9 design features to know about SkyTrain’s newly opened Capstan Station

This is part one of Daily Hive Urbanized’s three-part series on the opening of Capstan Station on SkyTrain’s Canada Line.

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At 11:48 am today, following a grand opening ceremony, the brand-new Capstan Station on the SkyTrain Canada Line welcomed its first train, marking the start of regular service.

Minutes later, dignitaries and media, travelling on a short looping train ride, returned to Capstan Station, but not before hearing the newest automated onboard announcement: “The next station is Capstan.”

Approximately 200 members of the public — including many young public transit fans — joined dignitaries and media for the station opening festivities.

“It is a big day,” said Kevin Quinn, TransLink CEO, during today’s ceremony. “This new station will ensure current and future residents of Capstan Village can make transit their number one transportation option and help reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It will connect a diverse community to jobs, schools, shopping, and recreation.”

This is the 54th station on Metro Vancouver’s entire SkyTrain network and the 17th station serving the Canada Line.

It is also the newest SkyTrain station since the 2016 opening of the Millennium Line’s Evergreen extension and the second time ever a station has been added to an existing active running section of a SkyTrain line, following the late 2003 opening of Lake City Way Station — nearly two years after the original 2002 opening of the Millennium Line.

Today’s opening of Capstan Station represents a delay in the station’s construction completion and opening. Construction first began in September 2021, and it was originally expected to open in 2023.

There were a range of reasons that led to the delays, going beyond the early supply chain impacts as a result of the pandemic and the challenges of safely building on an active rail rapid transit line.

TransLink previously told Daily Hive Urbanized there were “significant challenges” relating to the site’s unstable soil and changing site conditions that arose partly from surrounding work by other construction projects within the Capstan Village area. Today, Quinn further elaborated on these geotechnical challenges, which necessitated TransLink to perform some structural upgrades to the station.

“That took some time to do. In the long run, it’s really important that we have a safe station. Safety is always going to be paramount for us,” said Quinn.

“And so, in prioritizing the safety of the station, we want to be sure that we have a station that’s here for years to come, for decades, for generations to come, that’s going to serve the City of Richmond really well. I’m really proud of the work that the team has done to mitigate a lot of those delays and come up with some creative solutions, really to get us exactly where we are today.”

Those engineering challenges, combined with the significantly extended construction timeline, also resulted in substantial scheduled service disruptions to Canada Line services within Richmond over the past three years, specifically the practice of evening closures between Bridgeport and Richmond-Brighouse stations.

As a result, the project’s construction cost also increased. The project’s cost went up by $10 million to a revised total of $62 million.

TransLink is covering the $10 million construction cost overrun, which increases the public transit authority’s share of the cost from $20 million to $30 million.

The funding commitment of $32.2 million by the City of Richmond, which spearheaded the project, remains unchanged. To fund the station, the municipal government collected a fee for every new home built in the Capstan Village neighbourhood since 2012; the area’s major developers include Concord Pacific, Polygon, Pinnacle International, and Yuanheng. The municipal government approached TransLink to advance the project after it had reached its revenue target in early 2019, years earlier than anticipated.

Capstan Station is one of four potential future stations on the Canada Line, with the other stations being West 33rd Avenue and West 57th Avenue in Vancouver and an additional station location to serve a future terminal building expansion of Vancouver International Airport.

“We also wouldn’t be standing here without the development community coming together to pitch this unique model to the City and to TransLink in the first place,” said Peter Udzenija, the director of corporation relations for Concord Pacific, today.

“We certainly wouldn’t be standing here in this new community without 1,600 new homeowners many of which are right here. They paid for it all. They should actually be standing here with us, and nearly a third of these buyers are actually first-time home buyers as well, so they truly believe in transit, and they believe in the area, so you know we facilitated it, but they paid for it.”

Capstan Station is situated at the northeast corner of the intersection of No. 3 Road and Capstan Way, just north of Yaohan Centre mall.

Across various projects in the development pipeline by multiple developers in the area — not just the 1,600 condominium homes by Concord Pacific — the new Capstan Village neighbourhood has now surpassed the halfway mark toward its full buildout with over 6,000 homes for approximately 16,000 residents.

Although Canada Line riders experienced extended periods of early service shutdowns, resulting in longer short-term inconveniences, the long-term benefits of Capstan Station are now clearly evident.

Capstan Station’s design goes above and beyond the standard configurations, layouts, and materials of the original 2009-built Canada Line stations, reflecting significantly greater emphasis on optimal functionality, accessibility, passenger comfort, and long-term capacity.

It incorporates and enhances the design standards established by recent Expo Line station renovation projects and the 2016-built Evergreen Extension stations and uses higher quality materials than the original stations of the Canada Line. Increasingly, with Metro Vancouver’s transit-oriented communities, SkyTrain stations are evolving into community hubs and becoming local landmarks.

The station was designed by local firm Office of McFarlane Biggar Architects & Designers.

Here is a rundown of nine notable design features of Capstan Station:

1. Canada Line’s longest station platforms

Although Capstan Station’s platform lengths are far shorter than the 80-metre length platforms found on the stations of the Expo and Millennium lines, its platforms are the longest on the Canada Line.

Capstan Station’s platforms span a length of 52.5 metres, which is slightly longer than the Canada Line’s previous longest platforms of 50 metres — found at the stations of Waterfront, Vancouver City Centre, Yaletown-Roundhouse, Olympic Village, YVR Airport, and Richmond-Brighouse.

The longer platforms not only offer additional waiting areas and circulation space for passengers but also prepare the station to support the Canada Line’s long-term upgrade from two-car trains to three-car trains, ensuring future capacity needs are met.

Most of the original Canada Line stations have a platform length of 40 metres, which are designed to be expandable to 50 metres.

2. More circulation space

Capacity considerations for any metro system are two-fold: one aspect is the transport carrying capacity of the trains, while the other is the spatial capacity and configuration of the station interior layouts to handle the efficient flow of passengers entering and exiting.

Capstan Station’s platforms are not only longer but also wider than those of a typical Canada Line station. This design provides additional waiting areas and larger spaces for smoother ingress and egress at the tops of escalators.

Additionally, Capstan Station features, by a significant exponential margin, the largest street-level concourse of any non-underground station on the Canada Line, providing ample space circulation capacity within the station. This includes ample space for waiting and any queues to use Compass ticket vending machines and snack and beverage vending machines.

As well, unlike the Canada Line’s existing elevated stations to the south, which have separate sets of fare gates for each of the northbound and southbound directions, Capstan Station features a single unified fare-paid zone. This allows passengers to use any fare gate for both northbound and southbound travel, and it eliminates the need to tap out and tap in again if they accidentally enter the wrong side of the station. Capstan Station features a total of six fare gates.

3. Both up and down escalators

Following the improved SkyTrain design standards first established for the Millennium Line’s Evergreen extension, Capstan Station features both up and down escalators between the concourse and platform levels. This is an important consideration for not only the station’s circulation capacity but also accessibility needs, especially with an aging population.

Another notable feature is that the staircases between the concourse and platform levels are located separately from the bank of escalators. This improves station circulation by dispersing passengers within a larger footprint of the station interior, especially at the platforms.

4. More trains deployed for increased capacity

As part of the opening of Capstan Station, train frequencies on the Canada Line are being increased to enhance capacity, not only to serve the new station but also to accommodate the growing ridership across the entire system.

Upon inquiry, TransLink CEO Kevin Quinn told Daily Hive Urbanized that, depending on the time of day, the Canada Line’s capacity has increased by between 12% to 20%. This is due to the deployment of two additional trains, raising the number of trains in service from up to 14 to 16 during off-peak hours and from 16 to 18 trains during peak periods.

However, he noted that train operating speeds on other segments of the Canada Line will not be increased to offset the longer end-to-end travel time resulting from Capstan Station. The addition of Capstan Station requires trains to decelerate, stop, and then reaccelerate at the midpoint between Bridgeport Station and Aberdeen Station. Each stoppage and door opening duration at Capstan Station is 10 seconds.

With a Canada Line fleet of 32 two-car trains, including 14 additional trains that entered service in 2019/2020, there is ample capacity to introduce further increases in train frequencies to meet growing demand. Notably, Canada Line ridership is expected to see a significant increase starting in Fall 2027, when the SkyTrain Millennium Line’s Broadway extension opens, transforming Broadway-City Hall Station into a major regional interchange between the Canada Line and the Millennium Line.

5. Public art as a key design feature

One of the most impressive aspects of Capstan Station is its fully integrated design approach for public art.

Instead of the large blank walls and typical dull tile panelling found in other Canada Line stations, the expansive walls framing the escalators, staircases, and concourse level have been transformed into a graphic mosaic titled “The Breath Below,” created by Vancouver-based artist Howie Tsui.

The mosaic is created from over 3,500 custom-made glazed glass and metallic titles, with a combined surface area that spans more than 3,600 sq ft.

Visible from both inside and outside the station, the mosaic depicts aquatic life in the Fraser River estuary, with the artwork drawing inspiration from traditional Chinese landscape paintings as a tribute to Richmond’s Chinese-Canadian heritage.

“The artwork expands on tradition by bringing viewers into an underwater perspective. The central feature is the lyrical quality of swaying eelgrass. The artist has used a technique similar to calligraphic brushstrokes to transcend the static state of the forms and infuse them with currents of motion,” reads the description for the mosaic.

“This technique evokes a sense of chi, or a vital spirit, within the picture’s environment and subjects. The artwork’s formal and philosophical aspects convey energies and harmony that are attributed to both Taoist and Buddhist principles, and may resonate with practitioners from the many nearby temples.”

The incorporation of public art into a public space is also a proven measure for Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED). In this instance, for example, the mosaic could reduce instances of vandalism, such as graffiti.

The mosaic also serves an informal wayfinding purpose. When viewed from the concourse level, the eastern half is dominated by the primary color of golden yellow, marking the northbound platform for trains toward Waterfront Station, while the western half features black, indicating the southbound platform toward Richmond-Brighouse Station.

6. Improved lighting

Glass-to-ceiling outer walls that frame the station interior enable natural light to pour in. Supplementing natural light is a highly comprehensive lighting system for virtually all levels and spaces.

Even the underside of the staircase handrails feature lighting that illuminates the steps.

7. Optimal wayfinding signage

Unlike the original Canada Line stations, Capstan Station features a thoughtful design and placement approach for wayfinding signage to eliminate any possible confusion.

This includes signage that clearly identifies the northbound and southbound platforms, and the ingress and egress points.

Additionally, and very importantly, the “Capstan” station name signs on the platform level are clearly visible from the perspective of passengers looking outside the train windows.

Moreover, all aspects of Capstan Station’s wayfinding signage fully align with TransLink’s current signage standards and practices, which was not the case with the original Canada Line stations, although some relatively minor improvements have been made over the years.

8. SkyTrain’s first all-digital station

Capstan Station is SkyTrain’s first all-digital station with enhanced display screens.

This is also the first SkyTrain station without any printed poster ad spaces, which follows the latest advertising trends that gravitate toward digital screens to optimize revenue opportunities.

There are big digital screens at the concourse level, four big screens on the trackside visible from the platform levels, and new television displays.

9. Retail space for Trees Organic Coffee & Cheesecake

As a CPTED measure that provides an informal manned presence and additional pedestrian traffic, and as a passenger amenity and revenue-generating opportunity, Capstan Station features a small commercial retail unit.

This retail unit is optimally designed, situated directly next to the station’s main entrance. Additionally, it is accessible from outside the fare-paid zone, enhancing the likelihood of the business’s success and longevity, especially in contrast to retail units deep inside a station beyond the fare gates, which limit the potential customer base to only SkyTrain riders.

Capstan Station’s retail space is leased to Trees Cheesecake & Organic Coffee. It is expected to open soon.

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This is part one of Daily Hive Urbanized’s three-part series on the opening of Capstan Station on SkyTrain’s Canada Line.

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