Some cities have transformed old rail lines into urban parks. I get that part of it but 97 St is main artery into downtown and the intersection needs to be widened and brought up to modern standards to provide better accessibility to downtown. Having RAM on one side, a potential new development on the other side, and 100 year old crumbling infrastructure in the middle makes little sense. In a different location an argument for rehabilitating the bridge could be made but 97th and 104th is not the place to have a transportation bottleneck particularly if a major Asian center and high rise materializes on 97th to the north of the current bridge.
 
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There's a noticeable socio-economic difference between the north and south sides of the bridge and one would hope that the city administrators would value economic development on the north side of the bridge ahead of creating a pleasant pedestrian experience over 97 St. 109 St is seeing development that most likely would not be happening if the rat hole was still there.
 
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Keep the bridge because there's so much potential with the crossing at the top. They could construct a MUP that connects Mary Burlie Park with Stationlands, or something more, and include more greenspace and community gardens.

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However, the pedestrian underpasses are narrow and dangerous, with muggings just waiting to happen. They should renovate the bridge so that the pedestrian underpasses are much wider and more visible to motorists (including the po-po). If they are wide enough to include cycling then all the better.

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Looking at the above photo I think the solution I'd prefer to see is to decommission the sidewalks on either side. Then level out the land where the sidewalks were so that the sidewalk routes above along the top side of the bridge. This would improve safety in the area and would encourage more pedestrian north-south movement. Vehicular traffic can maintain under the bridge.
 
I was trying to remember why this bridge remained when the Rat Hole and 105 St bridge were removed so quickly when the rail yards were moved out of DT. And I think it only still exists because Via continued passenger services downtown for a few years when all other rail was pulled out.

Maybe it's time to take the bridge out, I don't know. I can see both sides of this argument.
 
BrettB said:
I was trying to remember why this bridge remained when the Rat Hole and 105 St bridge were removed so quickly when the rail yards were moved out of DT. And I think it only still exists because Via continued passenger services downtown for a few years when all other rail was pulled out.

Maybe it's time to take the bridge out, I don't know. I can see both sides of this argument.
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The historical ownership records for the 97th St. Bridge were not as clear as they were for the Rat Hole and 105th St. Bridge.

At the time Qualico purchased Station Lands from CN, CN insisted the City owned the bridge and the City insisted CN owned the bridge. The Downtown Plan at the time called for 97th Street to be brought up to grade as one of the Gateway Entries to downtown and neither the City or CN wanted to be responsible for the costs of removing the bridge to facilitate that.

Qualico solved the impasse by purchasing CN’s interest in the bridge “if any” (CN weren’t prepared to acknowledge ownership even long enough to sell it) and by having the City approve the redevelopment of the bridge including a “jewel-box” retail structure as part of the original DP for Station Lands. The City also required Qualico to include and maintain an extension of shared use path on the bridge and link it to 105 Avenue on the west side of 97th St.

The ability to bring 97th St. up to grade died with the new RAM being given approval for direct access to their parkade from 97th St. at its then/now current grades even though alternatives were offered to them.

Via rail service had ceased several years before CN listed the site for sale and they had already removed all of the railroad tracks.

As an aside, the City once owned the 101 St. Bridge that had been long removed from the other end of the site when the rail was removed west of 101 Street. While they brought 101 St. back to grade when that was done, they “cheated” by not fully removing the foundations and by only bringing the road bed up to the lowered sidewalk elevation (a similar condition to what you see on 97th St.). That’s why there’s a “dip” in 101St. as you drive/walk between 104 and 105A Ave. It’s the same reason there’s an even greater “dip” in Jasper Ave. between 109 and 110 St.
 
That's actually so interesting, it's kind of cool that there are still some small remnants of the old CN rail yards, although not visible to everyone. I was telling my coworkers that Stationlands was once part of the CN railyards and they refused to believe me lol.

Here's a little picture update of the Remand and the bridge from yesterday.

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So now imagine if the Remand site was sold to Qualico and their linear park continued across 97th Street -- according to Ken they already own the bridge. The remand site could see another two-tower build-out (biting into the Quarters precinct) and that linear park extension could be one of Edmonton's finest -- to say the least it is off to a good start. And, as I have mentioned before there is a "ghost" LRT station below 97th street that could be brought to life, rejuvenating connections to a whole series of places and giving Qualico a connection to the entire City by way of that rejuvenated station. Destroying the bridge will do zero for improving traffic on 97th street and will just work to maintain the area as "undesirable" and gritty. It may take a while but this could be a blossoming area of the City -- Qualico has proven to be a quality developer and it deservedly is showcased in their very name.
 
Some in Edmonton have a propensity to "knock the Sh!# out of" existing infrastructure, refusing to ever see the value in keeping the value in repurposing into something other -- Coliseum, Paramount Theatre, and building after building that doesn't jibe with a "new is better" attitude. We need to pay attention to the onslaught of new crap being built that isn't worth the match it takes to burn it down.
 
Edmcowboy11 said:
Looking at the above photo I think the solution I'd prefer to see is to decommission the sidewalks on either side. Then level out the land where the sidewalks were so that the sidewalk routes above along the top side of the bridge. This would improve safety in the area and would encourage more pedestrian north-south movement. Vehicular traffic can maintain under the bridge.
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This would actually be a very good solution to improve safety for pedestrians. Taking out the underpass will not fix the bottleneck for vehicles as the area north on 97 Street where older buildings are closer to the road is also part of it. The bottleneck is from 107 Ave to 104th.
 
To my mind the only legitimate reason to remove the underpass and widen the 97th street corridor is if we are installing a streetcar the length of 97th.
Running from either the Quarters or Churchilll square all the way North to Eaux Claire it would greatly expand transit options and 10X the throughput of the corridor
 
It's hard to imagine a developer building at that location without wanting frontage or access onto 97 Street. It's much better to have a building with storefront windows fronting onto 97th rather than a blanc sterile wall that's above grade and isolated from the street.
 
Out of Towner said:
It's hard to imagine a developer building at that location without wanting frontage or access onto 97 Street. It's much better to have a building with storefront windows fronting onto 97th rather than a blanc sterile wall that's above grade and isolated from the street.
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Maybe we should focus our efforts on filling all the empty storefronts here and elsewhere downtown before coming up with grand ideas for more commercial space that may just sit empty for years.
 
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