ION - Waterloo Region's Light Rail Transit

[Canard]

our first look at some ION POV!

[tomh009]

THanks -- but driving on the wrong side of the tracks?

[ijmorlan]

THanks -- but driving on the wrong side of the tracks?

The freight always uses the southbound track, except south of the crossover near the Perimeter Institute, where it uses the northbound track.

My understanding is that LRT service will use only the northbound track late at night in order to leave the southbound track for freight only.

[KevinL]

My understanding is that LRT service will use only the northbound track late at night in order to leave the southbound track for freight only.

I believe LRVs will NEVER be active on any tracks outside the OMSF when the freight is active. Full separation of modes.

[Canard]

Stage 2 of Gold Coast Light Rail is about to open (Sunday) and they tweeted out this awesome overhead photo of one of the intersections.  Can't get enough of those pavement markings!  So wish we had that here.

   

[Pheidippides]

They’ve already started on Edmonton's order.

Are you sure? This article says first Edmonton vehicle is expected in July of August 2018 and Bombardier is on schedule. That would seem like a long time to build a vehicle.

The first rail cars are due in July or early August, and residents should see the first trains testing the track soon after. “Bombardier is on schedule,” TransEd spokesman Dean Heuman said in his bi-annual update Wednesday. “(Trains) will be on the track before the end of the year to start testing.”


Are they doing any other orders between Edmonton and ours? If not, that statement kind of worries me about the rest of our order.

[Canard]

Yes, I'm sure. They're doing ours, then Edmonton's, then Metrolinx'.

There may be something else slotted in there in parallel as well. Look for an announcement about that in the new year.

I think you're reading a bit too much in to it - I wouldn't be worried.

[ijmorlan]

My understanding is that LRT service will use only the northbound track late at night in order to leave the southbound track for freight only.

I believe LRVs will NEVER be active on any tracks outside the OMSF when the freight is active. Full separation of modes.

The document I saw said that one freight could go northbound between 23:00 and 01:00, sharing the northbound LRT track between the switch at Waterloo Town Square and the crossover near Perimeter Institute. Then from 01:00 to 05:00 the freight has exclusive use of that piece of trackage. So it shares maybe 200m of track with northbound LRT traffic and 50m of track with southbound LRT traffic.

Of course given the speeds, frequency and nature of service, and modern signalling systems, it would be perfectly safe to just mix freights in with LRT traffic in this specific case, but it’s a lot easier (i.e., possible) to get approval for an almost completely time-separated operation.

[trainspotter139]

They’ve already started on Edmonton's order.

Are you sure? This article says first Edmonton vehicle is expected in July of August 2018 and Bombardier is on schedule. That would seem like a long time to build a vehicle.

The first rail cars are due in July or early August, and residents should see the first trains testing the track soon after. “Bombardier is on schedule,” TransEd spokesman Dean Heuman said in his bi-annual update Wednesday. “(Trains) will be on the track before the end of the year to start testing.”


Are they doing any other orders between Edmonton and ours? If not, that statement kind of worries me about the rest of our order.

Edmonton's delivery is spread out over a couple years. They should have already started on the roof sections for Edmonton's 7-module order. The team working on roof sections isn't really needed for the rest of our order so they might as well be working on roof sections for the other orders. Our order really only has 4 LRVs left to be assembled,  the other 10 are either delivered or are going through extensive testing and tweaking at BBD Millhaven. They might even slot in a few Metrolinx LRVs during the Edmonton run to try and appease Metrolinx.

[Canard]

Wondering what our FLEXITY Freedom LRV's are going to look like blasting along the Waterloo Spur at 70 km/h? Wonder no more!

This footage is from the Stage 2 extension of Gold Coast Light Rail, in Gold Coast, Australia, set to open this Sunday.  The vehicles are 7-module variants of the FLEXITY 2 platform, of which the FLEXITY Freedom design was derived.

[Canard]

Moar:

[nms]

I noticed the other day that at least one of the sets of traffic lights at Erb/Caroline mixes LRT signals and car signals. The traffic lights facing south have the white LRT light in the top circle while the bottom three are the usual red/yellow/green. Will the LRV's only be responding to the white lights (ie horizontal vs vertical) at each intersection, or will it be some combination with the red/yellow/green?

[Markster]

I noticed the other day that at least one of the sets of traffic lights at Erb/Caroline mixes LRT signals and car signals.  The traffic lights facing south have the white LRT light in the top circle while the bottom three are the usual red/yellow/green.  Will the LRV's only be responding to the white lights (ie horizontal vs vertical) at each intersection, or will it be some combination with the red/yellow/green?

What you see there is actually the bus signal. The LRT relies on its own signals separate from traffic signals. These the signals with vertical and horizontal white bars.

[bgb_ca]

That sounds like a bus signal. They are a similar stripe to the lrt ones and hang from traffic lights. That intersection is also busses left turn only from Caroline to erb so it would make sense.

[timc]

Does anyone know why we went with the horizontal bar bus signals instead of the dedicated lights for buses like at Highland Hills mall?