Transit Fantasies

[waves]

I love fantasy maps and picking them apart and everything. So Thanks! However, some things don't quite make sense in this map:

1. Green Line: Going from Victoria to Kingsway to Patterson to Moscrop would be a big giant mess for anything other than a bored tunnel. Also it doesn't really make sense to travel south to Patterson and then go back north towards BCIT. Yeah it could work but it's not a very cost effective or useful design.
2. Pink Line: Kootenay, Burnaby Heights and Willingdon Stations are too close together. Eliminate Burnaby Heights.
3. Pink Line: For SFU a super fast elevator could work, but it's not very elegant. If you put the line at an 8% grade starting at Dalla-Tina Ave you could get a station depth of 10m at the current bus loop or an 18 sec escalator ride. 8% is really pushing the grade to the max though. With all that said, putting a second station at Univercity is not practical since you have to immediately begin descending if you want to connect back to the evergreen line at the same max grade.
4. Pink Line: From Waterfront to Burrard, you seem to want to send it down Thurlow. If thats the case it doesn't make sense to use the existing Burrard Station which already struggles to meet passenger demands. You would have to build a new station, in which case, Robson Street makes more sense as a station location. Also Bored Tunnel is pretty much the only option from Thurlow and Beach to Arbutus and 8th.
5. Pink Line: Marine-Knight is not a very useful termination point. If you are going to bother going out that way, you may as well connect to either Metrotown or 22nd Street Station. Also, I question the usefulness of such a spur that has a river beside it and runs through an area that is not very dense and doesn't really go anywhere useful other than to connect to the Canada Line.
6. Pink Line: The road is East Blvd and West Blvd and not Arbutus once you go past 37th Ave (your stations need re-naming).
7. Red Line: It's hardly worth extending the Canada Line just for one station, let alone Minoru, which doesn't really need a station (nor does Steveston). The only logical way the Canada Line becomes a priority, or is even worth it to extend, is if it crosses the Fraser.
8. Red Line: The Canada Line Waterfront Station butts up against the Expo Line Waterfront Station so you can't really extend the Canada Line without rebuilding everything between Yaletown and Waterfront so although a floating tunnel is a cool idea that I too have pondered, it's a non-starter.
9. Red Line: From Lonsdale Quay to 13th is way too steep for even a LIM Skytrain let alone the Rotem Cars so this route is also a non-starter even though it is pretty geometrically
10. Blue Line: The first narrows is the shallowest and shortest route across Burrard Inlet so it makes sense to take advantage of this a go straight to Park Royal rather than to Cap Road first. This would also give you the advantage of connecting it through to the Green Line rather than making it a terminus station.
11. Yellow Line: "Wesbrook" not "Westbrook". Also not sure if you mean Wesbrook Village or not. Going south-west-ish from 10th to 16th to have a station for Wesbrook Village before turning on to East Mall and terminating at University Blvd would make sense. Going straight from 10th along University Blvd and terminating immediatley at the new bus loop there probably makes more sense though.

Suggestions in general:

• Connecting the North Shore: For every Seabus trip that goes one way, Translink can run 6 buses round trip between the North Shore and Downtown. Any Skytrain investment would need to reduce the Seabus frequency down to tourist attraction levels (Say, one Seabus every 40 min). With this in mind, the most cost effective and connective route that one could build to the North Shore would be from Lonsdale Quay to Commercial Broadway Station. From there you would have direct access to Metrotown, Surrey, Coquitlam, UBC and Downtown. Ideally you would have a line down Hastings first (your pink line) so that the transfer to Downtown could be made sooner. The next line worthy of being built would be the expo line extension to Park Royal.
• Arbutus Line: I think that a more worthy route for the Arbutus Line is to travel to Templeton Station on Sea Island. You could terminate there or continue by crossing the middle arm of the Fraser to Cambie Street with a station beside Aberdeen Station then you have two options: 1) continue across Richmond, across the North Arm of the Fraser on to Bryne Avenue and Southridge Drive and terminating at 22nd Street Station, or, 2) continue Richmond but cross the Fraser to intersect River District then go into a Bored tunnel and continue in a straight line to Metrotown, then along Willingdon to BCIT and Brentwood.
• 41st Ave Skytrain: I don't really think this should be a priority for a Skytrain Line, I think other extensions are more important, ie Canada Line to Tsawwassen Ferry Terminal, SNG BRT (hopefully) extension from Newton to White Rock, Lonsdale Quay to Commercial Broadway.

I look forward to you next map if you make another one.

Shamless plug for my own Fantasy Map: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1FhwW_oU9MFAOHbpk-cWK6R1tBFo&usp=sharing
Past Relevant Posts: One, Two, Three, Four