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Waterloo Region Transit Developments (ION LRT, new terminal, GRT buses)

urbandreamer said:
K-W is squaresville central. It is completely dominated by auto-centric people, ideas and businesses.

Progressive?

Hell no!
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It's Richard Florida in action. The universities and high tech industry retains the creative class, who are more accepting of progressive ideas.
 
London is looking at BRT. They haven't gotten to the point that they have nodes outside downtown yet. The GTA municipalities and Ottawa's push for transit dollars have got other cities that weren't there yet thinking about how to get on board. The interest and press that transit is getting in Ottawa and the GTA is having a trickle down effect on changing policies throughout Ontario.
 
Automation Gallery said:
Yes maybe bigger but population wise its half of the 1/2 million people living in the London area.
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For census divisons (06 census):
Middlesex = 422k
Waterloo Region = 478k

The only way you can say Waterloo Region is smaller than London is to compare the CMAs

2006 census:
London CMA 457k
Kitchener CMA 451k

but the Kitchener CMA for some reason does not include Wilmot (Baden, New Hamburg, Mannheim) and Wellsley Townships despite being in the Waterloo RM and meeting the criteria to be included in the CMA.

In any case the Kitchener CMA should have passed London CMA in the latest post-censul estimates (released last month but not yet online), since they were within 1700 in the last estimate
 
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Regardless of size, KW has something London doesn't have - all of its major trip generators strung out on one corridor. This includes two downtowns, two major shopping malls, two universities, the main hospital, the HQ for two of the three largest private employers in the region (Clarica and RIM) and a lot of redevelopment potential.
 
PS, Waterloo region is not very progressive. Few smaller cities in Ontario truly are. This is actually one thing that sets Canada apart from the United States - while we are more progressive, on average, it's all concentrated in the large cities. Some of the most progressive thinking parts of the US are small university towns like Boulder, Colorado or Davis, California.

Sure, there are "university towns" in Ontario like Kingston, Guelph and Peterborough in the sense that they have relatively vibrant downtowns that cater to student populations. But those places (I can speak about Peterborough directly) have city councils that are seemingly run by septugenarian dinosaurs with a used car salesman-cum-Rotarian mentality going for them. These aren't the kinds of small towns like the aforementioned ones in the US where the mayor bicycles to work.
 
Automation Gallery said:
Waterloo of all the places looking at having a future LRT? when is London, Windsor, and Sarnia getting into the game.:rolleyes:
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??? They've been working on this for near a decade. Surely Windsor and Sarnia are way too small and spread-out.

London is a good question - it's about the same size as Waterloo?
 
nfitz said:
??? They've been working on this for near a decade. Surely Windsor and Sarnia are way too small and spread-out.

London is a good question - it's about the same size as Waterloo?
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I can understand Sarnia with a population of only 80 000, but the greater Windsor region has a population of around 325000 people, This border city which also attracts a good amount of tourism should difinetly be considered for a future LRT line.
 
nfitz said:
??? They've been working on this for near a decade. Surely Windsor and Sarnia are way too small and spread-out.

London is a good question - it's about the same size as Waterloo?
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I think London's going to need to start thinking big. It's pretty far away from Toronto, so development won't get drowned out as much by the GTA as Waterloo would. I think it's got a pretty good chance at becoming a big city outside the GTA, of course only if it wants to.

Windsor needs some sort of higher order transit, but I agree that Sarnia is a bit too small.
 
Now, if we had a passportless North American Union, there'd be an excellent alibi for a Windsor-Detroit network...

Sexy.
 
All of these are on the proposed route(s):

-3 downtowns (4 if you count Preston)
-1 or 2 University Campuses (route dependant)
-6 total campuses including Cambridge architecture school, Laurier school for social work, UW pharmacy school and proposed Center for International Governance in Uptown
-3 major malls
-2 major power centres
-1 tentatively moved VIA station
-2 potential GO stations
-4 bus terminals
 
Now, if we had a passportless North American Union, there'd be an excellent alibi for a Windsor-Detroit network...
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I don't know how many people would use such a system (aside from a handful of commuters, and Canadian fans going to watch sports in Detroit), but it's interesting.

I don't think there are any subway networks that transfer across international borders, but the closest existing example is at the two transfer points between Hong Kong's MTR and the Shenzhen Metro, at which passengers are required to get off one metro system, walk across the border, go through Hong Kong and Chinese immigration checkpoints, and then enter the other system. For most locals, going through immigration only involves swiping identity cards and doing a thumb scan at automatic gates on both sides of the border.

There are plans for the MTR and the Shenzhen Metro to accept each other's smart fare cards, which would require both cards to recognize two currencies (Hong Kong Dollars and China's RMB).

*****

Not familiar with the Waterloo LRT plan, but I'm thinking it would be interesting to see future extensions turn the LRT into something like the interurbans of old. The system could be extended east to Guelph, and south to Paris and Brantford.
 
ShonTron said:
I know there's regional politics of including Cambridge, but that also opens up the internal Cambridge politics of having to serve all three former town components - Galt, Preston, and Hespeler. Better to have a series of frequent, quality bus routes serve the various areas from Fairview Park or even Sportsworld if need be, because the LRT would be ridiculous if having to meet the demands of the three-headed beast that is Cambridge.
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Actually, only two of the heads will be served in the long run - Galt and Preston, which are connected quite linearly. Hespeler's been left out for the moment, though it would be wise to include it on a route to Guelph, should such a creature ever be brought into this world.
 
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