whattheheck said:
^ Well, that looks like crap.
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Even by suburban standards this is ugly. Putting a lot of parking in front a building close to a LRT stop seems even more stupid.

Its only early January and we already have a strong contender for the ugliest new project in the year.
 
David A said:
Even by suburban standards this is ugly. Putting a lot of parking in front a building close to a LRT stop seems even more stupid.

Its only early January and we already have a strong contender for the ugliest new project in the year.
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To be fair not everyone is going to use the LRT 100% of the time so having some parking isn’t the worst thing
 
J_gordo said:
To be fair not everyone is going to use the LRT 100% of the time so having some parking isn’t the worst thing
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I have to agree. I live in a condo right next to an LRT station and we still need a car for the majority of our trips. Transit is so much slower/impractical if you aren't going downtown or to the U of A. And 95% of our visitors come by car. Hate it though we do, parking is still a needed selling feature. I wonder if in 20 years there may be a move to converting interior parking lots like this into park amenities, one can dream.
 
SarcasticMarmot said:
I have to agree. I live in a condo right next to an LRT station and we still need a car for the majority of our trips. Transit is so much slower/impractical if you aren't going downtown or to the U of A. And 95% of our visitors come by car.
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Just out of curiosity, how much will the VLW help change that, if at all?
 
CplKlinger said:
Just out of curiosity, how much will the VLW help change that, if at all?
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I don't think it will help us much. Often the places we want to go: Climbing Gym, Friends Houses, River Valley, Superstore, etc are not on a train line. Only draws for us on VLW are West Ed (which we go to maybe twice a year) and 124th (maybe every other month). We loved living carfree in Vancouver (best part of a horrible city) and being next to the LRT has let us remain a 1 car family (which is a huge savings!) but car is still king in Edmonton.
 
It’ll take 20 years for the LRTs to really get there. That’s why TOD is so key. When those hubs get built up around stations, the line is more valuable.

Many Edmontonians have their dentist, barber, friends, daycares, restaurants, etc all spread out across the city or at least a “quadrant”. Whereas in places like Vancouver, more of my friends there live “along the skytrain” and have many of their local service/retail/leisure locations at stops along the train (if not walkable in their community already).

Projects like west block help though, and obviously all the big employment hubs of malls, hospitals, and unis are the biggest generators.

Transit is also cost prohibitive though vs a car if you don’t use it frequently and already own/insure a vehicle. That’s my biggest barrier to using more. Makes way more sense to drive (even with paid parking often) or to bike.
 
Sidewalk construction on 107 Street:
1737049223206.png
 
Despite all the construction pain, I'd argue that the Valley Line will probably be the prettiest light rail system out of any in the country by the end of all this. Stuff like this shows glimpses of what we're getting as a final product.

I don't think the Toronto light rail systems, ION or whatever passes for the Green Line in Calgary can compete with this.
 
Having lived in Metro Vancouver for 22 years, I have less rose coloured glasses of their transit system. There's a lot more of even City of Vancouver let alone Metro Vancouver that is not served by rapid transit than is served by rapid transit. UBC might be another 15 years away from Skytrain and we don't have high hopes for the SFU gondola. I emailed politicians 24 years ago about the need for lines to UBC, on Hastings, 41st Ave, Willingdon, Arbutus, and then reaching out to all the suburbs. Was told we didn't need redundant lines. Then an incident in 2014 where loose power rail was ripped off just before the afternoon rush hour and I can tell you exactly how ineffective a bus bridge service to replace full trains running every 2 minutes was and how badly we needed those redundant lines. It took me 6 hours to get home for what is normally a 75 minute trip. A few months later I ditched transit in favour of motorcycling.

Edmonton's on the right path.
 
thommyjo said:
ITransit is also cost prohibitive though vs a car if you don’t use it frequently and already own/insure a vehicle. That’s my biggest barrier to using more. Makes way more sense to drive (even with paid parking often) or to bike.
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This right here! ETS really needs to take a hard look at how to attract occasional users. I've preached on here before about the value of distance based fares but it is really frustrating how even when transit is an equally speedy option the cost for an individual trip is much higher than using the car you already own.
 
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