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Calgary Regional Rail Transit
- Thread starter Oddball
- Start date
Operater
Active Member
Hi All,
I Find the Comments About Psgr Rail Out of Calgary Interesting. NO bad Feeling but It Ain't going to Happen, If it WAS Hunter Harrison Still Running C P R, You would B Laughed Out the Door so Fast You wouldn't Know what Hit You, Its Being Blunt. The NEW GUY, Who Took Over in Jan 2017 Might B Receptive to Limited Psgr Rail between Calgary - High River, Cochrane and Airdrie if That. Lake Louise, Banff, Canmore? Good Luck on That. If Your Lucky Maybe You can Get Trudope and the Libtards to Pay for It, Calgary & the Alberta Gvnt sure Won't B dishing out the Green Stamps to Pay for It. Is there a Market for It,, Yes.Is there any Co -operation Between Gvmnts
Not on Your Life, YET Its OK Hit the Taxpayers for a Carbon Tax - M0ney that Could Pay for It. Just a Few Opinions.
Tnx,
Operater.
I Find the Comments About Psgr Rail Out of Calgary Interesting. NO bad Feeling but It Ain't going to Happen, If it WAS Hunter Harrison Still Running C P R, You would B Laughed Out the Door so Fast You wouldn't Know what Hit You, Its Being Blunt. The NEW GUY, Who Took Over in Jan 2017 Might B Receptive to Limited Psgr Rail between Calgary - High River, Cochrane and Airdrie if That. Lake Louise, Banff, Canmore? Good Luck on That. If Your Lucky Maybe You can Get Trudope and the Libtards to Pay for It, Calgary & the Alberta Gvnt sure Won't B dishing out the Green Stamps to Pay for It. Is there a Market for It,, Yes.Is there any Co -operation Between Gvmnts
Not on Your Life, YET Its OK Hit the Taxpayers for a Carbon Tax - M0ney that Could Pay for It. Just a Few Opinions.
Tnx,
Operater.
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UrbanWarrior
Senior Member
That would be awesome.
darwink
Senior Member
AJX
Active Member
Is the volume the amount of car trips to Banff?
darwink
Senior Member
Mountain Avenue Two-way Traffic I believe.
Or traffic across the bridge. Which as a choke point would be the natural place to measure. The gondola initial study had it for a few points iirc.
One of these red circles:
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JasperTF
New Member
The Banff Long Term Transportation Study shows that 93% of Banff's annual 3.8 million visitors arrive in a personal vehicle, traffic congestion is an issue with approximately 1,000 parking stalls required in the short term. Banff has a reputation for being one of Canada's national treasures, options that are up for consideration to improve visitor experiences include park-and-ride lots, new roadway links, transit enhancements and aerial transit (gondolas). On average 23,751 vehicles per day enter Banff town-site. Intercept parking is commonly used where space is not readily available at the destination area, or where the presence of vehicles would undermine the visitor experience. By providing a safe and inviting place for visitors to park their vehicles outside the destination, the character of the destination can be retained and the visitor experience can be enhanced with the removal of congestion and a convenient and environmentally friendly transit system. A trail of the intercept lot concept is possible using existing stalls in the Fenlands lot, if successful it would be easy to expand the lot size. Expanding road capacity will not substantially reduce vehicle wait times and would simply shift the problem elsewhere in the road network that has not been expanded. In order to resolve congestion, around 7,400 vehicles per day would need to be removed from the road system, in the short term park-and-ride schemes will be effective, for the long term and efficient, frequent and fast rail service will meet those needs.
Amalgamation of On-It, Roam and Airdrie Transit under a single entity controlled by a Calgary Regional Partnership Transportation Group would be an initial step, the Airdrie Transit buses on routes 901 and 902 could be used for an enhanced connection between Canmore and Banff, and to an intercept lot at Fenlands and another at junction 89 on Highway 1. GO Transit's Regional Express Rail program will not become operational until 2022, at which point rolling stock will become available to use for commuter rail services Airdrie-Calgary and Okotoks-Calgary, and weekend/holiday train service Calgary-Banff. For the longer term, establishing an intercept lot at Fenlands would lead to an aerial gondola to Norquay, eliminating the hill climb and allowing development of the parking lot, and another aerial gondola to the Cave and Basin and on to Banff Upper Hot Springs/Sulphur Mountain, creating a transportation hub at the Banff railway station, with access to the bus station for scenic tours and easy walking distance to Banff Avenue.
For movement of people around Banff, aerial transit would be a convenient long term solution, being grade separated they are not subject to congestion that occurs with at-grade solutions, aerial transit is also a visitor experience in itself. The best alignment for an aerial transit system would be one that does not travel over private property, has minimal visual impact from residences and principle viewpoints, and connects the principle visitor destinations. By establishing the intercept lot at Fenlands, it would make a convenient point as a start of aerial transit, one gondola up to Norquay, and another to the Cave and Basin and on to Banff Upper Hot Springs/Sulphur Mountain. Neither of these routes cross private property, and nor do they cross Banff town-site or Banff Avenue. For the destinations, aerial transit could lead to the closure of various parking lots that could instead be used as locations for additional facilities that could enhance the visitor experience.
https://www.albertaregionalrail.com/
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darwink
Senior Member
The options, plus the blue Norquay access (pretty unlikely in my opinion). The red option you maintain the viewscape of Cascade Mountain for most of Main St, but it is slower from the intercept lot to the Main St. Green is the preferred option from the study, the different branches being whether maintaining the maximum view from the hot springs or the Rimrock is more important. Orange is an option for a second intercept lot, but increases complexity of the system.
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JasperTF
New Member
This is how I would see the routing of the gondolas.
Black - car parking
Yellow - ARR station
Blue - Norquay gondola
Red - Cave&Basin and Hot Springs&Sulphur Mountain gondola
https://www.albertaregionalrail.com/
Black - car parking
Yellow - ARR station
Blue - Norquay gondola
Red - Cave&Basin and Hot Springs&Sulphur Mountain gondola
https://www.albertaregionalrail.com/
Attachments
hollahollaholla
New Member
So I have been emailing CP, Parks Canada and different towns around Calgary to try to find any interests in these places on a regional rail system. So far all my replies have been mixed:
CP claimed they would tolerate trains on their rails as long as they don't cut into their profit and they won't help in any costs.
Parks Canada only cares about keeping the integrity of the park from an environmental perspective and pushed more of the responsibility on CP as it's their rails.
VIA very quickly said there are no plans to expand service to western Canada in the future.
Haven't heard back from Okotoks or Cochrane however I have read in the past that Cochrane has been very on board with a commuter rail service.
Airdrie: I found the response very interesting. They said that long term heavy or commuter rail is very effective in Europe and Asia and has a place in an integrated transportation system. However they only want to focus on their 10 year plan to increase ICE service and eventually bus to a green line terminal in the north while also protecting corridors for green line all the way to Airdrie.
On some anecdotal evidence I talked to some lovely Parks Canada ladies who had choice words about CP. CP doesn't really care about anything was their opinions, won't help fencing to protect bears, won't do anything that may cost them money, billions in profit to be made. Then one of the ladies said "they're really just a bunch of dicks".
I feel like if Calgary wants to set up a regional rail system then the CRP will need to set up a corporation similar to Translink or Metrolinx. They can start trying to acquire track from CP (which I assume on their mainline will be impossible) or at least trying to get time to run rush hour trains. I think there is a great opportunity to acquire rolling stock from GO Transit once they electrify their lines so we could buy trains for cheap. If the LRT has proven anything it's that in this car loving, wide highway part of the country people are willing to take trains. For me a line from Airdrie to Okotoks with a few intermediate stops would be a good start. That guy in Banff wants to bring back passenger trains and I hope all the best for that, maybe a train every 2 hours express to Banff and commuter service during peak times. We need a Calgary Metropolitan Transit company to be set up before anything can move forward and put pressure on elected officials to make that happen.
But man do I ever wanna get on a commuter train to go places around Calgary.
CP claimed they would tolerate trains on their rails as long as they don't cut into their profit and they won't help in any costs.
Parks Canada only cares about keeping the integrity of the park from an environmental perspective and pushed more of the responsibility on CP as it's their rails.
VIA very quickly said there are no plans to expand service to western Canada in the future.
Haven't heard back from Okotoks or Cochrane however I have read in the past that Cochrane has been very on board with a commuter rail service.
Airdrie: I found the response very interesting. They said that long term heavy or commuter rail is very effective in Europe and Asia and has a place in an integrated transportation system. However they only want to focus on their 10 year plan to increase ICE service and eventually bus to a green line terminal in the north while also protecting corridors for green line all the way to Airdrie.
On some anecdotal evidence I talked to some lovely Parks Canada ladies who had choice words about CP. CP doesn't really care about anything was their opinions, won't help fencing to protect bears, won't do anything that may cost them money, billions in profit to be made. Then one of the ladies said "they're really just a bunch of dicks".
I feel like if Calgary wants to set up a regional rail system then the CRP will need to set up a corporation similar to Translink or Metrolinx. They can start trying to acquire track from CP (which I assume on their mainline will be impossible) or at least trying to get time to run rush hour trains. I think there is a great opportunity to acquire rolling stock from GO Transit once they electrify their lines so we could buy trains for cheap. If the LRT has proven anything it's that in this car loving, wide highway part of the country people are willing to take trains. For me a line from Airdrie to Okotoks with a few intermediate stops would be a good start. That guy in Banff wants to bring back passenger trains and I hope all the best for that, maybe a train every 2 hours express to Banff and commuter service during peak times. We need a Calgary Metropolitan Transit company to be set up before anything can move forward and put pressure on elected officials to make that happen.
But man do I ever wanna get on a commuter train to go places around Calgary.
JasperTF
New Member
Can you email me through my website.
https://www.albertaregionalrail.com/
I would be interested in knowing who you have been talking to and what their exact response was, if you are willing to help I am open to advice, ideas, and anything you are willing to offer. Regional Rail will happen, it is just a matter of when.
hollahollaholla
New Member
Yeah I'll try to fish them out and get back to you I just cleared out my inbox not long ago. I think I mostly got replies from PR people except for Airdrie it was the transit coordinator Chris. I also got a response by Jeff from LRT on the green talking about his position and the steps to take. Right need he wants the green line to go north and have build outs for that, then he'll worry about regional rail.
Cowtown
Senior Member
I like the idea of a regional rail system, but I'll throw this question out there. Do you think the benefit will outweigh the cost at this point? I haven't looked into all the details, but I would assume a regional bus network would be much cheaper.
darwink
Senior Member
Rail can bypass chokepoints and delay needed highway expansions by even bringing down peak of peak by 100 cars an hour, due to the nature of how congestion works (u-shaped curves, market failures, and how congestion happens).
Benefits vs costs really depend as what you count as a benefit — are you counting the amortized cost of not building an extra lane as a benefit for example.
I think you could get a substantial system running for $1 billion - buying rights to right of way, expanding CPR lines to accommodate 2 way traffic all day at 30 minutes or better frequency. If it would hold off expansion of the following orange bits for the foreseeable future, I think it would be worth it:
Benefits vs costs really depend as what you count as a benefit — are you counting the amortized cost of not building an extra lane as a benefit for example.
I think you could get a substantial system running for $1 billion - buying rights to right of way, expanding CPR lines to accommodate 2 way traffic all day at 30 minutes or better frequency. If it would hold off expansion of the following orange bits for the foreseeable future, I think it would be worth it:
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Habanero
Active Member
I was going to say kind of the same thing. If you're leveraging existing train track infrastructure via CPR the costs should be bad, getting the buy in from CPR might be more prohibitive.