Category: Going Green

Categories
Going Green Rapidways Urban Planning

Bogotá, Colombia cashes in on its rapid transit success story

A Transmilenio bus travels in its dedicated lane through the streets of Bogotá, Colombia. Photo courtesy of DianaCats.
A Transmilenio bus travels in a dedicated lane through the streets of Bogotá, Colombia. This system has earned the city up to $300 million through selling carbon credits. Photo courtesy of DianaCats.

, one of Bogotá, Colombia’s major thoroughfares, used to resemble a noisy, tangled, smoke-laden parking lot jam-packed with motorcycles, cars and small, privately operated buses. Then, beginning in 2001, it became part of a 7-line bus rapid transit system in the city known as TransMilenio.

In addition to making it faster and easier for the 1.6 million commuters who use the system each day to reach their destinations, TransMilenio has enabled the city to eliminate 7,000 of the small buses from its thoroughfares. This, in turn, has led to a more than 59% reduction in the use of bus fuel and associated CO2 and other emissions.

In recognition of this remarkable “green” achievement, last year the United Nations granted approval to TransMilenio to generate and sell carbon credits to developed countries that exceed their emissions limits under the Kyoto Protocol. According to analysts, this has already generated an estimated $100 million to $300 million in revenue for the city’s coffers.

Closer to home, York Region residents can look forward to a faster, easier and more environmentally friendly alternative to driving along busy routes such as Highway 7 with our vivaNext rapidways, which will allow our beautiful blue Viva vehicles to safely speed past congested traffic.

Related articles:
The New York Times
Mother Nature Network

Categories
Going Green

A great way to spare our air in warmer weather is to take transit

While warmer weather and patio surfing go hand in hand, unfortunately, so do smog advisories.  Smog, which is most prevalent in summer and can affect our health, is produced when heat and sunlight react with air pollutants such as the ones we emit when we burn gasoline to drive our cars.

While we have been largely spared of smog advisories this summer due to cooler temperatures, this past week we have seen some days where the temperature after humidity reached almost 40 degrees sparking advisories. And last summer eight advisories were issued over a 17-day period in and around the GTA. According to the Ontario Ministry of the Environment, one of the best ways to reduce smog advisories is to reduce our car use in warmer weather and take transit.

The vivaNext plan will make transit more convenient and up to 40% faster, providing a viable alternative to driving even when there is no smog advisory. With such speed and convenience, why would anyone choose to sit in congested traffic? We’re focused on moving the vivaNext projects forward and starting construction.

In addition to taking transit, here are some other ways you and your family can help spare our air –

See what kids can do to keep our air clean
Tips from the Ministry of the Environment

Categories
Going Green Live-work-play Rapidways Urban Planning

Curitiba, Brazil: a model city for transit use

A bus in Curitiba stops to pick up and drop off passengers. Notice the dedicated lane and the station that allows for level boarding at all doors.
A bus in Curitiba stops to pick up and drop off passengers. Notice the dedicated lanes and the station that allows for level boarding at all doors.

Curitiba, Brazil, home to over 3.5 million people in the greater area, has one of the most used and advanced bus rapid transit systems in the world. In fact, about 75% of the city’s commuters use the system for their daily trips to work. That’s a big contrast to the Greater Toronto Area where about 22% take transit according to Statistics Canada.

Like many bus rapid transit systems around the world, Curitiba’s buses are in their own lanes and move unimpeded by congestion and traffic signals as they have signal priority. They have a pre-boarding fare payment system and level boarding that works similarly to a subway, allowing for the fastest boarding possible and; therefore, less time between buses and higher capacity. People pay their fare and enter an elevated tube-shaped station. They say their capacity for a line is 36,000 riders/hour, which is similar to a subway.

Curitiba has not always had a transit vision. In the 1940s, the city had envisioned growth built around the car. But in the 1960s, a ballooning population made the city rethink expansion. A new vision was adopted that put strict controls on urban sprawl, reduced auto traffic in the downtown core and developed a convenient and affordable public transit system. They also changed the idea of a city growing outward from its city centre to development being built along corridors that branch out from the centre.

The system is credited with reducing the number of auto trips per year by 27 million. Curitiba uses 30% less fuel per capita than other cities in Brazil and has one of the lowest rates of ambient air pollution. Their system has been the inspiration for systems in Los Angeles, Bogota and Panama City to name a few.

Our goal is to provide you with the best possible rapid transit system. We can’t be like them weather wise (they have an average winter temperature of 13 degrees), but we can have a rapid transit system built around corridors that is fast and convenient.

What did you think about Curitiba? Can you imagine 75% of people in York Region taking transit for their daily commute?

Watch a film about the system in Curitiba

Learn more about the evolution of BRT

Categories
Going Green Live-work-play Urban Planning

Bold car-free experiments in other communities

Many cities around the world are experimenting with ways to make their communities more livable. Here is an interesting example from Vauban, Germany, where cars are practically forbidden. And yes, the name is spelt strangely similar to Vaughan.

The community is built on the site of a former military base as a mixed-use development where transit and cycling are the preferred methods of commuting. In fact, all the cars are parked in a parking lot on the outskirts of town. Seventy per cent of people chose to give up their cars and 57% of people sold their cars when moving to Vauban. It is a community of 5,500 people that live in a rectangular square mile. The rectangle shape makes it ideal for running a light rail through the city that is close for everyone to walk to.

According to the article in the New York Times, it is an attempt to separate suburban life from auto use. Something called “smart planning”. Not only is this idea good for the environment, but people that live in the community say they are less tense and happier.

This is one of the more bold experiments I’ve seen, but the question is whether it can work in North America. A similar experiment called Quarry Village is set to begin on the outskirts of Oakland, California. They promote it as a more enjoyable place to live that is close to the Bay and California State University. To date, over 100 families have showed their interest in the community out of the 1,000 planned homes.

While we are not aware of any experiments this bold in Canada, I firmly believe that they have the right idea promoting mixed-use development. York Region residents won’t be moving into car-free communities where their cars are kept on the outskirts of town any time soon, but we are on the right track using transit to lay the groundwork for mixed-use developments so people can rely less on their vehicles to get around.

Could you give up your car if you lived in a community like Vauban? Does the idea appeal to you?

Check out this New York Times slideshow for images of the town.

Categories
Going Green Live-work-play Urban Planning

Save time and relieve stress by getting rid of the commute

An artist rendering of what the live-work-play community at Markham Centre will look like when complete. Rendering courtesy of the Remington Group.
An artist rendering of what the live-work-play community at Markham Centre will look like when complete. Rendering courtesy of the Remington Group.
Construction at Enterprise, which will be within walking distance of the above rendering of Markham Centre.
Construction at Enterprise, which will be within walking distance of the above rendering of Markham Centre.

Are you tired of sitting in congested traffic trying to get to work or to visit with friends and family?

I don’t like to think that we are simply designing and building a rapid transit system. We are helping to create live-work-play communities. That’s the basic term for living in a place where everything is nearby. The goal is to create more time in your life and reduce reliance on a vehicle to get around.

Other names for this concept are a mixed-use development or new urbanism. The idea is the same: it is about making communities that let you live within walking distance of work, shopping, restaurants, cinemas, parks and other activities. And when you do have to travel, there are transit options nearby such as subways, rapidways and GO trains.

Unlike many parts of Europe where it’s the norm, it will no doubt require a mind-shift from many Ontarians. But I can tell you that it’s already starting with the youth. They get it from a logical, environmental and social standpoint. I get the sense that they place greater importance on quality of life and that excludes sitting in a vehicle for hours every day.

This shift has also started in our local communities – Markham, Mississauga and Richmond Hill for example.

What examples have you seen? What are your kids saying about it?

Categories
Going Green Rapidways Stations

Gimme Shelter

Rendering of a vivastation showing the middle section, which will be enclosed and heated.
Rendering of a vivastation showing the middle section, which will be enclosed and heated.

As you might have already heard, we are currently working on a video where the lead architect of the new vivastations talks about the design of the shelters for the rapidways we will be building over the next few years.

Since that video is not yet completed and there’s growing interest in how the vivastations will keep people protected from the weather, I wanted to take some time to talk about a few features of the new stations. In a way, here’s a trailer of the video…

There will be three different sections (modules) in each station. The middle section will be completely enclosed and heated, blocking the wind, rain, snow and cold temperatures.

Extensive consultation with the public told us that comfort and keeping warm are very important to riders, which is reflected in the design for the new service.

The stations will be large enough to provide adequate personal space and there’ll be an overhang reaching above the vehicles to protect people boarding and alighting on rainy days.

The stations are also more environmentally friendly. Energy efficient LED lights will brighten the station at night. The enclosed section will have automatic accessible doors at each end of the enclosure. They will still have sensors to open automatically, but as you can see in the picture, the hinged doors are on the side of the enclosed section. This will keep heat from escaping when someone triggers the sensor by walking along the platform. Accessibility has also been top of mind during the design process, ensuring that the platform and station design are accessible for individuals with disabilities.

Each platform will be 55 metres long with a 27-metre glass and steel canopy structure in the middle. This will make the stations easy to find and the curved canopy will blend well into the natural streetscape.

Last week, we had a full day of production, shooting interviews and b-roll for the video. Watch for the finished product on our website in the coming weeks.

Categories
General Going Green Rapidways

vivaNext educates students for Earth Day

“Cool”, “sweet” and “we love Viva “ – those were the responses to our vivaNext plan for bus rapidways and subway extensions. 

earthday1
Students from Cardinal Carter Catholic High School show us their "V" for viva.

Today’s guest bloggers are Andrea Witty, Community Liaison Specialist, and Kathryn Webber, Project & Public Relations Coordinator, who spent Earth Day at Cardinal Carter High School in Aurora talking to the students about the new rapidways that are coming to York Region.

We shared time-lapse animations that showed what Vaughan, Newmarket and Markham will look like in 5-20 years when the rapidways and subway extension projects are built. Being able to actually show the end result of our plan makes talking about it way easier.  They loved the images and the peak into the future.

Students were excited about the long range plans to increase connections and make it easier to travel across the region for shopping and work, getting to university and to get to Toronto.

While the vivaNext plan will save people time and prevent stress from being in gridlock, the plan is a part of a long-term sustainable solution to save something much more important than time – our planet.

 

What did you do for earth day?

 

Categories
Going Green

VivaNext office goes dark for Earth Hour

Viva’s blue buses are some of the greenest in the world. We weren’t in the office during the official Earth Hour, but we still wanted to do our part. For one hour on Friday, March 27, we turned off our lights and had a litter-less lunch. Staff members also received energy efficient light bulbs to take home.

 

Across Ontario the demand for power dropped over 6% and demand was down over 15% in Toronto alone. Around the world, over 4,000 cities from 80 countries turned off the lights. Organizers believe that about a billion people participated.

 

But vivaNext knows that turning off lights for an hour is only part of a solution. That is why we work year-round on transit solutions that will decrease the carbon in our atmosphere.

 

What did you do during Earth Hour to help our environment?