Expo Line - Surrey Langley Extension: Planning & Pre-Construction

[Tvisforme]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

Which planners are doing this? City planners? I can't imagine Translink would.

City planners are up there with ivory tower eggheads who don't seem to live day to day in the cities they are planning for.

Just my opinion, but I'm not aware of any officials on the North Shore calling for LRT instead of SkyTrain.

[chowhou]

Originally Posted by Tvisforme

Just my opinion, but I'm not aware of any officials on the North Shore calling for LRT instead of SkyTrain.

There are technically no calls for LRT exclusively, but whenever transit expansion to the North Shore is proposed, it's always "move forward on work for the future expansion of rapid transit to either light rail or Skytrain", so it's never discounted for some reason.

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by chowhou

There are technically no calls for LRT exclusively, but whenever transit expansion to the North Shore is proposed, it's always "move forward on work for the future expansion of rapid transit to either light rail or Skytrain", so it's never discounted for some reason.

Maybe because Skytrain is proprietary technology, it's not appropriate for a government to plan for it specifically, it might be seen as favoritism? It's weird.

They should just use "rail rapid transit" or something more generic if that's the case.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

Maybe because Skytrain is proprietary technology, it's not appropriate for a government to plan for it specifically, it might be seen as favoritism? It's weird.

They should just use "rail rapid transit" or something more generic if that's the case.

SkyTrain is Translink's name for rapid transit, applied to all three lines, and as far as I know none of the technology is proprietary. (That's an inaccurate talking point used by LRT Valley proponents).

Any chance that this thread could be about the Langley SkyTrain, and chat about the North Shore goes to the appropriate thread?

[LeftCoaster]

Skytrain just means Vancouver's eixsting rail transit system. It doesn't mean bombardier proprietary tech when used in that context at all.

[Migrant_Coconut]

They do call it "RRT" in the studies. SkyTrain is the public term.

Might be a holdover from the Millennium Line in the 90s when they locked in the Edmonds-Cariboo alignment and buried the Columbia-Brunette alternative; the result was that when the NDP got in, they were able to scream "favouritism" and "corruption" and get the alternative built instead... so now 20-30 years later, they have to pretend the crappier alternatives are in the running lest the process be considered "rigged."

[xd_1771]

The whole attempt to tie the term 'SkyTrain' to the propulsion technologies (rather than its proper definition of being, essentially, the name of our system) was a sort of informal campaign by various groups/individuals who essentially wanted us to stop building SkyTrain and look at conventional LRT systems.

I don't know who said it first, but the whole idea that we could only take in one manufacturer had essentially been widely accepted/unopposed by anyone for decades (see: 2006, 2008, 2011, 2016). Nobody could figure out the actual truth (not even the old UBC SkyTrain group), so "SkyTrain is a proprietary technology" became widely accepted as fact.

I took some role to dispel the myth by coming in with SkyTrain for Surrey and using that platform to make people aware of the existence of non-Bombardier systems. (I had, of course, just come out of spending a year in Japan and discovering LIM rails in the subways in Fukuoka, Osaka, and the just-opened system in Sendai).

But even with me doing that, it still took until 2019 for TransLink and Bombardier to finally make a public statement about it and clearly say to the public, "no, SkyTrain is not propietary, there are no patents held by SNC-Lavalin, there is no exclusivity to Bombardier for building our trains", and until the following year for us to see that there were indeed multiple bidders for that big SkyTrain car contract.

Things are a lot better in 2024 but in essence we are still recovering from having our long term plans affected by decades and decades of unhampered libellous misinformation.

[ilikeredheads]

Skytrain is just a name.

One of Bangkok's transit systems is called "BTS skytrain". It doesn't use LIM powered cars, nor use rolling stock made by Bombardier.

[MIPS]

SkyTrain is a name that was exclusively given to our system for marketing purposes. I can bet you $100 the name was designed to sound catchy for the Expo because it looks amazing in print.

It's a great name to locally call transit under LIM technology which for quite a while was just called the "Greater Vancouver Rapid Transit System"...which doesn't sound as awesome.

[aberdeen5698]

Originally Posted by ilikeredheads

Skytrain is just a name.

"Skytrain" is Vancouverspeak for "Grade Separated Transit".

[trofirhen]

Related to grade separation is that, appararently the ling stretch of eastern Sjytrain along the Fraser Highway will be elevated- on the concrete guideways used now.
OK, yes, I know, too $$ exoensive, etc, but putting it - even in a covered trench, would make it so much less visually scarring. Sorry if I sound hyper-sensitive to this (hey, maybe I am)

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by MIPS

SkyTrain is a name that was exclusively given to our system for marketing purposes. I can bet you $100 the name was designed to sound catchy for the Expo because it looks amazing in print.

It's a great name to locally call transit under LIM technology which for quite a while was just called the "Greater Vancouver Rapid Transit System"...which doesn't sound as awesome.

That was true before the Canada Line was built, but that's also part of the SkyTrain system, and doesn't use LIM propulsion.

[aberdeen5698]

Originally Posted by trofirhen

Related to grade separation is that, appararently the ling stretch of eastern Sjytrain along the Fraser Highway will be elevated- on the concrete guideways used now.
OK, yes, I know, too $$ exoensive, etc, but putting it - even in a covered trench, would make it so much less visually scarring. Sorry if I sound hyper-sensitive to this (hey, maybe I am)

IMHO, the number of person-hours of riders who benefit from the open views of the elevated line exceeds the number of person-hours of non-riders griping about how it blocks the view.

[VancouverOfTheFuture]

Originally Posted by aberdeen5698

IMHO, the number of person-hours of riders who benefit from the open views of the elevated line exceeds the number of person-hours of non-riders griping about how it blocks the view.

disagree if you live close to the line on the street. it can actually be pretty loud. i was recently in someones backyard who backs on the millennium-line, and man that thing is loud when it goes by... i wouldnt be able to back onto it. too loud for me.

[chowhou]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

disagree if you live close to the line on the street. it can actually be pretty loud. i was recently in someones backyard who backs on the millennium-line, and man that thing is loud when it goes by... i wouldnt be able to back onto it. too loud for me.

So will more people live close to the line on the street, or will more people ride the line daily? I don't think we need to guess.

[officedweller]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

disagree if you live close to the line on the street. it can actually be pretty loud. i was recently in someones backyard who backs on the millennium-line, and man that thing is loud when it goes by... i wouldnt be able to back onto it. too loud for me.

I rode the Expo Line from Surrey a few weeks ago in a MKIII and was surprised at how noisy it was, especially for a newer train.

[aberdeen5698]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

disagree if you live close to the line on the street. it can actually be pretty loud. i was recently in someones backyard who backs on the millennium-line, and man that thing is loud when it goes by... i wouldnt be able to back onto it. too loud for me.

I'm not trying to claim that it's friendly to the neighbors. I'm trying to point out that an elevated system is a lot more pleasant for the riders, and that needs to be considered too. Anything that helps to attract ridership by making the transit experience nicer is a good thing for transit, IMHO.

I was disappointed that the Canada Line didn't run elevated along the centre median between Marine Drive and King Edward Avenue. What a great view that showcases Vancouver for visitors arriving from the airport. Missed opportunity, I think.

[MIPS]

Originally Posted by Changing City

That was true before the Canada Line was built, but that's also part of the SkyTrain system, and doesn't use LIM propulsion.

I refuse to call the Canada Line more than a subway. The technology is far more conventional and the planning and design is arguably worse than the SkyTrain. They slapped the SkyTrain name on it and 15 years later we *still* just call it "the Canada Line".

It's like how TTC for decades separated the naming of the Scarborough RT (or "The RT") from the rest of the streetcar and subway fleet.

[Changing City]

Originally Posted by MIPS

I refuse to call the Canada Line more than a subway. The technology is far more conventional and the planning and design is arguably worse than the SkyTrain. They slapped the SkyTrain name on it and 15 years later we *still* just call it "the Canada Line".

It's like how TTC for decades separated the naming of the Scarborough RT (or "The RT") from the rest of the streetcar and subway fleet.

We also call the other lines the Expo Line and the Millennium Line. I suspect most people using the system have no idea what propulsion system the train has, and don't really care.

The important thing is that SkyTrain is the driverless, grade separated, frequent and generally reliable transit network, with three different lines and a variety of styles and ages of train carriages.

[Migrant_Coconut]

IMO it's because the Canada Line is effectively isolated from the rest of the network (if you're not headed downtown); once the Broadway extension opens, opinion might change.