GO Transit: Service thread (including extensions)

[crs1026]

^I won’t pretend they are perfect, but to be fair - ML has in fact erected a fair amount of fencing (and sound walls) such that in many locations it is a puzzle where a trespasser entered. We may see even more with electrification and as the various track projects are completed. CP and CN much less so (that video is on CP rather than ML’s own property).
I don’t imagine we will ever see a perfectly sealed railway system, nor would we want to….. just imagine how Sunnyside would look with sound walls along the tracks next to the Gardiner.
Our society has little patience with “petty” rules and ordinances - even those that have relevance to saving lives and human safety. Add in youthful urges for adventure, and disregard of risk. ML is doing the right thing by keeping the risks in the public eye. It is only partly altruistic… ML can’t afford bad publicity, may not want to endure high profile litigation, and they stand to lose the most when trains are delayed by incidents. Sadly, I doubt their safety campaigns will ever be 100% effective.

- Paul

 

[Krypto98]

I understand your points. I had actually called the Go Transit Safety line itself - not just Metrolinx customer service. And when the train passed about 10 minutes later, with people still on the tracks, it appeared to me to be going at the normal speed for this time/area, with no horns blaring, and certainly not at a crawl. I figured the Go Transit Safety line was the most direct route. Weeks later they've done nothing to secure the perimeter, having seen someone slip through the fence this past weekend. I've avoided getting a Twitter account, so I did email a follow-up to Metrolinx customer service today contrasting their news release with their own inaction.

I believe that metrolinx policy regarding tresspassers on track is for trains to reduce speed to 25 mph and be prepared to stop. If this was on the Bala sub near union that would be close to track speed anyways...

 

[Allandale25]

Ontario election features big promises on public transit. What’s on offer for Peterborough-Kawartha?​

Better GO Transit service to Peterborough, cheaper fares, more money for cities to run public transit – the major political parties all have something different to offer voters in the region on public transit.

Big promises on transit in Ontario election

How are the major parties proposing to improve transit? And what do local bus riders think of the plans?

peterboroughcurrents.ca

 

[ssiguy2]

I've never understood why GO expansion always seems to avoid Brantford.

There are a lot of commuters between Brantford & Hamilton and a stop at Dundas would serve McMaster.

 

[DirectionNorth]

I've never understood why GO expansion always seems to avoid Brantford.

There are a lot of commuters between Brantford & Hamilton and a stop at Dundas would serve McMaster.

The track between Brantford and Hamilton is owned by CN, which uses it as its SW Ontario mainline, and would crowd Hamilton and Niagara slots on the CN portion of the Oakville Sub.

Theoretically, we could have a shuttle service between Brantford and Hamilton, but I don't know whether there is room for a stop in Hamilton, Dundas, or Brantford.

Besides, there are (sigh) more seats to be won in London. If anything is set up, it will probably have the very low utility.

 

[Towered]

I've never understood why GO expansion always seems to avoid Brantford.

There are a lot of commuters between Brantford & Hamilton and a stop at Dundas would serve McMaster.

Brantford could certainly use the investment. It's a startlingly shabby city with obvious signs of decay and poverty, but it's the next stop for the middle class priced out of the insane GTA real estate market.

 

[reaperexpress]

I've never understood why GO expansion always seems to avoid Brantford.

There are a lot of commuters between Brantford & Hamilton and a stop at Dundas would serve McMaster.

Really? Never?

Three weeks ago you posted in this thread:

I'm curious..........when it comes to GO expansion why is Brantford never considered? It has a rail line going right to it's downtown and Paris. It has 150,000 people and such a service would also get Brantford to Hamilton commuters and a stop at Dundas would also serve McMaster. It would be money way better spent than on the useless London route.

And these were the responses:

CN has entered the chat.

Would it? It's about the same distance from the old Dundas station to McMaster than it is from West Harbour.

Though with the long term plans to terminate some trains in Aldershot, it may well make sense to extend an hourly train to Brantford with a stop in Dundas.

Traditionally the answer has been that Brantford already has a commuter rail service to Toronto, which is is the one operated by VIA Rail. See the 2018 timetable below, with commuter-oriented trips highlighted in green.
View attachment 399370
View attachment 399371

However, given VIA's recent reluctance to reinstate the commuter services from Kingston (e.g. train 651, shown in green below), it is possible that VIA is now interested in transferring their commuter services to GO.
View attachment 399369

In principle it seems outside VIA's national mandate to be providing commuter service within a particular urban area of a particular province, but it's possible that pre-pandemic it didn't matter since those services were profitable anyway. But if VIA is now doubting that they will continue to be profitable, it may be looking to download those services onto the Province, in which case VIA trains 82 and 83 might be replaced by GO trains in the future.

Reaper's answer is a good one, and the mention of CN by others is also apt.

That said, I would add:

Brantford has lobbied for GO service; and that resulted in the 13 bus trips it now gets on weekdays.

I'm not sure what the ridership volume is on those buses, but I imagine that would factor in to considering whether a train is appropriate.

The service, currently is no more frequent than hourly, which seems a bit light for train replacement.

That said, we all know trains will lure additional riders.

****

One thing I'm not sure has been addressed (it may have been) was that Brantford Transit was actually abysmal a few years ago, and the quality of that last-mile connection is an issue when developing
a plan to lure more into transit-based commuting.

 

[ssiguy2]

There is a VERY interesting development at Metra that Metrolinx should keep an eye on.

Metra is the Chicago areas commuter & suburban rail system. It has roughly twice the trackage of GO and nearly quadruple the amount of stations. It carries {2019} roughly 25% more passengers per day than GO rail and offers both all day each way lines as well as just one way limited service weekday lines like GO. Metra, like all commuter/suburban systems, has been hit particularly hard by COVID as it, like GO, tends to be used overwhelmingly by people getting to their downtown white collar jobs which often could be done at home unlike blue collar ones.

Starting next month, Metra will be running a 3 month pilot program, offering unlimited travel on all lines regardless of the distance for just $100/month and $70 for students/disabled/seniors. The July/Aug/Sept pilot will allow Metra to see how it effects ridership on summer travel but also Sept when students are back at class and summer vacations for workers are over. Like GO, Metra serves areas well beyond it's immediate urban area to outlying cities.

They are doing this to entice riders back as well as seeing how it effects ridership on each line, when people travel, and how much {if anything}" it will cost the system if it is made permanent. Metra has the advantage of having most of it's lines electrified so it doesn't suffer from GO's huge operational expense of diesel but conversely it's rider revenue per mile travelled is much lower than GO's.

It could end up actually costing the agency very little money or even increase revenues as the much lower fares are overridden by the much higher ridership. Toronto saw this with the UPX when it dropped it's fares by 70% but due to so many more people using the service, revenues actually went up.

 

[ARG1]

They are doing this to entice riders back as well as seeing how it effects ridership on each line, when people travel, and how much {if anything}" it will cost the system if it is made permanent. Metra has the advantage of having most of it's lines electrified so it doesn't suffer from GO's huge operational expense of diesel but conversely it's rider revenue per mile travelled is much lower than GO's.

Correction: Only 2 Metra Lines: the South Shore Line and Metra Electric are electrified (This claim is debatable since as far as I know the SSL isn't even officially part of Metra, so I'm not sure if this program even includes the SSL). The remaining 10 lines aren't.

 

[ssiguy2]

I thought it was more than that so I stand corrected.

That said, it's even better for a comparison. Metra is definitely the most similar system to GO in NA if not all of the Americas. Both have both commuter only and all day routes, run on former freight lines, are mostly diesel, and radiate from a office heavy downtown in a similar sized lakefront city. This is an ideal situation for ML to see what such a policy does to ridership and revenues. ML can do all the studies it wants but only real life situations can give them a true picture and ML now has the benefit of seeing those results but with none of the risk.

This is truly a once in a lifetime opportunity for ML to see how such a flat fare system could {or could not} work in the GTAH.

 

[Allandale25]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1533474577778630657

 

[reaperexpress]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1533474577778630657

The scheduled travel times for GO local trains were all shortened by a few minutes in 2020 due to the drastically lower ridership, which produced shorter dwells at stations, as well as faster acceleration due to shorter trains. It sounds like (contrary to GO's proclamations of low ridership), ridership is returning to levels which require the extra schedule padding which was present pre-pandemic.

Or, instead of slowing down train schedules, they could keep the local trains short (e.g. 6-car MP40 or 8-car MP54) and add supplemental express service during periods where more capacity is required. On LSW, they obviously need to reintroduce peak-period express service from Niagara and Hamilton (these can be longer trains), and during the midday they could run an hourly express service from West Harbour (cutting the local service back to Aldershot or Burlington).

 

[Allandale25]

^ speaking of ridership

https://twitter.com/x/status/1533458603159564290

 

[anb]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1533474577778630657

They should've just cancelled any track work today on both LW and Barrie as both the Gardiner and DVP were closed heading into downtown, and Line 1/2 both have delays/closures. They really need better planning all around the board in these situations. This would've been a great time to detour the west end weekend buses to Kipling terminal, but they instead chose Port Credit where the Lakeshore service is hourly and most likely over capacitated.

 

[Northern Light]

^ speaking of ridership

https://twitter.com/x/status/1533458603159564290

Maybe tag AMA on that one........would be good to see her aware of it if nothing else.