Proposal would see four light lines built
![Colleen Hardwick. Town Hall Meeting with Vancouver's mayoral candidates.............................(Photo credit: Francis Georgian / Postmedia) , Vancouver. Vancouver Reporter: , ( Francis Georgian / PNG staff photographer) [PNG Merlin Archive]](https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/vancouversun/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/png-0924-3.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=288&h=216)
TEAM mayoral candidate Colleen Hardwick announced Wednesday she wants to can a proposed SkyTrain extension from Arbutus Street to the University of British Columbia in favour of four light rail lines.
The plan would not affect the current SkyTrain extension to Arbutus, which is under construction. But it could drastically change future transportation options in Vancouver.
Start your day with a roundup of B.C.-focused news and opinion delivered straight to your inbox at 7 a.m., Monday to Friday.
Thanks for signing up!
A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder.
The next issue of Sunrise presented by Vancouver Sun will soon be in your inbox.
“For the same price as seven subway kilometres to UBC we can bring 58 kilometres of state-of-the-art light rail transit to every corner of the city,” Hardwick said in a news release.
The proposed light rail lines would stretch across the city, from the west side to the east side, downtown to the Fraser River.
A “Crosstown Line” would run from UBC to the PNE via Granville Island and the new St. Paul’s Hospital in the False Creek Flats. The 17km line would run up W 10th and West Broadway to Arbutus, where it would link with the Broadway SkyTrain extension now being built.
It would then veer north along the Arbutus Corridor, turn east near Granville Island, head north by Main and then go east again along Hastings.
The 15 kilometre “Arbutus-Marine” Line would link with the Crosstown Line at Arbutus and head south along the Arbutus Corridor to Marine Station and the River District.
The “41st Ave” Line would be 18 kilometres long and run from UBC to Metrotown in Burnaby. The “Commercial-Victoria” Line would run from Hastings to Marine, a distance of 8 kilometres.
Hardwick said that light rail would cost “less than one-sixth the price per kilometre” of a subway. She said that four planned subway projects in Toronto and Montreal are estimated to cost $700 million to $1.1 billion a kilometre.
“There’s so many problems with the subway, not the least of which is the cost, which is not covered, despite what has been advertised,” Hardwick said before a noon press conference at Arbutus and Broadway.
“We’ve only had the money to study it, not to actually build it. I think it’s important that people be clear on that.”
She also noted “subway construction is really designed for a tower form of housing to accompany it. I think that surface rail which allows more ground-oriented housing typologies is more suitable.
“There’s also the question of the effect from a climate perspective, that it’s much more destructive to be building towers with concrete, the subway with concrete as well.
“So (rail has a) much lower cost, without the climate implications. With a better form of urban design, we can be building surface rail.”
The City of Vancouver had several designs for a streetcar or light rail system in recent years. The NPA proposed a $100 million streetcar system in 2011, but lost to Vision Vancouver and any plans for a streetcar system were nixed.
More to come …
jmackie@postmedia.com
