Quote:
Originally Posted by bizaro86
That's probably true, that building it above ground downtown was the right call. But not building it to the airport on the NE line? Dumb. And just because it wasn't built underground downtown originally, doesn't mean they shouldn't have put it underground when they started replacing all the stations. (Which is still ongoing)
Michael
|
Quote:
Originally Posted by bizaro86
The plan was to put the new underground line under 9th avenue, so you could leave 7th avenue open during construction of the 9th avenue line. I think there was also another reason they couldn't do it under 7th avenue, something to do with the soil or adjacent buildings or something, but I don't recall exactly.
Michael
|
Alright, time for clearing up some transit-related things, low-hanging fruit first:
Airport LRT
Airport LRT lines/stations typically have relatively low ridership due to a number of factors including: business travelers often choosing taxi rides they can write off, airport workers not being a strong ridership base (odd hours, low cost parking), limited or non-existent development potential around stations due to flightpaths, luggage (even with specially designed train cars to accommodate some luggage), etc. Quite a few examples attest to this: Portland, Atlanta and Vancouver are a few.
As for the NE line not going to the airport either what is currently built or future expansion, it simply follows stronger ridership bases: a mix of residential and retail corridor. The average Calgarian (I would guess) goes to the airport about 5 times a year, while most travel to work 200+ times a year. Getting to and from work is what the vast majority use (intracity) rail transit for. There are hundreds of thousands of Calgarians both in NE Calgary and elsewhere (SE, North Central) that should be served by the LRT for this purpose before the airport is. Simply a numbers game.
Airport LRT sounds like a nice thing to have, and it would be. However, other priorities have to come first, both in terms of new lines (SE, North Central) and the current and future routing of the NE LRT.
Underground LRT History
History as I know it, just copy/pasting from an old post of mine:
When the LRT was first planned in the early to mid 70s, having it run under 8th Avenue downtown was plan A, and the surface transit mall along 7th Avenue was plan B. When costs started to escalate in the later planning stages, 7th Avenue was chosen, but not before some facilities under City Hall (specifically, the shell of an underground station) had been constructed when the new City Hall was constructed.
In the years since, it was planned that eventually at least one of the LRT lines would have to move under 8th Avenue as 7th Avenue approached capacity. Every new building along 8th Avenue has had to take this into account, and every time there has been utility work in the area, they have moved as many utilities as possible to make way for the eventual 8th Avenue Subway. For example, there is a space in the lower levels of the Banker's Hall complex that is currently being used as an auditorium but is actually a placeholder for the tunnel and/or station.
This is the first I've heard of the story about the rich Saudi guy bankrolling LRT in the 70s. To be quite honest, it sounds far-fetched. I would assume that, at the very most, it was just some very preliminary musing on the part of the City and/or the Saudi person.
Underground LRT Future
Some more copy/paste:
Fast forward to now. The 7th Avenue transit mall is at capacity and political will and public sentiment has been growing to finally build the 8th Avenue Subway. 2007 mayoral candidate Sandy Jenkins had it in his platform, and others mused about it. A budget was approved after the 2007 election for a preliminary engineering study that will recommend routes, station locations, alignment, platform lengths, construction methods and staging, timeframe, costing, etc.
Also being dealt with will be the SELRT downtown alignment, which will be in its own separate subway. This study is just getting underway now (as far as I understand anyway) and is supposed to be completed next year sometime.
Planning done to date points toward the 201 line (south and northwest legs) using the 8th Avenue Subway with 3 or 4 stations. The SE LRT will enter downtown from the east on 10th Avenue, go underground somewhere east of MacLeod Trail, travel under 10th Avenue to 2nd Street West, turn north, continue underground all the way to Eau Claire.
Stations tentatively at 1st Street West, 7th/8th Ave., and Eau Claire. The 202 line (northeast and west legs) would continue to use the existing 7th Ave. The recommendations in the study may change some of these elements but will probably resemble most of it. After that, it would need approval, to be made a priority, and the biggest hurdle, funding.
This also explains why the current work on 7th Avenue (replacing old stations) does not mean that underground LRT has been abandoned. The two projects are independent of each other.