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R+T is very suburban?
#31
This Ring Rd. discussion is maybe drifting too far from the topic of the thread - perhaps it deserves its own thread?

I personally agree with ijmorlan that there are options to improve the situation without closing Ring Rd. entirely. The problem with it now is that there is too little friction for drivers which causes excessive speed. The university opted for speed humps as a remedy, but they aren't a great solution.
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#32
(04-12-2021, 12:34 PM)timc Wrote:
(04-11-2021, 01:02 PM)Tony_Plow Wrote: The R&T Park is a complete failure in urban planning, and there's no easy way to fix it.  I know this is a pipe dream, but IMO all parking lots should be moved behind the buildings and away from the main streets (Hagey Blvd. and Wed Graham Way).  Next, mixed-use developments should be built along Hagey, with ground level retail and condos/apartments. 

Why would the University want condos built on its land?

$'s ...same reason they want office buildings there.
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#33
The speed humps are generally effective, at least on the west side. I know that the one between the Environment buildings and Needles Hall was quite a doozy.

Building condos on the North campus would also raise tricky issues of ownership. I am not mistaken, the University owns all of the North Campus on both sides of Westmount Road but shares the space through a variety of lease agreements. If you added private residential space, it could get sticky.

However, it might work if the University was looking for additional residence space, particularly for upper year students who might not need all of the accoutrements of a first-year residence (like dons and house meetings for instance). With a little bit of imagination, I could even see another "Velocity" (née the Minota Hagey residence) or two planted there. For now, while the affiliated colleges (aka the church colleges) have managed to mix residence and classroom space in the same building envelope, the main campus (as well as WLU) have not mixed academic spaces with residence spaces anywhere else on their campuses.
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#34
(04-13-2021, 01:30 AM)nms Wrote: The speed humps are generally effective, at least on the west side.  I know that the one between the Environment buildings and Needles Hall was quite a doozy.

Building condos on the North campus would also raise tricky issues of ownership.  I am not mistaken, the University owns all of the North Campus on both sides of Westmount Road but shares the space through a variety of lease agreements. If you added private residential space, it could get sticky.

However, it might work if the University was looking for additional residence space, particularly for upper year students who might not need all of the accoutrements of a first-year residence (like dons and house meetings for instance).  With a little bit of imagination, I could even see another "Velocity" (née the Minota Hagey residence) or two planted there.  For now, while the affiliated colleges (aka the church colleges) have managed to mix residence and classroom space in the same building envelope, the main campus (as well as WLU) have not mixed academic spaces with residence spaces anywhere else on their campuses.

I mean, ultimately this is the university's choice right? They could sell the land to the condo if they wanted to. But even if they didn't, they could just build rentals instead.
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#35
(04-13-2021, 01:30 AM)nms Wrote: The speed humps are generally effective, at least on the west side.  I know that the one between the Environment buildings and Needles Hall was quite a doozy.

The problem with speed humps is that while they generally slow traffic at the speed hump, they don't generally slow traffic over the length of the route. It's definitely a remedy that can be used to retrofit an existing roadway, but it's not the ideal solution.
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#36
(04-12-2021, 11:57 AM)danbrotherston Wrote: Also, RCH, I think 4 should qualify as many.

It doesn’t have an explicit loading area, but you can drive within 60m of an entrance directly to the building near the PHY-E2 bridge; also it is possible to drive a vehicle right up to the lower level door near DWE but this might not count because I don’t know if the barrier gate is normally left open. Also I don’t fully grant the other buildings I mentioned — GH is 100m from the TC dropoff, AL is 70m (through TC); LIB is 140m. So depending on exactly where you put the cutoff these may or may not count as having vehicle access.

I will grant that as society changes it may become feasible to increase restrictions on vehicles on campus; but as of right now, it’s a pretty low-traffic area compared to the total number of people using it. The problem is with a few speed demons on Ring Road, not with the actual amount of traffic.

Right now all of campus is within 100m of a public access road, with the exception of a small area around the Arts quad. If you close Ring Road, that distance increases to more like 400m. That change requires significant thought. By contrast, take somewhere like Barcelona. If I am measuring things on Google Maps correctly, the typical width of one of their superblocks is 400m, meaning that every point in the superblock is within 200m of one of the remaining roads. So right now campus has already implemented the superblock concept, except that the remaining road (Ring Road) is much lower traffic than the equivalent in Barcelona. Ironically, the lower traffic probably contributes to the excessive speed of some of the remaining traffic — it’s very difficult to speed on a congested road.
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#37
(04-13-2021, 08:01 AM)jamincan Wrote:
(04-13-2021, 01:30 AM)nms Wrote: The speed humps are generally effective, at least on the west side.  I know that the one between the Environment buildings and Needles Hall was quite a doozy.

The problem with speed humps is that while they generally slow traffic at the speed hump, they don't generally slow traffic over the length of the route. It's definitely a remedy that can be used to retrofit an existing roadway, but it's not the ideal solution.

We should try paving the entire thing with setts (rocks formed into a more-or-less rectangular block shape). That can make the entire surface somewhat rough.

Speed humps can be anywhere from useful to very bad depending on how they are implemented. I’ve seen footage of people crossing a quintuple speed bump which certainly slows traffic down right at the bump, but which causes aggravation and probably vehicle damage; there is really no way to cross it at all smoothly, even at an entirely reasonable speed, and vehicles tend to stop, then bump forward unpredictably as they cross one bump after another. At the other extreme, we have at some times had humps on campus that were so smooth they might as well not have been there. I think large humps that have significant vertical deflection but also long horizontal length are best. There are some on I think John St. which are good: I can’t imagine going over them at high speed, but at a reasonable speed one just slows down a bit extra and glides smoothly over them.
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#38
(04-13-2021, 09:46 AM)ijmorlan Wrote:
(04-12-2021, 11:57 AM)danbrotherston Wrote: Also, RCH, I think 4 should qualify as many.

It doesn’t have an explicit loading area, but you can drive within 60m of an entrance directly to the building near the PHY-E2 bridge; also it is possible to drive a vehicle right up to the lower level door near DWE but this might not count because I don’t know if the barrier gate is normally left open. Also I don’t fully grant the other buildings I mentioned — GH is 100m from the TC dropoff, AL is 70m (through TC); LIB is 140m. So depending on exactly where you put the cutoff these may or may not count as having vehicle access.

I will grant that as society changes it may become feasible to increase restrictions on vehicles on campus; but as of right now, it’s a pretty low-traffic area compared to the total number of people using it. The problem is with a few speed demons on Ring Road, not with the actual amount of traffic.

Right now all of campus is within 100m of a public access road, with the exception of a small area around the Arts quad. If you close Ring Road, that distance increases to more like 400m. That change requires significant thought. By contrast, take somewhere like Barcelona. If I am measuring things on Google Maps correctly, the typical width of one of their superblocks is 400m, meaning that every point in the superblock is within 200m of one of the remaining roads. So right now campus has already implemented the superblock concept, except that the remaining road (Ring Road) is much lower traffic than the equivalent in Barcelona. Ironically, the lower traffic probably contributes to the excessive speed of some of the remaining traffic — it’s very difficult to speed on a congested road.

All of these buildings, even the ones we both listed as inaccessible to private motor vehicles have direct access by service vehicles.

Why can't that work for all buildings?

And yes, it would be a large area, we should aim to be better than other places, not half as good.

It's a mindset shift. Yes, private motor vehicle access is convenient. And the externalities of that convenience fall on others. This is true at every single level.

Ironically, I disagree with the only current vehicle restrictions on campus, namely that the university is heavily restricting transit vehicles on Ring Rd. I was absolutely livid when the university administration put up fencing, took out sidewalks, banned buses, and DIDN'T restrict cars, and they pretend this is in the name of "safety".
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#39
(04-13-2021, 08:01 AM)jamincan Wrote:
(04-13-2021, 01:30 AM)nms Wrote: The speed humps are generally effective, at least on the west side.  I know that the one between the Environment buildings and Needles Hall was quite a doozy.

The problem with speed humps is that while they generally slow traffic at the speed hump, they don't generally slow traffic over the length of the route. It's definitely a remedy that can be used to retrofit an existing roadway, but it's not the ideal solution.

I also forgot to mention the Canada geese who walk wherever they please on the Ring Road.  They definitely slow traffic down!  Tongue
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#40
banning of buses /walkability probably has to do with the self driving vehicle tests that occur there.
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#41
(04-14-2021, 09:24 AM)kalis0490 Wrote: banning of buses /walkability probably has to do with the self driving vehicle tests that occur there.

I don't think so. Banning of buses and sidewalks have only increased the number of pedestrians around and crossing.
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#42
(04-13-2021, 10:06 AM)danbrotherston Wrote: All of these buildings, even the ones we both listed as inaccessible to private motor vehicles have direct access by service vehicles.

Why can't that work for all buildings?

I think you may be missing my point. You claimed that lots of buildings are presently inaccessible to private motor vehicles; I pointed out that actually only 1-3 buildings can reasonably be counted as inaccessible, and even those aren’t that far from a dropoff zone. The accessibility we’re talking about is not a boolean, after all, but rather a distance from a door to a place where a vehicle can stop.

Increasing the distance from a maximum of 140m, with most buildings well under 30m, to a maximum of 400m, is a big difference; and the only payoff is to reduce the already-low level of traffic on Ring Road and even lower levels of traffic on the driveways slightly.

Quote:Ironically, I disagree with the only current vehicle restrictions on campus, namely that the university is heavily restricting transit vehicles on Ring Rd. I was absolutely livid when the university administration put up fencing, took out sidewalks, banned buses, and DIDN'T restrict cars, and they pretend this is in the name of "safety".

I don’t think buses are banned, just reduced, mostly due to the LRT and of course soon to be moved to the new bus terminal. And I’m not aware of sidewalks being removed — where did that happen? Corrections and memory jogging welcomed! But I understand the administration wanted to get rid of buses, which is totally asinine. A few professional drivers coming through once every couple of minutes (combined between all routes) are not the problem, either for congestion or for safety. A similar discussion happened when the iXPress was being set up and GRT wanted to run it down I think Central — Albert — Seagram. The neighbourhood complained about excess traffic, as if one bus in each direction every 10 minutes was a problem compared to the many miscellaneous vehicles which use those streets. So for years the iXPress ended up being maybe 3-5 minutes slower on every trip than it should have been.

Actually just on logical grounds the notion of restricting buses annoys me (in addition to the policy absurdity). If arbitrary members of the public are allowed to drive their vehicles on campus, what is the basis for telling buses they can’t? I mean, if I bought an old GRT bus I could drive it around and around Ring Road; how can GRT not be allowed to do the same? GRT is part of the public, after all. It would be like having a retail store where absolutely anybody can just walk in, but GRT drivers aren’t allowed, or a web page that is allowed to be seen by anybody who is not logged in, but not by certain logged in roles.
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#43
(04-14-2021, 09:24 AM)kalis0490 Wrote: banning of buses /walkability probably has to do with the self driving vehicle tests that occur there.

I doubt that very much, but if true, that would be totally absurd. You don’t restrict buses so that a few speculative tests can use a roadway. Anyway, if the self driving is anywhere near ready for prime time (spoiler: it’s not) it can handle a few buses.
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#44
(04-14-2021, 11:23 AM)ijmorlan Wrote: ...
Quote:Ironically, I disagree with the only current vehicle restrictions on campus, namely that the university is heavily restricting transit vehicles on Ring Rd. I was absolutely livid when the university administration put up fencing, took out sidewalks, banned buses, and DIDN'T restrict cars, and they pretend this is in the name of "safety".

I don’t think buses are banned, just reduced, mostly due to the LRT and of course soon to be moved to the new bus terminal. And I’m not aware of sidewalks being removed — where did that happen? Corrections and memory jogging welcomed! But I understand the administration wanted to get rid of buses, which is totally asinine. A few professional drivers coming through once every couple of minutes (combined between all routes) are not the problem, either for congestion or for safety. A similar discussion happened when the iXPress was being set up and GRT wanted to run it down I think Central — Albert — Seagram. The neighbourhood complained about excess traffic, as if one bus in each direction every 10 minutes was a problem compared to the many miscellaneous vehicles which use those streets. So for years the iXPress ended up being maybe 3-5 minutes slower on every trip than it should have been.

Actually just on logical grounds the notion of restricting buses annoys me (in addition to the policy absurdity). If arbitrary members of the public are allowed to drive their vehicles on campus, what is the basis for telling buses they can’t? I mean, if I bought an old GRT bus I could drive it around and around Ring Road; how can GRT not be allowed to do the same? GRT is part of the public, after all. It would be like having a retail store where absolutely anybody can just walk in, but GRT drivers aren’t allowed, or a web page that is allowed to be seen by anybody who is not logged in, but not by certain logged in roles.

I'm not actually certain of the current situation, but I know that was a goal of the administration.

The sidewalks that were removed were on the other side of Ring Rd. which was replaced by a fence. They weren't completely continuous, but it was convenient, because one could walk up one side until there was a break in traffic, then cross. They took out the sidewalk and replaced with the fence, which people now do the same thing along the outside of.

In general we agree...see also the people who complained about the diesel trains to the airport...because a diesel train ever 15 minutes is a problem by the thousands of private vehicles and taxis that train replaces are fine.
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#45
I just took a quick tour around the UW campus circa 2015 via Google Streetview (side note: you can do that now whereas previously Google didn't go on semi-private roads). The "sidewalks" that were removed were paved sections of the eastern side of the eastern loop (ie from the pedestrian connection at CPH & University Ave north to the path that went out to Columbia). They were barely sidewalk width. I think they were put in place to recognize that there was enough foot traffic there that the grass didn't grow. Due to the elevation difference between Ring Road and the Laurel Trail, it would have been difficult for the University to widen the sidewalk without putting in a retaining wall.
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