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Barrie Collingwood Railway (BCRY)

crs1026 said:
While we are mulling over the future of Wasaga Beach, I'm almost afraid to bring this up, but.....

Giorgio Mammoliti Hints at Running for Mayor of Wasaga Beach

- Paul
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1603140539217.png
 
RedMelon said:
Here is my plan Red boxes are go stations for weekend service Only!! And BCRY for only weekdays since go wouldnt use itView attachment 277781
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Is there any demand for weekday rail trips between Collingwood, Stayner, and Barrie ? Or, will the locals always prefer to drive?

I'm thinking of a model that has a small, UP Express sized, EMU passenger train making a few daily trips between Collinwood and Barrie South. That small train can operate both on weekdays and weekends.

In addition, some of the weekend GO trips from / to Toronto can be extended to Collinwood.

If the big GO trains run from Allandale to Collinwood nonstop, leaving Stayner and Angus to be served by the short local EMU train, then a bit of saving can be achieved by making the Stayner and Angus station platforms short.
 
ShonTron said:
Betty Disero, a former Toronto councillor (a right-wing Liberal representing the Davenport area), is now Lord Mayor of Niagara-on-the-Lake.
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You know more obscure things than you let on, sometimes........LOL
 
RedMelon said:
There are a lot of industries along the line in Bradford
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While the rails might still be in place at several locations, there might be one customer left in Bradford, maybe.

crs1026 said:
... were we just as annoying?)
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Ya, we probably were.

ShonTron said:
Really, extending trains on poorly maintained or abandoned track is quite ridiculous. But there's an opportunity - especially if Barrie moves the bus terminal to Allandale - for a nice tourism entrepot, with buses taking on passengers headed to Midland/Penetang (Martyrs' Shrine/Ste Marie, Discovery Harbour/beaches), Wasaga, Collingwood/Thornbury, Orillia, and the casino. At Allandale itself, it might be smart for Barrie to zone for some hotel and event space - there's a pretty good network of waterfront parks right there.

I would love to see a return of some of the pre-war summer resort culture in Ontario, when cityfolk would board trains, boats, and coach buses to places like Wasaga, Port Dalhousie, Gravenhurst (and onto boats plying the Muskoka Lakes), either to vacation homes, to resort hotels, or just day trips. Allandale could be that new gateway. I could really see this as I think the era of cheap airfares has peaked.
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The Simcoe County Linx service seems to have had a good start and they have added routes from their initial schedule. I don't know what their strategic plan is but it would seem to make sense to develop some kind of hub at Allendale. Limiting service to Georgian College/RVH was a desire to serve the needs of County residence to travel within the County.

It's been mentioned a couple of times, but I have a big problem with public money going to provide subsidized service (as all transit is) to Casino Rama. Pre-Covid, you would be astonished at the millions that came out of that place in a week. They already have a bus bay for charters that would make many cities weep.

A return of lake boat service in Muskoka would be cool. Many of the old resort 'houses' went through significant downturns in the latter part of the last century but those that survived have turned around. I'm not sure the Gravenhust wharf as it currently is would be able to handle it (the 'wharf spur' was ripped out decades ago), and I'm not sure I'd want something the size of the Seguin sidling up to a dock at a private cottage (yikes!). Also, nothing of any size can enter Bala Bay anymore.
 
crs1026 said:
=... were we just as annoying?
- Paul
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lenaitch said:
Ya, we probably were.
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LOL. Great admission from you...............

But truth be told neither of you are old.........just more mature than you used to be..............

As has ever been the case............

The more mature find cause to complain about those less so....................often not wrongly.

Few recognize that at the time; even less remember that later.
 
Northern Light said:
LOL. Great admission from you...............

But truth be told neither of you are old.........just more mature than you used to be..............

As has ever been the case............

The more mature find cause to complain about those less so....................often not wrongly.

Few recognize that at the time; even less remember that later.
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LOL. The good times....

While I would have to admit to a certain amount of culpable behaviour, my recollection is that in our excesses we did actually hold some level of angst that somebody might actually call the cops, and they might actually come, and that might actually not be a good thing. I do remember shusshing people, pulling the curtains, trying to coax the silliness back indoors where the neighbours might not hear, trying to get people to walk it off. And trying to stay inconspicous lest we be caught with some now-legal material in our pockets etc.
My observation is that these days, when one expresses even mild annoyance about loud parties, slobberfaced drunkenness, etc, one receives a uncomprehending look that says, it's our right to be outrageous. When the neighbour's kids get loud at 2 AM, there's no point calling it in any more. Lately there have been reports about cops intercepting people hauling entire DJ gear to illicit beach parties. That's a level of determined behaviour that I don't remember. I can imagine how residents in party zones like Wasaga Beach must feel about the partying. But then, I was graduated and married and respectable before boom boxes even got sizeable, so.....;-)

- Paul
 
lenaitch said:
While the rails might still be in place at several locations, there might be one customer left in Bradford, maybe.



Ya, we probably were.



The Simcoe County Linx service seems to have had a good start and they have added routes from their initial schedule. I don't know what their strategic plan is but it would seem to make sense to develop some kind of hub at Allendale. Limiting service to Georgian College/RVH was a desire to serve the needs of County residence to travel within the County.

It's been mentioned a couple of times, but I have a big problem with public money going to provide subsidized service (as all transit is) to Casino Rama. Pre-Covid, you would be astonished at the millions that came out of that place in a week. They already have a bus bay for charters that would make many cities weep.

A return of lake boat service in Muskoka would be cool. Many of the old resort 'houses' went through significant downturns in the latter part of the last century but those that survived have turned around. I'm not sure the Gravenhust wharf as it currently is would be able to handle it (the 'wharf spur' was ripped out decades ago), and I'm not sure I'd want something the size of the Seguin sidling up to a dock at a private cottage (yikes!). Also, nothing of any size can enter Bala Bay anymore.
Click to expand...

I was just wandering around the Gravenhurst wharf area, and yes, the spur (originally the mainline terminus of the Northern Railway) is long gone, replaced by a pleasant path.

Of course, I wouldn’t have the Seguin do dock-to-dock service, but I was just thinking about the infrastructure that was once in place for excursions from the city: London had the LP&S go right to Port Stanley; Detroit and Windsor had steamships to Boblo Island; and CP’s trains led north from Ottawa and Montreal right to those cities’ cottage countries.

Today, you’d need buses to do most of the work, but trains can do the heavy lifting to Allandale.

Edit:

I was also thinking about how none of Ontario’s great beaches really had rail access: not Wasaga, not Sauble, not Pinery/Grand Bend, and not Sandbanks. Odd.
 
ShonTron said:
I was just wandering around the Gravenhurst wharf area, and yes, the spur (originally the mainline terminus of the Northern Railway) is long gone, replaced by a pleasant path.

Of course, I wouldn’t have the Seguin do dock-to-dock service, but I was just thinking about the infrastructure that was once in place for excursions from the city: London had the LP&S go right to Port Stanley; Detroit and Windsor had steamships to Boblo Island; and CP’s trains led north from Ottawa and Montreal right to those cities’ cottage countries.

Today, you’d need buses to do most of the work, but trains can do the heavy lifting to Allandale.

Edit:

I was also thinking about how none of Ontario’s great beaches really had rail access: not Wasaga, not Sauble, not Pinery/Grand Bend, and not Sandbanks. Odd.
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Ya, I was being a little tongue-in-cheek about personal dock-to-dock service.

Interesting observation about the lack of historic rail to the province's beaches. I honestly don't know how old some of these places have existed as tourist destinations, at least from the Toronto area. Goderich, Kincardine and Port Elgin had historic rail service (Goderich still does) but I don't know enough of their economic history (Goderich had, and still has, the salt mine and a grain elevator)

It might simply be a reflection that, even back in the day, the economics of a rail line based solely or primarily on passenger service (commuting not yet being a thing) wasn't viable for operators or backers.
 
Nice to see you agree with my idea, People say "oh you don't know freight" But honestly just unload trucks in utopia and bring them to the locals, its way more profitable.
 
OPisAUser said:
I've seen evidence online that some rehab is going on on the Beeton spur. The track looks pretty fresh. Though I have also heard that Tarpin Lumber has quit rail service. They haven't received a rail car in months. It is a shame that they rehabed the spur but lost a customer.

Though I have to agree with an earlier post on this thread. It would probably be better for Barrie to only operate the BCRY as a transload. It would give all the benefits of rail service to local industries without the huge bill of maintaining rails and railroad crossings. This would allow the Beeton spur and Meaford sub between Allendale to Utopia to be abandoned.
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Nice to see you agree with my idea, People say "oh you don't know freight" But honestly just unload trucks in utopia and bring them to the locals, its way more profitable.
 
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