Quote:
Originally Posted by Ottawan
Byron has been the right location from the get-go, and most people with any sense know that. By eliminating Carling for 'cost', they can now 'blame' the NCC for forcing them to take the only route that makes sense.
Carling does deserve better transit service at some point, but not on a route that starts at Tunney's and ends at Lincoln Fields. Also, Carling is more likely to get a supplementary transit line someday. If Carling were used today, the urban area north of it would never get rapid transit, and would forever be worse off than it even is today (who would use the transitstumpway from Dominion, or Westboro - only a few poor schmucks who have no other choice).
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Blimey, we might have something approaching a consensus around here!
I agree completely with the above - you're dead on that if Carling gets the LRT line first, rapid transit service north of it would never improve. But I think things could actually get worse, and not just for people in Westboro.
Given that the TMP calls for the western LRT to go to Lincoln Fields (by whichever route) and then on to Baseline - but not Bayshore - there is going to be a big transferring problem at Lincoln Fields. People from Barrhaven will get first dibs on the train at Baseline, while their compatriots from Kanata will always be faced with fullish trains at Lincoln Fields (barring some kind of short-ending operating scenario along with infrastructure at Lincoln Fields to support it, namely a third track). Given that there are in fact more riders from Kanata than Barrhaven, this is a recipe for a lot of anger (Baseline apparently gets the LRT rather than Bayshore because *all day* ridership is higher to Baseline due to Algonquin College, whereas peak ridership is higher to Bayshore).
Now, imagine if you will a Carling LRT line, leaving the West Transitway from Dominion onwards still in place. All these Kanatans will be arriving at Lincoln Fields by bus and will be required to transfer to LRT going down Carling, all the while that the West Transitway - which they had been using up to the very day that LRT opened on Carling - remains available for use. How long do you suppose it would be before Kanatans and their politicians start demanding that their express buses be allowed to continue on as before? How long do you suppose that OC Transpo and Council could resist the political pressure? Before long we'd be back to a variant on the high cost system we have right now: BRT & LRT doing the same thing. Plans to rework Albert and Slater would also have to be shelved and chances are that buses from the Southeast Transitway and the abortive Hospital Link (whose riders would be facing a similar albeit less serious problem at Hurdman to those from Kanata at Lincoln Fields) would be through-routed with buses from Kanata to help "balance" things out downtown.
On the other hand, if you block off the West Transitway to buses by converting it to LRT, you instantly create pressure to do the right thing and extend a second LRT branch to Bayshore or Moodie, and with much of DND moving to the Moodie area, there would also be additional reverse flow ridership to justify the extension.