Navigation
User login
Bells corners to Kanata south ?
If I look at google there seems to be some form of road or bikebath or rail line... that shows up between bells corners and kanata south eaglson road.
Google even shows a train on part of it.
http://maps.google.ca/maps?&q=stafford+Rd+West,+ottawa,+ON&t=h&z=18
Is this an abandoned rail line? could it or its right of way be used by the FOTO kanata line instead of going to north Kanata.
just wondering, it looks like there is far more houses in walking distance if you put a stop in south kanata 5km from split at bells corners,
and it could be extended easier to stitsville 9.3 km from the split at bells corners.
I have never been out there personally and I don't know the history of the area so I don't actually know what is there now, but I was just thinking out loud.
What is out there now?
howie
Stittsville link
This looks like an old line which goes onto Stittsville as well. So with a bit of forethought a link could be established between Stittsville, South Kanata, Bells Corners and March road and connect communities and commuters with their workplace.
Trans-Canada Trail
Yes, that is an abandoned railway cooridor.
Go out there sometime on foot.
It is now the trans-canada trail.
There is space in most places to accomodate putting a railway line back in place, leaving space for current trail users. yes, there is more housing there.
If your goal is to get people from Stittsville (who don't pay transit taxes!), or south Kanata (who do), to the Queensway-Carleton, or Riverside hospitals, to Woodroffe Campus, then a train along here makes a lot of sense. If your goal is to get people downtown, then the existing express bus service may in fact be a more sensible proposition. Note that the train line is not walkable from very many places, mostly because those places were designed to be walking hostile.
However, to put a train line back in place there will require some work, and some negotiation. As such, it is not "low-hanging fruit". On the other hand, getting a train into northern Kanata to serve the 30,000 jobs there, and to keep the growing communities up the 417 (such as Carp and Arnprior) from clogging the 417 that people from Kanata expect to use, then a train to Kanata north makes
more immediate economic sense.
So, it's not a question of A vs B. It's a question of A now, and B later, or B later, and A never. The budget is limited, and we can't do everything on the first round. We have significant investment in our express bus system, and our goals are to augment it, and provide capacity increases where we need them (i.e. DOWNTOWN).
Volunteer researcher, Friends of the O-train.