Orion VIII
New Member
I can't speak for stations in the East Region, however I know enough heaters were ordered and delivered for installation at most stations west of Union.
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GO Transit: Service thread (including extensions)
- Thread starter drum118
- Start date
I can't speak for stations in the East Region, however I know enough heaters were ordered and delivered for installation at most stations west of Union.
jeicow
Active Member
They've had them at some bus terminals for a while now. I think Square One got them when they did the entire reno about 5-6 years ago. I haven't heard of them being at stations before, but Exhibition doesn't have the infrastructure as the rest of the Lakeshore West line so this might just be the band-aid way of making it better.
EnviroTO
Senior Member
geez....if you are cold and desparate enough to want to press a button for 10 minutes....you are likely gonna freeze to death while holding the button that long!!!
Yes, commas can change everything in a sentence.
a) A sticker above the button says that they will activate when the button is pressed for 10 minutes, but only if the temperature is below 0.
b) A sticker above the button says that they will activate, when the button is pressed, for 10 minutes, but only if the temperature is below 0.
dunkalunk
Senior Member
Your second one is a comma splice.
TOareaFan
Superstar
I think what the poster was saying (and I feel bad for joking about the typo....we all make 'em but that one just painted funny image of a freezing commuter with his finger stuck to a button for 10 minutes) was:
A sticker above the button says that they will activate for 10 minutes when the button is pressed, but only if the temperature is below 0.
Urban_Enthusiast86
New Member
Related to the Kitchener extension...
http://www.570news.com/news/local/article/148238--region-buys-land-for-transportation-hub
Region buys land for transportation hub
The region of Waterloo has purchased about 3 acres of land at the corner of King and Victoria in downtown Kitchener to build a hub for transit.
The region paid almost 5.8 million dollars for land along Victoria between King and Duke street West.
That's where it will build a transit facility where GO and VIA Rail trains, inter-city buses, the GRT system and rapid transit will all connect at one location.
The region's CAO Mike Murray says the facility will eliminate the need for the VIA Rail station on Weber, but the Charles street bus terminal will likely stay open.
Murray says the location is ideal because all preferred routes for the rapid transit system, whether it be bus or light rail, go right past that site.
The facility will also have room for retail development on the ground floor and office and commercial space upstairs.
After the required plans and studies are completed, Murray says they will seek proposals from the private sector to work with the region to develop the property.
http://www.570news.com/news/local/article/148238--region-buys-land-for-transportation-hub
Region buys land for transportation hub
The region of Waterloo has purchased about 3 acres of land at the corner of King and Victoria in downtown Kitchener to build a hub for transit.
The region paid almost 5.8 million dollars for land along Victoria between King and Duke street West.
That's where it will build a transit facility where GO and VIA Rail trains, inter-city buses, the GRT system and rapid transit will all connect at one location.
The region's CAO Mike Murray says the facility will eliminate the need for the VIA Rail station on Weber, but the Charles street bus terminal will likely stay open.
Murray says the location is ideal because all preferred routes for the rapid transit system, whether it be bus or light rail, go right past that site.
The facility will also have room for retail development on the ground floor and office and commercial space upstairs.
After the required plans and studies are completed, Murray says they will seek proposals from the private sector to work with the region to develop the property.
Urban_Enthusiast86
New Member
http://news.therecord.com/News/Local/article/819443
Region reveals $6M purchase of land for transit hub
November 24, 2010
By Jeff Outhit, Record staff
KITCHENER — Regional council secretly spent almost $6 million to buy most of two blocks, to build a central transit hub in downtown Kitchener.
The facility will front on Victoria Street North, between King and Duke streets across from the Kaufman lofts.
The long-proposed plan, always targeted for King and Victoria streets, could bring together GO Transit commuter trains and buses, Via Rail passenger trains, Grand River Transit buses, Greyhound and other intercity buses, and rapid transit if ultimately approved.
“People can move from one system easily to the other,” Regional Chair Ken Seiling said.
“We’ve brought everything to a common point. That’s the weakness in a lot of municipalities. They have a train station in one place, a bus terminal at another place, and sometimes the two don’t fit together very well.”
Redevelopment of the site could include commercial, office and residential space, possibly in partnership with private developers. Construction may be just over two years away, after a plan and business case is prepared. No decisions have been made on demolitions.
Council has been acquiring the properties since 2008. It revealed four purchases Wednesday.
Acquired properties include a Korean grocery, the vacant Rumpel Felt factory, the End of the Roll flooring products store and the Noble Trade plumbing business. All that’s missing is the Beer Store site on King Street that council still hopes to include in the redevelopment.
Some Grand River Transit buses would relocate from the Charles Street terminal. Its future is uncertain. Seiling expects Via Rail to join the central transit hub. It’s not known how this would affect its nearby station.
Council gave the go-ahead behind closed doors to start purchasing land in August 2007. Regional government used an outside lawyer who did not reveal the buyer, to avoid tipping off owners who might drive up prices.
16 Victoria St. N. was purchased in May 2008 for $1.2 million.
50 and 60 Victoria St. N. were purchased in December 2008 for $3.2 million.
510 King St. W. was purchased last month for $1.4 million.
Seiling contends taxpayers got a good deal. He compares the average purchase price, at just under $2 million per acre, to the provincial courthouse that’s under construction at Weber and Frederick streets. It cost just over $3 million an acre.
Seiling does not believe council acted prematurely. Politicians started buying land a year before they proposed a contested rail transit system in Kitchener and Waterloo.
That proposal, costing up to $800 million, is still without final approval and was widely panned in the recent municipal election. But Seiling contends a central transit hub makes sense with or without rapid transit. “It’s pretty exciting,” he said.
GO Transit is launching two commuter trains a day late next year, from Kitchener to Toronto in the morning and then back to Kitchener in the early evening.
The site for the central transit hub is about three acres, with 240 metres of frontage along the CN Railway tracks. A regional report states: “The assemblage has strong appeal for attracting large developers interested in partnering with the region in future redevelopment of the site.”
Council said its next steps, expected to take just over two years, will involve:
Refining objectives. This includes a cost and revenue analysis, studying expected users, and assessing functional requirements, including commercial opportunities.
Preparing a conceptual plan. This includes studies on how the facility will operate, how it will meet regional needs, and defining office and commercial densities.
Developing a business case. This would include more financial analysis, more studies on development potential, and risk assessment.
Region reveals $6M purchase of land for transit hub
November 24, 2010
By Jeff Outhit, Record staff
KITCHENER — Regional council secretly spent almost $6 million to buy most of two blocks, to build a central transit hub in downtown Kitchener.
The facility will front on Victoria Street North, between King and Duke streets across from the Kaufman lofts.
The long-proposed plan, always targeted for King and Victoria streets, could bring together GO Transit commuter trains and buses, Via Rail passenger trains, Grand River Transit buses, Greyhound and other intercity buses, and rapid transit if ultimately approved.
“People can move from one system easily to the other,” Regional Chair Ken Seiling said.
“We’ve brought everything to a common point. That’s the weakness in a lot of municipalities. They have a train station in one place, a bus terminal at another place, and sometimes the two don’t fit together very well.”
Redevelopment of the site could include commercial, office and residential space, possibly in partnership with private developers. Construction may be just over two years away, after a plan and business case is prepared. No decisions have been made on demolitions.
Council has been acquiring the properties since 2008. It revealed four purchases Wednesday.
Acquired properties include a Korean grocery, the vacant Rumpel Felt factory, the End of the Roll flooring products store and the Noble Trade plumbing business. All that’s missing is the Beer Store site on King Street that council still hopes to include in the redevelopment.
Some Grand River Transit buses would relocate from the Charles Street terminal. Its future is uncertain. Seiling expects Via Rail to join the central transit hub. It’s not known how this would affect its nearby station.
Council gave the go-ahead behind closed doors to start purchasing land in August 2007. Regional government used an outside lawyer who did not reveal the buyer, to avoid tipping off owners who might drive up prices.
16 Victoria St. N. was purchased in May 2008 for $1.2 million.
50 and 60 Victoria St. N. were purchased in December 2008 for $3.2 million.
510 King St. W. was purchased last month for $1.4 million.
Seiling contends taxpayers got a good deal. He compares the average purchase price, at just under $2 million per acre, to the provincial courthouse that’s under construction at Weber and Frederick streets. It cost just over $3 million an acre.
Seiling does not believe council acted prematurely. Politicians started buying land a year before they proposed a contested rail transit system in Kitchener and Waterloo.
That proposal, costing up to $800 million, is still without final approval and was widely panned in the recent municipal election. But Seiling contends a central transit hub makes sense with or without rapid transit. “It’s pretty exciting,” he said.
GO Transit is launching two commuter trains a day late next year, from Kitchener to Toronto in the morning and then back to Kitchener in the early evening.
The site for the central transit hub is about three acres, with 240 metres of frontage along the CN Railway tracks. A regional report states: “The assemblage has strong appeal for attracting large developers interested in partnering with the region in future redevelopment of the site.”
Council said its next steps, expected to take just over two years, will involve:
Refining objectives. This includes a cost and revenue analysis, studying expected users, and assessing functional requirements, including commercial opportunities.
Preparing a conceptual plan. This includes studies on how the facility will operate, how it will meet regional needs, and defining office and commercial densities.
Developing a business case. This would include more financial analysis, more studies on development potential, and risk assessment.
EnviroTO
Senior Member
Let's hope the people running K-W don't change much. The LRT spine and an intermodal terminal with transit buses, LRT, intercity buses, GO rail, and VIA Rail could create a critical mass that might make transit a truly viable option in K-W.
ShonTron
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That's quite the property. I did not realize that it crossed both sides of Waterloo Street. It certainly has enough room to handle the buses (the site is larger than the Charles Street terminal). The Charles St terminal could then be sold for a tidy sum.
nfitz
Superstar
I would think that part of this project would have to be closing Waterloo Street between Victoria and Breithaupt. And perhaps grade-separating King Street.
dunkalunk
Senior Member
Part of this project would also likely involve the raising of the rail corridor and to construction of road underpasses at King, Duke, and Weber, or even closing off Duke as well. The rail corridor needs to be raised regardless to build the underpass on King for the LRT, so grade separation of at least this part of the corridor makes a lot of sense before/during the construction of the intermodal hub.
Urban_Enthusiast86
New Member
And that's only the start of it!
Just think of what this accessibility will do for land values in the area. Not only will it make transit a much more viable alternative, but it'll finally get downtown Kitchener out of the slump where companies locating downtown say they need to have abundant parking downtown (i.e. the Lang Tannery fiasco where a neighboring heritage building was demolished for a parking lot, while there's already more than enough in the area).
Not only will transit be viable, but downtown Kitchener may just develop a genuine CBD as a result. And with that, there's more and more reason for people to buy condos in the central transit corridor, since there will be more jobs downtown and this infrastructure should reverse the decentralization that's gone on in this region for decades.
unimaginative2
Senior Member
Fantastic news! This will be a massive help to rail transit in K-W. One of the biggest problems I have persuading people to take the train to Kitchener is that there's virtually no connecting transit at the VIA station. Bringing together all the different modes at a prominent site on King Street is a major step. The local buses are a big question mark, though. It would be a step backwards to no longer co-locate intercity and local buses at one terminal and the Charles Street terminal is already overcrowded, so there's a strong case to be made for moving everything up to Victoria. On the other hand, it's really on the fringe of downtown and would reduce transit accessibility to the downtown core.
I'll be a little sad that trains will leave the lovely and historic old train station on Weber. I hope that it will get a good adaptive reuse. It would make a great restaurant.
I'll be a little sad that trains will leave the lovely and historic old train station on Weber. I hope that it will get a good adaptive reuse. It would make a great restaurant.
Urban_Enthusiast86
New Member
Well, over the longer term, once the LRT/BRT has been established, the Region plans to align GRT routes along major corridors in more of a grid pattern (this should've been done already), as opposed to the subdivision-looping mayhem that exists now. East-west corridors would connect to the nearest LRT station, where riders would transfer.
Currently, all the local routes going downtown cram into the Charles street terminal. I think in the future, you'll see a decentralization of local busses going into the downtown core. Some will connect to Victoria Station. Some will connect to Ottawa Station (not downtown, but pretty close). Some might connect to the more central station (Queen/Frederick). This would reduce the need for a single bus terminal where all busses converge.
Think of it this way. Suburban Toronto commuters working at Bay and Dundas or Yonge and Bloor make their trip in from Milton/Newmarket/wherever to Union station via the GO-train. But then they transfer onto the subway and go up the Yonge line to reach their final destination. All the local TTC routes going downtown don't all meet at a single point. It would be sort of similar here.
ShonTron
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Minor service changes for January 2011:
- A few additional midday Brampton-Union Station bus trips; some padding of some Brampton/Orangeville and Bolton bus schedules
- A few new Mac-Square One/Bramalea trips; some cuts to York-Markham/Mount Joy trips
- More weekend homebound trips on the Waterloo-Square One route
- A few more Barrie-Bradford-Aurora trips
- 2 more midday Stouffville outbound trips
Not much of interest. I am finding it ironic that GO keeps adding more and more bus trips to the Brampton-Union service after depriving it for so long of hourly buses. I am surprised there have been no reductions to the Brampton-York Mills slow boat services yet given the utility of Zum and the beefed up Union service.
http://gotransit.com/public/en/news/whatsnew.aspx
- A few additional midday Brampton-Union Station bus trips; some padding of some Brampton/Orangeville and Bolton bus schedules
- A few new Mac-Square One/Bramalea trips; some cuts to York-Markham/Mount Joy trips
- More weekend homebound trips on the Waterloo-Square One route
- A few more Barrie-Bradford-Aurora trips
- 2 more midday Stouffville outbound trips
Not much of interest. I am finding it ironic that GO keeps adding more and more bus trips to the Brampton-Union service after depriving it for so long of hourly buses. I am surprised there have been no reductions to the Brampton-York Mills slow boat services yet given the utility of Zum and the beefed up Union service.
http://gotransit.com/public/en/news/whatsnew.aspx