[p_xavier]

Originally Posted by Dado

That's not entirely true... he claims to have supporting responses from city staff, so there is something new coming tomorrow.

And while it is true that it is the same comments and same solutions, the fact remains that the public awareness and perception does not match the reality: the public thinks we're getting rail, but we're just getting another decade of buses.

I'm all for rail, but I'm a realistic guy. The EAs for much of the Transitway are done. Why would I wait 5 years to start building rail instead? I find it childish to push for rail when EAs are not done.

And supporting answers for what, that it will cost 900M$ for Transitway? If it's the same kind of presentation he had at Lansdowne, then he won't lose my time twice. OMG, financing is not secured, let's all panic, we'll never receive money! (BTW, if transit was only the responsibility of one level of governement, we wouldn't have to beg for that).

You're sounding sort of like David Gladstone... but, speaking of the idea, I gather we will be getting just that soon. VIA is doing track upgrades in the area and some of those upgrades include things like a new siding at Fallowfield Station. The excuses against putting in rail-based downtown bypass services are fast disappearing and in the coming crunch we need to remove as many people as possible from going through downtown who aren't actually going to downtown.

Well it's a cheap way to achieve fast results, but for suburbs only. You don't need one type of transit system, like most of councillors seem to think, but you need a variety of options for different needs.

We have an EA and study for downtown on the surface, so it's ready to go with only minor modifications (mainly to lengthen the platforms for 3-car instead of 2-car trains). We know that part won't take more that 3 years. Transitway conversion is relatively easy and certainly doesn't require 6 years to accomplish - a serious push would get it done in one summer season (May-August). The only significant hang-up is the missing West Transitway/Ottawa River Parkway section, which will require a study and an EA. For that reason, the City should start on a study and EA for that ASAP. We could be riding trains downtown in 4 years - if we got on with it.

Minor modifications need EA updates. Plus to modify all engineering studies and such. A tunnel study is easier to do than a surface route study. Even if we would be riding trains downtown in 4 years. That short stretch would be only used for 2 years, and actually would cost more to run than buses because of the low level of passengers of these trains. The ridership studies showed that the N-S route has the lowest level of ridership, so yeah, I'm still happy that the first project was cancelled.

If people assumed that they would ride a train in a tunnel in 3 years, with the current lack of leadership, well they just have to wake up. It won't happen. Even for the Transitway construction, it takes an eternity to be done.