Ottawa Transit Developments

[Kyle Campbell]

If Transport Canada has placed an edict on platform speeds, then that's specific to Ottawa as there is no such regulation on any other system anywhere in Canada.

Dan

It may actually be specific to Ottawa. They had a set of unique rules approved by TC, though I can't find the actual list, just the reference to the meeting

55. City of Ottawa Capital Railway Trillium Line

City of Ottawa Capital Railway – Trillium Line

tc.canada.ca

 

[Kyle Campbell]

It's not a done deal because:
- If we don't criticize what went wrong in the project planning process they will keep making the same mistakes in future projects
- Many of those things can still be fixed by additional investment. Like you said, the Line 2 upgrade was fairly cheap by Canadian standards and that's because they omitted so many useful upgrades. To the point that there are multiple items in the Ottawa Transportation Master Plan that are to fix up Line 2/4. Notably extending the second track through Walkley station to improve headways to 10 minutes and reduce travel times by a couple minutes. The best time to do that work would have been while the line was shut down, but since that didn't happen we should be talking about when we would like to go back and do it.

Yes! Those systems are even worse than Line 2! The Finch LRT is slower than the local bus it's replacing, despite having half as many stops and a dedicated ROW!

In terms of making the most of what we have, I definitely agree with making double track from Mooney's Bay to Walkley, and the full distance from Corso Italia to Dows lake. The single track sections through the tunnel and the Rideau River bridge are manageable. The goal would be to get to that fabled 8 minute headway. That would allow the currently nearly useless line 4 to interline and make it a way more viable connection.

In terms of extensions, the dropped connection to downtown Hull should be added back, with the Gatineau Tramway going to Sparks now I don't think the original worries about capacity constraints at Bayview are as big. I'd also extend all the way to Riverview. Their current plan of doing it as a busway is not going to generate any ridership. Nobody uses the Riverview Park and ride right now, they all drive down to Bowesville and get on the train now instead