Calgary Public Transit - Discussion

[Lubicon]

Originally Posted by chemgear

https://calgaryherald.com/news/crime...box=1691536765

Suffering a critical stab wound to the neck, a city man was able to use a CTrain station help button to summon assistance before collapsing, court heard Tuesday.

Crown prosecutor Tom Buglas said Jaskaran Jhutty was stabbed during a group attack at the SAIT station early on April 22, 2022.

Two of four men who were scheduled to stand trial in Jhutty’s assault pleaded guilty, while Buglas withdrew charges against two other accused.

At the request of defence lawyers Shaun Leochko and Fadejimi Orefuja, Fradsham ordered reports into the Indigenous backgrounds of the two offenders.

A sentencing date will be set next week.

Can someone explain what this is and what it means from a legal perspective.

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by Lubicon

Can someone explain what this is and what it means from a legal perspective.

Probably whether the Judge has to consider Gladue factors for the trial and sentencing:


https://aboriginal.legalaid.bc.ca/co.../gladue-rights

[Bill Bumface]

I know there is sound reasoning behind it, but I'm still really uncomfortable that there is wiggle room in the laws and conventions that Canada operates under that allow for race to be considered in sentencing.

[sureLoss]

Nov 24 to Dec 4 there will be a partial closure of red line between Chinook and city hall stations. This is to facilitate the switchover to the permanent platform at Victoria Park/Stampede station

https://newsroom.calgary.ca/city-of-...-line-closure/

In advance of the planned nine-day closure of part of the Red Line and lanes of northbound Macleod Trail, we are announcing details of shuttle routes, transit, and driving options and advising commuters to plan extra travel time.

Between the evening of Nov. 24 and the early morning of Dec. 4, there will be no train service between Chinook and City Hall/Bow Valley College stations. There will also be periodic traffic lane closures on northbound Macleod Trail around Victoria Park/Stampede Station. These closures are required to complete an important phase of construction in the Victoria Park/Stampede Station rebuild project – the switch from the temporary track and platform to the new permanent track and platform.

“This is a significant closure of our system,” said Doug Morgan, General Manager of Operational Services with The City of Calgary. “It is very rare for us to have a planned track shut down on a weekday because we know how important CTrain service is to our customers. We are working hard to provide alternatives, including the largest replacement shuttle service in our history, temporary park and ride locations, and parking alternatives. Travellers – whether on transit or driving – should know their options and plan extra time.”

[Jimmy Stang]

I will admit to not knowing the details of the track and electrical work involved, and I appreciate that it is a major project, but... nine days seems like a long time to completely shut down a segment of the line.

Assuming everything that can be done in advance has been done (the new tracks and overhead wires are already in place, ticket machines installed, etc,) then all that remains is ripping out a bit of track, and connecting the new track/electrical to the main line.

Easier said than done, of course, but it would be interesting to see how other cities have handled similar projects.

That being said, I think that they have planned the contingencies as well as possible to limit the disruption, with 4 of those days will be over weekends. The 3 hockey games will be interesting though.

[lazypucker]

Don't understand why they can't do the shutdown during the last week of December, if it is not weather dependent.

There will definitely be a lot less riders during the Christmas week.

[The Fisher Account]

Originally Posted by lazypucker

Don't understand why they can't do the shutdown during the last week of December, if it is not weather dependent.

There will definitely be a lot less riders during the Christmas week.

Probably would skyrocket costs up (considering they are already running crews 24/7) and couldn't guarantee enough staff would be available to do the work.

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by lazypucker

Don't understand why they can't do the shutdown during the last week of December, if it is not weather dependent.

There will definitely be a lot less riders during the Christmas week.

What pricetag would be reasonable to inconvenience say 20k people instead of 50k?

[DoubleK]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Stang

Easier said than done, of course, but it would be interesting to see how other cities have handled similar projects.

Seattle is having a nightmare with the East Link LRT project, it's been delayed close to 2 years after discovering quality issues.

Edmonton's Valley Line was delayed almost three years.

Calgary West LRT was pretty much on schedule IIRC. Something like 5 years from funding to in service date is pretty remarkable.

Calgary Transit does a pretty good job IMO.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by powderjunkie

What pricetag would be reasonable to inconvenience say 20k people instead of 50k?

20 minutes of impact for 30k is 10,000 hours x twice a day so 20,000 manhours at say $30 per hour after tax is work 600k. So say up to a half million dollars.

[jwslam]

Originally Posted by powderjunkie

What pricetag would be reasonable to inconvenience say 20k people instead of 50k?

your 30K people difference are not being paid on tax dollars.

If "inconvenience" was a consideration, all road construction would only occur at night, making sure to re-open lanes for rush hour.

[Jimmy Stang]

Victoria Park / Stampede Station is open again. I didn't hear a lot of complaining during the closure (social media or traditional media), so it seems that the shuttles and other contingencies worked quite well. The mild weather was no doubt welcomed by the workers, and also commuters switching to shuttles.

[Shazam]

Originally Posted by Lubicon

Copyint this quote from Wormius over from the YYC Politics thread as my replay is more suited to transit than politics:

"I don’t even think that is what is causing ridership lows. We have a system that is downtown weekday commuter focused. Ridership is low outside those periods because the service is reduced. 5 or so minutes between trains in the morning or afternoon rush is great. Outside those hours it’s less compelling especially when you have free parking after 6, why would you take transit at $7.20 per person for a roundtrip.

*if* somehow the result of the security presence is more ridership and it leads to better service then I’m all for that."

Great discussion on the radio the other day regarding transit in Calgary and it brought up Wormius' point. It was pointed out that Calgary has always focused transit on getting commuters into and out of the DT core as our city has one of the highest concentrations of DT workers of any major city. So that makes sense. But things have changed and if we want transit to grow we need to offer more of it to places people want to go at more times of the day. So basically modify the model so it's more like Toronto or Vancouver for example.

Edmonton overhauled their system a couple of years ago and ridership is now at 108% of pre-pandemic levels. Calgary is at 80%.

A few things:

Trains run like crazy during rush hour. 5 minutes or so -"so" being 2X = 10 minutes? Trains run literally right behind each other in rush hour. Like trains are 30 seconds apart. Trains ran 7 minutes apart back in 1996 during rush hour - ask me how I know.

They went back to four car trains of late and went back to three car trains for some reason. I'm presuming it was the construction.

Bus schedules are still not back to 2019 service levels. This sucks like really hard. My bus used to come every 15 minutes during morning/afternoon, now it's every 30 minutes. I think they lost a lot of drivers, my youngest takes the bus to school and they had a hell of a time filling that position.

Anyhow, yeah, I suppose if you live in, um, Bowness and need to get to Taradale for work, transit isn't going to work for you. Got a solution for CT?

November has been ridiculous for passengers. It was nuts.

The CT app sucks giant donkey balls. Even the goddamned SSO is done wrong. Christ.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Shazam

A few things:

Trains run like crazy during rush hour. 5 minutes or so -"so" being 2X = 10 minutes? Trains run literally right behind each other in rush hour. Like trains are 30 seconds apart. Trains ran 7 minutes apart back in 1996 during rush hour - ask me how I know.

They went back to four car trains of late and went back to three car trains for some reason. I'm presuming it was the construction.

Bus schedules are still not back to 2019 service levels. This sucks like really hard. My bus used to come every 15 minutes during morning/afternoon, now it's every 30 minutes. I think they lost a lot of drivers, my youngest takes the bus to school and they had a hell of a time filling that position.

Anyhow, yeah, I suppose if you live in, um, Bowness and need to get to Taradale for work, transit isn't going to work for you. Got a solution for CT?

November has been ridiculous for passengers. It was nuts.

The CT app sucks giant donkey balls. Even the goddamned SSO is done wrong. Christ.

Funny example...it doesn't quite start in Bowness, but it covers most of the trip on one bus!

[chemgear]

https://calgary.ctvnews.ca/more-than...lice-1.6695303

Calgary police say more than two dozen people are facing charges in connection with an undercover operation into drug trafficking at CTrain stations.

Between Nov. 28 and Dec. 8, undercover officers were set up in the Marlborough, City Hall, Chinook, Rundle, Eighth Street, Sunalta, Whitehorn, Westbrook and Heritage LRT stations.

These officers intercepted 40 drug purchases, which led to 27 suspects being arrested.

Police say 212 criminal charges were laid in the operation.

In addition to the arrests, police say they seized several weapons, including an axe, 15 knives, five cans of bear spray, three batons and two Airsoft pistols.

[The Familia]

Good. Drug dealers are the scum of the earth. Useless, lazy people preying off of those struggling with addictions and mental health issues.

[surferguy]

I’m happy to see that while our drug dealers are armed with weapons, the weapons they have are not hand guns.

[GirlySports]

Who is stuck on a train right now?

Why is a switch issue unfixable?

Why aren't they running shuttles, this is almost a full breakdown.

[Weitz]

Originally Posted by GirlySports

Who is stuck on a train right now?

Why is a switch issue unfixable?

Why aren't they running shuttles, this is almost a full breakdown.

I am. I get parking downtown but prefer the train most days. Was about to get off and go back to my car to drive and the train pulled away.

The real question is why isn’t there a switch downtown so trains can still move half the line?

[The Fisher Account]

Why after spending millions extending platform lengths at train stations are they still running 3 car trains during rush hour that are absolutely packed?