Archive for the ‘Gateway’ Category
Why are Roads different to Transit?
One of the twitter responses I got to my last post
Now I must admit that even when I was with Translink – many years ago now – I was not required to do much about the Major Road Network (MRN). It exists because the province was going to download some provincial highways and bridges to the municipalities anyway. So if they all joined up into Translink they would have access to some of the new funding that was to come with the new authority. The only exception was the City of Vancouver which did not have any provincial highways within it to be downloaded. Fortunately one of the strongest proponents of the new authority was Councillor George Puil, and he came up with the formula that persuaded Vancouver that being part of the MRN would be a Good Idea. Some roads within Vancouver are now identified as part of the regional MRN.
You can refer to Translink’s web site for more information (and a map) which also includes the rather odd list of bridges, one they built themselves – partly paid for by tolls – to replace the free Albion Ferry, two important links that cross municipal boundaries and one bizarre little ancient wooden swing bridge wholly inside Delta. Oddly the Annacis Swing Bridge which connects Delta’s Annacis Island to New Westminster – and also carries the Southern Railway of BC – remains with the province even though the road it carries is not a provincial highway either. Basically the Knight St and Patullo Bridges were overdue for expensive upgrades so the province was eager to get rid of them.
Translink committed to spend $45m on the MRN this year – which out of a total spending of ~$1.4b is not a very large amount. Translink does not itself have any operational involvement – all of that spending is passed through the municipalities and nearly always on jointly funded projects. The MRN is actually run by a committee made up of the Chief Engineers of each of the municipalities, with Translink providing administrative support. Day to day management and operations remain with the municipalities. For cities like Vancouver and New Westminster there is no real interest, or opportunity, for major capacity expansions. The cities are built out and land acquisition costs are huge. And as Seattle is learning (and Boston learnt) tunnelling for additional freeway capacity is not only expensive but very risky. The only real stumbling block has been the lack of willingness to give up road space to more efficient modes. There are no busways here – and very few dedicated separate cycling facilities. No one has ever seriously considered here what the French call “the art of insertion” (link to presentation) to devote more of the space between building frontages of a street to wider sidewalks, tram tracks or dedicated exclusive bus lanes.
It must also be noticed that municipalities themselves do not spend very much on new road building. A lot of new roads get added to the network every year, and “improvements” are made to the existing roads, by developers – or by cities thanks to development cost charges. Many major developments are made conditional upon increases to local network capacity. No-one, so far as I am aware, ever does any examination of the combined network effects of these developments.
The big spender on roads in the region is the province. While other jurisdictions have cut back on road spending to free up funds for more efficient and environmentally friendly public transport, BC continues throw billions at freeways and other major highway expenditures. It has never suggested that any of these projects be subject to dedicated funding – or referenda of local populations. It is merely continuing with business as usual – blacktop politics has long dominated the BC agenda. In part this is due to the fact that BC only has one major urban metropolis. The Ministry of Transportation is in reality the Ministry of Highways since no other mode grabs the attention of the provincial politicians in quite the same way. BC Ferries, of course, being a whole ‘nother topic best left for another day.
The reasons the province gives for its obsession with road construction is always framed in the context of jobs and the economy. It is always referred to as an “investment” which sounds so much less profligate than “spending”. In urban areas like the Lower Mainland it has also been tied to the port – the “Gateway” – even though the vast majority of the import and export tonnage moved through the Port of Vancouver moves inland by railway – and probably increasingly by pipeline in the future.
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INSERT The Port of Metro Vancouver has recently announced that it is changing the way it licences trucks that serve the Port. Apparently there are too many of them. Of course none of this was ever anticipated the Gateway proponents and their demands for a much wider Port Mann Bridge and the South Fraser Perimeter Road
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In reality, the major growth in traffic on these new roads is single occupant cars and trucks used as cars. Traffic in urban areas expands and contracts to fill the space available – and this induced traffic is seen long before land use changes add their contribution to congestion. Which in any event is not an all day or everyday phenomenon. Most roads, much of the time, have spare capacity. Like the parking lots, they are overbuilt to meet the peak need and the rest of the time are underutilised. It was ever thus.
It is very significant I think that only two new major bridges have been funded by tolls in recent years – and in both cases revenues have been below forecast. Gordon Campbell early on decided to court popularity by cancelling the tolls on the Coquihalla Highway and no-one has ever seriously suggested tolling elsewhere, though a P3 on the Sea to Sky uses “shadow tolls” to calculate payments to the contractor. User pay is a prerequisite for transit – and ferries. On highways and bridges, not so much.
Choosing the happy city
There is a storify based on the #happycity hashtag,which now features many more pictures thanks to the recent Twitter upgrade
At SFU Woodward’s on Wednesday March 26, 2014 the third in the Translink series.
Choosing the Happy City
Charles Montgomery
There were many empty seats even though SFU had “oversold”. If you reserve a seat at one of these events and then find you cannot attend, please remove your reservation as soon as you can. There were people who would have liked to be there. But at least there was also a live stream and the event will be added to the Youtube site in due course.
The introduction was made by one of Fraser Health’s public health officers. Happiness is fundamental to health. We need a system that promotes physical activity. Urban form and transportation determine how people choose to move around, and also affordability of housing and access to green space. People who live in the suburbs of Vancouver walk more than other places. We must improve and maintain choices especially for non urban places. She made the point that some policies which seek to deter car use can adversely affect the mobility of people who live in places where there is no other choice but to drive for many trip purposes. There is an inequity in adopting such deterrents before there are adequate choices fro everyone.
Charles Montgomery started his presentation with two “exercises” – the first to identify Translink staff “the institution we love to hate”. He invited audience members to hug a member of Translink staff if they were near them. The second related to two images of dorms at Harvard University. One was a traditional building, the other a somewhat forbidding modern block. Most people indicated they preferred the traditional building, as did newly arrived students. But a study showed that there was no difference in the happiness of the students after three years. Many factors determine happiness not just the design of the buildings but social environment within them is important.
The idea of idea of increasing happiness is not new. Early economists called it maximizing utility. However often “we get it wrong.I think pursuit of happiness is a good thing. We can measure it. … More pleasure than pain, healthy, in control, meaning, security but strong social connection underlies all of these. Both the GDP and creativity in a city depends on opportunities for social interaction. He showed a three dimensional graph of space time prisms, which showed the people who are more dispersed find it harder to connect. They spend much less time in the spaces and times when they can meet others. The edge of the urban agglomerations are the least likely to be socially active. If you live in the exurbs you do not have the time, energy or willingness to join things or even vote.
The shortness of the the commute time is the best indicator of satisfaction. “How we move is how we feel”, and even only five minutes of walking or cycling improves mood and regularly moving under our own power also improves health. Equally driving a nice car on an open road also improves our mood. The trouble is that open roads are rare – and impossible to find at commute times. Driving even a nice car in a congested city is like piloting a fighter jet in terms of the stress experienced. People rate the experience of using transit lowest of all mostly due to the loss of control and that the trips on transit tend to be the longest.
In Greater Vancouver 40% of all trips could be done in 20 minute bike ride. In cities the design of the built environment determines both our behaviour and our bodies. If we build infrastructure for cycling – making it safer – more people will cycle. People will walk 800m to shop in a good urban environment but less than 200m in the typical suburban big box centre. The huge parking lots are a deterrent to walking even short distances.
He cited Larry Frank’s work in Atlanta showing maps of destinations available within a 10 minute walk of home. While there are many in the traditional city centre in the suburbs there are none. It is not surprising then that people who live in the suburbs on average have 10 pounds more in weight
Status interventions
– Equity
Having low social status is bad for health. When transit viewed as a “hand out for the undeserving” – he used the notorious ads in the Georgia Strait some years ago for a GM car dealer which had a bus with the words “creeps & weirdos” as the destination sign – it is unsurprising that it is difficult to persuade people to change modes. Enrique Penalosa redesigned the city of Bogota and it was all about equity. He cancelled a new freeway but built the Transmilenio BRT based on the Curitiba example.
– Freedom
This is represented by our having mastery of our movement. In one experiment they used skin conductance cuffs on people in a mockup of a subway car. Even though this was staged at a party, as the space available to the group in the car became more restricted so their stress levels rose. He showed a picture of the Navigo card in Paris which is much more than a transit ticket. It also gives access to Velib bike sharing – and (he claimed) car sharing (which if so is a change since I was in Paris). “It also gets you cookies” But mostly it gives people the freedom to live with less stuff. they do not need to own a car or a bike [and can get around without worrying about either being stolen]
He then showed picture of the land the province has recently put up for sale in Coquitlam. This “swathe of Burke Mountain will not be well connected”. But families can save $10k a year by not owning a car. He cited Daniel Kahneman’s Book “Thinking, Fast and Slow” We are rightly fearful of house fires and build new suburbs to allow access to big fire trucks, with wide roads and sweeping curves – like a race track. Streets aren’t safe enough for kids to play on – but we somehow think that we have made them “safer” and the areas they serve. There was a notorious experiment on children with Oreos. They could take one immediately or wait awhile and then get two. He says that the problems we require that we slow down and consider their complexity.
The challenge is the cost of congestion, but we attempt to solve it by designing disconnection. He illustrated this with a picture of the new Port Mann Bridge construction and remarked that we only realized that the new bridge was not needed until after it opened. All the traffic and people that now use it could have been accommodated if the old bridge had been tolled and a rapid bus service along Highway #1 introduced. [This was actually something that the Livable Region Coalition pointed out at the time, by the way. No-one believed us.]
“We did it before” He showed a slide of the Livable Region plan from the 1970s. And he also showed the “Leap Ahead” transit plan which its authors (Nathan Pachel and Paul Hillsdon) estimated would cost $6.5 bn but could be paid for with a $0.05 sales tax.
Referendum = fast brain disaster
“The best thing to do is cancel the referendum.” However since that is unlikely we can save ourselves by adopting the recommendations that Roger Sherman used to win the second Denver referendum. Their program was called “Fast tracks” It was a clear plan and fully costed designed to appeal to the core values of the voters. Most of them drive so it has to show how improving transit improves life for drivers
It is not enough to present a clear picture – it has to have a champion, preferably a celebrity and since Brad Pitt is unlikely to be available he suggested Diane Watts
Bring it back to happiness
Working together is good for us build more resilient community
Q&A
The first question pointed out that the Leap Ahead plan did not seem to have much for the North Shore
“Now is not the time” to determine the details – though it does have a fast bus, and I suggested adding another SeaBus
The second noted that he used an illustration of Disneyland. Expectation of good time in built form
Tests in Disneyland show that architecture that speaks to us is good for well being
Technology in design of transportation
Vehicle sharing systems, driverless cars, use of Car2Go in East Vancouver shows that is a bedroom community. there are plenty of cars there overnight but none during the day. We have to have more activity in our residential areas – this is not a technology problem.
Eric Doherty pointed out that he had not mentioned climate change
“While it feels good to do the right thing but not everybody agrees on what that is. Trying to convince people to think like us does not work”. Gateway sucks did not work – it did nothing to convince people who had to drive that there was any concern over their needs.
How do we overcome this mindset of entitlement?
Golden (referring to the first presentation in this series) got all the players in the room and respecting others point of view. sophisticated comm??
Q from twitter on codes
Self reports on happiness higher in small towns
Rural areas
Everybody can benefit from a village
Codes for rural community Gordon Price commented “The City is not shaped by market forces”
Nathan Woods (Unifor) said: We need $3m and Brad Pitt. How do we get that?
Developers stand to benefit – they have the resources. The Surrey BoT strongly supports transit
Can you supply examples of success of postwar planning
Lewis Mumford
False Creek
New Urbanists
Seaside FL
Lean urbanism
Forest Hills Gardens NY (GP again)
Is a dense urban environment enough?
Towers are as bad for lack of trust as exurbs
Just pushing us together is not enough
“Lazy tower style in Vancouver”
Town houses, courtyards, green space
Example of Copenhagen – can we transfer that here?
The answer would be Long and complex. But in one word- Experiment – just line Janette Sadik Kahn did with bike lanes in New York
Gordon Price pointed out how really emotional the fight over bike lanes here had become
Change is very difficult. Regarded as intrusive
One action for individuals?
Started out as a journalist feeling I had no right. We can all change a bit of the city. Those of us who live here have the right to change where we live
What has surprised you in the reactions since the book came out
Jarret Walker told me that on these examples its not the planners who are the problem. “We know that. You have to convince the politicians … and the people.”
Try not to scare people
Someone from modo talked about Share Vancouver and its implication for resilience, during disasters for instance
Life changed in New York with Sandy. How can we create that sense of urgency?
Experiment Granville St what are we learning?
The questioner felt that all the changes we have seen have been controlled by the business community
Times Sq occurred with support from the BIA – who have benefitted as rents are now going up. The police closure of Granville St at weekends was a response to violence. It gave more space for people to move around and thus reduced conflicts
Councillor Susan Chappelle from Squamish said that they were trying to get a regional transportation dialogue going – they are outside the Translink area with a small transit system provide by BC Transit. They remain “disengaged”. The immense changes he talked about are not translated into budget of small town. In the current situation “Words are used, with no change happening.” Squamish is left disconnected
The measures are the same for reducing GHG and increasing happiness. Should we encourage commuting [between Squmish and Vancouver]? The industrial zoning is out of date.
Can design offset crime? Social justice?
Some people assert “None of this is going to work until we overthrow the 1%” But his work shows that the way we design cities has an immediate impact. It’s an equity issue. Many people complain that they can’t afford to live here but then they oppose the density increase essential [to get reduced housing/transportation combination cost reduced]
Some who was arranging a summit of cultural planners pointed out how hard it was to get a large meeting to places which did not have good connections. Change the way transit works to support the summit
BC Transit should take cue from TransLink interagency approach We can crowd source all kinds of stuff
btw People actually talk on the #20 bus
Big issue is transit funding. A city has found solution?
Richmond is the only place where car ownership has fallen – obviously a response to the Canada Line
See the example of the Los Angeles referendum which was not just about transit – it paid for everything with something for everyone
REACTION
This was by far the best presentation in the series so far, in large part because it was not read from a script. He was speaking to the slides he was showing but clearly enjoyed interacting with the audience. It was indeed a performance – and a good one at that. On the other hand there did not seem to be a great deal that was new or remarkable in the content. Working in this field for forty years means that I have actually witnessed exactly the same set of prescriptions proffered for a what at the time seemed like different problems – congestion, growth, inequity, sustainability, bad air quality, global warming. And now happiness – or its absence.
I have got into a lot of trouble for stating unequivocally “transit sucks” to transit management. They of course would rather boast of their accomplishments, how well they do under difficult circumstances, and how resistant politicians are to pleas for more money. But the fact remains that despite increasing expenditures, the overall transit mode share is very difficult to change. We know what the solutions are – we always have done – but we seem reluctant to embrace the changes necessary. And he is probably right that we have an elite stuck in fast brain mode whenever they deal with these situations. He actually cited Kevin Falcon – more than once – and it seems to me he is right. The Jordon Batemans of course simply play to that preference. It is a lot easier than actually thinking clearly (slowly) and then acting.
Elections in Washington doom Vancouver, and the planet
There is much celebration to the south of us. In their state and local elections, despite huge expenditures, the coal merchants were unable to get the result they wanted. “Bad news for Big Coal in Whatcom County” is the headline in the Seattle PI.
In a nationally watched county election, a slate of four Whatcom County Council candidates, backed by conservation groups and the Democratic Party, took the lead over pro-development, Republican-aligned opponents. The county is a key battleground over whether Western Washington will become home to a huge coal-export terminal.
And this got tweeted as “Big coal can’t even buy an election these days”. This also got picked up by the Sierra Daily in a piece headed “Coal Train to Nowhere”
Understandably given local concerns over coal dust and its health impacts it seems likely that the export of more coal to China through Cherry Point is not going to happen.
“The coal industry is in a death spiral,” Eric de Place of the Sightline Institute said to Connelly. “They cannot even buy an election right now.”
I think he is being a bit short sighted. While this is a triumph for people over corporations – if the votes continue to go this way – Big Coal is not going to give up. It simply takes the trains from the Powder River a little bit further. Over border to Port Metro Vancouver. There are no concerns about local accountability here. No-one who has to run for an election here has any ability to stop the coal trains. And the Port only has to meet the needs of shippers. It has no obligations at all to the local community. Indeed Prairie provinces have more influence than the Mayor of Surrey, say. So while her council objects to coal trains that has no effect at all.
The additional costs of a slightly longer train journey to Surrey Fraser Docks are unlikely to deter Warren Buffet. He doesn’t need to buy any politicians here. The Port is positively salivating at the extra business. They will do his bidding happily and ignore whatever protests there might be as the Directors are secure in their positions. The federal government has abandoned any pretence at trying to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and anyway these count against the country where the coal is burned. It matters not at all to Stephen Harper that we are headed for a 2℃ increase in global temperatures – because his only concern is his own re-election. Coal trains through White Rock will have no measurable impact on that.
“Fears of a damaging trade war”
The Americans are going to start a study to see if Canada subsidizes its ports – with particular reference to Prince Rupert. Oh goody, I just happen to have a recent picture of that
Container ship at Prince Rupert - my photo on flickr
I added the comment
Container ships to Prince Rupert from the Asian Pacific rim save two days sailing over Vancouver. And the CN line from PR to Chicago is easier too. But BC is still spending billions on its misguided Gateway programme.
In fact Canada has its own federally funded programme of Pacific port expansion (this is a 2007 report which popped up near the top of my Google search). And of course this blog has been warning for some time that any program that is designed to win more business from the United States will, inevitably, attract their attention. And when times get tough the instincts of American politicians are always towards protectionism. Indeed just look at almost any of the earlier posts in the same categories as this one and you will see that this response was indeed predicted.
Whether or not the rules say that governments in Canada are allowed to invest in ports, or in improving access to ports (something the Americans have been doing for years too) does not matter. Anyone who followed the softwood lumber saga – which continues to this day over how we deal with beetle damaged timber – understands that it is what appeals to American voters that matters, not what the agreements on “free trade” might include.
Basically, as Pierre Trudeau observed, when you sleep next to an elephant…
Their view of “free trade” is that they want our resources, especially the oil gas and water. They also want untrammelled access to our markets. But if we want to be treated as equals in an open trading relationship, that is only a matter of what is currently acceptable. Speeches and smiles when the documents are signed – but lots of harrumphing and threats if the deal turns out to favour us in any significant way.
Our current political leadership at both federal and provincial levels has been embarrassingly eager to adopt the role of America’s little brother – not noticing that the Americans themselves always add the word “annoying” to the front of that appellation. The economic viability of the programs to expand our ports and the transportation networks that connect to them was never very strong. After all, just handling containers and passing them along adds very little value. The employment (after the construction phase) is quite small when viewed as a cost per job given the billions spent. And the jobs themselves are not exactly what we need either. The whole traffic of consumer goods from Asia to North America, funded by dubious financial instruments and a huge trade deficit, is clearly not sustainable. The environmental impact has been, generally, ignored by government.
It is, after all, only a study. But given the reaction already, the penny seems to have dropped, finally, that the people who have been pushing the Gateway and port expansion have really not been especially forthright. And that we could indeed be stuck with some more white elephants. The money is largely spent – and the benefits have not been very much and could evaporate. Just as BC’s lumber processing industry has shrunk to a shadow of its former self, not least because of the pressure of the US softwood lumber producers.
Fortunately, the construction of the additional container berths at Roberts Bank has not yet started. It is not too late to cancel them – but we are stuck with the SFPR and the widened Highway #1.
Bering Strait Tunnel approved
I did not see this story in our mainstream media this week. It came me from a secondary source that cited The Times and when I did a Google news search I could not find that either but I did get a piece from the Daily Mail. This is the précis from the secondary source
Russia has unveiled an ambitious plan to build the world’s longest tunnel under the Bering Strait as part of a transport corridor linking Europe and America via Siberia and Alaska. The 64-mile (103km) tunnel would connect the far east of Russia with Alaska, opening up the prospect of a rail journey across three quarters of the globe from London to New York. The link would be twice as long as the Channel Tunnel connecting Britain and France. The tunnel across the international date line would be built in three sections through two islands in the Bering Strait and would link 6,000km (3,728 miles) of new railway lines. The tunnel alone would cost an estimated $10-12 billion to construct. Russian Railways is said to be examining the construction of a 3,500km route from Pravaya Lena, south of Yakutsk, to Uelen on the Bering Strait. The tunnel would connect this to a 2,000km line from Cape Prince of Wales, in West Alaska, to Fort Nelson, in Canada.
Now, since it ends up in BC you would have thought, perhaps, that local news sources might have picked it up. Not according to Google.
For one thing, the Port of Metro Vancouver continues to talk about expansion even though their case looks increasingly thin. After all we already face a rapidly changing world as the new Panama Canal and an ice free North West Passage both will cut shipping time and cost. While the UK press naturally likes the story of a round the world trip by train from London to New York, the real issue is going to be the movement of freight, especially containers, between the far east and the United States. This is the market that the Port thinks will expand. I think this in itself is a bit dubious, given the precarious nature of the US economy. But whatever the size of the market a direct train service from China to North America would drastically cut shipping times and by pass sea ports altogether. Moreover such a route could be electrified – and not just the bit under the Strait – meaning it would cut dependence on increasingly scarce and expensive oil for transportation.
For BC a direct rail link also means that our exports of coal, lumber and oil could also start moving by train – but I think that is less likely given the fact that these lower value cargoes are more cost than time sensitive.
But in any event it really does show how sensitive transportation forecasts are to assumptions. And you can be sure that a trans Bering Strait tunnel was not included in any of the Gateway’s forecasts.
LAWSUIT LAUNCHED OVER ROAD CONSTRUCTION ON BURNS BOG
St Mungo Cannery site - photo by Stephen Rees
Burns Bog Conservation Society is non-profit environmental organization working to conserve and protect Burns Bog, a globally-unique ecological wonder in Delta, British Columbia.
For Immediate Release:
LAWSUIT LAUNCHED OVER ROAD CONSTRUCTION ON BURNS BOG
Wednesday, November 24, 2010 – Delta, B.C. – The Burns Bog Conservation Society announced today that it has delivered a statement of claim to Federal court office. The Society claims that the Federal Government has violated the conservation covenant to protect Burns Bog.
“The construction of the South Fraser Perimeter Road will have a significant impact to the health and well being of residents, plants and animals alike,” said Eliza Olson, President, Burns Bog Conservation Society. “Our Governments have failed to conduct a thorough and credible analysis of the environmental impact of paving a highway through Burns Bog, over valuable farmland, and along the Fraser River.”
The freeway will cause irreparable harm to critical habitats of the Fraser delta including the bog, farmland, and the forests and wetlands located in Surrey and North Delta. As such, Burns Bog Conservation Society, with a grant from West Coast Environmental Law, has hired Vancouver lawyer Jay Straith to advocate on their behalf.
“The governments have failed to honour their commitment to protect Burns Bog under a Conservation Covenant and Management Plan signed by the Governments of Canada and British Columbia, Metro Vancouver, and the Corporation of Delta,” said lawyer Jay Straith. “They must be held accountable for their actions and negligence.”
Further, the Federal Government has violated public trust, and ignored their fiduciary duty to protect the environment, by carrying out the development of the South Fraser Perimeter Road. The development contravenes the laws outlined in the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act and the Federal Species at Risk Act in the following ways:
- Fails to ensure that the Federal Environmental Assessment of the South Fraser Perimeter Road was considered in a careful and precautionary manner, to avoid adverse environmental effects
- Fails to disclose the use of Federal lands for the purpose of enabling the project to be carried out
- Fails to protect endangered species such as the Pacific Water Shrew
- Fails to meet the legal requirement of assessing the overall cumulative effects of the South Fraser Perimeter Road, in combination with related Gateway Projects such as the Delta Port expansion and Golden Ears Bridge.
It’s not too late for our governments to do the right thing.
-30-
For more information, please contact:
Eliza Olson
President of the Burns Bog Conservation Society
604-572-0373
info (at) burnsbog.org
The SFPR will run along the south bank of the Fraser. The St Mungo cannery site is below the south pier. - Stephen Rees photo
Rail for the Valley – new report
Rail for the Valley released yesterday a report that looks at the possibilities for the Chilliwack to Surrey interurban line. This is the route that was once used by BCER to link up what were then small farming communities to New Westminster and Vancouver. The line was closed to passenger service in the early 1950s when, as in most of North America, high quality, fast electric public transit was being abandoned in favour of near universal car ownership. Since then, many people have seen that this was a very poor bit of planning, and that since the line still exists and is in public ownership, reinstatement of some type of rail based transit might be a good idea.
I was sent an early copy – and I must say that it failed to excite me. Rail for Valley think that it will help their cause, so I have provided a link to their blog where you can read their case and find a copy for yourself. What I had to point out to them was what is missing. It does cover – in great detail and at a high level of credibility – what the capital cost of reinstating service might be. That is based on widespread experience of utilizing existing railway rights of way for light rail passenger services.
But while there is a great deal of information about capital cost there is nothing at all about revenue – or indeed operating costs. I looked for, and could not find, any attempt to assess what the potential ridership might be, or what the revenue stream would need to look like. It would appear to me that the absence of any demand forecast leaves the biggest question open – how are we going to pay for this? This has to be the first question to be asked. The assertion that light rail has a record of attracting users out of cars is not nearly enough to convince a skeptical public that this idea is economically feasible. What kind of revenue can be expected from fares and how much support is to be required from the various levels of government?
The problem I see is that this report concentrates on what the project might cost – and even goes into detail on service levels. But there is no assessment at all of where people want to go and how much of that can be met by travel on this line – or indeed if it can provide the right combination of fares + time (generalised cost) to be attractive.
We spent a lot of time at that Abbotsford Committee looking at the way the line through that city is aligned north south when the dominant movement pattern is east west. And eventually concluded that a new tram line was needed, with a bus lane being the intermediate step along the way. And that was without any demand modelling!
In Greater Vancouver transit expansion is stalled. Translink can no more consider this proposal than it can anything else since it has no money for any expansion. So this report ought to have concentrated on what could happen outside the Metro area. There is no regional transportation agency in the valley – nor is there any way to collect much to support the (woefully inadequate) transit that is there now. So a report that used reviving part of the interurban at low cost within the imagination ability of local politicians might have a chance. Presenting a mega project with no hope of financing is not realistic and is far too easily dismissed.
The real problem for the valley is the Port Mann Bridge is being replaced by a much wider structure and the freeway is being widened as far as the Metro boundary. Piecemeal widening is occurring further east as well. The reason for that is that the BC Liberals and their friends like to think that the regional strategy has “failed” – and that there are huge opportunities for lots of money to be made by continuing to develop farm land at low densities. This pattern suits developers, car salesmen and indeed business interests in general. It is what they know how to do, since they have been doing this for the last fifty years and more. And they are convinced that despite the end of cheap energy they can continue as before. The impact of burning fossil fuels is something they think can be safely ignored, or will be mitigated by technologies and government subsidies, and that they can keep doing that with impunity indefinitely. They recognize no limits to growth. Indeed their entire premise is that economic growth is essential, that people want to believe that their personal disposable incomes will increase (even though in real terms is has been static for most households) and will continue to vote for this pattern. Indeed as they just have done in the Delta by-election.
We would have got much better value for money if the Port Mann/Highway #1 project had been replaced by transit expansion. Indeed, Premier Campbell liked to boast that the Canada Line provides the capacity of ten lanes of freeway in the space taken by two. So one might have expected that he would have considered that, if he actually was concerned – as he so often professes – about climate change. But, of course, his track record is to say one thing and do the opposite. Which is now getting him in trouble with his core constituency. There is of course a great deal of anger. Here it has been captured by Van der Zalm and his antiHST campaign. I see some similarities with the Tea Party movement. It is about taxes. It is about the fact that people feel stretched financially and are worried about the future – and that the elites do not seem to be listening to the voters. That spin and rhetoric is used on them – and that their experience does not match what they are being told. I suspect that the anger will intensify as the new highway and bridge fills up with traffic, the tolls are raised and the commute times increase – but by then it will be too late.
The way to pay for Rail for the Valley was not to waste it on freeways. The way to save the valley from sprawl was to strengthen the ALR, not weaken it, and build transit oriented development (TOD). But TOD does not work is there is no transit.
RfV say they are not in a position to produce a demand forecast – and that is true too. Anyway, the way we do modelling here you can put in any land use pattern you like – just as the province did for its freeway forecast. They used the same future land use pattern for both “with” and “without” scenarios. The model has no feedback loop between network and land use. It ignores induced travel. It says that trip making is simply a function of population size and distribution. So it is not exactly realistic – but it would still show that if the freeway had not been built and the people still came in their millions then a new railway line would have carried them. And some spread sheets would also demonstrate that would have been financially supportable – given some way to link travel choices to social costs. Not unreasonable assumptions – unlike the wildly unreasonable assumptions that are made by the Gateway program and the “business as usual” crowd in general.
Quite what the model would forecast if you now put in the widened freeway and its greatly dispersed population pattern that reflects real decisions as opposed to wishful thinking I can only imagine. The case for the use of the existing right of way might still be shown to be more viable than a new one. The costs of acquiring land for transportation being one of the largest single elements – and a quick glance around the place where that by election occurred will now show exactly how much land the SFPR is taking over. It is not a small project. But in current decision making timelines, any demand forecast for the valley has to assume the current projects are completed and up and running before the trains (or trams) arrive.
At the same time as this report emerged, so did the discussion about how to pay for more transit in Metro Vancouver get restarted. There is to be a meeting this week between the Mayors, the Premier and his Minister of Transport. Some kind of deal will – it is hoped – emerge that will allow Translink to expand beyond its present services, and for the Evergreen Line to the North East Sector to be built at long last. I doubt, somehow, that the interurban will take up much of their time. Though places like Surrey and Langley have made it clear that they will not tolerate any new funding mechanism that just pays for one line that does not serve them. More buses – and bus lanes – seem the easiest way to meet that demand even if that will not exactly satisfy them. But that is the nature of compromise – a solution that leaves all parties equally dissatisfied. The Fraser Valley, of course, is not part of that process.
UPDATE There was a short report on the local CBC News
Port of Vancouver Container Trade 2009
Overall container volume for Port Metro Vancouver decreased nearly 14 per cent, for 2.2 million TEUs (twenty-foot-equivalent unit) on the year. The downturn in the economy and erosion of consumer confidence in 2009 led to an almost 19 per cent decline in laden container imports, while stable demand for containerized exports of forest products and specialty crops helped laden outbound units advance by one per cent. Although the Port’s laden container business finished the year down 10 per cent, the sector recorded a marked improvement compared to the 17 per cent decline reported at mid-year.
This from a press release by the Port yesterday.
Containerized Statistics by TEU (twenty-foot-equivalent unit)
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Total Container TEU 2,152,462 2,492,107 -13.6%
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Total Laden TEU 1,932,715 2,153,816 -10.3%
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Import Laden TEU 1,007,304 1,238,350 -18.7%
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Export Laden TEU 925,411 915,465 1.1%
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Access Port Metro Vancouver’s complete 2009 statistics at www.portmetrovancouver.com/about/factsandstats.aspx
The press release and backgrounder tries to put the best spin it can, but the fact remains that it was a very bad year to expand the port’s container facilities. The figures above refer to just two years – and 2008 was not exactly stellar performance either.
All the ports along the North American Pacific coast experienced a lack of traffic. China – the major source of loaded import containers – has actually not been doing badly lately. It is just not trading with the US as much. It is finding that domestic demand, and that from other Asian economies, is filling the gap. Since the US economy is not doing well at all, and has not seen any recovery in employment, most forecasts continue gloomy. The probability that the pattern of pre-crash financing of consumer spending will return seems unlikely – yet that is what the whole Gateway program is based on. That somehow trade will grow exponentially indefinitely and Vancouver will take an increasing share of it.
The damage that projects like the South Fraser Perimeter Road and the expansion of container storage at Roberts Bank – on farmland – will be extensive. Fortunately, they are not so advanced as to be irreversible – yet. Up to now all that has happened is some sand has been dumped as pre-load. That could be removed and the damage reversed. The problem will be that it requires the ruling elite to admit that they, just like everyone else, failed to predict the sudden reversal of economic fortunes that resulted from the deregulation of US banking and financial markets. Even though a very similar event occurred under the Reagan administration with the collapse of the savings and loan industry, and the regulation regime itself was introduced after the earlier Great Crash of 1929.
The world has changed in the last few years. Actually, the real world, outside of the financial markets, was already much more precarious and the need for a different approach had long been identified. Exponential economic growth is simply not possible on a finite planet – and the carrying capacity of our ecosystem, the thing we depend on for our lives, was exceeded some time ago. Yet most politicians still talk as though growth is essential – which is only true if we stick to a financial model that has clearly failed. I cannot say that I am optimistic that the light will dawn at any political level here, or in the US for that matter. I do see, however, that more and more citizens are taking matters into their own hands and being the change they seek. I wonder if that will be enough.
Regional Growth Strategy consultation
Now there’s a headline to send your pulses racing. Yes, I know all sorts of exciting things are going on in the world, but somebody has to pay attention to these things. And I did volunteer for the Livable Region Coalition that I would lead the charge – though I was very pleased to see LRC founder Gordon Price at the meeting. It took up most of the morning at the Metrotown Hilton, and it is taking me some time to get my notes on line as I found that both the batteries for my notebook PC were dead. So I am working from scribbled notes.
Johnny Carline opened the proceedings with a summary of the process to date. They are now on the second draft of the strategy having been through extensive consultations with the public, municipalities and “stakeholders” (more about that later). The Regional Growth Strategy is only one of twelve parts of the Sustainable Region Initiative.
The RGS has changed the Livable Region Strategy objectives by introducing the idea of “a sustainable economy” but Carline admitted that what is there now is not sustainable but is more to do with “economic viability”. There is also a new commitment to deal with climate change. Metro has worked hard with Translink on transportation choices but not with senior governments whose policies he said were “pulling us apart”.
In addition to the public meetings they held two focus groups of randomly chosen residents and interestingly their views were not very different to those “self selected” people who attended the meetings. Overall there is around 90% support for the new strategy, though 40% think there should be a higher level of regional agreement, which is directly contrary to the views of municipal officials (elected and professional) who think they should have more autonomy. The implementation of the strategy is the municipalities’ greatest concern, as well as the role of Translink. Perhaps the greatest area of concern now is employment dispersal – an area where the LRSP notably failed to get implemented – and the need to protect industrial land.
Urban Centres
The RGS maintains the LRSP list of multiple centres with different scales and roles (as Central Place Theory states – range, hinterland, hierarchy) but adds two new municipal town centres, one on the North Shore and the other in Langley Township. Pubic pressure has resulted in neighbourhood centres being added to the map even though they have no regional significance.
Frequent Transit Corridors
As result of municipal pressure these have been taken off the map but the idea remains key, that high density development needs to be located along the routes used to link centres, but these corridors will not be allowed to undermine the centres. Translink will work with the municipalities to define these corridors, which will need commitments from both sides and will not go forward without that.
(I think that this is a significant policy issue and shows, once again the great local resistance to the need for increased densities in established areas.)
Industrial Lands
There has been a “big push back from the municipalities” on how these are defined: they want autonomy, but the region feels there is a need to be able to accommodate the repatriation of manufacturing as well as “the need to support port activities” as well as meeting the need for truck “storage”.
49% of office employment in the last 15 years has gone to developments outside of the town centres, often on industrial land. These areas are not transit friendly which has significant mode split and ghg implications. The new road systems now being built are “expensive and counter productive” and the increased dispersal of employment undermines regional objectives. However the region does not have the necessary powers to control this growth. We must all understand that we cannot say we support the objectives of the RGS and continue as we have been doing. The result has been a compromise called a “mixed employment” designation which will act as an “escape valve” – since both the development industry continues to want to develop these and municipalities cannot afford to forgo the additional tax revenue. The region will “not be happy” if that designation extends the problem. Carline remarked that this was the “juiciest policy debate” in the process.
Rural Areas
These small areas have been added: they are not an urban reserve or “development in waiting” but rather lands outside the ALR and the Green Zone where low density development has occurred. The density guidelines have been removed, but sewers will not be extended into these areas to support development, though they may still be needed for health or environmental reasons.
Conservation and Recreation Areas
Linkages have now been added between these areas as part of the region’s Greenway Network
Housing
Everyone wants a stronger policy but there is a limited amount that municipalities can do absent federal support.
Transportation – the thorny issue
Translink gets to “accept” the regional stratgey but Metro can only comment on theirs. “At the staff level we all get it”. The role of providing service to meet existing demand is core to Translink. Investing to shape growth is an important policy direction and is the Metro interest. For transit there are three concepts
- established markets
- major emerging transit markets
- locally emerging markets
As Martin Crilly pointed out, Translink cannot get too far ahead of current demand. But Metro has identified the areas where future transit investment should go
- The Evergreen Line
- Surrey Town centre to other centres in Surrey
- Surrey Town Centre to Langley and other adjacent regional centres
Implementation
Everyone wants clarity. But the plan cannot be rigid so Metro has identified two amendment processes. 1) The municipal Regional Context Statements are a major instrument that allows for variations from the plan without amendment, except that the agricultural designation and the urban containment boundary cannot be changes by this process. 2) Special Study Areas which will only require 50% +1 vote at the GVRD Board for approval (not the higher levels of agreement required for other amendments)
The intention is to get the plan “put to bed before the summer break”. More public consultation meetings will be held across the region from January 12 to 26.
After the small group discussion three stakeholders got to speak from the lectern.
Jeff Fowler of UDI
We support wise and efficient use of a scarce resource: density must be tied to transit. The development industry buys into the vision but the municipalities seem to find it easier to identify where development will not go than where it will. The industry understands the need for development at transit stations and for infill. We have a limited land base so it is crucial to identify places where development will be permitted.
Government still restricts land uses, there are limits on what can be done on industrial land which limits the possibilities for municipalities to adapt to economic change. Some industrial areas are near transit stations and would be good places to put new development. Restrictions on land use do not compel density to go into the right places. The industry has to confront NIMBYism, high development cost charges and demands for additional community facilities. 23 local governments all beholden to local pressures makes increasing density difficult. We need to leverage the investment that has been made in [rapid] transit. As one Orgeon official has pointed out “we do not like sprawl but we don’t like density either!”
In Toronto’s centre building costs are around $40-50 psf: in Vancouver its $150 psf. The average house price in Toronto is $560,000, in Vancouver $900,000.
We must be wary of restrictions on land use and need to be bold and creative to achieve greater density
Port of Vancouver
(I am sorry but I did not catch the name of the speaker). We are much interested in growth and development, especially as it effects the Pacific Gateway. We welcome the collaborative approach to the regional goods strategy and the reinforcement of the major transit corridors. He also noted the linkages to industrial areas. They oppose mixed employment areas as they see them eroding the industrial land base and are often not well served by transit. He also spoke about “Fair Tax Equity” (which is a bit rich coming from a wealthy agency that has been refusing to pay property tax in Richmond).
Greg Yeomans of Translink
The two agencies are trying to establish the same thing and the two plans should be regarded as “two chapters from the same book”. Translink supports the goals, the retention of the transportation component and the strongly defined urban growth boundary. The Frequent Transit Corridors are also supported and shoud align with Translink’s Frequent Transit Network.
More work and refinement is needed on jurisdictional issues, the transit markets concept and priorities as well as implementation and amendments.
Gordon Price posed a question in the form of a long statement which essentially stressed the impact of the huge investments now being made in roads and bridges. Essentially the region’s growth strategy has largely worked – up until now.
Johnny Carline responded that the dispersal of employment was what had prompted the road building program as a response to an intolerable level of congestion. “If you stop dispersal of employment you will end the demand for roads”. We are call for better management of the road system to give priority to trucks. The land use plan limits sprawl. A firm urban containment boundary limits amount of land left for greenfield development. Focussing development, and the lac of alternatives, works in our favour. What is worrisome is that highway expansion will also spawn development outside the region. Metro Vancouver should be expanded to Hope.
In answer to another question he also remarked that because travel has been cheap and easy, longer distance commuting has been an attractive option. This applies to transit as much as car use. But also the region has offered “freedom to travel” which is highly prized. “Perhaps the best trip is no trip at all”.
COMMENTARY
The discussion around each table was recorded on large post it notes and stuck to the wall. They will be transcribed and, I suppose, recorded by Metro.
Deb Jack of Surrey Environmental Partners made a couple of very good points: the conservation areas are not nearly big enough. Simply protecting what we have is not good enough. Secondly while turning attention to climate change is good, the RGS ignores the much bigger issue of the need to promote biodiversity. Even of we manage to control ghg, this will be a much greater threat to our survival as a species.
In my view, the choice of “stakeholders” to be given the platform emphasizes what has been wrong with this process throughout. Far too much attention is being paid to what other agencies and corporate interests want, and far too little has been done to include communities and other interest groups. Why do none of the NGOs, foe example, get to comment from the lectern? If Gordon Price had not shown up, would the question he raised even have been considered?
But there is also far too much complacency in Carline’s reply. No urban region has ever cured congestion by building roads. Congestion is – as everywhere – just about tolerable. If that were not the case, people would change their travel behaviour and relocate. What every urban system sees is the level of congestion that the local populace thinks, collectively, is what they can put up with. The only way to reduce traffic congestion is to make better use of the space devoted to moving (and parking) vehicles – essentially reducing the role of the single occupant car (the greatest waste of resources known to man) and buidling better transit systems.
Deb Jack, again, made the point that the choice of transit technology is always made by the province, not Translink. What the region needs now South of the Fraser more than anywhere, is Light Rail, not Skytrain. And, I added, not freeway expansion.
The idea that the RGS can somehow stop the incesant demands of the road building lobby is bizarre. Of course the Port supports it – it has won every round. The Gateway Council gets “most favoured” treatment and every other interest group – of whatever kind – is largely ignored. What the Port claims is never challenged. There is no need for port expansion. Given what we now know about peak oil and climate change there will likely never be enough demand to justify these new facilities. Anyway they will all be underwater in a few years time. Parking spaces for trucks is not the greatest issue this region faces and there is absolutely no need for truck priority. All they need to do is change their scheduling procedures so that trucks dropping off a container can collect one at the same time – and also expand the port’s working hours to encourage trips into the off peak periods. Pretending that you need a new freeway so that truckers can work 8 to 4 Monday to Friday is a ridiculous priority.
And while I have nothing against Greg Yeomans personally, his contribution was otiose. He did the job his organization needed done, but given what Carline had already said, it did not need saying again. Yet many voices in the region seem not be heard. There is never any time for the concerns of the people – or the environment – to be heard at these gatherings. Only corporate PR and spin.
Interchange ‘entirely for port,’ says councillor
The City of Richmond has long wanted another interchange on the freeway. Their preferred location would be Highway #99 at Blundell. The province does not want to do that, but has offered a new partial interchange on Highway #91 at Nelson Road. However, in order to get that Richmond would have to contribute $3m.
One of the reasons the City is saying it needs the interchange is to reduce truck traffic on Westminster Highway. This has increased dramatically as the port industrial lands on the south arm between LaFarge and Riverport have been developed. Richmond would like the new access road to be grade separated at Westminster Highway. They can’t have that either.
Local councillor Harold Steves is quoted in the paper edition but very oddly, this is left out of the on-line version I linked to above.
Steves maintains the province wants to build a new bridge over the South Arm of the Fraser at No 8 Road and the new interchange is needed to facilitate it.
“Everything to build this new crossing is falling into place,” he said. “It would destroy East Richmond farmland.”
The Ministry of Transport never gives up on a defeated road proposal. This one has been around for a long time. It would also have, of course, a new crossing of the North Arm to connect up to Boundary Road.
If you look to the map on the left, Boundary Road runs due south from the point where Highway #1 turns east. Just draw a mental line due south, and you will see how it neatly falls halfway between the Deas Tunnel and the Alex Fraser, and skirts (or not depending on how you define it) the brown area in the middle of Delta – Burns Bog. It would remove some traffic from both Marine Drive and the Knight Street bridge to the west and the Queensborough Bridge to the east. And it would also add capacity which is currently maximised at the tunnel. While the counterflow system designed to ease commuting to and from Vancouver does help those flows, it does so at the expense of counter peak movements – which have increased significantly as a result of the dispersal of both employment and industry away from Vancouver’s downtown.
Previous proposals from the MoT fell foul of the Cities of Vancouver and Richmond, as well as creating great concern over the ALR, the Bog and the green zone generally. This route is missing from Transport 2021, which was incorporated in to the LRSP. Of course the province no longer has any concerns about these issues, as it determination to pursue the Gateway project on the south bank of the South Arm demonstrates. You can also see how much of the land south of Westminster Highway is now grey not green. That’s port industrial development, and a lot of it fairly recent. The picture below shows the view upstream from the east end of Steveston Highway. The left side of the picture is almost filled with empty containers stored on new fill, mostly dredged from the shipping channel – a process which is continuing even as I write this.
The Review piece is mainly a response to the urging last week of the local MLA to accept the deal that is being offered. There is no response from the Port, but also no word at all from the MoT. The previous minister dismissed calls for the doubling of the Deas Tunnel, saying that is was not a current priority for the province. And, of course, if the long range plans of the MoT never change, which certainly seems to be the case, that might well explain his response. It is probably cheaper now to build yet another cable stayed, post tensioned bridge (like the Golden Ears) than sink more tubes adjacent to the existing tunnel. But more importantly, as Steves notes, it also opens up a lot of land for highway oriented development. In exactly the same way as the SFPR converts land from agriculture to industry in Delta. And as the widening of Highway #1 will facilitate along the valley.
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