Hamilton Hamilton LRT | ?m | ?s | Metrolinx

Ottawa has a population of 848,720, and has a busway and plans for LRT lines.

Hamilton has a population of 504,559, and planning for 2 rapid transit lines.

Waterloo region has a population of 478,121, and planning for a rapid transit line.

Mississauga has a population of 704,246, and still has no rapid transit.
 
Any dedicated streetcar lane is a pleasure to ride on. You will fly past the traffic. A good example of a streetcar lane that met a lot of opposition, but in the end turned out great is the St. Clair streetcar line in Toronto. I took this line the other day and it was easy to see how much quicker the route was.
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"Flying" past traffic is a bit of a stretch, don't you think?
 
Hipster Duck said:
"Flying" past traffic is a bit of a stretch, don't you think?
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Those streetcars are definitely capable of flying if they want.

Right now the St. Clair streetcar line is disconnected from the rest of the network due to track replacement on Bathurst. So there's 6 or 7 vehicles on the route. Last weekend, there was a backup of 6 streetcars all sitting in St. Clair station loop, backing out onto the street (so yeah, all the vehicles on the route were in the same place). I hopped on the car at the front of the pack, and proceeded to wait 12 minutes until it actually departed. The driver then drove to St. Clair West at a speed of about 80 km/h.
 
CDL.TO said:
Those streetcars are definitely capable of flying if they want.

Right now the St. Clair streetcar line is disconnected from the rest of the network due to track replacement on Bathurst. So there's 6 or 7 vehicles on the route. Last weekend, there was a backup of 6 streetcars all sitting in St. Clair station loop, backing out onto the street (so yeah, all the vehicles on the route were in the same place). I hopped on the car at the front of the pack, and proceeded to wait 12 minutes until it actually departed. The driver then drove to St. Clair West at a speed of about 80 km/h.
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Oh yes, I've experienced that late at night. If you get on one of the last streetcars, it's rare that anyone will want off or on in between Yonge and Bathurst. The drivers will tear up the track and clear the entire stretch in less than 3 minutes.

During the day and especially at rush hour, they have to go slow and space out. If there is more than two streetcars in St. Clair West at one time, the buses get into a kind of gridlock. Some of the bus drivers get really pissed when that happens. It's funny to see them all laying on their horns and yelling at each other to move out of the way. The supervisors just watch and laugh at them too.
 
W. K. Lis said:
Ottawa has a population of 848,720, and has a busway and plans for LRT lines.

Hamilton has a population of 504,559, and planning for 2 rapid transit lines.

Waterloo region has a population of 478,121, and planning for a rapid transit line.

Mississauga has a population of 704,246, and still has no rapid transit.
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Are you going to post this in every thread? Mississauga is building one rapid transit line, and is planning for two more.
 
Plans for light rail system in city steaming ahead

June 17, 2008
The Hamilton Spectator

Hamilton is aiming to have a rapid transit plan by the fall in hopes of securing provincial funding.

The city is focusing on light rail as its top option after it was overwhelming endorsed by the public. The public works committee agreed yesterday to allow staff to develop a feasibility study over the summer.

If council signs off on the plan, the city hopes to deliver a request for funding to Metrolinx in the fall. The province has set aside $17.5 billion for rapid transit.

Mayor Fred Eisenberger said the city must move quickly to get government funding before it's gobbled up by other cities. "I really think we need to have our oar deep in the water by fall."

Metrolinx has not told the city how much money it would be willing to invest, but city staff said they were told to "dream big." A Hamilton light rail system would cost $1.1 billion. Several councillors agreed to take the next step, but are worried about the potential cost to taxpayers.
 
I was looking over the Hamilton Rapid Transit's Final Rapid Transit Feasibility Report, and it mentions that should they go with Light Rail, the track gauge could be 1.435 m (standard gauge), and the catenary supply voltage could be 750 VDC (1500 VDC optional).

The current TTC streetcar fleet uses 600 VDC, but with the new Transit City, the TTC will be increasing the voltage to 750 VDC. However, the track gauge will remain as 1.495 m.

If, in the hopefully not too distance future, the Hamilton, Burlington, Oakville, Mississauga, and Toronto light rail systems should interconnect somehow, the vehicles would not be able to interface with each other. The track gauges will be different.

Metrolinx should set standards on what should the voltage, track gauge, and other benchmarks to be followed by each transit system. Waterloo Region may want to as well have a role in this as well, should they go with light rail as well.
 
It's definitely not too late to establish standards like that.

It's completely possible that Metrolinx could be named the lead agency on every Metrolinx funded project - when it comes to detailed engineering design of course.

I do believe that Urban design should be done my the locals.
 
The City of Hamilton has agreed in principle to eventually convert King and Main back to two-way streets as a traffic-calming measure.

Will they have to redesign the east-west LRT line this way?
 
urbanfan89 said:
The City of Hamilton has agreed in principle to eventually convert King and Main back to two-way streets as a traffic-calming measure.

Will they have to redesign the east-west LRT line this way?
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I don't think they are at the point where they have done any engineering design.
 
Does it really matter if Hamilton and Toronto use different track gauges? Mississauga and Toronto, yes, it might be a problem if they had different ones since they're next to each other. But Hamilton and Toronto? Now come on, really?
 
Coruscanti Cognoscente said:
Does it really matter if Hamilton and Toronto use different track gauges? Mississauga and Toronto, yes, it might be a problem if they had different ones since they're next to each other. But Hamilton and Toronto? Now come on, really?
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I thought this as well when I read his post, but upon thinking about it, why not? Changing the gauge to match Toronto's wouldn't add very much to the capital cost and, even though it seems unbelievably unlikely for Hamilton and Toronto to be LRT connected any time soon, who knows what the future may bring?

Who was it that was seriously proposing a 512 extension to Stoney Creek a few months back? Might they give their input here, as hilariously dumb as the idea was?
 
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