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  #21  
Old Posted Apr 4, 2019, 3:35 AM
Hali87 Hali87 is offline
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I've mentioned this before but I've always thought a gondola (the ski resort kind) would work well as an Arm crossing. Land and clearance issues would be easier to work around (much less is needed in the way of supports), and it would be an interesting attraction as well as being practical. It could have stations at Shirreff Hall and on Purcell's Cove Road near the entrance to Fleming Park with a stop in the park itself. This would increase access to and from the Peninsula without adding more vehicles to the Peninsula road network. Running a gondola through/over Fleming Park seems more politically feasible than running an expressway through it. Portland, OR has actually had a transit-gondola for a few years and there are plans to implement them in Burnaby and Edmonton, so it's not as far-fetched an idea as it would have seemed 10-15 years ago.

Failing that, I think a realistic scenario (and one that I would support) would be a bridge crossing the Arm at or near Fleming Park that is only for use by pedestrians/AT, transit, and emergency vehicles. This would again restrict the number of vehicles being dumped onto the Peninsula street network while also improving access, and people who need to drive would benefit since many other trips could be diverted from the Rotary (so traffic there wouldn't be as bad as it otherwise would have been). It wouldn't make sense to me to optimize a bridge here for vehicular capacity - it's already limited by the established hard-to-widen road networks that would be at both ends of it basically no matter where it crossed the Arm.
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  #22  
Old Posted Apr 4, 2019, 11:10 AM
ILoveHalifax ILoveHalifax is offline
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A bridge across the Arm does not have to be freeway style with long ramps but rather s nice 4 lane road and preferably with some boulevard planting down the center and stop lights at the intersections - far less disruptive - could be a very pretty streetscape - and the bridge could be of a very creative style so as to be a real asset to the views up and down the Arm
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  #23  
Old Posted Apr 4, 2019, 5:09 PM
Franco401 Franco401 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ILoveHalifax View Post
A bridge across the Arm does not have to be freeway style with long ramps but rather s nice 4 lane road and preferably with some boulevard planting down the center and stop lights at the intersections - far less disruptive - could be a very pretty streetscape - and the bridge could be of a very creative style so as to be a real asset to the views up and down the Arm
It would seem to me that the issue is the mainland approach. A four-lane or even two-lane road emptying onto Purcells Cove Rd would be a disaster for traffic, and if it were to connect to the existing network it would likely have to extend all the way to Northwest Arm Drive. The land acquisition alone would be prohibitively expensive, which brings me to what I imagine is the biggest obstacle for this project: buying up outrageously expensive waterfront property on both sides of the Arm. A quick search of properties in the area has available houses asking for $1-5 Million, and its unlikely the province or feds will get much of a deal on them when homeowners know they're needed for a major infrastructure project. Surrounding wealthy residents also going to raise a stink when they find out their property is about to have a big, loud bridge within a stone's throw.

The time for a major road bridge across the arm was 60 years ago. It might make sense from an engineering perspective, the cost and the subsequent influx of vehicles the peninsula are highly undesirable, regardless of whether it is built to freeway standards. I think pedestrian/cyclist/transit bridge, or a ferry, are the best options. The lack of a high-traffic link on the mainland side would also keep costs and disruptions down as it could connect from Sir Sandford Fleming Park directly to South St, keeping the span shorter and eliminating the need for expropriation.
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  #24  
Old Posted Apr 12, 2019, 5:04 PM
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someone123 someone123 is offline
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Originally Posted by Franco401 View Post
A quick search of properties in the area has available houses asking for $1-5 Million, and its unlikely the province or feds will get much of a deal on them when homeowners know they're needed for a major infrastructure project.
$1-5M is not very much when planning a major piece of public infrastructure. And actually there will always be land costs; even if the approaches are publicly owned there is the opportunity cost of not being able to sell. So it doesn't really matter if the approaches are public or private. What matters is the value of improvements on the land that will need to be destroyed and in this case it's modest (i.e. a handful of houses on large lots, not major public or commercial buildings, or a whole neighbourhood).

We often hear that expropriation is beyond the pale. But then again I was reading some council reports and one of the items being discussed at regional council is whether they should expropriate a parcel on Prince Albert Road merely to prevent its owner from building a hotel that is already approved there (https://www.halifax.ca/sites/default...0416rc1553.pdf). My guess is that Dartmouth area residents who are against the development will generally be perfectly OK with this example of expropriation and will not oppose it en masse because it violates their deeply held anti-expropriation beliefs.

What is really going on is that public opinion on what is reasonable or attainable has been warped by decades of heavy NIMBYism and politics. If Halifax is to do well in the future while growing by 2% a year it will need to get past this and consider infrastructure projects even if 0.00001% of the population is not happy with fair market value compensation.
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  #25  
Old Posted May 2, 2019, 3:27 PM
OldDartmouthMark OldDartmouthMark is offline
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Ferry service from North West Arm to peninsular Halifax ready to run

Quote:
David Backman says it’s about time the North West Arm ferry returns.

The North West Arm Boat Tours owner is ready to run his 6.6-metre pontoon boat from the north side of the Dingle Park to the Halifax peninsula.

All he needs is a floating dock to land on the Halifax side.

“We’ve been ready to go now for about two weeks and we’re just waiting on a place to drop the people off on the Halifax side,” Backman said on Monday.

He initially sought to use the public dock at the bottom of Oakland Road, directly across from the Dingle Park.

“We went to the city and applied to have a dock put in, but it’s been denied,” he said, citing budget issues. “So now we’re falling back to the boat launch at the bottom of Jubilee Road.”

Halifax Regional Municipality recently installed floating docks at the St. Mary’s Boat Club, Sir Sanford Fleming Park and Horseshoe Island Park.

The municipality is in the process of awarding the tender to a bidder for the new Jubilee dock, so there is no established timeline, said spokeswoman Brynn Langille in an email.

These floating docks are installed annually and are not associated with the North West Arm ferry service, Langille said.
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