City underlines successes and challenges as the Valley Line LRT turns one

As the 13-kilometre Valley Line Southeast LRT rolls by its first year in operation, the City of Edmonton's head of transit says its reliability and ridership growth have made the year a "success story," even though shelter doors were removed from stations and numerous cars and trains have collided along the way.

The Valley Line Southeast cost Edmonton, along with the provincial and federal governments, $1.8 billion to create. It was built with TransEd using a public-private partnership (colloquially referred to as a P3). The 11 stop line, first conceived in 2008, opened four years behind schedule on Nov. 4, 2023. A second phase, known as the Valley Line West, is being built using a P3 with Marigold Infrastructure Partners. The second quarter of 2024 report suggests the $2.6 billion project, which adds an additional 14-kilometres of track and 14 stops to the overall Valley Line, is on budget and has completed 20% of the work. The province provides a schedule that suggests the line should be open in 2028.

Back on the already-open Valley Line Southeast, numbers gathered over its first year in operation suggest it's a success, Carrie Hotton-MacDonald, branch manager of Edmonton Transit Service, told Taproot.

"On time-performance is actually really high. (Valley Line trains) have 98.8% on-time performance," Hotton-MacDonald said, during an interview at the station's Muttart stop. "When I got the number, my immediate question was: 'Well, how does that compare to high-floor LRT service for the Capital and Metro lines?' So I checked in on that stat, and we had just over 95% (on-time performance.)"

In December, train frequency on the line was increased to five-minute intervals roughly one month after trains started accepting riders. Monthly ridership on the line has climbed by more than 100%, from 138,000 during its first month of operations in November 2023, to 279,000 in September 2024 (both numbers are approximate). For comparison, Hotton-MacDonald said ridership across the ETS system as a whole is up 12% when compared to pre-pandemic levels.

"Ridership has grown a lot month over month," she said. "It just speaks to how important this line is for the city. If you think ahead to a city of two million people, we need this type of infrastructure. We can't serve that population with just a bus-based system."

The Valley Line has a fleet of 26 low-floor trains. As of Oct. 24, 23 of the trains were in service, two were out for preventative maintenance, and one required repair due to a collision with a motor vehicle that caused a derailment.

For comparison, the Valley Line West will have 46 trains.

In an interview at the Muttart stop in late October, as packed trains whizzed by about every five minutes during rush hour, Hotton-MacDonald offered causes for celebration but also noted some challenges the line has faced, including driver (mis)behaviour, shelter doors being removed, heaters, and work continuing on sidewalks and pathways connected to the line.

Drivers, cyclists, and pedestrians have hit or been hit by Valley Line trains at least 23 times over its first year in operation. The Edmonton Police Service has commented on some of these incidents, saying they were due to drivers making illegal right turns at barrier-free intersections with the tracks.

"It's definitely (caused by) driver behavior," Hotton-MacDonald said. "We have looked at signal timing, we have looked at signage. We'll continue to partner (with TransEd) to see if there's more we can do. There are lots of good education campaigns and communication that we've done about it. We need people to really slow down and pay attention, and follow the rules of the road."

Hotton-MacDonald said she has been asked if gate arms at intersections between vehicles and trains would fix the problem. But both she and city council have specific reasons why they feel gate arms aren't the solution.

For one, Hotton-MacDonald said, the arms already fail to prevent people from driving into trains. "Even with our high-floor service where we have the gate arms, we still have collisions involving vehicles. I know it seems like it would be the solution, but it's not really a solution that will make this all go away," she said. "When council looked at the design options for this style, they went with this urban, integrated, low-floor LRT service, and it was intentionally designed to be embedded and integrated with the adjacent communities."

The collisions are mostly due to a learning curve, Hotton-MacDonald said.

"This isn't unexpected," she said of the incidents. "We have learned from other cities that have implemented this style (of LRT) that, over time, it will improve. We're looking forward to (seeing) a reduction as more people get used to interacting with the train service."

Not every city has overcome the challenges of mixing drivers with low-floor trains, though. Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario, opened its ION low-floor LRT in 2019. The city has since seen trains fatally strike pedestrians in 2020 and 2023. Drivers are also still involved. In September, no injuries were reported when a train and car collided.

Crews removed 152 automatic doors from 76 shelters along the Valley Line, costing $20,000 in equipment costs. The labour bill was paid from TransEd's existing maintenance budget. Hotton-MacDonald cited poor reliability, accessibility concerns, and social disorder including vandalism as the reasons that led to the decision. Removal took less than one month, which Hotton-MacDonald called "record time." The doors are in storage, but she's not sure if they will be re-installed.

"I don't know if this is the right design," she said while sitting in one of the shelters, explaining that council made the design choices for the doors in 2013. "If someone (using a mobility device) needed to come in while we're seated, there's just not a lot of space to navigate while you're waiting for the door to slide and then come in."

Hotton-MacDonald said she's not sure if different doors will be added to the shelters. The shelters are too shallow for a push door that opens inwards, and the platform's safe zone (behind the yellow portion) is too stubby for one that swings outwards, she said.

She also said comfort levels during winter weather for riders using the shelters is comparable to that of bus shelters. The tall Valley Line shelters have heaters in their ceilings but Hotton-MacDonald questioned their efficiency.

"They're quite high, and the style of heat that comes from them, honestly, in my opinion, doesn't make a significant impact," she said. "That's another design element that we can review … and whatever lessons we learn will carry over into Valley Line West."

Sidewalks and pathways near stations such as Bonnie Doon have been under periodic reconstruction since the line began operations, sometimes limiting walking options to and from stations. The line's technical manager, Po Sun, told Taproot in an email that this sort of concrete repair and revision is "not unusual." Large infrastructure projects commonly come with deficiency fixes and warranty work that TransEd is responsible for under its existing contract. Sun said the work is expected to continue into 2025.

Hotton-MacDonald said that accessible re-routing is standard when pathways are disturbed, and that riders should call 311 if they notice this is not the case at any station. She also said this work is worth the inconvenience in the long run.

"I understand it's very disruptive now, but the intent is the work (TransEd does) is to make those improvements so that it's better for all the riders and people in the area," she said. "(It's a) short-term pain, long-term gain kind of thing."

Hotton-MacDonald also shared some future news about the Valley Line and ETS in general.

An ongoing collaboration with the CNIB Foundation has yielded paint additions to transit centres that improve navigation for people with partial sight. So far, that includes blue lines on the edges of curbs. She expects the partnership to create further accessibility improvements, including along the Valley Line.

Meanwhile, replacement trains for the aging ones in use on the Capital and Metro lines should arrive by around 2028. A community celebration is in the works for when the old trains are retired.

"When you have train cars that we're trying to operate from the '70s, they actually don't even manufacture parts for them anymore," Hotton-MacDonald said. "The team is literally sourcing parts from other cities who are no longer using those train cars, so we're borrowing from Calgary as they retire theirs. We're basically pulling as many parts as we can from them and then fabricating things in-house if we need to."

The city recently posted that it's planning a one-year anniversary event for the LRT, but did not have further details as of press time.