Province gives Calgary money... council deciding what to do with it.

[nik-]

The obvious answer is to make the Peace Bridge a double decker.

[Bunk]

Originally Posted by kermitology

I like Nenshi, but that is super lame. How about council be professional and do something without this song and dance around it?

Would your preference be no consultation? Or more formal methods? I don't think there's much appetite to do something like a plebiscite, but there's also a strong desire to hear from the public one way or another.

Videos are a fairly accessible and easy way for the public to understand the merits of each option a little better.

[Traditional_Ale]

I say a portion of it should go to save the MRU Jazz program.

[Muta]

Originally Posted by kermitology

I like Nenshi, but that is super lame. How about council be professional and do something without this song and dance around it?

Why is that lame? Watching what each alderman propose via Youtube is super cool. That's the kind of new civic engagement I was looking for when I voted for Nenshi.

[troutman]

Originally Posted by Muta

Save it and put it in an interest-generating account, which works towards eventually building an LRT connection to the airport / the SE LRT line.

+1 - LRT really should go to the airport.

[SebC]

Originally Posted by Traditional_Ale

I say a portion of it should go to save the MRU Jazz program.

Not sure if that something that would/should fall into the municipal realm. I'd suspect it isn't.

[AR_Six]

I am in favour of 3 or 4. Either would sit okay with me, but I would be interested in what neighbourhoods and areas would get revitalization priority. I will vote for 4 by a narrow margin.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by kermitology

Transit capital fund.. for the love of god, do NOT give it back to us. We pay low taxes as is, and this city has desperate need for more infrastructure investment. Particularly transit, which is appallingly bad for a city of +1M people.

I don't disagree with spending the money on transit, (Airport LRT would be the best bang for the buck) but the part I've bolded is incorrect. In fact, it's farcical and completely wrong.

Calgary metro has a population of 1.278 million people. The US metros closest to us in population are Memphis, Oklahoma City, Louisville KY, and Richmond VA.

In 2011, Calgary Transit had 96.2 million passengers. (1)
In 2011 Memphis Transit Authority had just over 10 million passengers (2)
In 2011 Metro Transit (Oklahoma City) carried ~3 million passengers (3)
Transit Authority of River City (Louisville) carries ~15 million passengers (4)
Greater Richmond Transit serves "more than 10 million passengers" (5)

So compared to the closest in size N. American metro areas to Calgary, our transit is used ~10x more often. Maybe you have another way of determining that our transit is in fact appalingly bad for a city of our size?

1 http://www.calgarytransit.com/html/a...ridership.html
2 page 7 of annual report http://www.calgarytransit.com/html/a...ridership.html
3 http://www.gometro.org/about-us
4 http://www.ridetarc.org/about/mission/
5 http://www.ridegrtc.com/images/RFP%20116-13-09.pdf

Edited to add: Louiseville has only busses, Memphis has a small trolley system (partly for tourism), OKC has only buses and Richmond has only buses. We have a modern (and groundbreaking when originally built) light rail transit system. Our transit is light years ahead of similar sized North American cities.

[Joborule]

I'm split on 3/4. I just picked 3 because it would shape up older neighbourhoods quite nicely and effects where people live.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by Traditional_Ale

I say a portion of it should go to save the MRU Jazz program.

No, no, no. The programs that MRU has done for decades that had good histories and employment results should get cut first. They're a university now, and they need to focus on churning out generic B.A.s

[Cowboy89]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

I don't disagree with spending the money on transit, (Airport LRT would be the best bang for the buck) but the part I've bolded is incorrect. In fact, it's farcical and completely wrong.

Calgary metro has a population of 1.278 million people. The US metros closest to us in population are Memphis, Oklahoma City, Louisville KY, and Richmond VA.

In 2011, Calgary Transit had 96.2 million passengers. (1)
In 2011 Memphis Transit Authority had just over 10 million passengers (2)
In 2011 Metro Transit (Oklahoma City) carried ~3 million passengers (3)
Transit Authority of River City (Louisville) carries ~15 million passengers (4)
Greater Richmond Transit serves "more than 10 million passengers" (5)

So compared to the closest in size N. American metro areas to Calgary, our transit is used ~10x more often. Maybe you have another way of determining that our transit is in fact appalingly bad for a city of our size?

Thank you for that. Biggest pet peave of mine is when pushing for civic initiatives, there's a demographic that feels that whatever Vancouver, Toronto, or Montreal has that we don't is automatically something we are 'behind' at and immediately needs rectifying. Sometimes it's a case of cart before the horse.

[frinkprof]

#1, #2 or a new Flames arena.

Transit is for losers.

[RoadGame]

#4 by a mile. If you want to see the consequences of not adequately investing in rail-based transit, look no further than Toronto. A threadbare network is having all sorts of consequences, on commute times, property values, neighbourhood composition, etc.

[johnnyrocket03]

I fail to understand why any of you would want to put this money towards transit rather than getting it back.

[Tinordi]

Dunno, maybe because people can think of themselves more than a few days removed from the present?

[V]

Originally Posted by You Need a Thneed

Provincial responsibilities.

For now. Deerfoot's going to be expensive to fix once it's on the City's dime.

[Cowboy89]

Originally Posted by Tinordi

Why wouldn't you? Bike and transit investment is basically net-positive in public wealth generation. For every car taken off the road you save $thousands for other drivers of the life of the infrastructure. I really dislike this siloed/tribal thinking that investments in transit are zero-sum, either they're for vehicles or they're against vehicles. For the most part investments in alternative transit or even the removal of vehicle infrastructure can be beneficial to motorists.

edit: This is a good summary of the public good case to encourage alternative transport options, check out page 58 for a summary monetizing the benefits.

http://www.vtpi.org/nmt-tdm.pdf

The problem is that there is limited space in urban centres and that you will run into use conflicts between vehicles and other modes. It's nice to build bike lanes where there's an existing unused right of way but for the most part you're talking about taking out lanes. That's fine if it leads to lower congestion. Best example I have is the Burrard Street Bridge in Vancouver. Converted a whole lane to bikes on a 6 lane bridge, drivers were initially irate but traffic effects are negligible and there's 26% more cycling trips over the bridge and certain to rise further.

http://www.openalex.ca/2009/11/vanco...e-success.html

Is it only beneficial to motorists if they leave their cars and start biking? Admittedly I didn't read the entire report, but I seem to be missing the part where if you're a motorist both before and after bike lanes are installed over top of existing roadway, how somehow your driving experience becomes in your words more 'beneficial.' I saw how in one specific example in your second link that the congestion was 'negligible' on the Burrard bridge, which I note is both a subjective term and also not 'beneficial.'

If the benefits of ripping out roads require that the experience gets worse for drivers, but disproportionately better for bikers and transit commuters, than why not just come out and say that drivers would still come out losers. Sure maybe not zero-sum, but definately not win-win.

[johnnyrocket03]

Originally Posted by Tinordi

Dunno, maybe because people can think of themselves more than a few days removed from the present?

So you want to do it to feel good and charitable? I think i'll take the refund, having more money in my account will make me feel pretty damn good.

[firebug]

Originally Posted by johnnyrocket03

I fail to understand why any of you would want to put this money towards transit rather than getting it back.

Perhaps because an efficient transit system would provide far more utility to us than an extra $50/year?

[johnnyrocket03]

Originally Posted by firebug

Perhaps because an efficient transit system would provide far more utility to us than an extra $50/year?

I have used Calgary Transit a lot and I have never not been able to get where I needed to go. I dont feel like there is much wrong with our transit system.