Links and tidbits is our semi-regular roundup of interesting fodder about transportation from the last few weeks or so. If you have links to contribute, put them in the comments, or email us.

• The South Surrey Park and  Ride and its expansion lot are now open! You may have already seen this on our Facebook page, but here’s a neat time-lapse video that shows the construction process.

• The pitter patter of footsteps, the clink of coins in the vending machine … wouldn’t it be interesting of the sounds of the transit system were musical? James Murphy has been fighting to turn all New York city subway turnstiles into musical instruments, to create a subway symphony.

• There’s nothing like a bit of workout before taking transit! Russia has launched a campaign to encourage citizens to be healthier – transit riders now have the option of paying for their subway ticket with 30 squats!

• Price Tags shares an image submitted by Jim McGraw, of the Bochenheimer Warte U-bahn stop, a major interchange station in Frankfurt, Germany. Interesting design, no?

• New York subway conductors have a rule: at every stop, they are required to point at a black and white sign to acknowledge the train fully arriving at the station. Two Miami Ad School students take advantage of this rule to put a big smile on the conductors’ faces. Watch the video below and read the full story here.

• Spacing Vancouver posts this absolutely stunning time-lapse video of Vancouver, that took 6 months and over 50,000 pictures to create.

• Just for kids! A bus-load of fun for the little ones from two to ten years old, on the Vancouver Tumblebus – a fully fitted gym on wheels with crash mats, monkey bars, a climbing wall, trampoline and more!

• We’ve all heard of gardens on top of homes or buildings in an effort to bring nature into the urban environment. We even have a tree on top of a building in Vancouver’s West End. But, have you heard of a bus with a rooftop garden? Designer Marc Granen calls his concept Phyto Kinetic.

• Here’s an interesting story – University of Toronto graduate Samah El-Tantawy has designed new traffic lights that uses strategies from game theory to reduce traffic congestion. Do you think this would work in vancouver?