EDMONTON – Unexpected demand has prompted the city to reverse course and look at building long-term park-and-ride lots in the middle of its new LRT routes.
The parking garages originally planned for Southgate and Century Park on the southwest line were eliminated to save money, with a temporary 1,200-stall surface lot added instead.
But some of those stalls will now have to remain even after a permanent facility is constructed near Ellerslie Road, transportation general manager Bob Boutilier said Tuesday.
“When we go to Heritage Valley, we can’t shut down Century Park entirely; it’s not possible,” Boutilier said. “Ultimately, what we have been trying to do is get (parking) to the end of the line, which is the ring road, Anthony Henday Drive.
“But what’s happening at Century Park … is less than a week after we opened (in 2010), it went up to 1,200 (users). We expected it would take months.”
Plans for the southeast line now propose up to 1,300 temporary parking spaces near 75th Street and Wagner Road, rather putting parking at Whitemud Drive.
While that facility is expected to be replaced by something permanent decades from now – once the tracks are extended from Mill Woods Town Centre to the Henday – Boutilier said it will never be eliminated.
“Once (commuters) start coming, after a period of seven, eight, nine years, … it is impossible to shut it down.”
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Planners are also looking for space to add a parking lot along the proposed west end line to Lewis Estates, Boutilier said.
For someone used to taking their car, “it takes a while to see the value of transit. If you can get them on LRT, that’s the first step.”
“We have to look at the cost and the value of bringing people into the system. They have decided they like the LRT experience. They’re not prepared to get on the bus.”
But the city has to find ways of helping cover the cost to build and operate these facilities, he said.
“Are we going to have paid park and ride lots or are we going to have free park and ride lots?”
This could mean charging more motorists a monthly parking fee, which already happens for some premium spots, or including garages as part of commercial or residential developments.
“We’re not talking about building a park-and-ride that will be moved in 10 years,” explains Councillor Amarjeet Sohi, “you’re talking 25-30 year timeframe.”
“Once we expand the LRT further from Mill Woods Town Centre and to 50th street and Anthony Henday, that’s where the permanent park-and-ride will be and that’s what our policy states,” adds Sohi.
Coun. Karen Leibovici said officials must recognize the inner parking areas won’t be temporary and ensure there’s somewhere for LRT passengers to leave their vehicles.
“They’re needed. If we want people to get on to our transit system, there has to be a way to get them to the main points, and that’s park-and-ride,” Leibovici said during a transportation and infrastructure committee meeting.
“We’re fooling ourselves if we think that everyone is going to wait 20 minutes, or 30 minutes or 40 minutes, to get a bus to get to the LRT.”
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