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Green Line LRT


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Some tid-bits from today's open house:

  • There's no plans on how to cross 16 Ave. That's for future planners to decide.
  • 2nd Ave station will need land from Eau Claire Mall. The houses north of the mall will probably be expropriated.
  • They are considering having Centre Street BRT share lanes and stations with LRT. If a bus breaks down on the track, the train can single track around it.
  • If feedback shows there isn't community support for surface LRT on Centre St, it will be up to council to decide what to do, ie proceed anyways or stop the line downtown.
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1 minute ago, lucx said:

They are considering having Centre Street BRT share lanes and stations with LRT. If a bus breaks down on the track, the train can single track around it.

Lol! Like on 7th ave??? Bahahaha

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The original idea of having the train go to 16th Avenue was so the expensive bit could be done in one shot - that is, a fully bored tunnel from 16th through to the edge of the beltline.

If they're having to run it on the surface of Centre Street, to keep it on the cheap, I propose we end it at Eau Claire and use the money from not bridging now and send it further south.  It's OBVIOUS the South won the Green Line, don't slap the north with a small itty-bitty useless segment as a consolation.  When the City gets more money, build the Green Line north in a really meaningful manner.

Pity though.  To have the Green Line go from the Beltline to the north end of the city would've saved the city huge in operating dollars from all the buses that run on Centre Street.  The ridership on day one on the north end would've made it a massive success.  But alas, they couldn't figure out the fact the Aurora Business Park would've been a great location for the LRV garage...

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  • 2 months later...

This might be a dumb question, but are there any concerns over the interaction of snow and the low-clearance vehicles and platforms? I'm under the (possibly erroneous/overstated) impression that the current high area under the platforms allows trains to push the snow into that cavity, whereas that won't be available on the Green Line - will the snow just get shoved up onto the platforms themselves, requiring frequent manual plowing? Note I'm not concerned about snow piles impeding the trains themselves.

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38 minutes ago, TimmyC62 said:

This might be a dumb question, but are there any concerns over the interaction of snow and the low-clearance vehicles and platforms? I'm under the (possibly erroneous/overstated) impression that the current high area under the platforms allows trains to push the snow into that cavity, whereas that won't be available on the Green Line - will the snow just get shoved up onto the platforms themselves, requiring frequent manual plowing? Note I'm not concerned about snow piles impeding the trains themselves.

It may be a bit of an issue if trains don't run frequently and snow builds up, but there's a good example of low floor trains running in snowy conditions in Minneapolis/St. Paul.  They actually designed a bit of a mini-plow shape on the front of the trains to help deflect snow.

Harlow_1516969885_greenline2.JPG

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Today’s Greenline presentation revealed that tunneling under Centre St to 16 Ave is estimated at $250-$300 million. This sounds like back-of-a-napkin math as they admitted it wasn’t a detailed estimate. Anecdotal support from Crescent Heights is 50/50 support for surface LRT and I’d imagine it’s quite less city-wide. Michael Thompson, the Greeline head, previously stated an option to not proceed if there isn’t community support. Can Councillors justify building this section with tepid community support? Is it reasonable to delay this section until funding becomes available to go underground?

They didn’t explicitly answer my question if they had a contingency plan if funding is delayed. The response was the federal and provincial partners remain committed to the project. It tells me there is no contingency plan and all the eggs are in stimulus spending. ?‍♂️

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5 hours ago, lucx said:

Today’s Greenline presentation revealed that tunneling under Centre St to 16 Ave is estimated at $250-$300 million. This sounds like back-of-a-napkin math as they admitted it wasn’t a detailed estimate. Anecdotal support from Crescent Heights is 50/50 support for surface LRT and I’d imagine it’s quite less city-wide. Michael Thompson, the Greeline head, previously stated an option to not proceed if there isn’t community support. Can Councillors justify building this section with tepid community support? Is it reasonable to delay this section until funding becomes available to go underground?

Well if it gets delayed, theres tons more that could get built in the South... to McKenzie Towne at the very least, on $250m to $300m, is very much a possibilty. Would also make for way better transfers than the 130 Avenue terminus lol. 

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I received a reply from Councillor Farrell’s staff. She wants Centre Street to be a community street and favors less car traffic. She supports surface LRT in Crescent Heights and I have a feeling the City considers 50% community support a win.

One interesting thing form the presentation was a diagram that showed Eau Clair station at a 3% grade underground. Edmonton’s LRT guidelines state a maximum station gradient of 1%. What’s the grade at Barlow station?

Clipboard 1.jpg

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10 hours ago, lucx said:

I received a reply from Councillor Farrell’s staff. She wants Centre Street to be a community street and favors less car traffic. She supports surface LRT in Crescent Heights and I have a feeling the City considers 50% community support a win.

One interesting thing form the presentation was a diagram that showed Eau Clair station at a 3% grade underground. Edmonton’s LRT guidelines state a maximum station gradient of 1%. What’s the grade at Barlow station?

Clipboard 1.jpg

3 degree gradient... i wonder if i could roll a coin across the platform, start to finish ?

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On 5/21/2020 at 2:51 PM, lucx said:

I received a reply from Councillor Farrell’s staff. She wants Centre Street to be a community street and favors less car traffic. She supports surface LRT in Crescent Heights and I have a feeling the City considers 50% community support a win.

One interesting thing form the presentation was a diagram that showed Eau Clair station at a 3% grade underground. Edmonton’s LRT guidelines state a maximum station gradient of 1%. What’s the grade at Barlow station?

Clipboard 1.jpg

Barlow/Max Bell I'm pretty sure is well above 1%, but unfortunately the resolution of the measurements from Google Earth Pro are pretty crude when it comes to the height.  At the east end of the station, it reads 1074m, at the west end it reads 1073m.  Since a meter is a pretty large measurement, heightwise, for a 100ish meter long platform, it's quite possible that the station is on a 2% gradient, but it seems steeper than that to me.

Jon

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  • 4 weeks later...
5 hours ago, downbeat said:

Stage 1 of the Green Line has (finally!) been approved.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/green-line-vote-1.5615066

Only thing remaining to see: how fast will we see construction... out of personal interest too, because as a welder, I kind of need a better paying job than fast food. And I'd imagine that the 20km of LRT isn't going to be held together by popsicle sticks... ?

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5 hours ago, armorand said:

Only thing remaining to see: how fast will we see construction... out of personal interest too, because as a welder, I kind of need a better paying job than fast food. And I'd imagine that the 20km of LRT isn't going to be held together by popsicle sticks... ?

Next year, most likely

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18 minutes ago, armorand said:

his worship...?

"Worship" is a formal title used for mayors. If you ever attend/watch a Calgary city council meeting, you'll hear the mayor being called "your worship" when he is spoken to by councillors and clerks, sort of like the way judges are called your honour/my lord/my lady/etc. (depending on the context).

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8 hours ago, downbeat said:

"Worship" is a formal title used for mayors. If you ever attend/watch a Calgary city council meeting, you'll hear the mayor being called "your worship" when he is spoken to by councillors and clerks, sort of like the way judges are called your honour/my lord/my lady/etc. (depending on the context).

I know - just kind of amazed that in 2020, we're still calling people worships, lords and barons...

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Ric McIver's June 18 statement:

Quote

We're consistent in saying that we've put money through legislation aside to build the Green Line ... that's always been contingent upon the city building essentially what they promised to build when the money was promised

https://twitter.com/RicMcIver/status/1273779752583618560

The NDP government pledged $1.5 billion for Shepard to 16 Ave. The UCP can't use the excuse the money was meant for the full 46 km. They're going to fund it. They just need time to find the money.

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1 hour ago, lucx said:

Ric McIver's June 18 statement:

https://twitter.com/RicMcIver/status/1273779752583618560

The NDP government pledged $1.5 billion for Shepard to 16 Ave. The UCP can't use the excuse the money was meant for the full 46 km. They're going to fund it. They just need time to find the money.

Maybe thats whats behind the talks of reintroducing PST... where else would the money come in for pipelines, Calgary/Edmonton LRT expansions and AHS - without scaring everybody to move out of province with any higher income taxes, Manitoba-level healthcare & carbon fees?

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