The future of Ottawa's Transit

[S-Man]

I guess that higher fare is the price you pay for paying less for your home.

[eternallyme]

I'm looking at the schedules...why a reduced weekday service on Family Day when most people have it off? Shouldn't it be a Sunday schedule?

[waterloowarrior]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

I'm looking at the schedules...why a reduced weekday service on Family Day when most people have it off? Shouldn't it be a Sunday schedule?

Not a holiday for federal employees or for employers in Quebec

[Ottawan]

Originally Posted by S-Man

I guess that higher fare is the price you pay for paying less for your home.

Exactly. Plus, I snooped their website, and they are running their service using some pretty comfortable-looking intercity buses. This costs money, and is probably disproportionately affected by the rising price of gas. This is exacerbated by commute times (and therefore gas usage) increasing due to traffic increasing, which once again is a factor of more people choosing to live in and commute from Rockland.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by O-Town Hockey

Get a car and pay for parking or suck it up! Those are massive transit distances when considering the limited number of riders they can get from these towns. People in Ottawa want everything for nothing.

That's not fair! There are some who want nothing for nothing too!

[eltodesukane]

Originally Posted by Hybrid247

This is all they got for blair right now. Not much of a change from the current station...

And why those separate enclosed waiting area?
Why not a single continuous enclosed space the length of the whole platform?
The way it is now, people have to go outside to reach the enclosed space.

It's the same problem at Hurdman, St Laurent, Blair, Billings Bridge, South Keys, Baseline, ...
As if it's on purpose to inconvenience the users.
(of course the administrators are not public transit users)

[MalcolmTucker]

Originally Posted by eltodesukane

And why those separate enclosed waiting area?
Why not a single continuous enclosed space the length of the whole platform?
The way it is now, most people have to wait outside.

Expense, plus crime prevention through environmental design.

Edit: \/ haha, yeah, big typo there!

[S-Man]

"Crime pervention"? Sounds ominous!

[waterloowarrior]

some rural changes targeted at seniors and people with disabilities including new rural shopping routes... as someone working in a rural area with a large elderly population transportation is a huge issue and kudos to the City, LHIN and other agencies for looking at this


http://ottawa.ca/calendar/ottawa/cit...al%20Areas.htm

[Dr.Z]

Originally Posted by eltodesukane

And why those separate enclosed waiting area?

I imagine some waits are "easier" outside but under a canopy. Think airport arrivals scene. Also, it could be swing space for bike parking. In terms of the design the canopy is more of a bonus instead of a slab wall without some measure of element protection.

[S-Man]

Agreed - protection from rain, but not driving snow. It ain't a warm cocktail bar, but it beats standing in a puddle in the rain.

[Uhuniau]

Yeah, so where's that interprovincial transit study again?

[S-Man]

It's in the NCC's 'to do' file, marked for the 2050 to 2100 period.

[lrt's friend]

And the result of budget decision made by council and our mayor, it appears that some 6 months after the route optimization, OC Transpo still has no ability to deal with capacity issues, and because of the absolute need to maintain maximum scheduling efficiency, the inability to even start a run on time.

I witnessed it all this morning (after rush hour). Buses on separate but almost identical routes running together. I suspect this is how they are scheduled. Buses running way late when there would have been no traffic issues from the start of the route. Serious overcrowding on a local route (service cutback too much). Standard buses running on a Transitway route that did not have a hope to handle the passenger demand at the very first stop on the route. It is very hard to feed an overcrowded feeder route with several other feeders onto a standard sized bus on a Transitway route.

What is sad, is that is pointless to complain. They listen but there is no action whatsoever. The iron clad budget has left the system totally unresponsive.

[kevinbottawa]

This is what Rob Ford was trying to do; get the private sector to help pay for the rail system.

Lord Elgin owner offers city $2 million to build Confederation Square LRT station
By David Reevely, The Ottawa Citizen March 27, 2012 12:03 PM Comment 0

Jeff Gillin, the owner of the Lord Elgin and other downtown hotels is offering the city $2 million toward the cost of an entrance to the planned light-rail system at Confederation Square.

OTTAWA — The owner of the Lord Elgin and other downtown hotels is offering the city $2 million toward the cost of an entrance to the planned light-rail system at Confederation Square.

The city had been planning to build a station under the Rideau Canal with a western entrance by the National Arts Centre, but a couple of weeks ago it modified the plan, pushing that station further east, close to Rideau and Waller streets. That leaves a gap of nearly a kilometre between the proposed stations called Downtown East and Rideau.

City council is due to sign off on the change Wednesday, but Jeff Gillin has asked councillors to delay the vote for 30 days while he and the NAC solicit further contributions.

Besides serving the arts centre and the Lord Elgin, an entrance at Confederation Square would serve big office towers like Place Bell and the replacement for the federal government’s Lorne Building, he wrote in a letter to city council.

“We believe the proposed downtown LRT system station locations must be more appealing to these twice-daily, Monday to Friday, bread-and-butter commuters,” Gillen wrote.

“These commuters will require easy access to the major employers along Elgin Street if they are to be encouraged to leave their cars at home and use public transit. Every additional step on foot will make the downtown transit system less appealing for these key commuters. The higher construction costs today for the NAC station will be recouped in countless ways over the decades to come.”

The exact rationale for moving the station east isn’t perfectly clear.

The city says putting Rideau station under Rideau Street will do a better job serving the Rideau Centre, ByWard Market, and residents and workers in Lowertown and Sandy Hill, in addition to allowing the planned rail tunnel to be built a little more shallowly. Mayor Jim Watson has used Twitter to challenge critics of the move to find $40 million if they want to add a fourth downtown station to serve Elgin Street directly.

The city is planning to spend $2.1 billion on the rail line between Tunney’s Pasture and Blair Road, but it’s cagey about exactly how much money it expects to spend on what because a shortlist of international bidders are working on proposals to get the contract to do the work.

Gillin proposes to pay $200,000 a year for 10 years toward the cost of an Elgin Street entrance to the system, however it’s achieved.

“We realize this is a small sum given the total cost of such a station. We hope the amount is significant enough to demonstrate our belief in the importance of this station to the success of the LRT system,” he wrote.

dreevely@ottawacitizen.com

ottawacitizen.com/greaterottawa

© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen

Read more: http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Lo...#ixzz1qKnQrliJ

[MalcolmTucker]

Problem is stations cost in the $100m+ range, likely more for the old complicated design under the canal and a heritage building. An extra $2 million is a drop in the bucket.

[eternallyme]

Still, if other businesses are willing, the $50M or so needed for the third station could easily be found.

[lrt's friend]

I want to point out that the tunnel is a 100 year + investment. We need to consider station location very carefully before making this kind of commitment. This is supposed to make transit access to downtown easier but if we have stations placed too far apart, this is going to defeat its purpose. We are now talking about stations that are close to 1 km apart and you still need to walk to your destination. This is a major building block towards creating a transit culture in this city but if we make it too difficult to access, it will be a failure. This needs to be more than just a commuter train only used during peak periods. If an Elgin Street entrance is too expensive to build from a Rideau Street station, why are the other two stations west of the canal not spread out better? We also have to address Canada Day crowds and access to rapid transit. This is probably the day in the year when transit is placed under the most stress. There needs to be station access close to Parliament Hill and Confederation Square to disperse Canada Day crowds quickly. Given this city's bad experience with 'transit malls' and vagrancy, I hope that they address this issue relating to a Rideau Street station, which could easily become a vagrant magnet. If not adequately secure, the subway could end up being a disaster and a money pit.

[kevinbottawa]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

I want to point out that the tunnel is a 100 year + investment. We need to consider station location very carefully before making this kind of commitment. This is supposed to make transit access to downtown easier but if we have stations placed too far apart, this is going to defeat its purpose. We are now talking about stations that are close to 1 km apart and you still need to walk to your destination. This is a major building block towards creating a transit culture in this city but if we make it too difficult to access, it will be a failure. This needs to be more than just a commuter train only used during peak periods. If an Elgin Street entrance is too expensive to build from a Rideau Street station, why are the other two stations west of the canal not spread out better? We also have to address Canada Day crowds and access to rapid transit. This is probably the day in the year when transit is placed under the most stress. There needs to be station access close to Parliament Hill and Confederation Square to disperse Canada Day crowds quickly. Given this city's bad experience with 'transit malls' and vagrancy, I hope that they address this issue relating to a Rideau Street station, which could easily become a vagrant magnet. If not adequately secure, the subway could end up being a disaster and a money pit.

Thank you for this comment. I don't think the 100-120 year life span of this tunnel is being considered. Toronto's subway feels ancient but it's only 58 years old; 100-120 years is a long time. I think the Rideau Centre station is a great idea, but there needs to be another downtown station, specifically at Confederation Square. If a station entrance can be done, great (although I don't see how that's possible considering how far the other stations are). Council needs to question the mayor on this.

[Hybrid247]

Can't they just shift the downtown east station a block over towards the east? The 2 planned downtown stations can't be more than 400-500 meters apart by the looks of it. Why not put the station between O'Connor and Metcalfe and add an entrance near Elgin?