The "E&N" debate, where the provincial government hopes that the railway will rot away, giving them the excuse to wash their collective hands of it, holds the key for the ongoing fight to mitigate the effects of global warming and climate change.
Recent letters advocating rail or bus solutions illustrate the schism with transportation planning in this province.
The bus solution is favoured by many because it is cheap, but therein lies the problem, the customers view buses as cheap and tend to take the car instead. The articulated buses or double 'artics' so favoured in photos, bring their own problems, as they are expensive to maintain and have poor operating characteristics in inclement weather and do not operate at all in snow. The double 'artics' are illegal to operate in Canada unless they operate on a fully dedicated right-of-way, which brings the cost up to that of light rail.
The one option not discussed is TramTrain.
TramTrain is a modern tram or streetcar, so designed it can operate as a tram or on the mainline railways in conjunction with regular railway traffic, thus greatly reducing the cost of installation, enabling the TramTrain to service destinations otherwise impossible. One TramTrain route in Karlsruhe, Germany is 210 km and to deal with longer routes, there are "Bistro" versions of TramTrain, complete with small coffee bar and a WC.
The brilliance of TramTrain is that it can leave the mainline and venture into city centres, operating as LRT or streetcar, taking the tram to where the customer wants to go!
By using TramTrain, it leaves the railway open for future freight and tourist trains, which will be very important in future years.
The big hurdle is dated thinking by politicians, bureaucrats and planners, who comfortably reside in the past, extolling the virtues of transit solutions long proven otherwise not.
The key to success is "user-friendliness" and TramTrain has proven that it is not just extremely user-friendly but it is the affordable transit solution for the 21st century.
D. Malcolm Johnston
Rail for the Valley
Delta
