Archive for October, 2009

Smart Cards for ETS

Oct
19
2009
The infamous ETS Platinum has a smart card reader onboard.

The infamous ETS Platinum has a smart card reader onboard.

Tomorrow council’s Transportation and Public Works (TPW) Committee will discuss a report on the prospects for implementing a ’smart card’ system for paying fares on ETS. These are typically ‘contactless’ or ‘proximity’ systems where you simply wave the card past the reader.

The report responds to an inquiry I initiated a couple of months ago in anticipation of my rotation on to TPW for the next year.

I’ve been keen on this since having a great experience in London with the ‘Oyster Card‘ system on my honeymoon three years ago, and since working on the U-Pass negotiations and implementation in my former role working for students at the U of A.

These systems have much broader application as well, such as the ability to integrate with other civic and partner cards, for example Edmonton Public Library card, City rec facility access, parking access. In Asia many smart card systems also function as debit cards.

ETS has been conducting a pilot project with the U of A, who are also evaluation smart card systems for their One-Card, which illustrates some of the potential for partnerships with other institutions.

From the report:

A key benefit of smart cards is the improved operational efficiency due to simplified fare product and financial distribution channels. Agencies report better revenues due to re-designed fare strategies, value-added service features and convenience.   Other benefits include:

  • Better able to forecast service and market adjustments with real time travel and usage data
  • Improve use of all transit modes due to easier transfers
  • Deliver immediate benefits and changes to fares, etc. to users
  • Provide access to other municipal services
  • Accept other smart cards from banks, etc.

There are positive operating budget impacts outlined in the report as well:

  • reduce financial losses due to fare evasion
  • sell advertisement on the card (logos, etc.)
  • reduce costs associated with printing fare media and distribution
  • enable immediate changes to create a more efficient transit service based on real time commuter travel history
  • reduce some of the support needed for other fare systems (ie cash, tickets, etc.).

I would add the following as well:

  • Customer ease of use in terms of being able to recharge the card on-line or automatically.
  • Ability to manage zone fares easily, which will be more important as intermunicipal transit develops in the Capital Region.
  • Ability to deactivate if lost or stolen.

The report indicates a four year rollout with a $24 million price tag. The city’s auditor recommended in 2006 that the city persue this as the financial and operational benefits were strong. I’m hoping to give it a push forward tomorrow and get the formal business case prepared.

I’d like to see us get started on implementation soon. This isn’t leading edge stuff anymore. This is now an established practice.

Posted in 2007-2010 Term | 6 Comments »

Inquiry: Open Data

Oct
14
2009

Today I submitted the following formal inquiry to city administration. It will likely come back to Council’s Executive Committee early next year. Mack Male and others connected to Change Camp and Bar/Demo Camp have been advocating for this and I’ve been reading about other Canadian projects, like Vancouver’s.

In local, national and sub-national governments around the world there is a trend toward making up-to-date government information freely available on-line in generically accessible data formats as so-called ‘Open Data’.

1) What level of awareness does the City Administration have regarding Open Data in municipal government?

2) What current initiatives are underway within City Administration that might qualify under the spirit of Open Data?

3) What further initiatives are under consideration within the city, and on what basis are they being evaluated?

4) Is Administration monitoring any successes and or challenges with this trend in other jurisdictions, especially large Canadian cities, and if so what can be shared with Council?

5) What would City Administration’s recommendation be on next steps regarding Open Data plans or strategies?

This inquiry process gets the issue on the agenda and we’ll go from there. Chris Moore with IT at the city has been very interested in this and I look forward to the report his group will provide.

[UPDATE Oct 19: Mack Male has posted further salient thoughts after a Change Camp session on this topic this past weekend.]

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Posted in 2007-2010 Term | 7 Comments »

River Valley and Ravine Setbacks – a.k.a “Top of Bank” [UPDATED]

Oct
08
2009

[UPDATE on outcome at end of post.]

The city needs a new policy for dealing with urban development along the edge of the river valley and ravine system. [Background here.] The latest draft came to City Council’s Executive Committee today.

We have about 22km of such edges remaining in the city where development may occur over time, and the policy could come to bear on a redevelopment in an existing area.

Since 1985 we’ve had a very weak policy which called for roadway along the edge with houses only on one side of that road. Because of a litany of ambiguities in the old policy and prior councils’ willingness to grant exceptions, only around 20% of the development that’s occurred since 1985 has a road at the edge. In many areas, especially in the Southwest, the frequent result has been houses backing directly on the ravine and valley, while some more recent cases have trails providing some buffer.

Let me be clear that I support a 100% continuous public access that is wide enough to provide good separation for wildlife, facilitate emergency access, as well as ensure long term geotechnical stability of the lands. I don’t necessarily think that this public access needs to take the form of a roadway; but in certain instances, as outlined in the policy, roadway may be appropriate and a minimum (30% is proposed) should be provided.

For development backing onto the slope, the draft policy proposes a 15m buffer for public access, which seems to have support from most stakeholders. It sounded like the developers can support this separation but are worried about how the lands will be traded against other obligations (for roads and parks mainly) when the land is subdivided into individual lots. This is one of the implementation details that needs more work.

Today at the public hearing some called passionately for a return to the 100% goal of the 1985 policy, and the creation of scenic roadways like Saskatchewan Drive and Victoria Promenade. Incidentally, few realize that those drives are scenic because a lot of the original vegetation was removed over the years to improve the view. Removing vegetation can weaken the slope significantly too.

The other factor that can weaken slope stability is water, either from poor drainage on a lot or from the many illegal backyard sprinkler systems that are installed in homes backing on the valley or ravines. Clearly we need the larger setback to mitigate this, and we’ll need stronger enforcement of infractions, and protection against liability for the city in the event that a property owner’s carelessness causes damage to the slope and others’ property.

It seems we’re close. Council will work on it some more next week and then some further consultations with the 29 identified stakeholder groups and hopefully we’ll be able to approve a robust policy that can ensure safe slopes and continuous public access.

[February 26, 2010 Update: Council approved the revised policy C542 on February 17. It provides for 100% continuous public along the Top of Bank, a minimum of 30% of which shall be either abutting a roadway or abutting park space fronting onto the roadway. It requires a minimum of 10m of setback from the 'long term line of stability' (established by geotechnical study) whereupon a trail will provide public access, and where houses back directly onto the trail a 6m wide public access is required every 120 metres. The length and breadth of the policy and background material can be found in the city's meeting records here. I supported the policy as it met my goal of continuous public access to the river valley and ravine edge.]

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Posted in 2007-2010 Term | 3 Comments »

Selling EPCOR water or wires would come to Council

Oct
01
2009

A report arrived at Council today on how any future decisions would be made regarding the sale or transfer of major assets still in EPCOR that Edmontonians depend on. The report responded to a motion I put forward in the summer asking for this information. [Download the report here.]

[Clarification added Oct 3: Just to be clear, I asked these questions as a hypothetical. There are no proposals that I'm aware of to sell EPCOR as a whole or any part of the Water, Wastewater or Electricity Distribution & Transmission assets in Edmonton. The Capital Power spin-off was it.]

In a nutshell, the city regulates water and wastewater, and as regulator approval would be required if ownership of the potable water plants, the water pipes, or the wastewater plant were proposed to change. This decision would come to a council meeting.

Furthermore, even though Electricity distribution is regulated by the province, there is a franchise agreement in place for the use of right of way for power lines and any change to this agreement would also have to come to council for approval. Electricity transmission assets (high voltage) are treated differently in terms of regulation and other legalities, so the sale of such might not come to a Council meeting.

The report indicates that EPCOR would also need to seek approval from its shareholder (also the City), which it normally would do at a closed meeting, to sell any major assets.

So what we’ve learned is that the process might start behind closed doors between company and shareholder, but in the case of the utilities that people have expressed concern to me about losing (namely, water, wastewater and power distribution) there would be a Council debate on the matter – one would hope that this would not occur in private.

Councillor Henderson proposed a motion aimed at changing some of the governing documents to explicitly require that there be a Council meeting to consider any proposed sale of major assets in Edmonton, but it was defeated 7 to 5. I supported his motion.

In fairness, there was disagreement among councillors about the practical realities of owning a competitive business, and how this conflicts with our desire for transparency as elected officials. In this instance I leaned toward transparency going forward, having learned a valuable lesson about what a relative lack of transparency in the Capital Power decision process led to in terms of confusion and angst among the public.

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Posted in 2007-2010 Term | 4 Comments »