GO Transit: Service thread (including extensions)

[Reecemartin]

A vlog for my trip down to Hamilton on the first day of hourly service on the Lakeshore West GO line in Southern Ontario. Enjoy!

 

[robmausser]

This is true.

This is what you get for not ingesting any caffeine in 3 months.

Its a fair point though that deserves discussion. Where do you decide where GO has service and VIA does?

I was all for VIA HFR phase 2 to London via the Kitchener route. But now, it seems like GO will be on those tracks. Does that mean that VIA should instead invest in a Hamilton/Brantford route? Or is it still worthwhile to have express VIA HFR service on the Kitchener (GEXR) route, only stopping at major cities, and GO is the milk run service.

 

[Richard White]

Its a fair point though that deserves discussion. Where do you decide where GO has service and VIA does?

I was all for VIA HFR phase 2 to London via the Kitchener route. But now, it seems like GO will be on those tracks. Does that mean that VIA should instead invest in a Hamilton/Brantford route? Or is it still worthwhile to have express VIA HFR service on the Kitchener (GEXR) route, only stopping at major cities, and GO is the milk run service.

For me, VIA rail should be long haul in the sense it goes to Ottawa, Halifax, Vancouver and places in between.

Places that are relatively close like Pickering, Hamilton, Guelph and Niagara should be done by GO transit.

 

[Nomad_87]

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Wish it went all the way to Barrie. But as long as the provisions are in place for it in the future I'll be happy

 

[innsertnamehere]

Wish it went all the way to Barrie. But as long as the provisions are in place for it in the future I'll be happy

15 minute service that far north would be a bit aggressive right now I think. I can definitely see it over the long term, especially given how insanely quickly Simcoe County is growing right now though.

 

[ssiguy2]

New development from London............

MegaBus already offers frequent service from London to Toronto and now a brand new bus service is about to start. ONEXBUS which will offer 6 return trips. It looks like this will serve more communities between London & Woodstock.

Having 2 regular bus services, VIA rail, and potential GO all to serve the London to Toronto corridor really exemplifies 2 things:
1} There is a lot of latent demand for transit services between the 2 cities.
2} How lousy, slow, and unreliable the VIA service is and why so many Londoners do not consider it a viable alternative.

 

[reaperexpress]

Having 2 regular bus services, VIA rail, and potential GO all to serve the London to Toronto corridor really exemplifies 2 things:
1} There is a lot of latent demand for transit services between the 2 cities.
2} How lousy, slow, and unreliable the VIA service is and why so many Londoners do not consider it a viable alternative.

Last time you made the claim that VIA was outcompeted by private bus companies in the London-Toronto corridor, I disproved it here.

Prior to the pandemic, VIA's market share was double that of Greyhound's. (Greyhound was the only bus company running London to downtown Toronto at the time). VIA ran fewer trips per day, but had 4.5 times more capacity per trip. And a typical VIA trip was 16 minutes faster than a typical Greyhound trip (2:09 vs 2:25). Or to look from another perspective, VIA ran 4 trips per day which took 2:10 or less, while Greyhound ran 3.

Both VIA and Greyhound had similarly poor reliability.

There is certainly lots of latent demand, and certainly lots of room for improvement for VIA, but you can't claim that the private bus offerings are significantly better than what VIA was offering.

 

[ShonTron]

So I visited Bloomington GO Station - the Garage Mahal - yesterday. I then tried to get home afterwards.

A visit to GO Transit’s new Garage Mahal

Despite Bloomington’s modern design and environmental features, it does not support contemporary demands for sustainable development or transportation.

seanmarshall.ca

 

[ARG1]

So I visited Bloomington GO Station - the Garage Mahal - yesterday. I then tried to get home afterwards.

A visit to GO Transit’s new Garage Mahal

Despite Bloomington’s modern design and environmental features, it does not support contemporary demands for sustainable development or transportation.

seanmarshall.ca

When I visited Bloomington on opening day I just bit the bullet and took an Uber down to Yonge Street.

 

[anb]

New development from London............

MegaBus already offers frequent service from London to Toronto and now a brand new bus service is about to start. ONEXBUS which will offer 6 return trips. It looks like this will serve more communities between London & Woodstock.

Having 2 regular bus services, VIA rail, and potential GO all to serve the London to Toronto corridor really exemplifies 2 things:
1} There is a lot of latent demand for transit services between the 2 cities.
2} How lousy, slow, and unreliable the VIA service is and why so many Londoners do not consider it a viable alternative.

This is a bit of a longshot, but hopefully we do get better bus connections to/from Sarnia and Windsor with London being the central hub between those places and Toronto. Via rail still needs a long way to go before anyone takes them as an alternative, and they also need to lower train prices as they really feel like a rip off. I mean $20 one way on GO vs $29 one way on Via from Toronto-Kitchener says it all.

When I visited Bloomington on opening day I just bit the bullet and took an Uber down to Yonge Street.

I still don't get why the off peak bus service stops abruptly during counter peak. Is it because of duplication on Yonge St or the Barrie/Stouffville line being too close to the RH Line? Because clearly nothing is stopping from running the *easiest* form of transit to help counter peak riders...

 

[allengeorge]

So I visited Bloomington GO Station - the Garage Mahal - yesterday. I then tried to get home afterwards.

A visit to GO Transit’s new Garage Mahal

Despite Bloomington’s modern design and environmental features, it does not support contemporary demands for sustainable development or transportation.

seanmarshall.ca

Slightly tongue-in-cheek, but…this is why I can never get excited about transit projects in York region. So many dollars flow there (politics!), but the region never backs the capital improvements up with serious service commitments or urban planning that would actually make transit a viable option.

 

[cbrown2009]

I do apologize for changing the subject, but now that the 401/409 tunnels are finished, could we see weekend Kitchener Line train service? Maybe in September? As I recall, there was something about not running weekends to allow tunnel work to proceed unimpeded..

 

[ShonTron]

I do apologize for changing the subject, but now that the 401/409 tunnels are finished, could we see weekend Kitchener Line train service? Maybe in September? As I recall, there was something about not running weekends to allow tunnel work to proceed unimpeded..

The tunnel boring work is only part of the work going on along the Kitchener Line - new tracks and platforms at Weston, Bloor, and Malton, a new station at Mount Dennis, and a fourth track only partially laid. Renovations at Bramalea aren’t done yet.

And then there’s getting CN permission to run on the weekends past Bramalea.

 

[Streety McCarface]

I do apologize for changing the subject, but now that the 401/409 tunnels are finished, could we see weekend Kitchener Line train service? Maybe in September? As I recall, there was something about not running weekends to allow tunnel work to proceed unimpeded..

The tunnel boring work is only part of the work going on along the Kitchener Line - new tracks and platforms at Weston, Bloor, and Malton, a new station at Mount Dennis, and a fourth track only partially laid. Renovations at Bramalea aren’t done yet.

And then there’s getting CN permission to run on the weekends past Bramalea.

Plus Guelph works, and bridge replacement that's going to start in Guelph soon.

 

[cbrown2009]

Plus Guelph works, and bridge replacement that's going to start in Guelph soon.

The tunnel boring work is only part of the work going on along the Kitchener Line - new tracks and platforms at Weston, Bloor, and Malton, a new station at Mount Dennis, and a fourth track only partially laid. Renovations at Bramalea aren’t done yet.

And then there’s getting CN permission to run on the weekends past Bramalea.

Granted, but seeing as how UPX trains already pass through some of these areas, shouldn't an hourly train schedule be able to pass without too much trouble? And with CN as well? In the case of Guelph, there would possibly be only a couple of trains passing to/from Kitchener. I was thinking more Mount Pleasant-Union, again with a couple of twins extended to/from Kitch.