Andrea Wan: Buzzer illustrator interview!

Andrea Wan's illustration for the April Buzzer, and her self portrait entitled The Wait.

Note: This is a scheduled post as I’m away this week, returning Monday April 11, 2011. If you need to reach TransLink info or staff, see this post!

This April, we are happy to have the work of local illustrator Andrea Wan on the Buzzer’s cover. Find out more about her in this interview!

Tell us a bit about yourself and your art!

I’m an artist and illustrator, born in Hong Kong and raised in Vancouver. I graduated from the Film program at Emily Carr and studied illustration and design in Denmark. My art explores subjects such as landscapes, memories and the subconscious.

How did you come up with the Buzzer cover? Can you talk a bit about the other concepts?

Since the #14 Hastings trolley route is back, I wanted to create a cover illustration showing that the neighborhood is welcoming back the old bus. I did a few other variations on this concept, but with people in it. I finally decided to choose a design showing an important landmark on Hastings—Woodward’s. [Editor's note: here's the other concepts on Andrea's blog!]

What kind of work are you doing lately, and where can we see it?

I’ve been working on personal drawings and a couple of commissions. My work can be seen on my website and blog.

Do you have a regular transit route that you take? And do you have a favourite seat on the bus or SkyTrain?

I live in East Vancouver and I often take the B-Line or the SkyTrain to my studio. When I take the SkyTrain I often like to stand by the door so I can look out the window.

Thanks so much Andrea!

Check out more interviews with our past illustrators here:

• Patrick Wong – March 2011
• Stephanie Wiriahardja – February 2011
• Allison Koberstein – January 2011
• Tobias Ottahal – April 2010
• Jesse Williams – March 2010
• Chloe Lan – February 2010
• Justin Chen – November 2009
• Michael Gilbert – October 2009
• Jane Koo – September 2009

April 2011 bus changes and the service optimization project: an interview with TransLink planning director Brian Mills

Changes for many riders' bus routes are coming on April 18, 2011!

Note: This is a scheduled post as I’m away this week, returning Monday April 11, 2011 to answer your questions. If you need to reach TransLink info or staff, see this post!

As you may know from the April Buzzer, the April 2011 bus service changes are taking place on Monday, April 18, and they’re part of a year-long TransLink service optimization project, aimed at making sure we’re using our transit resources efficiently and effectively.

There’s a lot of small adjustments to a large number of routes—but the overall amount of service hours won’t change, and many more customers will see service increases than service reductions. Some notable changes include:

• The 14 trolley route is returning, picking up parts of the 10 and 17 routes! See a map of the new 10, 14, and 17 routes.
• The 50 and 15 routes are now interlined, or linked together. The 50 will change to the 15 Cambie at Olympic Village Stn and head southbound to destinations including Cambie Village, Queen Elizabeth Park and Oakridge; northbound 15 buses will change to the 50 at Olympic Village Stn. See the new route map.
• The 112 now terminates at New Westminster Station, and the C9, a new Community Shuttle route, will be added to pick up the New West–Lougheed portion of the 112 route.
• The 351 improves its frequency from 60 to 30 minute service between 10-11 p.m.
• The C19 will have 30 minute service between 7 a.m. – 8 p.m. on Sat/Sun/Holidays
• The 480 will be truncating its service at Bridgeport Station instead of No. 3 Rd.

Read the full list of service changes here, and see this post for the Buzzer blog conversation on the service changes so far. But to give us all more background on April’s changes and the whole optimization project, I did an interview with Brian Mills, TransLink’s director of service and infrastructure planning.

Read on to find out why the project exists, its guiding principles, how we figure out what routes to focus on, and more!

Read more »

Reminder: UBC Line workshops, April 5-6, 2011

Note: This is a scheduled post as I’m away this week, returning Monday April 11, 2011. If you need to reach TransLink info or staff, see this post!

Reminder: there’s two more UBC Line workshops this week!

Tuesday, April 5, 2011
6 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Kits Secondary School Gym
2550 West 10th Avenue, Vancouver
(Google map)

Wednesday, April 6, 2011
6 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Tenth Avenue Alliance Church
11 West 10th Avenue, Vancouver
(Google map)

If you can’t make these, you can also go to the main UBC phase 2 consultation site to examine our work and offer your feedback online until Friday, April 22, 2011.

And you can watch a recording of the UBC Line webinar from yesterday on our provider’s server—just note that you still have to register to access it at this time. Click here to see the recording.

Thanks to all who attended the UBC Line phase two webinar!

Just a quick note to say thanks to everyone who attended the UBC Line Rapid Transit phase 2 consultation webinar on April 4, 2011!

This is our second time doing a webinar, so if you attended, remember to fill in our questionnaire, and feel free to share any discussion on the webinar itself or the UBC Line project in the comments here.

If you didn’t join us, you can watch a recording of the webinar on our provider’s server—just note that you still have to register to access it at this time. Click here to see the recording.

I’ll also have the webinar up at YouTube shortly, once the recording is passed on to me as a file. The video will be posted on our main site and the blog for further discussion.

The team is also working on answering the questions that weren’t covered during the webinar: those will be on the main site and the blog when they’re ready!

And don’t forget: there are still two in-person workshops on April 5 and 6, 2011, in case you want to talk to someone in person or you know others who want to go. Full details here!

Thanks again to all who joined us online!

UBC Line: webinar reminder for Apr 4, 2011, plus notes from the first two workshops

Passengers boarding a 99 B-Line bus.

One reminder and two workshop recaps from the UBC Line Rapid Transit study!

Webinar takes place Monday, April 4, 2011

Jeff Busby, TransLink's Manager of Infrastructure Planning

A quick reminder that we are holding a webinar for the UBC Line Rapid Transit Study next Monday, April 4, 2011 from 7 p.m. – 8 p.m. PST. Tell your friends!

Jeff Busby, TransLink’s Manager of Infrastructure Planning, and Erin McConnell, our Manager of Corporate Communications, will talk about the preliminary design alternatives, criteria and initial results in their evaluation, plus the feedback we are looking for. There will be lots of time for questions!

You can do a few things in advance of the webinar:

• pre-register on our webinar page
• do a bit of homework: see our main UBC Line page to review the alternatives and evaluation information, so you’re familiar with the topic
• and submit your questions in advance in the blog comments. (You can ask during the webinar too, but advance notice helps ensure we get to the most popular inquiries! Use the Like comment function to vote on questions you’d really like answers on.)

And don’t worry if you can’t attend the webinar, either — we’ll record it and the video will be available after the event, just as we did for Surrey. We’ll also make sure to answer all questions that don’t get covered in the online session.

Notes from the first two workshops

Our consultation team sent me this update about how the first two workshops went, in case you were wondering! (The first workshop was on Wednesday, March 30, 2011 at the Masonic Hall, and the second was on Thursday, March 31, 2011 at UBC’s Ponderosa Centre.)

Read more »

Watch for TransLink CEO Ian Jarvis on the system next Mon Apr 4, 2011

Ian Jarvis, TransLink CEO

On Monday, April 4, 2011, look out for Ian Jarvis, TransLink’s chief executive officer, out riding the system!

Again, this is a little project we’re trying out this year: sending our executives out to talk to customers, ask for feedback, and answer questions. (In March, our COO Doug Kelsey went out: here’s what he heard.)

(Edit: To clarify, Ian usually rides the system fairly regularly, but this specific outing is about proactively talking to customers, rather than just being a fellow rider.)

Ian will be out at about 9:30 a.m., focusing on the Surrey region: he’s planning for stops at Surrey Central, Newton Exchange, Scottsdale Exchange, and Scott Road. You’re invited to submit your questions in advance via the blog here.

And on the day of Ian’s trip, you can follow his progress via our Twitter feed: Erin McConnell, our manager of corporate communications, will be tweeting about Ian’s ride periodically. At that time, you can also send in questions to our TransLink Twitter feed.

We’ll have a wrap-up note here on the blog: ETA still to be determined as I’m away next week.

And as always, feel free to offer your feedback on this initiative as it unfolds. We want to hear your thoughts on this project and how we can make it better!

The April 2011 Buzzer is now out!

The April 2011 Buzzer is now on board all buses, SeaBus, SkyTrain, and West Coast Express!

The whole Buzzer is devoted to the bus service changes happening on April 18, 2011: there are in fact so many that I had to push out the community events and the history item :(

But it’s for a good cause: many bus services have been adjusted in order to increase efficiency, boosting service on high-demand routes and reducing service where demand is low. (You can see all the changes online here). It’s part of the service optimization project that we talked about last year, and I’ll have a blog interview with one of our planners up next week to talk more about it.

And for the eagle eyed transit fans, you might be pleased to note that the #14 trolley route will be returning on April 18! The 14 was an iconic trolley route that ran on Hastings from 1955 to 1997, and in its new form, it will be taking over parts of the 10 and 17 routes to run from Hastings to UBC. I will have more on the 14 in a blog interview next week with another of our planners.

Again, I am quite proud to have a cover from a local illustrator: this time it’s the lovely Andrea Wan. Thanks Andrea!

And I’m also proud to give QR codes a try on the Buzzer—get a QR code app for your smartphone, snap the codes in the Buzzer and you’ll reach various links on the TransLink website! Thanks to reader Sean Turvey for suggesting QR codes in the first place :)

If you can’t get the Buzzer on the system, you can always read it in PDF form on our website. Visit our Buzzer PDF archives, or grab this direct link to the PDF.

Remember to enter the FareCard contest too! You can win a free FareCard in every issue of the Buzzer: read the issue, then email in your info and the answer to the trivia question by Wednesday, April 20 at 9 a.m.. We’ll pick a winner from all the correct answers, and that person will be notified by phone shortly after the draw.

Enjoy the latest Buzzer as always! Comments are welcome below.

Buzzer blogger away Mon Apr 4, back Mon Apr 11, 2011

A note to say I will be away on a break for a week starting Monday April 4, 2011!

A few scheduled posts will go up in my absence, and I’ll be back to answer your comments and e-mails on Monday, April 11, 2011. (Eep: the end of April fast approaches!)

Here’s some handy links in case you need info/help while I’m off:

• Follow the TransLink Twitter account for key service updates, plus breaking news
• Sign up for e-mail or text message alerts for your bus routes and train trips here
• Our transit alerts can also be found at the TransLink alerts page
• Complaints, commendations, lost property questions, and other inquiries can be directed to TransLink’s customer information area
• You can also reach our transit information line at 604-953-3333
• Look out for April 6, when Vancouver turns 125!
• And for fun, here’s a comic about Chopin and Liszt :)

Congrats to Oleksiy Gayda: winner of our fare card naming contest!

Bus operator Anthony Crann, TransLink VP Mike Madill, name contest winner Oleksiy Gayda and SkyTrain’s Colleen Milek show off the new card on Thursday, March 31, 2011!

Oleksiy Gayda, winner of the naming contest!

A big congratulations to Oleksiy Gayda from Burnaby, who submitted the name Compass for the new electronic fare card!

Seventy-two people actually submitted the name Compass to the contest, and Oleksiy’s name was randomly drawn to win the prize of an iPad and a pass loaded with a year of transit, once the smartcard system is operational in 2013.

Oleksiy has lived in Vancouver since moving here over 10 years ago, and he’s a regular transit rider, since he doesn’t own a car!

For the contest, he submitted two or three names, including Compass.

“With Compass, I was thinking of a word that could mean something more, like a commuter or community pass, shortened to Compass,” he said.

And in fact, Oleksiy said he’d forgotten about the contest until he got the call a few days ago saying he’d won. It was a real shock.

“This is the first time I’ve ever won a contest,” Oleksiy said. “So this is a great experience, and a great prize.”

Again, feel free to share your thoughts on the name and the new card in the comments: and for more on the smartcard project, check the main smartcard project page, or the past Buzzer blog smartcard posts.

And scroll on down for more pictures of the name launch today!

Read more »

Compass: the winning name of TransLink’s electronic fare card

Compass: our new electronic fare card

As many of you may know by now: Compass is the name of our electronic fare card, which will debut in 2013!

That’s right—after 10,000 votes on the three final names for our smartcard, over 40% of the vote went to the name Compass. Staff have been out at major transit exchanges all across the region this morning, handing out Compass pass holders and more to announce the new name.

The contest’s winner—drawn from all those who submitted “Compass” to our contest in fall 2010—will be announced later this morning, so I’ll have that info for you up in a bit. Edit: Here’s the post about the winner, Oleksiy Gayda!

But for now: feel free to share what you think of the new name et al in the comments. And as always, for more on the smartcard project, see the main smartcard project page, or the past Buzzer blog smartcard posts.

UBC Line updates: the alternatives are now online, and the first consultation is tonight, Wed Mar 30, 2011

A lineup for the 99 B-Line at Commercial-Broadway Station.

Two updates for the UBC Line phase two consultation!

All the alternatives are now online

A screenshot of one of the alternatives now posted on the UBC Line phase 2 consultation website: this one shows Bus Rapid Transit.

Check the main UBC Line phase 2 consultation website: all consultation materials are now up, and our questionnaire is open!

This means you can view details of all seven UBC Line alternatives plotted out a map, and learn about the potential routes, station locations and more.

But make sure you find out all the other info too:

• how the alternatives may integrate into streets,
• how each alternative ranked in the preliminary evaluation, and
• what feedback we are looking for,
• plus for more info on the design considerations and trade-offs that guided the project team through all the designs, check out page 21-24 of the design guide, which is also linked at the top right of each individual alternative page.

And THEN, don’t forget to fill in our questionnaire with your feedback!

We really want to emphasize that all these items are super important to look at, so you understand where the alternative designs came from, how we’re evaluating them, and what helpful feedback you can provide (we’re not picking a favourite at this time, though we know you may have one!)

First consultation session is at the Vancouver Masonic Centre tonight, Wed Mar 30, 2011

A reminder that the first UBC Line phase two consultation session is tonight, Wednesday March 30, 2011!

Wednesday, March 30, 2011, 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Vancouver Masonic Centre, Jewel Ballroom, 1495 West 8th Avenue, Vancouver (Google map)

And the next one will be tomorrow:

Thursday, March 31, 2011, 6 p.m. to 9 p.m
Ponderosa Centre, 2071 West Mall, UBC (UBC map)

After that, there’s two more in-person sessions and one online webinar upcoming: see the UBC Line Phase 2 Community Consultation Workshops page for all the details. Or visit TransLink’s Facebook page and click the “Events” tab to add the events to your Facebook calendar (or share them with your friends!)

On removing freeways and reforming buses: an interview with Dr Kee Yeon Hwang, president of the Korea Transport Institute

Dr. Kee Yeon Hwang, president of the Korea Transport Institute, at the Hotel Vancouver on March 28, 2011.

I got a chance to speak with Dr. Kee Yeon Hwang, president of the Korea Transport Institute this Monday!

As you may know, he’s giving two talks this week about his work in Seoul: one on removing a major freeway to restore a downtown stream, and one on reforming Seoul’s bus system. (See this post for the talk details!)

Dr. Hwang talked with me about those projects and how they came about, plus what he’s up to now, which includes high-speed rail plans and elevated bike freeways in Korea. Read on for more!

Read more »

Our smartcard name will be revealed on Thu Mar 31, 2011

You'll just tap your smartcard to validate come 2013.

Well, it’s almost here! The winning name (and the winner!) of the smartcard naming contest will be announced on the morning of Thursday, March 31, 2011.

Staff will be at stations and exchanges to share some swag and announce the new name. So keep an eye out on Thursday to find out the winner!

(For more about the smartcard project, check out the TransLink site or the Buzzer blog’s past smartcard posts.)

Fun with language: how to say SkyTrain in Cantonese

A SkyTrain near Main Street-Science World.

A little while ago there was a conversation on the blog about what SkyTrain can be called in Cantonese. Which was really fascinating, because I had no idea there were other names for SkyTrain around town!

Here’s the full conversation thread, but these comments provide a good summary:

Andrew S:

It’s kinda interesting, everyone that speaks Cantonese that I know (including me) call the SkyTrain “fai-cheh” (like “fast car” or “fast train”) :P
“Let’s ride the SkyTrain!” becomes “Dahp fai cheh la!” (kind of…)

Tim Choi explained the etymology a bit further:

As Andrew stated, “cheh” appears to be used for any ground vehicle, ranging from baby carriages/buggies to rickshaws to bicycles to trucks to tanks.

Ways to say “train” include the following:
“li cheh” – ‘li’ means a series, so a series of ground vehicles = train!
“foh cheh” – ‘foh’ means fire, and so a vehicle that uses fire describes the early steam trains, and thus the term is used more commonly for heavy rail.
“fai cheh” – ‘fai’ means fast, and thus used to describe express trains (the Westcoast Express, for example, is called “xih on fai cheh”, where “xih” means “west” and “on” means “coast”).

If you want to say “Let’s take Skytrain!”, one possible translation would be “yuh cih dahp [preferred translation for SkyTrain] ah!”. “Yuh cih” means “[all] together”. The ‘c’ in “cih” is pronounced like “church” without the ‘hurch’, and the ‘ih’ is like “ick” without the ‘k’ sound.
“ah” or “la” are exclamations you can use to end off statements.

So, there you have it: SkyTrain in Cantonese :)

And I’d love to know if anyone else call SkyTrain or buses by a different name in other languages. Are they literal translations of SkyTrain or something slightly different in English?

Links and tidbits, Wed Mar 23, 2011

A roundup of interesting tidbits and links about transportation from the last week or so!

• Vincent Kartheiser and Rich Sommer from the tv show Mad Men recorded an in-period plea for high speed rail in America! Just thought you’d enjoy it, as Hollywood endorsements of transit options are few and far between :)
• On Twitter, @dizzysays sent along a 1985 home video of SkyTrain!
• Anna Dean, who retired from TransLink last year, shares her story of being a woman in the transit industry with the Vancouver Sun (the article mistakenly says BC Transit!) Incidentally, Edra McLeod, who is mentioned in the story, is part of the podcast in my 2009 post about the conductorettes.
• Unfinished London: a (really excellent) homemade documentary about a Tube line in London that was never built.
• Hamburg contemplates putting in a cable car, kind of like our prospective gondola project for SFU/Burnaby Mountain.
• A couple of fun links shared by VIA Architecture: trippy transit benches in Philadelphia, and how much could you save by riding transit instead of driving?
• Bike sharing will be starting in Toronto come May 3, 2011! Also, in other Toronto news, the TTC has hired a chief of customer service!
• Vancouver has a new fleet of delivery tricycles. And in other Vancouver bike news, here’s a Georgia Straight review of metro Vancouver’s bike infrastructure.
• Great traffic infographic from the How We Drive blog.
• Ric sent in photos of his Super Express trainset.
• Complaints section: Average Joe Cyclist had a bad experience with BCAA Bike Assist (and their vice-president sent in a response!). And over in Victoria, a letter-writer complains about BC Transit’s transit ticket transfer policy.
• Nathan over at South Fraser OnTrax posts a couple of illustrations of the planned Waterloo Rapid Transit, as it may be similar to Surrey rapid transit solutions.
• SkyTrain… to murder! (It’s a mystery novel set in Bangkok: ha ha :)
• Portland’s TriMet has installed audible signals to warn pedestrians that a bus is turning, after a recent fatal collision at a crosswalk. Then a lady named Jeri Ellsworth posted a critique of the signals that made the president of the signals’ contractor insult her on YouTube! Super weird.
• Look: I’m quoted in a recent Mass Transit magazine article on the negative side of social media.
• Dominik Raab does bike stunts: it’s kind of like parkour for bikes!
• David Cooper shared a video on LRT planning in Detroit, done to the tune of Eminem.
• I never posted this before: the lovely drawings of Christoph Niemann, telling the story of his sons’ obsession with the NYC subway.
• And last but not least, Jason Vanderhill sent through this story about pregnant ladies on transit getting seats! A topic dear to my heart :)

If you have any items to suggest, or a photo to showcase on these posts, e-mail me at thebuzzer@translink.ca! (Seriously: photos. Send them to me!)