Ottawa Rapid Transit Network developments

[Franky]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

One has to wonder what the impacts of the litigation settlement will be on the city budget. What more will this city have to give up as a result? We have already spent $244,000 so far this year, defending the LRT contract cancellation, coincidentally, enough to have paid for a new swan house, that our mayor claims we cannot afford. This is but a drop in the bucket compared with the litigation costs that we will have to pay as the court case date approaches, and then there will be the settlement itself.

Is there a non-confidence motion equivalent for mayors? We can't afford ($$$) to keep him at the helm, he must go.

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

What are you talking about? Half speed trains? You are using existing track, with speed limits and level crossings in an urban area. Let's be realistic about how fast trains will be allowed to operate. Why would you not include waiting time? It is part of a passenger's trip. Why would you not include the trip back to downtown? It is the most important destination.

I'm talking about the original E-W line that pushed for that section of rail to go back full speed. This was part of the rationale. To be realistic would be to continue using the changes that were to be put in place.

Because you don't go to a stop 10 minutes in advances. They took the average between two trains. Because they haven't made the case for destinations, only for a trival downtown station. People working at the hospitals and the area, and if a bigger network would have been in place, it would have saved even more time.

It was not that the route would not have been popular, it was there was no room to grow after a certain point, and conversion of the corridor was mandatory, oh my, just like the Mayor's Task report suggested. This was the point for the original O-Train link, except in this case, there's no need to tear up the tracks and start over again.

[Franky]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

I'm talking about the original E-W line that pushed for that section of rail to go back full speed. This was part of the rationale. To be realistic would be to continue using the changes that were to be put in place.

Because you don't go to a stop 10 minutes in advances. They took the average between two trains. Because they haven't made the case for destinations, only for a trival downtown station. People working at the hospitals and the area, and if a bigger network would have been in place, it would have saved even more time.

It was not that the route would not have been popular, it was there was no room to grow after a certain point, and conversion of the corridor was mandatory, oh my, just like the Mayor's Task report suggested. This was the point for the original O-Train link, except in this case, there's no need to tear up the tracks and start over again.

What if the via rail tracks were extended up the transitway on a shared section bus/light-rail? Trip from the south of Ottawa would go all the way downtown, maybe even to link up to the O-train or to Tunney's pasture.

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by Franky

What if the via rail tracks were extended up the transitway on a shared section bus/light-rail? Trip from the south of Ottawa would go all the way downtown, maybe even to link up to the O-train or to Tunney's pasture.

I suggested building an underground station under Bronson, and doubling the tracks there up to confederation, where lines woud be split to Kanata, Barrhaven, Riverside South and South-East. There are talks for that by the STO. Trains are much faster than buses, so there's no point of sharing tracks with buses. It also prevents any future automation.

That way, LRT would be better balanced too, using the South-East Transitway instead of the O-Train corridor.

Staff tells us that that corridor is not "appropriate", and not dense enough, but it's the exact same one they came with the E-W LRT line, at 10x the price!

[Franky]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

I suggested building an underground station under Bronson, and doubling the tracks there up to confederation, where lines woud be split to Kanata, Barrhaven, Riverside South and South-East. There are talks for that by the STO. Trains are much faster than buses, so there's no point of sharing tracks with buses. It also prevents any future automation.

Faster than 100 km/h? Buses have sidings all along the transitway, trains would have fewer stops. I can't imagine the trains would be that frequent, we were talking about one every 10 minutes. If you build a surface track, you can still move people around while the tunnel is being built. Sharing with buses until a complete build-out looks like a good solution. I the LRV are ever allowed to be automated, then a decision can be made to take buses off the ROW. Seems simple enough.

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

That way, LRT would be better balanced too, using the South-East Transitway instead of the O-Train corridor.

Staff tells us that that corridor is not "appropriate", and not dense enough, but it's the exact same one they came with the E-W LRT line, at 10x the price!

I think we need to start smaller, like surface rail (higher capacity), then if population/taxes grow enough to support it, build a DT tunnel and convert to rapid transit. These big expensive plans are just pie in the sky.

[Deez]

Originally Posted by Randy Gordon

This plan has changed so many times that it is little wonder there is mass confusion on any future direction. First, there was a north-south plan that was rejected, then a east-south plan that was cast aside and now an east-west plan is proposed.

So when staff respond to public and political input by altering a plan, it's "mass confusion"...but when they stick to their guns, they're too inflexible? Give me a break.

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by Franky

I think we need to start smaller, like surface rail (higher capacity), then if population/taxes grow enough to support it, build a DT tunnel and convert to rapid transit. These big expensive plans are just pie in the sky.

I don't see anyone in Toronto complaining about a 55G$ transit plan. I just think that people in Ottawa are cheap losers. But then again, I could go on and on about public servant mentality.

How is so that highway expensions could go on so smoothly? They cost big bucks too... You don't hear anyone that they can't afford them. Just look at the people in Rockland.

[Franky]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

I don't see anyone in Toronto complaining about a 55G$ transit plan. I just think that people in Ottawa are cheap losers. But then again, I could go on and on about public servant mentality.

How is so that highway expensions could go on so smoothly? They cost big bucks too... You don't hear anyone that they can't afford them. Just look at the people in Rockland.

Taxes are high enough without multi-bilion dollar boondoggles. Again, the Alta Vista Corridor, Hospital Link and Hospital transit Link are road project we can do without. They are VERY expensive and not very useful.

That aside, a rail/bus transitway would have many advantages over a rail-only system. We can keep some of our direct to/from neighbourhood routes. We could service many station in between rail stations with collector buses. We could have express buses. We could still use the transitway as emergency vehicle routes. We could use regular service vehicles.

[waterloowarrior]

Build light rail down Carling: expert
Engineer backs Doucet in opposition to parkway route

Patrick Dare
Ottawa Citizen

Friday, November 14, 2008

OTTAWA - A veteran transportation consultant says the City of Ottawa should be building a commuter rail line down Carling Avenue rather than tearing up parts of the Transitway for a rail system.

Morrison Renfrew, an engineer who worked on the city's former north-south commuter rail project, says the city should build a twin-track light rail line along the centre median of Carling Avenue as a way to get commuters from the west into downtown and back. The city's proposed public transit plan calls for the replacement of buses along the Ottawa River Parkway with commuter rail, a proposal that is drawing community opposition and some concern from the National Capital Commission.

Mr. Renfrew worked with the city for two years when the north-south commuter rail line was being developed, a project that was cancelled late in 2006. He has been hired by Urbandale, the major developer in Riverside South, to analyse the city's transit options.

Lyon Sachs, president of Urbandale, says Riverside South was supposed to be a transit-oriented community, served by trains almost from the very beginning, but he says it will just turn out like all the other car-focused suburban communities if the city follows its current plan to run rail east-west first.

Mr. Renfrew says the O-Train running north and south on the former CP line should be replaced by a proper LRT service, running the same trains that would run along Carling.

Mr. Sachs is hoping Mr. Renfrew's ideas will help the city change its mind and choose to run rail to the south in the near future, and indeed Mr. Renfrew is to take part on Monday in a forum advancing an alternative transit plan suggested by Councillor Clive Doucet. Mr. Doucet vigorously opposes the city's current transit plan and he also says Carling is a much better east-west route than the river parkway.

Mr. Renfrew says that Ottawa should let the buses continue to roll as it builds a Carling rail corridor, which he said would eventually spur much new development. He said Carling already has hospitals, office towers, residential towers and shopping, but it could have much more if it were linked to a sleek rail service that runs every five minutes.

He is proposing construction of seven stations along the Carling corridor and running LRT vehicles at up to 60 km/h, but with an average speed of 38 to 40 km/h. He said there are some problems with traversing intersections, but they can be solved with transit-priority traffic signals and in some instances by having the train run below the grade of the road.

Mr. Renfrew believes the Carling project, which would link into the north-south rail line, can be built for $460 million and that it would take riders from Lincoln Fields to downtown in about 17 minutes.

The city has suggested that Carling could be supplied with a secondary rail service, perhaps a streetcar service with up to 22 stops. But Mr. Renfrew says the city should be using the natural east-west corridor as a transit hub that would drive development.

Mr. Renfrew says the city is correct in wanting to build rail in a tunnel downtown to deal with congestion, but he is perplexed that the city's new transportation master plan does not include a ring road for Ottawa and doesn't link Ottawa with Gatineau

© Ottawa Citizen 2008

[waterloowarrior]

Money for transit must be confirmed

Randall Denley
The Ottawa Citizen

Saturday, November 15, 2008

Ottawa's new transit plan is running into serious affordability problems even before it is approved. Sources familiar with the funding situation say the most Ottawa will get from the federal and provincial governments is $400 million each. If the city puts in a similar amount, it will be $500 million short of what's required for the transit expansion's first phase.

That would leave city councillors in a tricky position. The rail line from Tunney's Pasture to Blair through a downtown tunnel will cost $1.3 billion and making the rail part shorter wouldn't be sensible. The $1.7-billion first phase of the transit plan also calls for $400 million in bus transitway expansion. The bus stuff will be ready to build faster than the rail, so the city intends to start with that. But what if councillors commit themselves to $400 million in bus spending and find they don't have enough money to do the rail? What councillors and the public need is a clear indication from the federal and provincial governments as to how much money they have available for transit in Ottawa over the 10 years it will take to finish the first phase of the expansion.

Whether the project actually qualifies for the money is a separate decision to come later. To put it in simple terms, Ottawa's first question is: "How much money have you got?" The followup is: "Will you spend it on this?" Councillors have been working closely with the federal government and there seems to be solid assurance there for a $400-million commitment between now and 2014 when the current federal infrastructure project runs out. The feds had already promised $200 million for the former project and $35 million for the Strandherd-Armstrong bridge, part of the first phase of the new transit plan. Much of the city's share of the transit plan will be paid for with federal gas-tax money.

Things are a lot less clear at the provincial level. Ottawa West-Nepean MPP Jim Watson says the provincial government won't be in a big rush to give Ottawa an answer, considering the false starts the city has had on this project. He wants to see all the details before making a real commitment.

Watson says he hasn't been briefed in a couple of months. Whose fault is that? This is the biggest municipal-provincial issue in Ottawa and Watson is supposed to be our point man at Queen's Park.

There is also Premier Dalton McGuinty, of course. Just over a year ago, he was urging Ottawa to think big on rail and produce a plan that would serve the city far into the future. Staff have now done that and councillors will approve it. The premier should tell us what help his government can give sooner rather than later. McGuinty has also expressed reservations about a tunnel in the past, and the tunnel in this plan is the key to its success. What's he think now? Let's just say the province has a lot of ground to make up on the Ottawa transit file. That's particularly true when one compares it to the approach McGuinty has taken in Toronto and its suburbs. Before the last provincial election, McGuinty popped up in Mississauga and delighted people in the Greater Toronto Area with a promise of $17.5 billion for a series of transit projects to be completed by 2020.

As it turned out, $6 billion of that was federal money that McGuinty had no authority to announce, but a couple of points stand out. The province, recognizing that the project was too big for municipalities to handle, was promising to pay for two-thirds of what would be built. It was also going to finance the work over 50 years, with the big costs to the provincial treasury not kicking in until more than a decade after McGuinty made his promise.

Compare that to the $200-million promise in his native Ottawa and the tut-tutting from Watson about how the city has handled earlier rail plans, and it doesn't look too impressive.

The uncertainty over the provincial contribution and the likelihood that there won't be enough government money for the $1.7-billion first phase of the city's plan ought to make councillors proceed cautiously. The city does have some capacity to contribute beyond matching the $400-million amounts from the other two governments, but it would be a mistake to load more than one-third of the cost on property-tax payers. The city also needs to retain some spending ability for the second and third phases of the project.

That leaves private-sector money, either from retail development in the rail tunnel or letting the private sector take revenue from the rail system in exchange for capital investment. Those are ideas worth pursuing, but they're iffy.

Councillors are likely to find themselves in the unfortunate position of approving a plan that is less than the public wants, but more than the city can afford. Rail is the critical part of that plan. If it's all that's affordable, the other governments need to speak up, now.

Contact Randall Denley at 613-596-3756 or by e-mail, [email protected]

© The Ottawa Citizen 2008

[Richard Eade]

Then there are the things which money MUST be spent on. For example, the parcel of land at Baseline Station that the City gave to Algonquin sits on top of the current Transitway Station. Algonquin's financing arrangement with the Province is such that the project must be completed by Sept., 2011. Thus, they need to start work by fall 2009.

Well, in order to turn the land over, Ottawa must first move the Baseline Station - by summer 2009. So the City needs to RUSH the expenditure of $185M so Algonquin can build a $69M building on land we gave them.

The new Baseline Station will be one of the first, if not THE first, priorities of the TMP.

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by Franky

Taxes are high enough without multi-bilion dollar boondoggles. Again, the Alta Vista Corridor, Hospital Link and Hospital transit Link are road project we can do without. They are VERY expensive and not very useful.

That aside, a rail/bus transitway would have many advantages over a rail-only system. We can keep some of our direct to/from neighbourhood routes. We could service many station in between rail stations with collector buses. We could have express buses. We could still use the transitway as emergency vehicle routes. We could use regular service vehicles.

Do you really think that most european cities build their transit system with taxes? No, tolls. It's time to get serious with them.

[Luker]

wow we really F'd this one up.


:/

[Franky]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

Do you really think that most european cities build their transit system with taxes? No, tolls. It's time to get serious with them.

A toll is a tax. European cities don't face the same problems North American cities face.

We missed the boat on climate change if that's your concern. Taxing GHG was the way to get tax money for sustainable alternatives. We voted in Harper instead, you know, the global warming denying, tar sands advocating, near sited, self serving, fear of change inducing conservative.

[Aylmer]

You know, for once I agree with you Franky!

[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by Franky

A toll is a tax. European cities don't face the same problems North American cities face.

We missed the boat on climate change if that's your concern. Taxing GHG was the way to get tax money for sustainable alternatives. We voted in Harper instead, you know, the global warming denying, tar sands advocating, near sited, self serving, fear of change inducing conservative.

It's not only taxing for GHG, it's also for subsidising people and keeping sprawl from happeing. You want to live 50km from your work? Fine, that's your choice, pay for it. Plus it's not only transit infrastructures that lack, but road infrastructures are crumbling down.

Canada's quality of life has come down horribly in the last decade, so if we don't want to be worst than a 3rd world country, we actually need to charge what it costs to do. But that seems to be a concept unknown to politician. Just look at the city of Ottawa, they want to freeze salaries. It's not staff fault's if they decreased taxes by 10% in 2001.

I'm all for giving people's choice, but come on, there is a cost associated to that choice. Whatever the choice is, there's an environmental costs that needs to be paid somehow. You want to develop on farm land? Fine, pay 5x the amount than right now.

[Franky]

I came across this article some of you may have already seen:

Rapid Streetcar:
Rescaling Design and Cost for More Affordable Light Rail Transit
http://www.lightrailnow.org/features/f_lrt_2007-02a.htm

I think this "rapid streetcar" is what the Carling route would become. In a way, creating a rapid streetcar network to complement our BRT might make more sense than replacing BRT with LRT.

[Jamaican-Phoenix]

Originally Posted by d_jeffrey

It's not only taxing for GHG, it's also for subsidising people and keeping sprawl from happeing. You want to live 50km from your work? Fine, that's your choice, pay for it. Plus it's not only transit infrastructures that lack, but road infrastructures are crumbling down.

Canada's quality of life has come down horribly in the last decade, so if we don't want to be worst than a 3rd world country, we actually need to charge what it costs to do. But that seems to be a concept unknown to politician. Just look at the city of Ottawa, they want to freeze salaries. It's not staff fault's if they decreased taxes by 10% in 2001.

I'm all for giving people's choice, but come on, there is a cost associated to that choice. Whatever the choice is, there's an environmental costs that needs to be paid somehow. You want to develop on farm land? Fine, pay 5x the amount than right now.

[waterloowarrior]

Duo to offer faster transit plan
Doucet, Leadman ready to unveil their own option

Ian Shelton
Ottawa Citizen

Sunday, November 16, 2008

OTTAWA - Two Ottawa city councillors are set to unveil their own version of a transportation master plan Monday.

Capital Councillor Clive Doucet and Kitchissippi Councillor Christine Leadman will be at the Gladstone Theatre Monday morning to promote a faster expansion of light rail than that offered in the master plan city staff presented to council last week.

They are expected to argue that the plan does not address the economic issues posed by rising oil prices and that a better plan would focus more heavily on light-rail transit.

The centrepiece of the staff plan is a downtown commuter rail tunnel that planners hope will ease the congestion caused by buses at rush hour. The three-phase plan would also expand the transitway system for buses and gradually develop light-rail lines south to Riverside South, east to Blair Station, and west to the Baseline Station.

The plan has come under fire for its high cost and slow pace.

The first phase alone is expected to cost $1.7 billion and funding will have to come from all three levels of government, although Mayor Larry O'Brien has gone as far as suggesting a public-private partnership to finance the project.

Meanwhile, the planned light-rail transit extensions are expected to take decades to complete, leaving commuters to rely on buses in the interim.

Mr. Doucet recently took the debate to cyberspace with an online "rant" produced last week. In the video, which can be viewed on the councillor's website, Mr. Doucet charges that the new plan does little to relieve the glut of buses that crowd Ottawa's downtown each day.

"We live in the bus sewer capital of North America," Mr. Doucet said in the video. "This new transit plan, news flash: it's a bus plan. It will sink $650 million into asphalt for buses in the next 10 years."

Despite such criticisms, the plan has gained crucial support at the federal level. John Baird, the MP for Ottawa West-Nepean, is the federal minister in charge of deciding whether or not to finance the plan. He has so far come out in support of what he calls "an exciting plan."

Ottawa's years-long dance with light-rail transit almost got as far as construction in 2006. That year, a newly elected Mr. O'Brien and several new councillors cancelled the planned north-south rail line.

© Ottawa Citizen 2008

[lrt's friend]

It was just announced on CFRA that 11 city councillors and 150 citizens attended Clive Doucet's and Christine Leadman's news conference on light rail. This is an amazing turn out for a daytime event, when most people are at work. I look forward to hearing the details.