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  #61  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 5:12 AM
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Originally Posted by cornholio View Post
Its not about commuters today. Its about opening up the coast to economic development.

None of this has anything to do with current residents and everything to do with future economic activity.

Until a fixed link is built the region will have virtually zero economic growth and continue being a borderline drain on the rest of the province.
Firstly, I'm as economic development-oriented as ya can get.

That said, I am very familiar with the historical voting patterns along the Sunshine Coast and, to put it mildy, it's rather enviro "green". From Gibsons up through Roberts Creek and northward a majority eclectic/bohemian "granola bar/tree-hugger" demographic crowd is extant. Not to be demeaning here.

Furthermore, Chief Calvin Craigan of the Sechelt FN is known to be one helluva militant. Adding up the foregoing, along with the NIMBY crowd thereto as well, the Sunshine Coast is not conducive to economic development per se... unless it's "green"... however one wishes to interpret that.
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  #62  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 5:37 AM
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Originally Posted by red-paladin View Post
It's not just the tolls that preclude a link to Vancouver Island, but technology itself. http://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/tr...and/fixed-link
Only on those alignments. The more northerly crossing was doable a long time ago, and was considered for making Victoria the terminus of CP when they were planning it.

The hops are across shallower channels, requiring much smaller spans.
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  #63  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 5:43 AM
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Originally Posted by Conrad Yablonski View Post
Yes I've travelled much of the route from Squamish to Jervis Inlet in an ordinary half ton truck-going slowly but I was surprised how far I got it was late winter so I turned around before it got dark.
I have driven the route from Powell river right to the base of mount Alfred in a front wheel drive car in the summer time. Pretty much the end of the road. As you said going slowly as the road is deactivated in the last third or so. This was probably 20 years ago. Very beautiful country. Huge glacier on mount Alfred fairly large river flowing from said glacier, many hanging valleys and tons of straight up and down thousand foot cliff faces. Looks like rock climbing country. Wish I had some pictures to post.
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  #64  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 6:11 AM
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Once the Sunshine Coast Link opens up, you will see the possibility of a fixed link through Campbell River.

Sure, it won't be convenient for most people going to the South Coast, but once the Sunshine Coast opens up, it will become quite developed quite quickly further justifying a few more bridges.
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  #65  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 7:22 AM
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This is the bridge that the BC government referenced in the pdf.
Norway's Hardanger Bridge. It's 1400 metres long, with 2 vehicle lanes and a pedestrian/bike lane.

Imagine two of these to cross Howe Sound:




From: http://www.byggutengrenser.no/inspirasjon/hardangerbrua



From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hardanger_Bridge
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  #66  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 8:27 AM
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Sure, but two of those monsters'd cost $4.6 billion in capital costs alone... to benefit just 25-26,000 residents, give or take a few hundred vacation homeowners and/or tourists?

Even 20-30 years down the road, I don't see how that could be practical.
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  #67  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 9:43 AM
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I am one of those who doesn't see the population to justify rapid transit to places like Ladner/Tswassen. This seems even more of a stretch. Unless it is about a link to Vancouver Island, I can't see it in my lifetime. It surprises me to see the Province creating a process.
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  #68  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 9:54 AM
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Option 3 is the only one that makes sense.

A little more real connectivity is needed in BC. So little of our coast is actually utalized.

Adding a fixed link to the Sunshine Coast would be a good thing.

Also the toll would be high enough to stop it from simply becoming a suburb as well.

Guessing it would be a 15 to 20 dollar toll or so (similar to the large local bridges around here).

The second portion crossing to Powell River would not be needed at this time.
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  #69  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 10:07 AM
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Originally Posted by Migrant_Coconut View Post
Sure, but two of those monsters'd cost $4.6 billion in capital costs alone... to benefit just 25-26,000 residents, give or take a few hundred vacation homeowners and/or tourists?

Even 20-30 years down the road, I don't see how that could be practical.
Two 1.5 KM 2 lane bridges would not cost 4.5 billion.

Seeing how the 3KM 10 lane GMT would not even cost anywhere near that much.

The 2.7 km 6 lane Golden Ears Bridge was well under 1 billion dollars (and the included an entire expressway too).
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  #70  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 11:26 AM
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^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

^Would two lanes per bridge be sufficient? Maybe 4 lanes is a bit much, but on a highway with large trucks, and subject to high winds & inclement weather ...
would not a third, middle, 'emergency lane' be in order, in case of a breakdown -esp a heavy truck- or in case of an accident? I'm just thinking public safety and tansport fluidity here.
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  #71  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 12:59 PM
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Originally Posted by red-paladin View Post
It's not just the tolls that preclude a link to Vancouver Island, but technology itself. http://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/tr...and/fixed-link
We will never see a "short" fixed route to the Island simply because no option on the south half of the island is safe or economically viable. The only safe option would be a bored tunnel, but it would be wishful thinking, as it's basically the Chunnel except 5 times deeper, and would likely be snapped like a twig when the south half of the Island suddenly moves in an earthquake.

So that leaves bridging/tunneling multiple islands at the north end. Which in turn means building out a highway to Powell River.

It may never make sense to build a fixed link to Vancouver Island as long as technology keeps up. It may make more sense to make a zeppelin-ferry service between Richmond and Victoria before it would make sense to build a bridge.
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  #72  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 5:38 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by trofirhen View Post
^Would two lanes per bridge be sufficient? Maybe 4 lanes is a bit much, but on a highway with large trucks, and subject to high winds & inclement weather ...
would not a third, middle, 'emergency lane' be in order, in case of a breakdown -esp a heavy truck- or in case of an accident? I'm just thinking public safety and tansport fluidity here.
2 with big shoulders would be fine. A single lane of roadway would be able to accommodate the current daily traffic on the ferry in about 2 hours, so there would be a heck of a lot of spare capacity.

4 lanes might not be much more expensive though, and if a Van Isle connection happens the capacity could be useful.
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  #73  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 5:58 PM
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Originally Posted by Stingray2004 View Post
Firstly, I'm as economic development-oriented as ya can get.

That said, I am very familiar with the historical voting patterns along the Sunshine Coast and, to put it mildy, it's rather enviro "green". From Gibsons up through Roberts Creek and northward a majority eclectic/bohemian "granola bar/tree-hugger" demographic crowd is extant. Not to be demeaning here.

Furthermore, Chief Calvin Craigan of the Sechelt FN is known to be one helluva militant. Adding up the foregoing, along with the NIMBY crowd thereto as well, the Sunshine Coast is not conducive to economic development per se... unless it's "green"... however one wishes to interpret that.
So your bets are on Powell River Bridge Link as the most likely.
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  #74  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 7:17 PM
twoNeurons twoNeurons is offline
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Originally Posted by Alex Mackinnon View Post
2 with big shoulders would be fine. A single lane of roadway would be able to accommodate the current daily traffic on the ferry in about 2 hours, so there would be a heck of a lot of spare capacity.

4 lanes might not be much more expensive though, and if a Van Isle connection happens the capacity could be useful.
Nah... I don't think it would be useful even IF the Island gets a link. Practically speaking it would primarily benefit the upper Vancouver Island Area.

If you did a Powell River - Texada Island - Courtenay connection, the shortest span would be under 6km. Assuming you could direct all ship traffic under the 6km span closest to the mainland, you may be able to get away with a floating bridge from Texada to the Island. I really don't know how feasible it is to build a 12km floating bridge, though.

Anyhow, this would be used by traffic going to the North part of the Island, but few in Victoria. In short, a 2-lane bridge would suffice for the life of the bridge.
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  #75  
Old Posted Oct 31, 2016, 7:46 PM
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Originally Posted by twoNeurons View Post
Nah... I don't think it would be useful even IF the Island gets a link. Practically speaking it would primarily benefit the upper Vancouver Island Area.

If you did a Powell River - Texada Island - Courtenay connection, the shortest span would be under 6km. Assuming you could direct all ship traffic under the 6km span closest to the mainland, you may be able to get away with a floating bridge from Texada to the Island. I really don't know how feasible it is to build a 12km floating bridge, though.

Anyhow, this would be used by traffic going to the North part of the Island, but few in Victoria. In short, a 2-lane bridge would suffice for the life of the bridge.
The likely connection is to Campbell River via Cortes, Read and Quadra Islands. Three significantly shorter hops.

I don't have depth charts for these areas, but based on the shapes of the islands, I'd imagine they're much shallower than Howe Sound, so the spans might not have to be very large at all.
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  #76  
Old Posted Nov 1, 2016, 2:02 AM
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For tsawwassen, why didn't they consider having a highway out to Galiano then have the ferry take the shorter route? See https://drive.google.com/open?id=1dT...bc&usp=sharing

They could eliminate the ferries to Galiano & Saltspring.

Would be an extra 32ish kilometers driving, but the ferry distance would be cut in half (~45min crossings).
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  #77  
Old Posted Nov 1, 2016, 2:12 AM
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Originally Posted by waves View Post
For tsawwassen, why didn't they consider having a highway out to Galiano then have the ferry take the shorter route? See https://drive.google.com/open?id=1dT...bc&usp=sharing

They could eliminate the ferries to Galiano & Saltspring.

Would be an extra 32ish kilometers driving, but the ferry distance would be cut in half (~45min crossings).
Because a bridge to Galiano from Tsawwassen would be the enormously expensive and structurally challenging part of the whole project and is the reason it's not being actively pursued. If we were able to build a bridge to Galiano, a bridge all the way to Vancouver Island would be a given as it would be the easy part.
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  #78  
Old Posted Nov 1, 2016, 2:30 AM
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If they built a bridge connecting Saanich to Cobble Hill, I could totally see myself living in the Cobble Hill/Mill Bay area!
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  #79  
Old Posted Nov 1, 2016, 5:09 AM
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Originally Posted by GlassCity View Post
..bridge to Galiano from Tsawwassen...
Sorry I wasn't clear - I was suggesting the opposite. Ferry from Tsawwassen to Galiano, then bridges from Galiano back to the mainland via Saltspring.
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  #80  
Old Posted Nov 1, 2016, 7:00 AM
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Originally Posted by waves View Post
Sorry I wasn't clear - I was suggesting the opposite. Ferry from Tsawwassen to Galiano, then bridges from Galiano back to the mainland via Saltspring.
An article on the topic: http://www.timescolonist.com/opinion...dies-1.2162108
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