Calgary Stoney Trail [Ring Road]

[RyLucky]

Originally Posted by VIce

Two and a half Southeast LRTs, or 7.5 SETWAYs.

-build any two lrts from downtown to the city limits
-fix crowchild/bow river, fix glenmore/deerfoot, build every interchange on the city's wishlist for 30 years
-10 000 blue rings
-500 000 cycletrack networks
-12 state of the art central libraries/opera houses/art galleries/museums/etc
-5 or 10 stadiums
-cover Deerfoot with a developable land bridge from 16th ave to Peigan Trail, freeing up a billion dollars of real estate while restoring river access and social integration to 100 000 people (essentially, undoing all the harm Deerfoot has caused)
-put it in a bank account and earn 3% per year, or $150 million/year <--which could then be used to buy an lrt line every 8-10 years indefinitely.

[Fuzz]

Next time some wiener complains about spending a million dollars on a bike lane taking 3m of space, I'm gonna show them this monstrosity.

[H.E.Pennypacker]

Originally Posted by Allan83

I can only assume that because this agreement with the Tsuu T'ina was so difficult they made sure to secure all the land they needed for the foreseeable future, and then some. Is this all going to be built at once, or is some of it part of the long term plans?

This is the only reason why I can think of why they're planning to overbuilt the shit out of this road (based on the video) right now ... They want to make sure it can handle a heavy traffic load and a potential expansion in the very long term - I mean it took over 50 years just to get the Tsuu T'iina to agree to give this part of the land up .. I can't imagine how long it'd take to try and acquire more land cutting into the reserve for an additional highway (in the very long term)

[MasterG]

Originally Posted by RyLucky

-build any two lrts from downtown to the city limits
-fix crowchild/bow river, fix glenmore/deerfoot, build every interchange on the city's wishlist for 30 years
-10 000 blue rings
-500 000 cycletrack networks
-12 state of the art central libraries/opera houses/art galleries/museums/etc
-5 or 10 stadiums
-cover Deerfoot with a developable land bridge from 16th ave to Peigan Trail, freeing up a billion dollars of real estate while restoring river access and social integration to 100 000 people (essentially, undoing all the harm Deerfoot has caused)
-put it in a bank account and earn 3% per year, or $150 million/year <--which could then be used to buy an lrt line every 8-10 years indefinitely.

This. My money is on 10,000 blue rings personally. Because if we are going to waste a shit-load of money we might as well be on something ridiculous. Oh wait...

Interesting Excel-generated factoid, someone might want to fact check: according to the City website the blue ring is 17m in diameter (that doesn't seem right). If we lined up $5 Billion worth of 17m diameter rings we would have a wall of blue stretching 170km.

[MasterG]

Originally Posted by 5seconds

The Nation has stated that this is a one-time opportunity, and that they would never entertain another road deal in the future. Both parties saw the need to buy enough land for 100+ years.

Saying that, am I being naive in thinking that a well designed, 3-lane in each direction road with wider bridges in the river valleys would suffice for decades? The deal with the Nation is done, so the corridor can be retained on the off-chance that it will eventually be needed, but for now, build it to a more reasonable scale.

The contrast in the Bow River bridge expansion and what is being planned for the Fish Creek and Elbow River crossings is quite stark. It's like one river is special and worth preserving and the other two are just getting in the way. That is one place that could be addressed; less fill, wider crossings.

Why does this have to even be free-flow to start? Sure I get it on a few big intersections, but there is no way that someone could argue that some of those random ones in the deep South need freeflow treatment - with double and triple lane on/off ramps at that.

The city survived much busier roads without grade separation just fine for decades. Built when you need it. At least then you have the option to not build it if you never do.

[fusili]

I can't bring myself to watch the video again. The interchange at Sarcee alone is enough to make me cringe. Sure the SWRR is needed, but this is over-engineered to a level that is beyond ridiculous. It seems like the engineers were given no constraints whatsoever.

[YYCguys]

Is the video showing the ultimate configuration or is it showing opening day? Will it be built in phases or all at once?

I get tense everytime I have to use the Crow/Glenmore/5th Street/Elbow/Macleod stretch of road, so some of the interchanges that are shown in the video scare the bejeezuz out of me, and that's just on paper!

[fusili]

I think the biggest over-the-top aspect of this is the absolutely massive medians (to accommodate what? 12 more lanes of traffic. Is this going to be bigger than the 401? Seriously?). Bridges are huge costs. Doubling (or even tripling) their spans is a massive budget impact. This could be done much, much, much more cost-effectively.

[MasterG]

Originally Posted by fusili

I think the biggest over-the-top aspect of this is the absolutely massive medians (to accommodate what? 12 more lanes of traffic. Is this going to be bigger than the 401? Seriously?). Bridges are huge costs. Doubling (or even tripling) their spans is a massive budget impact. This could be done much, much, much more cost-effectively.

They also seem to believe that a bridge cannot be built with at least 2 lanes in every direction regardless of local needs. Seriously, every offramp/onramp looks to be 2 or 3 lanes, most on Deerfoot do fine with 1 and it has 5-10x the traffic this will ever seen.

[You Need A Thneed]

Originally Posted by MasterG

They also seem to believe that a bridge cannot be built with at least 2 lanes in every direction regardless of local needs. Seriously, every offramp/onramp looks to be 2 or 3 lanes, most on Deerfoot do fine with 1 and it has 5-10x the traffic this will ever seen.

It's true that Deerfoot sees more traffic than this will likely ever see. However, the ramps on Deerfoot don't really "do fine". They are a huge source of congestion.

[Spring2008]

Is there any possibility of cutting this thing by a billion or two and re-allocating that money to the NC/SE LRT?

Originally Posted by Wooster

It will be a scandal if citizens make it. This thing is so overbuilt, it's crazy. Look at the span of each bridge all to leave space to accommodate this fantasy of a future 16 lane configuration for this leg only that will never be needed, nor is desirable. Forget government flights and cell phone bills, this is waste. If people don't like it, they should speak up

[fusili]

Originally Posted by 5seconds

16 lanes total in the Ultimate stage (8 now and 8 later, in theory).

401:

Point made. In what crazy world does the SWRR require a similar number of lanes to the 401: the primary east/west route in the heart of a region of 7 million people whose main axis is east/west? This is insanity.

[MasterG]

Originally Posted by You Need A Thneed

It's true that Deerfoot sees more traffic than this will likely ever see. However, the ramps on Deerfoot don't really "do fine". They are a huge source of congestion.

Sorry I didn't mean that, I do agree with you: I put the qualifier on as "most" ramps, there are definitely trouble spots which brings it back to the SWRR. So many more obvious, better quantified and more pressing challenges than this road in our transportation network.

• 1 billion onto Deerfoot improvements . 50 mil for each of the top 20 problem intersections (if there are even 20 interchanges that need work).
• 2 Billion for NCLRT
• 1 Billion for Stephen Ave Subway
• 1 billion to get started on crowchild and BRT network

[MalcolmTucker]

Originally Posted by 5seconds

I think it's also a shame that the older Fish Creek bridge, which was designed with a large opening, is now being filled to match the smaller bridge they are creating for the southbound lanes.

Remember that this has yet went through the P3 design process, which means if a bidder presents a better, cheaper way to meet the government's objectives, that is what will be built. Creating narrow river passages is the worst case, and I doubt it will be in the final design.

Same with the second phase allocation for 8 extra lanes, which leaving it out would likely mean dog legs at the end of an 8 lane bridge and intersection improvements far off to the one side. Or returning to ground level between two shorter bridges with proper detours to allow for easy enough construction of the future phase.

Trust in the P3 process to value engineer the hell out of this.

[MalcolmTucker]

Originally Posted by MasterG

They also seem to believe that a bridge cannot be built with at least 2 lanes in every direction regardless of local needs. Seriously, every offramp/onramp looks to be 2 or 3 lanes, most on Deerfoot do fine with 1 and it has 5-10x the traffic this will ever seen.

When you extend your planning horizon out far enough, future proofing it for possible needs 50 years from now makes sense. Adding a second lane to a flyover would be very disruptive, and very expensive (since the financial models have can't assume construction inflation will converge with inflation as a whole, and interest rates are way lower than construction inflation). Remember that this is all borrowed money, and that the money borrowed doesn't really exist outside of this project. The tradeoffs are not ring road vs. LRT, but ring road vs. nothing.

[MasterG]

Originally Posted by MalcolmTucker

When you extend your planning horizon out far enough, future proofing it for possible needs 50 years from now makes sense. Adding a second lane to a flyover would be very disruptive, and very expensive (since the financial models have can't assume construction inflation will converge with inflation as a whole, and interest rates are way lower than construction inflation). Remember that this is all borrowed money, and that the money borrowed doesn't really exist outside of this project. The tradeoffs are not ring road vs. LRT, but ring road vs. nothing.

You mean the trade off is Ring road + debt vs. nothing. All of your assumptions would apply to any infrastructure project of substantial size and life-cycle, no?

I would rather have better Deerfoot + NLRT + 8th Ave Subway + Fixed Crowchild + Debt vs. nothing. They would have the same financial cost if borrowed money for one project gets the same rates as borrowed for others over the same time frame which is a reasonable assumption to make.

The difference is that these projects have better benefits that are larger, spread over a greater number of users, more quantifiable and more pressing. Many have studies, analysis and numbers to back up the economic analysis on these projects. The SW Ring Road has none of this other than by 2035 we expect a completely guessed number of cars to take the road.

The economics of the project don't fail just because it is expensive or we can't afford it or we have many, many better projects that are more important to fund. This project fails on it's own merits of being an expense way to solve a problem that we can't even be sure exists or will ever exist.

[Wooster]

Originally Posted by MalcolmTucker

Remember that this has yet went through the P3 design process, which means if a bidder presents a better, cheaper way to meet the government's objectives, that is what will be built. Creating narrow river passages is the worst case, and I doubt it will be in the final design.

Same with the second phase allocation for 8 extra lanes, which leaving it out would likely mean dog legs at the end of an 8 lane bridge and intersection improvements far off to the one side. Or returning to ground level between two shorter bridges with proper detours to allow for easy enough construction of the future phase.

Trust in the P3 process to value engineer the hell out of this.

The fundamental premise of needing 16 lanes at some point needs to go. Then it can be value engineered on a much tighter configuration for an ultimate 8. Just the length of the bridge decks to traverse this massive wide configuration will cost hundreds of millions of dollars that could be saved.

[H.E.Pennypacker]

Originally Posted by fusili

Point made. In what crazy world does the SWRR require a similar number of lanes to the 401: the primary east/west route in the heart of a region of 7 million people whose main axis is east/west? This is insanity.

Probably in a world 100+ years from now .. That being said if they're building it out full 3 lanes in both directions off the get-go, that seems like massive overkill and an very costly in execution .. Nothing wrong with thinking ahead but I think this is getting far ahead of themselves at the present time

Originally Posted by 5seconds

The Nation has stated that this is a one-time opportunity, and that they would never entertain another road deal in the future. Both parties saw the need to buy enough land for 100+ years.

[MalcolmTucker]

Originally Posted by 5seconds

I hope you're right, but that assumes that wider valleys are one of the Province's objectives. I'm not convinced that's the case. It will be interesting to see how (if) changes are made under a P3.

If memory serves interchange configuration changed a fair amount on the SE ring road due to the P3 partner presenting value engineering.

[MalcolmTucker]

Originally Posted by MasterG

You mean the trade off is Ring road + debt vs. nothing. All of your assumptions would apply to any infrastructure project of substantial size and life-cycle, no?

I would rather have better Deerfoot + NLRT + 8th Ave Subway + Fixed Crowchild + Debt vs. nothing. They would have the same financial cost if borrowed money for one project gets the same rates as borrowed for others over the same time frame which is a reasonable assumption to make.

The difference is that these projects have better benefits that are larger, spread over a greater number of users, more quantifiable and more pressing. Many have studies, analysis and numbers to back up the economic analysis on these projects. The SW Ring Road has none of this other than by 2035 we expect a completely guessed number of cars to take the road.

The economics of the project don't fail just because it is expensive or we can't afford it or we have many, many better projects that are more important to fund. This project fails on it's own merits of being an expense way to solve a problem that we can't even be sure exists or will ever exist.

I am talking about from the provincial budget perspective. Not building this does not create a pot of money to spend more on other things. It changes the province financial picture, but not enough to be a game changer. Ring road versus no ring road does not weigh on how big 'son of MSI' will be in my mind.