Edmonton finally gets modern light rail with the opening of the Valley Line
The first segment of the new line is expected to change transit quality by introducing low-floor rolling stock into ETS' fleet.
Low-floor Alstom Flexity Freedom trains will run on the Valley Line until the westward expansion is open.
Last Saturday, at 5:15 am, the first trains departed from the 102nd Street and Mill Woods stops on the new Valley Line. City officials, transit enthusiasts, and excited citizens alike showed up to the opening ceremonies to welcome the long-awaited light rail line.
First proposed in 2009, as a part of the city’s long-term LRT Network Plan, the full extent of the Valley Line is to link the Lewis Farms Transit Centre in the quickly growing outer suburbs west of Anthony Henday Drive to Mill Woods, in the southeast, another growing residential district, centered around Mill Woods Town Centre. The line is to connect several key transit hubs along its route, including West Edmonton Mall, at Churchill Square with connections to the Capital and Metro lines, as well as the Pedway system, and at Davies station, the system’s first elevated stop, where a new park and ride and transit centre are located.
Potential full extent of Edmonton’s LRT system, as shown in a March 2012 official city website fact sheet.
A long-awaited boost to Edmonton’s transit network
In 2016, the City of Edmonton announced a public-private partnership with TransEd Partners in the construction of the line. Ground was broken on the Valley Line on April 22nd 2016. According to then estimates, the Southeast portion of the line was poised to be completed by 2020. Issues with excess rainfall curtailed construction in 2019, and with further problems encountered during the construction of the LRT-specific Tawatinâ Bridge later that same year, the 2020 deadline was postponed until 2021, and later 2022. A subsequent delay in August 2022 due to structural deficiencies on the line’s elevated portion caused further delays until 2023. The line’s last postponement happened in July, when a significant portion of the installed signalling cables had to be replaced due to oxidation. After more than a decade of construction and a dogpiling of issues throughout the process, not unlike the infamous Ottawa Confederation Line, Valley Line Southeast was opened on November 4th.
All in all, the project had a price tag of $1.8 billion, with $800 million being approved by the City Council back in 2012, and the rest to be supplied by the federal and provincial governments. After issues with underfunding from both Ottawa and the Alberta government, only in 2014 did the project receive full funding.
A Bombardier/Alstom Flexity Freedom train being tested on the ION network at the University of Waterloo, as a part of Kitchener-Waterloo regional transit.
Alberta’s first low-floor rail transit
A member of the TransEd group, and now-part of Alstom, Canadian-German manufacturer Bombardier Transportation has been contracted to provide rolling stock for the Southeast portion of the line. Flexity Freedom trains, originally meant for the Toronto Eglinton Crosstown line, and used on the ION network in Kitchener-Waterloo since 2019, are a first in Albertan transit, due to their low-floor design. The Metro and Capital lines both run exclusively Siemens SD-160 and Siemens-Duewag U2 trains, both high-floor rolling stock that require higher platforms or the use of steps from street level stops, limiting accessibility. The new Bombardier/Alstom trains are also considerably shorter, with a 42m maximum length, unlike the Siemens trains which require stations of a 125m platform length.
The Valley Line’s full planned extent, as per the City of Edmonton.
Valley Line West, the second phase of the project, is scheduled to be completed by 2028. The city will work with Marigold Infrastructure Partners on this portion.
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