Eight months ago the city’s LRT network plan amounted to six fat arrows radiating from downtown. While it was nice and all, I worried that nobody had figured out how these different legs were going to tie together.
The council decision to use low-floor trains for new lines a few months later introduced the concept of a central circulation loop, but it was still unclear what that meant.
Then a more detailed consultant’s diagram went public, and suddenly it all made sense. Councillor Don Iveson calls it the "Hope Springs Eternal" map, and if you’re interested in seeing it, he’s posted it at doniveson.ca.
The concept is pretty simple, actually: lines to west Edmonton, Mill Woods, and Sherwood Park all radiate from a central loop.
The loop is rough, but could run from downtown to the University of Alberta via 102 or 103 Ave. and the High Level Bridge, turn down Whyte Ave.e to Bonnie Doon, and then head back to downtown, crossing the river somewhere near the Muttart Conservatory.
The three lines branch off at various points: the line to the west just north of Corona, the line to to the southeast at Bonnie Doon, and the line to the east tentatively somewhere between there and the river.
Operationally, three routes could exist: west to east (via the university and Whyte Avenue), southeast to west (via downtown), and east to southeast (via downtown, the university, and Whyte).
Connections with the existing system could be made at Churchill, Corona, University, and Health Sciences stations.
The upshot is that there would be a direct train between any two stations on the low-floor system, and each route would connect with the existing high-floor trains in at least one place.
This system is pretty flexible – not only can trains run from any branch to any other branch (or even just around the circle), but it would be easy to add another branch later on without unbalancing everything.
It’s not perfect, especially with its use of surface streets and the High Level to get between Churchill and University when we’ve got a perfectly good subway. This was an inevitable result of the decision to switch train technologies, however.
All in all, it’s the best way to arrange the three legs so that the new stations have both direct service to downtown as well as Whyte Avenue. While it won’t be right away, I’d be pretty happy to see something like this passed by council.
