Be prepared to hear this new onboard announcement while riding SkyTrain Canada Line through Richmond: “The next station is Capstan.”
Just in time for Christmas, all aboard!
Tomorrow, Friday, December 20, 2024, Capstan Station will finally open to the public for regular service, providing Richmond with a shiny new SkyTrain station on the Canada Line and a ticket to better public transit connections.
The station will open at approximately noon, following a grand opening ceremony with dignitaries and media.
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.
Capstan Station is located at the northeast corner of the intersection of No. 3 Road and Capstan Way — roughly mid-way between Bridgeport Station and Aberdeen Station.
This new infill station on the Canada Line was built to serve the new high-density residential neighbourhood of Capstan Village, which will see the construction of over 6,000 homes, all within a 10-minute walking distance of the station. Over 16,000 people are expected to reside in these new homes upon full buildout.
As well, the new station provides more options to reach the area’s shopping malls, with Yaohan Centre now a six-minute walk from either Capstan Station or Aberdeen Station. This new station is also only a three-minute walk to Union Square Shopping Centre and an eight-minute walk to Continental Shopping Centre. All three malls are also renowned for their diverse selection of Asian restaurants, cafes, and dessert shops.
Location of the future Capstan Station on the Canada Line. (TransLink)
Construction on Capstan Station first began in September 2021. It was originally scheduled to open in 2023, before being postponed to mid-2024 and ultimately to the end of 2024.
TransLink recently told Daily Hive Urbanized that the construction of Capstan Station faced “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. As a result of these geotechnical challenges, there was a need to perform structural upgrades to the station, which impacted the project’s timeline and costs. As well, there were some previous pandemic-related supply chain issues.
The periods for crews to safely perform some of the most challenging and substantial parts of the construction process were also limited to overnight hours, which also necessitated numerous and much longer than anticipated periods of early nightly closures of the Canada Line’s segment between Bridgeport and Richmond-Brighouse stations over the last three years.
September 2024 construction progress on SkyTrain Canada Line’s new Capstan Station. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)
September 2024 construction progress on SkyTrain Canada Line’s new Capstan Station. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)
Due to these challenges, TransLink told Daily Hive Urbanized the final cost for building Capstan Station is now about $62 million — representing a $10 million increase from the previously stated $52 million when construction began.
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 City of Richmond’s $32.2 million funding commitment for the project remains unchanged. Beginning in 2012, the municipal government financed its share of the station construction costs by charging a fee for each new home built in the new Capstan Village neighbourhood, where major developers include Concord Pacific, Polygon, Pinnacle International, and Yuangheng. After reaching its revenue target ahead of schedule in early 2019, the City approached TransLink to begin design work on the project.
“Neighbourhoods are often resistant to new development and residents moving in. We hope all Richmond residents will be able to appreciate the tangible benefits of the new development around Capstan,” Terry Hui, the President and CEO of Concord Pacific, told Daily Hive Urbanized.
“I don’t want to take any credit for all this new infrastructure, I’m just facilitating it. It’s our customers who pay for it, and it’s a whole range of community infrastructure. This funding model is the first of its kind in Vancouver. The City of Richmond deserves credit for its leadership bringing all the parties together to get the station built.”
Capstan Station’s design represents a major upgrade and future-proofing over other Canada Line stations. It features distinctive architecture, both up and down escalators, a larger concourse, and longer platforms extending 52.5 meters to accommodate future three-car trains (compared to the typical 40-meter platforms on most Canada Line stations). The station also includes wider platforms for more spacious waiting and circulation areas, retail spaces, and public art. The station was designed by local architectural firm Office of McFarlane Biggar Architects & Designers.
Preliminary conceptual artistic rendering of the public realm for SkyTrain Capstan Station. (City of Richmond)
In pre-pandemic 2019, on an average weekday, over 37,000 passengers travelled on the Canada Line between Bridgeport and Aberdeen stations. In 2023, this average weekday travel volume between the same two stations reached 30,500, which is lower than previously due to continued pandemic impacts on ridership and the impact of the sustained periods of early evening closures to enable the station’s construction. These figures should not be confused for ingress and egress at these specific stations, as they include the many other passengers who travelled through the segment to reach other parts of the Canada Line.
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.
Daily Hive Urbanized will have coverage of Capstan Station’s opening on Friday, December 20, 2024.