Green Line LRT | ?m | ?s | Calgary Transit

[Surrealplaces]

Hi Group,

I have to admit I like to Know where all these Job (?) figures come from. The Figures seem to B very high really.

Tnx,
Operater.

You mean the 49,000 jobs? It seems high, but iirc the labour force numbers have been increasing the whole time of this downturn, one of the issues is that the eligible workforce has also been increasing due to a young population turning 15 each year and intl immigration, so it's kept the unemployment rate static. I think @Oddball has those numbers somewhere.

 

[darwink]

Alberta's employment picture.

Unemployment is high, near 10 year highs:

But the labour force is near the all time high too:

Which means that although unemployment is near its all time high:

That employment is also near its all time high:

 

[Operater]

Hi Group,

I Can't Argue Figures as I Honestly Don't know a Lot about Them All. Sorry About that .Guess I Only go with what I read. Hope its OK/

Tnx,
Operater,

 

[kora]

The 7 Avenue SW station will be the busiest in the city, being the intersection of all 3 LRT lines.

To accommodate the crush of people, they are looking at narrowing the road width of 2 Street SW and creating a large pedestrian plaza. I don't know the details or the scale of this project but I am hearing the road could be reduced to 3 total lanes for some stretch.

 

[Oddball]

Hmmm interesting. 2nd isn't exactly a hot thoroughfare for drivers so I could probably get behind that. I explicitly voted for the tunneled options to prevent from losing roads like 2nd for driving, but reducing the number of lanes would hardly be killer. The construction and parked cars have had it nearly constantly at 3 lanes or less anyway. I'm assuming they'd primarily be using that god awful little concrete hell hole on the NW corner of 2nd Street and 7th Ave SW. I'd be all-aboard with that plan.

 

[kora]

I'm assuming they'd primarily be using that god awful little concrete hell hole on the NW corner of 2nd Street and 7th Ave SW

That would make sense. I know there was a building proposed over that park a while ago, but that's probably a dead proposal.

 

[Oddball]

Yeah that's the intended site for the drastically scaled back First Canadian Centre, Tower II, but I have to agree with you that there doesn't seem to be much likelihood of that project ever going forward.

 

[MichaelS]

I think the problem with that park is it contains the parkade for FCCI. They built the parkade for both of the original towers, but capped it when it got to grade and didn't complete the original, 64 storey tower.

 

[Oddball]

I think the problem with that park is it contains the parkade for FCCI. They built the parkade for both of the original towers, but capped it when it got to grade and didn't complete the original, 64 storey tower.

Oh I see. That makes sense though. I really wonder how they're going to do it then. All the other corners are occupied by current structures. Maybe they're talking about eating up a lane of traffic so they can put access there.

NW Corner of 2nd Street & 7th Avenue NW As is:

NW Corner of 2nd Street & 7th Avenue with 1 lane reduced:

You could substitute any of the other street corners as well. I wonder if the plan would be to add an access point directly from the Core. It's probably wouldn't be possible now that that street corner's space has been given over to Simons.

 

[UrbanWarrior]

Here are the primary renders for the core areas stations excluding Inglewood Station as there is currently no updated render.


16 Avenue North Station

2 Avenue SW Station

7 Avenue SW Station

Centre Street South Station

4 Street SE Station

Source: http://www.calgary.ca/Transportation/TI/Pages/Transit-projects/Green-line/home.aspx

 

[darwink]

a middle of the street station head would mean you wouldn't need a concourse level potentially.

I'd just get a concession from the scotia bank tower owners instead though TBH

 

[Oddball]

From @UrbanWarrior's post in the General Urban Development Discussion thread:

Quite frankly, WTF? Why did we bother burying it again?

EDIT: I took a look at the Vision document on the Green Line site. It isn't as bad as it first appears. Rather than being cut down to a single lane, it's actually two. The person doing this render was awfully generous with the width of the curb on the East side of the entrance. There is a lane separating it from the existing park and sidewalk.

As I expanded on here. I'm fine with it being cut down to two lanes, I just think it's gonna be really unwieldy with the proposed alignment. I'm assuming that there are engineering constraints involving First Canadian Centre's undeground parking garage that are forcing them to do it this way. It would be more sensible if it were right against the existing East Sidewalk and that the two lanes of traffic were only to it's West, but that may not be possible.

 

[UrbanWarrior]

I'd imagine so. But I'm hoping there will be a concourse at least at 7th Street, as this will become the central nexus of the C-train System for decades to come, especially once the Red Line Subway comes online.

 

[Oddball]

I think I can mostly get behind what they've got going on with the 16th Avenue N station save for the fact that the render appears to eliminate the right-hand turnoff for North-bound traffic from Centre St. on to 16th Ave. I don't drive that stretch often enough to know if that's going to lead to nasty backups. I could definitely see it being touchy at rush hour though.

Here's another view of the station from the vision document:

http://www.calgary.ca/Transportation/TI/GreenLineDocuments/GL-Long-Term-Vision-FINAL-Reduced_Part6.pdf, page 82.

Does anyone know if that mid-rise building with the Save-On has any basis in reality? I just thought it was odd that they specifically put a Save-On and not a more generic place filler.

Also, no 9th Ave N. Station in the vision document. 100% dead then eh? Too bad. I would have liked what it could have done for the area, but it was probably too expensive.


There isn't much more available in the vision document for the 2nd Ave. SW station sadly. I feel like, being the station for Eau Claire, it'll be pretty critical. Expect a revamped plaza by Livingston Place and the Chinese Cultural Centre though.

http://www.calgary.ca/Transportation/TI/GreenLineDocuments/GL-Long-Term-Vision-FINAL-Reduced_Part7.pdf, page 92

I'd vastly prefer to see this renamed Eau Claire Station as well. I think there are already too many stations with street/avenue number names. This is a well known community already, best to make use of the name of the are IMO.


I have to say, I'm totally perplexed by the 7th Avenue Station Entrance. Maybe the First Canadian Centre parking lot juts out more that I know, but if that's the plan why did we even bother with burying it? The vision document offers little more in the way of elucidation, but it does appear to show more clearly that the first render that there are meant two lanes of traffic going through rather than just one.

same link as 2nd ave, page 94.

I can't say I see the point of putting one on either side though. Doesn't that just complicate the pedestrian issue? I guess it must be because that entrance goes directly down to the middle of track. Likely confirming the lack of a concourse level. At least from that entrance. First Canadian Centre's parking garage likely comes into play. Cutting it down to two lanes is palatable to me, but I just feel like it would be better if they were both on the East side of the entrance as opposed to be bifurcated by it. Then maybe it could be better integrated with the "park" on the NW corner and the sidewalks could be widened South of the entrance. It would also mean that most people exiting the train would only have to make a single street crossing to get to either the Core or the 3rd Street station.

4th Street SE looks like a pretty normal Calgary C-Train station revamped for the low floor format. Seems all good to me.

same link as 2nd ave, page 98.

This image from the vision document confirms that it will surface before Olympic Way and traverse above it. I think most of us were probably expecting that, but it's nice to see what the plan looks like in more detail.

Also, am I the only one who wants to see this station renamed Olympic Way-Stampede or just Olympic Way Station?

 

[CBBarnett]

a middle of the street station head would mean you wouldn't need a concourse level potentially.

I'd just get a concession from the scotia bank tower owners instead though TBH

This would work really well and is very common in many European cities. 2nd Street at 7th is likely on the short-list of the most overly wide roads in the city with no future ever resulting in additional car capacity being required. It begins as a two-lane one way road (plus parking) only 2 blocks to the south, with the addition of only one night-time only travel lane from Stephen Ave. The station head area has a width of 4 lanes.

So the additional capacity available at this location of 2nd Street cannot ever be utilized fully unless travel patterns changed significantly (e.g. 2nd Street has a new connection across the river or into the Beltline is some unlikely theoretical future). Smart to re-purpose the space for the more critical station of the whole network for the next 50 years and likely easier than right next to the skyscrapers.