Census data
Transit users: This data idenitifies those residents who use transit to get to work daily. Even though transit use is generally high throughout the whole city of Vancouver, this data helped identify where the higher concentrations of transit users were located.
Cyclists: This data identifies those residents who cycle to work regularly. Since cyclists are likely to make use of a skytrain when commuting long distances, it was considered important to know where the cyclists were and to consider them in the placement of a sky trainline.
Average Total Income: Since lower income residents tend to be higher users of transit, we felt it was important to flag lower income areas and factor that into our analysis.

*The population distribution within Vancouver is significantly higher in terms of density when compared to any other municipality in the region. All existimg transit routes within the city are used to capacity. Because of this we decided to overlook population figures, considering transit use/demand within the city is generally high in all areas.

Land Use
Existing land use can greatly help identify the price of land and complexities of developing/acquiring certain parcels. During the normalization process each land use was ranked, in order of prority. Below is a diagram which identifies the ranking and briefly explaining why it was chosen.

Geology
Soil types greatly affect construction costs. The geology map below was georeferenced and geology data was then applied to the project. The chart below identifies how each soil type was ranked in the normalization process.

Elevation
Increased construction costs are associated with higher slopes, so we flagged these higher slope areas and normalized them with lower numbers (areas of less priority)
Data was collected from the city of Toronto, on the construction costs associated with their subway system. Since Toronto’s subway system is comparable to that of Vancouver’s sky train, it was used to help normalize the desirable and less desirable areas.
According to the city Toronto slopes from 0-3% are ideal for building underground. Slopes under 6% were suitable for light rail construction and slopes over 6% were very costly.
Existing skytrain lines
To ensure that our proposed skytrain line will not be located immediately adjacent to an existing line a buffer of 2km was placed along the existing skytrain lines. A changing value was then given to the buffer, with a high value of 100 being at the centre of the buffer, and 0 at the far edge. The rest of the map, outside this buffer was given a value of 0.
Existing Schools/Institutions
Public institutions and schools are destinations which benefit from being located close to a skytrain line, since it makes the institution more accessible to patrons. A donut buffer of 500m (10min. walk) was created around all the institutions.
Existing roads
Since road corridors are free of any existing built structures, it was assumed that fewer costs are associated with developing a LRT line along a roadway. Roadways are in most cases city owned, and provide direct corridors along which a LRT line can be located without relocating individuals or business.
Water
Developing a skytrain line over water is exceptionally costly, and was overruled and not logical for the specific scenario studied. For this case water was given a maximum cost value.