[Joborule]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Stang

Aesthetics are one thing, but that's only part of it. I don't think that overhead does any favours to the street below - shadowing, traffic, the "pedestrian realm".

The +15 and +30 bridges, and the height needed to clear the CPR tracks, would mean that the platforms will be far above the street. Or if the bridges are demo'd, that obviously impacts the indoor walkability of downtown.

So sure, I said "ugly baby", but I believe that the elevated option is subpar for more than just that.

And I think that most of all, this is just another way that the province is trying to save the city from itself. The province is exerting more power over municipalities and the their ability to make decisions. And the sad irony of it all is that the inaction and delays by the successive UCP governments is a key reason why we're at this point, and then they offer a half-baked solution as a "take it or leave it" to the city. After seemingly being OK with, and guaranteeing the funding for, the underground alignment.

So aside from being cheaper (probably), elevated doesn't really win in any other categories for me.

At this point I think that the city chose the only option available to them, otherwise the federal funding goes down the toilet. So get started on the Shepard to "Grand Central" bit because that has to be done anyway. It won't serve the majority of commuters until it gets into downtown proper, but... here we are.

Originally Posted by para transit fellow

What is not discussed by the province is the extra costs of the that route. Going elevated will cost money in settlements/ lost assessment value for developers

10th ave has been slowly developing eastward from 8 street SW to 4th street. That trend was expected to continue eastward. Meanwhile there are four existing apartment complexes ( Bromely Sq, Mount Royal House, Centre 1010, and Upten).

Truman homes is in the process of developing an 18 story complex kitty corner to bottle screw bills/ Mt Royal House. I foresee court battles there over lost return on investment.

...and the province expects the City to pay for these expenses

Originally Posted by Torture

Hahahahhahahaha. Nope. City is on the hook for all the risk. Can't wait for taxes to go up to cover cost overruns or businesses along the elevated track inevitably suing.

Torture and para transit bring up an important point about possible cons of this, do the landowners actually have a case? Can they prove that having the LRT line be elevated instead of underground damage their property value that they have to be compensated for? What makes this different from the 7th ave transit mall where train runs at grade? Or in Sunnyside where the train ROW runs along homes backyards? (Big reason why it was delayed back in the 80s) Or business in Sunalta where there are high rises being built despite the guideway being there for over a decade?

I have serious doubts that the court of law would actually side with landowners about this. Unless these landowners have claim over air rights, what is there argument about an elevated line damaging their property value aside from perception?

I guess that I have a much more optimistic belief in how the elevated line could look through proposed corridor, and am of the belief that it'll actually "elevated" the areas potential of bringing about more life to the streets than what's present with thoughtful design that takes the concerns into consideration to compliment and address them.

For example, I can't see how the 7th Ave Station wouldn't be integrated into The Core +30; it would be stupid to not do so. The mall would benefit from have the station directly in the station. Also the elevated line provides a station for the Beltline from day one as well, improving transit connections for the area, whereas with the cost of the latest underground proposal deferred the station; likely to never be built due to extremely high costs, low projected ridership ratio.

It sucks for Truman's new building there that they've started construction before this switch up. But is it the end of the world? Having a train station literally right in front of the building should be a fair trade off. And the nearby business/residence by there should gain from it as well. Overall, the alignment provides better transit service for the area, and if designed right it could actually become a cool Calgary feature that would be featured in lots of photops. And it's not like Calgary is the first city nor the last to build an elevated train through their urban centre. Plus, technology has improved that it won't necessarily be as loud as the L Train in Chicago.

In the end, I feel a lot more confident about the elevated route costing significantly less than the underground route before construction, and faith the cost overruns would be less/more controlled as well. Essentially, Plan A failed, and now the city been told that they have to do Plan B, which many on council are bitter about.

It's more challenging to build below than it is above. From my understanding, tunnelling for the route is more complicated than initially imagined, which is why along with that and general costs for these things all over escalating, the project would likely have cost overruns occur during the construction. If we're giving grief over the province about not contributing to in shared risk costs of the elevated alignment, would we be expecting them to do the same for the underground option even though it wouldn't be their responsibility in that case either? This is the city's project, not the provinces. The way they've gone about it was typical UCP fashion, but ultimately the city is on it's own when it comes to keeping the costs in check.