Published June 19, 2024

Caisse proposes tramway in master plan for regional transit

Peter Black

peterblack@qctonline.com

Delivered within the six-month deadline, and containing many new elements from the previous plan, the Caisse de dépôt et placement de Québec Infra (CDPQ Infra) has laid out a sweeping master plan for transit in the greater Quebec City region.

Unveiled at a crowded news conference on June 12, the project, called the Circuit integré de transport express (CITE) plan, foresees a tramway, rapid bus service and potentially a mass transit tunnel between Quebec City and Lévis, built in three phases.

Phase 1 of the CITE project is similar in its key elements to the project the city had underway until the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) government put it on pause in November over concerns about the escalating cost.

In the altered version the Caisse proposes, the central tramway line would run from Cap-Rouge in the west to Charlesbourg in the north-east, passing along Boul. Laurier and Boul. René- Lévesque, with a tunnel to Saint-Roch.

The previous plan had the eastern terminus on Rue D’Estimauville, a change that had been imposed by the CAQ government; the initial route the city proposed in 2018 when the plan was first unveiled included the Charlesbourg line.

The new line would run for 28 kilometres, compared to the 19 km of the D’Estimauville version.

Under the Caisse plan, the D’Estimauville extension would be built in Phase 2, and a line from Charlesbourg to the Lebourgneuf sector in the northwest in Phase 3. A spur to Jean Lesage International Airport is also in the long-term plan.

Supplementing the tramway would be two rapid bus (SRB) networks running on dedicated lanes serving suburban areas, as well as the downtown core of Lévis. The Quebec City SRB line would run along Boul. Charest, connecting to the tramway in Saint-Roch in the east and Boul. René-Lévesque in the west.

In Lévis, the SRB line would pass along Boul. Guillaume-Couture to the Desjardins complex, connecting in the west with the Sainte-Foy transit hub after crossing one of the two bridges.

Both SRB lines are included in the first phase of the project.

The Caisse plan hopes to trim the cost of the tramway and increase its “social acceptability” by several measures: reducing the size of the tram cars, making stations smaller, lowering the platform for the tram rails and using available battery technology to reduce the amount of overhead electrical lines.

The CITE plan, according to the CDPQ Infra release, “proposes new, interconnected transit solutions that will offer high service frequencies, with extended timetables, increased comfort and reliability and significant time savings, reducing travel time by up to half in some areas.”

The report says the plan “has the potential to significantly increase ridership on the [metropolitan Quebec City] public transit system, adding at least 40,000 people a day. This represents a minimum increase in public transit ridership of 30 per cent, generating a further reduction in GHG emissions.”

As for a “third link” between Quebec City and Lévis, the Caisse recom- mends a seven-km tunnel dedicated exclusively to a tramway line be built between the downtowns of the two cities, “in time and in accordance with demographic and densification conditions.”

The report, after studying six possible crossing sites, concluded “the traffic flow on any of the corridors studied would be relatively low, as would the reduction in the number of vehicles on existing bridges. The addition of an intercity road would move congestion points deeper into the Quebec City road network, forcing a reconfiguration of these corridors. As a result, the marginal gains in mobility for the [greater Quebec City metropolitan area] cannot, on their own, justify the construction of a new intercity road.”

The $15.5-billion estimated cost includes $7 billion for the tramway, $4.5 billion for SRB and express bus lanes, and, should it proceed, $4 billion for the tramway tunnel.

The city’s budget for the tramway line, updated in November, had been $8.4 billion.

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