Calgary Transit LRT
Anderson to City Centre Line
Calgary Transit's original LRT Line, the Anderson/City Centre line, was
opened to the public on May 25, 1981 with the ceremonial train being driven
through a special opening ceremonies banner by Mayor Ralph Klien. The opening
ceremonies were held at the City Hall station, at the time named the 2 Street SE
Station. The Anderson/City Centre line consisted of 7 suburban stations
and 8 downtown stations that were constructed starting in 1980. The 7
suburban stations from south to north are Anderson, Southland, Heritage,
Chinook, 42 Avenue (Later renamed 39 Avenue), Erlton (Later renamed Erlton/Stampede),
and Stampede (Later renamed Victoria Park/Stampede) stations. The 8
Downtown stations are for westbound trains on the avenue they were 1 Street SW,
4 Street SW, and 7 Street SW and the eastbound trains were 8 Street SW, 6 Street
SW, 3 Street SW, Centre Street, and 2 Street SE.
The first station, Anderson, is situated west of MacLeod Trail at Anderson
Road South and served as the terminus of the original Route 201 line from
opening day of May 25, 1981 until October 9, 2001 when the South LRT extension
opened up. Anderson station was built as a centre loading platform with
access via a pedestrian overpass that was adjacent to the south end of the
platform. The east side of the station had the bus terminal and the west
side of the station led to a park and some residential areas. The tail
tracks at the south end of Anderson station led to the Anderson Maintenance
Facility, which housed the original 27 LRV's that were ordered. On the
pedestrian overpass, there is a concession where patrons could purchase fares,
snacks, drinks, and get schedule information, along with ticket vending machines
and schedule information. Later on after the line was opened, this station
became wheelchair accessible at the north end of the platform where it had an
at-grade crossing that crossed over the northbound track and the CP Rail tracks
to access the north end of the bus terminal. The above photo was taken on
August 30, 1980 by the late Eric Johnson that shows a CP Rail train led by
SD40-2 #5771 passing the under construction Anderson Station. If you were
to look at that same scene today, you would see the at-grade crossing replacing
the emergency exit that is shown in that photo. This photo was also used
on Page 29 of the book entitled "The Railways of Calgary (Volume
Three) The Diesel Era - 1950 to 1999" by Kevin Franchk, published
by Donald Bain of B.R.M.N.A. publishing (Calgary, Alberta)
Further north on the line was Southland Station, located west of MacLeod
Trail at Southland Drive. Southland Station is a centre loading platform
that is served by several feeder buses. This station has access from a
pedestrian overpass at the north end of the platform, which can be accessed from
the bus terminal. This station also featured the Concession and the Ticket
vending machines on the pedestrian overpass level. Most of the bus routes
that serve this station today are community shuttle buses on the weekends and
served with a mix of shuttle buses and full sized buses. Southland station
serves as a link to the residential areas that surround the area and is
accessible to businesses in the area via buses. Southland was also
upgraded later in service life to have an at-grade crossing, with the crossing
at the south end of the station crossing only the southbound track to meet the
Park & Ride lot.
The third station heading northbound is Heritage Station, located west of
MacLeod Trail at Heritage Drive. Heritage Station was originally built as
a Park & Ride lot with a bus terminal. Both of those still exist
today, but with the addition of the LRT Station. This station was built
very similar to the Southland station with the bus terminal at the north end of
the station and the Park & Ride lot at the south end of the station, with a
centre loading platform. Heritage Station serves as a link to Heritage
Park (Accessible via the Route 20 - Northmount/Heritage and the Route 502 -
Heritage Park during Spring to Fall each year), residential areas, and local
businesses via buses. Somewhere around 1983-1985, there was an additional
storage facility for LRV's that was built south of Heritage Station named
Haysboro Storage. It houses 49 LRV's and is used specifically only for LRV
Storage. Heritage Station later was upgraded to be wheelchair accessible
at the south end of the station crossing only the southbound track at-grade to
meet the Park & Ride lot.
Following the train northbound from Heritage Station, the fourth station is
Chinook Station. This station is located at 61 Avenue South, east of
MacLeod Trail. Chinook Station is a centre loading station built identical
to Heritage and Southland stations. Served by several feeder buses, this
station serves residential areas, local businesses, and industrial areas
surrounding the area. One of the biggest attractions to this station is
the Chinook Centre mall, about 4-5 blocks west of the station. Chinook
Station was later modified to have an at-grade wheelchair access at the south
end of the station, accessible from the Park & Ride lot that crosses the
southbound track to meet the station.
The fifth station heading northbound is 42 Avenue Station, located at 39th
Avenue South, east of MacLeod Trail. 42 Avenue Station was later renamed
the 39 Avenue Station between March 1986 and December 1987. This station
is a side loading platform, with the platforms for the northbound trains on the
east side of the tracks and the southbound trains on the west side of the
tracks. 42 Avenue Station was a link to local industrial and
commercial businesses on the east side of the station and residential on the
west side of the station. This station was probably one of the first
stations to be wheelchair accessible for the south line suburban stations.
From 42 Avenue station, the train heads northbound to go through the longest
tunnel on the LRT line, named the Cemetery Hill tunnel. The Cemetery Hill
tunnel is 2300 feet long and has an emergency exit half-way through the tunnel
on the west side, accessible through a set of doors that join both northbound
and southbound tunnels. The emergency exit tunnel leads out into the yard
of Shaw Cablesystems on MacLeod Trail after climbing through stairs and a set of
ladders. Past the tunnel on the north side is Erlton Station, later
renamed the Erlton/Stampede station. Erlton Staiton is located beside
MacLeod Trail at 25 Avenue South. This station is a centre loading
platform that is accessible by a pedestrian overpass at the north end of the
platform that leads to the bus terminal on the east side. This station
serves the Calgary Exhibition and Stampede grounds, some industrial and
commercial businesses, and residential areas too. This station was later
retrofitted with a wheelchair ramp and an at-grade crossing that joins up to the
sidewalk at the 25th Avenue South grade crossing.
The final station on the south line before downtown is the Stampede station,
later renamed the Victoria Park/Stampede station. This station was
originally built as a 2 platform station, but was built with a third platform on
the far east of the station. Stampede station also has a tail track to
store trains and equipment at the end of the third platform. Access to
this station is via a pedestrian overpass that starts on the west side of
MacLeod Trail and leads to the doors of the Roundup Centre in the Stampede
Grounds. This station was later made wheelchair accessible by linking a
ramp from the south end of the station for tracks A and B to the overpass
directly above it. Where the wheelchair ramp begins, is where the
emergency exit used to be located at the south end of the platform, although
there is still some of the old emergency exit remaining.
After the Stampede Station, the Anderson/City Centre line continues north
beside MacLeod Trail until it reaches a tunnel where the train goes underground
to pass underneath the CP Rail tracks between 9th and 10th Avenues and emerges
at about 8th Avenue to climb back up to grade level to get to 7th Avenue at 3
Street SE. Along 7th Avenue from 3 Street SE to 8th Street SW, the trains
all follow normal traffic signals on the "In street limits". As
the train heads westbound, it makes 3 stops before reaching the terminus station
at 8 Street SW. Those three stations are 1 Street SW (Between 1 and 2
Streets SW), 4 Street SW (Between 4 and 5 Streets SW), and 7 Street SW (Between
7 and 8 Streets). All three of those stations are side loading platforms
along the north side of the tracks. Between 7 Street and 8 Street Stations
is a switch (Which no longer exists since 1984) that links the two stations up
so the trains may head the opposite directions.
When the trains have been switched from the westbound track to the eastbound
track at 8 Street SW Station, the train heads eastbound to pick up and drop off
passengers at 4 stations before going back south to Anderson. These 4
stations are 6 Street SW (Between 5 and 6 Streets SW), 2 Street SW (Between 2
and 3 Street SW), Centre Street (Originally between 1 Street SW and Centre
Street, now located between Centre Street and 1 Street SE), and 2 Street SE
(Later renamed City Hall Station by 1987, located between 2 and 3 Streets SE, 2
Street SE was later renamed MacLeod Trail in the downtown area). At the
east end of City Hall station, there was a single crossover track that was later
removed and changed to a double crossover by 1985 when the Whitehorn C-Train
line was opened.
Originally, Calgary Transit had planned on building the C-Train system
in a subway format where the trains would run underground underneath 8th Avenue
SW/SE instead of above ground on 7th Avenue. In 1980, the new City Hall
municipal building was voted by Calgarians to be built on already existing
government owned land instead of leasing office space from private
businesses. Design of the new 14-storey municipal building included a
parkade to be built underground, including at the time, a subway for the LRT
system to be constructed. Unfortunately because the LRT system was already
$23.3-million over budget, underground LRT in Calgary was put to a halt and all
that was ever built was the shell of the tunnel. The view in the third
photo on the second row above shows the split in the tunnels at the east end of
the tunnel. Beyond the ends of the splits in the tunnel is the tunnel that
leads north and south along the Anderson LRT line. The tunnel on the left
of that photo would lead to the future Whitehorn line and the tunnel on the
right would lead to the existing Anderson line. From the tunnel that
connects downtown to the Stampede station, you can see the one side of the
tunnel curve to meet this tunnel that was suppose to be built. Not many
people knew about this tunnel even existing until it aired on CFCN News/CTV
Calgary back in 1998 with John Jensen of Calgary Transit that answered questions
during the interview. The only way to access this tunnel is through an
access door inside of the Municipal parkade and down a ladder. Special
thanks goes to CFCN News/CTV for allowing us to use these images.
After speaking with someone at City Hall back in 2003, I was told that this
tunnel may be finally used with the future LRT line that is being researched to
bring a leg of the LRT from downtown to MacKenzie Towne in the far SE of
Calgary. However, if it is still not used at that point, at least it is
still there for future consideration if the city ever does decide to revisit the
idea of underground LRT in Calgary. It was rumored that in the basement of
the Banker's Hall building, there was also the shell of a possible LRT Station,
although it turns out that there never was as there is already an auditorium
built down there. If Calgary Transit really did build LRT underground in
Calgary, than there would be less accidents along the C-Train line as most of
the accidents that you hear about on the news these days happen on 7th Avenue,
including at least 3 or 4 derailments and several vehicle and pedestrian
accidents. Having the LRT underground also reduces the amount of stations
required for loading and unloading as well.
However, with the current Anderson/City Centre line, there really wasn't many
changes to the line until beginning in the mid 1980's when the Whitehorn line
was becoming a reality and construction began. Another LRT Station was
built between 1 and 2 Streets SE (2 Street SE was later renamed MacLeod Trail in
the downtown core) and this station was originally called the 1 Street SE
Station until about 1986-1987 when it was renamed the Olympic Plaza
Station. Olympic Plaza station was built identically to the rest of the
downtown stations at the time having a concrete raised platform with a metal and
glass canopy on the one side of the tracks, this station being a westbound
station, it had the platform on the north side of the tracks. All the LRT
Stations remained with this original look with the paint being the only thing
changed over the years until the 1990's.
Sometime in the mid-1990's, the 4 Street SW Station was modified to include
an elevator and staircase to access a +15 pedestrian walkway that connected this
station to the Eaton's Store across the street. Another change to the
downtown LRT system included the relocation of the Centre Street platform from
between 1 Street SW and Centre Street to between Centre Street and 1 Street
SE. The new Centre Street station included a wider platform and a larger
glass canopy that covers up the entire platform area. This station began
construction in the summer of 1998 and was opened in about June or July
2000. The old Centre Street platform remained as it was used during the G8
world summit held at the Hyatt Regency hotel and Telus Convention Centre, of
which, they had to close down the new platform during the summit. The old
Centre Street Platform was destroyed on the weekend of August 3, 2000.
This page last updated on
January 21, 2004
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