[EdwardEdm]

Controversial opinion: built the BRT and have it operate alongside an LRT extension, as long as the route is different from what the LRT would be. Giving people more options of fast and high quality transit is not a bad thing, and might help overall ridership and propel a change in transit culture over time.

I think that's what should happen, although I see it a bit differently.
BRT to Castle Downs is a branch along 153 Ave from 97 St. It will be interesting to see what sort of BRT infrastructure they plan to use on this section.
I don't see a Castle Downs Station serving riders East of 97 St.
My guess would put an LRT trip to Downtown from Castle Downs Station at somewhere between 20-25 minutes, probably closer to 20. The 120x is 30ish minutes. Assuming BRT can shave some time off of that so it is closer to 25 minutes, there won't be any advantage for riders East of 97 St to go further West to catch the LRT over the BRT, so even with LRT, a 97 St BRT should hold its own.
Recently listening to an ETSAB meeting, ETS does have intentions of developing more crosstown routes. While service hours are a limiting factor, a bigger one is having enough buses. I guess even with a satellite garage, expanding the fleet might not happen until the Southeast Garage is built. 153 Ave was specifically mentioned as a crosstown route, so any BRT infrastructure could be used by a 153 Ave crosstown route. Quite frankly, I don't see much need to put true BRT infrastructure between 97 St and Castle Downs Road on 153 Ave. Greisbach Road and Beaumaris Road could get signal priority, but dedicated bus lanes might be overkill.
If LRT gets held up long enough, building a BRT right to Naki along the future LRT corridor might be useful as a LRT precursor.

 

[Glenco]

The federal government's $30 Billion over 10 years for public transportation begins in 2026 - what new projects will Edmonton be putting forward?

$20 Billion of that fund is for metro region agreements (province/cities kicking in money, too). To qualify and access this money, cities will have to demonstrate the following (these rules were put in to help address housing crisis).

Eliminate all mandatory minimum parking requirements within 800 metres of a high-frequency transit line.

Allow high-density housing within 800 metres of a high-frequency transit line.

Allow high-density housing within 800 metres of post-secondary institutions.

Complete a housing needs assessment for all communities with a population greater than 30,000.

Then, $5B of the $30B is for Targeted Funding - initiatives that support transit, school transportation and active transportation (walking or bike paths, rural and remote transit, investment in Indigenous communities and electrification of public transit and school transportatio). This targeted funding stream will address federal priorities such as net-zero emissions.

The final $5B is for Baseline funding and will be allocated based on population and ridership and will primarily focus on system expansion, lifecycle extension, performance upgrades and investments in fleets. These may include expanding bus fleets, retrofitting subway stations or constructing new tram lines.

Again, I wonder what is Edmonton's top priorities in accessing this funding.

Vancouver alone has a new 10 year transit plan with a cost of $21B. What is ours?

Carney bucks. With the current economic uncertainty Carney may want to spend big on infrastructure to tide us over until the nightmare in the Whitehouse resolves itself.

 

[CplKlinger]

I guess even with a satellite garage, expanding the fleet might not happen until the Southeast Garage is built.

That flat-out can't happen. Perhaps the satellite garage has room for another 20 (this report is ambiguous about whether the city paid to retrofit the garage to handle 40 buses, or only the 20 they ordered), but beyond that they're out of space. Kathleen Andrews didn't add any capacity; it was a like-for-like replacement. Here's the council report on ETS' plan to build/renew the fleet storage and maintenance facilities, along with the detailed executive summary and the associated timelines.

 

[yeggator]

You are essentially defeating the purpose of the LRT line, which an LRT terminal in or near St. Albert.

Wait, are you not able to see the map I made through the link?

 

[yeggator]

Your alternative option probably won't save the city much compared to just heading straight north over the rail yard.

True, but if, for the same amount of money, the alternative alignment hits Northgate and the Town Center area of Griesbach with all the shops, it might be worth it.

 

[Gronk!]

Wait, are you not able to see the map I made through the link?
View attachment 670282View attachment 670283View attachment 670284

Sorry man, I didn't notice the URL of your map.
I like your idea, although perhaps an alternate route could be via 127 St and then 153 Ave.

 

[CplKlinger]

Controversial opinion: built the BRT and have it operate alongside an LRT extension, as long as the route is different from what the LRT would be. Giving people more options of fast and high quality transit is not a bad thing, and might help overall ridership and propel a change in transit culture over time.

I agree. Besides providing more options, it could also help the long-term sustainability of the LRT network. Back in 2011, the city was mapping out ways to handle overcrowding once the LRT system was fully built out (the report says they were already having to ask people to commute earlier/later to spread out the peak periods), and one solution was to run parallel bus service during the busiest time periods. I know we probably won't get back to the pre-covid rush hour levels, but BRT is still a way to ensure the LRT system doesn't handle the entire load of north/south commuters, while still providing a comparable level of service (still inferior to LRT, but better than conventional bus).

 

[The_Cat]

One concern I have for the NW Metro Line is the frequency of the trains, If they're staggered with the Capital Line trains (12 minutes?) they could be packed going to Castle Downs and St. Albert.

 

[yeggator]

One concern I have for the NW Metro Line is the frequency of the trains, If they're staggered with the Capital Line trains (12 minutes?) they could be packed going to Castle Downs and St. Albert.

The Downtown tunnel can accommodate 2.5-minute headways, so each line can be run with 5-minute frequencies.

 

[YEG Bus Rider]

The federal government's $30 Billion over 10 years for public transportation begins in 2026 - what new projects will Edmonton be putting forward?

$20 Billion of that fund is for metro region agreements (province/cities kicking in money, too). To qualify and access this money, cities will have to demonstrate the following (these rules were put in to help address housing crisis).

Eliminate all mandatory minimum parking requirements within 800 metres of a high-frequency transit line.

Allow high-density housing within 800 metres of a high-frequency transit line.

Allow high-density housing within 800 metres of post-secondary institutions.

Complete a housing needs assessment for all communities with a population greater than 30,000.

Then, $5B of the $30B is for Targeted Funding - initiatives that support transit, school transportation and active transportation (walking or bike paths, rural and remote transit, investment in Indigenous communities and electrification of public transit and school transportatio). This targeted funding stream will address federal priorities such as net-zero emissions.

The final $5B is for Baseline funding and will be allocated based on population and ridership and will primarily focus on system expansion, lifecycle extension, performance upgrades and investments in fleets. These may include expanding bus fleets, retrofitting subway stations or constructing new tram lines.

Again, I wonder what is Edmonton's top priorities in accessing this funding.

Vancouver alone has a new 10 year transit plan with a cost of $21B. What is ours?

Assuming the province doesn't block funding because of ideological mismatches, unwillingness to comply with provincial bike lane expectations or opposition towards provincial rail plan integrating with our LRT/transit system.

We need baseline funding to renew bus fleet.

 

[EdwardEdm]

That flat-out can't happen. Perhaps the satellite garage has room for another 20 (this report is ambiguous about whether the city paid to retrofit the garage to handle 40 buses, or only the 20 they ordered), but beyond that they're out of space. Kathleen Andrews didn't add any capacity; it was a like-for-like replacement. Here's the council report on ETS' plan to build/renew the fleet storage and maintenance facilities, along with the detailed executive summary and the associated timelines.

Andrews most definitely increased capacity over Westwood. The fleet size has grown, referencing one of your links, in June 2020 fleet size was 962 units and today it is 995. The often cited capacity for Andrews is 300 units, and that might come from a press release from around opening time. That released early on said it was housing "approximately 300 buses" and later broke that down to 275 diesels and 30 electrics. Capacity on a chart from the links shows Andrews capacity as 330 units, and indeed, ETS added 20 more electrics in so with that they would have been around 325ish. Now, granted stuffing 330 buses in Andrews might not be ideal, but clearly is doable, and indeed Andrews recieved the majority of the recent bus order with few buses being retired so it might even be over 330 now.
So, what can ETS do to increase capacity?
- with peak bookout being 14 electric buses, they could move 30 Proterra's out to another facility for storage until such time as they have things sorted out and the buses can regularly operate and allow the diesels that are covering for them to be retired.
- 10ish Vicinity's could go into storage and rotated with the active fleet. Peak bookout is I believe 22 units out of a fleet of 49
OR
- figure out where they can be run to get 10 more on the road and retire older diesels to free up space
- park buses regularly on the ramps at Ferrier and Mitchell again this was common for many years. Yeah, it was never ideal to leave buses idling all night during the winter, but they did what they had to. The Ferrier ramp was expanded in fact to get extra lanes for buses. I don't think the Ferrier tents are seeing much use either. While some space is for the historic collection, I believe they're otherwise being used for storing dead buses waiting for maintenance. The Ferrier ramp can hold 16 buses, and Mitchell more than that. It has more lanes and longer lanes.
Something like a 153 Ave crosstown would probably start off like the 53 with 30 minute service. 1 hour round trip, so 2 buses. If they could build a loop at 142 St, and maybe run as far East as Victoria Trail to access Clareview it might be 3-4 buses needed.

 

[The_Cat]

Facts, the West Valley Line does a good job of matching its design to sensible community integration. In the suburban areas west of Meadowlark, it has good or total separation from the roadways to quickly move people around. From Meadowlark to Downtown, it’s a good local connector.
That being said, I hope that the inclusion of a prominent elevated section of LRT near one of our most trafficked areas and the experience the city now has with building elevated rail translates to increased utilization of above-ground LRT for the Metro Line extension. First off, the whole Kingsway area should be re-done elevated, and I also think instead of bridging over Walker Yards, we should run the LRT above-ground east along the Yellowhead and then up 97th Street. The Metro Line is intended to be a fast commuter route through the largely suburban Northwest, so this design makes more sense than tightly integrated at-grade alignments. Would be way cheaper than moving utilities to build trenched stations.

Yeggator, I took the liberty of pasting your post from the Valley Line thread. Going forward, the more I see LRT being built and operated, the greater a shift I see from bus to LRT usage, as well as a greater share of transit usage among Edmonton-area users. If LRT is built above ground, LRT can travel as fast as 70 km/h. In the past, I think LRT construction had to be packaged with other traffic improvements (e.g. a pedestrian underpass at McKernan School, with limited interference to neighbourhoods (e.g., access at street level), or value engineering like the crossing at Kingsway.

If LRT is built to outlying communities, I think speed will be important if residents commute to Edmonton. If highway traffic is faster, they will likely drive. If there are traffic jams, they may likely stay home.

 

[thefreezebreeze]

Yeggator, I took the liberty of pasting your post from the Valley Line thread. Going forward, the more I see LRT being built and operated, the greater a shift I see from bus to LRT usage, as well as a greater share of transit usage among Edmonton-area users. If LRT is built above ground, LRT can travel as fast as 70 km/h. In the past, I think LRT construction had to be packaged with other traffic improvements (e.g. a pedestrian underpass at McKernan School, with limited interference to neighbourhoods (e.g., access at street level), or value engineering like the crossing at Kingsway.

If LRT is built to outlying communities, I think speed will be important if residents commute to Edmonton. If highway traffic is faster, they will likely drive. If there are traffic jams, they may likely stay home.

Yeah building into the northside where the roads are hella wide and easy to drive, speed should absolutely be the priority. Otherwise you're right, many people will still just drive instead. Can we elevate as much as possible, and keep that gantry working?

I'm not sure what the province has in mind for commuter lines in the Edmonton area, but I feel like the metro and capital lines are well suited to take that on, in which case speed again is going to be so important. Planning future builds is one thing, but correcting the Kingsway area mistake is another and seems like a huge and disruptive undertaking.

 

[Wax]

The Downtown tunnel can accommodate 2.5-minute headways, so each line can be run with 5-minute frequencies.

I think the metro line cannot handle any more frequency because of churchill not being a flyover (I got this from a city planner but I could be wrong)

 

[Hannamay]

could it be possible to have a new kingsway mall platform insted of of walking quite a ways to get to the one by rah and walking a mile for the one at blanchford
its quite annoying they dont build a station along 106 st .which by the way it not used as much as it once was. now that they took the old station out at nait and moved it even further down the line , my dad whos is now a senior was complaining that its way to far of a walk to get to the mall for the people who have groceries carrying it all the way to the train is inconvenient. be smart edmonton not dumb