That's good news at least that Federal funding won't be impacted should the CPC win. Hopefully it can start full steam ahead now.
 
There's a reason Rempel turned off the comments on her tweet. Here's the announcement without the spin

https://calgary.ctvnews.ca/o-toole-...en-line-lrt-funding-with-conditions-1.5570089

Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi, who is not running for re-election in the October municipal election, said he was somewhat confused by O'Toole's announcement, as the Green Line has already been approved by the federal government.

"What I'm reading that saying is they're actually going to cancel that approval, and they will only fund a different project, thereby leading to much more delay," he said.

"I will tell you unequivocally, the federal government, the previous Harper government and the Trudeau government, were in no way the cause of any delays on this project. That is all the government of Alberta, it is all Premier (Jason) Kenney, and to make aspersions otherwise is simply not true."
 
There's a reason Rempel turned off the comments on her tweet. Here's the announcement without the spin

https://calgary.ctvnews.ca/o-toole-...en-line-lrt-funding-with-conditions-1.5570089

Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi, who is not running for re-election in the October municipal election, said he was somewhat confused by O'Toole's announcement, as the Green Line has already been approved by the federal government.

"What I'm reading that saying is they're actually going to cancel that approval, and they will only fund a different project, thereby leading to much more delay," he said.

"I will tell you unequivocally, the federal government, the previous Harper government and the Trudeau government, were in no way the cause of any delays on this project. That is all the government of Alberta, it is all Premier (Jason) Kenney, and to make aspersions otherwise is simply not true."
Hopefully Nenshi’s interpretation isn’t true. But there are a number of conditions that O’Toole outlined including provincial approval, which as we all know, has been a major stumbling block in this whole debacle!
 
Hopefully Nenshi’s interpretation isn’t true. But there are a number of conditions that O’Toole outlined including provincial approval, which as we all know, has been a major stumbling block in this whole debacle!
I mean, wouldn’t federal funding be contingent on provincial approval regardless of which party is in power? Without the provincial portion of funding, there is no project, so it seems like it’s a moot point who is Prime Minister.
 
But the province already approved the new plan back in July when Trudeau was in town?

https://calgaryherald.com/news/loca...ince-approves-calgarys-green-line-lrt-project

So isn't the federal component of the funding now in jeopardy if we have a new Prime Minister based on what O'Toole is saying?
I think I missed the nuance that the Conservatives said funding would be conditional on the City developing a plan to build the Green Line in its entirety.

I can’t decide if the Conservatives would actually withhold funding for Phase I and II unless the City comes up with a plan to build the entire Green Line. What does “reasonable amount of time” really mean with respect to building the other segments of the line, especially when the City has always expressed its intention to build the entire line once funding was available.

I don’t really see the Conservatives inserting themselves when the feds have never been the problem (despite O’Toole’s claim that the delays are Trudeau’s fault). I also disagree with Nenshi’s assessment that the delays are all Jason Kennedy’s fault. The City shares plenty of blame. Maybe it’s because I ignore news about Edmonton, but it doesn’t seem like Edmonton has this much trouble building transit.

I think the Conservatives are trying to appeal to undecided voters, and voters in Rempel’s riding by indicating their commitment to fund the entire line, and at the same time, appealing to their base by appearing cost conscious, but I don’t really see them pulling current funding when the City and the Province have finally come to terms.
 
From the Election thread:
Jan Damery promises to prioritize as the next phase of the Green Line for 2030:
  • North to 64th
  • South to McKenzie Towne
  • Line grade separated either above or below ground at 16th Avenue North
1632149397726.png
 
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From the Election thread:
Jan Damery promises to prioritize as the next phase of the Green Line for 2030:
  • North to 64th
  • South to McKenzie Towne
  • Line grade separated either above or below ground at 16th Avenue North
View attachment 350286
Speaking of route 305, when they give it the MAX upgrade, I think it should take a different routing than it does currently. Instead of turning off 14 Street NW to go into Kensington, it should continue down Bow Trail, and get to Parkdale Blvd via Crowhcild instead. And then when it gets to Bowness, it should take a different route so it can go through the Trinity Hills area rather than down to the Bowness turnaround point for buses. The route 1 can handle the ridership for the current route it does west of downtown.

The 305 should be focused on getting people from West Calgary to downtown as quickly and direct as possible, while hitting hotspots along the way. I'm conflicted if it should directly hit the Foothills Hospital by going down 16th Ave rather than Parkdale Blvd.
 
Speaking of route 305, when they give it the MAX upgrade, I think it should take a different routing than it does currently. Instead of turning off 14 Street NW to go into Kensington, it should continue down Bow Trail, and get to Parkdale Blvd via Crowhcild instead. And then when it gets to Bowness, it should take a different route so it can go through the Trinity Hills area rather than down to the Bowness turnaround point for buses. The route 1 can handle the ridership for the current route it does west of downtown.

The 305 should be focused on getting people from West Calgary to downtown as quickly and direct as possible, while hitting hotspots along the way. I'm conflicted if it should directly hit the Foothills Hospital by going down 16th Ave rather than Parkdale Blvd.

I don't have a strong opinion on what the 305 should do on the west end past 77th St; it currently goes to Bowfort Road and COP, maybe it should stop at Greenwich, maybe Trinity Hills, who knows -- there's so many little nodes scattered around there, none of them super vital. I don't know what sort of visitorship COP gets (in a normal tourist / sports season). Heck, this area is building out and maybe the best answer today is different in two years.

However, I think it'd be a mistake to take Crowchild when running as a MAX service. It does save time; Google says that it's 5 minutes from Parkdale/29th to 9th/11 St via Crowchild and 7 minutes via Kensington Road. The difference might be a little more when there's more traffic -- although the Crowchild route would skip what might be the only transit priority feature on the corridor, the bus advance light at Kensington/Parkdale by Pizza Bob's. So there is a benefit; it's 31 minutes from 77 St W to 2nd St downtown and it might save 2 or 3 minutes, maybe 10%.

But there's a cost for this benefit; the 305 would skip three stops, on Kensington Road at 14th St, at 19th St and then at Crowchild. And those are significant nodes.
Here's the entire corridor. The dots at each stop represent the activity; the orange ones are scaled to population within 400m walking distance (the largest is 1750 people at 14th St), and the blue ones are scaled to the number of businesses (the largest is 83 in Bowness). There's 14 stops on the route; the 14th St stop is #1 for people and #2 for businesses, the 19th St stop is #2 for people and #4 for businesses, the stop at Crowchild is #7 and #8, about the corridor average.
1632337549675.png


BRT should in theory -- if operated frequently, not six times a day like the 305 -- draw from further than 400m. But it's hard to evaluate individual stops at that level, since what's 800m from one stop might be right at the next one. So I looked at groups of stops in the four communities served; here's a map if needed:
1632337917087.png

1632338791257.png


The three stops in Hillhurst have about 1/3 of the population of the corridor and half of the businesses. Some of the businesses on the longer end is that Kensington Rd up to 10th St is within 800m of the 14th St stop, but I'd note that 1) this stop provides corridor residents access to Kensington, and 2) even without the further stops, there is more within 400m of the Hillhurst stops than there is within 800m of Montgomery or Bowness.

I think that serving all of the people with all of the travel time is better than serving 2/3 of the people with 10% less travel time.

Bonus fun fact: The reason the 305 doesn't follow the 1 all the way to 10th St is that the corner of Kensington Rd and 10th St is too tight for bendy buses.
 

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I don't have a strong opinion on what the 305 should do on the west end past 77th St; it currently goes to Bowfort Road and COP, maybe it should stop at Greenwich, maybe Trinity Hills, who knows -- there's so many little nodes scattered around there, none of them super vital. I don't know what sort of visitorship COP gets (in a normal tourist / sports season). Heck, this area is building out and maybe the best answer today is different in two years.

However, I think it'd be a mistake to take Crowchild when running as a MAX service. It does save time; Google says that it's 5 minutes from Parkdale/29th to 9th/11 St via Crowchild and 7 minutes via Kensington Road. The difference might be a little more when there's more traffic -- although the Crowchild route would skip what might be the only transit priority feature on the corridor, the bus advance light at Kensington/Parkdale by Pizza Bob's. So there is a benefit; it's 31 minutes from 77 St W to 2nd St downtown and it might save 2 or 3 minutes, maybe 10%.

But there's a cost for this benefit; the 305 would skip three stops, on Kensington Road at 14th St, at 19th St and then at Crowchild. And those are significant nodes.
Here's the entire corridor. The dots at each stop represent the activity; the orange ones are scaled to population within 400m walking distance (the largest is 1750 people at 14th St), and the blue ones are scaled to the number of businesses (the largest is 83 in Bowness). There's 14 stops on the route; the 14th St stop is #1 for people and #2 for businesses, the 19th St stop is #2 for people and #4 for businesses, the stop at Crowchild is #7 and #8, about the corridor average.
View attachment 350713

BRT should in theory -- if operated frequently, not six times a day like the 305 -- draw from further than 400m. But it's hard to evaluate individual stops at that level, since what's 800m from one stop might be right at the next one. So I looked at groups of stops in the four communities served; here's a map if needed:

View attachment 350716

The three stops in Hillhurst have about 1/3 of the population of the corridor and half of the businesses. Some of the businesses on the longer end is that Kensington Rd up to 10th St is within 800m of the 14th St stop, but I'd note that 1) this stop provides corridor residents access to Kensington, and 2) even without the further stops, there is more within 400m of the Hillhurst stops than there is within 800m of Montgomery or Bowness.

I think that serving all of the people with all of the travel time is better than serving 2/3 of the people with 10% less travel time.

Bonus fun fact: The reason the 305 doesn't follow the 1 all the way to 10th St is that the corner of Kensington Rd and 10th St is too tight for bendy buses.
Good reply. I had my opinion that the BRT should go down Bow, and turn onto Kensington RD/Parkdale BV via Crowchild for the time savings even at the expense of skipping the density of Hillhurt to avoid redundancy with the route 1. This is with an assumption that West Calgary residents would prefer directness to downtown rather than direct connection to the Kensington area. But the time savings could be very minimal, that still sticking through it's current route is an ideal option to provide rapid transit to a growing urban hot spot.

As for 10 ST corner. I believe (not 100%) the route 1 does have some articulated buses on it's route now. If it's indeed the case, then that corner may be not be the barrier it once was then. In that case, it makes the case for the BRT to go through the heart of Kensington on route to West Calgary a lot stronger in my mind. Residents in that part of town would be making Kensington their destination. So being dropped off right at the main corner of the street is very appealing. Same goes for those in that neighborhood that may appreciate having a stronger connection to Winsport and the development occurring around there.
 
I wonder if there is an opportunity to create an overpass or underpass for the road interchange there as well. Wouldn't work well for the urban vibe we want for either street...
 

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