Showing posts sorted by date for query Metro Vancouver. Sort by relevance Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by date for query Metro Vancouver. Sort by relevance Show all posts

Friday, March 13, 2026

Dunsmuir Tunnel in Downtown Vancouver, SkyTrain service to be reduced on weekends until June

 https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/downtown-vancouver-skytrain-service-delays-weekends 

Ideally, if a subway or metro line doesn't have 4 tracks, 3 would be the next best thing. Then 2 tracks could always remain operational while the 3rd is being repaired. For the most part, Skytrain is just a double track system. Unfortunately, the YVR-Canada Line is even single tracked at the end of the line in YVR and in downtown Richmond. The Canada Line should have been the 1st phase of an eventual south extension to Delta and the BC ferry terminal. Plus, a north extension from Waterfront_station_in Vancouver to Lonsdale_Quay and the ferry terminal. This would be a vital link between Canada_Line and the Horseshoe Bay ferry terminal. Unfortunately, Vancouver and BC are about maintaining congestion and transportation inefficiency.

Perhaps someday, if Vancouver is ever allowed to function like a proper big city, the Dunsmuir_Tunnel could be extended under Stanley Park and the 1st Narrows to Park Royal and the ferry terminal. However, what's more likely to happen is that after the Dunsmuir_Tunnel reaches Waterfront_station, the line will continue east. https://evelazarus.com/the-dunsmuir-tunnel 

https://buzzer.translink.ca/2022/04/new-tunnel-technology-will-transform-your-skytrain-trip/ 


https://searcharchives.vancouver.ca/construction-progress-photo-of-cpr-dunsmuir-tunnel-10 

https://searcharchives.vancouver.ca/construction-progress-photo-of-cpr-dunsmuir-tunnel-9

Saturday, January 31, 2026

Why Greater Toronto Has Several Skylines

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eI9WJa9Q8dA 

Of course many large urban areas around the world have more than 1 or 2 skylines or tower clusters. 

For the longest time, no building in Vancouver or BC, was allowed to be as tall as the 1930s CIBC tower, which is now a stump.

https://www.blogto.com/city/2017/05/toronto-lost-observation-deck-commerce-court-north/

https://www.torontojourney416.com/canadian-bank-of-commerce-building/ 

https://www.25king.ca/the-history 

It wasn't until the early 1970s when stumpy, Vancouver allowed a building to be taller than the L.A. City Hall, or the Smith Tower in Seattle. 

The 1930s CIBC tower, the L.A. City Hall and the Smith Tower, would still be prominent towers in Vancouver, but stumps in their own cities. 

Despite Vancouver being divided by an inlet and a river, the city wasn't able to build a huge wall along Boundary Road. Thus, the KEEP THEM OUT agenda was a little thwarted. The various White city councils tried to do the next best thing. That was to symbolically impose various restrictions as a reluctance to think, plan and build on a BIG city scale. The time especially from 1960 to 2000 had predominantly White City Hall and its councils continually impose several overlapping restrictions. 

Since Vancouver can't control immigration or the movements of non-white people, keeping things small and backwards, means that less people will move there than to Toronto, Montreal, Calgary and Edmonton. However, with a mild winter climate, more and more people want to move to backwards BC, especially small-minded Vancouver and provincial Victoria. 

In spite of immigration and Multiculturalism, Vancouver was to perpetually promote its small scale agenda. 

While the first Skytrain line can finally run 5 car trains, the stations weren't designed to become long enough to eventually accomodate 9 car trains like the big city Montreal Metro has. 

The 2nd and 3rd Skytrain lines are still only running 2 car joke trains. Running 8-10 car trains is what a proper big city would do, but not backwards Vancouver. 

Narrow bridges provides strong symbolism of the cities narrow-mindedness. When bridges are too narrow, its difficult to have a proper express or rapid bus system. The reluctance to build parallel bus and HOV bridges helps to maintain the congestive planning approach that is vancouver and the Greater Region. 

Vancouver's refusal to build parallel bike bridges has meant that 2 lanes were removed from the Burrard Bridge, 1 lane from the Cambie Bridge and 2 lanes from the Granville Bridge. 

Keeping buildings symbolically short when compared to what scenic Sydney, Auckland, SF and Seattle allow, also helps to maintain Vancouver's reluctance to enter the big and tall urban scale. In fact, the scenic setting that Vancouver is in has been used as the main excuse to continually scale the city down. Yet, several scenic cities around the world are either able to have wider bridges, wider roads, longer trains or taller buildings. 

The world is mostly composed of non-white people. Canada has less than 1% of the world's population and stubborn Vancouver symbolically remains as a small provincial backwater on the Pacific Rim. 

https://centralparktower.com.au Unlike Perth, Vancouver forbids 50 story office towers and Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne size residential towers. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/108_St_Georges_Terrace In fact, no office building in Vancouver has been permitted to have a 40th floor. However, since Burnaby and Surrey aren't under the restrictive controls of Vancouver, they will eventually allow office towers over 40 stories. 

Despite Australia having less people than Canada, Perth is allowed to have taller buildings, wider bridges and longer trains than Vancouver. Taller buildings, wider bridges and longer trains are even less likely in Halifax than whats in Brisbane or Queensland.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q1_(building) To see buildings on a similar scale of what Brisbane allows, one has to get to Greater Toronto. Brisbane is allowed to have some buildings that would even be impressive in Melbourne and Sydney. 

While Montreal is allowed to have taller buildings than Vancouver, Montreal isn't allowed to have Sydney size towers. Especially not on the scale of what Melbourne and Toronto permit. 

Wednesday, January 21, 2026

Perth, WA, Australia

 https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/travel-information/driving-in-wa/driving-in-perth 

https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/technical-commercial/smartfreeways While WA take a spart aproach, backwards BC still takes a dumb approach to things.

https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/projects-initiatives/all-projects/metropolitan/smartfreeways/ 4 lanes each way with 2 track in the middle. You won't find that in Vancouver or anywhere in backwards BC. 

https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/projects-initiatives/all-projects/metropolitan/canning-bridge-bus-interchange 

https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/technical-commercial/smartfreeways/how-to-use-a-smfy/making-way-for-emergency-vehicles

https://www.mainroads.wa.gov.au/projects-initiatives/all-projects/metropolitan In contrast, the Metro Vancouver Region is a joke!  

"Perth is Australia’s fourth biggest city, with a population of 2.3 million. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhS-fiJ14GU Perhaps surprisingly, Perth has an expansive suburban railway network. 8 lines, 85 stations and 270 km of track – it’s a large system for a relatively small city." 


https://jfdatalinks.blogspot.com/search?q=Perth

Saturday, January 17, 2026

The Great SkyTrain upgrade (potential)

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_D2CXdZ_4Ro 

Unfortunatly, the first 2 Skytrain lines were designed to only have 80m stations and trains. The 3rd line to YVR and Richmond was only designed to have 50m stations. In contrast, the Montreal Metro has stations long enough to accomodate 152.4m long trains. Thus, the greatest mistake was to not enable the Skytrain to eventually become a very high capacity train system. Combine that with mostly narrow bridges and roads in Greater Vancouver and you have the epitome of congestive urban planning. 

At least by late 2025 some of the new 5 car trains were out, along with some of the old 6 car little box trains on the 1st line. The 2nd and 3rd lines are still running 2 car joke trains, but that symbolically fits right in with the, KEEP BC SMALL AND BACKWARDS mentality. 

A proper big city long-term plan would have been to allow for 10 car trains, with at least 5-6 car trains at the start when each line opened.

Wednesday, January 7, 2026

Metro Vancouver's SkyTrain transit system turns 40

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VeSQtHusn1A  

The history of SkyTrain 1985-2025 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pEt76BgRP5E 

Expo Line Extension (Surrey - Langley) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CavX1TWYUsE 

Surrey Langley Skytrain Construction https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRARdwNIbls 

17 years and waiting for UBC SkyTrain https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIEhFrTuqkc  

YVR-Skytrain: Canada Line https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvwFeKtbyxU

Wednesday, December 24, 2025

Spacex starship height

 https://www.spacex.com/vehicles/starship 123m or 403 feet in length.

https://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-starship-nasa-saturn-v-sls-moon-rockets-comparison-2019-7

https://www.nps.gov/wamo/faqs.htm 169m or 555 feet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Monument 


Even the Skytrains in backwards Vancouver aren't allowed to be as long, due to such short stations. Of course the Montreal Metro can run 152.4m or 500 foot long trains, because of building longer stations in the first place.

Tuesday, December 23, 2025

A Six-hour SkyTrain shutdown caps chaotic pre-Christmas morning in Metro Vancouver

 https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/bridges-skytrain-shutdown-chaos-december-23-2025 

There is nothing like short trains that stop running and mostly narrow bridges which prevents a proper and efficient regional rapid bus network.

Monday, December 15, 2025

Metro Vancouver leadership chaos

 https://globalnews.ca/video/11579521/metro-vancouver-leadership-chaos 

This has been such an inept and mismaged organization for several decades. Too many short trains and mostly narrow bridges, but always enough money to put into another $HIT box project. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metro_Vancouver_Regional_District

Saturday, November 22, 2025

Some Canada Mega-projects Under Construction

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwsOVZ-j7hg 

Oakridge_Park is on a much smaller scale than MetrotownBrentwood and Lougheed. It will especially be on a much smaller scale than Parramatta in NSW. 

Unfortunatly, the Oakridge-41st_Avenue_station was only designed to have 50m platforms, when it should have been at least 100m. Thus, the utter foolishness has meant that instead of allowing for a future level station clearance to accomodate 5 car trains, the Canada (embassament) Line was only designed to just have 2.5 car trains. While its extremely short stations might have been disguised as a cost saving measurer, there didn't seem to be any key people onboard to make sure that it could eventually become a proper big city train line. Its sad that a line which opened in 2009 is still only running 2 car trains. While the 2.5 car configuration is still a joke of a train, at least half of an extra coach-length is better than nothing. Plus, there should have been extra cars ordered by now so at least during the very busy times the trains could be operating at 1 minute headways. Unfortunatly, this goes against the Vancouver & BC congestion planning mentality.

Despite being built several years after the Sydney_Harbour_Bridge, the joke that is the Pattullo_Bridge was designed to only have 4 narrow lanes & only 1 sidewalk. Of course the replacement_bridge will only open with 2 lanes each way. It was as if someone really wanted to make sure that there won't be 2 bus lanes and no HOV lanes when the bridge opens. While the new bridge is designed to be expanded from a 4 lane joke to eventually having 6 lanes, it still won't be wide enough to accomodate 2 HOV lanes as well as 2 bus lanes. Of course the new bridge won't have any emergency lanes, just like the old bridge. However, it will have 2 bike lanes and 2 sidewalks. https://www.globalhighways.com/news/pattullo-bridge-completion-end-year Its only fitting that in backwards BC this new bridge wouldn't be designed to eventually have a lower deck to accomodate 2 bus lanes and 2 LRT tracks. 

If the planners were afraid to symbolically have a wide bridge between NW and Surrey, the old Pattullo_Bridge should have been designed to eventually have a lower deck for trams, trucks and busses. Even when the SkyBridge between NW and Surrey opened in 1990, it wasn't designed to have any bus lanes or emergency vehicle lanes and especially, no bike and footpaths. 

Is Vancouver the best city in North America? (2019) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8dmVUrNt38

 One of the biggest mistakes in Vancouver & SW BC is to have short trains combined with mostly narrow bridges. Thus, the region doesn't get to have long, high capacity trains and there isn't a proper regional network of bus-bridges. The refusal to twin most of the bridges means that it's almost impossible to have a proper and efficient regional network of rapid-bus and HOV lanes.  

While Montreal built the REM to augment their long-train Metro system, Vancouver should have allowed for enough clearance to eventually have 500 foot long trains. 80m-50m Skytrain stations are going to become inadequate, when there should have been a 152.4m provision so that the trains could eventually become as long as the ones on the Montreal Metro. 

Is Regional Rail in the Future of British Columbia? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PeIOVy6fFc

Monday, November 17, 2025

Broadway Subway Construction as of November 2025

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uot7oIA9-ZE The station platforms will be 80m, which can only accomodate a 5 car train.

Unfortunatly, even if this segment had 500' or 152.4m long stations like the Montreal Metro, the rest of the first 2 lines only have 80m stations. Thus, 80m is only about 52% of the length of a Montreal Metro station, which can accomodate 9 car trains. It's taken until 2025 for the SkyTrain to gradually start running 5 car trains. In theory, if two Vancouver 80m trains run at twice the frequency as one 152m Montreal Metro train, a similar capacity could be attained. 

However, in the long run, it would have been much more cost effective to have the first 2 SkyTrain lines stations already roughed out to 152m, or a least have enough level clearance to eventually become twice the length. But that's what a proper big city would do, something that Vancouver is against.   

Even as an initial cost saving measure, the YVR-Canada Line should have opened with 100m stations, instead of the inadequate 50m joke. Then it could immediately accomodate 5 car trains. The station platforms should have had enough level clearance to eventually accommodate a 160m long train consisting of 8 cars reaching both ferry terminals. Of course there seems to be no plan to connect YVR to both ferry terminals.

Its very difficult for BC cities to allow proper big city size infrastructure, because that would symbolize a pro growth initiative. Since the world is mostly composed of non-white people, a slow growth agenda became a clever way to symbolically demonstrate a refusal to build big. BC is multicultural, but Canada has less than 1% of the worlds population. Even in the 2020s, BC still retains some of its colonial outpost mentality. Just keep things small and backwards and try to remain a backwater for as long as possible. 

Metro Vancouver sales tax and vehicle levy suggested for new TransLink revenue sources

 https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/translink-sales-tax-vehicle-levy-new-revenue-sources-movement-competition