Ring Road To Nowhere

[shermanator]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

If money was no object, nobody would have a problem with this. Is there a project in particular that is of more potential benefit to more people than a fully-functional ring road?

I would argue that in addition to the NC-SELRT line, the upgrade of Crowchild from 17th ave SW to 24th ave NW would be a project that could benefit more Calgarians than the ring road. Considering Crowchild is backed up due to the bottleneck almost every day

Of course, I have no idea of how many vehicles per day are anticipated on the ring road or the NC-SELRT vs how many vehicles per day on Crowchild. That's really the number that will give the biggest indicator of benefit to Calgarians.

The ring road is definitely needed, I won't argue that point, but yes the $5B price tag does make it tough to swallow.

[kevman]

Does anyone know what population estimates the road is being built toward? If the road is sized for ~1 million trips a day are we talking about a city of 3, 4, 5 million plus!?

Maybe I'm just cynical but when does building for the future ever work out as planned? We plan for expansion all the time at work and in the end the expansion never gets built or if it does it's completely different than what was envisioned as little as 5 years earlier.

Hell people get it wrong all the time with things as simple as their own homes...

[Magnum PEI]

Originally Posted by shermanator

I'm definately biased in that I will never ever drive this road, but I think that $5B would be much better spent in building a North Central / South East LRT line.

That's what I said when council approved the Airport Tunnel. I know better now.

[kevman]

Just for fun:

The Peace Bridge cost $25,000,000 and sees 5,000 users a day for a cost of $5,000 per day user.

The ring road that will cost $5,000,000,000 will need 1,000,000 users a day to be at the same cost per day user as the Peace Bridge. If only 100,000 people use this leg in a day it is 10 times more expensive per user than the finger trap.

Yeah, I went there.

[Handsome B. Wonderful]

Originally Posted by shermanator

I would argue that in addition to the NC-SELRT line, the upgrade of Crowchild from 17th ave SW to 24th ave NW would be a project that could benefit more Calgarians than the ring road. Considering Crowchild is backed up due to the bottleneck almost every day.

The city came up with a plan that completely redesigned a significant portion of that road in manner that actually solved transportation issues, so of course the inner city dwellers pitched a hissy fit and shot it down.

[Bunk]

Originally Posted by Handsome B. Wonderful

The city came up with a plan that completely redesigned a significant portion of that road in manner that actually solved transportation issues, so of course the inner city dwellers pitched a hissy fit and shot it down.

Shouldn't they have? It was designed with 1950s highway design mentality. Surely the same ends could be achieved without bulldozing entire blocks of neighbourhoods. The project was sent back to the drawing board in a 15-0 vote at Council, so it wasn't just inner city folks balking, the 9 suburban councillors agreed.

[KelVarnsen]

I'm curious, is there a link to that plan anywhere?

[calgarygeologist]

Originally Posted by Bunk

Shouldn't they have? It was designed with 1950s highway design mentality. Surely the same ends could be achieved without bulldozing entire blocks of neighbourhoods. The project was sent back to the drawing board in a 15-0 vote at Council, so it wasn't just inner city folks balking, the 9 suburban councillors agreed.

Originally Posted by Handsome B. Wonderful

The city came up with a plan that completely redesigned a significant portion of that road in manner that actually solved transportation issues, so of course the inner city dwellers pitched a hissy fit and shot it down.

Crowchild Trail redevelopment is doomed. I can't see any possibly solution at this point. I think the only thing that could be viable, although probably quite costly, would be to build a new roadway above the existing Crowchild. Essentially some sort of design which builds a new N-S Crowchild Trail elevated while maintaining the existing lower roadway for access to Memorial Drive and 6/9 (Bow Trail) and 12 Ave.

[CKPThunder]

As a side note and I apologize since I don't know what it would entail. Would it be possible to piggy back off the SW ring road project and build a flood mitigation floodway/tunnel at the same time?

Sort of divert the water from Elbow near the Reserve and send it down south along the ring road and empty it out in the south?

I have no idea what the ramifications would be of this especially for those living south of the city.

[stampsx2]

I think the most irritating thing about some Calgarians is the attitude " well I don't use it so why are we building it "? With that attitude nothing would get built.

I dont' use transit or the education system but I pay for it. I don't use libraries, the airport tunnel, the cycle path or pools but I pay for it. If I move to High River I have the exact same problem on a smaller scale. Get over it already.

[kevman]

Originally Posted by stampsx2

I think the most irritating thing about some Calgarians is the attitude " well I don't use it so why are we building it "? With that attitude nothing would get built.

I dont' use transit or the education system but I pay for it. I don't use libraries, the airport tunnel, the cycle path or pools but I pay for it. If I move to High River I have the exact same problem on a smaller scale. Get over it already.

Use it or not there is nothing wrong with questioning a $5 billion dollar price tag on a piece of public infrastructure. That's $1,250/Albertan to pay for this segment of road. Is a ring road required? Sure. Is one of this scale required? I don't really know...

[BlackArcher101]

Do we even know if this will be the opening day configuration or if it's just the eventual end design? What phases will this road be opened with? Opening with interchanges/ramps missing like the NW portion?

[DoubleK]

I think the issue that everyone is highlighting is the fact that the bridges will be built to handle the ultimate design regardless of what the 'Opening day configuration' is.

Most of the money is in the bridge structures. You can incrementally add lanes based on demand, not so much for the bridge spans.

[polak]

omg just throw some Phil & Sebastian's along the road and have an exit that goes directly to the Ship and Anchor and they'll shut up about their damn peasant trains.


...

[Robbob]

Flying cars...were we not promised flying cars by now.

[getbak]

Originally Posted by Robbob

Flying cars...were we not promised flying cars by now.

Think about how poorly people drive on a flat surface. Do you really want to add a third dimension to the equation?

[polak]

Originally Posted by fotze

OMG we need to put some Tim Horton's in Texas so I can commute from there and then complain about my 5 day commute when I look at the map. Think of the sq footage I could afford for $350k in Houston.

Are you kidding, the US has incredible highway infrastructure. That commute would be 2 days tops. Although the lack of Tim Hortons is alarming.

[V]

Haha, what a monstrosity. This sprawl needs to get reigned in.

[polak]

Originally Posted by V

Haha, what a monstrosity. This sprawl needs to get reigned in.

I don't know man, do you know what high density housing gets you?

Ebola, among other things.

[GGG]

An 8 lane design with land purchased for 16 but bridges designed for only the 8 lane design would be my choice.

Keep the land available as it was very difficult to get but don't try to save money long term on the bridges by pre-investing in the 16 lane design.

I think at the point 16 lanes are required 8 lanes on highway 22 will be the correct way around the ring road. Also I have hope over the next 50 years the reserve system will be phased out and individual land ownership will take over the reserves allowing for development and expansion of the city onto Tsu Tina land. (one can hope).

The traffic / planning engineers I have talked to believe that 16 is overkill as well and I trust there judgement. Although some planners also must support this design as well.