MF YYC Politics - there, I mega did it

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by FacePaint

Price increase was completely the fault of delays caused by the Province. So when you say you're on the side of the Province are you on the side that paused construction for review, then agreed with tunneling. Or the side of the Province that paused construction again for review and forced through a new, crappy plan?

Nobody hates the UCP more than me, but I think subsequent events have shown that the impact from the pause is overblown. They finally got the green light in July 2021 and it took them 3 years to get to the Lynnwood stub announcement. So I think it's pretty reasonable to conclude that they were not actually on the cusp of going to tender in late 2020 when the pause hit and that they were going to run into the inflation/supply chain problems either way.

Let's also remember where the world was in 2020 and 2021...productivity wasn't exactly awesome as the world was adapting, so it's not like we lost really high yield time. But also it's not like the green line team couldn't do any work during this period; particularly SE of the Elbow River, but the extra due diligence would also have meant more clarity and some progress towards the tunnel if/when the green light came. So why did it take 36 more months to see anything resembling progress?

I want to say that the pause was stupid - and it almost certainly happened for the wrong reasons - but it looks like it was a broken clock moment for the UCP. I suspect the city's entrenchment at this point made it awfully hard for them to admit/acknowledge they were wrong (who hasn't been there in an argument with a spouse or whatever)...even to the point of opting for the Lynnwood stub despite the many many problems that would have created (not to mention completely undermining a bunch of arguments they used to justify going SE, like the MSF location).



And it's not a crappy plan. Without even factoring capital costs or timelines I actually think elevated is the superior option because it will be less harmful to PIP, delivers many riders to their destination level instead of 3+ stories below, and has better OPEX.

[GullFoss]

Originally Posted by powderjunkie

And it's not a crappy plan. Without even factoring capital costs or timelines I actually think elevated is the superior option because it will be less harmful to PIP, delivers many riders to their destination level instead of 3+ stories below, and has better OPEX.

Explain this to me in more detail, including what PIP means?

[TorqueDog]

Originally Posted by powderjunkie

And it's not a crappy plan. Without even factoring capital costs or timelines I actually think elevated is the superior option because it will be less harmful to PIP, delivers many riders to their destination level instead of 3+ stories below, and has better OPEX.

Elevated infrastructure tends to make the area underneath and immediately surrounding it pretty undesirable, generally:

- Degrading the visual appeal of downtown. It’s ugly infrastructure and you know the supports will end up an eyesore, collecting grime and becoming inundated with sh-tty tagging.
- Blocking out the sun and reducing daylighting, which makes the areas below colder; way less inviting and usable.
- Increasing the ambient noise floor — and it’s already loud enough to begin with thanks to all the crackle-tuned Audi dickholes.
- Reducing the curb-appeal and value of immediately surrounding areas, kicking in the teeth any high-value development that these areas could have otherwise supported or invited in the future.

I could keep going, there’s a lot of reasons why elevated sucks.

I mean, I’m sure the bean-counters are happy that the capital cost is lower, but the sum of the negatives and opportunity cost over years and decades can’t really be hand-waved away. This will dramatically change the feel of the downtown core at street level wherever it runs, and not for the better. Boston’s “Big Dig” is one of the most instructive case studies of solving an infrastructure problem that Calgary — courtesy of the UCP — is poised to create for itself. Perhaps it isn’t at the sheer scale of the Central Artery, but the same problems it created for Boston are the ones this’ll create for Calgary.

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by GullFoss

Explain this to me in more detail, including what PIP means?

Prince's Island Park. Here's a post I wrote explaining in more detail:

Elevated actually wins for me before even considering costs. It's a better user experience. And IMO it is actually less harmful to the public realm where it really matters. (And then of course it's cheaper with cheaper OPEX)


A big thing overlooked in the city's plan is that grade-change transitions have the most detrimental impact to the public realm and create dead zones. There is a chicken/egg thing where a lot of these dead zones don't seem so bad, because they are tucked up against a car-sewer-stroad like Macleod or 16th or Bow Tr or Memorial...but those were mostly self-fulfilled prophecies.

Transition to underground is arguably better than to elevated (red line along Macleod Tr, or Hounsfield Hts to go under 16th), but fewer transition zones is best of all. (lots of examples of elevated transition zones: Bow River crossings, Blue line @ Millenium Park, red line up the hill to SAIT, etc)

Some sort of transition is inevitable near Olympic Way. Elevated is mitigated by being right beside the heavy rail tracks (a hostile barrier in themselves), but the tunnel would have seen it on 11 Ave (unclear exactly where since they changed 4 St station to surface level).

But then in Eau Claire we would have had a double whammy going from underground to elevated, whereas a continuous elevated option is actually a lot less disruptive. Going to surface along Centre St would also likely mean transition zones near 16th.

So on the whole I'm not convinced the tunnelled alignment is significantly less disruptive to the public realm - especially where it should matter to us the most. But none of it is the end of the world either way. We just need better ways to move people.

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by TorqueDog

Elevated infrastructure tends to make the area underneath and immediately surrounding it pretty undesirable, generally:

- Degrading the visual appeal of downtown. It’s ugly infrastructure and you know the supports will end up an eyesore, collecting grime and becoming inundated with sh-tty tagging.
- Blocking out the sun and reducing daylighting, which makes the areas below colder; way less inviting and usable.
- Increasing the ambient noise floor — and it’s already loud enough to begin with thanks to all the crackle-tuned Audi dickholes.
- Reducing the curb-appeal and value of immediately surrounding areas, kicking in the teeth any high-value development that these areas could have otherwise supported or invited in the future.

I could keep going, there’s a lot of reasons why elevated sucks.

I mean, I’m sure the bean-counters are happy that the capital cost is lower, but the sum of the negatives and opportunity cost over years and decades can’t really be hand-waved away. This will dramatically change the feel of the downtown core at street level wherever it runs, and not for the better. Boston’s “Big Dig” is one of the most instructive case studies of solving an infrastructure problem that Calgary — courtesy of the UCP — is poised to create for itself. Perhaps it isn’t at the sheer scale of the Central Artery, but the same problems it created for Boston are the ones this’ll create for Calgary.

Look at all the development this one killed:

https://maps.app.goo.gl/7nYBpAofDkSYAkgz8

Follow the elevated section in either direction. It's really not that bad. The context there is different because its along an ugly stroad, so the pillars actually create a bit of a buffer to a nice wide ped ROW.

We've seen it hasn't really hurt development in Calgary, either


To the Calgary context, the corridors this follows are already pretty cold & bleak. 10 Ave is mostly bland concrete buildings and surface lots that expose the CP tracks.

2nd Ave is bland corporate lobbies with very few CRUs (Commercial Retail Units) once you're a block past Stephen Ave.

More than 50% of 2nd is already in shade for 22 hours a day for the darkest 8 months of the year. That's actually pretty much true 12 months of the year - for the summer its more like >40% for 21 hours a day (and more shade at high noon in summer isn't necessarily a bad thing these days).

[para transit fellow]

Are we moving dicussion regarding merits of the green line routing from the transit thread?

[TorqueDog]

Originally Posted by powderjunkie

Look at all the development this one killed:

https://maps.app.goo.gl/7nYBpAofDkSYAkgz8

Follow the elevated section in either direction. It's really not that bad. The context there is different because its along an ugly stroad, so the pillars actually create a bit of a buffer to a nice wide ped ROW.

We've seen it hasn't really hurt development in Calgary, either


To the Calgary context, the corridors this follows are already pretty cold & bleak. 10 Ave is mostly bland concrete buildings and surface lots that expose the CP tracks.

2nd Ave is bland corporate lobbies with very few CRUs (Commercial Retail Units) once you're a block past Stephen Ave.

More than 50% of 2nd is already in shade for 22 hours a day for the darkest 8 months of the year. That's actually pretty much true 12 months of the year - for the summer its more like >40% for 21 hours a day (and more shade at high noon in summer isn't necessarily a bad thing these days).

Neither the Metro Van example nor the 10 Ave / 14 St elevated track are really a good parallel to punching an elevated track through the downtown core.

You’re missing several long-term points about how urban environments evolve and why cities like Boston and Seattle eventually reverse these types of decisions. I mean yeah, sure, 10th and 2nd aren’t exactly shining examples of a walkable pedestrian utopia, but those corridors are probably two of the best examples of opportunity for revitalization. The area being relatively bleak as an excuse for why we should be okay with it just reinforces why we shouldn’t be, because we still have the opportunity to fix it before the Green Line effectively locks it in (short of enduring an even more massive cost to fix it later). 1950s Boston justified the Central Artery the same fatalistic way; its ugly and industrial, so what difference does it make?

As for shadowing, at least there’s some sunlight, even if for short periods. An elevated alignment will kill the surviving daylight. CRUs don’t get developed until a place becomes desirable, and for a city looking to invest in revitalization of its downtown communities, this moves in precisely the wrong direction. If you’ve spent any time in Toronto, as much as I loved the convenience of the Gardiner Expressway as a driver (it kinda felt like zipping through a Need for Speed track), you know it’s a horrible piece of infrastructure at ground level which — between that and its steadily rising cost of maintenance — is why they constantly debate getting rid of the elevated portion somehow.

Making decisions today about building tomorrow’s city using yesterday’s urban planning decisions is what this boils down to, really. It’s looking at 1950s infrastructure with an undeserved fondness rather than learning from it.

You’re right about transitioning areas also being crap, but at least those are small pockets rather than one big long stretch of it.

[Fuzz]

The worst party is the delay and elevated line will now cost more than underground if we had just been able to get the #### on with it already.

[para transit fellow]

Anyone else get a spam txt message from the Sharp campaign today?

This is Sonya Sharp, running for mayor of Calgary.

You deserve safe streets, fair taxes, and more transparency.

Can I count on your vote?

Reply 'Yes'

[topfiverecords]

Originally Posted by para transit fellow

Anyone else get a spam txt message from the Sharp campaign today?

safe streets, fair taxes, and more transparency

Is that it? At least we're finally gettin some transparency I guess, whatever that means.

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

The worst party is the delay and elevated line will now cost more than underground if we had just been able to get the #### on with it already.

I don't think they were ever able to get on it; almost certainly the big contributor to the massive cost increases and delays in 2017 and 2019 was the geological challenges of the DT tunnel. Even after Alberta finally granted permission to proceed in 2021, it still took 2 years for the Green Line to pick a constructor and didn't even reach the 60% design stage until the summer of 2024.

The only way the Green Line could have proceeded earlier was to cancel the entire tunnel in 2019-2020; not just the northern section.