Friends of the O-Train

By 1 vote, Council approves $145M for busways, garage

2007-01-18T07:34:00.000-05:00

This motion passed by 1 vote yesterday.

This may kill all the EAs, including Interprovincial.

This also waves goodbye to Ottawa's share needed to attract the $400 million Federal and Provincial money and makes a mockery of the Mayor's task force.

The bus garage alone will cost more than the entire O-Train project.

This report was not provided to Committee or the public in advance of the meeting.

Transit Committee knows that the Federal and Provincial money is still on the table (as per letters from Baird and Jim Watson). However staff insisted that the provincial money was only available for the original north-south project.

This action must be reconsidered by council.

Updated Jan 16, 2006

2006-12-27T00:30:00.000-05:00

We have been at the bus saturation point downtown since OC Transpo made the announcement it was reducing downtown buses in fall 2004. This means no new buses can physically FIT onto Slater and Albert streets, making a downtown eLRT solution a top priority of any transportation plan for Ottawa.

What's New:
City hid true cost of light rail, documents show - Ottawa Citizen Jan 7
Transit Needs to get on a roll - Ottawa Citizen Jan 3
City would run better if it listened to knowledgable volunteers (letter)
Letter from MPP Jim Watson.

Friends of the O-Train is glad the city has voted for a 6-month period for consideration of practical LRT options for Ottawa.

We continue to offer our suggested alternatives and extensions centered around expansion of the successful O-Train and a high frequency electrified downtown loop.

Much of the work can begin soon thanks to previous investment and environmental assessments already completed.

LRT in Ottawa is not dead. The O-Train has already become an essential component of the overall transit network in the city. Expanding it is the first step in the right direction.

Letter From Jim Watson

2006-12-24T16:06:00.000-05:00

On, Thursday, Dec. 21, 2006, Tim Lane, a member of the Friends of the O-Train, received the following letter from his MPP, Jim Watson, Ottawa West-Nepean.

---
Dear Mr. Lane:

Thank you for your letter regarding the light-rail project.

As you know, Ottawa city council did vote to cancel the
project last week, and as such the province will now await
the next steps from city council.

Our Ministry of Public Infrastructure Renewal made it clear
(as did the Premier and I) that our funds were still on the table
and that we looked forward to reviewing a business case and
ridership study for any new proposal. Our bottom line has
always been that we believe the duly elected city council should
decide what is in Ottawa's best interest, and we will be there to
assist financially up to $200 million.

I have also mentioned to Mayor O'Brien that our capital dollars
can not be used to fund any potential lawsuit or other non-transit
use. I would encourage you and the Friends of the O-Train to
work with the new city council and take part in the six month
review and task force that Mayor O'Brien has announced.

I thank you again for your correspondence, and for your
continuing interest in Ottawa public transit.

Sincerely,
Jim Watson, M.P.P.
Ottawa West-Nepean

Our Plan at a Glance

2006-11-23T18:23:00.000-05:00

Dedicated Electric LRT from Bayview to Hurdman on 3 minute service.
This would require approximately 50% more electric vehicles to be purchased from Siemens, currently pegged at 22. We believe Siemens will like this idea.

Remove all buses from Albert and Slater, deploying them locally to provide better neighbourhood service.

Large transfer hubs at Bayview and Hurdman, with commercial stores and services available.

Expanded (not replaced) Diesel O-Train service using existing track to a park and ride at Earl Armstrong Rd.

Improved 7.5 minute O-Train frequency from South Keys to Bayview (15 minutes from Earl Armstrong).

Savings of $340 Million to be used for expansion East, West, South and North to Gatineau.

Friends' FAQ

2006-11-22T23:21:00.000-05:00

1. How can the O-Train frequency be reduced to 7.5 minutes without adding extra track somewhere?
2. What are some of the key differences between the FOTO proposal and the city's LRT project?
3. Where will maintenance and storage facilities go?
4. If the current O-Train is from Bombardier, and this service will be expanded to the South, does Siemens have a comparable model train?
5. Why does your plan call for eliminating buses from downtown?
6. Why don't you extend the train to my neighbourhood?
7. To get all the federal and provincial financial assistance the total project has to be $600 million. If the Friends' plan is only $438 million, how might the remaining $162 million be used?
8. The City's N-S plan calls for a station at Gladstone. Why isn't a station already there?
9. What happened to the planned station at Lester? And will there be one at Walkley?
10. Who are the Friends of the O-Train anyway?

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1. How can the O-Train frequency be reduced to 7.5 minutes without adding extra track somewhere?

The short answer is that extra tracks will be required. The FotO proposal calls for short lengths of extra tracks, known as "passing tracks", to be placed at strategic points along the line.

Adding passing tracks is a standard way to improve frequency on a single track line. Generally, one fewer passing track is needed than the number of trains serving the line. We have identified a number of places where it would be easy to add passing tracks, much more cheaply than double-tracking the whole line and without closing down the current O-Train service for 3.5 years.

The whole Canadian railway system works this way. Even where you see two tracks on Canadian railways, such as between Montreal and Toronto, they are generally parallel single tracks with trains running in both directions on each
track and switching back and forth to pass.

Many LRT systems overseas use single track in sections where cost or corridor land availability are a problem. Even one of the newest in Britain, the Croydon Tramlink system in South London, had single track sections on bridges over railway lines and under roads, on a rural section, and into the busy Wimbledon terminal. The same is true for sections of the newest British LRT system in Nottingham, as well as LRT in Birmingham, Sheffield, etc. In the US there are single track sections on many LRT systems, such as St. Louis, Portland, and Sacramento CA.

City staff actually committed to Council, when the O-Train first started, to study the need for additional trains and passing tracks, but they never did. They were also supposed under the statement of work for the North South EA to study the possibility of extending the diesel O-Train to a new park-and-ride in the vicinity of Leitrim Road, where the tracks were still in place, but they never did that either.

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2. What are some of the key differences between the FOTO proposal and the city's LRT project?
Cost Savings of our proposal compared to the City's project:

$120 million is saved by not having to buy new buses and bus garages. Instead the buses will be used to provide better local feeder service to the Hurdman and Bayview hubs and the Armstrong park and ride.

Our proposal is costed at $438 million. That's $340 million less than the city's plan.

The cost savings can be used to improve service on existing express and regular routes, and it can be used to run the O-Train out to Bells Corners, Kanata, Carp, Barhaven, Richmomd, and to Gatineau (to reduce most if not all blue Gatineau buses along Rideau and Wellington Streets).

Whereas the City is proposing to add to the Slater/Albert street transit congestion by adding a single car LRT line, we propose to eliminate the transit congestion by eliminating all buses on these streets. Whereas the City is proposing a slow single car LRT from Barhaven to the University of Ottawa, we are proposing a fast three-car shuttle LRT train in both directions every 3 minutes between Hurdman and Bayview, and a three-car LRT O-Train service every 7 minutes between Bayview and Earl Armstrong.

Whereas the City is proposing to build a single car LRT to Barhaven that takes longer than the existing Express Buses, we are proposing to bring O-Train service to Barrhaven that is faster than the Express Bus.

Whereas the City is proposing to scrap its total investment in the award-winning O-Train and take three years to replace existing LRT service between Bayview and Greenboro, we are proposing to build on our O-Train investment by expanding it to Earl Armstrong, to Gatineau and to Barhaven, Bells Corners, Kanata, Carp and Richmond.

Wheras the City is proposing a $900 million LRT line to compete directly with its over 1 billion dollar investment in bus transitways, we are proposing an integrated transit system that builds on success and reuses and maximizes past investment for a transit solution to actually meet the City's target for transit ridership.

Some of the technical differences of our plan compared to the City's project:
The City is proposing a streetcar service (single-cars), we are proposing running trains (multiple-cars).

While the City proposes that the lanes on Albert and Slater will be shared bus-LRT and the lanes on Mackenzie King Bridge will be shared private car-LRT, we suggest that the LRT lanes downtown be dedicated throughout.

Buses removed from Albert and Slater would be used to provide a local feeder service. Their plan calls for removing neighbourhood buses. We feel that getting more bus service into the neighbourhoods, combined with a more
comfortable, cleaner, and faster way to get through downtown is what will get a higher percentage of the population to use transit.

While they plan to run a 1-unit LRT every 5 minutes, we can run a 3-unit LRT train every 3 minutes, (200 passengers versus 600 per train and 2400 versus 12000 per hour).

They do say that they can run a train every 3 minutes in future or increase the length to 2 units, but they aren't buying enough vehicles to do that, while we are.

They will also be running the LRT mainly empty westbound in the morning and eastbound in the afternoon. Our plan has good loadings in both directions between Hurdman and Bayview.

While they say that the speed in the suburbs will be limited to 80 km/h and 40-50 km/h on curves, we propose that the suburban speed can be up to 120 km/h and the curves superelevated to avoid speed restrictions.

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3. Where will maintenance and storage facilities go?

Potential sites that can be used as a maintenance and storage facility include:

Vimy House, former Champagne Streetcar Barn & bus garage.

Bayview City works yard, north of the Transitway, on the east side of Bayview Road.

Hurdman area.

Former Algonquin College Lees Ave. campus.

Former railway passenger coach storage and servicing yard, Ottawa Station

An Environmental Assessment would determine the best option. Minor expansion of the current Walkley O-Train maintenance and storage facility could be done without an EA. This could be done to satisfy the service requirements of our proposed expanded line to Armstrong park and ride.

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4. If the current O-Train is from Bombardier, and this service will be expanded to the South, does Siemens have a comparable model train?

Siemens has very similar products to Bombardier. The DLRT models (Siemens' Desiro and Bombardier's Talent) share styling, similar floor height, similar model of MTU diesel underfloor engine, similar INDUSI automatic train control, similar body width at floor (so matches platforms).

Siemens Desiro has one articulation joint versus two for the Talent, and has two doors, spaced differently from the three Talent doors. This would work at Bayview but would require one added platform edge extender at the other station platforms, a minor issue.
Both trains would be serviced the same way but the jack spacing in the shops would be different, (should also be a minor issue).

You don't have to buy all your vehicles from the same manufacturer. Some US systems are buying LRVs from multiple suppliers. Some small European operators have as many as three different manufacturers' DLRT.

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5. Why does your plan call for eliminating buses from downtown? Don't we need some buses?

We propose eliminating only the current Transitway buses from Albert and Slater. Other local bus route would continue undisturbed. Albert and Slater Street bus congestion has been operating at capacity for several years and, with the exception of the Friends' plan, there are no other cost-effective ways to service growth. The city's plan of mixed bus and train service actually makes congestion worse and will
require major Express service cancellations.

It is worth noting that Express service cancellations were approved in Council July 12 vote in favour of the proposed LRT, yet no public consultations for Express
route cancellations were conducted.

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6. Why don't you extend the train to my neighbourhood?

There are many extensions that could be done to both north/south line, and the downtown line. We limited our October 30 announcement to work that we think can easily be done in the current project plan/contract, using currently completed Environment Assessments. We also limited our proposals to things that we felt were urgent, specifically solving the downtown bus congestion problem that has plagues Albert and Slater streets since at least 2001.

In doing our detailed planning and costing, we did come up with a number of extensions that could be done as demand required and money permitted. Some of these will take political work with other jurisdictions, and some of these are just a question of deciding that they need to be done.

These extensions are in alphabetical order - each would cost about $50M and take about 1 year to complete.[See the Extensions page for details on each option.]

AIRPORT extension	- 2km
ALTA VISTA/HOSPITALS	- 2km
BILLINGS	- 2.5km
CASINO LAC LEAMY	- 3km
OTTAWA VIA STATION	- 1.5km
ST.LAURENT	- 2km
TUNNEYS' EXTENSION	- 2km
Terrasse de la Chaudiere	- 3km

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7. To get all the federal and provincial financial assistance the total project has to be $600 million. If the Friends' plan is only $438 million, how might the remaining $162 million be used?

We've outlined several easy and economical extensions that are compatable with our plan.

Since the practical plan has a cost of only $438M (at a cost of $146M to the city), an expenditure of an additional $54M on the city's part would leverage an additional $108 in federal and provincial funding. There is therefore a possible
additional $162M that could be spent on any of the extensions listed here, or to provide better transit service elsewhere in the city.

Remember, this is all taxpayers' money, with the bulk of the city's portion coming from gas tax revenue. The rest of the city's part was going to be coming from a property tax increase.

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8. The City's N-S plan calls for a station at Gladstone. Why isn't a station already there?

They ran out of money in the original budget. They failed to take up the offer of a local office building developer to help pay for it.

Before the welded rail went in in 2003, they weren't sure the timetable could accommodate the extra stop. Helen Gault told City Council later that this was no longer a problem.

They were supposed to study it as a priority addition to the existing O-Train. They failed to do this.

There is LOTS of demand within about 400 m (Adult High School, St Anthony's and Sala San Marco Banquet Halls, highrise seniors residence, assisted City housing, Preston Hardware, Sakto Office buildings, lots of restaurants, Italian community centre, St. Anthony's Italian church, schools, bus routes (3 and 14), Great Canadian Theatre Company (soon to go), BA Banknote Company, etc. etc.

It also has direct residential walk-in access from all four quadrants, thanks to the pedestrian bridge at Young Street.

Picture:
This photo shows the vestiges of the turnout at the
south end of the passing track between Gladstone Avenue and the Queensway, looking North. It shows the diverging route actually curved the WRONG way. According to all the textbooks, "You can't DO that!". But I guess the NCC, who dug the rock cut and built the tracks there in the mid 60's, didn't subscribe to those textbooks. It worked OK for over thirty years.

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9. What happened to the planned station at Lester? And will there be one at Walkley?
There is no need for a station at Lester, as it is in the middle of the greenbelt with no walk-in, planned bus routes, or park and ride, so City Council voted in July to delete it from the plan.

A stop at Walkley depends on some signal and track improvements to allow slightly faster running and also the willingness of a developer to build a station there, but it is certainly not ruled out by our plan.

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10. Who are the Friends of the O-Train anyway?
Friends of the O-Train is a group of volunteers whose goal it is to raise awareness of workable transit options in Ottawa. We're comprised of transit experts, rail enthusiasts and regualar individuals many of whom have served on several city committees such as..
· Light Rail Pilot Project Steering Committee
· Light Rail Pilot Project Sounding Board
· Light Rail Pilot Project Environmental Assessment Public Advisory Group
· Rapid Transit Expansion Study Advisory Group
· North-South Light Rail EA Public Advisory Group
· East-West Light Rail EA Public Advisory Group
· East-West Light Rail Technical Advisory Group
· Alta Vista Transportation Corridor Public Advisory Group
· Light Rail Maintenance Yard Public Working Group
· Highway 417 (Central Section) Public Consultation Group
· Southwest Transitway Extension Public Advisory Group
· Gatineau Rapibus Public Consultation Group
· Carling to Bayview LRT Corridor Community Design Plan
· Bayview Yards Community Design Plan Working Group
· Bronson Escarpment Community Design Plan Working Group
· Rockcliffe Airbase Redevelopment Public Consultation Group
· NCC Plan For Canada's Capital Public Working Group
· NCC Lebreton Flats Redevelopment Working Committee
· NCC Sparks Street Public Working Group
· City of Ottawa Downtown Urban Design Plan Working Group

The 85% vote against Bob Chiarelli was a strong vote againt the proposed LRT plan, which was the most hotly debated issue in the election.

Ottawa residents want something better than the city's proposed LRT project, and that is what we offer. Our goal is not to design Ottawa's transportation solution, but to offer recommendations on where to start making changes to achieve the best value for money. We serve those who want effective public transit - the residents of Ottawa, not developers, land owners or senior city staff.

Contact Us for more information.

Buses Crowding Slater Street, since 2004

2006-11-22T22:27:00.000-05:00

In Fall of 2004, OC Transpo posted this notice to alert customers it was reducing the number of buses on Slater street in the pm. Quote:

"Congestion on Slater Street in the afternoon rush hour has increased steadily in recent years causing bus delays and slowdowns. This has affected customers waiting for buses downtown, as well as the reliability of the entire transit system.

One of the problems has been the number of buses on Slater Street which could not handle the capacity of the afternoon peak period. We will therefore be reducing the number of buses on Slater Street in the afternoon in order to speed up service and improve schedule reliability."

Some people still think that "Bus Rapid Transit", which we supposedly have here in Ottawa, is "the way to go".

Unfortunately for them, downtown is at capacity in the # of buses that it can handle. So, trying to increase transit use to or through downtown by jamming more buses through downtown is not going to work.

Surprisingly, OC Transpo admitted this way back in the fall of 2004, when they REDUCED the # of bus routes starting from downtown in the afternoon, and "forced" users of those routes to take some other bus to Hurdman to connect to a local bus. What a concept!

The Friends of the O-Train plan has recognized this and it's one of many reasons to have 3 minute eLRT service from Bayview to Hurdman, with reliable bus "spokes" into local neighbourhoods. The hub and spoke model is the only way forward, and truly rapid LRT in the downtown connecting two modern transfer hubs will make transit fast and enjoyable.

Extensions to our Plan

2006-11-22T20:14:00.000-05:00

The following are future extensions to the Friends of the O-Train plan. Each is approximately 2-3 km long and range in cost from $11 - $66 million. None of these extensions would be possible if the city's deluxe all-electric plan is taken. The money saved by using the Friends' plan could be allocated to do any of these extensions quickly and easily.

ALTA VISTA/HOSPITALS
BARRHAVEN
CASINO Du LAC LEAMY
MARCH RD KANATA
OTTAWA VIA STATION
TACHE/TERRASSE de la CHAUDIERE
TUNNEYS' PASTURE

ALTA VISTA/HOSPITALS (link)	Light rail could extended from Hurdman, along either the existing VIA rail corridor, or along the existing Transitway corridor, to enter the General Hospital complex. There would be stations accessible from CHEO, The Ottawa Hospital (General Campus), and the Rehabilitation Centre. This extension would be electric, and would extend the downtown eLRT line. The eLRT vehicles would be quiet, and would not disturb patients. Service to the hospitals would be focused on shift changes, as well as providing all-day service for visitors and out-patients. The eLRT vehicles would be able to accomodate many physically challenged patients, accomodating patients in wheel chairs. This extension would require additional eLRT vehicles to provide peak-hour service, and could provide service levels from one train per 15 minutes, up to one 600-person train every 3 minutes. This extension could be done for less than $66M (9 minute service).
BARRHAVEN (link)	The North/South O-train line could be extended from Confederation station along the VIA line to Barrhaven. This extension would provide for stations at Colonnade (shared with a Kanata extension), as well as stations at Merivale, Fallowfield, and Jockvale Rd. The initial terminus would be Fallowfield, with one or two additional stations added to the south-west. The line would be shared with VIA rail, and this would require two passing tracks to permit VIA trains to pass the LRT vehicles. Diesel LRTs would initially provide service to Bayview, including stops at Carleton University. This line could be operational 3-4 months after an Environmental Assessment, and cost: $32M - FALLOWFIELD/jockvale (15 minute service on DLRT) $11M - FALLOWFIELD/416-park'n'ride.
CASINO Du LAC LEAMY (link)	Light rail could be extended to the Casino de Lac Leamy. This could be done with diesel LRT (using Bombardier Talent, or Siemens Desiro). If ridership waranted, the line could be electrified at a later date. Service from South Keys would have every second train travel across the Prince-of-Wales bridge (via Bayview station) next to St.Joseph Blvd in Gatineau, terminating at the Casino. The Casino is slated to be a major transfer point of the recently announced Gatineau/STO Rapibus project. Further, the Casino has a number of parking garages which are essentially empty from 9 to 5 that would permit park'n'ride for Gatineau based employees that work in Ottawa. A station at Tache Blvd would easily connect to 14 different STO routes that originate from West Hull and Aylmer. Along with the proposed Kanata extension, this could provide for a 1-transfer service connecting Aylmer and Kanata. For Ottawa based employees who work on St.Joseph Blvd (such as at Place Vincent Massey) the LRT would provide a very efficient service. The use of the Prince of Wales bridge would significantly reduce bus congestion on Booth Street, Rideau Street, and King Edward Avenue. This extension would require one additional vehicle, some signal upgrades, and construction of stations. This extension and the Terrasse extension would cost $19M combined, and could be operational in less than 1 year, provided the politicians were all willing.
OTTAWA VIA STATION (link)	The downtown eLRT could be extended from Hurdman to the VIA train station. This extension could be done using the transitway to the existing train transitway station or with a platform at the West end of the VIA station beside the existing VIA train platform. This would provide for cross-platform transfers from arriving VIA trains. Later the line could be extended to parts further East, as envisioned by the Rapid Transit Expansion Study. (cf Blackburn Hamlet extension, to be documented) The extension from Hurdman to VIA station could be done for $38M.
TUNNEYS' PASTURE (link)	The downtown eLRT line could be extended from Bayview to Tunney's Pasture along the transitway. The eLRT would share the transitway with buses coming in from the west. Some bus routes (16,18,55,57,86,176) would terminate at Tunney's rather than continue to Bayview. These routes would extend North into Tunney's Pasture providing a circulator service for people getting off the LRT or other buses. Other routes would continue to terminate at the Bayview transfer station. This extension would reduce the number of transfers for East end originating employees of Health Canada and Stats Canada. The LRT heading West from Bayview would climb a ramp on the North side of the transitway trench between Parkdale and Holland Avenue and stop at grade on the East site of Holland. This would allow trains that reverse here to do so without interfering with buses travelling in the transitway trench below. A huge advantage of this for passengers is that they will not have to climb the stairs to get to the buildings at Tunney's, and they will have bus routes (16,18,55,57,86,176) going by every three minutes to take them to work. This extension could be done for less than $29M.
TERRASSE de la CHAUDIERE (link)	Light rail could be extended to the Terrasse de la Chaudiere. This could be done with diesel LRT (using Bombardier Talent, or Siemens Desiro). This could also be done with electric LRT, extending the downtown system across the bridge into downtown Gatineau. The two options are not mutually exclusive. Service from South Keys would have every second train travel across the Prince-of-Wales bridge (via Bayview station) to stop at Montcalm and Tache near Terrasse. A station at the bus depot on Tache Blvd (at Terasse) would easily connect to 14 different STO routes that originate from West Hull and Aylmer. Many of these routes could be terminated there or at Portage, avoiding the congestion (and delays) that they experience while crossing the bridges to Ottawa. This would permit STO to run more frequent and reliable service in Gatineau. For Ottawa based employees who work at Terrasse or Place du Portage (PWGSC, Heritage, many others) the LRT would provide a very efficient service. The use of the Prince of Wales bridge would significantly reduce bus congestion on Booth Street, Ridean Street, and King Edward Avenue. This extension would require one additional diesel vehicle, some signal upgrades, and construction of stations. This extension and the Casino extension would cost $19M combined (for the diesel option) and could be operational in less than 1 year, provided the politicians were all willing.
MARCH RD KANATA (link)	The North/South O-Train line could be extended from Confederation station, along the OCR right of way to Kanata. This is a long extension, and would have stations in Kanata (March Rd), at Herzberg Rd, the Queensway Carleton Hospital/Bells Corners, as well as stations at Woodroffe, Merivale and Colonnade. A person boarding at Kanata would have 30 minute service to Bayview, with transfers to the downtown eLRT, or possible extension to Gatineau. This extension would be done with diesel LRT vehicles. This extension has not yet been detailed priced, but may be possible for less than $41M. The train from Kanata could be extended from Confederation through Billings to Hurdman using the VIA line, rather than to Bayview. Such an extension might provide for 1-transfer service between Orleans and Kanata, avoiding downtown. (This trip would take approx. 45-50 minutes from Place d'Orleans to March Road by bus and train, compared to 1 hour 18 minutes by bus today).

Presentation to PTAC

2006-11-22T19:29:00.000-05:00

On Nov 16 2006 we, the Friends of the O-Train, formally presented our proposal to Ottawa's Pedestrian and Public Transit Advisory Committee. PTAC has agreed to present a report on alternate plans for LRT to Transportation Committee.

See the presentation slides in the PDF below:

Presentation to PTAC - 5 Meg PDF

What People are Saying...

2006-11-22T19:00:00.000-05:00

Give the mayor some time
Michael Polowin, Citizen Special
Published: Monday, January 08, 2007

I think it is incumbent upon us to remember the strength of the mandate that our new mayor enjoys. It is also incumbent upon our councillors to remember the strength of that mandate.

It is true that all councillors running were in fact re-elected. However, lest some begin to believe that such success is entirely due to their individual sterling qualities, I think it important for many of them to remember that they were virtually ignored during the election season. The attention given the race for mayor sucked much of the oxygen out of the coverage given to the various council races, other than the odd endorsement and story, and therefore the public was focused on the race for mayor. With more coverage of council races, more might have been defeated.

I note that Mr. O'Brien won across the city, in almost every ward, including many of the wards held by those whose political philosophy does not necessarily agree with his. I was astounded to see that when the final vote for light rail was held, there were 11 votes for the old plan. Didn't those councillors notice that between votes for the mayor and for Alex Munter, the old plan was rejected by more than 83 per cent of the voters?
...
As light rail was perhaps the leading issue in the campaign, and clearly was the hill on which the former mayor chose to plant his flag, the decisive defeat of Bob Chiarelli showed the people's view of the old plan. Councillors should recognize that.

Michael Polowin practises municipal and commercial real property law. E-mail him at michael.polowin@gowlings.com
complete article

===================

What's next?
The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Saturday, December 09, 2006

Councillors Jan Harder and Maria McRae have pulled a fast one on rookie
Mayor Larry O'Brien and other councillors naive enough to support their
revised north-south light-rail proposal.

Light rail was one of the central issues of the municipal campaign. Mr.
O'Brien promised a careful look at the proposed project and a realistic
alternative.

We woke up the second day of the council meeting to read that Mr.
O'Brien and 11 councillors had taken an impulsive decision that will
cost us more than the original billion-dollar boondoggle. With a split
council and more than 80 per cent of the electorate having voted out
former mayor Bob Chiarelli, the main proponent of north-south rail, why
would a rookie mayor, a couple of days into his term, break his
commitment to the voters and fall for the Harder/McRae ploy?

If this is what he meant by bringing a businesslike approach to City
Hall, I shudder to think what might be next.

Scott Parsons,
Ottawa
© The Ottawa Citizen 2006

===================

No trust

The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Saturday, December 09, 2006

Re: Subway transit plan receives council's OK, Dec. 7.

Absolutely incredible. Unbelievable, as a matter of fact! And our city
politicians wonder why we can't trust them.

Mayor Larry O'Brien promised a six-month review of the light-rail
project -- not one week.

What was Councillor Rainer Bloess thinking? He took a cruise knowing
that light rail was council's first order of business in early December.
Mr. Bloess failed us and failed miserably at representing Innes Ward.

Pierre Langevin,

Orleans
© The Ottawa Citizen 2006

===============

Big mistake

The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Saturday, December 09, 2006

So now we know. We made a mistake on election day. We (I did, too) chose
a mayor who made a promise that he's already broken -- or at least
failed to explain.

And we elected councillors who obviously don't listen or don't care what
their constituents said at the ballot box. We might as well have elected
Jan Harder as mayor or maybe Larry O'Brien should just pass his chain of
office over to the Barrhaven boss-lady. Obviously she has the power at
the council table.

And we have four years to endure our collective mistake. How much more
damage will Mr. O'Brien and his merry band of misfits inflict upon us
poor trusting taxpayers in that time?

Joe Spence,

Kanata
© The Ottawa Citizen 2006

======================

We win, but we lose

The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Saturday, December 09, 2006

I voted for Larry O'Brien because he promised a debate on light-rail
transit. If Mr. O'Brien had proposed an expensive subway solution to the
already overpriced light-rail system that goes nowhere, I would not have
voted for him. Perhaps this is why people have lost confidence in their
leaders, and why many people do not vote anymore -- because even when
your guy wins, you lose.

Jeff deMontigny,

Ottawa
© The Ottawa Citizen 2006

======================

- In ott.general on Nov 30, 2006
>Pat wrote:
> I ride OC Transpo every day. What makes it palatable is that most of
> the traveling happens at 80 km/h along the transitway. Still, I spend
> over 1 hour each way (better than falling asleep in bumper-to-bumper
> Queensway traffic though).
>
> If the new (expensive) train can't achieve these speeds, why are they
> even considering it???
>
> Definitely something fishy going on here.
>
> None at all wrote:
>> Well, I'm not sure about 40kmh but not too much faster. As well, it
>> was disclosed last week that the ride from BarFhaven to downtown will
>> take over 40 minutes (Longer than a car ride) and will then merge with
>> City traffic. Council admitted that taking the lightrail will in fact
>> take longer to get to your destination. It really is a huge joke and
>> complete waste of money.
>>
>> Pat wrote:
>>> Is it true that the maximum speed of the new train is only 40 km/h?
>>>
>>> Who the hell is going to ride a "streetcar" into Ottawa from Barrhaven
>>> (and later, Kanata) at 40 km/h????
>>

It has nothing to with commuting it's purpose is a legacy for Bob
Chiarelli and to ensure his re-election in November 2006 (ooops, I
guess it didn't do that either! It is to increase property values in
Barrhaven.

The upside of the LRT speed is if you miss the train you can run to the
next stop and get there first.

Letter of Support

2006-11-14T21:22:00.000-05:00

Dear Mr. Gladstone,

It was with pleasure and excitement that I heard about the "Friends of
the O-Train" proposal. This matched the ideal scenario I've discussed
with many friends in the past here in Ottawa.

In order to grow as a city there needs to be decent transit for people
living in the city, going across the city as well as those coming in
from the suburbs. The City of Ottawa only seems to be focused on
creating in/out commuter solutions.

The waste of bus inventory that sits on our downtown streets spewing
exhaust while stuck in a traffic jam of its own creation is deplorable
and an eyesore.

As you point out - this bus inventory would be far better used elsewhere
and also provide us with faster cross city transit times and create
effective use of transfer points with ample space/land at Hurdman and
Bayview.

To me there is no other plausible first step for introducing light rail
to Ottawa other than the plan proposed on this website. The plan
maximizes use of existing bus inventory, fixes a downtown congestion
problem, creates a stronger city community and still provides major
increases in efficiency for suburban commuter flow. This is also a
first step in cleaning up the "bus depot" effect on Rideau Street that
has concerned City Counsel. We have created bus terminals on city
streets and the current O-Train proposal will only serve to exacerbate
the problem.

This will also boost ridership on the currently under-utilized existing
O-Train line - especially if the link to Gatineau is completed.
Tearing up and replacing this existing O-Train track is a premature
expense and likely to be fraught with cost overruns due to
environmental issues.

Please let me know if there is any way I can lend some of my time to
supporting this valuable proposal.

Best Regards,

Davis Jermacans
City of Ottawa resident
8 Nov 2006

A Practical LRT Alternative for Ottawa

2006-10-30T01:45:00.000-05:00

Nov 5, Ottawa Citizen: "It's one thing for the mayor to attack the motives of people who are trying to steal his job, quite another to be positioned against a group of volunteers with an alternative plan that, on the surface, seems more effective and less expensive than the mayor's."

Solution Saves at least $340 million, Enables a Doubling of Downtown East-West Transit Capacity, and Provides Options for Easy Expansion

The Proposal will be presented to a Public Meeting of the City's Pedestrian and Transit Advisory Committee on Thursday, November 16th

Ottawa, October 30, 2006: Friends of the O-Train, a volunteer organization of transit experts and advocates, today announced the release of its Practical LRT Plan for Ottawa. The purpose of the plan is to prove that demonstrably better alternatives exist to the LRT plan currently proposed by the City. With a new Council on November 14th, our objective is that this Practical Plan would form the basis of a renegotiated LRT contract.

"We want to get this plan out now so that all candidates and voters know that a vote against the City's proposed plan is not a vote against intelligently designed, cost-effective transit," said David Jeanes speaking on behalf of Friends of the O-Train. "There are ways to do it right. It just takes political will."

"As a result of a design that dramatically increased service levels and system capacity, the Practical Plan enables significant transit ridership increases as called for in the City's Transportation Master Plan," said Jeanes. "It solves the transit capacity constraints through the downtown core for decades to come. It also provides easy and economical expansion options to the city's east, west, south and north to Gatineau. The Practical Plan can do all this with a capital budget of $438 million, a savings of over $340 million dollars compared on the City's proposed plan." Key elements of the Practical Plan include:

Expanded O-Train Service

The current O-Train diesel light rail transit (DLRT) service will be extended to a Park & Ride at Armstrong Rd. and the service schedule doubled to every 7.5 minutes between Bayview to South Keys.

Unlike the City's proposed plan, this expansion will involve no disruption of the current O-Train service and could be in full service by fall 2007. In conjunction with existing bus services, this rail transit infrastructure allows for sufficient growth capacity to serve north-south transit demand well beyond the forecasts in the City's Official Plan. As future demand warrants, trains could be added such that peak hourly capacity on this line could exceed 9,000 riders.

The budget for this part of the plan would be $39 million. An environmental assessment would be required for the Armstrong park and ride. This line will provide effective, economical, optional expansion south to Barrhaven along the current VIA corridor to Fallowfield, to the Airport, north to Gatineau via the Prince of Wales Bridge, and east-west to Kanata.

Bayview to Hurdman ELRT Service

Electric light rail transit (ELRT) service will be provided over a 6 km route between new, comfortable, high-capacity terminals spanning the downtown core. Eleven sets of three-light rail vehicles (LRVs) coupled together, will service the route at 3-minute intervals providing peak hour capacity of over 13,000 riders.

By concentrating the ELRT service in the downtown core, all transitway buses can be removed from Albert and Slater streets, while dramatically improving rider's overall origin-to-destination service levels, reliability and comfort. Removing buses from the downtown core eliminates at least 15 minutes off suburban feeder bus routes, allowing an increase in route frequencies of at least 40% without any increase in bus fleet capital or operating costs. Dramatic improvements in service frequency and reliability, with a single efficient connection to ELRT will induce and enable significantly increased ridership. As ridership grows, the maximum capacity of this 2-line ELRT system could ultimately grow to over 25,000 riders per hour, more than double current peak hour ridership levels.

The budget for this part of the plan would be $399 million. This part of the project would require an environmental assessment for a maintenance yard as well as for the line extension from the University of Ottawa to Hurdman terminal. This part of the project could begin construction in the spring of 2007 and be in full service by the fall of 2009.

Like most successful urban rail transits systems, the Practical Alternative incorporates a hybrid hub-and-spoke route network. Unlike the City's current proposed plan, which is planned to serve only 2.1% of Ottawa commuters, the Practical Alternative cleanly solves the problems of downtown transit congestion and provides for faster, more frequent and more reliable service for the vast majority of Ottawa's transit riders.

Additional information has been released on the Friends-of-the-O-train website: http://friendsoftheotrain.blogspot.com .

Friends of the O-Train
Formed in the summer of 2006, Friends of the O-Train consists of community leaders, transit experts, rail experts, and tax-payers concerned about the overwhelmingly poor transit effectiveness and value of the City's current proposed LRT plan. Many of our group members were present in the late 1990s for the original O-train vision, and we sought to return to the vision expressed then by Mr. Chiarelli, that of an incrementally expanding light rail system that was both practical and economic.

Contact:
Phone: David Jeanes. 613-594-3290
Email: friendsoftheotrain@gmail.com
Web: http://friendsoftheotrain.blogspot.com

The Cost

2006-10-30T01:42:00.000-05:00

The costs of our Practical Alternative Plan were developed by career rail transit experts and used benchmark cost comparisons from relevant LRT projects. The total cost of our base plan for practical LRT in Ottawa is $438 million. Assuming the City's proposed plan comes in at its lowest published estimate of $778 million, our plan represents a savings of $340 million compared to the City's plan.

Our plan leaves $162 million leftover in the $600 million funding memorandum of understanding signed by the City, Federal and Provincial governments. This savings is money that can be invested in other critical transit needs and opportunities in Ottawa. In contrast, the City's proposed plan costs at least $178 million more than the funding formula requires. This means the City must either extract an extra $178 million in taxes Ottawa from residents and businesses or reduce City services that cost as much.

Downtown Congestion

2006-10-30T01:34:00.000-05:00

The city's plan will lead to a mixed bus-rail-auto mess that other cities have run into, see photo to the right. It was published in the Guardian Oct 4 2006, in an article on the the woes that have befallen British cities with the deregulation of buses by Margaret Thatcher. Do we really want Albert and Slater to look like this? Aren't they congested enough?

The city has proposed reducing Express buses by 29%. How they intend to do this is unclear. Our Practical Plan eliminates buses on Slater and Albert.

You can see their current congestion scenario in this graphic:

OC Transpo admits that the number of buses downtown must be reduced. Our proposal is shown here:

une alternative pratique pour Ottawa

2006-10-30T00:38:00.000-05:00

Le train Léger sur Rail (TLR), une alternative pratique pour Ottawa

Une solution qui économise au minimum 340 millions$ permet de doubler la capacité de transport Est-Ouest et fournit une option facile à développer.

Ottawa, le 30 Octobre 2006: Les amis du O-Train, un groupe bénévole d'experts
et d'activistes dans le domaine des transports urbains, annonce aujourd'hui la diffusion de son Plan pratique pour Ottawa. L'objectif du Plan est de prouver que de meilleures alternatives existent au plan TLR proposé par la Ville. En prévision de la formation d'un nouveau Conseil le 14 novembre prochain, notre but est de fournir ce Plan Pratique en tant que base d'un contrat à renégocier.

« Nous voulons soumettre ce plan dès maintenant afin que les candidats et les citoyens soient informés du fait qu’un vote contre le plan actuel de la ville n’est pas un vote contre un système de transport offrant un rapport qualité-prix intelligent » explique David Jeanes au nom des amis du O-Train. « Il y des façons de le faire correctement. Il suffit d’avoir la volonté politique. »

« Un système conçu dans le but de faire croître dramatiquement le niveau de service et la capacité, le Plan Pratique permet d’augmenter de façon significative l’achalandage tel que demandé dans le Plan-Maître des transports de la ville, » ajoute Jeanes. « Il résoud les contraintes de capacité du Centre-Ville pour les décennies à venir. Il fournit aussi des opportunités économiques pour la ville à l’Est, à l’Ouest, au Sud et au Nord vers Gatineau. Le Plan Pratique peut être mis en place à partir d’un budget en capitale de 438 millions, une économie de plus de $330 million de dollars sur le plan proposé par la ville. »

Les éléments clés du Plan Pratique incluent :

1) Le développement des services du O-Train :

Les services du système actuel de Train Diesel Léger sur Rail « O-Train » seront prolongés jusqu’à un stationnement incitatitif du chemin Armstrong. La fréquence sera également augmentée à un intervalle de 7,5 minutes entre Bayview et South Keys.

Contrairement au plan proposé par la ville, ce plan amélioré n’obligera pas l’arrêt des services actuels du O-Train et pourra être en opération dès l’automne 2007. En combinant les services d’autobus actuels, cette infrastructure de transport sur rail permet d’augmenter la capacité afin de désservir les besoins Nord-Sud bien au-delà des prévisions du plan officiel proposé par la ville. Lorsque la demande sera suffisante, l’ajout de trains pourra être effectué afin d’augmenter la capacité aux heures de pointe à plus de 9,000 passagers.

Le budget pour cette partie du plan est de 39 million$. Une étude environnementale sera requise pour le stationnement incitatif de la route Armstrong. Cette ligne fournira une option économique efficace pour un possible développement : au sud vers l’aéroport et vers Barrhaven le long du Corridor actuel de Via Rail, vers Gatineau en empruntant le pont Prince Wales, vers l’est de la ville et vers Kanata à l’ouest.

2) Un service de Train Léger Électrique sur Rail de Bayview à Hurdman :

Un service de Train Léger Électrique sur Rail (TLER) sera instauré sur une distance de plus de 6km à travers le centre-ville, entre de nouveaux terminus conviviaux à haute capacité. Onze rames de trois voitures légères sur rail (VLR) desserviront cette ligne à un intervalle de 3 minutes fournissant ainsi une capacité de plus de 13,000 passagers pendant les heures de grand achalandage.

En concentrant les services de Train Léger Électrique sur Rail dans le centre-ville tous les autobus peuvent être retirés entre les rues Albert et Slater tout en améliorant dramatiquement la quantité du service global, son confort et sa fiabilité. L'élimination des autobus du centre-ville élimine au moins 15 minutes aux itinéraires d'autobus suburbains, permettant ainsi une hausse des fréquences d'itinéraire d’au moins 40%, le tout sans augmentation de frais de capitaux pour les autobus ou encore de coûts d’opérations. Une telle amélioration de la fréquence et de la fiabilité du service - avec une simple synchronisation au service TLER - permettra d’accroître l’achalandage de façon significative. Avec la croissance du nombre de passagers la capacité maximum de ce système TLER à 2 lignes pourrait mener à une augmentation ultime supérieur à 25,000 passagers/heure, plus du double du niveau d’achalandage actuel aux heures de pointe.

Le budget pour cette partie du plan est de 399 millions$. Une étude environnementale sera requise pour la construction des ateliers de maintenance ainsi que le prolongement de la ligne entre l’Université d’Ottawa et le terminus Hurdman. La construction pour cette partie du projet pourrait débuter au printemps 2007 pour se terminer l’automne 2009 permettant ainsi un service complet.

Comme la plupart des systèmes de transport urbains sur rail qui ont eu du succès, l'alternative pratique incorpore un système d’épine dorsale auquel se joint un réseau « hub-and-spoke » de routes circulatoires, de type hybride. À l'opposé du plan proposé par la Ville qui ne desservirait que 2,1% des navetteurs d'Ottawa, l'alternative pratique résoud les problèmes de congestion d'autobus et fournira un service plus fréquent et plus fiable pour la vaste majorité des usagers des transports collectifs d'Ottawa.

Des informations supplémentaires sont disponibles sur le site internet des Amis du O-Train au: http://friendsoftheotrain.blogspot.com.

Les Amis du O-Train
Créé à l'été 2006, le groupe "Les Amis du O-Train" est composé de leaders
de groupes communautaires et d'experts en transports collectifs et en transports par rail qui sont préoccupés par l'inefficacité et la faible valeur du plan de tramway actuel de la ville. Plusieurs membres ont participé dans les années 1990 à l'élaboration de la vision d'origine pour le train léger et ils recherchent un retour à la vision exprimée à l'époque par M. Bob Chiarelli, soit celle d'un réseau de trains légers dont l'expansion se ferait par tranches économiquement pratiquables.

Contact:
Téléphone: David Jeanes. 613-594-3290
Courriel: friendsoftheotrain@gmail.com
Site internet: http://friendsoftheotrain.blogspot.com

Contact Us

2006-10-30T00:31:00.000-05:00

David Gladstone
Founder, Friends of the O-Train; Chair, City Centre Coalition (1999-2006)
613 720-7110
DSadrock@aol.com

David Jeanes
President Transport 2000
613-594-3290

Tim Lane
Transport 2000 Transit Researcher
(613) 722-1317
timlane@istar.ca

Stephen Fanjoy
Ward 2 Representative on the former East-West LRT Environmental
Assessment Public Consultation Group

Ron Rancourt
Webmaster
613-521-1272
ronrancourt@gmail.com

Quotes and Endorsements

2006-10-29T23:51:00.000-05:00

Nov 23, 2006
Dear Mayor O'Brien,

Congratulations on your recent election as Mayor of the City of Ottawa. I am grateful that you ran as Mayor and I wish you all the best in the coming months.

I am writing to express my support for recent light rail plan proposed by the Friends of the O-Train.

The plan has been explained several times in the Ottawa Citizen. The article today by Patrick Dare in the Citizen clearly indicates that the plan has the support of the Albert/Slater business coalition leaders. Bus congestion in downtown Ottawa is terrible and the plan by the Friends of the O Train is simple yet effective.

In my view, the plan is superior to that currently proposed by the City of Ottawa. It solves the problem of bus congestion in the downtown core and it also allows for the light rail train that currently serves Carleton University to continue. Shutting down the O Train that services Carleton University for 3 years to build a new system would be disastrous.

The Friends of the O Train plan calls for keeping the existing popular and very comfortable clean burning diesel north-south O Train and running it farther south to Armstrong Road, where a park and ride would be operated. Service frequency would be improved from 15 minutes to 7.5 minutes between Bayview and South Keys.

That train and city buses would bring commuters from the suburbs to a transfer station at Bayview, west of downtown, or by bus to Hurdman station east of downtown.

There the commuters would transfer to an electric train that would offer service every three minutes through downtown between Bayview Station and Hurdman Station.
Buses would be kept out of downtown. The trains would have three cars that would carry up to 600 passengers in total.

The City would have the future option of adding legs of the transit system to Gatineau over the Prince of Wales bridge, to the Airport and to the VIA station in Barrhaven.

The plan proposed by Friends of the O Train would free up more buses for better service in MY neighbourhood. It would allow faster, more direct, more frequent buses from my area to Greenboro, for better connections to downtown.

This would allow me to take the bus to the Transitway, or the O Train, and not have to drive to Greenboro and use up valuable parking there, because the current bus service from my area is so poor.

And, the Friends of the O Train plan, because it reuses buses that currently sit downtown in a traffic jam of their own making, would not require the City to buy any additional buses, nor build any new bus garages!

I appreciate that many have worked hard for the O Train to serve the residents of Ottawa South. I urge you vote and support the Friends of the O Train Proposal. We can get a lot better bang for our hard earned taxpayer money by supporting the Friends of the O Train plan and keeping our beautiful diesel light rail train for truly RAPID transit in South Ottawa.

Sincerely,
James Laws
Ottawa South Resident

---
Nov 21, 2006
Mr. Hume Rogers, of the Albert-Slater coalition of downtown businesses, yesterday said the Friends of the O-Train proposal presented during the municipal election could be "a very sensible solution" that downtown businesses would not fight.

Mr. Rogers said the community group's proposal needs professional study and financial details fleshed out. But he said it's a remarkable piece of work from a volunteer group.

"The basic concept of the plan is excellent," said Mr. Rogers, who is general manager of the Capital Hill Hotel and Suites. Read More

---

Nov 15, 2006
Local business group the Albert Slater coalition urged the mayor-elect to reject the existing plan and come up with a more cost-effective and viable solution.

"Both Albert and Slater are currently at or above their capacity to handle bus traffic in an efficient manner and adding the LRT to this mix will only make an already bad situation much worse," said coalition spokesperson Hume Rogers in a press release. "Unfortunately, the current plan does not reduce the volume of buses on the streets but in fact increases it by an average of over 13 per cent while significantly reducing the number of express routes from both east and west."

Mr. Rogers asked Mr. O'Brien to take a closer look at the Friends of the O-Train plan, which proposes to extend the existing diesel line to Armstrong Road in the south and add an electrified six-kilometre loop between Bayview and Hurdman.

Read more from the Ottawa Business Journal.

Nov 14, 2006

I don’t see the logic in the current LRT plan. Why throw away the existing OTrain? The Friends of the OTrain plan seems to make the most sense. It may not be perfect … but so far it seems to be the most logical one. Nothing’s stopping us from finetuning it further.

But then what will poor Bob have for a legacy?? lol

- Anonymous Blogger

Nov 7, 2006

A Plan Worth Considering - Splatto Blog
An Ottawa based volunteer group has given the city a great proposal for lightrail that makes far more sense than anything else proposed at this point in time. The group Friends of the O-Train has proposed a plan which will save us $340 million , make use of the existing O-Train track, remove all buses from the downtown transit corridors, increase the frequency of downtown service, and ultimately put more buses in the suburbs. Click the map to the right in order to see an enlarged, detailed version scanned from a copy of the Ottawa Citizen last week.

Seems like an ambitious, cost effective plan that addresses Queensway gridlock, doesn't it? The reason isn't because it forced upon us by an incumbent mayor, who refuses to take public opinion into account and cloaks the entire operation in secrecy. Likewise, it isn't because mayoral challengers are too busy writing off the current plan on the campaign trail.

Instead, it's because average citizens who care enough about the issue at hand have taken the time to properly study the facts and propose a concrete idea.

The LRT is turning out to be the top issue of the campaign, and the best proposal by far has come from a group of volunteers with no political interest. Perhaps it's time we had a sensible group like this running things down at 100 Laurier.

-

Mr. O'Brien, who also spent yesterday on the campaign trail, said he believes the "Friends of the O-Train have the beginnings of a solution," for the city's transit problems. (from: Ottawa Citizen)

-

CTV poll conducted over four days last week by the Strategic Counsel shows that 52 per cent of respondents feel the incoming city council should revisit the north-south light rail plan.

-

I am delighted to see that public transit has become the most important issue of this election campaign. For the first time we have consensus throughout the City of Ottawa that we must move commuters by transit.

I want to thank the Friends of the O-Train, a dedicated group of transit supporters, for their latest proposal, and I am committed to reviewing and considering the details of the plan.

Diane Holmes

Nov. 6, 2006
Thank you all for your great efforts in coming up with an alternative. I am a supporter of the o-train and an alternate LRT plan.

Jim Ryan, Candidate for city council
Ward 18 - Alta Vista

Dear Mr. Fanjoy,

I must say that I am quite impressed with your proposal and that I have changed my flyers to reflect an alternative to cancelling the original deal.
The savings alone are worth a second look.
As a fiscal conservative candidate for council, I applaud their work and look foreward to working with them and other like minded citizens in finding the right solution for Ottawa.
Excellent piece of work.

Gilles Chasles
Candidate for Ward 6
Stittsville Kanata-West

I do like your plan very much. It seems to be cost-effective and innovative. We all need powerful antidotes to the Mayor's train to nowhere.

Anu Bose PhD
Candidate Kanata North

Nov 3, 2006

Ottawa Citizen Poll:Are you in favour of the current north-south light-rail project?

Yes: 34%
No: 66%

"I am very impressed with the proposal from THE FRIENDS OF THE O-TRAIN to take city buses off Albert and Slater.It is a very positive and cost efficient solution to the proposed Light rail.If elected I will work with the Friends of the O-Train to implement a better system for the public."

Douglas Besharah
Ward 10 candidate for city council

-

The group Friends of the O-Train has come up with an O-Train proposal that actually makes sense. First off, financially it makes sense. The price tag is at about 450 million which is half the cost of the current plan. The current plan will cripple the city financially and leave us paying for the 30 million the O-Train is projected lose ever year. Furthermore the current plan means that the initial investment made for the Greenborough to Bayview line will be for naught. While the city paid 24 million for the trains and track, they will be ripped out and the city will receive only 7 million for the trains. Also the train, under the FOTO-T model will not be shut down which is a great bonus for Carletonites like myself....more

From blogger Suburban Tory

When I heard the solution proposed by the Friends of the O-Train on the radio, I immediately understood that it addresses not only the problem the north-south LRT is meant to solve but at a fraction of the cost to capture the expected increase in net ridership; it also addressed the most critical problem of a congested and rush-hour grid-locked downtown core. The latter is addressed by providing a dedicated, safe ELRT corridor through the downtown core to shuttle commuters from buses terminating at Hurdman and Bayview stations into the downtown core. Having ELRT trains leaving every few minutes from these stations at rush hour to pick-up/deposit all commuters from/to the core will be a dramatic improvement over the status quo which leaves commuters fretting over finding the right bus in a long train of buses and once on board, fuming because the bus sits in traffic for 15 and occasionally up to 30
minutes trying to get out of the core.

Via Email

Nov 2, 2006
Great plan and makes sense. With some tweaking I am sure it would be better than the current propo$al. Some other notes I am sure you and others have thought of..

Add the Airport link asap -- who cares what the cabbies and parking people think.
Add the Gatineau link asap -- It would be in their best interest as well and the bridge is already there.

Make major Transfer Stations at Bayview and current Ottawa VIA Station -they would be the bookends of a downtown LRT.

Once that goes well then add more commuter train lines coming in from the West and East on existing rail lines that already come into the main VIA station.

Move the ScotiaBank Place to Lebreton flats (just joking.. seeing if you are still reading) I am sure you have lots of ideas.. if you are interested in a few more of mine let me know. We have to make better use of what we already got.

Regards,
Jason (via email)

-

I just wanted to let you know in the next few days, I will be posting a complete endorsement of your o-train plan as reported on October 31st. The Friends' plan is cost effective, makes use of existing resources, addresses the east-west traffic problem, will allow the current o-train to remain in operation during construction, allows for very simple future expansion, and will increase the quality of service both along the existing o-train route and downtown. Thanks for providing such a realistic, intelligent option to the debate.

Matt (via email. Here's his site)

-

Larry O'Brien at Barrhaven mayoral debate: "We need to stop the proposed plan and review some of the other proposals brought forward including the plan by the Friends of the O-Train."

-

CFRA Poll:

55.2% - Sounds much better & more affordable than council's plan
4.42% - Council's North-South trains to Barrhaven are the best plan
23.8% - Light rail should be built now west to Kanata & east to Orleans
15.4% - Now is the time to build a downtown transit tunnel
1.06% - Other
1407 Total Votes

Oct 31, 2006:

Absolutely brilliant timing and what great uptake! If this doesn't stop
the current stupidity, nothing will. You're all terrific! Thank you,
thank you, thank you for all your efforts.

Cheers - Ida

That is BRILLIANT! I just hope someone actually gets off their "I'm a city planner and I know everything" high horses and give the practical plan a chance.
I know, wishful thinking.

anonymous blogger - link

If the frequency is high, this makes sense to me. I'd much rather make 3 quick transfers than go on a milkrun and end up stuck in downtown traffic everyday just to stay on the same bus.

anonymous blogger - link

“In order to do it for as little cost as possible, we didn't
electrify the line, which would have been very expensive,''
Gault says”.

“... its diesel engines will cause pollution and that its failure to run right into the downtown core will keep potential commuters away.... Gault dismisses the environmental concerns, pointing out the pollution prevented by getting a trainload of potential drivers off the roads .... this is an incredible environmental benefit.''

Helen Gault (Director of Planning, OCTranso) in a 2001 Toronto Star news article, stating the merits of deisel O-Train.

Many people who live in big cities with LRT or Subways have to transfer 2 and 3 times to get where they are going. Ottawa's "bus from every neighborhood to the downtown core" system is no longer sustainable. We have to move to a big city hub and spoke model.
A 3 car train would be about the same length as 2 articulated buses. Every platform along Albert/Slater can handle that and then some.

anonymous blogger - link

The City of Ottawa needs an integrated regional rapid transportation
plan, which is safe, fast, convenient and affordable." Said O'Brien "This proposal from the "Friends of the O-Train" is a good example of community driven solutions to community issues, and deserves serious consideration."

Larry O'Brien
Mayoral Candidate

Congratulations David on a well thought out plan. I was planning on motioning for a bus hub system from Hurdman to Bayview using one bus route in order to get the other buses off of Albert St. Your plan works much better.

I will be promoting this plan and hope you will accept me into the Friends of the O'Train. I am a regular user of public Transit and will continue to use public transit even after the elections.

Catherine Gardner
Barrhaven Candidate www.catherinegardner.ca

Oct 30, 2006:
Gary Ludington welcomes Practical LRT Alternative for Ottawa
------------------------------------------------------------

Kitchissippi ward candidate Gary Ludington says the Practical LRT Alternative is a good start to getting a workable light rail system for Ottawa.

The Alternative, which was released this morning by the Friends of the O-Train, is a "useful alternative that solves a number of problems with the current city plan and can be used as the basis for fixing light rail," Ludington said.

He thanked the Friends of the O-Train for contributing to the LRT debate in a practical way -- by looking for real solutions. He particularly praised the extension to Gatineau, which he had already called for as a necessary link for the many commuters to federal jobs in Quebec.

Ludington said the "Practical Alternative" should be carefully reviewed by City engineering staff and the general public. "The alternative plan points the way to achieving a significant cost-saving while preserving the current O-Train service and expanding it in ways I advocated three years ago when I last ran for City Council."

"A central theme of my campaign is greater transparency in how decisions are made at the City. Many of the problems with the current LRT proposal arise from the reluctance of City staff and politicians to share relevant information with the general public. Let's not make the same mistake twice."

For more information:
Gary Ludington Campaign
613-722-9777
info@GaryLudington.ca
http://www.GaryLudington.ca

Oct 30, 2006 Update:

College Ward candidate Brett Delmage supports Practical LRT proposal
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Brett Delmage, a candidate for City Council in College Ward, praised the Practical LRT Alternative for Ottawa that was released this morning by the Friends of the O-Train.

"This alternative provides an excellent basis for a sensible, cost-effective rethinking of Light Rail. It works to solve the traffic jams on our north-south arterials, while still leaving funds for starting work on east-west Light Rail that can serve College Ward residents."

Delmage has proposed using the existing E-W rail tracks which form the southern boundary of College Ward in order to provide rapid transit access for currently-difficult-to-serve areas like Merivale Road and Bells Corners.

He said the Practical LRT Alternative makes much better use of existing N-S rail infrastructure, and avoided boondoggles like the proposed city LRT extension to Barrhaven. "I've heard at the door from residents in my ward that their friends in Barrhaven aren't happy with the LRT plan. Why should they be, when LRT will take 40 minutes to go downtown, instead of 25 minutes on an express bus?"

Delmage noted that the other College ward candidate, Rick Chiarelli, had voted in favour of the Barrhaven LRT extension.

"This initiative is also a perfect example of the depth of expertise and involvement that citizens are willing to give to their city. As a former chair of an advisory committee to City Council, I've supported citizen involvement which helps ensure that city decisions are well-thought-out, workable, and cost-effective."

For more information

Brett Delmage Campaign
613.225.1279

The express bus system has the worst cost recovery of any OC Transpo peak period routes.

–Tim Lane

[On ridership under the Practical Plan:]

It is a difficult thing to answer without a lot of underlying assumptions. This is something that a group of citizens can not do on our own, without resources.

The Deluxe Way has a net decrease in ridership due to cancellation of express bus service.

There can be no increases in ridership to/from the city's core because of the bus congestion downtown, which our plan solves.

Our plan also frees up a lot of peak-hour buses for use in suburban areas, and in particular, may permit creation of more suburban/industrial park express routes. (Without having to purchase additional buses!)

-Michael Richardson (email Oct 27/06)

I endorse this well-considered plan as a proposal for community discussion and comment during the final weeks of the election campaign, followed by its consideration by the Mayor and Council to be elected on November 13th.

Replacing the convoys of buses which crowd Albert and Albert Streets with comfortable, easy-to-board, regularly-timed light rail trains will benefit all travelers downtown - pedestrians, cyclists, transit users, and car and truck drivers.

-David Gladstone

There is every reason to believe that the Practical Alternative will make a significant direct contribution to achieving the City's 30% modal split target for the following reasons:
- Our plan eliminates all delays and all congestion arriving to and departing from downtown.
- At no extra cost, our plan allows peak hour express, regular, and arterial bus service to the LRT terminals to increase route frequencies by 40% or more.
- Frequency and reliability of transit service is among strongest variables that increase ridership.
- Our plan provides the infrastructure to double peak hour ridership through the downtown core compared to either the current situation, or the City's proposed mix of LRT and buses.

In contrast, we know conclusively that the City's proposed LRT plan will result in an increase of only 1,090 net new peak hour riders, at the cost of eliminating 30% of express routes and canceling the O-Train for 2.5 years (over 5 million riders).

-Stephen Fanjoy

I used to live a stone's throw from LeBreton Flats and often thought about how much better downtown would be if long lines of noisy, fumy buses were removed. In rush hour it can take as long as 35 minutes by bus from LeBreton to the Rideau Centre. I can cycle it in about 10 minutes. I once counted 28 buses in a line from the DND building west. This long line of buses was like a train with 28 engines. Just plain stupid.

-Ann Coffey (email Oct 27)

The Talent diesel O-Train is double articulated and 48 m long and can seat 135 passengers. I will not use the 150 standees in this argument. The platform lengths on the line do not permit running units in pairs, but that can be solved. The proposed electric Light Rail Vehicle, the single articulated Siemens S70 Avanto can seat 72.and is 29 m long. So it needs two S70 Avantos to replace one Talent. Since OCTranspo proposes to operate single units only, they are in effect halving the productivity of their manpower. And manpower is the most costly item in a transit budget. Is not the purpose of capital investment to reduce operating costs and improve productivity?
...
Light Rail lines serve destinations, such as Universities, Downtown Central Business District, Airport, Hospitals, Hotel districts and Transit collection points. Passengers do not walk at the residential end to Light Rail, They would if there was coordination and design between Land Use and Light Rail stops, like is done in Stockholm. There is no evidence in Ottawa that there is creative land use design around stations. Residential passengers either use a feeder bus, a car for Park-and-Ride, get dropped off (also called Kiss-and-Ride), or use a bike. If Ottawa wants to have a light rail line closer to Barrhaven, they should construct a Light Rail line parallel to the VIA line. It would be more direct.

John Bakker, Professor-Emeritus, Civil Engineering (Transportation)University of Alberta, from a forthcoming article in Transport Action.

Advantages of the Practical Plan

2006-10-29T23:25:00.000-05:00

Advantages of removing buses from Slater and Albert streets and replacing them with ELRT from Bayview to Hurdman:

ADDITIONAL SAVINGS: $60 million in bus purchase costs, $60 million on bus garage construction costs, and $25 million yearly bus operating costs saved by deleting buses from downtown, and using them to provide better local service.

In four years, that would equal $220 million in savings, more than offsetting the $200 million threat from Dalton McGuinty.

- There are approximately 200 buses heading west on Albert St. and a similar number going east on Slater St. during each peak hour.

- Under the practical plan for solving the downtown congestion problems (caused by too many buses and no room for further expansion of transit capacity to downtown), the following proposals are made:

- Buses coming in from the west Transitway would terminate at a new transfer facility to be built at the west end of Lebreton Flats, near the existing Bayview station.

- Buses coming in from the east and southeast Transitway would terminate at a new transfer facility to be built at Hurdman Station.

- A 30 vehicle ELRT fleet would replace all the buses that used to run across downtown from Bayview to Hurdman, and passengers would transfer from the buses to the ELRT to reach destinations downtown.

Advantages

- There would be 400 fewer diesel engines running each hour in downtown, eliminating all the noise and pollution they now cause.

- A bus that turned around at the edge of downtown would save the 15 minutes it takes to cross downtown.

- A bus that turned around at Bayview would be back in Bayshore, or Arlington Woods, or almost back in Kanata or Barrhaven, to start its next run, in the time it would take to cross downtown.

- Similarly, buses that turned around at Hurdman would be back in South Keys, Beacon Hill, Blackburn Hamlet, or Orleans, starting their next run, in the time it would take to cross downtown.

- We would increase bus frequencies, probably by 40% or more, in all those suburban neighbourhoods, without having to buy any new buses.

- The electric light rail vehicles would cross downtown faster than the buses currently can, because they board faster than buses, accelerate faster than buses, would have no buses in their way, and the traffic lights would be synchronized with the ELRT movements.

- If buses currently take 15 minutes to cross downtown, the ELRT could easily do it in under 12, and more likely, 10 minutes.

Operating cost savings

- Each of those 400 buses is taking 15 minutes, or 1/4 hour, to cross downtown.

- At an average bus operating cost of about $100.00 per hour, that's
100 x 400 x 1/4 = $10,000 saved per each hour of bus operation during the peak period, by not having the bus cross downtown.

- There is the equivalent of about 5 "peak" hours per day, that's
5 x 10,000 = $50,000 per day of saved bus operating costs.

- Times 250 working days per year, that's about
250 x 50,000 = $12,500,000 of bus operating cost savings per year.

- When we look at all the mid-day, evening, and weekend buses that would no longer cross downtown, the savings would be about double, or $25,000,000 per year.

It's as if we suddenly "found" an extra $25 million per year to run more bus service into everybody's neighbourhood, City-wide.

- Of course, the money isn't actually "saved", it and the buses are put to better use, provided a higher frequency of service in various neighbourhoods.

- Recall that the City's plan for fitting ELRT into downtown requires REMOVING bus service from outlying neighbourhoods.

Capital cost savings

- What would it cost to purchase all the buses that would be needed to improve bus service across the City, under the "traditional" way of doing things in Ottawa?

- There are about 130 buses running between Bayview and Hurdman, in both directions combined, at the peak of the peak, around 8:15 am.

- Away from this extreme peak, there would be ~ 100 buses in that stretch simultaneously.

- The Friends of the O-Train practical plan for ELRT downtown would make these 100 buses available to do something else, at no capital cost.

- 100 buses, at about $600,000 average cost each, would cost $60 million.

- It would also mean that we would not need to build a new bus garage, for a saving of another $60 million.

- Getting more bus service into the neighbourhoods, combined with a more comfortable, cleaner, and faster way to get through downtown is what will get a higher percentage of the population to use transit.

- For example, Toulouse France replaced all the buses into their downtown with LRT. This led to a considerable ridership increase. All the buses terminate at the beginning of the LRT line and people all ride into town on the trams. The time saving makes for no complaints about the transfer.

Tim Lane
Nov. 11, 2006

Videos - recorded Sept 27, 2006

2006-10-29T23:05:00.000-05:00

Nov 22, 2006:
Michael Slavitch, Kanata engineer, speaks to CBC Ottawa Morning on the FOTO plan.
http://cbc.ca/ottawa/media/audio/ottawamorning/20061123LRTN23.ram requires Real Player
His challenge to Larry O'Brien, which sparked the CBC interview is right here.

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Nov 6, 2006: CKCU's Giacomo Panico interviews David Jeanes. David shares the merits of our plan to listeners.
Play the audio stream now.

Oct 30 Update:
David Jeanes describes our Practical Plan to CFRA listeners: 8 minute MP3.

The following videos were shot by James Blondeau - see more videos about the O-Train at his site: Tell Me Why (particularly this little gem, where Chiarelli states his dream).

Here Tim Lane explains why we went to Carleton, and our position on the city's proposed LRT project.

Tim talks turkey with Clive Doucet. He tells of a meeting with a VIA executive who expressed interest in using the VIA corridor for getting to Barrhaven. This would save well over $100M and make it a faster trip to downtown. Clive was unaware he signed off on the sale of the O-Trains. Oops.

Helen Gault (Director Planning/Chief, OC Transpo) on selling the O-Train. (she would otherwise mothball them). Ron and Tim ask about using the Trains for going into Gatineau or using them elsewhere on welded rail lines elsewhere in Ottawa. Helen claims 93% of her passengers heading to teh centre go to downtown and not into Gatineau. (An interprovincial transit study has begun and we recently learned that the NCC is no longer a part of that, leaving the two cities to work it out).

Helen explains her Express Bus strategy - fewer more frequent routes means people will have to walk further. (And how will this reduce buses anyway?)

A 3 year shutdown of the O-Train is not necessary.

In the News

2006-10-29T12:23:00.000-05:00

City hid true cost of light rail, documents show - Ottawa Citizen, January 09, 2007

City would run better if it listened to knowledgable volunteers - Ottawa Citizen, January 07, 2007

Transit needs to get on a roll - Ottawa Citizen, January 03, 2007

Democracy has spoken on light rail - The Ottawa Citizen Dec 3, 2006

O-Train plan finds more friends in downtown core - Patrick Dare, The Ottawa Citizen Nov 21, 2006

It's never too late to fix a mistake - Leo Valiquette, OBJ, Nov 6, 2006

Friends of the O-Train spike Chiarelli's hopes - Mark Sutcliffe, Ottawa Citizen, Nov 5, 2006

Letter to the Citizen - Nov 1, 2006

O-Train idea well worth a close look Randall Denley, Ottawa Citizen Oct 31, 2006

Reporter's Notebook: Alistair Steele, CBC Radio, Oct 31, 2006

"Friends" on the Right Track Susan Sherring, Ottawa Sun Oct 31, 2006

Une nouvelle proposition pour le train léger Le Droit, Oct 31, 2006

Group's O-Train plan to be cheaper, reduce downtown traffic Ottawa Business Journal, Oct 31, 2006

Update: Group proposes cheaper, more expandable O-Train plan
Ottawa Business Journal, Oct 31, 2006

O-Train idea well worth a close look
Photograph by : Robert Cross, The Ottawa Citizen

Randall Denley, The Ottawa Citizen - original article
Published: Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Columnist Randall Denley says the proposal from Friends of the O-Train makes more sense than anything put forth by any candidate -- or city staff. It is, he says, a practical plan that can move large numbers of people, quickly and cleanly, through the downtown core.

In a word, eureka. A volunteer group called Friends of the O-Train yesterday proposed a simple, logical plan to improve transit in the city that makes infinitely more sense than anything we've heard from the leading mayoral candidates, or the city's squad of high-priced bureaucrats.

The volunteer transit group calls its idea a "practical LRT plan for Ottawa," and it's certainly that. The plan has two key elements.

First, it would extend the O-Train south to a major park-and-ride lot at Armstrong
Road. The estimated cost is $39 million, giving it a bit of an edge over the city's $880-million plan to take light-rail south.

The practical plan also calls for electric light-rail to run in a six-kilometre loop between Bayview in the west and Hurdman in the east, effectively taking buses out of the downtown. The cost of that line is $407 million, the group says, for a total project cost of $446 million, about half of what the city plans to spend to go north-south only.

That's the big picture. The details make the idea even more compelling. The advantage of electric light-rail is that it can move large volumes of people, quickly and cleanly, through the downtown core.

The city plan loses that advantage by continuing to choke Albert and Slater with buses. The practical plan proposes to stop almost all buses at Hurdman or Bayview,
transferring passengers to three-car light-rail trains that can hold 600 people and would leave every three minutes. That would make the trip into downtown quick, simple
and clean.

The bigger trains also maximize another rail advantage: the ability to move a large number of passengers with only one operator. Turning buses back before they reach
downtown would shorten their routes, providing greater frequency of service to the suburbs at no extra cost, Friends spokesman David Jeanes says.

Mayoral contenders Larry O'Brien and Alex Munter have been telling us a tunnel downtown is a good idea. It's not. With light rail only in the downtown core,
there's no need to go underground.

The practical plan uses mass transit logic for its extension south. That means concentrating passengers at relatively few locations, instead of travelling great distances to pick them up.

The Armstrong Road park and ride would be easily accessible from the Riverside South subdivision and would meet all the city's projected needs for commuters from the south. It would give the south exactly the same kind of quick service to the electric train terminals the rest of the city would have. The practical plan reduces the service to a very acceptable 7.5-minute frequency, making most of the city's expensive double-track plan unnecessary. The city wants five-minute service
frequency, which would mean a lot of empty trains.

One of the things many people have forgotten is that the electric rail plan throws away all the money the city has spent putting the diesel O-Train in place.

We paid $17 million for the trains themselves, but hope to get only $7 million back when we dispose of them.

The trains have 25 years of useful life remaining. The eight kilometres of track will be torn up and replaced with track for the electric trains. The practical plan builds
on what we have already spent, and can be built almost immediately, with no service disruption.

This proposal solves two of the city's two key problems --transit congestion in the core and lack of a good transit connection from the south. It also creates a new system that can be built on incrementally as money becomes available, improving service east-west.

That makes infinitely more sense than spending every dime we have on an overbuilt north-south line that would only add to congestion in the core, all with no overall plan in hand and no money to improve east-west service.

The Friends of the O-Train is a group of about 24 citizens, made up of people who have been advising the city on light-rail and watching this project carefully for years. Their plan offers the much-needed moment of clarity on an issue that has become lost in a fog of confusion.

The practical plan ought to appeal to councillors worried about lawsuits because it reduces what Siemens will be asked to do, in the short term, but doesn't scrap it. As
such, it's perhaps the best way to work around the contract commitment.

The main issue, though, isn't what the outcome of a lawsuit might be, or precisely what's in the secret contract with the rail consortium. The goal is to improve our transit system in a way that will increase its capacity and make sense to riders and potential riders. We're not planning to send an astronaut to Mars. We're only trying to get people downtown by transit. How difficult can it be?

Contact Randall Denley at 613-596-3756 or by e-mail,
rdenley (at) thecitizen.canwest.com

- For more election coverage, visit the Citizen's
Municipal Elections 2006 website at:
www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/features/municipalelections2006/index.h tml

© The Ottawa Citizen 2006

"Friends" on the Right Track

http://www.ottawasun.com/News/OttawaAndRegion/2006/10/31/2185814-sun.html
Tue, October 31, 2006 - original article
By SUSAN SHERRING

Confused about all the different schemes purporting to be the road
ahead for light rail?

Small wonder.

Of the three main mayoral candidates, each purports to have the best plan.

Larry O'Brien wants to kill the light-rail project, at least until he has time to figure it all out.

Alex Munter wants to fix it. (Actually, he says don't nix it, just fix it. And that's getting tiresome if you attend as many debates and news conferences as the City Hall press corps!)

Bob Chiarelli wants to keep it the way it is.

And yesterday, Friends of the O-Train, a volunteer group of transportation gurus, came up with their own plan they say council should use as a starting point when the newly elected group takes power in December.

It's a lot to absorb, isn't it?

Especially when the price tag bandied about for Chiarelli's plan is $1 billion (at least by his opponents), and other plans promise to save hundreds of millions.

If you're having trouble figuring it all out, you're not alone.

Most of us just don't want to sit in rush-hour traffic on our way to work.

If our elected leaders don't want us to idle our cars, they had better work fast!

Here's the uncensored, apolitical truth about light rail.

The average Ottawan really has no way of knowing which plan is best. We can't hope to figure out which is the most cost-effective, the one that offers the best value for your hard-earned dollar.

The Friends of the O-Train have a plan, which, on paper, appears quite simple.

While Munter talks about doing away with light rail in the downtown core, having transit users getting off at Lebreton Flats, this new plan essentially does the opposite.

The plan sees electric light rail service provided over a 6-km route in the downtown core, from Bayview to Hurdman, and takes the buses off Albert and Slater streets to ease traffic woes.

Those buses would be sent back to the 'burbs to improve service there, spokesman David Jeanes explains.

The plan also keeps the current O-Train pilot project, extending it to a Park-and-Ride at Armstrong Rd. and doubling the service to every 71/2 minutes between Bayview and South Keys.

The overall cost savings would be more than $330 million, the group says, with a capital budget of $438 million.

There's a lot of history between the existing light-rail plan passed by council in July and the Friends of the O-Train.

And much of it isn't good.

With Jeanes as its spokesman, the group has butted heads over the present plan and harsh words have been exchanged with city staff.

The fight went public more than once, with harsh and angry words being exchanged at city committee meetings.

Nice guy Ned Lathrop, then-deputy city manager, nearly blew a gasket when the group and staff clashed.

PUBLIC BEEF

The Friends say the city didn't do enough public consultation on light rail.

In fact, if you were one of the handful of the "general public" which attended one of the many public consultations, you'll know these meetings weren't very well attended.

Did the city do enough to encourage the public?

According to the group, citizens weren't welcomed and neither were their ideas.

Jeanes admitted yesterday many of their ideas were considered and adopted.

Clearly that was never good enough for Friends of the O-Train.

Let there be no mistake.

Whatever their issues, the people who make up Friends of the O-Train are a dedicated lot who've spent countless volunteer hours trying to push their ideas ahead. And for that, they should be commended.

But time is running out.

With just two weeks for a group of new councillors going to the table in December, the clock is ticking.

Fast and loud.

Une nouvelle proposition pour le train léger

Le Droit - original article

Avec les Amis du O-Train, un lien de train léger de six kilomètres serait construit entre les stations Bayview et Hurdman et il traverserait le centre-ville par les rues Slater et Albert.

Le plan adopté cet été par le conseil prévoit aussi que l'infrastructure sera installée sur Albert et Slater, mais le train partagerait une voie avec les autobus.

Les Amis du O-Train proposent à la place que ces voies soient utilisées uniquement par le train léger.

«Les express provenant de l'est et de l'ouest arrêteraient leur course aux stations Hurdman et Bayview, où ils laisseraient leurs usagers, explique Tim Lane, un membre des Amis du O-Train.

Plus de détails dans notre édition du 31 octobre 2006.

Group's O-Train plan to be cheaper, reduce downtown traffic

Group's O-Train plan to be cheaper, reduce downtown traffic
By Ottawa Business Journal Staff - original article
Tue, Oct 31, 2006 9:00 AM EST

Public transit advocacy group Friends of the O-Train has released an alternative plan to the hotly contested light-rail project, one which promises to be cheaper as well as move traffic out of the downtown core.

The volunteer group has suggested extending the O-Train line south to a park-and-ride at Armstrong Road, and run a six-kilometre loop between Bayview in the west and Hurdman in the east.

The group's plan is estimated to cost a total of $446 million, about half the amount of the cost of Mayor Bob Chiarelli's $880 million north-south only plan.

The plan also proposes increasing the frequency of trains, from every 15 minutes to 7.5 minutes to get from Bayview station to Greenboro station. As well, it recommends providing service every three minutes at stops on the east-west route going through downtown from Bayview to Hurdman.

Friends of the O-Train spokesperson David Jeanes says using three-car LRT systems, which can hold up to 600 passengers, would provide greater frequency of transit service to the suburbs at no extra cost, since the trains carry more people than buses with only one operator.

Mayor Chiarelli's LRT plan proposes a 30-kilometre electric rail system that would run from the University of Ottawa in the southwest to the Barrhaven town centre.

Update: Group proposes cheaper, more expandable O-Train plan
By Krystle Chow, Ottawa Business Journal Staff
Tue, Oct 31, 2006 2:00 PM EST - original
Public transit advocacy group Friends of the O-Train is proposing what its members say is a cheaper, more expandable and environmentally friendly alternative to the city's $880-million light-rail project.

The volunteer group has suggested extending the O-Train line south to a park-and-ride at Armstrong Road, as well as run a street-level, six-kilometre loop between Bayview in the west and Hurdman in the east with new electrified trains, instead of ripping up the existing diesel train infrastructure to build a whole new double-track electric system.

"There's no indication (from ridership surveys) that there's a need to replace the (existing) diesel trains," says David Jeanes, the group's spokesperson.

He adds that the city just needs to increase the frequency of the trains, from every 15 minutes to 7.5 minutes to get from Bayview station to Greenboro station, and add the "missing piece" from Waller Street down the Transitway to Hurdman.

"(The section from Waller Street to Hurdman) was always supposed to be converted to light rail anyway," he says. "Now's the time, when we're rebuilding Albert and Slater, to rebuild it for the LRT."

Mr. Jeanes says there will be no need for a downtown tunnel for the trains if the city replaces most of the downtown buses with a dedicated LRT track using electrified three-car trains, which will be able to transport 600 passengers at a time. The trains will be more cost-effective as well, he says, since they will carry more people than the buses will with only one operator.

The group's plan recommends providing service every three minutes at stops on the east-west route going through downtown from Bayview to Hurdman.

This plan, Mr. Jeanes says, will be easier to expand than Mayor Bob Chiarelli's proposed system, since the Bayview and Hurdman stations are only a few kilometres away from other major stops such as Tunney's Pasture and Ottawa's hospitals.

"We'll be able to have a future expansion plan that isn't a $2 billion mega-project," he continues.

As well, the increased frequency of train service and reduction of downtown congestion will give commuters cleaner air and more efficient bus service east of Hurdman and west of Bayview, he adds.

The group's plan is estimated to cost a total of $446 million, about half the amount of the cost of Mayor Bob Chiarelli's $880 million north-south only plan.

With Friends of the O-Train's proposal, the city would purchase 10 or 11 three-car electric trains and get about 130 buses out of the downtown core.

Mayor Chiarelli's LRT plan would involve purchasing 20-some electric trains to completely replace the existing service with a 30-kilometre electric rail system that would run from the University of Ottawa in the southwest to the Barrhaven town centre.

Mr. Jeanes says it isn't necessary to expand directly into Barrhaven, which has had a huge investment in its transit system, and as such has buses get downtown 12 minutes faster than the proposed LRT.

"We won't have trains running on empty out to Leitrim (with our plan)," says Mr. Jeanes. "(The LRT project) got out of control and it's not what the city needs...Right now, it will cause a disruption and will have no growth potential."

Give this new rail plan some thought
The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Wednesday, November 01, 2006

Re: O-Train advocates engineer better way, Oct. 31.

The "new" light-rail transit plan from Friends of the O-Train looks much more sensible, practical, forward-looking and would be very much less expensive than the current plan.

Many of this plan's proponents have been members of the city's transportation advisory committee and have had to produce this alternative plan because of the inability or the refusal of the city to listen to their input. One wonders why the city would have an advisory committee with some experienced and committed members, then ignore their proposals.

An additional advantage of this plan by concentrating a major bus/rail transfer at Hurdman Station is that there is an existing rail corridor leading to Kanata that is adjacent to Hurdman, and which could provide the basis of a fast and economical rail service route to western suburbs and Scotiabank Place.

Trevor Davies,
Kanata

--

Friends of the O-Train spike Chiarelli's hopes
Mark Sutcliffe tracks the top candidates' momentumoriginal

Mark Sutcliffe
The Ottawa Citizen

Sunday, November 05, 2006

The Friends of the O-Train, it turns out, are not the friends of Bob
Chiarelli. How ironic that a group of public-transit advocates may
have killed any remaining chance of the mayor being re-elected.

A group called the Friends of the O-Train, after all, should be
natural allies for a mayor who has championed light rail for nine
years and has made it the centrepiece of his latest term and current
campaign. But if Chiarelli can't find support from the guys with the
model train sets in their basements, then who else is left?

The mayor looks increasingly like he's lined up on the wrong side of
an issue that he counted on as being the strongest plank in his
platform.

Chiarelli appears to have prepared for a re-election campaign that
would be a referendum on the general merits of light rail against an
opponent like Terry Kilrea, who is against costly mega-projects. But
instead of being able to run as a light-rail champion, Chiarelli has
been forced to argue the logic of his specific plan against two strong
opponents: an informed debater and light-rail supporter in Alex Munter
and a credible and experienced business person in Larry O'Brien.

The scrutiny of his plan has put the mayor on the defensive from the
opening weeks of the campaign. When Treasury Board President John
Baird delayed federal funding until after the election, Chiarelli
tried to shift tactics and make the campaign a referendum on federal
interference. But the public seems to have welcomed the delay as an
opportunity to hear good debate about an important issue.

Trailing in the polls, Chiarelli's only hope then became convincing
voters that his plan was the best and that the front-runner Munter
would only cause costly delays and lawsuits by revising the strategy.
Chiarelli's radio commercials attacked Munter's light-rail plan as a
"light-rail sham."

It's one thing for the mayor to attack the motives of people who are
trying to steal his job, quite another to be positioned against a
group of volunteers with an alternative plan that, on the surface,
seems more effective and less expensive than the mayor's.

Without an urban planning degree or a week to do research, it's hard
for any voter to know for certain the best plan for light rail.
Instead, residents will have to judge whose strategy sounds most
credible. And it's becoming almost impossible for the mayor to defend
his plan as the most solid when no one else has lined up with him.

The presentation this week from the Friends of the O-Train speaks to a
growing public fear that the city was about to pay too much for a plan
that would not solve our transit problems.

The Friends propose, among other things, taking buses out of the
downtown core and running trains every three minutes from Bayview to
Hurdman. That sounds like a much more effective way of addressing
gridlock than simply adding trains to streets that are already crowded
with buses. As if that wasn't compelling enough, the plan costs about
half as much as the city's strategy.

Chiarelli's response to any alternative plan for light rail has been
consistent throughout the campaign: it's too late and too expensive.
He also points out that the Friends' plan will require people to
transfer to the downtown service from other trains and buses, which
the city views as unappealing to riders.

But if Chiarelli has become stranded on the issue he defined as the
most important, it will be exceedingly hard for him to convince voters
to change their minds in the final week of the campaign. It's hard to
count out an incumbent with a track record like Chiarelli's, but it
will take a tectonic shift for him to come from behind in this
campaign.

As for the other two candidates, Munter can only benefit from the
intervention by the Friends of the O-Train. Their plan is not an exact
match to his, but it's a closer fit than with anyone else's.

For O'Brien, it creates more pressure for him to come up with a more
specific solution than his current position of delaying light rail for
six months. O'Brien may want to consider studying the Friends' plan
carefully and deciding if he'd like to adopt it as his own.

The real test of leadership, after all, is not coming up with the best
plan, it's choosing the best one, even if it's someone else's. The
perception that not even light-rail supporters think Chiarelli has the
best plan may cost him any chance of a comeback in this campaign.

CHIARELLI

HOT: Needing help wherever he can get it, Chiarelli probably boosted
his fortunes among seniors by offering reduced prices for bus passes
and better service from transit drivers. He's also the only candidate
willing to send the O-Train to Barrhaven, which should help him do
well in at least that ward.

NOT: The Friends of the O-Train may have extinguished any remaining
fire in Chiarelli's camp. If the guys with the model train sets in
their basements aren't supporting Chiarelli's plan for light rail,
who's left?

Next: It's time for a Hail Mary pass. Chiarelli needs a dramatic shift
in the final week or he'll be out of a job.

MUNTER

HOT: The announcement by the Friends of the O-Train helps Munter more
than any other candidate. It casts more doubt on Chiarelli's plan and
lines up well with his own transit proposal.

NOT: Munter attacked the mayor's plan to reduce the cost of bus passes
for seniors as a cynical attempt to "buy their votes with their
money." The same criticism about vote-buying could be made about any
promise to reduce costs or taxes, including Munter's.

Next: As the front-runner with one week remaining in the campaign,
it's time to focus on the ground game: how to get the most supporters
to the polls on election day.

O'BRIEN

HOT: O'Brien has cleverly begun positioning the campaign as a
two-horse race between him and Munter. His only hope at a win is a
complete implosion by Chiarelli's campaign. The endorsement of former
mayor Jackie Holzman also helps.

NOT: As the last entrant in the race and the candidate with the least
political experience, O'Brien has the least sophisticated campaign.
His news releases are often poorly worded and contain spelling
mistakes (including, once, O'Brien's own name) and his team will face
a tough challenge to get the most supporters to the polls on election
day.

Next: O'Brien should consider endorsing the light-rail plan of the
Friends of the O-Train, since he still doesn't have a specific transit
plan of his own.
(c) The Ottawa Citizen 2006

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It's never too late to fix a mistake
By Leo Valiquette, Ottawa Business Journal Staff
Mon, Nov 6, 2006 12:00 AM EST original

Last week's alternative proposal for light rail from a local lobby group demonstrates there is more than one way to build a railroad provided we are willing to accept the consequences of derailing the existing contract.

Volunteer group Friends of the O-Train has proposed a plan that would establish the base for both east-west and north-south light rail without ripping up the existing O-Train system, tunnelling under downtown at great cost, or taking a scenic tour of the countryside on the way down to Barrhaven.

Instead, the group proposes keeping the existing diesel line and extending it down to Armstrong Road where there is already a park and ride. The east-west link would consist of electric trains running on separate track on a six-kilometre run between Bayview (the station just before downtown where the current O-Train begins) and Hurdman, the key transit nexus on the east side of downtown. In this way, the group contends, downtown bus routes can be eliminated and, with that rubber tire congestion off of the streets, it isn't necessary to take the downtown train line underground. Morning express buses will now be free to make more frequent runs to the 'burbs since their routes will be shorter and they won't have to make their way through the core. This could mean fewer buses would be needed and OCTranspo could retire its more geriatric vehicles sooner rather than later. The system could then be expanded further east and west at a later date.

The price tag for all this? Only about 60 per cent of the current plan, the proponents claim.

Sounds great, doesn't it? Media big and small were quick to jump on the proposal. More than one editorial comment was written about how it makes so much more sense than anything else from city hall thus far.

However, there is still the little matter of the contract that has already been signed by the city with the Siemens consortium to build the north-south light rail line. This line, to recap, would run from U of O, through downtown to Bayview ,then south in a nice graceful curve to the Barrhaven town centre. This plan has already been the subject of great criticism and consternation due to the veil of secrecy that surrounded the tendering process and the route itself.

Nonetheless, this plan was approved by city council in the summer and signed by the Siemens group. For any other plan to be entertained at this point, the city must renege on that contract or attempt to renegotiate it after the fact. As Mayor Bob Chiarelli has repeatedly warned, this would likely result in multimillion-dollar penalties, years of delay and inflated construction costs. Mayoral challenger Larry O'Brien is willing to bite those bullets on the grounds that to address the shortcomings of the existing plan, it must be scrapped entirely in favour of a new one. Alex Munter, meanwhile, insists he can fix the current plan within a timeframe that will keep things on schedule with Siemens. And of course, all three have their reasons why the other guy's idea is a train wreck waiting to happen.

Any of us who believe that the existing light rail plan has significant flaws that must be addressed (which I believe it does), must be willing to accept the consequences of trying to turn back to clock at this 11th hour. It all comes down to a basic risk-reward scenario. Is the risk of millions wasted on penalties and inflationary construction costs worth the reward of a transit plan that better serves the interests of the community as a whole?

My vote is still out on last week's proposal from Friends of the O-Train. The first thought that comes to mind is the huge transfer station that will have to built at Bayview for it to serve as the nexus for all those west side buses, the southern diesel O-Train and the downtown electric light rail route. The volume of people making transfers and milling about on those station platforms would dwarf anything seen on the city's transit system at present.

Nonetheless, it does demonstrate that it is possible to come up with different ideas that have the potential to serve a greater number of commuters from all points of the compass with cost savings that would more than compensate for any financial penalties. It boils down to how willing we are as a community to ignore fear-mongering and accept the short-term pain for the long-term benefit of a more efficient and effective integrated transit system.

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Alistair Steele, CBC Radio, Oct 31, 2006 original

Finally, someone has come up with a detailed, workable solution to Ottawa’s light rail transit mess …and it’s not a candidate for mayor or council.

Friends of the O-Train is a group of public transit advocates, including members of Transport 2000 and other groups that are passionate about public transportation. David Jeanes is the group’s spokesperson. He’s one of this city’s most knowledgeable transit experts and he’s volunteered hundreds, even thousands, of hours of his time helping the city get light rail right.

Unfortunately, his advice was ignored at every step of the way. Relations between Jeanes and senior city staff grew so tense that Jeanes eventually withdrew from the process altogether, watching from the sidelines as city council passed a plan few people believed would actually work.

Now John Baird’s intervention has given Friends of the O-Train new hope. A new city council – and possibly a new mayor – will make the decision on the current light rail plan on Dec. 15.

Alex Munter has been preaching “fix it, don’t nix it,” but his plan has lacked detail. (To be fair, Munter is playing a bit of blind man’s bluff, because like the rest of us, he hasn’t seen the contract with Siemens). His own panel of experts will report back in July with ideas about what to remove from the north-south plan, but concepts for an east-west line won’t come for a while. Larry O’Brien wants to “press the reset button,” but hasn’t offered any clear alternatives. The Friends’ proposal fills in all the blanks, and it makes near-perfect sense.

First of all – and no surprise, considering the group’s name – they want to save the diesel O-Train that’s been chugging from Bayview to South Keys via Carleton University for a couple of years now. Not only that, they want to extend it to a Park and Ride at Armstrong Road in Riverside South, near what was to have been the eastern end of the Strandherd Bridge. The link across the Rideau River into Barrhaven will have to wait, at least for now.

More important, say the Friends, is to take care of downtown congestion now. To do that, they’re proposing an electric light rail line from Bayview to Hurdman to serve the downtown. There’d be a train every three minutes to ferry passengers in from the transfer stations. That frequency would eliminate the need for buses on the busy Albert-Slater corridor and allow OC Transpo to improve service elsewhere. It would also eliminate one of the most common criticisms of the current plan: That by forcing three modes of transportation (not counting pedestrians) to compete for space, it actually intensifies the problem of downtown congestion. And all for $446 million – $330 million less than the cost of the current plan, say the Friends.

I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised this afternoon to hear Bob Chiarelli dismiss the Friends’ proposal. We’ve heard it all before, he says. Chiarelli says city staff did take the experts’ ideas into consideration when it formulated the current plan. Which is strange, because the Friends’ plan doesn’t look anything like the one council will look at in December. City staff had – and presumably still has – serious concerns about combining diesel and light rail systems and turning Bayview into a giant transfer station.

And to be fair, many of these proposals have come up in one form or another and were rejected by council. But this plan bears such close resemblance to what Alex Munter is proposing (or at least, what he appears to be proposing) that politically, Bob Chiarelli can’t support it, no matter how much sense it makes.

So he’s threatening the same thing he’s threatened will happen if the current contract with Siemens is broken – that it will cost untold millions and delay any form of light rail in Ottawa for four or five years. The message: It’s better to go with a plan that’s shrouded in doubt and secrecy because it will be easier to get started on than a plan that looks better, faster and cheaper.

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O-Train plan finds more friends in downtown core
Patrick Dare, The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Tuesday, November 21, 2006 original
Business coalition leader considers alternative rail proposal 'sensible'
Hume Rogers never thought the city's commuter rail plan made any sense. But he says the alternative plan being proposed by a community transit group might be just the ticket the city needs to ease horrendous downtown congestion.

Mr. Rogers, of the Albert-Slater coalition of downtown businesses, yesterday said the Friends of the O-Train proposal presented during the municipal election could be "a very sensible solution" that downtown businesses would not fight.

Mr. Rogers said the community group's proposal needs professional study and financial details fleshed out. But he said it's a remarkable piece of work from a volunteer group.

"The basic concept of the plan is excellent," said Mr. Rogers, who is general manager of the Capital Hill Hotel and Suites.

Downtown business property owners have vociferously opposed the $880-million light-rail plan favoured by outgoing Mayor Bob Chiarelli, a plan that would add trains to an already seriously clogged Albert and Slater streets.

The downtown property owners are fed up with the hundreds of buses that crowd into downtown during rush hours, mixing with cars and trucks and creating chaos for commuters, who have trouble catching the right buses.

The city's proposed Siemens electric commuter train -- to run 30 kilometres from Barrhaven to the University of Ottawa -- could make things even worse, the business group fears, with trains crawling along Albert and Slater like streetcars.

Their opposition to the plan, coupled with the intervention of Treasury Board President John Baird -- who decided not to sign off on the federal government's $200-million contribution to the project until the new council votes on it -- helped make the rail project an election issue.

Opposition to the north-south rail plan played a role in the defeat last week of Mr. Chiarelli, the biggest booster of commuter rail. Now the fate of the plan is in doubt.

During the election, the Friends of the O-Train proposed a much cheaper alternative.

Their plan calls for keeping the existing, popular diesel north-south O-Train and running it farther south to Armstrong Road, as well as increasing the frequency of service.

That train and city buses would bring commuters from the suburbs to a transfer station at Bayview, west of downtown, or by bus to Hurdman station east of downtown.

There, commuters would transfer to an electric train that would offer service every three minutes through downtown. Buses would be kept out of downtown. The trains would have three cars and carry up to 600 passengers.

Larry O'Brien, who promised during the election a six-month return to the drawing board on commuter rail, defeated Mr. Chiarelli and has been pondering what can be done.

The city's top public servants have argued that the current, council-approved rail plan, with a building consortium led by Siemens, is the best option.

The new members of Ottawa council were handed three binders packed with information about the deal in the last few days. They will vote in December on whether to go ahead with the Siemens-led plan.

But councillors are also getting briefings from the Friends of the O-Train about the alternative. David Jeanes of the Friends said yesterday that Mr. O'Brien had two sessions with the transit group before the election. Other councillors are also being briefed.

Mr. Jeanes said council needs the six-month breather that the new mayor has spoken about.

Mr. Jeanes said the Friends' proposal, which "resonated very well with the public," will be attractive to councillors in the east and west, as well as the south.

He said that with this plan, "you are building for both directions," while taking polluting buses out of downtown.

Mr. Rogers said business owners would like to see the city do a serious study on the option of building a downtown tunnel. However, he said the Friends' plan is pretty impressive.

It would solve the problem of hundreds of big, noisy, polluting buses flooding the core. It would solve the two-kilometre-long bottleneck in the transit system downtown. And it would be a system that the city could expand, when the ridership warrants.

"Can we live with the the Friends of the O-Train plan? Absolutely," said Mr. Rogers.

© The Ottawa Citizen 2006
Photograph by : Robert Cross, The Ottawa Citizen

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Democracy has spoken on light rail, The Ottawa Citizen Published: Sunday, December 03, 2006 original

Re: Self-aggrandizing posse, Nov. 26.

Letter-writer John Unrau describes the Friends of the O-Train as a "self-aggrandizing posse" with "no democratic legitimacy." It is not clear what form of democracy he has in mind.

Voters in Gloucester South-Nepean (Ward 22), which comprises the entire Riverside South and south Barrhaven service areas for the city's proposed light-rail project, voted 72 per cent in favour of mayoral candidates who were against the city's proposed project. Across Ottawa, 85 per cent of voters supported candidates who were against the plan.

Democracy seems to have spoken loud and clear.

The group believes it is the significant functional and financial advantages of our practical light-rail alternative plan that has captured the attention of citizens.

For example, the city's proposed billion-dollar light-rail system would have enticed only an extra 1,050 people to take transit in the morning rush hour.

This is about one half of one per cent of Ottawa commuters in 2021. We stepped forward and spoke out, but credit for change is due entirely to voters, candidates, and a great example of democracy in action.

The Friends fully support Mr. Unrau's suggestion that a thorough and impartial conflict-of-interest investigation into all aspects of the city's light-rail project would be prudent. No one involved with the development of the practical light-rail alternative plan stands to gain personally from its acceptance any more than any other typical citizen, taxpayer or transit user.

The Earl Armstrong Road location for the southernmost end of the diesel light-rail service was chosen because it is on the existing rail corridor, a major vehicle corridor, and it is closer to Riverside South than the Leitrim site. It can easily service feeder buses from Riverside South as well as Park-and-Ride commuters from communities beyond.

While it is true that the Friends of the O-Train are a self-organized group of volunteers, the city and former regional council have appointed many of us to a wide range of public consultation bodies.

Perhaps then Mr. Unrau's use of the term "posse" was fair. It denotes citizen volunteers recruited by the duly appointed or elected authority to perform an unpaid civic duty like volunteer firefighters, for example. The Friends sincerely hope that with the council vote on Dec. 15 this particular fire is truly stamped out.

Stephen Fanjoy, Ottawa
Friends of the O-Train

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City would run better if it listened to knowledgable volunteers
The Ottawa Citizen - January 07, 2007 original article

Re: O'Brien wants managers to go by the book, Jan. 3.

I enjoyed reading that Mayor Larry O'Brien wants to run the city more like a business. I agree that sluggish, centralized bureaucracies with rules and regulations and hierarchical chains of organization no longer work very well.

As the article suggests, allowing individuals and non-profit organizations to participate in planning will deliver better and more innovative services.

One only needs to look at the current O-Train service to see an example of a concept developed, at least in part, by a number of community volunteers. This project was championed by several councillors, was carried through to a successful pilot and was extended indefinitely by council on Dec. 18, 2002. In 2003 it won the Federation of Canadian Municipalities' award of excellence and the American Public Works Association's project of the year. Today there is a valid environmental assessment that would allow service to be extended to South Keys station, and next could be an extension to the new Leitrim park-and ride-facility, both at minimal cost.

Contrast this to the recently rejected light-rail proposals that relied on expensive outside contractors and repeatedly disregarded the suggestions of volunteers and community experts. Through too many rules, an overly complex environmental assessment and a horrendously long, complex, secretive tendering process, there resulted a solution that cost more than 20 times the cost of the pilot project even though it was only two to three times longer. The solution even required shutting down the O-Train system for three years and building a new maintenance facility by the Greenbelt, while the existing facilities could be easily expanded at underused, brownfield Walkley yard.

Had city managers and OC Transpo been able to innovate and build incrementally, we could have had fast north-south rail service to Leitrim three years ago, and to Riverside South by now. We could have made much better use of the federal and provincial funds to sustainably extend the current line east-west using the existing rail line paralleling Baseline/Walkley, over to Hull and Gatineau, and we could gradually convert the bus Transitway to rail, as it was designed to be.

Let's build our new transit systems in an innovative and sustainable fashion, allowing volunteers and community experts to contribute fully.

Bernie Geiger, Ottawa

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City hid true cost of light rail, documents show

Mohammed Adam, The Ottawa Citizen Published: Tuesday, January 09, 2007

The City of Ottawa didn't publicly disclose the full terms under which the consortium picked to build the north-south commuter rail line, freedom-of-information documents obtained by the Citizen show.

"It was an accounting shell game," said Councillor Alex Cullen, a light-rail supporter who turned against the project when costs began to soar.

"They wanted to avoid the $1-billion threshold, but the manipulation of the figures helped undermine public confidence and the credibility of the project. Light rail suffered death by a thousand cuts -- and this was one of the big ones."

Talk that the cost wasn't fully disclosed dogged then-mayor Bob Chiarelli through last fall's municipal election campaign, and contributed to the death of the multimillion-dollar project.

At the height of the light-rail debate last summer, the cost of the project fluctuated wildly between $654 million, which the city said was the right figure, and $1 billion, which critics maintained was closer to the truth. The Citizen documents show the top three bids ranged from $953 million to $1.4 billion.

But city bureaucrats strongly disagree, saying no one hid anything or tried to mislead area residents. Rejean Chartrand, the senior manager who oversaw the project, said councillors approved the bidding process and were fully aware of what was going on. He pointed out that in reports sent to councillors in June and July, before they voted 14-7 to approve the project, everything was spelled out to the last cent.

"We told council every step of the way how we were going to do this," he said. "There are reports that track everything we did. The figures were always there."

The Citizen requested the light-rail documents in August under the municipal freedom of information laws, but the city delayed their release before the election, and then, following "third-party" objections, withheld turning them over until now. Still, some important information is still missing. An appeal before the Ontario information and privacy commissioner is pending.

The contract between Siemens and the city has also not been made public, even though Mayor Larry O'Brien, during the election campaign, called for its release.

According to the Citizen's documents, the three bidders were told by the city that the winner would be the one with the lowest price for a project that contained three elements: construction of rail line, the new maintenance yard and maintenance costs over 15 years. After an evaluation by a city panel last April, Siemens won the bid with a total price of $953.1 million. The group led by Bombardier followed with $977.9 million and the third bid, led Japanese giant Kinkisharyo, came in at $1.4 billion. All the figures include GST, which cities don't pay.

But for weeks after Siemens won, city politicians and bureaucrats spoke publicly only of the cost of the rail line, without any reference to the cost of the entire package. The documents show that Siemens bid $736.7 million for the basic light-rail portion, with Bombardier at $728.7 million and Kinkisharyo at $964.6 million, including GST.

Even though Bombardier had the lowest price for designing and building the rail line, Siemens won because it had a cheaper overall package. At the onset, the city asked the three companies to include the cost of the Strandherd-Armstrong Bridge as part of the project because without the link, the trains wouldn't be able to cross the Rideau River into Barrhaven. Siemens' price for the new bridge was the cheapest, and when GST was subtracted from the prices, Siemens ended up with the lowest bid at $721 million. Bombardier was next with $725 million and Kinkisharyo came in a shade over $939 million.

Mr. Chartrand said after Siemens was chosen, the city worked with the group's engineers to find ways of saving more money and eventually beat down the price to $654 million.

Mr. Chartrand, who was also a member of the selection panel, said the Siemens bid was so superior there was little debate over the choice.

"There is a clear recommendation for the selection of Siemens-PCL/Dufferin as the Preferred Proponent," the panel said in its report.

"When compared to the next best Proposal, Siemens-PCL/Dufferin has the lowest design-build price, the lowest net present value for annual maintenance costs, which includes the cost of the Maintenance Centre."

Mr. Cullen, who was one of 13 councillors who voted last month to kill the project, said it was a classic example of how not to do things.

He said a project that was perhaps the best thing Mr. Chiarelli has ever done, failed because its chief proponents chose not to play straight with taxpayers. He said the companies bid on the project as a package that included three or four key elements and the city should not have tried to mislead people by selling only one part of it.

"The companies bid on the whole thing and when you add it up, it comes to $1 billion. The project suffered from public distrust over the numbers. It is a case study of how this kind of manipulation defeats itself," Mr. Cullen said.

© The Ottawa Citizen 2007 - original article

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Transit needs to get on a roll

The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Wednesday, January 03, 2007

The new council's decision to scrap the light-rail project doesn't relieve it of the duty to improve Ottawa's transit. It only makes the job more difficult and urgent.

Bus riders won't wait for this council to come up with the perfect grand plan, one to which all councillors will agree, that future councils will endorse and for which other levels of government will be happy to pay. Ottawa needs better bus service now, and it needs more and better rail service.

Even if the city stopped growing (unlikely), Ottawa would have to provide more buses and better routes. The time for empty talk about the environment is past. One way to fight smog and climate change is to get people out of their cars. Ottawa's goal of getting 30 per cent of commuters on buses is achievable. The current system, though, is inadequate to the task.

The fact that public transit was one of the biggest issues in the municipal election should be a clue for those councillors still stuck in the Dark Ages. People in all neighbourhoods, of all levels of income and all lifestyles, want better transportation options.

People in Barrhaven want to be able to ride quickly to destinations in Kanata. For that matter, people in Kanata want to be able to ride quickly to destinations in Kanata.

The Transitway and the O-Train serve students and commuters to downtown very well, but that's no longer good enough. The best way to mitigate the effects of sprawl is to encourage people to commute and shop within their neighbourhoods. That means better bus service in the bedroom communities. It also means ridding ourselves of the attitude that the suburbs are bedroom communities.

The Transitway works so well that many buses are clogged in rush hour, making the commute fast and onvenient but unpleasant. Other routes are less crowded, but they require a willingness to stand and wait, often in the cold.

The city must keep expanding the Transitway, build more park-and-rides and ensure that buses go to the farthest stations often enough to make those stations worthwhile. If the city moves away from inefficient express routes, it must replace them with a hub-and-spoke model that allows people to transfer quickly, easily and without braving the weather. It must create suburban feeder routes that run frequently.

Even the rail boosters on council are dispirited after the last rail plan lurched to its death in December. Everyone is sick of talking about rail. Too bad. The O-Train pilot project has been a success; councillors would be foolish to ignore that information. Ottawa has shown itself ready for new forms of rapid transit.

Just when the city needs leadership and good sense, it seems unlikely to get it. Ottawa has a new mayor and a fractious council. OC Transpo still doesn't have a manager to replace Alain Carle, who left the job abruptly last year. It's time for someone on council to start the next big push for transit.

© The Ottawa Citizen 2007 original article

About the Award Winning O-Train

2006-10-26T23:31:00.000-04:00

Ottawa's successful Light Rail Pilot Project, now called the O-Train, was, and remains, the most successful public transit initiative done in Ottawa.

It cost $32 million for an 8 km system, (avg. cost $4 million/km) from Bayview to Greenboro. The project was built by re-using an existing Canadian Pacific Railway line and the project work included track upgrades, simple stations, a maintenance facility at Walkley yard, and three diesel light rail vehicles (dLRVs).

It is now an essential part of the city's transit system and is relied upon by up to 12,000 passengers per day - double the original expected ridership.

The O-Train travels on an 8-km length of existing freight rail track, and connects to the city’s bus rapid transit system (the “Transitway”) on each end of the line. The existing corridor is owned by Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR). The line serves Carleton University, a major employment centre, and a shopping mall in a densely populated neighbourhood.

The pilot project is unique by North American standards and involves four “firsts.” It is the first time that light rail passenger trains had been mixed with heavy rail traffic on an existing rail network, and the first time passenger rail services had been operated by a single operator. In addition, this was the first time Bombardier Talent DMU trains had been used anywhere in North America, and the first trains driven by bus operators.

The Federation of Canadian Municipalities presenting a Sustainable Community Award for the O-Train at Carleton Station, May 23, 2003 after just 18 months of operation.

It also won the Ontario chapter’s American Public Works Association (APWA) Public Works Project of the Year award.

The O-Train has even been to Carp! Here's a couple photos from the trip, Sept 24, 2006.

In Corkstown

March Rd.

Back at Walkley Yard

The Future?

"Capital Railway is planning to take steps to modify and to expand the O-Train Line between 2006 and 2009 for the continued operation of rail commuter service over the O-Train Line." from the city's Three-Year Rail Network Plan. This announcement indicates the intended use of the track south of Greenboro.

See a schematic of the Southern LRT Extension (pdf) planned at the time.

2006-10-23T12:43:00.000-04:00

Official Launch of the Friends of the O-Train website. Stay tuned for upcoming announcements and check the links on the right for more information.