Thursday, September 10, 2009

New Metros Abound

Looks like we have new Metro segments in Dubai and Sofia. Trinidad could put theirs on hold. But funny regions are building Metro lines and in Sofia, they are cheap!
Construction of a further extension from Mladost 1 to the International Exhibition Center on Tsarigradsko Shose began on July 2 for completion in 2012. The €94m project includes 2·5 km of tunnel, one station and a car park.

6 comments:

Matt Fisher said...

Here's a map of the proposed Curitiba Metro I made. At least this should pale in comparison to this.

(By the way, in the latter, the reason I include the Orange Line is not because it's a busway, but really because it should have been a f**king rail line. The idea that BRT can be a substitute for rail is wrong.)

(Oh, and with both Curitiba and my home of Ottawa, both longtime heralded as examples of BRT by its proponents, finally going for rail, I dare say they could be apoplectic.)

Matt Fisher said...

Finally, about the one of Curitiba I made, it only shows the Blue Line. Five more are planned, according to Wikipedia (in Portuguese only).

Justin said...

Rail in Trinidad! Still boggles the mind.

Loren said...

That may be why the BRT champions are now advertising the likes of Bogota, Colombia -- Curitiba and Ottawa are betraying them with their moves toward urban rail.

Alon Levy said...

Sofia is cheap because it's a low-income city. Sofia's regional income per capita, not adjusted for living costs, was €5,100 in 2006, about one sixth that of the US. This means that, scaled to income, the metro project costs the equivalent of $325,000,000 per km in the US, which is slightly higher than subway construction costs in LA and SF (about $300 million/km) and slightly lower than in Tokyo ($500 million/km, scaled to income).

I'm cheating a bit because since 2006, Bulgaria has grown faster than the US by a few percentage points. However, this effect is small, worth maybe a 10% discount, and canceled by the fact that LA and SF are considerably richer than the rest of the US.

Matt Fisher said...

Sydney is getting both Oceania and Australia's first metro. You can see my map here of the current proposal.

(In this map, I have the Metro Light Rail line shown with a proposed extension to Dulwich Hill, which can be done cheaply, since it's on a line that's soon gonna be closed to freight trains, from what I've read on Wikipedia. But as I say in my map, it doesn't include an extension to Circular Quay that should be done. This is because I couldn't find the exact route.)

Regarding the route of an extension to Circular Quay, can anybody help me? Anybody? Bueller? Bueller? Bueller? (A bit of a joke on my part; this is, of course, taken from one of my favourite John Hughes movies. R.I.P., John.)