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

Go Elevated or try for Underground?

  • Work with the province and go with the Elevated option

    Votes: 10 76.9%

  • Try another approach and go for Underground option

    Votes: 2 15.4%

  • Cancel it altogether

    Votes: 1 7.7%
  • Total voters
    13
DougB said:
I don't get that table. For example, why is the capital cost for Beddington to North Pointe zero? Why are capital costs identical for 16 Ave to 64, 16th Ave to North Pointe and 16th Ave to Beddington? Does capital include land acquistion (I would expect so)? Why are the capital costs south of Shepard so high given that the right of way is already in place?
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The city does not have reliable costing north of 64th, and that was reflected in the prioritization document presenting in spring/summer 2021 which was useful in some respects and not others.

Capital should have an estimate, but lets say to relocate utilties it was necessary to acquire land, that wouldn't be known or estimated.

To McKenzie Towne it is still 3.5 km, requires additional vehicles, and doesn't have the ROW fully ready to build even if the land is secured. It requires landfill/fill remediation to avoid some expropriation (boo the corridor work being done right when the buildings on 126 ave were being built, in 2005-6) and/or taking away road capacity. Could probably do it for less as part of a larger project, but running it as a project on its own was the name of the game for this work.

We also can't expect accurate comparable costing on non-priorities. They're going to be estimated based on the best study available and rules of thumb.
 
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Most places have. Even Calgary. The West LRT was close to triple the 2005/6 cost (when Westbrook was to be elevated!) Scope control is really hard. Just have to look at the Canada Line in Vancouver. Even 15 years later the main complaints are still about scope without any acknowledgement that changing the scope would change the cost.
 
The Canada Line was a steal by contemporary cost standards. Are people wishing it was built with higher capacity (longer platforms and trains, double tracking to the terminal station in Richmond) or something else?

I haven't heard similar comments about the west LRT, other than Shaganappi being in the wrong place and lacking an overpass (but I was there for the engagement and it's what the "community" at the time wanted), which could indicate that we got a system with appropriate capacity.
 
darwink said:
the above plus provisions for multiple tie ins and flying junctions with existing skytrain and future skytrain lines, and multiple exits per station.
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If the trade-off is undersized but in-operation, efficient, rapid and reliable transit v. spend billions more with more projects risks to get a higher capacity line, they made the right choice. Transit needs wins and far more examples of it being a victims of it's own success rather than failing to deliver anything or taking so long to deliver political interests change. 150,000 new daily riders is 150,000 new daily advocates for service improvements.

If it could be replicated (acknowledging many technical reasons why it's unlikely to be this easy) - Spending the same to get 3 Canada Lines on 3 separate corridors v. 1 corridor with a 3x higher capacity Canada Line would be a great win and would transform Vancouver even more remarkably than it's already impressive transit system has.
 
Would it be a lot of work for bureaucrats? Yes. Would it cause a lot of political controversy? Yes. Would it be easy for politicians to order it be done? Also yes.
 
darwink said:
I’d argue it isn’t undersized.
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Agreed - should have said the perception of being "undersized". It's an incredibly effective transit line.

I am actually surprised more North American cities haven't tried to copy the Canada Line - even just at a superficial level. Every major transit project is imagined as such a one-off from others, and there seems to be a preference in early design to look at comparable cities for implementation ideas (even if they have shit transit) rather than look at the good implementation ideas themselves.
 
Toronto and Montreal are building new turn-key lines with small, automated trains and smaller stations that will save costs over their conventional subway networks. That's not the whole story with the Canada Line, but I read that it inspired those projects: https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/montreal-skytrain-train-reseau-electrique-metropolitain

Montreal seems to be hitting the mark with the REM, but Toronto's Ontario Line looks like it will still be super expensive.
 
badc0ffee said:
Toronto and Montreal are building new turn-key lines with small, automated trains and smaller stations that will save costs over their conventional subway networks. That's not the whole story with the Canada Line, but I read that it inspired those projects: https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/montreal-skytrain-train-reseau-electrique-metropolitain

Montreal seems to be hitting the mark with the REM, but Toronto's Ontario Line looks like it will still be super expensive.
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Almost like there should be some national or at least provincial standard that's replicable across the board. Cities and provinces might be too proud to give up any authority on their projects. Green line is too far gone to do something like this so we're likely too far gone.
 
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