Disappointing News On Commuter Rail

[Canucktunes]

It appears that commuter rail is not a priority to the city of Ottawa according to the Ottawa Citizen.

VIA isn't interested in altering their schedules and city staff think the network wouldn't work so I guess it's going to be shelved.

The city has also decided to keep the current O-Train vehicles so the mOOse Consortium will be unable to purchase them from the city.

[Ra'akone]

Sounds very dissapointing....MOOSE? Sounds like they'd be something of an "AMT" to the region, if their plan went ahead.

But...there's politics as usual! *So, what else is new?*

[Canucktunes]

Sounds very dissapointing....MOOSE? Sounds like they'd be something of an "AMT" to the region, if their plan went ahead.

But...there's politics as usual! *So, what else is new?*

Yeah, I had hoped for an AMT like service. I've used them numerous times to get to downtown Montreal from Laval, before the subway got up there.

VIA has beefed up their schedules so the only option now is a peak commuter service in the west to Woodroffe near Baseline Station (with options for extra stations on Merivale and/or Prince of Whales Drive). The STO are basically only interested in getting their Rapidbus system up so their train option is on hold.

The plans to get the O-Train up to the Casino will probably also be on hold because the city wants it's own.

[M.Wright]

It appears that commuter rail is not a priority to the city of Ottawa according to the Ottawa Citizen.

VIA isn't interested in altering their schedules and city staff think the network wouldn't work so I guess it's going to be shelved.

The city has also decided to keep the current O-Train vehicles so the mOOse Consortium will be unable to purchase them from the city.

Honestly I do see why the city wouldn't be interested in this, as it would encourage more people to move outside of the city limits (which right now the city is trying to prevent since it means less tax dollars for them). So this is just like the 174, why would the city spend money on a project that wouldn't benefit the tax payers of the City of Ottawa very much? It's the same reason why the city refuses to widen the 174, despite calls from the Province and the Feds to widen it (with even offering funding). As the 174 east of Trim Rd mainly services the residents of Clarence-Rockland, who are not city taxpayers. In response to the widening calls in 2007, the city actually ended up putting in "traffic calming" measures. Which seeing as it is a highway and cannot put speed bumps, I noticed they ended up using traffic lights for the traffic calming. As in Cumberland Village, that light cycles like every 30 seconds for the cross street traffic. Now that's more a benefit to the tax payers since at that point, the traffic coming from the cross street are tax payers. The through traffic is mainly Clarence-Rockland residents, and therefore aren't tax payers to the City of Ottawa.

If it was still Highway 17, it probably would of been widened by now seeing as the Province was even offering to fund 33% of it's widening costs. (The typical funding model here in Canada) Also by widening it, that would just encourage more people to move out of the city.

But as for the commuter rail, it doesn't make sense for the city to spend money on a project that wouldn't really benefit it's own tax payers, as that money would be coming from the tax payers, and seeing as these rail lines would mainly service commuters who are coming in from outside the City of Ottawa, why should the city pay for it? Seeing as it would take cars off the road, that would free up more road space for more cars on the roads into Ottawa and therefore increase the growth outside of the City. In the states, many cities spent money on infrastructure projects that benefited non-taxpayers more then it benefits taxpayers, and such projects were later a regret for the city as it reduced their tax base. Ottawa is trying to prevent that from happening, and like I said, it doesn't make sense to spend money on a project that wouldn't benefit tax payers very much.

Only way we're going to get a commuter rail system is if the province creates something like GO Transit for Ottawa because everyone on this side of the river pays taxes to the province. But given that the province is in it's own financial mess at the moment, this is quite unlikely. Also seeing as this mOOse project would of went into Gatineau, they would of also had to get the Gatineau government onboard, which is unlikely since their focus is on buses right now. So the only true operator I could see for this project could be the NCC, but we all know how well they run stuff.

But the city has much more important stuff to spend their money on at the moment, like fixing our culverts to prevent future sinkholes, as now the city is going on a spree to replace the culverts that are in similar conditions as the one found on the 174.

I do agree commuter rail would be nice, but unless the upper level governments get involved (which is highly doubtful), it is just not feasible, since it is really not a municipal issue. But all our upper level governments are quite uninterested in transit, or are in a financial crisis. So I highly doubt we will see commuter rail in Ottawa.

EDIT: After reading the citizen's article and checking out the website, a few more issues stands out. First off, only way they would be allowed to use the VIA corridor is if it was double tracked. But who is going to pay for that? Adding another track is quite expensive, so again, this is proof that it needs to be done by an upper level government. The tracks also need to be fixed. So once again, who's going to pay for that? Another issue is if they plan to run those trains from Gatineau to Arnprior, it would involve a total reconstruction of the Airport Parkway/Brookfield interchange to bring back the old connector track that used to be there. Who's going to pay for that?

So as you can see, it's already getting expensive with the items I have just mentioned. Also it looks like north of the VIA line on the O-Train line, it would need to be double tracked as well, since that would be a major capacity issue with the current amount of train traffic (as I doubt it would be reduced), plus running two additional commuter rail lines along it. That would be a expensive project considering most of the ROW is above/below grade, and there is a tunnel and rail bridge in the way. Not to mention widening the below grade section north of Dows Lake, that would involve widening all those bridges along there.

So for a project that really won't benefit city residents, that is a lot of capital expenditures if everyone expects the city to pay for all those projects. Why would the city spend capital money on this project, once again, a project that wouldn't benefit tax payers, and if it would, it wouldn't benefit as much tax payers as LRT extensions would.

Asking the city to pay for this project would be like asking Metropolitan Toronto in 1965 to pay for the starting and the operation of GO Transit, which mainly services the 905 region. Where as Metropolitan Toronto has their focus on Subway extensions back then because the Subways actually serviced the tax payers more then GO Transit does.

Anyway that's just my 2 cents, as it makes no sense for the city government to be involved in this project at all when the city can spend the money that would be spent on this project on LRT extensions. Keep in mind as well, from a political prospective. Residents from Clarence-Rockland, Arnprior, and Smith Falls, aren't voters in the City of Ottawa (just like they aren't tax payers). But spending money on non-tax payers would probably anger the tax payers in this city, resulting in loss in the next election.

Keep in mind that most of these recent capital projects (including the LRT) are coming out of our debt financing fund. Which for you non-political people, is the city putting it's self in debt. Seeing as our debt has risen over the past 6 years to an alarming amount (as recently in the news), if we're going to put ourselves in debt and pay for it later, it might as well be a project that would service the most tax payers. As this debt will catch up to us in the future when the monthly payments become too large. It will happen, and it has happened in the states in many of the cities down there. So spending money on a project that would reduce our tax base, wouldn't be a good idea in the long-term.

I am not against commuter rail at all as I would like to see it, but it should not be expected that the City of Ottawa should pay for this. The federal government would be the one more responsible for this, but that is quite self explanatory on why it won't happen.

[Canucktunes]

Provincial funding would have been a prerequesite and the 417 is already being widened to accomodate more traffic in the west end with provincial funds so it appears to be something that just wont see the light of day.

Smith's Falls, Richmond and Alexandria are out because of VIA's restructuring on this side of the border so that would only leave a route from Pembroke to Prince of Whales drive via Shawville and Kanata. That isn't enough.

Then there's the fact that the Quyon ferry operations just got funding to upgrade their two small ferries to one large cable ferry and a Park & Ride facility serviced by the 93 is being built at the corner of Terry Fox & Innovation. This on top of the new Park & Ride at Scotiabank Place, where a more frequent 90 route will be added in a few years.

It's a shame someone couldn't get a tourist train on that track with a dining car and extra passanger cars for commuters. That way people could get their breakfast on the train travelling from Pembroke to Woodroffe Ave and/or dinner from Woodroffe Ave to Pembrooke.

Oh well...

[dowlingm]

I agree that this is pretty unlikely stuff in the short run. I do think that VIA should be leaned on to try a Kingston-Brockville-Ottawa service arriving around 0830, with that train running through to Montreal to break up the current 3 hr gap in the morning between Ottawa-Montreal services. Operating new services on new lines like Pembroke is one thing but Kingston, Brockville, Smiths Falls are all existing stations and will be open already to handle 651 (Kingston only) and 41

[smallspy]

With what funding would VIA provide this service with?

Dan

[dowlingm]

the same funding they would use to do any other timetable change. Not a single extra rail needs laying or station opened, and Kingston already acts as a morning starting point for 651. It's a question of fleet and personnel management and the will to explore the possibility of a market opportunity.

[Brian Jensen]

is there any up to date news on whats going on with the lrt in ottawa?

[8792]

the same funding they would use to do any other timetable change. Not a single extra rail needs laying or station opened, and Kingston already acts as a morning starting point for 651. It's a question of fleet and personnel management and the will to explore the possibility of a market opportunity.

Excellent point, it just goes to show how Via as a Crown Corporation is not profit driven or even driven to maximize revenues. What's also really frustrating is the fact that Via refuses to carry local passengers between Barrhaven and Train. With Park N Ride at Barrhaven, I have no doubt Via would earn some revenue from this. Charge $5 + HST for a one-way trip. Via gladly dead-heads empty trains to/from Train & Barrhaven at a loss, yet continue to refuse to turn these deadheads into small revenue generators to cover at least some of the deadheading expenses.