Raise the Hammer

this whole province is backwards when it comes to LRT, our whole country is caught up in the freedom of having a vehicle. More roads for more cars has never been the answer for a city but it sure helps automotive and oil companies. It is cheaper to rent a car for the weekend to travel than it is to take bus or via rail. That's just backwards

Hey Ryan when is this LRT dead line is i sure hope its after the election for the city cuz i whant to see a new mayor to champion the LRT

In, just, your second sentence: you spelled "too" wrong; it's a city “which” has… a system “of” one-way…; you’re missing several commas; and you used “city” twice. Man, you’re dumb. LOL all over again!

Why should eye consider any thing you right when ewe are to stuped to from a sentence snmple! LOL all over again!

"Taxpayers are ready to revolt…" Really? The senate, bob young, mike harris, peggy-gate, gas plants, hwdsb, rob ford… haven’t created a ripple, so cool the hyperbole, or there’ll be terrible world-ending consequences and no one will take you seriously, anymore! LOL all over again!

There’s no way you’d be this obnoxious in a face-to-face setting, so I'd guess you’re just another cowardly puke, hiding behind his big brave keyboard. LOL all over again!

Your obsession with voting on RTH is as childish as your writing. This time, I’m cereal.

You can't capitalize. You spelled "whiz" wrong. You spelled "too" wrong, again, stupid. Who's "we?" I'm in offensive mode because you are an offensive cowardly, obnoxious little puke, who ruins my visits to RTH. Sign your name, sissy. Learn two spell, stupid.

If i thought this site or u were worth it i would put some efford intooit but u are such narrow minded microbrained lemmings that u just arnt

Hamilton will continue to be a second-rate, former factory town as long as the mentality you're supporting continues. It will be a bedroom community for more prosperous neighbouring cities and it will never be seen as a place where you can both work and live. It won't attract new employers or retain quality (tax-paying, affluent) employees. It will continue to decay. An LRT, among many other things (walkable streets, bike infrastructure, etc.) is how you make a city attractive (and sane) to live in.

And broke.

This would have been an awesome comment in 1958.

^Even then it would have been ridiculous.

The LRT and the Big Move will both die slow, agonizing deaths unless we, the voters, indicate to both the Liberals and the NDP that we support the vision and we will back it with our ballots. If you put yourselves in the shoes of Wynne, for a moment, the Liberal Party has been advancing a modest green agenda and has little to show for it in terms of electoral support. Recent polls show a Hudak majority if an election was held today and if you like Rob Ford and his War Of The Car you'll love Tim Hudak.

On the other hand, the Liberals have failed and are failing to engage the public in explaining the benefits of the Big Move in terms of economy, ecology, and energy. In the coming years climate change is going to radically reshape how we live and we can either prepare for that or we can, pardon the pun, be hammered when it is imposed upon us.

I do sympathize with Wynne in acknowledging that an adult discussion with Ontarians can be difficult in light of the utter failure of corporate media to adequately frame the debate. In Hamilton, for example, while The Spectator reports on the product offerings at Tim Horton's and McDonalds, it is yet to report (to the best of my knowledge) that atmospheric concentrations of CO2 have reached 400 ppm.

That leaves it to alternative media, social media, and ourselves to get the message out.

It's not just Hamilton (though the city is reliably backwards). Look at the recent debate in Toronto's council chambers, or the Brampton vs. Mississauga dust-up, or the Western GTA Summit whose big takeaway was that transit is an important priority. The province had doubtless hopedto take its cues from the GGH/GTHA municipalities, but it's increasingly looking like a bigfooting is in order.

I'd say that mainstream media has done a decent job of pushing the discussion (Metrolinx surrogate Civic Action basically have a soapbox on 680New, the Star is very pro-transit, and even the National Post has run its share of Bedford op-eds). For all of that, Metrolinx is still all but unknown to 90% of the voting public. This despite spending wads on PR. The adult discussion is mostly difficult at this stage because the province and Metrolinx have avoided having that discussion for the last three years. Instead, they launched their conversation mere months before they were to deliver their funding recommendations. That deadline is basically here now. Ten days from now, the other shoe drops, and we will go on to improvise the most ambitious infrastructure undertaking in a generation.

Fingers crossed it turns out well.

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/05/16/highway_427_extension_north_to_major_mackenzie_dr_to_be_built_by_2020.html

As long as Wynne keeps talking about implementing new and creative taxes I doubt her popularity will grow.

I am still trying to understand why a city that has virtually no congestion on its roadways could possibly benefit from LRT. If the buses are crowded during rush hour on King/Main than lets add a few more buses at a fraction of the cost.

"...place you can drive through in 20 minutes - a talking point no one should be proud of -..."

Try telling that to someone who has just called an ambulance or the fire department. I am sure they would be glad that the city can be driven through in 20 minutes.

"We have virtually no congestion in large part because we have prioritized our public infrastructure investments on highways, low-density suburban sprawl and vastly overbuilt lower-city streets that destroy the neighbourhoods they cut through."

How do you expect people and goods to travel without highways? Please name an urban centre in NA that does not have a highway network?

Our suburbs are not as low density as you might think. The rural areas might be but if you go to Ancaster and Dundas etc they are just as high density as the lower city (but not the dt core). Besides LRT is not planned for the suburbs.

Our lower city streets were not overbuilt a generation ago and the neighbourhoods were not destroyed a generation ago either. Downtown decline has been a trend across the western world for years now - not just Hamilton. It is the population in the lower city that has declined as people chose to move to bigger houses and nicer neighbourhoods with less crime.

Your reasoning does not provide an answer for why LRT is needed or cost effective. Basically you made my case. The lower city is not congested. With no congestion LRT will be a complete failure.

The pro-LRT side has misguided people, on several occasions, with incorrect or partial facts. Take the Charlotte LRT example which the pro-LRT side consistently refers to.

Hamilton Light Rail states: http://hamiltonlightrail.com/the-facts

"Myth: LRT won't attract new ridership.

Fact: LRT systems consistently outperform even optimistic ridership growth projections. Charlotte's Lynx line, which opened in 2007, was supposed to start at 9,100 daily passengers and reach 18,000 daily riders by 2025; but by Q1 2008 it already reached 18,600 daily passengers and has since increased to 21,000 as of 2010. A 2009 survey found that nearly three quarters of Lynx passengers were new to public transit."

A quick fact check on Wikipedia (if you don't trust Wikipedia as a source, follow the references it provided): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynx_Rapid_...

"Prior to the opening of the line in November 2007, CATS projected ridership for the completed Blue Line to be 9,100 on an average weekday in its first year of operation, gradually increasing to 18,100 by 2025. In its first few months of operation, the Blue Line saw an average daily weekday ridership of 8,700 passengers. By the end of the first quarter of 2008, weekday ridership had increased to 18,600, double first-year projections and ahead of the 2025 projections. In March 2008, the single light rail line accounted for 19.5% of total system ridership – 402,600 of the 2,061,700 monthly passenger-trips of all lines including bus, dial-a-ride, and vanpool. Daily ridership continued to climb through the fall of 2008 due to increasing gasoline prices, peaking at 22,300 in the third quarter.

By summer 2009, a CATS survey indicated that 72 percent of Lynx riders did not use public transportation prior to its completion. On December 11, 2009, Lynx celebrated its 10 millionth passenger trip since its opening in November 2007. For 2009, Lynx saw a decrease in daily ridership from 19,700 to 19,500 passengers per day. As of the fourth quarter of 2012, the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) has Lynx daily ridership at 14,800, making Lynx the 21st largest light rail system in the United States in terms of ridership."

Conclusion: While the LRT had a positive effect, the increase in ridership is also largely due to the spike in gas prices around 2008. If you research a bit further, you will notice that pretty much every transit agency had a boost in ridership during those years, regardless of whether they had LRT or not.

The Benefits Case Analysis claims that the benefits (entirely on estimates and assumptions) of the options are: BRT: $313m Full LRT: $852m Phased LRT: $748m

And the costs: BRT: $220m Full LRT: $784m Phased LRT: $655m

For a benefit-cost ratio of: BRT: 1.4 Full LRT: 1.1 Phased LRT: 1.1

Already, there is creative math in play, for if you actually make the calculations yourself, you will get: BRT: 1.423 for a return on investment (ROI) of 42.3% Full LRT: 1.087 for a ROI of 8.7% Phased LRT: 1.142 for a ROI of 14.2%

How can you call the benefit-cost of the two LRT options the same?

With that kind of number manipulation, it's not surprising why it could manage to conclude in favour of the option with the least bang for the buck (even by their own numbers). But let's argue with reason and not rhetoric. Certainly, the full LRT option may dwarf the other options on some non-measurable factors, but that's because it's the most expensive option, and thus providing the most stimulus for the economy and development. Following the same (flawed) logic one could probably conclude that a subway for the B-line corridor is even better, although it will cost way more. What the report should have considered is that for the price of one full LRT we could build three BRTs in the city (with less cost), benefiting three times the area. Compare that with the smaller-scoped LRT option, and you might conclude differently on which option has the greatest impact on economic development, urban revitalization, environmental sustainability and user experience.

In the Benefits Case Analysis, travel time savings account for over 70% of the "incremental transportation user benefits". I would like to see what their actual calculations are, because the way it's presented the numbers simply don't add up.

From the Benefits Case Analysis: "With the improvement of transit services along the Main Street / King Street corridor in Hamilton, the analysis shows that the investment will generate significant time savings for existing transit users (those that currently travel on buses), new transit users and auto users."

Existing transit users will benefit only if they take the LRT (or BRT). If the transit user is travelling North-South or taking a bus on another corridor, he or she does not get any benefit from the LRT. For transit users that do take the LRT, the benefit is pro-rated based on the length of the trip on the LRT. You get the full benefit (of 8 minutes or whatever stated in the report) only if you travel the route from one terminus to the other. If you are on the LRT for only two stops, the time savings will be small. Also, because the distance between stops will be longer, the walking time for existing transit users may increase. The time savings you get on the LRT may as well be offset by the increased time to walk from/to your source/destination.

New transit users, if they used to travel by cars, will likely have worse commute times than before. Except in heavily congested areas(which Hamilton is not), public transit will always be slower than cars. Public transit is a cheaper alternative to automobile, and the reason people don't use it is because it's slow. The whole point of building transit is to narrow the gap in commute times between driving and taking transit. The smaller the gap, the more people will see public transit as a tolerable alternative to driving. But this gap will never be eliminated, and those who switch from their cars to the LRT or buses will have their commute times lengthened. Did Metrolinx consider the extra commute time as costs?

I was inclined to agree that auto users will benefit from a faster commute due to fewer cars on the road (thanks to other commuters taking the LRT), but then congestion isn't a problem for Hamilton in the place: http://raisethehammer.org/article/1820/c... Plus, the implementation of transit-priority signals will likely disrupt the vehicular traffic on or crossing the corridor. What we might see are more traffic lights installed and more irregular signal cycles which are designed to speed up transit vehicles at the expense of car traffic.

That's why I'm skeptical about the numbers.