Quote:
Originally Posted by Bombaman
Anthony Perl, director of urban studies for Simon Fraser University, calls McCallum’s proposal “the stupidest” idea he has heard yet for transportation in Metro Vancouver.
His biggest concern is the implications for urban development. Whereas LRT encourages development along the corridor, a SkyTrain system creates “hyper-concentration at the stations — massive skyscrapers — and then deserts between them,” he said.
“That’s not a landscape that I think of as particularly desirable or sustainable, and to pay $2 billion extra to create that, compared to light rail, is why I think it’s the stupidest decision I’ve ever seen, in transportation terms.”
Perl also characterizes the linear-induction propulsion system used in SkyTrain as “a dead-end technology” monopolized by one supplier — Bombardier Inc.
“If you buy a SkyTrain, there’s only one supplier and you can only get it at the price they give to you,” Perl said. “There’s no price competition.”
I totally agree with him, unfortunately, the pareto rule prevailed in this case.
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I'm having a more difficult time these days taking anything that comes out of academia without a grain of salt. Unfortunately, ideology is pushing the academic world in many areas toward the realm of fanaticism and that's unfortunately what I see in these quotes. Any academic who uses words like "the stupidest" and "dead-end technology" is just pushing an ideological opinion and quite frankly over simplifying things.
Transit use in Metro-Vancouver is some of the highest in North America. Portland for example is put up as this shining beacon of how Vancouver should be designed but statistically we use transit double digits more in Metro Vancouver than in Portland even with their "amazing LRT" system we hear about all the time.
So it seems to me like we're actually doing things right if our adoption rates are higher and we should stop worrying about what others are doing. It works here and is working here, so we shouldn't re-invent the wheel.
He is right on some of his points that there is a danger of densifying around SkyTrain hubs and having deserts in between, but that honestly is not the reality in Metro-Vancouver and would quite frankly not change with LRT either.
This whole debate between LRT vs SkyTrain is honestly a debate between ground-based trains vs grade-separated trains. That's it. It isn't a technological debate at all. But people make it out to be. That's the whole problem, people are arguing a point that has never been the point and that's what McCallum and his team, and honestly a majority of those in Surrey, see.
The body can't function without a backbone and neither can a transportation network. You need to rapidly move people around a region from center to center, then from there the modes of travel descend to support smaller and smaller circles. You can't have one without the other and have effective traffic management.
I don't care that you have a "Director" in your title and work for SFU, paper doesn't often translate into reality. I was taught by a few PhD professors when I was in school that wouldn't survive in the actual industry they taught about simply because of that disconnect between what works in theory or in a hypothesis, and what actually translates into the real world with the many dozens of times more variables academics never account for when trying to make their points.
The sooner we stop debating all of these projects and just start building the damned things, the better the region will be. That's the cold-hard reality.
And if you still think it is LRT vs SkyTrain, how many of you on the old LRT front think Broadway extension is a bad idea? Guess what news flash, that is SKYTRAIN even though it will be a subway. Has nothing to do with technology but rather grade-seperated vs non.
Quite frankly they should both be built at the same time anyway. Shouldn't even be tied together aka they should be building RRT extension out to Langley and at the same time building LRT Newton to Guildford. That's another issue in this region I won't get into, but our inability to do more than 1 thing at a time.
And it isn't all about money. It's largely about desire and having some balls.
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