Intercity Transit

[BASE]

I would like to see Churchill Station expanded underground with platforms for commuter rail. This would create a real hub in the centre of the city.

This would certainly be incredible but seems like it would be prohibitively expensive. Perhaps there would be some room in the quarters for a station with a connection the the Churchill LRT lines.

Gut feeling that the conversation about accommodating more rail service will pick up steam in the next 5-10 years.

 

[CplKlinger]

Gut feeling that the conversation about accommodating more rail service will pick up steam in the next 5-10 years.

Speaking of which, I'd love to see @archited's idea about the Coliseum building come to fruition. Old Strathcona could also make a good location, the only limitation to regional use would be the lack of adequate parking. I talked with someone who volunteers with the local neighbourhood association, and they had to fight tooth-and-nail to even get a community garden set up along CP's property line. According to her, the only real reason CP is still holding on to that yard is in case a passenger line between Calgary and Edmonton comes to fruition. Until then, they're using it for lumber shipments.

 

[Platinum107]

Where would a new commuter/inter city train station be placed in Edmonton? I assume the current VIA station wouldn't be the best particularly for trains from the south. Would the CP right of way work for a station to meet up with the new Gondola in Strathcona or would they take a train to a station new the Leg grounds crossing over a new shared use high level bridge?

Realistically, The CP Strathcona Junction Yard directly south of Whyte Avenue is the best candidate for a Regional/Commuter/HSR combined station, for services south of the city that is. I could see a secondary station being built on that empty parcel of land behind the RAM in downtown for North, East and West services (including the current VIA line).

Only in my dreams did I come up with the concept of a large through-running underground station directly in the heart of downtown, being served by various tunnels branching to the north and a new 4-track rail bridge crossing the river from the south. I can acknowledge that the cost of something like this is astronomical and therefore we'll probably, most likely, never see it happen but it's fun to think about it!!

 

[Gronk!]

I would forget about a downtown CP terminal unless there is a new bridge in the works. The High Level Bridge has the ERRS streetcars and that living bridge project on the go.
The Whyte Ave terminal south of Whyte - or even north of Whyte - could potentially link up with the ERRS terminal and the gondola terminal.

 

[CplKlinger]

I would forget about a downtown CP terminal unless there is a new bridge in the works. The High Level Bridge has the ERRS streetcars and that living bridge project on the go.

Plus it's too weak to support even the LRT, let alone full-sized passenger trains.

 

[Gronk!]

There was a time when passenger trains did cross the High Level Bridge until 1989

 

[The_Cat]

It’s tough to convince commuters to take a train when there is a freeway accommodating 110 km/h vehicles.

 

[BASE]

Would indeed need to be incorporated as part of the high level bridge replacement. Would be nice to have it cross the river but Whyte Ave area would also be suitable with the streetcars & gondola as discussed.

 

[CplKlinger]

There was a time when passenger trains did cross the High Level Bridge until 1989

There certainly was. Unfortunately, a lot has changed since then.

From the article:
"The High Level Bridge’s main trusses had already lost an average 44 per cent of their width by the time the City of Edmonton took ownership of the bridge in 1994, Stantec engineers say.

City maintenance efforts and repainting has helped slow the loss. The damage only increased five per cent in the last 25 years, they estimated. On the upper level, the railway stringers and floor beams were at 58 per cent and 50 per cent, respectively.

Much of the damaged can’t be seen. The beams are joined by steel plates and rivets. Pack rust builds up inside that connection. That causes plates to bend and rivets to be overloaded, threatening to break the connection, wrote the engineers: 'We cannot recommend a significant increase in loading on the bridge.'"

Could it be brought back to its former capacity? In theory yes, but it would be expensive and complicated.

"...the cost to restore it to original strength would be monumental, said Jason Meliefste, city branch manager for infrastructure planning and design.

'You’re dealing with a 100-year-old structure,' he said in an interview Wednesday. 'It has 5,000 steel beams, more than 1,000 different sizes, all held together with steel plates and old rivets."

 

[archited]

^^^^ And yet still it is worth saving from many different rationale viewpoints. But it does need to be repurposed away from and auto deck function.

 

[CplKlinger]

The Edmonton Radial Railway Society's museum has a DVD with colour footage of the streetcar system, shot by an American tourist in the summer of 1949. They don't own the copyright so they can't sell copies themselves, and you need to go there to see it. But here are a couple of pictures I took of the video which shows trains crossing the High Level Bridge. It's not the best quality, since I used my phone camera to take a picture of a video while it was playing, but hopefully you still find it interesting.

Here are some other pics just for posterity.

 

[CplKlinger]

^^^^ And yet still it is worth saving from many different rationale viewpoints. But it does need to be repurposed away from and auto deck function.

I agree with you 100%, it would be criminal to neglect it until it had to be torn down. I'm just trying to make sure people understand that there's a reason nothing heavier than a streetcar can currently traverse it.

 

[EdwardEdm]

There was a time when passenger trains did cross the High Level Bridge until 1989

Not quite. CP ceased serving their Downtown station in 1972, followed by it's demolition in 1978 or 1979 as I recall. From then on CP operated to their Strathcona station, and VIA Rail maintained that when they took over passenger operations.
The CP trackage over the High Level Bridge into Downtown Edmonton, curved towards the west north of 104 Ave where they interchanged with CN, so it wasn't conducive for running passenger trains into the CN Tower. Having said that, they could have easily made a reverse move into/ out of the station, not unlike VIA does into their Edmonton station today.

 

[Platinum107]

It’s tough to convince commuters to take a train when there is a freeway accommodating 110 km/h vehicles.

There isn't a freeway like that, at least not going into the city.

People will take the train if it's competitive in travel times, frequency, coverage and convenience relative to cars. The fact that Edmonton doesn't have an inner-city freeway network actually gives the feasibility of a regional rail network (not commuter, there's a difference) a leg up compared to similar American cities. The actual Achilles Heel for quality medium and long-distance passenger trains in Canada is the duopoly that CN and CP have on the physical rail network here. The Federal and Provincial governments need to have a serious conversation with the two companies around the private ownership of railway infrastructure and the drive for efficiency vs. the increasing need for a more sustainable and practical transportation option going forward.

A country can have a great passenger and great freight rail network coexist at the same time, but something has to be done to get both to a good solid state, whereas at the moment one is good and the other is practically non-existent. So what could the solution be? Nationalize the entire track network and have private and public companies run on it? Convince and support these private companies in running their own passenger services as they did in the past? build an entirely separate network slowly from scratch? Each of these have their own unique challenges and benefits, but I'll support any measure which allows me and future generations of Edmontonians, Albertans and Canadians a sustainable, affordable and reliable choice for our mobility.

 

[quit]

There isn't a freeway like that, at least not going into the city.

People will take the train if it's competitive in travel times, frequency, coverage and convenience relative to cars. The fact that Edmonton doesn't have an inner-city freeway network actually gives the feasibility of a regional rail network (not commuter, there's a difference) a leg up compared to similar American cities. The actual Achilles Heel for quality medium and long-distance passenger trains in Canada is the duopoly that CN and CP have on the physical rail network here. The Federal and Provincial governments need to have a serious conversation with the two companies around the private ownership of railway infrastructure and the drive for efficiency vs. the increasing need for a more sustainable and practical transportation option going forward.

A country can have a great passenger and great freight rail network coexist at the same time, but something has to be done to get both to a good solid state, whereas at the moment one is good and the other is practically non-existent. So what could the solution be? Nationalize the entire track network and have private and public companies run on it? Convince and support these private companies in running their own passenger services as they did in the past? build an entirely separate network slowly from scratch? Each of these have their own unique challenges and benefits, but I'll support any measure which allows me and future generations of Edmontonians, Albertans and Canadians a sustainable, affordable and reliable choice for our mobility.

I can't see nationalization of the track network ever happening again.