ION - Waterloo Region's Light Rail Transit

[timio]

Weather forecasts for this winter tend to suggest it will be less extreme than the past few years, but you can't trust the forecast for more than a few days in advance.

[tomh009]

As much as I don't want to post this, I'd rather it be me that breaks the bad news.  First official word that our trains are behind schedule - and so is the King Street Underpass, by a staggering 6 months.

http://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/lrt-vehicle-...-1.2635924

Are we confident that Galloway is accurate with his 6-month figure?  Or is it only a guess?  It seems very long given that it's driven by only the approval process.

[DHLawrence]

Wasnt there a pretty document that walked through short/medium/long (pie in the sky) redevelopment plans for Hespeler road and Fairway road and other areas? Had a bunch of high rises and what not filling up the Cambridge Centre parking lot etc.

Here you go, notmyfriends, I found it!

http://issuu.com/urbanstrategiesinc/docs...647#search

The transformation over time section starts on page 135.  Page 139 has Hespeler Road and page:

Looks like they have everything on my wishlist. I'd extend the creekside linear park up to Eagle, but one block at a time!

[Canard]

Cincinnatti just took delivery yesterday of their first CAF LRV.  They even made it into a huge public event, almost a parade, even!

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">.<a href="https://twitter.com/Cincy_Streetcar">@Cincy_Streetcar</a> delivery: Route maps at 275 and from Race/Liberty. Arrival to MOF expected about 5 PM. <a href="https://t.co/SdSiTdcJYi">pic.twitter.com/SdSiTdcJYi</a></p>&mdash; Roadmap Cincy (@RoadmapCincy) <a href="https://twitter.com/RoadmapCincy/status/660183406240772096">October 30, 2015</a></blockquote>

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Streetcar vehicle slowly rolled off the flatbed and onto the track. Now it will be towed into the MOF. <a href="https://t.co/tIewC8aE9E">pic.twitter.com/tIewC8aE9E</a></p>&mdash; City of Cincinnati (@CityOfCincy) <a href="https://twitter.com/CityOfCincy/status/660216774537908225">October 30, 2015</a></blockquote>

I really, really, really hope that the Region lets us know when our first train arrives, and they won't just sneak it in overnight so nobody notices!

I think that you meant to say the delay at King.

I did - sorry!

Are we confident that Galloway is accurate with his 6-month figure?  Or is it only a guess?  It seems very long given that it's driven by only the approval process.

While they may be 6 months behind now, I suppose that doesn't mean the end is also pushed out 6 months. If they work faster (he did mention they're talking of doing a lot more winter work, now), then the end date moves up, so it actually might not be as delayed as we were just talking about. Hopefully that's the case.

[Canard]

Just a Sunday-morning video from you from YouTuber ErebosSan, of the first day of operations on the Tramway de Besançon, France. I can't wait for ion's first day of operations, and I really hope we have some kind of party/celebration like this!

[eizenstriet]

Just a Sunday-morning video from you from YouTuber ErebosSan, of the first day of operations on the Tramway de Besançon, France.  I can't wait for ion's first day of operations, and I really hope we have some kind of party/celebration like this!

I watched those trains travel around Besançon for 6 minutes, and I conclude that the French have a lot to learn from us.

Everywhere they went, the trains were passing through mid-rise development. No highrises at all! How will they ever make the transit pay for itself?

And don’t get me started on those stodgy buildings. Pretty well the same old thing, kilometer after kilometer. They should pick the best five, say, of those and keep them. The rest – gone, so that a progressive city can be created, free from the fusty past. Then they might have an interesting liveable city which others might want to move to. Also, they might then actually attract some tourists!

The only possible thing we could learn from the French is who their vehicle suppliers are. We might need them.

[tomh009]

Ignoring the sarcasm ... the traditional mid-rise cities in France have substantial population density already, it really is not comparable to the traditional downtown core in Kitchener (or most other mid-size cities in North America). And that's in spite of a population of only about 100K, roughly the same as Guelph.

[Markster]

It seemed odd when there was no work on the King underpass all summer long. I had assumed that work would begin in the spring, shortly after all the major closures began.

Hearing that it’s already six months behind pretty much tells me that I wasn’t wrong to think something was awry.

[BuildingScout]

I watched those trains travel around Besançon for 6 minutes, and I conclude that the French have a lot to learn from us.

Everywhere they went, the trains were passing through mid-rise development. No highrises at all! How will they ever make the transit pay for itself?

And don’t get me started on those stodgy buildings. Pretty well the same old thing, kilometer after kilometer. They should pick the best five, say, of those and keep them. The rest – gone, so that a progressive city can be created, free from the fusty past. Then they might have an interesting liveable city which others might want to move to. Also, they might then actually attract some tourists!

When your entire downtown is four or five stories high you do not need highrises. This is in contrast to Uptown Waterloo where buildings higher than three stories are against zoning regulations. For example, population density is three times higher in Besançon than in Kitchener.

Also one of the reasons Besançon is so much nicer is because over the centuries they have never been afraid to take down their ugly buildings while defending the nicer ones. We fail on both counts: on the one hand we let the very nice old Kitchener city hall be taken down and then we have heart attacks over Barra Castle's demolition.

I've posted plenty of pictures here of new construction for example in Strasbourg, Paris and Prague with new daring buildings smack in the middle of historical downtown. Can you imagine this ever been allowed here? The heritage committee would have a mass heart attack.

[mpd618]

I watched those trains travel around Besançon for 6 minutes, and I conclude that the French have a lot to learn from us.

Everywhere they went, the trains were passing through mid-rise development. No highrises at all! How will they ever make the transit pay for itself?

And don’t get me started on those stodgy buildings. Pretty well the same old thing, kilometer after kilometer. They should pick the best five, say, of those and keep them. The rest – gone, so that a progressive city can be created, free from the fusty past. Then they might have an interesting liveable city which others might want to move to. Also, they might then actually attract some tourists!

We could learn some things from places like Besançon. Like how to construct dense urban buildings with zero parking, and not care about NIMBYs concerned with spillover parking. Like how not to consider single-family detached houses to be a viable building style right next to the central part of the city.

It goes both ways, eizenstriet. Building medium-density buildings, and doing so in a broad area, requires the kind of community buy-in that the neighbourhoods adjacent to the downtowns would make extremely hard to obtain.

Perhaps we'll see you at council advocating for less parking and less setback in new developments, so that smaller-scale development can be viable here.

[Canard]

The Besançon system had a bunch of park-and-ride stations, and they are expanding some of them.

[MidTowner]

We could learn some things from places like Besançon. Like how to construct dense urban buildings with zero parking, and not care about NIMBYs concerned with spillover parking. Like how not to consider single-family detached houses to be a viable building style right next to the central part of the city.

It goes both ways, eizenstriet. Building medium-density buildings, and doing so in a broad area, requires the kind of community buy-in that the neighbourhoods adjacent to the downtowns would make extremely hard to obtain.

Perhaps we'll see you at council advocating for less parking and less setback in new developments, so that smaller-scale development can be viable here.

I agree with a lot of what you say. Out of curiosity, what entails "medium-density" to you, though? "Single-family detached housing" can be dense enough to support transit and other uses within walking distance. Actually, here in Kitchener-Waterloo, it did, and those neighbourhoods that now seem adjacent to the downtowns were streetcar suburbs with commercial mixed in, and where many people could walk to their jobs, most could take transit to their jobs, and most people did walk to do shopping and run errands. Before the car, there was no reason to set houses far back from loud, dangerous streets, and houses close to the street created the kinds of density that made these things possible. Again: it's possible to achieve a fair bit of density even with detached family homes.

Doubtless we can learn from cities of our size in Europe. It's probably not possible to emulate them, though. People have grown to want different things. In many European city centres of varying sizes, it's hard to convince someone to live in a ground floor apartment for security reasons, and the fact that they're less marketable means mixed-use (with all of its many many benefits) has come naturally. Here, most of us are still hung up on wanting a single-family-home, especially with kids. But we can make that work, too. If you're advocating for razes mass tracts of existing century homes near our downtowns to make way for miles of mid-rise development, I admit that that seems sustainable, but there might be an insufficient market for the new apartments, and a lot of the people living in those (relatively) sustainable and transit-oriented old neighbourhoods might be driven to far-flung suburbs because they feel they just have to have a (single-family detached) "home," and now none exist near the cores.

I agree 100% with your last paragraph. Less (or no) parking requirements; less setbacks. Doing that would go a long way.

[KevinL]

Time for some updated shots of Benton/Charles?

Fresh concrete under those tarps!


Molds being formed around the southbound curves.


A curiousity here: the rebar and spacers are in separate sections and the tracks in between do not meet. I'm guessing they want to solidify these sections in concrete, then make some kind of expansion joint.


And, from street level.

[eizenstriet]

mpd618
We could learn ... how not to consider single-family detached houses to be a viable building style right next to the central part of the city.

Lots of those houses you’re speaking of have been “viable” right next to the central part of the city for a century or so. The successive owners have built admirable communities, and aren’t about to surrender their investments, their roots, and their faculties of critical thinking just because you in your own interests would like to label them “unviable”.


We could learn ... to... not care about NIMBYs concerned with spillover parking.

You seem now to be acknowledging that there will be “spillover parking”. So can we now lighten up on the warranty that high density near transit will not have parking demand? I mean, you know that a single-family detached house behind The Red has had its “BY” become a parking lot for that building. You know that people may contend with 144 Park or the Kaufman Lofts because there is not provision for their second cars. You know that residents of The Bauer Lofts complain of inadequate visitor parking. So let’s grant that “NIMBYs” are not always just paranoid, and that they may dare to suggest that development be prepared to sustain its own attachment to the automobile.


Building medium-density buildings, and doing so in a broad area, requires the kind of community buy-in that the neighbourhoods adjacent to the downtowns would make extremely hard to obtain.

Within my own immediate area, I do not recall any notable opposition to The Red, The 42, 133 Park, 144 Park, the Cortes on King, The Bauer Lofts, The Seagram Lofts, BPR Lofts, Princess Condominiums, the Silver Thread Lofts, Cripple Creek, the St. Louis School Lofts, The Barrelyards, or The Grand. These honour to an arguable extent the transition zone principle with – dare I say it – viable single-family detached neighbourhoods. Even 133 Caroline had as much opposition from dispersed users of the Iron Horse Trail as from “NIMBYs”.


And while we’re at it, can we acknowledge the reflexive “NIMBY” appellation for what it is – like all derogatory epithets, a device to short-circuit discussion - ? People quite naturally try to protect what they deem valuable, what they have saved for, what they have risked for, what they have raised their children in, what they have created which is satisfying. Are they really any less worthy of engagement than those who oppose re-aligning The Iron Horse Trail?

[eizenstriet]

BuildingScout
Also one of the reasons Besançon is so much nicer is because over the centuries they have never been afraid to take down their ugly buildings while defending the nicer ones.

I’d be very surprised if Besançon was a free-and-easy demolition town. France must be one of the most rigorous preservers of architectural heritage on the face of the Earth. And not only does it mandate conservation. A family whose modern (but “compatible”) home I stayed in near St. Malo was describing to me how it took 3 successive building plans to satisfy local authorities that their design would not disrupt the character of the surrounding historic structures.


We fail on both counts: on the one hand we let the very nice old Kitchener city hall be taken down and then we have heart attacks over Barra Castle's demolition.

These two straw man examples on the far ends of the spectrum beg the question. Serious initiative regarding the ones in between is the issue.


I've posted plenty of pictures here of new construction for example in Strasbourg, Paris and Prague with new daring buildings smack in the middle of historical downtown. Can you imagine this ever been allowed here? The heritage committee would have a mass heart attack.

I am hard-pressed to recall “the heritage committee” here objecting to daring buildings smack anywhere. I do recall many instances of objection to removal of the “historical”. Where on the spectrum lies the appropriate resistance to demolition is the real issue. Juxtaposition of the old and the “new daring” can be stimulating – see the area of The High Line in Manhattan – as long as there is enough of each. And both the locals and the touristic public seem to find a well-conserved place like Besançon appealing. Thus my admittedly facetious commentary on the Besançon train tour.