Speculating.....InTransitBC gets financial bonuses if it can open it ahead of schedule, and right now construction and testing is ahead of schedule. They originally said train testing would begin in the summer....instead, it started 3 months early.

A great holiday, to be sure. Hasn't it officially been renamed La fete Nationale?

__________________The opposite of political correctness is not unvarnished truth-telling. It is political expression that is careless toward the beliefs and attitudes different than one’s own. In its more extreme fashion, it is incivility, indecency or vulgarity. These are the true alternatives to political correctness. l

He's got the dream, now Mayor Gérald Tremblay needs the cash to build a tramway network, extend the métro, set up an airport shuttle and achieve other promises in his 20-year, $8.1-billion scheme to improve the flow of people and goods on Montreal Island.

On a day filled with competing news conferences and sparring press releases by Tremblay and city hall opposition leader Benoit Labonté, one of his main rivals in next year's municipal election, the mayor rolled out the final draft of his transportation plan yesterday.

While the new version appears unchanged from the initial draft he unveiled one year and two public consultations ago, Tremblay raised the stakes yesterday by pledging to complete the first of three tramway lines by 2013.

It's a commitment from my administration and we have an obligation to proceed," Tremblay said.

"Everyone," he added, "now recognizes the importance of public transit."

The city will launch the first of $1 million worth of feasibility and impact studies on the initial tramway route in the coming weeks, Tremblay said.

As The Gazette reported last week, the first line would be a six-kilometre circuit linking Old Montreal and downtown along Berri St., de la Commune St., Peel St. and René Lévesque Blvd.

The line would pass through the Griffintown neighbourhood south of downtown, where Montreal city council recently approved a controversial $1.3-billion commercial and residential project by a developer that urged the city to build the tramway.

The developer, Devimco Inc., has pledged $15 million toward construction, provided the tramway is built by 2014.

Other projects include:

- Building a rail shuttle between downtown and Trudeau airport within five years ($550 million), and then extending the route through the West Island.

- Extending the métro Blue Line one kilometre east from St. Michel Blvd. to Pie IX Blvd. within five years ($170 million) and, in 10 years, to Anjou borough ($775 million).

- Adding 500 public transit buses over 10 years ($300 million).

The pricetag for the initial Old Montreal-downtown tramway route is estimated at $260 million and should be ready for test runs around 2011, the plan says.

In the meantime, the Montreal Transit Corp. will operate buses on the route, starting on June 23.

The agency projects the bus route will become popular, with eventually 12,000 trips per weekday, and double that number during weekends, MTC spokesperson Isabelle Tremblay said last week.

The next two tramway routes, to be built in 10 years, would run on Park Ave. and on Côte des Neiges Rd., between Jean Talon and downtown.

The estimated cost of the three lines, covering 20 kilometres, is $985 million, the plan says.

But a key question for critics yesterday was whether Tremblay can bankroll his ambitions.

During a rival news conference to announce a plan for a new maritime entranceway to Montreal, Labonté said he's not against a tramway, but said his rival has yet to justify the choice.

"Santa Claus tells us in June that we are going to get an electric tramway," Labonté said.
"But we don't know which Christmas it's going to be."

Labonté and his Vision Montreal party also accused Tremblay of low-balling the cost to build the tramway.

The plan pegged the price at $45 million per kilometre.

However, studies by the provincial Metropolitan Transit Agency set the price per kilometre of a tramway line on Park Ave. at between $71 million and $88 million in 2005, Labonté said.

Tremblay said the cost cited in his plan is a fair estimate.

As for financing, the city is "very serious" about installing road tolls to garner about $200 million a year, he said.

The city is also negotiating with the Quebec government for new sources of revenue, he said.

The federal government, meanwhile, said yesterday it's open to funding for Montreal.

The government plans to invest $5 billion in infrastructure in Quebec in the coming years, Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon said in an email response to The Gazette.

The government is already collaborating with the city and the province on studies for the proposed rail link between downtown, Trudeau airport and the West Island, he said.

"Today is a big recycling day," Bergeron, a long-standing proponent of tramways, said following Tremblay's news conference.

"The bitter part of this announcement is that it's completely recycled and designed to captivate, but ... the willingness to implement isn't there."

The city of Montreal's $985-million tramway dream consists of:

- 20 kilometres of tramway service on three lines, beginning with a closed circuit through Old Montreal, Griffintown and downtown to be built by 2013. The other routes would be on Côte des Neiges Rd. and Park Ave., both between Jean Talon St. and downtown. More routes are possible in the future, the city says.

Busby Perkins+Will has been commissioned to design three stations for the Richmond portion of the new Canada Line transit system, an elevated line running parallel to No. 3 Road. Aberdeen Station, Lansdowne Station, and Richmond-Brighouse Station will be designed as a family, united by similarities in structure, glazing, and roof elements.

The stations will be fully glazed to encourage inward and outward visibility. Platforms will be accessible primarily via stairs and escalators, with transparent elevators providing wheelchair access. On the platforms, extensive use of glass will create a visual connection with the surrounding area. Distinctive wooden roofs will provide weather protection for the length of the platform, and will clearly identify the stations as part of the Canada Line's Richmond segment.

Each station has been concieved as a catalyst for future development, and has been designed to complement its envisioned surroundings. Aberdeen will support mixed-use commercial development, Richmond-Brighouse will serve a large-scale urban project, and Lansdowne will be surrounded by a large-scale park and plaza. Strategic daylighting will ensure that future development does not reduce the level of daylight brought into the stations, and rooftop rainwater collection will be incorporated into landscape design features. Other opportunities to incorporate sustainable principles are being pursued as designs progress.

So yeah, the tramway is definitely making its grand return to Montreal within the next 5 years! (our old trams disappeared in the 50s I think)

But it would be really bad if there's no money/will left in the meantime to beef up the rest of our transit system.
Like someone said in the Quebec section, many many neighbourhoods on the island immensely need metro stations or something equivalent...

Hamilton is aiming to have a rapid transit plan by the fall in hopes of securing provincial funding.

The city is focusing on light rail as its top option after it was overwhelming endorsed by the public. The public works committee agreed yesterday to allow staff to develop a feasibility study over the summer.

If council signs off on the plan, the city hopes to deliver a request for funding to Metrolinx in the fall. The province has set aside $17.5 billion for rapid transit.

Mayor Fred Eisenberger said the city must move quickly to get government funding before it's gobbled up by other cities. "I really think we need to have our oar deep in the water by fall."

Metrolinx has not told the city how much money it would be willing to invest, but city staff said they were told to "dream big." A Hamilton light rail system would cost $1.1 billion. Several councillors agreed to take the next step, but are worried about the potential cost to taxpayers.

They're calling it the biggest bridge repair project in Canada. And transport officials are pledging that the two-year, multi-million-dollar facelift about to be received by the Honoré Mercier Bridge - which links the Montreal borough of LaSalle to the Mohawk reserve at Kahnawake - will not prove to be motorists' biggest pain in the neck.

But a South Shore mayor whose 10,000-resident municipality is linked to Montreal by the 74-year-old span wonders whether the renovation - while clearly necessary - is really what's needed to meet the long-term interests of residents living in the region.

"More and more, people are using their cars to get into Montreal," said Jacques Lambert, mayor of the town of Mercier. "(The bridge renovation) is like a Band-Aid. What we need is more public transit, transit adapted to the needs of the region.

In that regard I guess we're like every other (Quebec) municipality, although in our case the need is greater. Especially in Châteauguay, Mercier and down to Huntingdon. We have no (commuter train), no métro. We have (inter-city) bus lines, but they're not co-ordinated."

Lambert's comments preceded the unveiling today of the details of the Mercier Bridge renovation, an operation that will involve reinforcing the span's supports and replacing the deck - the foundation of the road surface that vehicles ride over.

Officially announced last April by Lawrence Cannon and Julie Boulet, the federal and provincial ministers of transport respectively, the Mercier renovation will effect some much-needed repairs to a 1.3-kilometre span that has become infamous for potholes, poor road conditions and traffic jams.

The first phase of the refit will see the steel supports reinforced and the deck replaced on elevated access ramps that go through the Kahnawake territory. That phase of the project is expected to cost $66 million, $57 million of which is being paid by Ottawa, the balance by Quebec. Work is expected to be completed by next year. The second phase of the renovation is expected to deal with the Mercier's superstructure. The refit is to be completely finished by 2011.

Just how much that work will disrupt the flow of traffic across the bridge, which is used more than 28 million times annually, remains to be seen and is on the agenda of today's news conference. Thus far, transport officials have stressed that detours and disruptions on the span will be kept to a minimum and that if a shutdown of lanes does become necessary, it would not happen during the day "and especially not during rush hour."

That said, rush-hour traffic jams will probably only get worse once drivers have to contend with work crews on the span. Any detours by commuters avoiding the Mercier would also probably create a domino effect, shifting the area's Montreal-bound traffic flow east toward the Champlain and Victoria bridges.

That possibility for the summer of 2008 was a reality for motorists who found themselves re-routed by the Oka crisis in the summer of 1990, when Mohawks blockaded the Mercier span.

Yet while that crisis created traffic problems, a partial solution was found downstream, as cars heading to Montreal from the western South Shore were routed along the seaway dike and across the ice bridge erected parallel to the Champlain.

The city is eyeing 13 digital advertising displays for the downtown core to complement the reinvention of No. 3 Road and generate cash for the city.

IBI Group, the consultant heading the city’s No. 3 Road restoration project, is recommending one large-format LED screen for the exterior of each downtown Canada Line station and 10 freestanding wrap-around displays along Richmond’s main drag.

In his report, the city’s Amarjeet Rattan said the technology could be “aesthetically pleasing, engaging and informative without creating a sense of visual pollution or overload” and generate revenue for the city.

“Many other public transit systems around the world have successfully introduced similar types of advertising at stations and other prime locations,” he said.

On Monday, staff’s recommendation to kick-start a pilot program for the displays was set for a council vote, but it was pulled from the council table.

City spokesperson Kim Decker said staff are folding new technical details into the report. She said it’s not clear when the recommendation will go to a council vote.

The LED screens, similar to big-screen TVs, would be attached to the Aberdeen, Lansdowne and Richmond-Brighouse stations. The 10 360-degree displays would be located at various points on No. 3 Road between Cambie and Saba roads, under the Canada Line guideway.

The proposed technology is said to offer images as sharp in daylight as they are in darkness, can withstand weather and be connected to the Internet.

According to Rattan’s report, the project could net the city $400,000 a year in revenue, based on a sharing agreement between the city, InTransitBC and a partner that would pay for the capital costs of installing the technology.

The city would also have access to portions of the displays for use by city departments at no cost.

The cash could go to the city’s public art reserve, leisure facilities development reserve and general revenue, according to Rattan.

Coun. Rob Howard called it a “pretty significant opportunity” for the city to generate revenue from a source other than property taxes.

“We talk all the time about property tax being an inappropriate in some instances, source of revenue for for a bunch of different city programs. This is an opportunity to generate some additional revenue, while we’re enlivening the street.”

In January, council voted to explore opportunities with InTransitBC for multimedia technology along with Canada Line on No. 3 Road that could be used in providing public information, visual displays, audio and advertising.

I'm just wondering what the current status of each cities rapid transit projects? Let's do a quick summary...

Victoria- ?Vancouver-Canada Line under constructionEdmonton- South LRT under construction and to open around 2010. Engineering plans unveiled for NE, N and futher south extensions...Calgary- ?Winnipeg- ?Ottawa-London-Kitchener-Waterloo-Niagara Falls-Hamilton- "aiming to have a rapid transit plan by the fall" -The Hamilton SpectatorToronto- any news about the metro extension?Montreal- two 1-station extensions to the metro will start soon, and endless talk about a LRT line to the south shore suburbsQuebec City- ?Halifax-