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GO Transit: Construction Projects (Metrolinx, various)

denfromoakvillemilton said:
Agreed but I'm looking for better weekend service on Barrie, Stouffville and Brampton imo. That will determine whether they are serious or not. I think West Harbour should be priority number one
@crs1026 @mdrejhon what do you think?
Click to expand...

We have to remember, budgets and project logistics are two different things. For the past couple years, lots of work has been in planning and design stages. Planning is relatively cheap.

I recall a graph on UT somewhere from a couple of budgets back showing the year over year cash flow. It showed a ramp up right about now, as construction begins in earnest. Will see if I can find it. I wonder how it compares to the larest budget.

All of the lines you mention have some actual work in progress or in the tendering stage. At this point, "priority" is not the issue. Some parts of that work will take longer than other parts to complete. The completion dates are determined by the work itself. At this point, West Harbour is furthest along. Newmarket is plodding along but oddly slow. Unionville is just getting started. Bramalea has some work tendered or close to tender but some of it (eg the 401 underpass) is a big job and will take a while.

While I am repeating myself, we really need to keep an eye on hiring and training as much as on laying track. The budget repeated the promise of 6000 weekly trips in 2025 versus 1500 today. Barring scheduling efficiencies, that's four times as many crews as there are out there today. With a minimum two years to qualify a throttle technician. You can't procrastinate the staffing. I sure would like to see the staffing and training plan.

- Paul
 
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crs1026 said:
I recall a graph on UT somewhere from a couple of budgets back showing the year over year cash flow. It showed a ramp up right about now, as construction begins in earnest. Will see if I can find it. I wonder how it compares to the larest budget.


- Paul
Click to expand...

I recall seeing the same graph. Did a quick search for it but couldn't easily find it so would be interested in seeing it again.

Update: Paul, was it the graph posted back in 2016 in this thread here?
 
raptor said:
Anyone knows what's this tender about?
Click to expand...

The MTO will be starting a multi-year project to rebuild the 401 bridges/overpasses at Leslie and the East Don River. As part of this, the station building at Oriole will need to be removed and replaced.

Dan
Toronto, Ont.
 
I'm likely confessing a little OCD, but having had some professional experience in the area - I am coming back to this crew hiring thing.
The issue for ML is not how many people they can hire, it's how many people they can train. That depends on how many trainers they have.

If you assume
- two year field training to qualify as an engineer
- each field trainee must be supervised by a qualified engineer
- to be qualified as a training supervisor, the engineer must have been out of training for two years

Here's a spreadsheet that models that scenario, using a hypothetical starting point of 100 qualified engineers. (Obviously, GO/Bombardier has some other number, but you can extrapolate from that round number.) Of that 100, only 60 are willing and able to be trainers (some people may be good at a job, but not good at training others....and with GO's recent hiring, there will be lots of good trainers in the works who just need another year or two of experience).

Using that starting point, the model shows that a population of 100 qualified engineers in 2017 will only grow to 216 qualified engineers in 2025. That's all the training process will generate. Perhaps some qualified engineers can be lured from VIA, CN, or CP...but that's a two way street, so I ignored that.

Simply put - once you load up the hiring with every trainee you can accommodate, you have to wait two years before anyone is available to train any more. And you have to wait four years (two to qualify as engineers, two to gain enough experience to be qualified to train) before those new hires can in turn train other people. Meanwhile, your senior trainers are attritting, and not all new hires pass the training.

My model is pretty unscientific and may have some formula errors. The variables that I depicted are variables that I know from experience are used in these analyses. Anyways, it gives you the general point.....ML's theory that it can expand to 6,000 runs per week may be wildly optimistic, not because of tracks, but because of lack of qualified staff.

I'm hoping ML has done its diligence and has a far better spreadsheet that refutes mine. If they don't, they should have.

- Paul
 

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crs1026 said:
We have to remember, budgets and project logistics are two different things. For the past couple years, lots of work has been in planning and design stages. Planning is relatively cheap.

I recall a graph on UT somewhere from a couple of budgets back showing the year over year cash flow. It showed a ramp up right about now, as construction begins in earnest. Will see if I can find it. I wonder how it compares to the larest budget.

All of the lines you mention have some actual work in progress or in the tendering stage. At this point, "priority" is not the issue. Some parts of that work will take longer than other parts to complete. The completion dates are determined by the work itself. At this point, West Harbour is furthest along. Newmarket is plodding along but oddly slow. Unionville is just getting started. Bramalea has some work tendered or close to tender but some of it (eg the 401 underpass) is a big job and will take a while.

While I am repeating myself, we really need to keep an eye on hiring and training as much as on laying track. The budget repeated the promise of 6000 weekly trips in 2025 versus 1500 today. Barring scheduling efficiencies, that's four times as many crews as there are out there today. With a minimum two years to qualify a throttle technician. You can't procrastinate the staffing. I sure would like to see the staffing and training plan.

- Paul
Click to expand...
Very true, all of it. I think this should be acclerated if they want to win again

[
smallspy said:
The MTO will be starting a multi-year project to rebuild the 401 bridges/overpasses at Leslie and the East Don River. As part of this, the station building at Oriole will need to be removed and replaced.

Dan
Toronto, Ont.
Click to expand...
Now would be the time to the station.
crs1026 said:
I'm likely confessing a little OCD, but having had some professional experience in the area - I am coming back to this crew hiring thing.
The issue for ML is not how many people they can hire, it's how many people they can train. That depends on how many trainers they have.

If you assume
- two year field training to qualify as an engineer
- each field trainee must be supervised by a qualified engineer
- to be qualified as a training supervisor, the engineer must have been out of training for two years

Here's a spreadsheet that models that scenario, using a hypothetical starting point of 100 qualified engineers. (Obviously, GO/Bombardier has some other number, but you can extrapolate from that round number.) Of that 100, only 60 are willing and able to be trainers (some people may be good at a job, but not good at training others....and with GO's recent hiring, there will be lots of good trainers in the works who just need another year or two of experience).

Using that starting point, the model shows that a population of 100 qualified engineers in 2017 will only grow to 216 qualified engineers in 2025. That's all the training process will generate. Perhaps some qualified engineers can be lured from VIA, CN, or CP...but that's a two way street, so I ignored that.

Simply put - once you load up the hiring with every trainee you can accommodate, you have to wait two years before anyone is available to train any more. And you have to wait four years (two to qualify as engineers, two to gain enough experience to be qualified to train) before those new hires can in turn train other people. Meanwhile, your senior trainers are attritting, and not all new hires pass the training.

My model is pretty unscientific and may have some formula errors. The variables that I depicted are variables that I know from experience are used in these analyses. Anyways, it gives you the general point.....ML's theory that it can expand to 6,000 runs per week may be wildly optimistic, not because of tracks, but because of lack of qualified staff.

I'm hoping ML has done its diligence and has a far better spreadsheet that refutes mine. If they don't, they should have.

- Paul
Click to expand...
Sounds like a long time, but we were supposed to be farther ahead at this point.
 
This column speaks to the table you referenced: "Stuck in transit: Ontario budget has lots more money for infrastructure, but little to ease congestion - ANALYSIS: Schools and hospitals get plenty of cash to expand in this year’s budget — transit, however, does not"

rbt said:
You missed the important bit. Table 6-16 on page 243 shows $7,176B in transit spending over 2017/2018 year, up from $3.8B last year. That's $5.4B provincial dollars and $1.7B from federal/municipal partners (so federal package + smart track tender?). Eglinton payments escalate as work continues but that's a small fraction of this spending. It looks like they're expecting to hit financial close on a number of additional tenders, probably the GO RER track work packages (though nothing explicitly states that).

Hamilton, Finch, and Mississauga LRT aren't enough to cover the spending increase (~$3.5B over 5 years) so I've got to assume a big chunk of that is deposits on things expected to be tendered.

I'm hoping this means Metrolinx will go tender crazy through May/June; as they've got to issue a ton of cheques for vendors by April 2018.
Click to expand...
 
smallspy said:
The MTO will be starting a multi-year project to rebuild the 401 bridges/overpasses at Leslie and the East Don River. As part of this, the station building at Oriole will need to be removed and replaced.
Click to expand...
Ah, the 401 rebuild - it never ends.

That makes sense ... though if they are doing that, why not take advantage of the project to do what they promised years ago, and shift the (310-metre) platform further north, towards Leslie station. If they shifted it just 200 metres north, they'd be right up to Esther Shiner Blvd., and at least cut the walk to the subway station by 200 metres (down to 250 metres from 450 metre, but still be at the edge of the 401/parking at the south end. Could add a pedestrian bridge over Esther Shiner, a new walkway, and get it down to 200 metres.

Or just do it properly, extend the platforms over Esther Shiner, shift the platforms a total of 350 metres north to Leslie station (I assume there is a knockout panel in there somewhere, so that there can be a connecting tunnel under the bus roadway to the tracks - or did they already build mezzanine tunnel/station under the roadway?), connect to subway properly, and just make those that drive, walk 150 metres from the platform to the car park.
 
TransitBart said:
How about connecting it to Leslie Station?
Click to expand...

No kidding. This has to be one of the lowest hanging fruit in the system. Don't even bother with a direct connection, just make a path to the Old Leslie entrance and build a temporary platform where the second track will eventually go. The cynic in me thinks Metrolinx is holding out because of a lack of parking, which would just be typical.
 
DonValleyRainbow said:
The cynic in me thinks Metrolinx is holding out because of a lack of parking, which would just be typical.
Click to expand...
If they just shifted the platform north to the bridge over Esther Shiner Blvd., and then built a path, then the south side would still be at the edge of the parking lot - nothing lost.

Though it's a hell of an improvement now that you can walk north to Esther Shiner along the tracks, and then on the streets to the Old Leslie entrance, rather than what you used to have to do (walk from the 401 up to the Leslie Street entrance to Leslie station). Though to tell the truth, I've used it more to get from Leslie to Ikea, than to the GO station.
 
TransitBart said:
How about connecting it to Leslie Station?
Click to expand...

DonValleyRainbow said:
No kidding. This has to be one of the lowest hanging fruit in the system. Don't even bother with a direct connection, just make a path to the Old Leslie entrance and build a temporary platform where the second track will eventually go. The cynic in me thinks Metrolinx is holding out because of a lack of parking, which would just be typical.
Click to expand...

Nevermind low-hanging fruit for a second - how many people do you actually expect to make this connection? Are you figuring tens, or hundreds? Would it really be worth it?

Dan
Toronto, Ont.
 
smallspy said:
Nevermind low-hanging fruit for a second - how many people do you actually expect to make this connection? Are you figuring tens, or hundreds? Would it really be worth it?

Dan
Toronto, Ont.
Click to expand...

Anything that promotes an well connected transit hub, for today and tomorrow, is definitely worth it IMO.
 
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