ION - Waterloo Region's Light Rail Transit

[panamaniac]

How!!?? Don't the train and the traffic have separate signals at that intersection?

[Acitta]

How!!?? Don't the train and the traffic have separate signals at that intersection?

Drivers think that obeying signals is optional.

[Square]

Today's crash. Photo from r/kitchener. 

One media story said this crash was at King and Pine. Ha ha, I don't think so. Was 2 crashes, this one and the King/Pine crash.

[KevinL]

Wow, I came through there just a couple hours before! Wild.

[danbrotherston]

Since this desiccated mummified horse corpse continues to get beaten here. Jason Slaughter made a video about how Trams (LRT) is the best urban transit mode for cities. I tend to agree with some caveats. https://youtu.be/bNTg9EX7MLw?si=62RoDzjdBejMnsMw

[westwardloo]

Since this desiccated mummified horse corpse continues to get beaten here. Jason Slaughter made a video about how Trams (LRT) is the best urban transit mode for cities. I tend to agree with some caveats. https://youtu.be/bNTg9EX7MLw?si=62RoDzjdBejMnsMw

Haha we do seem to bring it up quite a lot. Its already built, we aren't getting a skytrain or underground system now. 

I do think the LRT was the right choice for KW, although in hindsight I think the implementation was a bit of an issue. The Region rightfully so cheaped out whenever possible, but having the mandate that no roads be shutdown or turned into one-way for the LRT was a big miss in my opinion. The system would have been more efficient and quicker if they had implemented the following design changes:

1. Caroline st s should have been a one way with the LRT running both ways down it.
   
2. King st in DTK should have been turned into a pedestrian/ LRT only road.
   
3. Obviously the hayward/ courtland ave S turn is a mess, it should have stayed on the rail right of way, then crossed king at Balzer.
   
4. The loop back from northfield to Conestoga mall slows everything down and make extending it to Rim park area impossible, they should have built a dedicated bridge over the highway beside the hydro lines then used something like Conestogo rd/ Bauer place to get to king st. 
   
5. Not sure how they could have made the borden/ ottawa split any better, maybe if they had continued on the rail right of way to kent or stirling ave they could have had by-direction. Or even continueing on the rail right of way until mill st then using Benton to get to DTK.
   
6. They should have/ still need to figure out the mess of lights on King by the hospital. I think they need to remove at least 1 of those lights. The most obvious one is the entrance to midtown hospital, Just make the entrance to the hospital off Green St.  If they could get rid of the one entering Central fresh market all the better. That seems to be the main area for accidents. Even the traffic at Agnes could be removed no need for that street to make a left on king, just divert traffic to Wellington/ Green st. 
   

There are lots of reasons some of these things we not implemented, mostly financial, but others had to do with the difficulty to negotiate with third parties. I for one am happy we have something over nothing. Imagine how watered down the system would have been if they went for BRT.

[danbrotherston]

Since this desiccated mummified horse corpse continues to get beaten here. Jason Slaughter made a video about how Trams (LRT) is the best urban transit mode for cities. I tend to agree with some caveats. https://youtu.be/bNTg9EX7MLw?si=62RoDzjdBejMnsMw

Haha we do seem to bring it up quite a lot. Its already built, we aren't getting a skytrain or underground system now. 

I do think the LRT was the right choice for KW, although in hindsight I think the implementation was a bit of an issue. The Region rightfully so cheaped out whenever possible, but having the mandate that no roads be shutdown or turned into one-way for the LRT was a big miss in my opinion. The system would have been more efficient and quicker if they had implemented the following design changes:

1. Caroline st s should have been a one way with the LRT running both ways down it.
   
2. King st in DTK should have been turned into a pedestrian/ LRT only road.
   
3. Obviously the hayward/ courtland ave S turn is a mess, it should have stayed on the rail right of way, then crossed king at Balzer.
   
4. The loop back from northfield to Conestoga mall slows everything down and make extending it to Rim park area impossible, they should have built a dedicated bridge over the highway beside the hydro lines then used something like Conestogo rd/ Bauer place to get to king st. 
   
5. Not sure how they could have made the borden/ ottawa split any better, maybe if they had continued on the rail right of way to kent or stirling ave they could have had by-direction. Or even continueing on the rail right of way until mill st then using Benton to get to DTK.
   
6. They should have/ still need to figure out the mess of lights on King by the hospital. I think they need to remove at least 1 of those lights. The most obvious one is the entrance to midtown hospital, Just make the entrance to the hospital off Green St.  If they could get rid of the one entering Central fresh market all the better. That seems to be the main area for accidents. Even the traffic at Agnes could be removed no need for that street to make a left on king, just divert traffic to Wellington/ Green st. 
   

There are lots of reasons some of these things we not implemented, mostly financial, but others had to do with the difficulty to negotiate with third parties. I for one am happy we have something over nothing. Imagine how watered down the system would have been if they went for BRT.

Indeed. It’s one of the things I was so frustrated by when I was in KW. I wanted to see better things get built, and building better things is how you get more stuff built because building mediocre stuff leads to mediocre outcomes that don’t generate as much future support. On the other hand, we have to beg for a decade to get the mediocre stuff we get just by the skin of our teeth and sometimes not even that. 

*shrug* I do think the LRT was better than mediocre but there is a ton of room for improvement. Sadly it’s not looking like we are going to continue it anyway.

[Momo26]

https://www.ctvnews.ca/kitchener/article...cambridge/

“A staff person talked about option 5 or plan 5 which would be scrapping the LRT and just going with the bus rapid transit into Cambridge,” Liggett told CTV News.

She admitted it was the first time regional councillors heard about it.

“I know that’s earth-shattering news, but that was an open session of regional council today,” she said during the Cambridge meeting.

The expansion of LRT into Cambridge carries a hefty price tag of about $4.5 billion. Liggett said it might not be realistic in today’s economy.


》》 thoughts?

[danbrotherston]

https://www.ctvnews.ca/kitchener/article...cambridge/

“A staff person talked about option 5 or plan 5 which would be scrapping the LRT and just going with the bus rapid transit into Cambridge,” Liggett told CTV News.

She admitted it was the first time regional councillors heard about it.

“I know that’s earth-shattering news, but that was an open session of regional council today,” she said during the Cambridge meeting.

The expansion of LRT into Cambridge carries a hefty price tag of about $4.5 billion. Liggett said it might not be realistic in today’s economy.


》》 thoughts?

4.5 billion isn't realistic in any economy.

But given that the wording doesn't even allow the idea of questioning why the price is so absurd, I expect that the opposition will get their way, and use the price inflation to kill the project.

And that group of people almost certainly has a lot of overlap with the people who will use this as yet another grievance Cambridge will hold over Kitchener, and as a reason to oppose any other work on the LRT (thus holding back the whole region).

Yeah, I'm a negative nelly today.

[ac3r]

Plan 5 of not spending 5 billion for that sounds like the best idea they've ever had regarding the LRT system. Let's go with that one.

[Momo26]

There is some region of waterloo form where one can fill out to provide feedback about the public transit in the Region. I'd have to go and find it now, but I did fill that out and I discussed how focus should be on creating nodes or what I called tentacles to connect various parts of kitchener and waterloo to the existing LRT. My goal was to impart doing this first as I had to take no less than 2 buses to connect to the LRT which is absurd and no one should have to take more than a single connection to get from one part to another part of the same city.

[cherrypark]

https://www.ctvnews.ca/kitchener/article...cambridge/

“A staff person talked about option 5 or plan 5 which would be scrapping the LRT and just going with the bus rapid transit into Cambridge,” Liggett told CTV News.

She admitted it was the first time regional councillors heard about it.

“I know that’s earth-shattering news, but that was an open session of regional council today,” she said during the Cambridge meeting.

The expansion of LRT into Cambridge carries a hefty price tag of about $4.5 billion. Liggett said it might not be realistic in today’s economy.


》》 thoughts?

4.5 billion isn't realistic in any economy.

But given that the wording doesn't even allow the idea of questioning why the price is so absurd, I expect that the opposition will get their way, and use the price inflation to kill the project.

And that group of people almost certainly has a lot of overlap with the people who will use this as yet another grievance Cambridge will hold over Kitchener, and as a reason to oppose any other work on the LRT (thus holding back the whole region).

Yeah, I'm a negative nelly today.

At this point just do the BRT for less, hope that GO to Cambridge gets approved, and live to fight for whatever Phase 3 would have been within KW. Even if that budget inflation seems out of hand, I'm not convinced the Regional council would have the fortitude to go for another phase for decades if it got anywhere near that with inevitable overages and issues on a complex alignment.

Also not fully convinced that mix isn't the best value for money option anyways. The alignment to Cambridge was so tortured by NIMBY wins that it feels like repeating a bunch of the half measures of Phase 1 but with an enormous cost of crossing two rivers on top of it.

[ZEBuilder]

Before everyone goes nuts that 4.5 billion is in 2033 dollars. If you look at cost in terms of 2025 dollars its only 3.1 billion which is insane yes but you need to look at other projects in Ontario to realize its one of the most sane cost estimates.

Phase 1 ION:
2011 cost was 818 million
2025 cost with inflation (and the 50 million overrun) is 1.2 billion
Cost per km: 63 million

Phase 2 ION:
2025 cost estimate 3.1 billion
Cost per km: 177 million

Phase 1+2:
2025 cost: 4.3 billion
Cost per km: 118 million

Hamilton LRT (no operating costs):
2021 cost estimate was 3.4 billion
2025 cost estimate with inflation is 4 billion
Cost per km (14km): 285 million

Hurontario LRT (current project not including operations):
2019 cost was 4.6 billion
2025 cost with inflation is 5.5 billion
Cost per km (18km): 306 million

Finch LRT (no operations in the contract):
2018 cost was 2.5 billion
2025 cost with inflation is 3.1 billion
Cost per km (11km): 282 billion

So yeah the cost is high but we're getting way more bang for our buck. If we were costing similar to Finch or Hamilton per km our phase 2 cost would have to be approaching 9 billion dollars. So sure its a high cost but its relatively reasonable all things considered.

[tomh009]

For a European comparison point I will give you Tampere, Finland. Phase 1/2 was fairly similar in many ways to our LRT. 10.2 km cost about 390M EUR plus 80M for 20 cars of rolling stock; this completed maybe two years ago, soon after the LRT. If I use a rough 1.5 exchange rate and guess at a few years of inflation adjustment that's maybe $750M or about $75M per km, not far off our phase 1 costs. (Our phase 2 is more complex and expensive to build than phase 1, whether 3x per km or not.)

[ac3r]

The best idea is to just scrap the past idealistic ION light rail idea the region had when it began. The world has drastically changed since then and there is no longer the need for the same project idea they had in 2010-2015 to be built today. It is obviously going to be a waste of money which we don't even have in the first place. The ION ultimately sucked, I think everyone can agree with that these days. Nobody cares about whether it was the best "bang for the buck" because it's just objectively bad. You're wrong if you disagree.

What needs to happen to deal with Cambridge is for the region to look at the transit from a fresh perspective. Them contemplating whether or not it makes any sense to build is a start. In fact, in my experience the fact they brought that up is them saying it's never going to happen anytime soon. It makes no sense to spend billions of dollars to run an LRT to a small suburban city of not even 140'000 people in which the majority of its population are not in favour of rapid urbanization of their community. That's fine and you can't force that. Fill the need by improving BRT because obviously the 302 route is obviously something people demand. Buses are thankfully really flexible.

Put money into BRT and put money into improving the existing LRT with things like faster frequency/headways, finally coupling the damn trains together and exploring ideas for future extensions - and an inevitable route to Cambridge. Things that will actually benefit people. Nobody is benefitting from burning 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 billion dollars on a project that'll take 15 years to finish and go way over budget, only for people to end up being extremely disappointed in the same way regional residents were disappointed in the existing LRT after all is said and done.

There are much better ways to improve transit between Cambridge and the rest of the region which don't include forcing a multi-billion dollar bill upon people.