Calgary Public Transit - Discussion

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

The rationale against the centre St bridge is that it is old and may need reinforcement. There are few river crossings, so it is important not to lose capacity, particularly when others are under repair. Buses will also still use the corridor, so beyond cutting the lanes from 3 to 1 in rush hour, you also still have bus traffic, cyclists and cars. I think this decision would be incredibly short sighted and probably regretted very soon after construction on it starts.

I think you could put the train on a new bridge and still use the centre street alignment.

[topfiverecords]

Originally Posted by Joborule

We really, really ####ed up by not doing this from the jump. Stupid Chu.

His name is even Chu. What the heck.

Chu Chu!

We don’t Chu-Chu-Choose You

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

I think you could put the train on a new bridge and still use the centre street alignment.

Yes,, just not up the bridge. My ideal solution is a bridge over the river, into an elevated line along the edge of center, not impacting road lanes until it crosses 16th, like the Vancouver line.

[D as in David]

Originally Posted by Joborule

We really, really ####ed up by not doing this from the jump. Stupid Chu.

He's Chupid.

[moncton golden flames]

The more this project appears to fall apart, can someone remind me why going to a Green Line BRT from Seton to Country Hills would be a bad thing?

[You Need a Thneed]

Originally Posted by moncton golden flames

The more this project appears to fall apart, can someone remind me why going to a Green Line BRT from Seton to Country Hills would be a bad thing?

Upgrading center street to a better BRT standard is already underway.

[moncton golden flames]

Originally Posted by You Need a Thneed

Upgrading center street to a better BRT standard is already underway.

I know, I live along the corridor.

I see successful BRTs all over the place and wonder why we are so set on LRT. I know we have a good track record (pardon the pun) but why can't a BRT work for the Green Line?

What about building a solid BRT from Seton to Country Hills with a downtown tunnel. We get the connections we need, the future tunnel for a transition to LRT if we need it. A tunnel will never be cheaper than today.

[jwslam]

Originally Posted by moncton golden flames

What about building a solid BRT from Seton to Country Hills with a downtown tunnel. We get the connections we need, the future tunnel for a transition to LRT if we need it. A tunnel will never be cheaper than today.

Digging a tunnel for buses now, and converting later...

That's like saying let's build a 50 storey residential skyrise now, then add the necessary plumbing, HVAC, and electrical later.

*Don't argue that you can fit all that in later. As you can see already the green line is running of different tech (floor trains) than our current red/blue lines. Tech changes and the cost to retrofit is not currently included in your math. Not to mention the costs of paving your tunnel for BRT, then having to tear up the pavement to put in tracks.

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by moncton golden flames

I know, I live along the corridor.

I see successful BRTs all over the place and wonder why we are so set on LRT. I know we have a good track record (pardon the pun) but why can't a BRT work for the Green Line?

A "problem" with the Green Line was that in 2015 it got more funding promises than was needed for a BRT, but ultimately nowhere near enough for a LRT that made everyone happy, and now too much political and financial capital has already been spent on rail to easily go back.

What about building a solid BRT from Seton to Country Hills with a downtown tunnel. We get the connections we need, the future tunnel for a transition to LRT if we need it. A tunnel will never be cheaper than today.

The tunnel has become so expensive that there isn't enough money leftover for the BRT. Even in 2020, a BRT that didn't require a tunnel or a new bridge over the Bow was already expected to cost $2.2B:

Spoiler!

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by moncton golden flames

I know, I live along the corridor.

I see successful BRTs all over the place and wonder why we are so set on LRT. I know we have a good track record (pardon the pun) but why can't a BRT work for the Green Line?

What about building a solid BRT from Seton to Country Hills with a downtown tunnel. We get the connections we need, the future tunnel for a transition to LRT if we need it. A tunnel will never be cheaper than today.

The beauty of BRT is that you don't need a tunnel, but can actually serve DT better. DT is short and wide (the true core is about 1800m wide x 750m tall - depending on how you want to define things but the shape/ratio stays about the same). So two stops running N-S doesn't cover the breadth of DT as well as 3-4 stops running E-W

So you'd build proper BRT corridor(s) in DT to serve all the MAX lines that run there.

But BRT for the north is lipstick on a pig. It's actually ready for LRT to the point we'd see operational savings (whereas a relatively low frequency LRT to the SE is operationally more expensive than a higher frequency BRT would be)

[Fuzz]

They should build the Bow River bridge for the BRT to Eau Claire that is LRT ready. Not today, but in the next 10 years, so they have fewer excuses in the future, and add a cycling/ pedestrian lane on it. The current options kinda suck right now.


Plus then an active Eau Claire station would be in place.

[moncton golden flames]

Originally Posted by jwslam

Digging a tunnel for buses now, and converting later...

That's like saying let's build a 50 storey residential skyrise now, then add the necessary plumbing, HVAC, and electrical later.

*Don't argue that you can fit all that in later. As you can see already the green line is running of different tech (floor trains) than our current red/blue lines. Tech changes and the cost to retrofit is not currently included in your math. Not to mention the costs of paving your tunnel for BRT, then having to tear up the pavement to put in tracks.

I know a BRT does not need a tunnel downtown, but my thought was build the tunnel now, because it will never be cheaper. With a tunnel built, an upgrade to LRT would be fairly seamless in the, hopefully, near future.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by jwslam

Digging a tunnel for buses now, and converting later...

That's like saying let's build a 50 storey residential skyrise now, then add the necessary plumbing, HVAC, and electrical later.

*Don't argue that you can fit all that in later. As you can see already the green line is running of different tech (floor trains) than our current red/blue lines. Tech changes and the cost to retrofit is not currently included in your math. Not to mention the costs of paving your tunnel for BRT, then having to tear up the pavement to put in tracks.

Seattle did this with their downtown bus tunnel and now LRT tunnel. Never looked into if it was effective.

[moncton golden flames]

Originally Posted by accord1999

A "problem" with the Green Line was that in 2015 it got more funding promises than was needed for a BRT, but ultimately nowhere near enough for a LRT that made everyone happy, and now too much political and financial capital has already been spent on rail to easily go back.


The tunnel has become so expensive that there isn't enough money leftover for the BRT. Even in 2020, a BRT that didn't require a tunnel or a new bridge over the Bow was already expected to cost $2.2B:

Spoiler!

So, we have roughly 6B for the project. 2.2B for North and South BRTs. Downtown tunnel is going to cost more than 3B?

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by moncton golden flames

So, we have roughly 6B for the project. 2.2B for North and South BRTs. Downtown tunnel is going to cost more than 3B?

A few things to consider:

- we had $4.6B for the project because each funding partner would do $1.53B
- So the latest $6.3B is actually $3.3B from the city and $1.5B from each of the others

- the province paid for like 90%* of the Blue line west. I'm sure it's a bit more complicated than that, but the city has gone from paying maybe $200M out of pocket for that line ~13 years ago to a lot more this time
- either current option (tunnel isn't really an option anymore but I digress) is predicated on the idea of spending a lot more in the future to build out and make them useful
- which is generally okay as there should be more funding to come from the other partners, but its also reasonable to worry about that

- Calgary's CFO was 'fired' a few weeks ago in the midst of a budget grandstanding process by councillors worried about the upcoming election
- I speculate she was professionally unwilling to compromise the city's financial position any further by more plundering of reserves/etc, but held her ground to be fired instead of resigning and losing severance
- There is a lot of specialized nuance with this theory, and there are certainly lots of other possible explanations

The TLDR is that we should be very concerned about the value we get from an unprecedented level of city spending. I'm not normally one to really GAF about gov't spending, but this might actually be pretty ####ed up. The city has more than doubled its initial commitment to get waaaaaaaaaay less than initially expected. $3.3B from the city for an underground stub or elevated stub+ would have been considered laughably insane a decade ago. But we've frog-boiled ourselves into thinking it's not

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by powderjunkie

- Calgary's CFO was 'fired' a few weeks ago in the midst of a budget grandstanding process by councillors worried about the upcoming election
- I speculate she was professionally unwilling to compromise the city's financial position any further by more plundering of reserves/etc, but held her ground to be fired instead of resigning and losing severance

This story hasn’t generated the heat that it should have. Pretty disgraceful for city council and the mayor to throw a civil servant under the bus for doing her job.

[MelBridgeman]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

This story hasn’t generated the heat that it should have. Pretty disgraceful for city council and the mayor to throw a civil servant under the bus for doing her job.

It is a disgrace but how could they fire her with cause? She would of still got a severance if she was fired without cause, no?