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

[CalgaryTiger]

The next chapter in the saga begins. Can't see why the province would say no to this but I never thought the province would do what they did either...

https://twitter.com/x/status/1836934127872008651

Letter from the Twitter pic that doesn't display in the embedded tweet:

View attachment 597439

As someone else said, these conversations should've been happening behind closed doors in the spring.

If they both came out in July and said, "we're going ahead with final planning on 4th Street to Shepard. We also need to see if all options have been exhausted for the part beyond 4th Street, that decision will come by the end of the year."

People would've been all "a train to nowhere?!" but all the City and Province would've had to say is, "no, this isn't the end product, we don't want to delay Shepard to 4th Street while we make sure we're building the best line for our money in the downtown. The final decision on that part will come by the end of the year."

The problem is that for a long time this hasn't been a partnership between the City and Province. Since the end of August they both have wanted to get a very public bite out of the other. The letter is sensible and without rhetoric, hopefully the puppet in the red hat can exercise the same self control.

 

[darwink]

As someone else said, these conversations should've been happening behind closed doors in the spring.

I'm not sure the Mayor was playing the unsaid, undefined role, both in working around the lines with the Green-line board and delivery team after learning of the scope cut 'our partners, and I are surprised of this. We need a more radical option to come with the proposal so we can choose to make tradeoffs' and working with the province more informally and continuously.

With $1.5 billion+ on the table, you'd think there would be fast friendships between the Mayor's office and the Minister's office back room figuring out a deal.

This problem comes back around to, I don't think the Mayor 100% embraces or has the skill set for where the Mayor's power and influence comes from in a weak Mayor system.

 

[lemongrab]

I'm not sure the Mayor was playing the unsaid, undefined role, both in working around the lines with the Green-line board and delivery team after learning of the scope cut 'our partners, and I are surprised of this. We need a more radical option to come with the proposal so we can choose to make tradeoffs' and working with the province more informally and continuously.

With $1.5 billion+ on the table, you'd think there would be fast friendships between the Mayor's office and the Minister's office back room figuring out a deal.

This problem comes back around to, I don't think the Mayor 100% embraces or has the skill set for where the Mayor's power and influence comes from in a weak Mayor system.

I wonder if things also got hung up on procedural issues...the Green Law Bylaw is pretty explicit that the mandate can only be changed by direction from council. So reconsidering the prescribed alignment from 4th to Eau Claire may have been impossible without an official and public council vote.

I believe council direction had previously dictated that proceeding with contracts for 4th to Shephard had to wait on feasibility/budget confirmation for the DT tunnel...which makes some sense if you've declared that the tunnel is the one and only option and because the whole project depends on it. But we know that doesn't have to be true.

As usual, they seem to have prioritized the tunnel over the project. The better option would have been to green light 4th to Shephard and direct GLB to reconsider all possible DT alignments. Which doesn't necessarily cancel the tunnel, but we'd finally get a proper evaluation of tunnel vs. other options (including other tunnel options *couch 1st St SW*). Politically I think you're offsetting the bad news of partial delay with the good news of true ground breaking.

And really this gets you to effectively the same place as the Lynnwood compromise. EC-Lynnwood until extension vs. 4th-Shephard until extension. But maybe they were scared it would give the UCP the chance to kill the tunnel...which happened anyways...

In this alternate timeline I wonder if it might have also motivated a 6th/9th Ave BRT enhancement (imagining an interim route from 4th St SE 'quickly' looping through DT like Max Purple)

 

[Surrealplaces]