - and it was clear from what happened to Chiarelli that making a political misstep on transit could put your career on the line. I think everyone was simply happy to stay on the sidelines and let O'Brien and Cullen take whatever hit may come with regards to this plan.

Now that the fear and paranoia of the last Council is gone, memory of the old TMP and it's fate fades away, and Council is revitalized by eager new members, I think we'll see alot more legitimate debate about the next stages of the plan (I think the first stage is pretty much set though).

[lrt's friend]

Upon looking at the origin-destination map, it is interesting that cross-town demand has comparable numbers to those travelling across the river from Gatineau. And this is why we ditched the idea of using existing rail for cross-town service?

I have always been of the opinion that if we are going to build LRT that we should build out in one direction first and do a good job. If it is eastward, we need to get to Orleans and even current demand certainly supports that. Of course, LRT should also be used to build for the future as well.