[dkazzed]

My most hated crossing (and I think some others will share this hatred) is the 114 st/University Ave crossing. That one is a complete clusterf**k that should've never seen the light of day.

The 111 avenue/106 street crossing at Kingsway is also right up there too

I very much agree with both. Especially with badly needed frequency increases to the south.

I cross 82 St and 112 Ave lots and never had any issue there. I think we're at least 30 years away until we hit capacity at 5 minute frequencies on the NE leg, contingent on Gorman and Horse Hills getting built out. Although the TOD that's finally getting built immediately north of Clareview is exciting.

 

[SarcasticMarmot]

My most hated crossing (and I think some others will share this hatred) is the 114 st/University Ave crossing. That one is a complete clusterf**k that should've never seen the light of day.

The 111 avenue/106 street crossing at Kingsway is also right up there too

Agree on the University Ave crossing. The 111 ave crossing isn't nearly as bad as it used to be, once they ditched the Thales signaling system its been fine. I drive down 112/111 frequently and the stretch from Commonwealth to the Royal Alex is much worse than the Kingsway intersection.

 

[dkazzed]

It's not terrible and Metro Line will probably not see the need for better than 5 minute frequencies in our lifetime. I think the main issue is that they allowed 106 St to continue to exist as is despite the fact traffic volumes barely even support it being one lane in each direction and traffic could have been diverted to 109 or 101 St instead. It's an extra traffic light cycle for no great reason.

 

[The_Cat]

Pedestrian traffic can also be a challenge at 106/111/Kingsway.

 

[Avenuer]

The City really should've elevated the Metro Line from south of Kingsway to north of Princess Elizabeth at NAIT, that would've avoided the level crossings at Kingsway, 111 Avenue, 106 Street and Princess Elizabeth. 1.5 km of elevated track with one elevated station at Kingsway/Royal Alex.

 

[The_Cat]

Reese from RM Transit releases a crayoning video for Edmonton!

It's been nearly six months since @Reecemartin shared his video on long-term LRT in Edmonton. I thought I'd revisit this video because some of his proposals are close to Edmonton's proposals for the proposed BRT routes.

I still like the 66 Street alignment for the Valley Line. Even if 50 Street is the preferred long-term route, the Valley Line could head east on AHD, like the Capital Line to Ellerslie Road.

 

[HappyJazzz]

Here's a quick diagram of what I described above

View attachment 621167

This was partly inspired by looking into recent accident stats, and finding what the city is now calling the high injury network.

View attachment 621168

Was really surprised to see how bad the 97st corridor is for all transport modes. It seems clear to me that an LRT line could work exceptionally well there, especially if built elevated.

It would not only get the the busses off the road, but it would visually present drivers with an attractive alternative to their car based commute.

These are things the 113st row can't do.

For what metro extension work is going to cost, it has to provide better service than a pseudo-streetcar!

Moving this over from the Valley Line thread, but I did some pondering on some of the comments and made a couple of adjustments to my re-imagined metro line.

First change is the crossover of the legs in the north end of Blatchford, with a hub station at VIA.
This gives users of both legs direct access to the rail hub, and gives NAIT staff and students faster access to the campus from the indirectly connected leg.

It also removes the enormous and costly bridge that's in the current metro plan from the equation.
Money which would be better spent on extending the tunnel downtown. Which leads to..

Second change is adding the pivot into grandin and govt stations, where a direct HSR route would likely terminate, then going back up to corona and the rest of the route.

I included the planned metro extension on this map to show just how easily that routing could be covered by BRT between the legs of the revised route.

Would the longer routing cost more?
Of course! But I think it'd be worth it.
And if done quickly, I think we could get the feds to cover at least half the costs, if not more..

 

[The_Cat]

I like the connection at Yellowhead. My gut feeling Is that the bridge over the rail yards will skyrocket in price and Edmonton could get in the same fight that Calgary did over the Green Line.

 

[Barnaby]

With the build out of High Point Clairview coming along nicely, it may be worth exploring the single station extension to Gorman. Construction should happen prior to development of this area.

All that is needed is two crossings with integration to CN's signalling, and a barebones high floor station. My napkin math says $150-200 million for this extension. This is assuming track and catenary is build out to Kuhlmann's, but not including that station and future Park and Ride.

Peanuts compared to the Metro Line bridge cost, that will be sure to exceed $500 million.

For just the cost of this giant bridge we could get a Capital Line Gorman extension, and a Valley Like West Extension from Brewery to the VIA rail station.

 

[The_Cat]

Something like stops at 127 Avenue, 137 Avenue/Northgate, 153 Avenue/Eaux Claires (on 97 Street) and 127 Street, Skyview (137 Avenue) and Maki Transit Centre might make more sense, along with at stop at the CN Station.

 

[Barnaby]

How much would a completely elevated alignment from Blachford to until 153 Avenue cost? It would be 5 km of elevated track and 1.8 km of ground level track to Castle Downs.

This would eliminate an underground station, and the bridge that is going to be mindblowingly expensive.

I included the spans of the current planned bridge, and what the 97th Street alignment would be. It would require a steel girder bridge for the CN crossing, but no supports on CN land would be needed.

The elevated stations could be build with BART style fare gates, and barebones like the Canada Line. The trains could also run at 80-90 kmh for 97th portion.

 

[HappyJazzz]

How much would a completely elevated alignment from Blachford to until 153 Avenue cost? It would be 5 km of elevated track and 1.8 km of ground level track to Castle Downs.

This would eliminate an underground station, and the bridge that is going to be mindblowingly expensive.

I included the spans of the current planned bridge, and what the 97th Street alignment would be. It would require a steel girder bridge for the CN crossing, but no supports on CN land would be needed.

The elevated stations could be build with BART style fare gates, and barebones like the Canada Line. The trains could also run at 80-90 kmh for 97th portion.

View attachment 623545View attachment 623551

The route chosen for this is truly baffling...
Thanks for putting numbers on it, needing a bridge that's 5 times longer to serve a route with extremely dubious benefits is just classic Edmonton...

As far as future plans go, this article offers a great analysis of the Canada line project, very insightful.
A lot of lessons to be learned on the P3 model, as well as TOD structure and methods.

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1087724X211003099?icid=int.sj-abstract.citing-articles.90

 

[The_Cat]

The NW LRT route was created over 20 years ago. It was originally planned as a Bus Rapid Transit route.

 

[HappyJazzz]

And a bus route it should stay...
The LRT plan always had three legs in the north, the current metro line plan is just another attempt at a 2 for 1 project, and like many value propositions it's lousy at everything.

 

[dkazzed]

Now hear me out, it's almost 7 metres wide, the trains are about 2.6m wide? We can make it fit. We're going to have to shuffle lanes arounds, move the SUP over, move the counterflow lane over, but it'll work.