Vancouver Downtown Historic Railway | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Overview | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Status | Indefinitely suspended | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Owner | City of Vancouver | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Service | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Type | Heritage streetcar, seasonal | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Services | 1 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Operator(s) | Transit Museum Society | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
History | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Opened | July 29, 1998 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Closed | October 2011 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Technical | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Track gauge | 1,435 mm (4 ft 8+1⁄2 in) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Old gauge | 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Electrification | 600 V DC | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
The Vancouver Downtown Historic Railway was a heritage electric railway line that operated from 1998 to 2011 between Granville Island and Science World (Olympic Village Station after 2009), in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. It operated only on weekends and holidays, usually from May to mid-October, and was aimed primarily at tourists. Two restored interurban trams were used on the line, which used a former freight railway right-of-way.
The line was owned by the City of Vancouver. The cars were operated by volunteers from the Transit Museum Society. The car shown (1207) was privately owned. By 2018 both tram cars (1207 and 1231) have been donated and moved to the Fraser Valley Historical Railway in Cloverdale.
Service was inaugurated on July 29, 1998, and was considered to be a demonstration project for a modern downtown streetcar system that the city plans to develop. [1] It continued to operate almost every summer through 2011, as an excursion-oriented historic electric railway line. In 2010, the heritage service did not operate, with the line from west of Olympic Village used for a modern-streetcar demonstration service known as the "Olympic Line" (see section below). Temporary modifications made to the overhead wire took longer than expected to undo, delaying the start of 2011 service, with the service starting on July 1 and scheduled to run mid-October. [2] The line did not operate in 2012, [3] and service suspended indefinitely due to financial constraints with no set plans to resume operation. [4] Furthermore, a Vancouver City Council report published in March 2014 recommended against reviving service on the heritage line. [5]
When last operational in 2011, the line ran from Granville Island to Olympic Village Station, however, Olympics-related construction razed the section of line east of the Cambie Bridge.
Make/Model | Description | Fleet size | Year built | Year retired | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Built in New Westminster, British Columbia | Interurban car | 3 - only 1207 remains | 1905 | 1958 | ex-British Columbia Electric Railway |
St. Louis Car Company | Interurban car | Originally 20; 5 survive - 1231 | 1912 | 1958 | ex-British Columbia Electric Railway |
The fleet also includes an ex-Brussels La Brugeoise et Nivelles PCC-style streetcar, painted red and cream.
The line's operator, the Transit Museum Society, also owns a large fleet of vintage buses and trolley coaches.
From January 21 to March 21, 2010, [6] a 1.8-kilometre (1.1 mi) free demonstration service called the "Olympic Line" (named for the 2010 Winter Olympics) ran every six minutes, 18 hours a day on the Downtown Historic Railway between Olympic Village station and Granville Island, [6] using two modern Bombardier Flexity Outlook streetcars, No. 3050 and No. 3051, leased from the Brussels tram system. [7] The City of Vancouver and the administrators of Granville Island paid $8.5 million for associated upgrades to the infrastructure.
The two stations were single side platforms with two shelters providing partial coverage from the elements. The Olympic Village station shared the parking lot with existing Canada Line station at West 2nd Avenue and Cambie Street. The Granville Island station was only accessible via foot from Anderson Street and Lamey's Mill Road below the Granville Street Bridge and Highway 99.
Station | Connections | Location | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
Granville Island | Route 50 - Waterfront Station - False Creek South | Anderson Street and Lamey's Mill Road | Single sided platform with shelters |
Olympic Village | Canada Line Route 15 Cambie - Olympic Village Station Route 50 - Waterfront Station - False Creek South Route 84 - VCC–Clark Station - UBC | West 2nd Avenue and Cambie Street | Single sided platform with shelters. Shared parking with Olympic Village station |
The City considered the streetcar demonstration "a tremendous success", with over 550,000 boardings during the two months of the experiment. [8] Bombardier received an award for "Exceptional Performance and Outstanding Achievement" at the 2010 CUTA awards, recognizing its operation of over 13,000 one-way trips with zero equipment failures, zero station delays and zero injuries. [9] Former mayor Gregor Robertson indicated a desire to continue operation of the line, with a potential extension to Main Street-Science World station via False Creek South, but mentioned that the city alone lacks the millions of dollars needed to complete the construction and equipment purchases. [10] Nonetheless, a streetcar along the alignment used by the Olympic Line was part of two of the proposals for rapid transit running east–west through the city of Vancouver for 2020. [11]
The proposal for a full-service modern streetcar line would extend the former heritage line through Chinatown and Gastown to Waterfront Station, and eventually to Stanley Park. There would be a separate line into Yaletown with longer-term potential for a number of other lines.
On October 13, 2014, Emily Jackson, writing in Metro Vancouver Newspaper , reported that Friends of the Olympic Line called on Vancouver City Council to commit $5 million to incorporate a refurbished line into Vancouver's transit authority. [note 1] The organization has called for the line to be extended to Main Street–Science World Station. The city has allocated $400,000 to decommission the line's former route.
In a 2021 report a two line light rail network (12 km and 25 stations) using most of the old route of the heritage line as well as new routing was estimated to be in the $1.1 billion range. [13]
Innovia Metro is an automated rapid transit system manufactured by Alstom. Innovia Metro systems run on conventional metal rails and pull power from a third rail but are powered by a linear induction motor that provides traction by using magnetic force to pull on a "fourth rail" placed between the running rails. However, newer versions of the technology are available with standard electric rotary propulsion.
The British Columbia Electric Railway (BCER) was a historic railway which operated in southwestern British Columbia, Canada. Originally the parent company for, and later a division of, BC Electric Company, the BCER assumed control of existing streetcar and interurban lines in southwestern British Columbia in 1897, and operated the electric railway systems in the region until the last interurban service was discontinued in 1958. During and after the streetcar era, BC Electric also ran bus and trolleybus systems in Greater Vancouver and bus service in Greater Victoria; these systems subsequently became part of BC Transit, and the routes in Greater Vancouver eventually came under the control of TransLink. Trolley buses still run in the City of Vancouver with one line extending into Burnaby.
The Canada Line is a rapid transit line in Greater Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, that is part of the SkyTrain system. The line is owned by TransLink and InTransitBC and is operated by ProTrans BC. Coloured turquoise on route maps, it operates as an airport rail link between Vancouver, Richmond, and the Vancouver International Airport (YVR). The line comprises 16 stations and 19.2 kilometres (11.9 mi) of track; the main line runs from Vancouver to Richmond while a 4-kilometre (2.5 mi) spur line from Bridgeport station connects to the airport. It opened on August 17, 2009, ahead of the 2010 Winter Olympics.
Heritage streetcars or heritage trams are a part of the efforts to preserve rail transit heritage. In addition to preserving street-running rail vehicles, heritage streetcar operations can include upkeep of historic rail infrastructure. Working heritage streetcars are closely related to the growing global heritage railway movement and form a part of the living history of rail transport.
False Creek is a short narrow inlet in the heart of Vancouver, separating the Downtown and West End neighbourhoods from the rest of the city. It is one of the four main bodies of water bordering Vancouver, along with English Bay, Burrard Inlet, and the Fraser River. Granville Island is located within the inlet.
The Xochimilco Light Rail is a light rail line that serves the southern part of Mexico City. It connects to, but is not considered a part of the Mexico City Metro. Rather, it is operated by the Servicio de Transportes Eléctricos (STE), the authority that operates Mexico City's electric trolleybus system and formerly operated the municipal electric tram system.
The Bombardier Flexity Outlook is a series of low-floored, articulated light-rail trams manufactured by Bombardier Transportation. Part of the larger Bombardier Flexity product line, Flexity Outlook vehicles are modular in design and commonly used throughout Europe.
The Portland Vintage Trolley was a heritage streetcar service in Portland, Oregon, United States, that operated from 1991 to 2014. It operated on a portion of the MAX light rail system, and for a brief time also operated on the Portland Streetcar system, in downtown and nearby areas. Service was provided with replicas of a type of Brill streetcar, nicknamed the "Council Crest" cars, which last served Portland in 1950. The service was managed by Vintage Trolley Inc., a non-profit corporation, and the cars were owned and operated by TriMet, Portland's transit agency. For 18 of its 23 years, the service followed a 2.3-mile (3.7 km) section of what is now the MAX Blue Line, between Lloyd Center and the west end of downtown. In September 2009, the route was changed to a 1.5-mile (2.4 km) section of the MAX system, along the transit mall in downtown Portland, from Union Station to Portland State University (PSU).
Downtown Vancouver is the central business district and the city centre neighbourhood of Vancouver, Canada, on the northwestern shore of the Burrard Peninsula in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. It occupies most of the north shore of the False Creek inlet, which cuts into the Burrard Peninsula creating the Downtown Peninsula, where the West End neighbourhood and Stanley Park are also located.
Transportation in Vancouver, British Columbia, has many of the features of modern cities worldwide. Unlike many large metropolises, Vancouver has no freeways into or through the downtown area. A proposed freeway through the downtown was rejected in the 1960s by a coalition of citizens, community leaders and planners. This event "signalled the emergence of a new concept of the urban landscape" and has been a consistent element of the city's planning ever since.
Marine Drive is an elevated station on the Canada Line of Metro Vancouver's SkyTrain rapid transit system. The station is located at the intersection of Cambie Street and SW Marine Drive in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Olympic Village is an underground station on the Canada Line of Metro Vancouver's SkyTrain rapid transit system. The station is located at the intersection of Cambie Street and West 2nd Avenue, adjacent to the Cambie Street Bridge in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Light rail is a commonly used mode of public transit in North America. The term light rail was coined in 1972 by the Urban Mass Transportation Administration to describe new streetcar transformations which were taking place in Europe and the United States. The Germans used the term Stadtbahn, which is the predecessor to North American light rail, to describe the concept, and many in UMTA wanted to adopt the direct translation, which is city rail. However, in its reports, UMTA finally adopted the term light rail instead.
Streetcars or trolley(car)s were once the chief mode of public transit in hundreds of North American cities and towns. Most of the original urban streetcar systems were either dismantled in the mid-20th century or converted to other modes of operation, such as light rail. Today, only Toronto still operates a streetcar network essentially unchanged in layout and mode of operation.
Although tram and Heritage streetcar systems date to the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many old systems were closed during the mid-20th century because of the advent of automobile travel. This was especially the case in North America, but postwar reductions and shutdowns also occurred on British, French and other Western European urban rail networks. However, traditional tramway systems survived, and eventually even began to thrive from the late 20th century onward, some eventually operating as much as when they were first built over a century ago. Their numbers have been augmented by modern tramway or light rail systems in cities which had discarded this form of transport.
The R4 41st Ave is an express bus route with bus rapid transit elements in Metro Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Part of TransLink's RapidBus network, it replaced the 43 Express that travelled along 41st Avenue, a major east–west route that connects the University of British Columbia (UBC) to the SkyTrain system's Oakridge–41st Avenue station on the Canada Line and Joyce–Collingwood station on the Expo Line.
The Santa Teresa Tram, or Tramway, is a historic tram line in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It connects the city's centre with the primarily residential, inner-city neighbourhood of Santa Teresa, in the hills immediately southwest of downtown. It is mainly maintained as a tourist attraction and is nowadays considered a heritage tramway system, having been designated a national historic monument in 1985. The line has a very unusual gauge: 1,100 mm. The main line is 6.0 kilometres long.
The SkyTrain rapid transit system in Greater Vancouver, Canada, was conceived as a legacy project of Expo 86 and was finished in time to showcase the fair's theme: "Transportation and Communication: World in Motion – World in Touch". Construction was funded by the provincial and federal governments. Vancouver had plans as early as the 1950s to build a monorail system, with modernist architect Wells Coates pencilled in to design it; that project was abandoned. The lack of a rapid transit system was said to be the cause of traffic problems in the 1970s, and the municipal government could not fund the construction of such a system. During the same period, Urban Transportation Development Corporation, then an Ontario crown corporation, was developing a new rapid transit technology known as an "Intermediate Capacity Transit System". In 1980, the need for rapid transit was great, and Ontario needed buyers for its new technology. "Advanced Rapid Transit" was selected to be built in Vancouver to showcase the Ontario project at Expo 86.
The Oranjestad Streetcar and is a single-track tram line in Oranjestad, the capital city of Aruba. It is owned and operated by Arubus, the national public transportation company. It was built as a key component of a larger project to upgrade the main retail areas of the town, other aspects of which included pedestrianization of streets, planting of trees, installation of ornamental street lighting and resurfacing of streets and sidewalks.
{{cite magazine}}
: Missing or empty |title=
(help){{cite magazine}}
: Missing or empty |title=
(help)Connecting Granville Island, a key entertainment centre for the 2010 Winter Games, and the Olympic and Paralympic Village Vancouver, the Olympic Line streetcar service will extend Vancouver's regional transit network along False Creek during 60 days of celebration before and during the 2010 Winter Games.
The group called Friends of the Olympic Line is calling on politicians from all parties to commit $5 million to re-animate the line known as both the Downtown Historic Railway and the Olympic Line.