Because making the road prettier and more attractive to build on should be secondary to a rapid "transit" project. Moving people efficiently should be the main priority. Hamilton and other cities will continue to grow. We should build it for a future that transforms latent demand from private vehicles to public transport.
A street-level tram line that moves people at the same speed as a bus will cause that conversion as grade-separated trains would.
It
will move them efficiently though. Hamilton isn't Toronto. The B-Line bus is actually very quick, so the same speed as the bus isn't that bad. The issue is that the B-Line is over capacity and gets worse each year as traffic mounts. LRT will solve the two main issues of the current bus system in 20 years; capacity and efficiency. It will bypass traffic in its own Right of Way, and it will multiply capacity by 5 times.
The cultural, economic vitality of the project is a central piece to this project but the transit goals are still being met. Hamilton has a $4b infrastructure deficit. The province/Feds replacing $1,700,000,000 of Hamilton's infrastructure even if it was a failed transit project would still be worth it though is what I think
@TheHonestMaple is speaking to.
LRT will take 30-32 minutes from McMaster to Eastgate, that's amazing, right now at 5PM it's estimated to take 41 minutes by bus and 35 minutes by car. The fastest the bus seems to show on Google is 36 minutes end to end at like 7:30PM. LRT taking 32 minutes would be a 10% increase in speed end to end, and if it can match that in rush hour, which I think is the point it would mean a 22% increase in speed.
The current bus times will only get worse as more people move to Hamilton, and the capacity issue will remain. Imagine a future where driving end-to-end takes 45 minutes and taking the bus takes 60 minutes. If LRT can remain sub-35 minutes with high capacity, then it will beat out driving as Hamilton's population grows.
Keep in mind also, that almost nobody goes end to end. Hamilton's project isn't a rapid transit line to downtown, it's more a local transit tram for mostly local trips. Hamilton doesn't and likely won't ever have the same commute patterns Toronto does, where people are taking it from the edges to a central spot which is the terminus. Majority of people will be taking 33% or less of the line which means a full-out Metro for like $10+ billion makes even less sense. A currently average 14 minute bus ride during rush hour will turn into a 10.5m LRT ride. It will improve comfort, encourage riders to take transit rather than drive, but commute times will be changed only marginally. Spending triple the money to get a further 3 minutes just doesn't make sense on a C/B analysis.
