Urban rail: new engine for development (Canada)

[marmar]

from the Globe & Mail:



Urban rail: new engine for development

Frances Bula
Vancouver — Special to The Globe and Mail

Last updated on Monday, Sep. 28, 2009 03:45PM EDT


Vancouver's plush new $2-billion transit line, the first rapid-transit link between a Canadian city and its airport, is so popular with the public that thousands waited on the streets on opening day in August just to try it out, while 80,000 a day have been riding it since.

What's less visible to the naked eye is the Canada Line ride that municipalities, landowners and property developers hope to take by developing areas around new stations in Richmond, Vancouver and the airport's Sea Island.

“With the Canada Line coming, it was not business as usual. We knew that,” says Terry Crowe, the manager of policy planning in the suburb of Richmond south of Vancouver, which launched an aggressive initiative five years ago to redesign its city around the five transit stations in preparation for new development.

When additional plans become reality, thousands more residents, shoppers and employees will be clustered around those stations in developments that have been designed to mesh with the 19-kilometre line that links the Vancouver waterfront and central Richmond – with a spur line to the Vancouver International Airport.

....(snip)....

While people complain that Vancouver has been slow off the mark to plan for development around its transit stations, the same can't be said for Toronto and Montreal.

Both cities have active plans for downtown-to-airport rapid-transit links on their books for construction some time over the next five years, and both are already taking a close look at planning around the stations for those new lines.

“At all the stations along the Eglinton Crosstown, we will be intensifying,” says Rod McPhail, the director of transportation planning for Toronto. (The city is preparing for a 31-kilometre, $4.6-billion line from Kennedy station to Pearson airport with a completion date of 2016.) In order to encourage that intense development, Toronto is going to do more advance work around each station than is typical for other kinds of neighbourhoods. ..........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/real-estate/urban-rail-new-engine-for-development/article1304421/

[pinto]

1. “transit-oriented development.”

Interesting approach, especially for areas with little public transit in place. The only missing comment I noticed was any mention of mixed income housing. But the concept overall is interesting.

[Greyhound]

2. How boring. Imagine wasting our time with stories of national efforts to help

citizens and stimulate their economy.

God! Don't they have any arrested celebrities there? Isn't anyone having any sex up there?

[stuball111]

3. Yeah.. Canucks are boring...I heard some guy got a speeding ticket up there...

and some people almost had sex...but decided to go to a hockey game instead..:rofl: :rofl: