darwink
Senior Member
The big thing right now with being anti-spur is that the entire system is already interlined and until very recently, capacity constrained. Build the Red Line Tunnel, and you can spur.
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- Thread starter Always_Biking
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ByeByeBaby
Active Member
If there was a spur to MRU, the headways (on both west lines) would be 12 minutes peak, 22 minutes midday and 30 minutes evening/weekend right now. Instead of giving somebody something, it would give everybody nothing. If we were in a position to have really high frequencies (including Stephen Ave Subway), then spurs start to make sense; that's where spurs in other cities make sense -- on routes that have sub-5 minute headways in the offpeaks, then sure, serve two corridors. If this city becomes a transit-focused city, then there are two to four spur lines that make sense, and an MRU line is probably among them.
I agree that "TOD Potential" is a pretty bogus and easily gamed measure. However, the ridership projections were pretty accurate IIRC; a MRU alignment with 2/3 the ridership for more money is hard to think of as a winner. Yes, there were unexpected costs on the existing alignment, but there's no reason to assume that there couldn't have been different unexpected costs on a different alignment. And note that the added costs shown are for changing to the alternative alignments; it's not $560 million, plus $180 to add a spur to MRU. It's $740 million to build a line to Westbrook that then turns south to MRU (and has 25K instead of 40K ridership). Building both the existing line and a spur would have been something like $1100 million (and perhaps 50K ridership, assuming high operating frequencies).
I agree that "TOD Potential" is a pretty bogus and easily gamed measure. However, the ridership projections were pretty accurate IIRC; a MRU alignment with 2/3 the ridership for more money is hard to think of as a winner. Yes, there were unexpected costs on the existing alignment, but there's no reason to assume that there couldn't have been different unexpected costs on a different alignment. And note that the added costs shown are for changing to the alternative alignments; it's not $560 million, plus $180 to add a spur to MRU. It's $740 million to build a line to Westbrook that then turns south to MRU (and has 25K instead of 40K ridership). Building both the existing line and a spur would have been something like $1100 million (and perhaps 50K ridership, assuming high operating frequencies).
CBBarnett
Senior Member
Thanks for the explanation, that makes a lot of sense - not to mention the resiliency benefits of splitting the network into two so one line no longer impacts the other if delayed (plus being underground, there's less likelihood of delays on the red line in the first place). Do you know the practical capacity of 7th Avenue today?
I guess I am thinking about it the other way. If a spur existed to MRU, the only loss is frequency for the 69 Street spur. Everyone heading to locations Westbrook to Saddletowne doesn't see their service quality change. So the trade-off (apart from construction cost) is more wait time for 69 Street commuters, but to the benefit of a direct, higher-quality MRU connection for most commuters heading there. It's a suits v. students situation.
It's a trade-off for sure, but a good one IMO. Anecdotally from my commute (pre-pandemic), 69 Street was hyper-downtown and peak-focused, very little reverse or off-peak commuting to the station. 69 Street was the busiest station on the West line - my guess Westbrook and Sunalta are the next two busiest (I really wish CT published station boarding numbers so I don't have to guess!) - but I can't imagine that MRU wouldn't have higher all day traffic given it's jobs and student density.
Of course, lots of this is moot given the operating picture anyways - capacity constraints or dividing headways to imaginary lines don't matter if the current LRT service is such low frequency off-peak that even existing lines are frustratingly slow to use. 16 minute headways on weekend and evening off-peak is brutal right now. In a more transit-focused city the wild difference between peak and off-peak. In our current situation, 6 minute headways for Westbrook-Saddletowne and 12 minute headways peak/midday to both 69th and MRU would feel like transit paradise.
darwink
Senior Member
Except not. The analysis at the time iirc was that for travellers in much of the city, focusing MRU access on the LRT would increase travel times, not decrease them, and as a result, not enable operational cost savings. Hence Max Teal and Max Yellow and the 20. It isn't that LRT service to MRU would be a bad thing, but that it isn't the unalloyed good that it is sometimes perceived to be. Especially given the potential access routes, which each would have serious drawbacks.
What the LRT to MRU would have had: a one seat ride to work for future Mayor Nenshi, who was one of the only independent city commentators at the time.
One project which would have been much more useful for MRU and much cheaper: BRT along 50th Ave SW, connecting to an infill LRT station. It also has the benefit of connecting more directly two very large high schools, bringing the student population for the project from 10,500 (MRU) to ~15,000. In comparison, UCalgary has a FLE count of 33,000. Plus the ATCO Corporate Park.
In the end it is always (unless we start expropriating properties to make rational grid connections as a city wide project, something we should do, but don't) going to be awkward to service because of history: the road grid around it developed when it was an airport.
adamyyc
Active Member
There's a lot of discussion about TODs on the forum, and Calgary's utter failure to establish decent TODs. Interesting TOC proposals in Markham and Richmond Hill, Ontario. Will be fascinating to see how these TOCs turn out 10, 20, 30 years from now.
JonnyCanuck
Senior Member
Wow ... 80 storie towers in Richmond Hill? That is like putting 80 stories in Airdrie.
CBBarnett
Senior Member
Toronto's hyper-TODs are wild. But their property market is wild too.
If the population and economy grows and you prevent building new homes in most places, the pressure must go somewhere - higher and higher prices on what's built + higher development densities to the few slivers of land where growth is possible. Sprawl sometimes seems an attractive option, but is self-defeating in the long-run (as the GTA has painfully learned). However, the pivot to TODs and redevelopment was not smooth for the region and land use changes failed to unlock much of the land base to redevelopment. Throw in decades of cheap debt and a population convinced that property prices shall go up (rapidly) forever and it's a mess.
The comments in the article from long-time residents should be paired with the graph below:
"It's effectively going to be a condo wasteland," said Graham Churchill, a Richmond Hill resident since 2005.
"We'd be jamming it into a small area that really can't take it."
Calgary's TOD and land use policies need to take note, especially as the sprawl game slowly collapses on us in the coming decades. It's far better to have a healthy redevelopment market of a range of densities, ages and types than end up in a polarized mega-tower v. multi-million dollar home trade off like much of the GTA.
Toronto's TODs are hyper crazy, and add great density, but to be honest, I would prefer Calgary's TODs to look like Sunnyside. In the end we'll end up with with some sort of hybrid, with some retail and a few high-rises nearby (like Brentwood and Dalhousie)
Every-time I go past it annoys me to no end to see Staples and Home Depot sitting between Chinook Centre and the LRT station. It's such a lost opportunity.
Every-time I go past it annoys me to no end to see Staples and Home Depot sitting between Chinook Centre and the LRT station. It's such a lost opportunity.
CBBarnett
Senior Member
Agreed. We'd be much further ahead as a city if we took all the boring 3-4 storey walkup apartments we have built throughout the city since the 1970s and just shoved them together with a strong pedestrians network right at the train stations than land-banking forever for tower that don't actually happen.
In such a scenario, 100 years from now someone might critique Calgary for not going dense enough in TODs if we just did solidly designed low/mid rise densities at the stations, but that's 100 years of strong ridership and transit culture ingrained into far more lives. The current strategy is far more risky - creeping transit irrelevance while we wait for imaginary towers.
darwink
Senior Member
The way to undo the landbanking though is universal continual contextual upzone. Now it makes no sense to wait for a higher and better use, ever.
GoVertical
Senior Member
Work underway on Calgary's North Central BRT corridor - LiveWire Calgary
Upgrades have started along Calgary’s North Central bus rapid transit (BRT) corridor, beginning with improvements to the North Pointe terminal station. Last week, councillors heard in the Green Line Q1 update that cost escalations were taking a bite out of the overall budget. With costs on the...
livewirecalgary.com
jhappy77
Active Member
One part of the city where transit really sucks is getting from the SW Calgary neighborhoods by Sarcee to UofC / Foothills / etc. The talk about "completing the grid" made me think about how we could widen Edworthy Street somewhat (tho still keep it moving at a relatively slow speed) and add some bus infrastructure for a new BRT route from the SW to the NW.
The University of Calgary and Foothills would give the route strong ridership anchors. As for the portion in the SW, it could be an extension of the Max Teal, or originate from somewhere else (maybe MRU -> Grey Eagle -> Westhills -> Optimist -> Sirocco -> Edworthy)
Thoughts?
The University of Calgary and Foothills would give the route strong ridership anchors. As for the portion in the SW, it could be an extension of the Max Teal, or originate from somewhere else (maybe MRU -> Grey Eagle -> Westhills -> Optimist -> Sirocco -> Edworthy)
Thoughts?
Urban Outdoorsman
Active Member
I'd love for something like this to link the blue and red lines. I commute from the NW to the SW and it is already bad enough in car, but to take transit takes me about an hour and a half... So I could see something like having some utility, especially if the hypothetical gondola never happens
Joborule
Active Member
I highly doubt will see a transit only crossing through Edworthy Park. That area I feel has a lot of public support to make it more of a proper park/natural reserve if anything. Plus, you can likely get the same result from an alternative - and cheaper - option.
If there's going to be a rapid transit form of connection for the Blue Line to the NW-Hub area, it'll likely be a BRT bus from Westbrook in the medium term, and then if it's justified (likely pushed by developers more so than the city/transit), the gondola would be built to link the two lines.
I'm not sure if I mentioned this in this thread already, but I could see the BRT that would go down Shaganappi from the Sage Hill area being the route that would do this. I also think that if the streetcar from Westbrook to MRU does happen, that the MAX Teal should be rerouted to go up Crowchild from MRU, and go through Foothills, UofC, Children's Hospital, Market Mall, and end at the future Northland LRT station. Therefore there is a rapid transit route that connects the major institutional destinations along the west part of the city. It'll kinda be an upgrade on the route 20, and would give students/commuters in the NW part of the city that go to MRU or Rockyview Hospital a much stronger connection to those locations.
Urban Outdoorsman
Active Member
With all the talk of streetcars in Calgary, I decided to dig around and see what the city has actually come up with in terms of potential routes.
The first and probably the most likely to be built is the SW line connecting MRU to the Blue line:
Although this is far from being a sure thing, as far as I can tell this is the most likely to actually get built one day and could serve as a really good launching point for streetcars in Calgary. I'm guessing once the Greenline has mostly wrapped up, the city might start looking more seriously at improving inner city connections.
The only other document I could find from the city is this report from 2014: https://pub-calgary.escribemeetings.com/filestream.ashx?DocumentId=25143
All in all, I think my fully built out ideal line would start at the 4st SE green line station and go south along Olympic drive past the new stadium, then turning onto 17th avenue past the BMO and following 17th all the way up to 37th street (thus connecting to Westbrook) and the following the proposed alignment to MRU. This alignment would mean the streetcar line connects to the Green line (4th street), the Red line (Victoria Park) and the Blue line (Westbrook) while also connecting the Event center, BMO, 17th ave, Westbrook, MRU and Currie in one shot!
The first and probably the most likely to be built is the SW line connecting MRU to the Blue line:
Although this is far from being a sure thing, as far as I can tell this is the most likely to actually get built one day and could serve as a really good launching point for streetcars in Calgary. I'm guessing once the Greenline has mostly wrapped up, the city might start looking more seriously at improving inner city connections.
The only other document I could find from the city is this report from 2014: https://pub-calgary.escribemeetings.com/filestream.ashx?DocumentId=25143
All in all, I think my fully built out ideal line would start at the 4st SE green line station and go south along Olympic drive past the new stadium, then turning onto 17th avenue past the BMO and following 17th all the way up to 37th street (thus connecting to Westbrook) and the following the proposed alignment to MRU. This alignment would mean the streetcar line connects to the Green line (4th street), the Red line (Victoria Park) and the Blue line (Westbrook) while also connecting the Event center, BMO, 17th ave, Westbrook, MRU and Currie in one shot!