Improved LRT Connectivity For Vanier/Overbrook

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by downtown_eddie_brown

An update on this; The Councillor's office got in touch with me for a meeting with Fleury and one of the OCTranspo folks to discuss the idea in a bit more detail. They both seemed interested in and receptive to the idea, and the presentation has been circulated to OCTranspo planners, so we'll see if anything comes of it as 2018 rolls around.

I pressed that the real value of the concept was how easy it would be to pilot, by just extending some existing lines once the Transitway is closed north of Hurdman.

I explained the issue of stop placement, and the value that comes from being able to simultaneously wait for an east-west bus and a north-south bus, and take whichever comes first in order to connect to the Transitway.

At the very least, the concept appears to be on OCTranspo's radar, and the Councillor seems to see value in the concept. We'll see where it goes from here.

Good for you for sticking with it until someone met with you. There are a lot of transit users inside and in the few blocks around your dark blue loop and as Uhanaiu says they will little to no benefit from the LRT.

That said my main question/criticism of your proposal is what is the purpose of taking people (essentially backwards for most people) to the LRT? In other words where are all these people going that the LRT would be faster or more reliable. For example someone lives near Montreal road. They can take the 12 directly to most offices downtown in about 20 minutes. If I take your loop I will be lucky to be getting on a train at Hurdman. About the only possible major commuter destination that the LRT could help would be Tunney's Pasture. Even then wouldn't it be faster to enter at Rideau Centre Station?

[1overcosc]

For downtown-bound travellers the value would be limited as you'd be travelling in a semicircle negating much of the time savings, but many other destinations would become much easier to access:

-The General and Riverside hospitals
-St. Laurent mall & Blair station area
-Destinations along Carling via the 101 (or whatever it's being renumbered to, I forget)
-Elmvale Acres
-Train Station
-The Airport
-Orleans

[downtown_eddie_brown]

Originally Posted by YOWetal

Good for you for sticking with it until someone met with you. There are a lot of transit users inside and in the few blocks around your dark blue loop and as Uhanaiu says they will little to no benefit from the LRT.

That said my main question/criticism of your proposal is what is the purpose of taking people (essentially backwards for most people) to the LRT? In other words where are all these people going that the LRT would be faster or more reliable. For example someone lives near Montreal road. They can take the 12 directly to most offices downtown in about 20 minutes. If I take your loop I will be lucky to be getting on a train at Hurdman. About the only possible major commuter destination that the LRT could help would be Tunney's Pasture. Even then wouldn't it be faster to enter at Rideau Centre Station?

I tried to frame the conversation as an "idea for an idea", which is to say that it's not a finalized plan that needs to be enacted in its current form, but that it simply might be worth looking into by The Powers That Be.

This said, while the 12 may look like a straight-shot downtown on paper, it's a turtle on the road due to the number of stops and controlled intersections along its route. Furthermore, with all east-end lines looking like they'll terminate at Rideau Station, we're potentially moving to a situation whereby a rider on the 12 heading to Laurier will need to spend half an hour getting downtown, only to need to transfer to the LRT at Rideau to go a single stop to Parliament.

If transit users in Neddy/Vanier/Overbrook need to get on LRT for Parliament Station, or Tunney's Pasture, or Baseline Station, the key lies in getting them onto the LRT as rapidly as possible. This makes the prospect of around 10 controlled intersections and bus stops along the Parkway, and potentially arriving at Hurdman Station in five to seven minutes, much more appealing than 30+ controlled intersections and bus stops heading to Rideau.

It would also provide frequent and direct service to the Airport and Tremblay Station for Vanierites.

All told, I think the concept is worth looking into to see if it actually translates to something useful on the ground.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by YOWetal

Good for you for sticking with it until someone met with you.

Councillor Fleury, in particular, always insists on meeting or calling people who email him about ward issues, so that there is no documentary trail.

That said my main question/criticism of your proposal is what is the purpose of taking people (essentially backwards for most people) to the LRT? In other words where are all these people going that the LRT would be faster or more reliable. For example someone lives near Montreal road. They can take the 12 directly to most offices downtown in about 20 minutes.

20 minutes?!?!?!

Not during weekday morning peak. Barely even at other times. And there is no direct-to-(or-from)-the-CBD service on the 12 after 7:00 p.m. or at all on weekends. One of the many joys of OC Transpo's routumcision policy, soon to be rolled out on ever single other local route that currently passes by the Rideau Centre.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

For downtown-bound travellers the value would be limited as you'd be travelling in a semicircle negating much of the time savings, but many other destinations would become much easier to access:

-The General and Riverside hospitals
-St. Laurent mall & Blair station area
-Destinations along Carling via the 101 (or whatever it's being renumbered to, I forget)
-Elmvale Acres
-Train Station
-The Airport
-Orleans

For macro-travel — to a suburban location along the current or future LRT network — a good LRT connection is required. That's the beauty of some of these ideas that have been bandied about.

For service to/from the downtown core and other inner residential neighbourhoods that are not served by the LRT — which is almost all of them — an excellent local bus service is required. That does not exist at present because OC Transpo is making no serious attempt to match service to demand, and the city is making no serious attempt to mitigate the impact of congestion on transit service. And it will not exist in the future because both of those problems will go unaddressed by the proposed service plan; there are ZERO plans for transit priority measures in any core neighbourhood that I'm aware of; and the continual splitting of downtown routes will degrade service, and the transit experience, for thousands of people who live and work inside the Greenbelt.

But at least we'll have grade- or horizontally-segregated rail rapid transit to every bloody car-dependent god-awful suburb.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by downtown_eddie_brown

This said, while the 12 may look like a straight-shot downtown on paper, it's a turtle on the road due to the number of stops and controlled intersections along its route.

The number of stops on the 12 is not a problem. The lack of TPM is. The failure of OC Transpo to match service frequency and vehicles is. (Why in hell is there EVER a 40-foot vehicle on those runs?) The refusal of OC Transpo to require rear-door boarding on local routes running on artics contributes greatly to the schedule adherence failure and inability of local routes to run in a reasonable amount of time.

Some of the problems are simple to solve, but OC Transpo doesn't believe they exists. Others would require money, but the suburbs are more politically powerful and get a greater share than they deserve. And in the meantime people who rely on local transit within the core are getting worse and worse service for their efforts.

Furthermore, with all east-end lines looking like they'll terminate at Rideau Station, we're potentially moving to a situation whereby a rider on the 12 heading to Laurier will need to spend half an hour getting downtown, only to need to transfer to the LRT at Rideau to go a single stop to Parliament.

Shut up and eat your "optimization".

If transit users in Neddy/Vanier/Overbrook need to get on LRT for Parliament Station, or Tunney's Pasture, or Baseline Station, the key lies in getting them onto the LRT as rapidly as possible.

Or, y'know, we could not truncate all the local routes at the Rideau Bloody Centre. We could also not do, as OC Transpo plans to do, force all transferring passengers to walk from the upper level Mackenzie King bridge, all the way through the Rideau Bloody Centre, and down to the Rideau LRT station, in order to make the bus-LRT connection... which is what is going to happen in 2018.

I really don't think people who live inside the Greenbelt, and especially in the old city of Ottawa (plus Vanier and Rockcliffe, the latter to a much lesser degree), realize just how unfathomably crappy their transit service is going to become, BY DESIGN, and with the political approval of their own city councillors.

This makes the prospect of around 10 controlled intersections and bus stops along the Parkway, and potentially arriving at Hurdman Station in five to seven minutes, much more appealing than 30+ controlled intersections and bus stops heading to Rideau.

Five to seven minutes is not a real-world travel time to Hurdman unless you vaporize any other vehicle that attempts to use the parkway.

[Guideway]

Originally Posted by Uhuniau

Five to seven minutes is not a real-world travel time to Hurdman unless you vaporize any other vehicle that attempts to use the parkway.

Last time I went up the parkway with the 9 on a saturday at noon it took me a good 15minutes to get to beechwood from Hurdman. During rush hour, it probably takes 20-30m...

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by Guideway

Last time I went up the parkway with the 9 on a saturday at noon it took me a good 15minutes to get to beechwood from Hurdman. During rush hour, it probably takes 20-30m...

All things being absence-of-traffic equal, I think it's slightly faster to get from Beechwood to Hurdman southbound on the "Parkway" than it is to do the reverse. Might be the configuration of the station, plus the left turns on the northbound trajectory.

[lrt's friend]

Just wait for the mega-roundabout at Coventry. Traffic will be backed up to Billings Bridge, St. Laurent, New Edinburgh, and through much of the tunnel. Cough, cough.