Take Transit Campaign to Province – From the Aldergrove Star

The following is a letter from VALTAC, published in many Fraser Valley newspapers and I believe sums up what the majority of residents think. Regional mayors should think twice before supporting any more TransLink inspired taxes, until the TransLink behemoth itself, cleans house.

Editor:

Re: TransLink Workshop Consultation Process, June 1-2.

Kicked off with a May 27 editorial in the Vancouver Sun by TransLink CEO Tom Prendergast and accompanied by a barrage of print, radio and TV advertising, the TransLink Community Consultation Workshops Showboat made eight stops in the GVRD.

Reports on attendance vary from 15-30 people per event, totaling less turnout than we had for the Mufford Crescent Overpass Open House hosted by the Township at Milner Community Hall on January 31 this year. Why such an abominable turnout despite the major advertising campaign promoting the event, depicting the upcoming challenges and begging for input?

We firmly believe the citizens of the GVRD are very concerned as to how we intend to cope with the 1 million-plus émigrés anticipated over the next 20 years. However, the citizenry simply declined to attend because they are resigned to the fact that in the long run TransLink will do as it pleases and taxpayers will be turned upside down and the required funds to subsidize TransLink will be shaken from their clenched fists. The only question remains in which manner and how painfully will the funds be extracted.

We don’t believe the boardgame used to delineate the options as tabled truly reflected the costs of the various levels of service. We would love to know what it cost for the media advertising blitz, board game development/production, etc. Was this the best use of funds considering the response from the public at large or must it be written off as the cost of the consultative process?

Joe and Mary 6-Pak can only be girding their loins for the inevitable shelling out of $800 per family of four in after-tax dollars, in perpetuity. The best they can hope for is it may possibly arrange for a bus to come closer to their front door with more frequent service or light rail will finally come to the South of the Fraser.

South of the Fraser, and in the Langleys specifically, we are third class citizens compared to North of the Fraser. We will reluctantly contribute the same dollars per capita, endure most of the population growth and continue to receive the least service. Unfortunately, plans I have seen for the future promise little more and guarantee nothing.

We want nothing but the best for South of the Fraser and only ask we somewhat receive in the proportion to what we will give. We await to see where the consultative process now takes us.

VALTAC will conclude by thanking the hundreds of citizens who stopped by our booth at the Langley Canada Day Celebrations. The interest and enthusiasm of the younger crowd (aged 16-23) who do not want to purchase a car and wish to avail themselves of light rail as a transportation alternate was overwhelming and encouraging. The 53-foot-long “mobile sign” has been a truly effective outreach vehicle and was instantly tied to our booth display.

With BC Hydro committed to reconfirmation of passenger running rights on the BCER and all Mayors and Councils South of the Fraser supportive of same, we must now elevate our campaign to the provincial government.

Lee Lockwood, VALTAC Chairperson, Aldergrove

TransLink funding crunch has mayors worried about Evergreen – From the Tri-City News

This is not surprising at all, with very little ridership potential and massive costs, it is real challenge to make the Evergreen Line SkyTrain, light-metro line successful! Again, TransLink completely ignores the folly of building hugely expensive metro lines on transit lines with not nearly enough ridership to demand metro service. TransLink is bankrupt, yet the highly paid mandarins that run the show are completely oblivious to this and plan to build even more expensive metro lines. Maybe we should do away with their $900 monthly car allowances and force the bureaucrats to take transit.

Postscript: For the cost of the Evergreen Line SkyTrain, we could have both a deluxe Vancouver to Chilliwack Interurban and a light-rail Evergreen line.

https://railforthevalley.wordpress.com/2009/07/14/time-to-bell-translinks-cat/

https://railforthevalley.wordpress.com/2008/12/26/can-translinks-business-cases-be-trusted/

By Janis Warren – The Tri-City News

Port Moody’s mayor continued to sound the alarm bell last week over the TransLink funding crunch and its potential to derail the Evergreen Line to Coquitlam.

Joe Trasolini told a sold-out crowd at the Tri-Cities Chamber of Commerce’s annual mayors’ barbecue that he believes the regional transportation authority’s board of directors will come up short when it presents its budget to the TransLink mayors’ council later this month (a vote is expected in October).

TransLink has promised to pay $400 million of the $1.4-billion cost of building the rapid transit line while the federal government has already committed $416.7 million and the province $410 million. Another $173 million is expected to come from private-public partnerships for the 11-kilometre route.

Earlier this year, during a pre-election speech to the local chamber, Premier Gordon Campbell said construction for the line, which is to run from Lougheed Town Centre in Burnaby, through Port Moody to Coquitlam Town Centre, would start in late 2010, with service starting in 2014.

“I have the greatest confidence in the design team,” Trasolini said Thursday about the Evergreen planners and engineers but urged caution about TransLink’s current operational budget deficit. “TransLink alone will not be able to come up with $400 million.”

Coquitlam Mayor Richard Stewart said his city’s plans for growth are contingent on the Evergreen Line being built.

And Port Coquitlam Mayor Greg Moore complained about TransLink governance, which was imposed by the provincial government in 2007 to yank control away from elected politicians and put in the hands of appointees who meet behind closed doors.

During the hour-long discussion, which was also attended by the Tri-Cities’ two BC Liberal MLAs, Iain Black and Douglas Horne, the mayors also talked about how their municipalities are strapped for cash as well as this year’s hikes in property taxes. Downloading pressures from senior governments to build non-market housing and fix regional roads are ongoing, they said. Moore said revenues from lottery, liquor and goods and services taxes would help pay for infrastructure renewal, including aging pipes and civic facilities.

Other questions from the floor focused on homelessness, measures to address immigration needs and the lack of affordable commercial space for Share programs.

Still, despite some heavy topics, the mayors kept it light by responding to a question on what other Tri-City municipality they would like to head.

“Coquitlam — for the first hour — to leverage the casino money, then Port Moody to get the Evergreen Line to come to PoCo,” Moore said, adding he wouldn’t mind briefly ruling Belcarra and Anmore for their parks.

“Coquitlam because the pay is higher,” Trasolini said.

Stewart quipped he wouldn’t mind being mayor of all five municipalities at once — an answer that delighted Coquitlam businessman and pro-amalgamation lobbyist Doug Stead, who cheered and applauded.

Time to Bell TransLink’s Cat

A letter that appeared in several lower mainland weeklies.

Editor:

TransLink is bankrupt, but as every bureaucracy knows, the taxpayer can be forced to ante up; in Canada, higher taxes cures all ills.

TransLink may not know how to plan for affordable transit, but the ‘boys and girls in the ivory towers’ know how to spin a sad-sack story. Oh woe, we have to cut bus services to the bone, but never the bus services that very few use. Strange that.

“If we don’t get money, we will go back to the dark ages” is the wail from Mr. Prendergast, TransLink’s well paid CEO. Rubbish!

It was predicted nine years ago that TransLink would hit a financial ‘wall’, because planners insisted planning and building metro (SkyTrain) on routes that do not have the ridership to support them.

Funny, no one mentions that just the SkyTrain metro system is subsidized by over $200 million annually and more metro is being planned and built, which in turn will further increase the annual subsidy.

TransLink refuses to admit they are wrong (no one else builds with SkyTrain) and continue their bluff until they get a $150 annual car levy, to subsidize their incompetent and wastrel planning. It seems that regional mayors and politicians have been suckered by TransLink’s con-game.

Here is a solution.

A basic regional transit property tax of $150; cities with one metro line, the tax rises to $300; cities with two metro lines, the tax is $450 and cities with three metro lines, the transit tax would be $600. The higher property taxes for metro lines, reflects the investment in transit improvement enjoyed by those cities.

TransLink must do away with perks like car allowances and certainly rid themselves of their expensive spin doctors and other hangers-ons; in short, regional politicians must tell transonic to live within its means.

What politicians are not afraid to bell the cat?

Bogota TransMilenio ‘BRT’ selling ‘carbon credits’ – From the Light Rail now folks

This is an interesting article, but badly marred by very poor research by the author.  It also should be noted that bus ridership figures for South American BRT’s have proven to be greatly overstated. What also is not mentioned is that BRT has been disappointing in operation in North America, India, Australia and Europe, failing to achieve projected ridership numbers.

In the analysis by the Light Rail Now folks it seems that to build a TransMilenio BRT in North America would cost about 50% more than a standard two track light rail line!

New York Times
July 10, 2009

By Degrees

Buses May Aid Climate Battle in Poor Cities

By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL

BOGOTÁ, Colombia:  Like most thoroughfares in booming cities of the developing world, Bogotá’s Seventh Avenue resembles a noisy, exhaust- coated parking lot a gluey tangle of cars and the rickety, smoke-puffing private minibuses that have long provided transportation for the masses.

But a few blocks away, sleek red vehicles full of commuters speed down the four center lanes of Avenida de las Américas. The long, segmented, low-emission buses are part of a novel public transportation system called bus rapid transit, or B.R.T. It is more like an above-ground subway than a collection of bus routes, with seven intersecting lines, enclosed stations
that are entered through turnstiles with the swipe of a fare card and coaches that feel like trams inside.

Versions of these systems are being planned or built in dozens of developing cities around the world. Mexico City, Cape Town, Jakarta, Indonesia, and Ahmedabad, India, to name a few providing public transportation that improves traffic flow and reduces smog at a fraction of the cost of building a subway.

But the rapid transit systems have another benefit: they may hold a key to combating climate change. Emissions from cars, trucks, buses and other vehicles in the booming cities of Asia, Africa and Latin America account for a rapidly growing component of heat-trapping gases linked to global warming. While emissions from industry are decreasing, those related to transportation are expected to rise more than 50 percent by 2030 in industrialized and poorer nations. And 80 percent of that growth will be in
the developing world, according to data presented in May at an international conference in Bellagio, Italy, sponsored by the Asian Development Bank and the Clean Air Institute.

To be effective, a new international climate treaty that will be negotiated in Copenhagen in December must include a policy response to the CO2 emissions from transport in the developing world, the Bellagio conference statement concluded.

Bus rapid transit systems like Bogotá’s, called TransMilenio, might hold an answer. Now used for an average of 1.6 million trips each day, TransMilenio has allowed the city to remove 7,000 small private buses from its roads, reducing the use of  bus fuel and associated emissions by more than 59 percent since it opened its first line in 2001, according  to city officials.

In recognition of this feat, TransMilenio last year became the only large transportation project approved by the United Nations to generate and sell carbon credits. Developed countries that exceed their emissions limits under the Kyoto Protocol, or that simply want to burnish a “green” image, can buy credits from TransMilenio to balance their emissions budgets, bringing Bogotá an estimated $100 million to $300 million so far, analysts say.

Indeed, the city has provided a model of how international programs to combat climate change can help expanding cities the number of cars in China alone could increase sevenfold by 2030, according to the International Energy Agency pay for transit systems that would otherwise be unaffordable.

Bogotá was huge and messy and poor, so people said, “If Bogotá can do it, why can’t we?” said Enrique Peñalosa, an economist and a former mayor of the city who took TransMilenio from a concept to its initial opening in 2001 and is now advising other cities. In 2008, Mexico City opened a second successful bus rapid transit line that has already
reduced carbon dioxide emissions there, according to Lee Schipper, a transportation expert at Stanford University, and the city has applied to sell carbon credits as well.

But bus rapid transit systems are not the answer for every city. In the United States, where cost is less constraining, some cities, like Los Angeles, have built B.R.T.’s, but they tend to lack many of the components of comprehensive systems like TransMilenio, like fully enclosed stations, and they serve as an addition to existing rail networks.

In some sprawling cities in India, where a tradition of scooter use may make bus rapid transit more difficult to create, researchers are working to develop a new model of tuk-tuk, or motorized cab, that is cheap and will run on alternative fuels or with a highly efficient engine. There are three million auto rickshaws in India alone, and the smoke is astonishing, so this could have a huge impact, said Stef van Dongen, director of Enviu, an environmental network group in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, that is sponsoring the research.

Bus rapid transit systems have not always worked well in cities that have tried them, either. In New Delhi, for example, the experiment foundered in part because it proved difficult to protect bus lanes from traffic. And a system that does not succeed in drawing passengers out of their cars just adds buses to existing vehicles on the roads, making traffic and emissions worse.

But with its wide streets, dense population and a tradition of bus travel, Bogotá had the ingredients for success. To create TransMilenio, the city commandeered two to four traffic lanes in the middle of major boulevards, isolating them with low walls to create the system’s so-called tracks. On the center islands that divide many of Bogotá’s two-way streets, the city
built dozens of distinctive metal-and-glass stations. Just as in a subway, the multiple doors on the buses slide open level with the platform, providing easy access for strollers and older riders. Hundreds of  passengers can wait on the platforms, avoiding the delays that occur when passengers each pay as they board.

Mr. Peñalosa noted that the negative stereotypes about bus travel required some clever rebranding. Now, he said, upscale condominiums advertise that they are near TransMilenio lines. People don’t say, ‘I’m taking the bus, they say, I’m taking TransMilenio, he added, as he rode at rush hour recently, chatting with other passengers.

Jorge Engarrita, 45, a leather worker who was riding TransMilenio to work, said the system had changed his life, reducing his commuting time to 40 minutes with one transfer from two or three hours on several buses. Free shuttle buses carry residents from outlying districts to TransMilenio terminals.

To the dismay of car owners, Bogotá removed one-third of its street parking to make room for TransMilenio and imposed alternate-day driving  restrictions determined by license plate numbers, forcing car owners onto the system.

With an extensive route system, TransMilenio moves more passengers per mile every hour than almost any of the world’s subways. Most poorer cities that have built subways, like Manila and Lagos, Nigeria, can afford to build only a few limited lines because of the expense. 

(A note from Zweisystem: Poor research here. Manila doesn’t have subways, but elevated LRT. Daily ridership on the elevated LRT is now well over 550,000, far more than what could be accommodated by BRT! Lagos also doesn’t have subways and LRT, is in the development stages! Poor research has ruined many a good article on transit in North America.)

Subways cost more than 30 times as much per mile to build than a B.R.T. system, and three times as much to maintain. And bus rapid transit systems can be built more quickly.  Almost all rapidly developing cities understand that they need a metro or something like it, and you can get a B.R.T. by 2010 or a metro by 2060, said Walter Hook, executive director
of the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy, in New York.

Although TransMilenio buses run on diesel, their efficient engines mean they emit less than half the nitrous oxide, particulate matter and carbon dioxide of the older minibuses. Cleaner fuels were either too expensive or did not work at Bogotá’s altitude, 9,000 feet above sea level.

TransMilenio is building more lines and underpasses to allow the buses to bypass clogged intersections, but for the moment the real challenge is
overcrowding. Juan Gómez, 21, a businessman, takes TransMilenio only on days when he cannot drive, and he griped that it was often hard to find
a seat.

It’s O.K., but I prefer the car,  he said.

And now an analysis by the Light Rail Now folks.

 

Of particular interest is the following excerpt regarding “carbon credits”:

Bus rapid transit systems like Bogotá’s, called TransMilenio, might hold an answer. Now used for an average of 1.6 million trips each day, TransMilenio has allowed the city to remove 7,000 small private buses from its roads, reducing the use of bus fuel and associated emissions by more than 59 percent since it opened its first line in 2001, according to city officials.

In recognition of this feat, TransMilenio last year became the only large transportation project approved by the United Nations to generate and sell carbon credits. Developed countries that exceed their emissions limits under the Kyoto Protocol, or that simply want to burnish a “green” image, can buy credits from TransMilenio to balance their emissions budgets, bringing Bogotá an estimated $100 million to $300 million so far, analysts say.

Indeed, the city has provided a model of how international programs to combat climate change can help expanding cities ” the number of cars in
China alone could increase sevenfold by 2030, according to the International Energy Agency” pay for transit systems that would otherwise be unaffordable.

I have several comments and questions in regard to this, and I would appreciate input from others.

(1) I wasn’t aware that individual TRANSIT SYSTEMS could apply for and receive UN certification to “generate” and sell such credits. Can anyone explain how this works? What does the buyer of these credits then do with them?

(2) On what basis did the TransMilenio system receive this authorization? It obviously has considerable value, since other countries – entire COUNTRIES – are willing to pay millions of dollars for these credits.

(3) Why aren’t ELECTRIC rail operations-especially light rail tramways – applying for and receiving such credits? Surely it can be demonstrated that new LRT/tramway startups have
reduced motor vehicle emissions in the corridors they serve?

(4) The article suggests that part of the basis for the TransMilenio “achievement” was the reduction in smaller buses effected by the implementation of the TransMilenio system. Can it
not be shown that the installation of new rail lines elsewhere has also accomplished reductions in urban bus traffic and emissions? And even more than Bogota, since electric propulsion reduced GHG emissions proportionately more?

(5) The NYT’s Bogota article appears to fit into the context of a major campaign currently under way to promote “BRT” for the NYC’s major corridors (i.e., mainly in Manhattan). This campaign appears to be driven by motor bus industry interests but with the collusion of elements within NYC’s public transit establishment, and it includes disparaging electric rail (including NY’s subway), presenting “BRT” as cheaper, more effective, and more environmentally friendly. It also fits into a larger nationwide pattern of bus system marketing attempting to disparage all forms of electric rail in the USA, including LRT/tramways, with the aim of diverting federal public transport policy away from investment in rail and into “BRT” development.

(6) Leaving aside the issue of TransMilenio’s GHG emissions reduction and “carbon credits” coup … It should be noted that TransMilenio requires FOUR (4) busway lanes in a GRADE-SEPARATED major arterial to provide capacity. The cost of the initial 38-km/24-mile system in 2001 was US $350 million; per adjusting for inflation to 2009 US dollars, and also adjusting for labor/living cost differentials, the equivalent cost of a system in a similar US corridor would be about $1.8 billion – about $73 million per mile, or roughly 50% more than the cost of a 2-track electric LRT/tramway system that could probably provide equivalent capacity with substantially lower GHG emissions and other environmental impacts.

NYC: Transport chief pushes more livable city, but faces anti-rail BRT “booby trap” – From the Light Rail Now Folks

Ominous news for the Fraser Valley efforts to reinstate the interurban, as it seems New York City’s transit planners are going against the world trend in building with LRT and instead is planning for Bus Rapid Transit or BRT. What a coincidence that TransLink’s new CEO, comes from New York City and its long established transit bureaucracy. Is the fix in to build BRT into the valley instead of light rail?

Proposed BRT in New York City - compare with LRT grassed ROW's!

Light Rail Now! NewsLog
2 July 2009
Updated 2009/07/02

NYC: New transport chief pushes more livable city, but anti-rail “BRT” campaign could be “booby trap”

New York City: For at least three-quarters of a century, this and other great American cities have catered to private automobile transportation at the expense of pedestrians, cyclists, and public transit riders. Now, in New York at least, this may be changing.

Janette Sadik-Khan, appointed head of the NYC Department of Transportation in 2007, is revolutionizing the way a city, and especially New York City, can approach transportation particularly by spearheading an effort to make the streets of New York livable by adding bike lanes throughout the city, setting aside areas for people to walk and sit, and designating lanes for bus transit.

Sadik-Khan created “Summer Streets”, whereby Park Avenue between 72nd Street and the Brooklyn Bridge was shut down for three weekends during the summer and completely taken over by … people. Amazing!

These measures are part of a strategic plan the department produced called “Sustainable Streets.” According to Sadik-Khan, transportation departments have traditionally been focused on moving vehicles around, and she believes their new goal should be to provide the highest quality of urban life. She says that we need to take a “fresh look” at our streets and streetscapes and how we use them.

All of the measures implemented so far have resulted in widespread enthusiastic response by the public.

Streetfilms has put together the following video interview to highlight what she has done.

http://bikeportland.org/2008/10/27/a-video-and-a-visit-from-nycs-dot-commissioner/

Ironically, although Sadik-Khan is chairman of the strongly pro-light rail/pro-streetcar orgainzation Reconnecting America, she’s gotten ensnared in a major offensive by the “Bus Rapid Transit” (“BRT”) wing of the highway/motor vehicle industry (and within the Metropolitan Transportation Authority) to push “BRT” throughout NYC to some extent, in opposition to rail transit alternatives, including the Second Avenue Subway project. Despite the solid successes of electric light rail transit (LRT) just across the Hudson River in Newark and the Hudson-Bergen LRT system serving New Jersey communities such as Bayonne, Jersey City, Hoboken, and Weehawken and, indeed, the phenomenal successes of new LRT starts in cities like Minneapolis, Charlotte, and Phoenix (in contrast to the comparatively lackluster performance of new “BRT” operations in several cities) a propaganda blitz has been under way in NYC to portray rail transit as largely a failure, and “BRT” as some kind of phenomenal savior of the American transit industry (a reverse-image fantasy backed by a barrage of fabricated claims and largely imaginary “facts”).

Thus, despite Sadik-Khan’s progressive roots and instincts, and her commendable efforts to “pedestrianize” New York’s streets and nudge the city toward a more human-friendly (as opposed to car-friendly) environment, this latest battleground in the Transit Wars could tarnish her reputation and compromise her vision. In other words, the”BRT” campaign might represent a serious booby trap. The bigger picture here is yet another confrontation between the old-line, Robert Moses-era ideologicial commitment to rubber tires and petroleum propulsion vs. the specific benefits and advantages offered by electric light rail, especially streetcars as Reconnecting America has communicated so well, with Sadik-Khan’s leadership.

Now, many transit advocates who recognize the proven capabilities of rail believe that, in NYC, Sadik-Khan needs to take a firm stand on the side of rational, 21st-century public transport planning. This means diplomatically or otherwise fingering the fatuous claims for “BRT” for what they are, acknowledging the drawbacks of “BRT” with respect to the heavy demands of a mega-city’s traffic corridors, and presenting both surface light rail/streetcar and grade-separated rail metro (i.e., subway) public transit as the right fit for NYC’s needs in these kinds of high-volume central-city applications.

Get ready, Seattle: You’re about to be a light-rail town – From the Seattle Times

 Seattle’s LRT line is “four to six times costlier than other light-rail startups in western states“, as planners designed the light rail service as a light-metro, with miles of expensive viaducts and even more expensive subway tunnels. The same sort of nonsense happened with BC Transit’s LRT plans for Broadway and Translink’s light rail plans for the Evergreen Line. By designing LRT to be a light-metro negates most of the economical benefits of light rail operation!

That being said, Seattle is the newest American city to embrace light rail.

By Mike Lindblom – Seattle Times transportation reporter

At last, Seattle is about to become a light-rail town.

On Saturday, the first passengers will board the Sound Transit trains from Westlake Center through Rainier Valley to Tukwila — putting behind them nearly a century of failed proposals to build a big transit system through Seattle.

The initial $2.3 billion, 14-mile segment took five years to build and was filled with engineering challenges and political suspense.

The project features a unique deep station within the soft soils of Beacon Hill, and the nation’s only tunnel where buses and trains share the same stations — downtown. Managers coped with toxic soil, sinkholes, street protests seeking more jobs for African Americans and a couple of minor train-car collisions.

One worker died in a supply-train crash during Beacon Hill tunneling. That stretch was so difficult that it left no time to spare in the final construction schedule, and it spooked transit-board members into canceling a deep station they had promised for First Hill.

“Light-rail years are like cat years,” said Ahmad Fazel, director of the stressful light-rail effort.

On the upside, the project provided more than 4,000 short- and long-term jobs. And trains will serve riders every 7 ½ minutes at peak times. Two more miles open later this year to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.

But the line is four to six times costlier than other light-rail startups in western states. And with an estimated 26,600 average weekday trips predicted next year, the trains often will appear mostly empty, like the South Lake Union streetcar.

Ridership should grow by 2016, when a tunnel to Capitol Hill and Husky Stadium lets students and employees from the south suburbs ride 19 miles from the airport to the University of Washington campus. Eventually, it will connect to north Federal Way, Overlake and Lynnwood in a 53-mile network that Sound Transit says will attract 280,000 daily trips in 2030.

Transit: a history

If you lived in Seattle in 1891, you could ride the new electric streetcars that replaced horse-drawn trains. Cable cars climbed Madison Street and ran down to Lake Washington. A longer train turned into Rainier Valley toward Kent. Trestles in the mud flats supported elevated tracks to West Seattle.

Construction visionaries complained about traffic congestion as long ago as 1911, when engineer Virgil Bogue proposed underground and elevated trains to cope with the city’s tight “hourglass shape,” plus a tunnel beneath Lake Washington. Voters rejected his plan, saying it would cost too much. Again in 1926, a city committee urged fast rail to staunch the loss of customers on Seattle’s declining streetcar routes. Seattle asked the state in vain to put rails into the Interstate 5 express lanes, designed in the late 1950s. After the 1962 World’s Fair, experts studied stretching its one-mile tourist monorail to Shoreline.

Rail measures lost public votes in King County in 1968 and 1970. Federal aid shifted to Atlanta, and buses flourished here. Much later, Seattle voters passed monorail measures four times before canceling a line in 2005, due to a revenue shortage; the unbuilt project cost drivers $124 million in car-tab taxes.

Rails were embedded in the downtown bus tunnel in 1989, a symbolic commitment to try again. (They were installed incorrectly, and Sound Transit would replace them in 2007.)

Another regional transit package, including light rail to Tacoma, reached the ballot in 1995 but lost. A year later, Sound Transit won by offering a shorter line from the University District to SeaTac, and more express buses.

The agency claimed its cost figures were “extremely conservative,” but in fact they were too low by half. After a management shake-up and scolding by federal inspectors, the agency under new chief executive Joni Earl produced realistic, higher numbers by late 2001 — and those have held up. Sen. Patty Murray and Rep. Norm Dicks lobbied to save a $500 million federal grant.

Two clever moves prevented a collapse. A committee that included former Mayor Charles Royer and Jim Ellis, a leader in earlier pro-rail efforts, advocated breaking ground on a shorter south-end line. They guessed correctly the south line would help whet the public appetite for more. And years earlier, lawyers wrote an escape clause that let the agency shorten its line or extend taxes indefinitely, without a public revote that opponents demanded.

Politicians OK’d big landmark stations, tunnels, spans through Tukwila and a winding route to reach and redevelop Rainier Valley neighborhoods, while calling Link an investment in the next century.

The first line is being finished $100 million below the official federal figure of $2.4 billion, which included a financial cushion.

Light Rail on the ballot

Link has been deemed a “light-metro” hybrid by some transit wonks. In downtown Seattle, the trains go faster than downtown Portland’s surface trains, which move not much faster than a pedestrian. But with 28 street crossings in Rainier Valley, capacity and speed here are less than with a big-city subway.

Millions were spent for oversized 400-foot-long stations — a nod to the future when four-car trains will be needed if the Greater Seattle population grows 1.2 million as planners warn.

Over the years, a collection of budget hawks, bus supporters, monorailists and road warriors opposed the agency, saying fixed rail reaches too few places and people to justify its prodigious costs here.

But in 2008, Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels cajoled fellow transit-board members to put more rail on the ballot, after a combined roads-and-transit package tanked the year before. The $18 billion measure won decisively, buoyed by younger, pro-Obama voters.

Despite a campaign slogan of “Mass Transit Now,” the full lines are 15 years from completion and taxes will last at least through the 2030s.

To reach Tacoma and Everett, a third ballot plan would need to be approved, continuing this odyssey four decades beyond its 1996 launch.

Bus Raid Transit – A transit Panacea or a money pit?

Phileas woes in Istanbul.

 

Many politicians are calling for Bus Rapid Transit, but really haven’t a clue what they are talking about. Internationally, BRT describes guided buses and/or large busway networks, but in Vancouver, BRT tends to mean B-Line style, limited stop, bus service. What is quietly forgotten is that BRT has not, except in third world countries where there are little affordable alternatives, fared well. Even Ottawa’s famed busways saw over a 14% drop in ridership in the first decade of operation resulting in Ottawa’s transit officials switch from BRT to LRT. The following is from a transit specialist who belongs to the LRTA.

In ‘Buses’ magazine, there an article about the Dutch Phileas buses (BRT) on the Istanbul BRT system. These are virtually brand new (not even two years old) 26 metre double-articulated parallel-type diesel hybrid vehicles which feature doors on both sides.

It seems that despite their young age most of the fleet of 50 have already had to be taken out of service with major problems which include difficulties in climbing a steep hill and breakages to the vehicles’ suspension system. The matter is so serious that it has even been discussed in Parliament.

Apparently the hill climbing issue is that the buses are designed to climb a 2.5% gradient at 40km/h, but the people of Istanbul see this as being too slow / want them to do so more quickly. The word on the street is that the buses were designed to run in a flat country (like Holland) and are not suitable for locations where heavily loaded buses are required to climb even gentle hills. Wondering aloud, I’d suggest that this is a question of available power, and that they should trial direct electric traction (trolleybus) as a way to improve their climbing speed – although not knowing the road configuration I cannot know for sure if this would be the whole solution.

The problems with the suspension seem to have been caused by overcrowding. As we know, buses normally have a maximum capacity limit on the number of passengers allowed to travel; these vehicles were designed to carry up to 230 passengers – although at peak times loads of 280 are often carried. As a contrast with steel rail transports (trains, trams, streetcars, etc) it often happens that at the busiest times the sheer numbers of people travelling will see them ‘packed in like sardines in a tin can’. It seems that the same has been happening with the Phileas buses, especially when there are football (soccer) matches at a stadium along the route the buses serve.

In the meantime the fleet of 200 CapaCity and other buses are having to work extra hard to cover for these buses – and plans to buy 50 more Phileas buses have been put on hold.

————–

According to Wikipedia the buses breaking down also caused severe problems because of the single-track nature of their dedicated right of way, blocking it so that other passes could not pass.

Seattle’s monrail versus LRT debate – Same story, different players!

This, from the Seattle Transit blog, is a short history of Seattle’s virulent monorail debate that caused much “wailing and gnashing of teeth” south of the 49th!

March 19, 2008 at 11:20 am

A Rehash: What Was Wrong With The Monorail

by Ben Schiendelman

A week ago, while talking about the viaduct, a friend said to me “If only we had just built the monorail…”

A few days later, when he regained consciousness and they took him out of the ICU (joking! joking!), I had calmed down. I gave him a list of why the monorail would never have worked, was a bad idea in the first place, and would probably have ended up half-built and bankrupt:

First, putting your technology choice in your law is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard of. Your law should always say something like “high capacity transit” or “fixed guideway transit” – something flexible – that way you don’t get backed into a corner. There were very few initial bids for the monorail – and only one that held up for long. This is not a standardized transportation system – there are many competing technologies for both trains and guideways. They’re generally proprietary – only one vendor will sell you the trains to go on your tracks. That means single bids, which kind of defeats the purpose of competitive bidding, don’t you think?

Second, don’t claim your fantastical technology will “pay for itself”. Seriously, that was how this all started – “it will be profitable”, we were told, “companies will be falling all over themselves to get the contract”. Yeah, and my buddies in Baghdad don’t know where to put all the floral arrangements. The original monorail group started out with that claim, then moved to $18-36 million a mile with operating costs recovered through fares (still no chance in hell), then more like $50-100 million a mile… eventually it became clear that it was, actually, a transit system, and that transit systems do, indeed, cost money. Too late: making all those crazy claims killed their credibility.

Third, and maybe even most importantly: This was supposed to be grassroots, bringing people together. Instead, it became an anti-light-rail festival of lies, alienating the support of transit users and people with brains everywhere. “Light rail can’t climb a grade”, they said, when the stretch we’ve built along SR-518 is as steep as their Hitachi monorail could do. “Light rail isn’t elevated”, they said… I hope everyone on this blog realizes the humor in that statement. “Light rail is so expensive”, they said (and I’m leaving out their capital letters and exclamation points) – but it turns out that the differences in cost between light rail and monorail are negligible. They poked fun at their base supporters, and it cost them.

Fourth, to cut costs, they planned to use single tracking and switches over the West Seattle Bridge (and they eventually cut Ballard from their plan entirely). Switches, for monorail, are huge, cumbersome devices that take many times longer than standard rail switches to actually switch over. The maximum frequency of trains over the bridge would have been choked off by switch actions between every set of trains. Even after making that decision, the monorail agency still advertised three minute headways – when they would have been physically impossible.

The rose-colored glasses the monorail agency looked through at every issue bit them time and again. They claimed that their real estate costs would be low because they “only had to pay for posts in the ground”, that their columns would be “thinner than light rail” (they weren’t), and that they would offer a “quieter, smoother ride” – they wouldn’t have. I’m not even discussing the financing plan – it was astounding. Along every step of the way, the agency lied, taking advantage of Sound Transit’s bad position at the time to hit as hard as they could at light rail, rather than collaborating. Oh, yeah, and they spent more on advertising alone than they were bringing in. …And their projections for car ownership (their funding source was an MVET) were far too high.

I’m glad they’re gone. There was no opportunity for mass transit there – they failed so many times in so many arenas that I hope that’s clear. All they did was confuse the public and spend our money. Yeah, I know, Ballard and West Seattle residents feel cheated – but it’s like Publishers’ Clearinghouse – you weren’t actually going to win a million dollars. We don’t have the tax base in Seattle alone, especially not just with an MVET, to build mass transit in that corridor.

We will. Once light rail is built northward to the county line, those will be the next logical places for Sound Transit to build using North King money.

From Seattle – The end of the line, for now: Tukwila is the jewel in the crown of Link – Mike Lindblom – Seattle Times

Though Seattle’s light rail project has more in common with Vancouver’s light-metro system, it does have portions running on city streets. Through the Duwamish River valley, it operates as a light-metro, running on a 8 km. viaduct.

As soon as light-rail trains head south out of Seattle, leaving the streets of Rainier Valley, the ride becomes more exhilarating.

Five miles of nonstop trackway allow speeds of up to 55 mph, next to highways and around banked curves. Blue lights on the Duwamish River bridge trip on, as a work of public art, when the train crosses.

Finally the train climbs to Tukwila International Boulevard Station, where the V-shaped roof creates a landmark. The angular design evokes “airplanes, liftoff, the idea of elevation, the slope and wing of airplanes,” in the words of its architect, David Hewitt, of Seattle.

On a clear day, from the 51-foot-high boarding platform atop a hill, riders can see Mount Baker, then turn toward the control tower of Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.

With this station, Sound Transit aimed to create a beacon, full of sculpture and lit from within. Detractors call it a Taj Mahal. Politicians on the transit board hoped the three-level station and tracks along the freeway, would convince taxpayers the agency could finish the job, after its financial near-meltdown years ago.

Unlike other stations, which rely on walk-ups and feeder buses, this one could lure some motorists off the highways, after the first 14 miles of track open July 18. Until an airport station opens this winter, Tukwila is the southern terminus of the line that starts at Westlake Center.

This stop provides the line’s only park-and-ride lot, with 600 free spaces, a reasonable stopover for commuters from SeaTac, Burien and Des Moines, or sports fans heading to Sodo. Parking is free but limited to 24 hours.

Chances are good the lot will overflow in the near future, as happened to Sounder commuter-rail stations a few miles east. Transit-board members don’t have a strategy yet, though some have hinted at user fees or carpooling incentives for Sounder lots someday.

Next year, the future RapidRide A line from Federal Way and other buses will pick up passengers on a wide two-lane roadway under the mezzanine. Lines will be rerouted to reach the station from Burien, White Center and Southcenter.

Off to the side, a drop-off area serves taxis and kiss-and-ride users, but getting there requires maneuvering through rows of parking. A nifty stairway connects to the sidewalk of International Boulevard. The station entry itself is enormous; riders take escalators past yellow-painted steel beams to the mezzanine and boarding platforms.

Construction on the huge station and mostly elevated trackway was remarkably smooth. A total 2,457 hollow guideway segments were trucked here from Cashmere, Chelan County, raised by a gantry, then cinched together in a series — like a box of tightly scrunched doughnuts — to form 182 spans. Still, there have been controversies:

• Early this decade, the city of Tukwila threatened to withhold permits to build the segment, after Sound Transit refused to spend more money to reach Westfield Southcenter mall.

• A subcontractor pleaded guilty to misrepresenting the strength of steel casings, wrapped around column foundations. Fortunately, engineering reviews concluded it was not a significant flaw and columns would still withstand a severe earthquake.

• Neighbors complained this summer of the screech caused by steel wheels on elevated tracks. Sound Transit has ordered lubricants and will apply them to the rails in the next few days, spokesman Bruce Gray said.

• As light-rail opponent Emory Bundy and others have noted, the 36-minute ride from Westlake Center to the airport, via Rainier Valley and Tukwila, is longer than the 194 bus, scheduled to take 28 minutes using freeway HOV lanes. Next year the 194 will be dropped, so transit riders heading to the airport will have to take a train.

Sound Transit argues Link runs more often than a bus; it saves time for people who live in the Valley; and trains are immune from airport-traffic tie-ups. Think Thanksgiving week.

The station appears isolated amid parking lots and low-rise drive-up businesses, but several apartments sit a short walk downhill.

And in the future, the adjoining city of SeaTac intends to redevelop the west side of International Boulevard for retailers, offices and housing in buildings eight stories high, along with a plaza, and town homes on the back streets, attracting up to 4,000 residents.

“We would love to see that built out as an international district, with a variety of shops,” said SeaTac City Manager Craig Ward.

Mike Lindblom      Seattle Times

Rail reality grows with Hydro’s revelation – The Vancouver Province.

 From the Vancouver Province and thanks for Brian Lewis for following this story!

Advocates for establishing a light-rail passenger service in the Fraser Valley have found an ally in B.C. Hydro.

And, not surprisingly, they’ve also found an opponent in mighty Canadian Pacific Ltd., the railway-based corporation that many have loved to hate throughout its century-plus history.

In fact, it’s the ever-present power of Canadian Pacific that led Langley Township Mayor Rick Green to issue a media release yesterday that he hopes will stop CP in its tracks.

The release announced that Langley has a letter from Hydro stating that the utility will continue to protect its historical rights to run passenger-rail service on a section of railway line it sold to CP years ago.

Known as the Pratt-Livingston Corridor, the track runs from 232nd Street, near Trinity Western University, through the downtown cores of the township and Langley City, then west to Cloverdale.

This line was sold by B.C. Hydro to CP in the late 1980s for its coal and container-train service to Deltaport.

But Hydro’s retained passenger-service rights reflect its historical roots in the early 1900s, when its private-sector predecessor, B.C. Electric, owned and operated its extensive, electrified interurban tram service between Vancouver and Chilliwack.

Obviously, when the B.C. government of the day decided that Hydro should exit the railway business, some bureaucrat had enough sense to protect the public interest in case the call for public rail transit in the Valley returned.

And it did. Public pressure is mounting on provincial and federal politicians to re-establish light-rail transit in the region as an environmentally friendly alternative to motor vehicles.

However, the 21-year-old agreement between Hydro and CP, which protected those passenger rights, only became public knowledge last April.

The rights will expire on Aug. 29, unless they’re renewed at the option of either party.

According to several sources, even some of the executives at CP didn’t know Hydro had retained its rights to public rail service. Nor, I’m told, were they amused.

“I have no doubt that this agreement is CP’s worst nightmare,” Green said yesterday.

Not only does CP have to set aside up to one-third of its wheelage (traffic) for public light-rail use, it also has to do it for free.

By contrast, CP makes millions of dollars annually by allowing TransLink to operate the West Coast Express on its northern line into Vancouver.

Now, according to the grapevine, CP is lobbying the Gordon Campbell government to block Hydro’s intention of exercising its legal option of renewing the agreement that will protect public use of the line for another 21 years.

This worries Green and other mayors south of the Fraser who fear the B.C. Liberals may cave into pressure from CP and order Hydro to back off.

For its part, CP said yesterday it’s still reviewing the agreement and had no further comment.

But Hydro said yesterday it has sent a letter to CP, saying it will exercise its option and renew the agreement. So far, so good.

blewis@theprovince.com

See also:

https://railforthevalley.wordpress.com/2009/02/03/light-rail-on-number-10-highway-the-langley-bypass-an-alternative-route-to-the-valley/