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

[badc0ffee]

It will, but I'm also assuming the city will try and re-jig current bus routes and force them to get on the train at Lynnwood. So in essence we may actually be making some of those express bus routes worse and multi-mode compared to today.

You may be right. At least that station is on Ogden Road, which has decent connections to much of the SE, and is on the proper side of the Bow river.

Here's hoping we can at least go to McKenzie Towne in the first extension.

 

[ahuch]

Park and ride here is about 250x300ft of parking.

That's about 278 stalls by my math. Not a ton.

A bus transfer here will probably account for the greatest ridership. I think it's reasonable that a transfer would ultimately save time. Average speed on Ogden Rd is going to be much slower than the train, Plus some bottlenecks at blackfoot and then possible freight train interference if one is cutting through Ramsay.

In fact, the dedicated grade separated right-of-way over the south freight line is perhaps one of the most relevant facts about this project. It is possible to come via this route and get stuck at the nvrlnd or traffic circle crossing for 30 minutes in a car or bus. Or get jammed up on Blackfoot due to gridlock from the same. Green line will bypass that conflict.

That's fair, I can only speak to the fact that I live near one of the stations that was cut... I was contemplating taking the train downtown once built, but if I'm driving up Ogden Road (literally my commute today) I'm just going to keep going driving downtown. Everyone's different though.

 

[lemongrab]

I probably wouldn't mind. I bet it saves an enormous amount of time to loop around at Millican rather than roll around downtown in traffic

Only if your workplace is close to 2nd St SW. Otherwise a slow bus probably solves your last km problem just as fast.

 

[Ramsayite]

That's fair, I can only speak to the fact that I live near one of the stations that was cut... I was contemplating taking the train downtown once built, but if I'm driving up Ogden Road (literally my commute today) I'm just going to keep going driving downtown. Everyone's different though.

Oh my condolences. That sucks. I'd be pretty bummed out too.

 

[kempes_78]

This LiveWire Calgary article goes into greater detail than the other media reports I've seen.

Green Line LRT cut down in south Calgary to stay within the budget - LiveWire Calgary

Scope changes on the Green Line LRT mean that the line will end four stops south of downtown Calgary, with one station brought to grade and another deferred to a later date. That’s the decision that Calgary city councillors ultimately made at the start of their summer wrap-up meeting on July 30...

livewirecalgary.com

Of note are the quotes from Councilors Evan Spencer and Terry Wong (their wards are directly impacted by the Greenline).



So this confirms what I was thinking and hoping, that they will simultaneously be applying for funding to start the next phase that goes further south.


This is actually a really good point by Wong about building the chassis before the rest of the car. I appreciate a conservative stepping up to support the greenline and explain this reality.

For those with eyes and ears explore. Why has the project cost more for less structures? Poor cost control.

 

[kempes_78]

I think so. But the site won't pay for itself, so it really is cost decision. Same is when the city bought out Lilydale chicken. was it the cheapest choice, or just solves another file at the same time?

So, many things. There is the pure escalation. That exists for sure. Then there is scope creep, that existed for sure. Then less than optimal risk management. Then less than optimal procurement planning.

To try to make the plan better, there was lots of delay. Likely, waiting made the costs higher and the project worse than our current situation, but, it would seem very bad if had moved forward at the time and had lets say a $1 billion overage in the 16th Ave - Elbow River tunnel.

Don't think of things in isolation. There is sleight of hand afoot. How often was the estimate reviewed for accuracy? Once in a blue moon? Is the 90% design complete yet and ready for approval and the execution contract agreed? How are the Contractor relations and designer? Don't think so.

 

[UrbanWarrior]

Well… wow. I missed some news. This is f*cked up. $6.2 billion for 7 stations, none of which are near densely populated areas? They even nixed Centre Street South Station, and that had the largest population within walking distance of it. Good lord what a shit show. I’ve lost faith now. Edmonton can do a major project and Calgary can’t?

 

[kempes_78]

This is still not a go yet, is it? The city is celebrating a nothing accomplishment again, this still requires and provincial and federal sign-off. We're getting close, no doubt but unless I'm not understanding correctly, no new work is starting anytime soon.

Still got 90% design to clear. What curve balls will be thrown? Is the execution agreement signed. Internal issues are far from finalised.

 

[Joborule]

I do understand that it sucks that the Centre Street Station in the Beltline is cut, but considering that the stations on 7 Avenue are still walkable distance to 17th Ave (including the eventual Green Line one), the Centre Street Station was a luxury rather than a need, and it being cut doesn't diminish the value of the line for Beltline residence that would want to head to the SE or North in the future.

 

[FCC1982]

Well… wow. I missed some news. This is f*cked up. $6.2 billion for 7 stations, none of which are near densely populated areas? They even nixed Centre Street South Station, and that had the largest population within walking distance of it. Good lord what a shit show. I’ve lost faith now. Edmonton can do a major project and Calgary can’t?

I’m not too sure about that:

The Valley Line is (finally) opening: Here's how we got to this point

Edmonton's Valley Line LRT is finally opening. Here's a look at how we got here.

edmontonjournal.com

 

[ByeByeBaby]

Everyone talks about inflation as the reason the project has ballooned, but what exactly is causing the increase? Is it labor? materials? engineering? Or was scope changed? How do we make sure the next time a project doesn't get completely changed from proposal to construction.

I don't know a ton about the nuts-and-bolts of construction, but I thought I'd have a look at this anyway. There's a detailed building price index available, which tracks the overall cost of residential and nonresidential building construction; the nonresidential is a mix of office, factory, warehouse, shopping centre, school and bus depot -- but the more detailed, I suspect the less reliable it is. Here's the nonresidential price index for Calgary by building component:

Note that it's an index where 2017 is 100, so the overall cost of nonresidential buildings has an index of 129; i.e. prices have gone up 29% since 2017. An LRT line is not a building, although it uses a lot of the same materials and trades; but like less plumbing and more earthwork than a typical building. The big component with really high cost increases are in metals and wood; a lot of the next ones, like openings, finishes and plumbing are not going to have a ton of use in an LRT system, I think.

Here's a few key dimensions over time, with the overall composite nonresidential building as a thick dashed line, (which will be the same line in all of the next figures so it's a useful reference):

Metal work had a spike in mid 2018, but otherwise, everything was quite flat price-wise until 2021, when the prices really started spiking; some have levelled off, and some still seem to be increasing.

Digging in a little bit more, there is also an industrial product price index, which breaks down the cost of a wide range of specific products at the national level. Here's the price of a few products that might be useful to buy if you're building an LRT line. (Note that the index in the link uses 2020 as a reference, and I've rebased it to have 2017 as the base, so it can be plotted along with the nonresidential building construction price index).

Some of these are really massive price increases; metal products almost doubled in price, with almost all of that increase in 2021. Heavy equipment and rolling stock went up less than construction as a whole, but in general it seems like materials went up faster than their underlying construction costs.

Which leaves labour as another key element; I don't think it'll surprise people what happened to labour if materials went up faster than construction overall. I've got two sources here; one is the union construction wage for Calgary, and one is average weekly earnings in Alberta by industry. Note that these are not identical measures -- you can increase someone's wage and cut their hours, or keep their wage flat but give them overtime to increase their earnings. You can also have someone more productive make more output for the same earnings. Not to mention that plenty of construction workers are non-union (especially in terms of 'construction industry workers', which includes the office staff at construction companies, managers, etc.) Note that the union wage numbers are only updated twice a year.

The actual union wages were pretty flat until 2023; while earnings more generally rose about 20% pretty steadily, but the all get to the same ballpark in the end. In any case, these are going up at a lower rate than construction in general.

Note this is a period of pretty substantial consumer price increases: here are the union wages (in actual dollars), both in current dollars (i.e. what the pay stub will say) and in constant 2017 dollars (i.e. how much they can buy relative to 2017 after inflation), showing the reduced buying power because of inflation:

On paper, these workers saw their wages go up by 20% or so since 2017, mostly in the past year. At the checkout, they can afford about 92-94% of what they could 7 1/2 years ago, and the recent wage bumps only take them back to mid-2021 purchasing power.

All this of course doesn't include other potential inflation factors (land acquisition -- house prices have shot up; financing costs -- interest also spiked), as well as likely the other culprits of scope creep, mispricing risk because of the design-build contract structure, etc, etc, etc.

How many billion would have been saved had the UCP and Rick McIver not put funding on hold for 2 years during COVID when we were still the only major project of this kind in NA? And all to review it and find nothing worth changing. And now they will point out this insufficient, butchered Phase 1 and say: “see! It wasn’t worth doing.”

No matter what you look at, the UCP put the hold on it starting December 2020... if I could time market spikes like that, I'd be too rich to bother posting here. (Just kidding, I'd post more, but with even fancier graphs... maybe Dijon graphs.)

 

[kempes_78]

Well… wow. I missed some news. This is f*cked up. $6.2 billion for 7 stations, none of which are near densely populated areas? They even nixed Centre Street South Station, and that had the largest population within walking distance of it. Good lord what a shit show. I’ve lost faith now. Edmonton can do a major project and Calgary can’t?

Less for more: the City has a lot to answer for. Poor management and planning for the design and estimate phase. Bold of the City to announce a new value without a full design in place!

 

[kempes_78]

I don't know a ton about the nuts-and-bolts of construction, but I thought I'd have a look at this anyway. There's a detailed building price index available, which tracks the overall cost of residential and nonresidential building construction; the nonresidential is a mix of office, factory, warehouse, shopping centre, school and bus depot -- but the more detailed, I suspect the less reliable it is. Here's the nonresidential price index for Calgary by building component:

View attachment 585028
Note that it's an index where 2017 is 100, so the overall cost of nonresidential buildings has an index of 129; i.e. prices have gone up 29% since 2017. An LRT line is not a building, although it uses a lot of the same materials and trades; but like less plumbing and more earthwork than a typical building. The big component with really high cost increases are in metals and wood; a lot of the next ones, like openings, finishes and plumbing are not going to have a ton of use in an LRT system, I think.

Here's a few key dimensions over time, with the overall composite nonresidential building as a thick dashed line, (which will be the same line in all of the next figures so it's a useful reference):
View attachment 585038
Metal work had a spike in mid 2018, but otherwise, everything was quite flat price-wise until 2021, when the prices really started spiking; some have levelled off, and some still seem to be increasing.

Digging in a little bit more, there is also an industrial product price index, which breaks down the cost of a wide range of specific products at the national level. Here's the price of a few products that might be useful to buy if you're building an LRT line. (Note that the index in the link uses 2020 as a reference, and I've rebased it to have 2017 as the base, so it can be plotted along with the nonresidential building construction price index).

View attachment 585037

Some of these are really massive price increases; metal products almost doubled in price, with almost all of that increase in 2021. Heavy equipment and rolling stock went up less than construction as a whole, but in general it seems like materials went up faster than their underlying construction costs.

Which leaves labour as another key element; I don't think it'll surprise people what happened to labour if materials went up faster than construction overall. I've got two sources here; one is the union construction wage for Calgary, and one is average weekly earnings in Alberta by industry. Note that these are not identical measures -- you can increase someone's wage and cut their hours, or keep their wage flat but give them overtime to increase their earnings. You can also have someone more productive make more output for the same earnings. Not to mention that plenty of construction workers are non-union (especially in terms of 'construction industry workers', which includes the office staff at construction companies, managers, etc.) Note that the union wage numbers are only updated twice a year.
View attachment 585040
The actual union wages were pretty flat until 2023; while earnings more generally rose about 20% pretty steadily, but the all get to the same ballpark in the end. In any case, these are going up at a lower rate than construction in general.

Note this is a period of pretty substantial consumer price increases: here are the union wages (in actual dollars), both in current dollars (i.e. what the pay stub will say) and in constant 2017 dollars (i.e. how much they can buy relative to 2017 after inflation), showing the reduced buying power because of inflation:
View attachment 585041
On paper, these workers saw their wages go up by 20% or so since 2017, mostly in the past year. At the checkout, they can afford about 92-94% of what they could 7 1/2 years ago, and the recent wage bumps only take them back to mid-2021 purchasing power.

All this of course doesn't include other potential inflation factors (land acquisition -- house prices have shot up; financing costs -- interest also spiked), as well as likely the other culprits of scope creep, mispricing risk because of the design-build contract structure, etc, etc, etc.


No matter what you look at, the UCP put the hold on it starting December 2020... if I could time market spikes like that, I'd be too rich to bother posting here. (Just kidding, I'd post more, but with even fancier graphs... maybe Dijon graphs.)

You are using the wrong index. Google civil or industrial engineering pricing. Find railroads and you will get answers. Using a risk reward contract is asking for trouble in getting a firmer price. Who is cost controlling this?

 

[Ramsayite]

You are using the wrong index. Google civil or industrial engineering pricing. Find railroads and you will get answers. Using a risk reward contract is asking for trouble in getting a firmer price. Who is cost controlling this?

I'm just going to comment on the strange fact that you created this account recently just to post these kinds of cryptic messages of outrage and opposition. You've posted like 10 times in this thread to say basically the same thing.

 

[O-tac]

Look at all these new posters coming out of the woodwork to defend the province and exclusively blame the city. Sure there’s blame to go around but objectively the province delaying the project in 2020 resulted in the price skyrocketing.