Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Next Generation is Just Plain Uncool-------& that's crazy

                                         MONTREAL – Amid a late-summer heat wave that boosted the temperature in part of the Montreal Island subway system to as much as 34 degrees Celsius, its operator is sticking to its guns and won’t add air conditioning to the specifications for its next generation of métro cars.

Michel Labrecque, board chairman of the Société de Transport de Montréal (STM), Tuesday rejected an air-conditioning demand issued by Richard Bergeron, leader of the Project Montréal party.

Bergeron had just repeated to reporters that the STM should equip all new rolling stock – métro cars and also buses – with air conditioning.

He presented a detailed series of rebuttals to objections raised against his party’s proposal during a city council meeting last week by Marvin Rotrand, vice-chairperson of the STM.

A combination of design changes to the next generation of subway trains can be expected to cut peak temperatures in the underground system by “three or four degrees” Celsius, Labrecque said at a city hall news conference that began as Bergeron’s was winding down.

While the electrically powered métro trains currently in service generate about 80 per cent of the heat inside the system through acceleration and braking, the design for the next generation should cut this by “about 25 per cent,” to about 60 per cent, Labrecque said. The STM also is roughly halfway through a 20-year program to improve ventilation through shafts that link subway tunnels to the surface, he added.

The debate boils down to priorities and available money, added Rotrand, stating frequency and punctuality of transit service are rated much higher as priorities by users than summer temperatures.

Heat levels in the transit system triggered fewer than 100 of the 17,000 to 18,000 complaints and comments submitted to the STM by users last year, Labrecque said.

The timing for the subway system is “crucial,” Bergeron said, given that a fleet of replacement métro trains still up for bidding is expected to remain in service “for the next two generations,” to about 2065. That’s about a half-century after deliveries are expected to begin and almost a century after the city’s subway system initially entered service.

Labrecque said the transit agency plans “a pilot project” next summer to try out air conditioning on longer-haul bus routes. That echoed remarks he’d made last Friday.

But the details for what Labrecque called a benchmarking study haven’t been finalized, he told reporters Tuesday.

Bergeron, accompanied by city councillor François Limoges, said a higher comfort level would draw additional users into the transit system.

Questioned by reporters, both said they could not predict how many commuters would choose to forgo private vehicles for buses or the métro if summer heat was not an issue.

“Bergeron admits he does not know if air conditioning will bring in lots of new riders,” Rotrand said.

“He can’t come close to proving” that such a move would bring more ridership and, thus, prove cost-effective.

Rotrand pegged the overall price tag of Bergeron’s proposals at about $225 million, although that figure includes retrofitting existing equipment.

Bergeron estimated the cost of a gradual changeover to air conditioning at “perhaps $2 million,” on an annual basis.

About 95 per cent of private vehicles now sold provide air conditioning, Bergeron said, up from about 5 per cent in 1980.

Transit users “should be able to benefit from a quality of service comparable to what is quasi-standard to its competitor, the automobile,” he added.

Mayor Gérald Tremblay and his administration “should take into account that transit users are not second-class citizens,” Bergeron said.

Bergeron said the greenhouse-gas emissions avoided by taking one private vehicle off the road would allow 12 busses to be equipped with air conditioning without any net additions of greenhouse gases

                                             .............................................HF&RV.........................................

5 comments:

thomas gerendai said...

I really dont think we Need AC in the metro they just need to reduce the temp by like 5 degrees , If they add AC the ticket price will only go up more

Les F said...

I would have thought ,that nowadays AC would be standard equipment in anything on wheels. However maybe not.but I can recall when the Metro first started operations it could get really stinking hot in those cars,& yet the Metro stations themselves were alot cooler. I believe initially the fans in the roof of the cars just couldn't exhaust the heat quick enough (that was in the 60's) Montreal's Metro moves a lot of people and being an electric subway it should be relatively cheap to run AC, certainly cheaper than taxing a gas or diesel driven bus.
You mught be right though , the admin of MTC would loook for any reason to increase fares,I suppose.
Also being electric powered , I can't see why a form of 'heat pump' couldn't be incoroprated into the system, heating in winter & cooling in summer (using the ambient air temp)? Mind you with all those doors opening at everystop about every minute or so, then maybe it just is not feasible.
....................................HF&RV..........

Sandra macDonald said...

What do your fares cost in Montreal now on the buses and subway?

I'm a bus driver in Vancouver and the fares here are based on zones and you can pay up to $5.00.
Here though, you can go in any direction for 90 minutes.
We have no ac on our buses and it's unbearable in the summer. I can't imagine a subway without it now, as I do recall the riding in the hot cars in the 60's.

Les F said...

onesmac said
What do your fares cost in Montreal now on the buses and subway?

I'm a bus driver in Vancouver and the fares here are based on zones and you can pay up to $5.00.
Here though, you can go in any direction for 90 minutes.
We have no ac on our buses and it's unbearable in the summer. I can't imagine a subway without it now, as I do recall the riding in the hot cars in the 60's.
Hi Sandra, here is the transit fares site for Montreal:
http://www.stm.info/English/tarification/a-tarif.htm
,,and I'm surprised the bus's in Vancouver don't have AC,.the ones here in Victoria ( at least any of the ones I recall taking had AC, and what a difference when you get on one without it.
I don't travel much by bus,although I think it's a great service & failry cheap,they eliminated the zones here and the fare was $2.25 last time I took one (last summer) I believe it's $2.50 now. You can take a bus from downtown ,all the way out to the ferry,for one fare, no traffic to worry about ,etc etc , & I was very surprised to hear many people thank the driver ,when getting off the bus.A lot of young pewopl ,which really surprised me, even when they get off by the rear door...I always say thanks when exiting by the front door,.......
and you right my memory of those metro cars in the 60's were that they were hot.
HF&RV
somehow I sent this message twice once it seems as a personal message ,when I meant to add it to this general thread for everyone..........

Brian Gearey said...

I can't remember the last time I took public transit but I would think you should have a/c