Bus reroutes for the C19, 177, and 791 start Monday, Feb 8
Bus reroutes for the C19, 177, and 791 start Monday, Feb 8
A few more non-Olympic service adjustments are happening on Monday, February 8. Pass it on to those who might be affected, please!
C19 UBC/Alma
Extensive modifications to the Museum of Anthropology’s parking lot are now complete, including the construction of a new bus bay. As of Monday, February 8 the C19 will now enter the Museum’s parking lot and utilize the new stop permanently.
The new bus stop at the museum is #61358. The temporary stop used during the construction (#61424) will be discontinued in coordination with the new stop.
Construction detours for the 177 and 791
From February 2010 to spring 2011, King Edward Street will be closed between Lougheed Highway and Woolridge for the Stage 1 construction of the King Edward Street Overpass. As a result, the 177 and 791 bus routes will be making detours on their routes, starting on Monday February 8.
The detours will affect only the 177 Braid Station and 791 Braid Station routes. (The 177 Coquitlam Station/Planet Ice and the 791 Haney Place routes are unaffected have a minor change: both will operate on a new section of Woolridge Street, which has been re-aligned, and the 791 Haney Place route will operate via Woolridge [the regular routing is via King Edward Street].)
So: these routes will be avoiding the closed section of King Edward Street by going northbound on King Edward under the freeway, right over Woolridge, then northbound on Schoolhouse, and westbound again on Lougheed Highway.
If this makes no sense to you, here are two handy maps that explain the rerouting quite nicely:
Also important: three bus stops on the 177 Coquitlam Station/Planet Ice route will be discontinued owing to the work!
- 58994 NB Woolridge St at Tupper Ave
- 53632 SB King Edward St at Woolridge St
- 59466 WB Woolridge St at King Edward St
But one bus stop will be introduced along the detour:
- 53948 EB Woolridge St at King Edward St
Please keep an eye out for future information about possible changes to these detour routings, including information about Stage 2 construction detours.
While on the subject of construction detours, There are two separate construction projects on 60th Avenue in Surrey that are causing 5-10 minute delays each for the 341 Langley/Guildford. One is at the intersection with 144th St while the other is between 148th St and 150th St. Both projects look like they will be going on for a while so I believe a detour might be in order. It would be much appreciated if you could pass this along to the right people, thanks!
As if the 791 couldn’t be slowed down even further! Why didn’t they continue on United Blvd, across the one lane bridge onto Braid to the station? At the worst times, the 791 can take forever to turn onto Brunette from Lougheed.
It appears Coquitlam and New Westminster planners were not talking to one another.
Coquitlam built United wide as a future highway and arterial. New Westminster did not want the traffic to be cutting through a freight train crossing that has 5 crossings between the bridge and Brunette. In addition for anyone stuck behind one of those long trains, it can take several minutes to clear. New Westminster instead wanted to channel traffic North and East over the trains. However Coquitlam hasn’t really improved the intersection with the border intersections.
New Westminster is waiting for the province to build an overpass from United Blvd, over the dip on the Millenium Line (it’s why it’s there in the first place) to a T interchange with Brunette as part of the North Fraser Perimeter Road project.
Having lived in that area of Coquitlam, taking the bus there has always been a gong show.
I had a chance to find out what happened to the eastbound stop on Lougheed at Coleman. Turns out they built the new exit and entrance with a bus stop in mind as evident with the bus lane and crosswalk leading from Kal-Tire over to it. But during the testing phase, it was found out that the buses had a hard time pulling out of the stop because of traffic rushing by at 70km/h that had no legal requirement to yield. Here’s the thing though, the speed limit drops to 60km/h just after the Coleman on ramp. The solution is simple! All that needed to be done to make that bus stop viable was to move the 60km/h zone back just before Coleman and add a sign alerting drivers to buses pulling out. But as the transit planners in the area don’t seem to get it, (also evidenced by the 158-C35-177 debacle) the area remains with sub-standard bus service and will likely continue to for some time to come.
As for Coquitlam building United Blvd wide because it was to be an arterial route and New West not co-operating because of the tracks at Braid, that’s all true, but if you notice on the SkyTrain near Braid Station there’s a dip in the tracks. That dip was meant to accommodate a United Blvd overpass. However, New Westminster, like Vancouver loathes traffic from the region entering their fiefdom, so it looks like that overpass will never see the light of day. It’s also why Front Street, a street almost tailor made to a counterflow system will never be widened or have a counterflow system put in place.
As for the 177 detour, as I see it, buses turning left from Schoolhouse to Lougheed may not be able to hit the bus stop on the corner after finishing the turn. Am I right in assuming that the 177 will not be serving the stop on Lougheed at Schoolhouse?
There has to be someway to improve the 791. The people coming up with the route plan for the 791 seem to forget that the route was meant for people in Pitt Meadows and Maple Ridge to get to SkyTrain faster, not service the area in between. During off-peak hours, the 791 should use the Trans-Canada and during peak hours should use Braid Street and United Boulevard. The route would then have the advantage of still offering rush hour service to the United Boulevard area for people working there.
D: I sent your comments about the specified detour to CMBC planning, and here’s the response.