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  #41  
Old Posted Sep 13, 2008, 7:59 PM
spryscraper spryscraper is offline
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I haven't been able to get a good map uploaded yet, but I'll describe it as best I can and hopefully anyone reading this will be able to make their own sketch with google maps and a bit of creativity...

The BOX:

-North & Chebucto & Oxford (gateway to mid-density West End)

-North & Windsor (fairly dense residential... Gladstone Ridge etc.)

-North & Robie (gateway to the North End, mid density residential/retail, transfer to Robie St. Line)

-North & Barrington (Dockyards, Stad, MacDonald Bridge)

-Barrington & Cornwallis (Dockyards, dense residential)

-Barrington & Cogswell (Casino, Purdy's Wharf, Historic Properties, NSCAD, hotels)

-Barrington & Duke (Metro Centre, North End of "Downtown" - bars, restaurants, CBD)

-Barrington & Spring Garden (Dal-Sexton, SGR and South End of "Downtown")

-Barrington & South (NSCAD, Westin, Cunard Centre, Pier 21, Farmer's Market, dense residential nearby)

-South & South Park (QE2)

-South & Robie (Transfer to Robie St. Line, Dal-Carleton, dense residential)

-South & Lemarchant (Dal-Studley)

-Oxford & Coburg (Dal-Studley, King's College, dense residential/dorms)

-Oxford & Quinpool (Oxford Theatre, mid density residential/retail)


Robie St. Line

-Robie & Leeds (NSIT, mid density residential)

-Robie & Young (Hydrostone Market, Oland Brewery, mid density residential/retail)

-North & Robie transfer station

-Robie & Quinpool (QE2, Commons, Museum of Natural History, Citadel Hill, Holiday Inn, whatever is replacing the old QEHS, dense residential)

-Robie & Coburg & Spring Garden (IWK, Dal-Studley, Dal-Carleton, dense residential/retail

-South & Robie transfer station

-Robie & Inglis (SMU, dense residential)


total stops/stations:
BOX: 14
Robie St. Line: 7 (including the two transfer stations)

Most of the stations could be similar to what is used now for MetroLink, but a few of them could be made a bit more special... Barrington & Spring Garden, Robie & Quinpool, "Hydrostone Station" at Robie & Young, and "Seaport Station" at Barrington & South for example. The Barrington & Duke station would be integrated into the current "terminal" and would end up being right outside International Place

Last edited by spryscraper; Sep 13, 2008 at 8:28 PM.
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  #42  
Old Posted Sep 14, 2008, 11:02 AM
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How would you fit these routes onto ridiculously narrow streets like North (and at least parts of all the others)?
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  #43  
Old Posted Sep 15, 2008, 3:24 PM
spryscraper spryscraper is offline
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The first step, no matter what the vehicle, is transit vehicle priority at every intersection. I think this would go a long way in cutting down travel times. Transit-only lanes, rail lines, or overhead wiring would also help if feasible.
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  #44  
Old Posted Sep 15, 2008, 8:29 PM
Spitfire75 Spitfire75 is offline
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I don't think you know how bad North St is at rush hour. I've seen it bumper-to-bumper light-to-light. I think the only way you could put a track there is elevated.
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  #45  
Old Posted Sep 15, 2008, 9:52 PM
hfx_chris hfx_chris is offline
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Agreed, there's just some areas you can't do anything...
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  #46  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2008, 3:08 PM
spryscraper spryscraper is offline
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If you think about it though, wouldn't transit priority work here? Even if traffic is bumper-to bumper, as long as the lights ahead of the transit vehicle are green couldn't it be reasonably expected to keep moving at a steady pace?
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  #47  
Old Posted Sep 17, 2008, 11:42 AM
hfx_chris hfx_chris is offline
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How? It's two lanes; you can't have bus-only lanes to jump ahead of the queues, so the best you could do would be to hold the green light for an extra minute or two until the bus gets through - but don't forget traffic would probably be backed up on the opposite side of the intersection anyway.
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  #48  
Old Posted Sep 18, 2008, 1:10 PM
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You could use a page from Bogotá's book, and close the streets at peak hours. Where we are not nearly as big, it could take less time to get adjusted.
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  #49  
Old Posted Nov 24, 2008, 6:55 AM
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Not much talk on this lately...

Will HRM get Rapid Transit any time soon? Or even a feasibility study?

Are we a bit too content with the status quo? Just wondering...

Thoughts?
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  #50  
Old Posted Jan 4, 2009, 9:42 PM
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I'm starting to warm up to the idea of rail transit. My idea is far fetched but I think it would work well.

The "New Bridge" that might be required would instead be a tunnel with a LRT line and a bus lane.

On the Dartmouth side the rail would connect to the main line and travel north to stops at NSCC Waterfront, Alderney Landing, Nivens Ave (Wyse Road area), the newly reconstructed Shannon Park, and Burnside.

On the Halifax side the Westin/VIA Terminal would remain crucial and along the rail cut turned tunnel stops would be constructed at Robie St, South @ Oxford, Quinpool (Flynn Park), Mumford, and the Village.

From the Peninsula a new LRT line and a trail would be built parallel to the CN line to Fairview. Stops along this new route would be built at the Mount, Birch Cove Terminal (Fast Ferry), Mill Cove (Fast Ferry), Sunnyside and Rocky Lake.

At Rocky Lake a new line would stretch across the eastern shores of Anderson Lake and connect onto the Dartmouth Line completing the loop around the Harbour.
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  #51  
Old Posted Jan 20, 2009, 11:52 PM
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This doesn't really belong here, but I couldn't figure out a better place for it.

Allnovascotia.com reported yesterday that HRM is making a bid for the abandoned CN rail ROW from Joe Howe to Lakeside. This is the same ROW they turned down last year when offered it for the bargain price of $3.3 million by CN. Apparently they are now in negotiations for it, hoping to get it at a better price. There was discussion in the article that part of it (the end out towards Lakeside) would become a trail, projected to be paved but off-limits to 4-wheelers. The section parallel to Joe Howe Dr would be used for street widening, bus pullover, turning lanes, etc (HALLELUJAH!!!) while Loblaws and other adjacent property owners are interested in picking up the nearby bits of it for expansion.

It is too bad that it won't apparently get used for rail transit, but at least some of these uses make sense.
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  #52  
Old Posted Jan 21, 2009, 1:54 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Keith P. View Post
Allnovascotia.com reported yesterday that HRM is making a bid for the abandoned CN rail ROW from Joe Howe to Lakeside. This is the same ROW they turned down last year when offered it for the bargain price of $3.3 million by CN. Apparently they are now in negotiations for it, hoping to get it at a better price. There was discussion in the article that part of it (the end out towards Lakeside) would become a trail, projected to be paved but off-limits to 4-wheelers. The section parallel to Joe Howe Dr would be used for street widening, bus pullover, turning lanes, etc (HALLELUJAH!!!) while Loblaws and other adjacent property owners are interested in picking up the nearby bits of it for expansion.
Well that makes perfect sense to me. Out by Lakeside where the rail tracks end it turns into the BLT Trail that goes out past Tantallon. On Joe Howe one thing HRM really needs to fix is the random unmarked Dutch Village turning lane. Coming off the highway theres two turning lanes but I'm still yet to see a sign telling people the left lane goes onto Dutch Village.

It's not mentioned in the article so I really hope HRM considers installing a bus turning lane/light at Scot Ave.

There's so many upsides to this project. If tied in with a Joe Howe/Bedford Highway Interchange make-over and a Bayers Road widening it would virtually eliminate most of the traffic coming off of the peninsula via public transit.

One upside for the trail part except for the obvious benefit of connecting the suburbs to the peninsula is the possibility of connecting this to the Greenway if it ever makes it this far down the rail-cut.

EDIT: I added the spur to my map and just FYI the Spur (the possible trail part) is 6.25km long!
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Last edited by Dmajackson; Jan 21, 2009 at 2:10 AM.
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  #53  
Old Posted Jan 21, 2009, 11:25 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Bedford_DJ View Post
On Joe Howe one thing HRM really needs to fix is the random unmarked Dutch Village turning lane. Coming off the highway theres two turning lanes but I'm still yet to see a sign telling people the left lane goes onto Dutch Village.

It's not mentioned in the article so I really hope HRM considers installing a bus turning lane/light at Scot Ave.
There need to be bus pullover lanes all along the west side of Joe Howe. The Scot St change you described makes sense too, though why buses still use Scot St and thus have to make that turn is a mystery to me. It may have made sense when the Bayers Rd shopping center was in business, but it makes little sense these days and those routes need to be reexamined.

Further up Joe Howe there is a desperate need to have a dedicated right turen ramp ontot he 102. Traffic bottlenecks there because of clueless drivers who take up the right lane but are going straight and stop at the lights, blocking the intersection.
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  #54  
Old Posted Jan 21, 2009, 8:27 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Keith P. View Post
There need to be bus pullover lanes all along the west side of Joe Howe. The Scot St change you described makes sense too, though why buses still use Scot St and thus have to make that turn is a mystery to me. It may have made sense when the Bayers Rd shopping center was in business, but it makes little sense these days and those routes need to be reexamined.
I think it might have to do with the park 'n ride in the back of the Village. Also a fair number of people use that terminal a day and with the new office building and Capital Health centre I doubt they'll move the terminal anytime soon. The one thing they really need is a stoplight at Desmond and Bayers Road equipped with transit sensors.
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  #55  
Old Posted Jan 23, 2009, 11:08 PM
hfx_chris hfx_chris is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Bedford_DJ View Post
The one thing they really need is a stoplight at Desmond and Bayers Road equipped with transit sensors.
Hell yeah. I can't tell you how many times I've sat there on a bus in heavy traffic waiting for enough of a break that we could get across to the ramp...
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  #56  
Old Posted Feb 14, 2009, 9:54 PM
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The Chronicle Herald held a poll yesterday about rail transit;

Do you think rail service is a practical way to help ease traffic congestion in HRM?
Total Votes Received: 2444
Yes 1893 77 %
No 369 15 %
Don't know 182 7 %
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  #57  
Old Posted Feb 14, 2009, 11:56 PM
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What I really think the city needs to do is simply build a small "demonstration" light rail line to serve part of the peninsula. It would be small electric or hybrid trains suitable to operate as streetcars, but they could also be given their own ROW at points. It could be something like a couple of kilometres just to connect Dalhousie to the downtown, or a kind of downtown "shuttle" service. People would see how much better rail service is and there would be political will to then slowly begin building a real network to serve the city.

A short tunnel connecting the ferry terminal (maybe a new one that handles the Bedford Ferry) with Barrington Street and Spring Garden Road would be very useful. Tunnels are expensive but we'd be talking about 1-2 km and it would be a permanently useful piece of city infrastructure. The city could also tie it in with electrical, water, and sewage (though a bit late for that..) infrastructure improvements for the downtown. Other future parts of a streetcar-like light rail system could simply run at-grade and be extended as needed (Barrington-Inglis for South End and SMU, Agricola or Gottingen for North End, and a West End line that would at first go to Chebucto Terminal and eventually could serve Clayton Park). The system would start out with only a couple of trains.
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  #58  
Old Posted Feb 15, 2009, 12:49 AM
hfx_chris hfx_chris is offline
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The problem though, is that HRM is completely anti-rail when it comes to transit. They even produced an anti-rail piece of propaganda on their website, calling it an "information sheet"
http://www.halifax.ca/metrotransit/CommuterRail2.html
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  #59  
Old Posted Feb 15, 2009, 1:15 AM
hfx_chris hfx_chris is offline
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I was reading through those comments on the Herald site. Mostly positive, but I think there's a lot of confusion surrounding rail-based transit.

There's commuter rail, which travels larger distances. This sort of system would be idea to connect Halifax with nearby towns like Windsor or Truro, or possibly beyond if demand existed. Canadian examples of commuter rail systems would be GO Transit in the Toronto area, and AMT in the Montreal area. These typically use standard diesel engines and have limited stops, and would not operate through city streets.


Light rail (LRT) feature smaller, often more streamlined trains. They handle fewer passengers, but would be for shorter distances. In the Halifax area they could be used to service areas like Bedford, Sackville or Beaver Bank. Stops tend to be more frequent, and they usually can (and do often) operate through downtown streets. Can be either diesel or electric, or both!


Trams/streetcars are much smaller, usually only one car, and travel almost exclusively in the downtown area, with limited rights of way. This would be the type of system Halifax once ran with their Birney cars. These are usually electrified.


Rapid transit is essentially the fancy word for subway. Typically underground, fast and long.


Personally, I'm a big fan of light rail (LRT). I maintain that the perfect system for Halifax right now would have it use the rail cut to enter downtown, with a downtown loop possibly consisting of Granville and Hollis, or the waterfront area, connecting to a new major transit terminal at the newly reclaimed Cogswell interchange site (with a connection to the ferry terminal), heading out towards Bedford, Windsor Junction and Beaverbank. Or, to keep it even smaller to start, it could go out along the 102 to a large park and ride lot at the 102/103 interchange.
I'm not a fan of streetcars/trams, because you probably wouldn't use them to go that sort of distance, and commuter rail honestly wouldn't be able to go any farther than the VIA rail station, necessitating a transfer to bus at that point.

Check out the Wikipedia article on light rail in North America for some more great pictures of essentially the sort of service I'm in favor of.

Last edited by hfx_chris; Feb 15, 2009 at 1:33 AM.
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  #60  
Old Posted Feb 15, 2009, 1:57 AM
Spitfire75 Spitfire75 is offline
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That's a lot of good info. Agreed that LRT would be perfect for HRM.
If we had an LRT like the one pictured above, I wouldn't mind riding it to work at all. We would get cars off the road and a boost to development around the corridor. Win/win.
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