http://www.canada.com/edmontonjourna...0-1d2bc65e896a
GO trains touted for capital region
LRT links to Spruce Grove, Leduc would offer sustainable, affordable lifestyles, says expert
Trish Audette, The Edmonton Journal with files from the Calgary Herald
Published: 2:31 am
EDMONTON - Tentative plans to speed up transportation between Alberta's major cities and their bedroom communities -- perhaps by stretching light rail train tracks to places like Spruce Grove or Leduc -- are key to striking a balance between sustainable lifestyles and affordable ones, a Toronto-based expert says.
"If you do commuter transit like GO Transit, you can have the best of both worlds," said Baher Abdulhai, the Canada Research Chair in Intelligent Transportation Systems.
GO trains wind through an 8,000-square kilometre area and move more than five million people every day between Toronto's downtown core and nearby cities such as Hamilton, Guelph and Oshawa.
On Tuesday, Premier Ed Stelmach announced $2 billion will go to the province's transit systems as part of the government's bid to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The goal, he said, is to take the equivalent of one million cars off the road.
Since then, the premier has made clear a Calgary-Edmonton rail link is "further down the road." The priority is moving people around the two metro areas with more ease.
"Without developing a good transit system within the areas of Calgary and Edmonton, the commuter rail between the two communities won't be as successful," he said. "Our focus will be co-operation. I want to see communities working with each other so that we can reach out to the growth areas."
Stelmach said he plans to see commuter train service expand beyond Calgary, for sure. "It will work because we will make it work."
Edmonton politicians expect the new transportation funding to be shared equitably.
"I don't think we need to make it more sexy, more innovative," Mayor Stephen Mandel said earlier this week. "We shouldn't need to be worried about what Calgary does."
But Jim Lightbody, an University of Alberta professor and expert in urban politics, called plans to expand light rail transit in the Edmonton area infeasible.
"The reality is very simple. Light rail transit requires passenger volume," he said Thursday.
"The wisest option would not be to reinvent public transit. We do not need grandiose blue-sky dreaming."
Instead of light rail, Lightbody said, the city needs better bus routes between Edmonton and its bedroom communities. "What you have in the Toronto metropolitan area is people who are happy to live in Mississauga," and work in the downtown core's financial area, he said.
The mayor of Leduc, however, said his community would provide those commuters. The international airport is expected to be a hub for LRT service at some point. "We have quite a bit of trouble getting workers out to the airport specifically," Mayor Greg Krischke said. "Light rail eventually might be an option (although) I think it might be a little premature." In the next few years, though, Krischke anticipates more and more people will want to leave their vehicles behind.
Edmonton city councillor Don Iveson said Thursday he anticipates Edmonton's transit system will look different than Toronto's. Rather than an express system taking people from outlying areas into the centre and back again, he sees a system that looks like a "spider web" and connects smaller communities, too.
with files from the Calgary Herald
taudette@thejournal.canwest.com
Wouldnt make it any worse! ok im done Im done
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