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

[YYCguy]

The environmental issues in Lynnwood and Ogden are forever going to be detriment to building anything around the station. It’s a crying shame that nothing can or ever will be done in that area.

 

[Silence&Motion]

We should build transit because it's simply the right thing to do; it improves accessibility, reduces emissions and so on. But that being said, Calgary has a problem with TOD sites sitting undeveloped and underdeveloped, which IMO is due to three things beyond the urban realm around the stations.

One is the planning processes not providing enough support: not permitting enough density, not reducing parking requirements, being stopped by local resident opposition, allowing the loading dock of a Superstore to be next to the transit station.

The second is absolutely dilution and the lack of coordination. A TOD node needs (relatively) dense mixed use; but developing that is a coordination problem. You need a coffee shop and a couple of restaurants and at least a convenience store if not a grocery to create the start of a TOD; but you need a bunch of residents within walking distance to support coffee shops and convenience stores. If there was a single TOD site, then there would be people willing to take a chance, but with 30 TOD sites, the risks are too high everywhere. The East Village sat for decades with nothing happening; the CMLC intervention provided a coordinating signal that this area was going to go, which meant developers were willing to build the towers and businesses were willing to locate there and that made spaces and places for residents. But it was mostly a signal; the area's always had pathways and a bridge to a park on St Patrick's Island; the library was always a short walk away; the National Music Centre isn't that heavily visited. The area didn't functionally change all that much -- more a signal said "okay, go here now" and everybody followed. But with all of that said, it's not like going from 30 uncoordinated TOD sites to 35 will change anything substantially. The problem is that picking three TOD sites to prioritize will upset the developers and landholders of the other 27, and Council isn't willing to do this. (This is also why the TOD nodes that have done the best -- Heritage, Dalhousie, Brentwood -- are the ones that had some retail at them before the train was there; this reduces the coordination problem.)

The third -- and the overwhelming leader -- is that we allow all of the new development to go into greenfield sites (and beyond into the region). TOD sites and the inner city are getting 10% of new development, so there's a problem with it not being concentrated. If they got 50% of the development, then this coordination problem is lessened substantially; they can and will all go at the same time.

Those three neighbourhoods you identified, though, are three terrible examples of new TOD potential. Building new LRT stations adds accessibility. In Victoria Park, the LRT station will be 700m walking distance from two different existing LRT stations (both of which are easier to get to, since they're at grade.) Plus the area is already walking distance to the downtown. Ramsay is similar; it's already very accessible to the downtown; community pressure here and in Inglewood keeps the densification from happening, and I'm sure the NIMBYs will still be living there five years from now. Lynnwood, on the other hand -- you blame the lack of TOD on "park and ride" stations with "car sewers". Ogden Road at the Lynnwood station is 60 km/h, four lanes, 16,000 vehicles a day -- not too far from the 21000 on 17th Ave SW at 69th St, or the 25000 on 36th St at Rundle -- and the station has a big ol' park and ride lot planned, which makes sense given all the polluted land around the station.

Honestly, the first phase of the Green Line doesn't have much TOD potential at all; 16th Ave N perhaps, then NIMBY-dominated Rosedale, then the already-accessible downtown and Beltline, then NIMBY-dominated Inglewood/Ramsay, then a bunch of heavy industrial and contaminated land -- Ogden and South Hill do have TOD potential, especially South Hill which has less community around to oppose it -- then on to areas with brand new development.

It should get built because it's going to get a lot of use and because we need to switch to transit; unfortunately, until we can break either Council's reliance on developers or the development industry's reliance on sprawl, the TOD part is not a good reason.

I think you underestimate the extent to which TOD can develop in an informal, incremental way where the surrounding urban form is favourable. You only need a massive, East Village-style coordinated approach where you need to drastically change the urban form. Places like Sunnyside, Sunalta, and Westbrook have seen gradual built up of amenities and density. The same can happen for Ramsay, Victoria Park, and Lynnwood. I'm not talking about a 10-year mega project. I'm talking about a Marda Loop style evolution occurring over 30 years. Ogden Road in Lynnwood is only 2 driving lanes. It has street-facing commercial buildings and some historic architecture. It looks a lot like 33 Ave in Marda Loop in the 1990s. (BTW: by Lynnwood, I meant the neighbourhood, not the station. I was referring to Ogden station).

As for Ramsay and Victoria Park, yes they are centrally located, but we also have to think of these stations as destinations for other people to get to, not just for local residents to commute downtown. Ramsay increasingly has employment spaces and amenities like the Crossroads Market. These are currently only accessible by car.

I don't disagree with your points about the barriers to TOD. But the biggest barrier to TOD is not having transit in the first place. At the moment our transit system has been built as a commuter rail network that shuttles people back and forth between the suburbs and the downtown core. As we add more stations to the inner-city, it will become more like a subway system that opens up large portions of the inner city to people without cars.

 

[ByeByeBaby]

I think you underestimate the extent to which TOD can develop in an informal, incremental way where the surrounding urban form is favourable. You only need a massive, East Village-style coordinated approach where you need to drastically change the urban form. Places like Sunnyside, Sunalta, and Westbrook have seen gradual built up of amenities and density. The same can happen for Ramsay, Victoria Park, and Lynnwood. I'm not talking about a 10-year mega project. I'm talking about a Marda Loop style evolution occurring over 30 years. Ogden Road in Lynnwood is only 2 driving lanes. It has street-facing commercial buildings and some historic architecture. It looks a lot like 33 Ave in Marda Loop in the 1990s. (BTW: by Lynnwood, I meant the neighbourhood, not the station. I was referring to Ogden station).

As for Ramsay and Victoria Park, yes they are centrally located, but we also have to think of these stations as destinations for other people to get to, not just for local residents to commute downtown. Ramsay increasingly has employment spaces and amenities like the Crossroads Market. These are currently only accessible by car.

I don't disagree with your points about the barriers to TOD. But the biggest barrier to TOD is not having transit in the first place. At the moment our transit system has been built as a commuter rail network that shuttles people back and forth between the suburbs and the downtown core. As we add more stations to the inner-city, it will become more like a subway system that opens up large portions of the inner city to people without cars.

We're in general agreement, I think. We talked past each other a little because there's no community of Lynnwood; the entire area between the river, the rail and Glenmore is Ogden. The gridded portion with the Ogden station does have potential to evolve into TOD eventually where the empty contaminated land by the Lynnwood station (and the area up Millican Road from the station) has a lot less. But for your comparison with Marda Loop, here's 33rd Ave 20 years ago:

And here it is 40 years ago:

It's been something of a commercial strip for much longer than the 1990s.

Here's the Ogden station area today:

There is some commercial, but 33rd Ave had a better commercial core in 1979 than Ogden does today.

And of course all this ignores that Marda Loop absolutely did have a 10 year megaproject; the Garrison Woods redevelopment of CFB lands (by a coordinated government effort). The northern half of Garrison Woods, within easy walk of Marda Loop, added 2000 people from 2001-2016.

Sure, Sunnyside has had wonderful gradual development over the past 30 years, (I wouldn't use Sunalta as an example of TOD growth; almost nothing there is new). But so has the Edmonton Trail corridor in Crescent Heights; so has the west Beltline or the 1st St corridor; so has virtually anywhere within walking distance of downtown without active community opposition.

 

[Dārayavauš]

So the City is building a line that doesn't service much in the way of where people live, willfully creating a white elephant. Sigh. Calgary used to be a well run city.

Really this is the best thing to do, otherwise if you try and go ahead with an $8.5 Billion project, the AB government for sure would kill it. This isn't an Oil and Gas project after all.

 

[Dārayavauš]

It's one thing to justify it as brining mass transit to multiple neighbourhoods, that is fine. But if part of the justification is "build it and we will see all sorts of redevelopment", I am skepitcal, based entirely past history/performance. We recently had JEMM withdraw a relatively simple TOD application in Shaganappi, due to the lack of support for it from the community and local councillor. This is also after the same community killed at SDAB a mixed use building at the corner of Bow and 26th, directly next to the LRT station. I can't imagine the existing communities in the north-central will be any more welcoming, making redevelopment any easier.

NIMBYs have far too much say in this city honestly. We spoil them rotten.

 

[Joborule]

It all depends on what the contracts come in at for phase 1. Too high, find more money. Low enough, go to 16th Ave. Even lower, go to McKenzie Towne as well. Then the next $750m-$1 billion goes to 64th Ave North, far enough to truncate the BRT. Hopefully with a 16 Ave N grade separation.

Initially I wanted this too, but I get the impression that it's not going to happen, and will be at-grade, and I'm content with that. The costs to make it grade separated may be significantly more, and what's the trade off benefit? Will it really improve traffic on 16th avenue which is a traffic light parade? Does being at grade make 16th any worse than it is currently? That's really the only reason I can think of to do grade separation aside from accident prevention with the train.

But with this being a Low-floor train, the whole point is to have it integrated with the traffic essentially so you don't have to put up these costly grade separated infrastructures everywhere.

 

[darwink]

We’re spending probably half a billion dollars to grade separate at Macleod (22,000+26,000 vehicles). Spent $70 million to grade separate the west LRT at 45th Street, baked in grade separation at Bow (44,000) and 17th (over 20,000). We’re planning to spend a fair amount to do so at McKnight. We did do 64th Ave in the NE grade separated as well (that was an add on expense too), it currently takes 24,000 crossings. At 69th Street there is a double separation for 26 and 15 thousand vehicles respectively. The Heritage Drive level crossing? 22,000 a day with no interacting turning movements. The city is planning to grade separate it and the lack of it led the city to spike a TOD project adjacent to the station. 162nd is 24,000 and not at an intersection.
But 16th Ave and it’s 50,000 crossing Centre St brings a ¯\_(ツ)_/¯? Not doing so will be a monumental mistake and either lead to the LRT not having a priority movement, traffic being absolutely horrendous, or both.

Lest we forget Edmonton’s attempts to save less than $50 million?

“
City council may be able to avoid future traffic snarls along the Metro Line at Princess Elizabeth Avenue, but it will cost up to $95 million.

The line has caused long traffic delays where it intersects with Princess Elizabeth Avenue near the NAIT station since the line opened last September. In some cases, drivers have had to wait up to 10 minutes to clear the lights.”

Those crossings? A 26,000 and 20,000 road respectively.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/edmonton-city-council-eyes-costly-solution-to-metro-line-traffic-problems-1.3525689

 

[Joborule]

We’re spending probably half a billion dollars to grade separate at Macleod (22,000+26,000 vehicles). Spent $70 million to grade separate the west LRT at 45th Street, baked in grade separation at Bow (44,000) and 17th (over 20,000). We’re planning to spend a fair amount to do so at McKnight. We did do 64th Ave in the NE grade separated as well (that was an add on expense too), it currently takes 24,000 crossings. At 69th Street there is a double separation for 26 and 15 thousand vehicles respectively. The Heritage Drive level crossing? 22,000 a day with no interacting turning movements. The city is planning to grade separate it and the lack of it led the city to spike a TOD project adjacent to the station. 162nd is 24,000 and not at an intersection.
But 16th Ave and it’s 50,000 crossing Centre St brings a ¯\_(ツ)_/¯? Not doing so will be a monumental mistake and either lead to the LRT not having a priority movement, traffic being absolutely horrendous, or both.

Lest we forget Edmonton’s attempts to save less than $50 million?
View attachment 334081
“
City council may be able to avoid future traffic snarls along the Metro Line at Princess Elizabeth Avenue, but it will cost up to $95 million.

The line has caused long traffic delays where it intersects with Princess Elizabeth Avenue near the NAIT station since the line opened last September. In some cases, drivers have had to wait up to 10 minutes to clear the lights.”

Those crossings? A 26,000 and 20,000 road respectively.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/edmonton-city-council-eyes-costly-solution-to-metro-line-traffic-problems-1.3525689

I get what you're saying and I do hope that 16th is grade separate so then the LRT has complete priority within that corridor, and is protected from possible vehicle/pedestrian collisions. But depending on how much vehicle traffic is reduced on Centre ST in lieu of the LRT, it may end up being the case that the current light sequence at Centre / 16th will essentially remain the same for cross traffic. If that's the case, I could see the city choosing the cheaper option of doing at-grade.

I do think though that the safest, and best option would be to grade separate it considering the volume of traffic 16th gets. Don't be in a position of regretting not doing it down the road.

 

[darwink]

Considering what I think the probable incremental cost would be —$30 million (station at grade but sub-optimally placed)-$100 million (station at least trenched with mezzanines on the North and south sides of the intersection for four corner access) I think it would be pretty wise to not lock us in at grade forever to at grade.

Replacing the at grade station during the future north bound expansion would also be an option, but with a probable shut it down for at least 6 months to a year+the cost of replacing something (perhaps $5-10 million down the hole) I don’t think it is the best move especially if we go north almost immediately after.

 

[darwink]

Mayoral candidates on the future of the Green Line:

Future Green Line: Will your mayoral candidates go south... or north? - LiveWire Calgary

After a year of waiting in the station for the goods to be delivered, Calgary will move forward on its $5.5 billion Green Line transit project. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was in town to make the official federal announcement July 7. A very short time earlier, the province made their...

livewirecalgary.com

 

[outoftheice]

Counter-point to the grade separation issue:

Everyone is looking at this topic exclusively as transportation engineers. The whole point of selecting low-floor LRVs for Green Line was so the train would integrate better into communities than the existing LRT and allow principles of good urban design to accompany transit planning for the first time ever in Calgary.

The decision to trench the 45 St crossing on the west LRT might have made sense from a transportation engineering perspective but was a terrible decision from an urban planning perspective. That trench kills any development potential along that entire corridor, creates a massive dead-zone along what is meant to be one of Calgary's premiere mainstreets and essentially walls off the community to the north.

Grade separating the Green Line for 16th Ave would require tunnel portals to the north and south which would interfere with the plan to place pedestrian crossings on Centre St every two blocks and would also further restrict vehicle turning movements to access the surrounding businesses and communities off Centre St. From an urban planning perspective grade separating 16th Ave hurts more than it helps and I would even argue that from a transportation engineering perspective it's not needed.

Don't forget the lights at that intersection are timed to accommodate the north/south flow of buses on Centre St that run every 90 seconds during rush-hour. The City of Calgary has to push 6 extended-buses through that intersection to equal the capacity of a single Green Line train. Given the fact Centre St will only be 2 lanes once Green Line goes in and trains will be running at 5 minute intervals max and will still be moving more people than the buses going now I would argue the lights can be timed to actually increases the east/west traffic flow on 16th Ave and still allow more people to move north/south along Centre St than happens today all without the need for expensive grade separation that will also hurt the surrounding urban realm.

 

[darwink]

^ the tunnel portals can be almost anywhere - tunnels are not (relatively) expensive. The stations are.

Could always elevate instead as well.

 

[Joborule]

Counter-point to the grade separation issue:

Everyone is looking at this topic exclusively as transportation engineers. The whole point of selecting low-floor LRVs for Green Line was so the train would integrate better into communities than the existing LRT and allow principles of good urban design to accompany transit planning for the first time ever in Calgary.

The decision to trench the 45 St crossing on the west LRT might have made sense from a transportation engineering perspective but was a terrible decision from an urban planning perspective. That trench kills any development potential along that entire corridor, creates a massive dead-zone along what is meant to be one of Calgary's premiere mainstreets and essentially walls off the community to the north.

Grade separating the Green Line for 16th Ave would require tunnel portals to the north and south which would interfere with the plan to place pedestrian crossings on Centre St every two blocks and would also further restrict vehicle turning movements to access the surrounding businesses and communities off Centre St. From an urban planning perspective grade separating 16th Ave hurts more than it helps and I would even argue that from a transportation engineering perspective it's not needed.

Don't forget the lights at that intersection are timed to accommodate the north/south flow of buses on Centre St that run every 90 seconds during rush-hour. The City of Calgary has to push 6 extended-buses through that intersection to equal the capacity of a single Green Line train. Given the fact Centre St will only be 2 lanes once Green Line goes in and trains will be running at 5 minute intervals max and will still be moving more people than the buses going now I would argue the lights can be timed to actually increases the east/west traffic flow on 16th Ave and still allow more people to move north/south along Centre St than happens today all without the need for expensive grade separation that will also hurt the surrounding urban realm.

This post here is why I'm okay with at-grade crossing for 16th since the low-floor trains are designed for this, and the area around that station as a whole is intended to be a urban corridor both to the north/south, and east/west. It's a case where at-grade is likely just as good as being underground, while being cheaper.

 

[darwink]

This post here is why I'm okay with at-grade crossing for 16th since the low-floor trains are designed for this, and the area around that station as a whole is intended to be a urban corridor both to the north/south, and east/west. It's a case where at-grade is likely just as good as being underground, while being cheaper.

Likely just as good? Edmonton's was also supposed to be likely just as good. If we are fine with this crossing at grade, we may as well re-engineer the entire line to have fewer grade separations and be a whole lot cheaper and slower, and extend far longer on day 1.

I want to demonstrate how different this is from our current practice, even on the greenline itself.

Applying a similar metric (crossing a 50,000 vehicle a day intersection at grade is ok) would lead to level crossings in no particular order at:
144th
Country Hills Blvd
96th
McKnight
Blackfoot
Glenmore
Barlow/114th
the entry into Seton
12th St SE
Olympic Way
Macleod Tr North and South Bound
1st St SE
Highfield
34th Ave
Ogden Road
90th Ave
130th

On the Red Line we could also retire the tunnels when they need renewal crossing 16th Ave N, and retire the bridges crossing 10th St and 14th Streets. Could eliminate all bridges and tunnels west of Crowchild on the West Line including the crossing on Sarcee. On the NE could eliminate the tunnel from Memorial to 36th, plus the one under 64th NE. On the South Line why not bring the line to grade at Southland, Anderson, Canyon Meadows and Shawnessy instead of renewing those bridges as they reach the end of their lives. On the SW BRT we should eliminate the grade separation at 90th Ave.

TLDR: Crossing 16th Ave at grade is a huge change from practice to date, and will be by far the busiest crossing in the city.

 

[Mountain Man]

The environmental issues in Lynnwood and Ogden are forever going to be detriment to building anything around the station. It’s a crying shame that nothing can or ever will be done in that area.

I thought they were going to remediate that area, tearing down the houses was all that is happening?