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Reading the smoke signals: The viaducts will be coming down

July 23rd, 2015 · 127 Comments

There’s been no official announcement or news release or staff report yet, but it looks as though the city is headed to a vote on taking the viaducts down, with planners and engineers recommending it, after having gone out and dug up all the new information council asked for two years ago.

As my story in the Globe says, community and business groups are hearing the summary of this new information from city staff, which all appears to be buttressing the argument that the viaducts should come down (would cost $50/60 million to make seismically sound, new commuter route connecting Expo Boulevard to a new Georgia Street extension would only add a few minutes in commuter time, etc etc).

I’m attaching here, besides the story, the PowerPoint that is being used at the community group talks. Not a lot of detail, but it does add a few interesting new bits and bobs of information.

Vancouver’s Viaducts JWG Jun22 Planning PDF

 

 

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  • IanS

    “Essentially, it boils down to this. Anyone who has spent even 10 minutes
    under the Viaducts understands that these depressing spaces kill the
    life and vitality of the historic and recently created areas and
    streets”

    While I appreciate it’s a done deal and I’ve no wish to rehash old arguments, I don’t think this is true, at least in part, and not necessarily true in whole

    The skateboard park underneath the viaducts is one of few park areas around there that’s full of life and energy. Anyone who has spent ten minutes walking along under the viaducts understands that.

    And, yes, there are underutilized areas. But that’s a choice. It doesn’t take much imagination to envision things like small parks, covered bike lanes, basketball courts, an expanded skate park, all of which could thrive under and around the viaducts.

    What is comes down to, IMO, was a choice made a number of years ago to remove the viaducts. The reports, analyses, rationales and justifications, they all came afterward. To be fair, however, Vision won the last election fair and square and it was obvious that they were going to take down the viaducts, so I guess, just like the HST referendum and the transit plebiscite, we get what we deserve.

    I am pleased to hear, however, that the developers will benefit from the removal of the viaducts. You can imagine my relief. 🙂

    Sadly, I would expect any contributions extracted from the developers (hardball negotiating with developers? Really?) will be passed on to the buyers. On the bright side, it will provide more fuel for those who believe that real estate in the city is becoming too expensive. So, there is an upside, I guess.

  • jolson

    Read the Traffic Report. Do the math; x number of vehicle trips times three minutes times as long as we have combustion engines equals x tons of carbon emissions. Traffic is slower and trips take longer. This can hardly be considered “good connectivity”, good for the environment, or good for public health.

  • jolson

    Mr. Segal your retreat to name calling and imaginative hyperbole belies your fanciful desperation to get someone to agree with you.

    You would do better to make your mark in history by figuring out how to integrate the climate change issues of our time with the practice of urban design. This is the challenge of your profession.

    What you have so far proposed is an extraordinary waste of resources and existing infrastructure.

    Let’s see an analysis in terms of climate change instead of the smoke and mirrors you and City Staff have so far produced.

  • Jeff Leigh

    Read the traffic report. It is 1-3 minutes, not 3 minutes.

    Then see what happens after all the planned development is built on privately owned land by Concord, Aquilini, etc. Your travel times are pre-construction, not post. This is about planning for the future, not maintaining the past.

    Then see what happens with actual traffic volumes. Traffic isn’t a fixed quantity, as we have seen time and again.

  • jenables

    Tessa, you can reply to me without getting personal. I selected the photo I did as it was the closest one I found (in an unexhaustive search) depicting the area in question from the same direction. I have never disputed there is a height difference, but I wouldn’t say it is from a completely different angle because a completely different angle would be looking southeast, or south or strictly east. The two photos are both shown looking north west from a similar point, with science world in the foreground in the lower left. Not a completely different angle and a really odd thing to pile on about.

  • jenables

    A bunch of park that will never come to be because development rights will be sold off to pay for the viaduct removal?

  • jenables

    You just said they aren’t operating at capacity and are under utilized. And yes, that light at citadel parade does cause a lot of problems. I think that’s probably normal when you have two traffic lights a condo’s width from each other.

  • Jeff Leigh

    Check the traffic study on their design capacity, and what they are carrying. They carry far less traffic than they were designed for. It isn’t because of the viaducts themselves, it is because of the limitations of the feeder streets and the destination street. So, why do you think they are built to such a larger capacity? Same question as previous.

  • Jeff Leigh

    Why would you want to do that? Don’t let your cynicism rule your life!

    The parts that should be sold off are the two square blocks that could be used for social housing. Sell it to the BC government, they can deal with the housing.

  • jenables

    you don’t think the congestion has anything to do with citadel parade? Also I do not believe they were designed to hold 1800 vehicles/hour. That makes no sense. It makes no sense to frame them in freeway terms when they are not a freeway unless you are framing them as such for political purposes. Otherwise, you’d have to ask the people responsible for building them.

  • jenables

    Jeff, I’m having trouble with this:
    No. The lineups on the Dunsmuir viaduct aren’t because of the viaducts. They are because the viaducts hold more vehicles than Dunsmuir can handle.

    And this:
    They carry far less traffic than they were designed for.

    So… They carry too many vehicles for dunsmuir, but less than they were designed to carry and the latter is a problem?

  • jenables

    If you have two bird’s eye views with the same thing in the center, but one is close to the ground, would you say the angles of the two were”completely different”?

  • Jeff Leigh

    “Otherwise, you’d have to ask the people responsible for building them”

    Great idea. The City built them. They already answered this question. You said you didn’t believe them. Do you now?

  • Jeff Leigh

    It is only a problem if you think that their current design capacity defines the capacity requirement for a replacement surface street.

  • Jeff Leigh

    “…would you say the angles of the two were”completely different”?”

    I guess I don’t understand why you continue to harp on this. It all started because you said you couldn’t understand what you were looking at. It seems some of us could. Again, can you tell now what you are looking at? If you can, isn’t this beating a dead horse? If you can’t, then how may we help you?

  • jenables

    Somehow I don’t see the province paying the city for development rights to build social housing. Rather, I can’t see the city charging the province to do so. Then again, we would have to get into the sticky definition of what constitutes social housing, or 30 units of social housing and 150 of market housing somehow equaling a building of social housing. Sigh.

    Look at what happened with Oakridge, where the park ended up on a rooftop, and you might see why I don’t have much faith in this proposal.

  • jenables

    I said there’s so much park, I can barely tell what I’m looking at, and provided a picture of the area as is. Warren, Tessa and you all chimed in to tell me the angle was completely different or that elevation changes the angle. I replied to you each in turn. Perhaps you can answer this question: is bc place on the left side (and therefore out of the picture) of the hypothetical tree lined new road in the artist’s rendering?

  • jenables

    This is a frustrating argument I’d rather have in person, tbh. You acknowledge the freeway plan was scrapped when they were built, yet you keep referring to them as part of a freeway. Why?

  • jenables

    I’m pretty sure the people who designed them are retired.

  • Jeff Leigh

    Asked and answered.

  • Jeff Leigh

    “is BC Place on the left side (and therefore out of the picture) of the hypothetical tree lined new road in the artist’s rendering?”

    It isn’t hypothetical, it is conceptual. It is a key part of the proposal. It is Georgia Street, or more specifically, the Georgia Street ramp. It is where the traffic from the current viaducts goes, by and large.

    In your cropped version of the artist’s rendering, BC Place is off screen to the left. If you look at the uncropped version of the same shot that I provided you from the display boards, you can see both BC Place and Roger’s Arena.

  • jolson

    Vancouver the Greenest City on the Planet!

    Ask a silly question get a silly answer.
    What will happen if the viaducts are removed?
    Answer; Commute times and carbon emissions will go up!

    Ask the question; How can we best reduce emissions associated with the Viaducts?
    Answer; Complete the viaducts connection to Clark Drive along Malkin with a flyover at Prior and another over the tracks at Clark.

    Benefits;
    1-Reduced congestion and emissions at Main Street intersections.
    2-Elimination of traffic impacts along Prior in the Strathcona neighbourhood, resulting in improved livability and public health.
    3-Excellent emergency access from downtown to the new hospital site on the flats.
    4- Substantial reduction in over all emissions.

    Question: Where is the so called Engineering Report (2006) on required seismic upgrades costing $50-60 million and required by 2016? Does this report even exist?

    Answer;
    Halcrow Consulting Inc produced in 2011 the following information concerning the Viaducts for the City of Vancouver;
    Yearly maintenance costs ~$25,000 per year
    • Short Term retrofits ~$200,000
    • Maintenance required in next 5+ years ~$1 million (barrier rehabilitation)
    • Maintenance required in the next 15+ years – $3 million (deck and joint
    rehabilitation)
    • Seismic upgrades ~$5 million
    If the viaducts were retained it is estimated with the above maintenance they would have a remaining service life of 40+ years.

    Let’s see an analysis in terms of climate change instead of the smoke and mirrors that City Staff have so far produced.

  • peakie

    And many are going to this
    https://twitter.com/DanielleBauer/status/627179552968577024
    by the Vancouver Planning Commission person Danielle Bauer. showing the St. Pauls site just south of the new non-Georgia Viaduct and Tsunami and Seismic collapse area.

  • peakie

    …“Anybody who thinks you can take down two major viaducts like that, which handles 60,000 people a day and a thousand heavy trucks a day — and not have some impact — they’ve got to be dreaming in Technicolor,” said Adam, who once held the position of what is now called director of transportation. “I would say leave them up. They’re a $100-million asset that’s doing a job.”

    …“It’s going to have rush-hour conditions for six to eight hours a day,” Adam said. “So it’s not going to be this pleasant drive around False Creek. It’s going to be basically a freeway.”

    …“The more difficult you make it to get there, the more people will simply choose not to go there,” he said of the effect the loss of the viaducts could have on downtown.

    Former Vancouver city engineer questions need to demolish viaducts
    by Mike Howell / Vancouver Courier August 12, 2015 08:00 AM
    – See more at: http://www.vancourier.com/news/former-vancouver-city-engineer-questions-need-to-demolish-viaducts-1.2027437

  • A Taxpayer

    The high cost of housing combined with policies that discourage commuting can only be a windfall for surrounding municipalities like Surrey in the long run.

  • peakie

    Meanwhile…

    Newly revealed viaducts report says replacement cheaper than demolition
    Bob Mackin / Vancouver Courier September 23, 2015 11:32 AM
    – See more at: vancourier.com/news/newly-revealed-viaducts-report-says-replacement-cheaper-than-demolition-1.2066925

    A 2009 report commissioned by City of Vancouver estimated the Georgia and Dunsmuir viaducts could last until 2024 without major rehabilitation and pegged the cost of replacement at less than $100 million. Associated Engineering noted deterioration of the concrete bridge rail, deck joints and cracking in girders, but concluded the bridges were “generally in good condition.” “There do not appear to be any significant functional deficiencies at present that would limit the life expectancy [of the viaducts],” said the report, obtained by the Courier last December,
    https://www.scribd.com/doc/280996458/2013-296-res-2
    after the civic election, in response to an October 2013 Freedom of Information request and subsequent appeal to the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner.

    However, city staff said in June of this year that they would recommend to city council in September that the viaducts be demolished and replaced with a new street network. A June 2013 report to council estimated that could cost as much as $132 million and free-up 10 acres, worth $110 million, for development. Acting city engineer Jerry Dobrovolny told the Courier Sept. 11 that findings of new reports would be presented to council in October or November.

    The city originally withheld information about the viaducts, claiming exemptions for policy advice, protection of city finances and third-party trade secrets and fear of harm to law enforcement and public security. It relented almost three months after an adjudicator ordered full disclosure in September 2014 of Burrard Bridge engineering reports, in a ruling that said the city’s claim the bridge would be at risk of a terrorist attack was mere speculation.
    The city originally withheld information about the viaducts, claiming exemptions for policy advice, protection of city finances and third-party trade secrets and fear of harm to law enforcement and public security. It relented almost three months after an adjudicator ordered full disclosure in September 2014 of Burrard Bridge engineering reports, in a ruling that said the city’s claim the bridge would be at risk of a terrorist attack was mere speculation.
    The city originally withheld information about the viaducts, claiming exemptions for policy advice, protection of city finances and third-party trade secrets and fear of harm to law enforcement and public security. It relented almost three months after an adjudicator ordered full disclosure in September 2014 of Burrard Bridge engineering reports, in a ruling that said the city’s claim the bridge would be at risk of a terrorist attack was mere speculation.

  • peakie

    However….

    TransLink to focus on extending life of Pattullo Bridge

    By Kelly Sinoski, Vancouver Sun
    September 25, 2015 1:38 PMRead more: http://www.vancouversun.com/translink+focus+extending+life+pattullo+bridge/11390812/story.html

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