GO Niagara

[Mapleson]

But just because the local pols can't play nice, why should Joe Taxpayer in Pickering or Barrie foot the bill to move people from one part of Niagara Region to another?

Exactly! Look to the April service cuts in York Region. The rationale was: GO is not the the regional transport business.

GO Transit should go to Niagara, Kitchener-Waterloo, and Guelph and perhaps try to set up a commuter service in Ottawa because the budget for GO Transit is also set by political will. While there will be more projects competing for the same money, there will also be more money to spend because people in Ottawa, K-W, Guelph will support spending money on GO. The more an agency is Toronto only, the less the rest of the province (and the federal government) wants to give that agency money.

I completely agree. GO Transit should go to Niagara, Kitchener, Cambridge, and Guelph. They shouldn't try to duplicate local area service.

GO/Metrolinx isn't strictly a Toronto commuter service anymore. It's a provincial body that's starting to provide service all over southern Ontario. It can supplement VIA routes between cities, run regional buses, and provide frequent regional rail. Just like with land use planning, the province is becoming a larger player in regional transit and reducing the fragmentation that's become a problem in Ontario. Hopefully what we've seen so far is only the start.


Two important differences: Durham has a regional transit body and buses go between the different cities. For Niagara, the former may not be essential, but the lack of the latter is inexcusable. Even Cobourg and Port Hope have regular transit between them.

You are confusing the bodies. GO, a division of Metrolinx, is strictly a Toronto commuter service. Metrolinx, the parent agency, is tasked with inter-regional transportation in the Greater Golden Horseshoe, not all of southern Ontario as you seem to believe. It is not meant to supplement VIA train volumes, as VIA trains are supposed to serve VIA's customer base. While I'd like to see wider integration over the mid- to long-term, I don't think it is advisable to continue expanding their mandate until they have their current domain reasonably under control.

GO's policy basically is build where the demand is, so I could see Cambridge at the end of the Milton Corridor by around 2031-2035. If the summer GO train to Niagara can support more demand over this period, I'd expect incremental service improvements, until they hit the line capacity. After that, Niagara will have to wait in line like everyone else.

I think regular GO service to Niagara makes sense. Would anybody think that commuter service for that much of a distance is out of place anywhere in Europe?

I think this is good for VIA. They can focus on the rest of the corridor.

VIA Rail Canada's Toronto-Niagara Falls train offers two departures per day in either direction, one in the morning and one in the late afternoon. In the summertime, there is a third train a few days a week.

If there weren't sufficient traffic they wouldn't be planning a mid-penninsula highway. Any corridor that can support two freeways can support seriously upgraded passenger rail. And considering ridership last year was more than triple the projections, I'd have to agree with kEiThZ. Imagine the potential if the tracks were upgraded for higher speeds. There's a huge amount of untapped potential for rail travel in this province.

I agree, there is a huge potential of untapped passenger rail demand. However, a high-speed ferry could service St. Catherine's-Mississauga-Toronto traffic more efficiently than taking a GO train through Hamilton. Beyond that, it's the goal of a local/regional transit authority.

Halton Regional Transit doesn't makes sense because of the comparitive size of Milton or Georgetown to Oakville or Burlington. Peel Regional Transit makes sense, but Hazel wants Mississauga to move towards a single-tier municipality, but intergration with Brampton is reasonably good. Grand River Transit coordinates service in and between K-W and Cambridge. St. Catherine's-Niagara-Port Colborne has enough internal demand to support some form of public transit. Funding from a regional level makes sense for it and regional funding points to either a regional transit authority or constant threat of local political manuvering.

 

[Kiwi]

Preferred stations: James Street North (Hamilton), Pan-Am Stadium (Hamilton), Fruitland (Stoney Creek), Fifty Road (Stoney Creek), Casablanca (Grimsby), Beamsville, and St. Catharines VIA, Niagara Falls VIA.

 

[Kiwi]

Layover sites: Stoney Creek, Lewis Rd, St. Catharines, Glendale Ave. and Niagara Falls VIA.

 

[Kiwi]

James Street North Station

 

[DavidH]

GO trains to Niagara this year will have two bike cars with racks covering the lower level, meaning that an additional 36 bikes per train will be carry-able.

http://travel.canoe.ca/Travel/News/2010/05/11/13909666-cp.html

 

[MisterF]

You are confusing the bodies. GO, a division of Metrolinx, is strictly a Toronto commuter service. Metrolinx, the parent agency, is tasked with inter-regional transportation in the Greater Golden Horseshoe, not all of southern Ontario as you seem to believe. It is not meant to supplement VIA train volumes, as VIA trains are supposed to serve VIA's customer base. While I'd like to see wider integration over the mid- to long-term, I don't think it is advisable to continue expanding their mandate until they have their current domain reasonably under control.

GO's policy basically is build where the demand is, so I could see Cambridge at the end of the Milton Corridor by around 2031-2035. If the summer GO train to Niagara can support more demand over this period, I'd expect incremental service improvements, until they hit the line capacity. After that, Niagara will have to wait in line like everyone else.

I'm not confusing anything. And I was using Southern Ontario and the GGH interchangably, as in beyond the GTA. With trains going to outlying cities and all day service on some of the lines, GO is becoming more than strictly a commuter service. As it should be. And as GO's service to Kitchener (soon) and Niagara show, GO does indeed supplement VIA. If the federal government isn't going to step up the the plate then there's no reason that the province shouldn't. One possibility is funding more trains under the VIA brand, which I believe some U.S. states do with Amtrak.

 

[denfromoakvillemilton]

I'd rather live in Hamilton then vaughan....

 

[Justin10000]

I'd rather live in Hamilton then vaughan....

Vaughn is a suburban blight. At least Hamilton has sone decent parks.

 

[The Mad Navigator]

Aside from Woodbridge and Thornhill, Vaughan doesn't really have any other "nice historic old style" downtown settlements worth seeing.

 

[denfromoakvillemilton]

Vaughn is a suburban blight. At least Hamilton has sone decent parks.

Amen to that. You can acutally go place without a damn car in Hamilton.

 

[Mapleson]

There are not synonymous or interchangable. They are distinct geographical areas, just as Metro Toronto, GTA, GTHA or GGH are not the same.

Confuse: to mistake one thing for another

Southern Ontario:

Greater Golden Horseshoe:

GO has bus service to Kitchener, but won't have trains there before 2030. GO has summer service to Niagara for the tourist market. These make sense mid-term (10-20 years) to connect to as part of the GGH and Metrolinx's mandated area of operations. London, Sarnia, Windsor, and Chatham-Kent are all Southern Ontario towns that have significant populations, but do not make sense as a commuter service or a tourist service. To the East are Belleville, Kingston, and Ottawa.

VIA rail is the federal crown corporation that targets occational user service. If you want more VIA trains, ask the Federal Conservatives and hold your breath until they come. Making VIA play politics to two funding fiddles and they'll be even more disfunctional that they are. If VIA were made a real crown corporation like CN (rather than just by an Order-in-Council of the Privy Council), they could go to the public and raise money.

Did you mean supplement or supplant? VIA carries 4-5 million passengers a year. GO carries 50-60 million passengers a year. GO and VIA should be coordinating to offer complimentary routes not supplementary routes. As such, I do not believe GO should go to any of the VIA hubs of Kingston, London, Niagara Falls, Ottawa, Sarnia, Sudbury, White River, or Windsor.

Metrolinx's mandate is to connect the GTHA. VIA's mandate is to provide trans-Canada passenger rail service. Mixing mandates means neither organisation will operate as well as it could.

As for Vaughn, I just want a subway stop at Canada's Wonderland and I'll be happy.

 

[Jonny5]

Vaughn is a suburban blight. At least Hamilton has sone decent parks.

Unfortunately, Hamilton has spent the past 20 years trying to emulate Vaughan in its undeveloped areas.

 

[MisterF]

There are not synonymous or interchangable. They are distinct geographical areas, just as Metro Toronto, GTA, GTHA or GGH are not the same.

Confuse: to mistake one thing for another

GO has bus service to Kitchener, but won't have trains there before 2030. GO has summer service to Niagara for the tourist market. These make sense mid-term (10-20 years) to connect to as part of the GGH and Metrolinx's mandated area of operations. London, Sarnia, Windsor, and Chatham-Kent are all Southern Ontario towns that have significant populations, but do not make sense as a commuter service or a tourist service. To the East are Belleville, Kingston, and Ottawa.

VIA rail is the federal crown corporation that targets occational user service. If you want more VIA trains, ask the Federal Conservatives and hold your breath until they come. Making VIA play politics to two funding fiddles and they'll be even more disfunctional that they are. If VIA were made a real crown corporation like CN (rather than just by an Order-in-Council of the Privy Council), they could go to the public and raise money.

Did you mean supplement or supplant? VIA carries 4-5 million passengers a year. GO carries 50-60 million passengers a year. GO and VIA should be coordinating to offer complimentary routes not supplementary routes. As such, I do not believe GO should go to any of the VIA hubs of Kingston, London, Niagara Falls, Ottawa, Sarnia, Sudbury, White River, or Windsor.

Metrolinx's mandate is to connect the GTHA. VIA's mandate is to provide trans-Canada passenger rail service. Mixing mandates means neither organisation will operate as well as it could.

As for Vaughn, I just want a subway stop at Canada's Wonderland and I'll be happy.

You're really hanging onto that Southern Ontario thing aren't you? Well I hate to break it to you, but the Wikipedia definition of Southern Ontario isn't the only one that's valid. It's very common for people to refer to Southern Ontario as a far more specific area, same with Eastern, Central, and Western Ontario. I'm glad I could clear up the confusion.

Would you consider Amtrak to be more disfunctional than VIA? Because Amtrak "plays politics to two funding fiddles" as you put it. Actually it's a lot more than that, since at least a dozen states provide funding to Amtrak, as well as British Columbia. It probably makes more sense for the provinces to contribute to VIA than to run GO-branded trains to compete with VIA.

And I mean supplement, because that's exactly what they're doing - adding trains to supply a deficiency in service to cities like Kitchener and Niagara Falls. Sure they should be more coordinated, but don't lecture me about that, lecture the governments that aren't coordinating.

 

[Mapleson]

You're really hanging onto that Southern Ontario thing aren't you? Well I hate to break it to you, but the Wikipedia definition of Southern Ontario isn't the only one that's valid. It's very common for people to refer to Southern Ontario as a far more specific area, same with Eastern, Central, and Western Ontario. I'm glad I could clear up the confusion.

Public discourse is held with commonly accepted terminology. If our definitions of Southern Ontario differ, then our solutions to Southern Ontario's issues will differ. I was trying to clearly delinate the terms as I (not wikipedia) know them. What I was expecting was a response along the lines of "this is the area I mean". That's how Wikipedia's definition should have been reached by commonly held acceptance by the authors. We don't need to use the Wikipedia definition, but it does help to use some definition.

Would you consider Amtrak to be more disfunctional than VIA? Because Amtrak "plays politics to two funding fiddles" as you put it. Actually it's a lot more than that, since at least a dozen states provide funding to Amtrak, as well as British Columbia. It probably makes more sense for the provinces to contribute to VIA than to run GO-branded trains to compete with VIA.

Amtrak is a completely different beast. It was established by issuing common stock to railroads that contributed capital and equipment. This means that Amtrak is not beholdant to the US Federal government for funding as VIA rail is here. Amtrak can sell liquidity or undertake a public debt offering.

Amtrak also has had a much higher level of investment than VIA.
1981 - $1.25 billion,
1986 - $0.60 billion,
1997-2002 - $5.2 billion
2004-2005 - $1.2 billion
2006 - $1.4 billion

Compare that to VIA where federal investment has been:
2007-2012 - $516 million
2009-2011 - $407 million (Stimulus Spending)

So no, Amtrak is almost a real corporation and just not a political puppet. VIA rail will not be more than a political puppet until it some option other than to spend federal funds in political priority areas. Adding provincial fund and provincial politics into the priority without some sort of third-party balancing means VIA would be split between trying to satisfy two political masters. In theory, deliniation between inter- and intra-provience trips makes the most sense between where VIA spends their limited dollars and where proviencial and local agencies meet localized demand.

And I mean supplement, because that's exactly what they're doing - adding trains to supply a deficiency in service to cities like Kitchener and Niagara Falls. Sure they should be more coordinated, but don't lecture me about that, lecture the governments that aren't coordinating.

I don't mean to sound like I'm lecturing. I do write to the government regarding my thoughts, but I'll admit I haven't sent this idea in. Thanks for the prompting. Perhaps, you want to send one as well? I love free postage.