Segment 3 of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skyline_(Honolulu) is one I can think of.
Green Line LRT | ?m | ?s | Calgary Transit
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thecivilengineer
New Member
I’m curious why building metro or LRT systems here is so costly. For instance, a short segment costing $6 billion seems excessive. In Sydney, Australia, they’re constructing 66 km of line for 11 billion CAD, which is much cheaper. It seems like similar projects around the world don’t have such high costs. What’s driving the price up here?
Silence&Motion
Senior Member
I think the "Ford" that @badc0ffee was referring to was Mayor Rob Ford, who tanked the "Transit City" LRT plan developed under Mayor David Miller, which had federal and provincial support. John Tory followed Rob Ford's "subways, subways, subways" campaign message. The province (under the Liberals at the time) basically took their cue from the City of Toronto, but refused to provide any additional money. More reason why the provincial government is better placed to take the lead on transit.
Edit: the problem with Rob Ford scrapping the LRT for a subway in Scarborough was not because one technology is inherently better than the other. It was because Ford blatantly lied. He had no actual plan to build a subway and things ground to a halt during his mayoralty. It was only after he left office that things started to get back on track. But now, with the closure of Line 3, Scarborough will go a decade with no mass transit at all, and they will ultimately only get three new stations to replace the five that were shut down with Line 3.
You misunderstand my point. What I'm saying is that the PCs (and Liberals, and NDP) all compete with each other to get the votes of suburban Torontonians. That has made regional transportation planning a major area of competition at the provincial level. That's a good thing! I'm glad Ford is investing in mass transit! It wasn't always this way. In the 80s, 90s, and 2000s, transit was seen as an "urban voter" issue that none of the parties cared that much about, and it fell almost completely to the municipal government to take the lead.
The problem in Alberta is that we're still in a situation where transit planning is still regarded as an "urban voter" issue. I don't think people in Airdrie care as much about a new LRT line in Calgary as people Richmond Hill care about a new subway line in Toronto (though they should because it will ultimately affect them!). The ABNDP can probably hope to flip a couple more seats in Calgary over issues of transit, but they're going to need 11 more seats to win power.
TL;DR: the UCP can afford to dismiss transit as a "fringe" urban issue. The ONPC (and every other ON provincial party) needs to campaign on transit to hold/win power.
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CalgaryTiger
Senior Member
Downtown section won't be done for a bit... but good to know we're not alone in our misery.
Segment 3: City Center
[edit]The third phase of the route, the 3.3 mi (5.3 km) City Center section terminating at Kaʻākaukukui station, may be completed under a public-private partnership (PPP). It is estimated the City Center section will cost $1.6 billion to complete.[160] Under the proposed PPP, the City Center section would be procured under a design-build-finance-operate-maintain (DBFOM) contract, which would award the successful bidder the right to operate and maintain the entire system for a period of 25 years after completing the City Center section. The City of Honolulu would retain oversight over operations and maintenance, public information, and responsibility for fare vending and enforcement.[161] A contract for $400 million to clear utilities in the City Center section was awarded in May 2018.[80]
HART issued a request for proposals (RFP) for the DBFOM contract for the City Center Guideway and Stations section in late 2018[162] and announced it had received proposals from several bidders by July 2020.[163] However, the bids for the construction of the City Center Guideway and Stations significantly exceeded HART's cost estimates, at $2.7 billion compared to the $1.4 billion estimate,[164] and HART officially discontinued pursuing a PPP approach to completing the City Center section in November 2020.[165] The bids for the operation and maintenance portion of the contract (ranging from $4.2 to $5.3 billion) were closer to the estimate ($4.95 billion).[164] On December 14, 2020, HART issued a request for information, asking for input from the construction industry for the best way to structure a RFP that would receive realistic bids. It is expected that this contract will be awarded and subsequently, construction will begin for the six stations and guideway in August 2024.[166][124]
Of note... the Honolulu thing seems to have too much in common with the Green Line.
HART Scrambles To Free Up Cash For Rail's Push Into The City Center
www.civilbeat.org
And if you're looking for elevated low floor (not downtown), you only have to look up the QE2.
Shaka
New Member
That alignment is a choice!
CBBarnett
Senior Member
Interestingly, Honolulu project phased things the way that the UCP and anti-Green Line folks have been saying - do the easy suburban part first, don't worry about the downtown until later. Problem is transit in suburbs isn't connecting anything to anything - you need that key core downtown part for the whole thing to make sense. As in most places, the urban core part will be the most technically complicated and expensive, but also where the whole value proposition resides for transit projects.Downtown section won't be done for a bit... but good to know we're not alone in our misery.
Segment 3: City Center
[edit]
The third phase of the route, the 3.3 mi (5.3 km) City Center section terminating at Kaʻākaukukui station, may be completed under a public-private partnership (PPP). It is estimated the City Center section will cost $1.6 billion to complete.[160] Under the proposed PPP, the City Center section would be procured under a design-build-finance-operate-maintain (DBFOM) contract, which would award the successful bidder the right to operate and maintain the entire system for a period of 25 years after completing the City Center section. The City of Honolulu would retain oversight over operations and maintenance, public information, and responsibility for fare vending and enforcement.[161] A contract for $400 million to clear utilities in the City Center section was awarded in May 2018.[80]
HART issued a request for proposals (RFP) for the DBFOM contract for the City Center Guideway and Stations section in late 2018[162] and announced it had received proposals from several bidders by July 2020.[163] However, the bids for the construction of the City Center Guideway and Stations significantly exceeded HART's cost estimates, at $2.7 billion compared to the $1.4 billion estimate,[164] and HART officially discontinued pursuing a PPP approach to completing the City Center section in November 2020.[165] The bids for the operation and maintenance portion of the contract (ranging from $4.2 to $5.3 billion) were closer to the estimate ($4.95 billion).[164] On December 14, 2020, HART issued a request for information, asking for input from the construction industry for the best way to structure a RFP that would receive realistic bids. It is expected that this contract will be awarded and subsequently, construction will begin for the six stations and guideway in August 2024.[166][124]
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Of note... the Honolulu thing seems to have too much in common with the Green Line.
HART Scrambles To Free Up Cash For Rail's Push Into The City Center
And if you're looking for elevated low floor (not downtown), you only have to look up the QE2.
Regardless of complexity though, the Honolulu project and Green Line got caught up in the anglo-sphere transit cost escalation disease problem where for a variety of reasons, everything is multiple times more expensive/takes longer to build than Europe or Asia for this type of construction. Which is why their downtown segment won't open for another decade and who knows how many billions of more dollars.
Huge political dramas causing delays in Honolulu too which is part of the cost increases, but there's more going on about how/who builds transit and how we finance it that makes the costs balloon to unsustainable numbers for so many transit projects. Something will need to change. The province taking a leadership role here isn't a bad idea in itself - project's this scale can't really be funded locally and offer regional/provincial level benefits.
The problem though is like what @Silence&Motion said. UCP going to UCP, the thing that's most unique about them is how nakedly political their action are right out in the open. There moves aren't about taking the politics out of transit to stabilize delivery and reduce costs, they are just weaponizing it further for their own political machinations - no contract is too big to break, no plans are too finalized to be replaced with "grand central station" cocktail napkin drawings - as long as points can be scored somehow against their enemies.
And that's the issue - Green Line had many faults, made worse and more expensive by constant political meddling since day 1. The UCP's takeover of the project isn't a solution to this, it's more of the same but so late in the game that it will cost us billions in cancellation fees, wasted effort and loss of confidence in building infrastructure here. Still, Green Line did build more pipe than one of the UCPs earlier boondoggles that lost 1.5 billion of taxpayer money on a politically-driven move, so there's that!
darwink
Senior Member
Good to look at what they scope in, and out. Plenty of projects world wide are reusing existing rail corridors for new purposes, not new ones, without costing that value. Pretty common to report after offsetting the reported cost with fare revenue? (operationally freestanding with partial capital contribution).
But in this case, it doesn't seem like any of that.
City and Southwest in Sydney, part of the 66 km line, is now costed at at least $20.5 billion. The Northwest line is costed at $25 billion, which is the second part of the 66 km metro. So total cost of $45.5 billion Kangaroo bucks for the metro you quoted at $12.15 Kangaroo bucks. nearly a 300% cost overrun if that is the right initial number.
I've been on the ones in KL and Miami. Both didn't seem oppressive from the street level, and were hardly noticeable to be honest but they're also accompanied by a fair bit of jungle like foliage.
CalgaryTiger
Senior Member
Good comparable, elevated would be a good opportunity to do something under the line. 1st Street would suit it well.
accord1999
Active Member
The City's plan after the 2020 revision was also to build to the suburban part first. Stage 1 had been split into three parts, and they were going to build the part from Shepard to 4 Street first because it was "shovel-ready".
Council approves Green Line program
www.calgary.ca
And IMO, what the UCP and anti-Stage 1 folks are trying to do is to save money by minimizing the amount of new stuff in the expensive DT core and use whatever savings to build out more to the suburbs. Ultimately, it's a battle of how much money you want to spend on the core and the SE LRT, a question that was never asked or answered. And because of that, it's allowed the Core to swallow up all of the Green Line's funding.
lemongrab
Active Member
Sure it can. Just live a little and giv'er with one of these! What could go wrong?
Or another outside the box idea: the 8th Ave subway comes to street level just east of 1st St - the tracks themselves being 35 inches below street level so you have a de facto low-floor station between 1st and 2nd, where it goes back underground. This would mean a portal for ~half of the 100 block, and then a shallow trench down most of the 200 block.
Under my plan 1st St is ped/bike only, so you ramp the middle of the former roadway down/up, while the sidewalks stay at street level. Overall you're substantially changing the character of ~1.5 blocks of Stephen Ave (probably not popular), though I think the portals are a real visual placemaking opportunity, and you're saving money by bringing an 8th Ave station to surface. And you're also adding 6-7 short blocks of new ped zone running N-S.
Dārayavauš
Active Member
Danhai light rail in Taipei is new and has elevated stations. So is the Yellow Line in Taipei, and through a densely developed area.
CalgaryTiger
Senior Member
You can do this at 4th Street or 5th Street but not 1st Street.Sure it can. Just live a little and giv'er with one of these! What could go wrong?
Or another outside the box idea: the 8th Ave subway comes to street level just east of 1st St - the tracks themselves being 35 inches below street level so you have a de facto low-floor station between 1st and 2nd, where it goes back underground. This would mean a portal for ~half of the 100 block, and then a shallow trench down most of the 200 block.
Under my plan 1st St is ped/bike only, so you ramp the middle of the former roadway down/up, while the sidewalks stay at street level. Overall you're substantially changing the character of ~1.5 blocks of Stephen Ave (probably not popular), though I think the portals are a real visual placemaking opportunity, and you're saving money by bringing an 8th Ave station to surface. And you're also adding 6-7 short blocks of new ped zone running N-S.
InfrastructureEnthusiast
New Member
Well yeah, all of Taipei is densely developed! I will say though that their LRT line was easily the least impressive part of their overall excellent metro system, very very loud with all the track noise. But that's more to do with their routing and tight turns, Kaohsiung's LRT wasn't noisy like that.
To Mountain Man's Q, newer elevated rail lines aren't as obtrusive as the old one in Chicago, but 2nd st isn't as wide as say Sukhumvit where much of Bangkok's skytrain is run, so the impact will be noticeable. That said, with so many downtown Calgary streets being canyons already, it may not make that much difference on the ground.
In spots where stations would require additional width, I suppose light tubes could be used to illuminate the street areas below, but in the end I think an elevated DT section would just disappear into the mental background quickly enough.
It would mean that 2nd st would have to go on a lane diet though, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Remove all parking, one through lane each way with space between the rail pillars used for turning lanes. Might even be enough space left over for bike lanes or expanded sidewalks.
Tothewest
Active Member
I haven't read the previous replies, i am sure they are all over the map. Now that it's a few days old, some things are a bit clearer, easier to unemotionally type. The politics are fairly irrelevant here, who is at fault, ect....bottom line is even if project had started 2 years ago, the cost overruns would still be what they are, with worse optics because of a 20% completed project.
1) $6.2B is a patently INSANE amount of money for 30,000 ridership on the route described. You can still be a transit focused city, with an incredible existing system....AND think this was turning into a VERY bad idea
2) Cant tunnel, it's that simple. Light rail transit, if you want to maximize your dollars for km's...function over form. Nobody talks about the elevated Sunalta leg, everyone's used to it....they'll get used to at-grade and elevated stations on the green line.
3) 100% supportive of a provincial body for mega projects, especially one that aligns a green line, airport line, and banff train into a hub downtown. These are beyond city's scope, this project, the valley line, and the rogers place rail spur are examples of that.
Onward and upward, but we need to start getting comfy that this project might not be as visually appealing in the downtown core and other areas....but honestly who gives a shit, every other city does this
1) $6.2B is a patently INSANE amount of money for 30,000 ridership on the route described. You can still be a transit focused city, with an incredible existing system....AND think this was turning into a VERY bad idea
2) Cant tunnel, it's that simple. Light rail transit, if you want to maximize your dollars for km's...function over form. Nobody talks about the elevated Sunalta leg, everyone's used to it....they'll get used to at-grade and elevated stations on the green line.
3) 100% supportive of a provincial body for mega projects, especially one that aligns a green line, airport line, and banff train into a hub downtown. These are beyond city's scope, this project, the valley line, and the rogers place rail spur are examples of that.
Onward and upward, but we need to start getting comfy that this project might not be as visually appealing in the downtown core and other areas....but honestly who gives a shit, every other city does this