GO Transit: Service thread (including extensions)

[crs1026]

Which would make it even less financially realistic.

The point in time for this decision is when (I’m sure it’s a “when”, not an “if”) the QEW is considered “full”, and a highway expansion is proposed. A new rail bridge, tunnel, whatever will look a lot cheaper in comparison to the cost of adding highway capacity and a better way frward.

Occupying the CN bridge may be OK for now, accepting its limitations, but I can’t imagine this area finding that limited service adequate as traffic and density grows. Putting all our eggs in CN’s basket is not the best way forward - dedicated GO tracks would be better n the future.

And having said that, I can easily buy the concept of a St Catherines hub, with trains terminating there or as suggested bending south to Wellandish, and a much-enhanced bus network linking everything from Fort Erie to Niagara on the Lake If we had 15-minute 2WAD that far, and really good bus links, we’d be serving the Niagara tourism and day trip markets well without creating the problem of 1500-person crowds taxing the transit system so badly.

- Paul

 

[Undead]

If we care about sustainable tourism, why on Earth would we price out people from the GO train and encourage them to drive their big, stupid SUVs to the falls??

 

[Northern Light]

If we care about sustainable tourism, why on Earth would we price out people from the GO train and encourage them to drive their big, stupid SUVs to the falls??

Entirely on-point.

If we can't make the trains work as well as we would like, in the near-term, then we should double, triple or quintuple buses making the run, and give them a dedicated lane on the QEW while we're at it.

 

[LNahid2000]

If we care about sustainable tourism, why on Earth would we price out people from the GO train and encourage them to drive their big, stupid SUVs to the falls??

THIS. If we don't make the cost of transit competitive with the marginal cost of driving, people are just going to drive. Even with the gas prices today, the marginal cost of driving will be less than the full GO Transit fare for 2 people. That's why the train was empty when it was $40 per person round trip.

 

[Bordercollie]

Entirely on-point.

If we can't make the trains work as well as we would like, in the near-term, then we should double, triple or quintuple buses making the run, and give them a dedicated lane on the QEW while we're at it.

Are WE GO bus operators and Niagara transit part of the same pool? Can't they borrow some busses from Niagara transit for GO shuttles? Or since Metrolinx funds everything just have 3 superLO go buses on standby for those GO meets and drop them off at the closest stop to the falls.

 

[Richard White]

Are WE GO bus operators and Niagara transit part of the same pool? Can't they borrow some busses from Niagara transit for GO shuttles? Or since Metrolinx funds everything just have 3 superLO go buses on standby for those GO meets and drop them off at the closest stop to the falls.

I think it is a Viva/YRT situation

 

[crs1026]

Niagara Region is in the process of amalgamating all its local transit properties into one system. That’s encouraging for the growth of a network to connect to a better GO service.. See here. PS and here.

PPS - According to the docs put before Niagara Regional Council here, WEGO is not part of the amalgamation.

- Paul

 

[lenaitch]

The point in time for this decision is when (I’m sure it’s a “when”, not an “if”) the QEW is considered “full”, and a highway expansion is proposed. A new rail bridge, tunnel, whatever will look a lot cheaper in comparison to the cost of adding highway capacity and a better way frward.

Occupying the CN bridge may be OK for now, accepting its limitations, but I can’t imagine this area finding that limited service adequate as traffic and density grows. Putting all our eggs in CN’s basket is not the best way forward - dedicated GO tracks would be better n the future.

And having said that, I can easily buy the concept of a St Catherines hub, with trains terminating there or as suggested bending south to Wellandish, and a much-enhanced bus network linking everything from Fort Erie to Niagara on the Lake If we had 15-minute 2WAD that far, and really good bus links, we’d be serving the Niagara tourism and day trip markets well without creating the problem of 1500-person crowds taxing the transit system so badly.

- Paul

No doubt. Given the clearances required and grades allowed, I would think that, if direct access to the river is desired, a tunnel would ultimately be cheaper and consume much less real estate.

Perhaps by then, GO/Metrolinx and its government will have formally figured out what it wants, and is mandated, to be. Is it to be a GGH/GTHA/etc. commuter transit service? VIA-Ontario? Via-Southern Ontario? Ontario Tourist Railway? Some of the above? All of the above. People looking for progress in reliable, regular and affordable ways to get to work every day must wonder about this foray into tourist rail.

 

[APTA-2048]

I think it is a Viva/YRT situation

WEGO is operated jointly by Niagara Falls Transit and the Niagara Parks Commission. The Green route uses buses leased to and operated by the Parks Commission, while the rest of the routes use buses owned and operated by Niagara Falls Transit.

 

[Northern Light]

Perhaps by then, GO/Metrolinx and its government will have formally figured out what it wants, and is mandated, to be. Is it to be a GGH/GTHA/etc. commuter transit service? VIA-Ontario? Via-Southern Ontario? Ontario Tourist Railway? Some of the above? All of the above. People looking for progress in reliable, regular and affordable ways to get to work every day must wonder about this foray into tourist rail.

I think it makes sense to position GO as the commuter/economy mode of travel; and VIA as the long-distance/luxury way to travel.

Its a fairly clean line that in general has little overlap, but might for areas like Toronto to Niagara, Toronto - Stratford, and Toronto - Picton/Prince Edward County.

I think in those cases, overlapping services with different price points is a reasonable outcome.

 

[reaperexpress]

Can't they borrow some busses from Niagara transit for GO shuttles?

They do. About half of the Green Line shuttle buses are borrowed from Niagara Falls Transit, even though the regular Green Line is normally operated by the Parks Commission.

Or since Metrolinx funds everything just have 3 superLO go buses on standby for those GO meets and drop them off at the closest stop to the falls.

3 double decker buses doesn't even start to come close to the amount of capacity they need. That's a total of 240 seats.

Assuming that the train's load drops by ~100 people in St Catharines, the trains would arrive in NF with around 1400 people on board.

~70 people brought bikes on board, so they can make their own way from the station
~300 people can cram into the 3 articulated Green Line shuttle buses
~100 people could cram into the two regularly-scheduled Green Line articulated buses (in addition to the passengers already on board)
~50? people may take other bus NFT bus routes from the terminal, heading to other parts of NF
So that's 530 people accounted for, and 870 people unaccounted for. Maybe a dozen people get picked up, some take a cab, and some walk away, but that's not going to make a serious dent in the deficit.

An additional 240 seats would certainly help though. Maybe they could run those GO buses non-stop to Table Rock Centre, while the articulated WeGo/NFT buses make the regular Green Line stops. As with the existing NFT shuttle buses, GO would need to collect WeGo fare, so maybe WeGo could provide someone to stand outside the GO bus door with a WeGo card reader.

 

[reaperexpress]

If we care about sustainable tourism, why on Earth would we price out people from the GO train and encourage them to drive their big, stupid SUVs to the falls??

THIS. If we don't make the cost of transit competitive with the marginal cost of driving, people are just going to drive. Even with the gas prices today, the marginal cost of driving will be less than the full GO Transit fare for 2 people. That's why the train was empty when it was $40 per person round trip.

Again, the affordability argument is a straw man in the context of the $10 weekend passes, because those passes do little to nothing to address affordability for most potential GO Transit trips.
A 260 km round trip to Niagara Falls on a $10 pass works out to $0.04/km. Meanwhile a 34 km round trip from Downsview Park works out to $0.29/km.
Or relative to the normal ticket price, a round trip from Downsview Park gets a 3% discount, while a trip to Niagara Falls gets a 72% discount.

Why is it that we are arbitrarily dumping money into getting high-occupancy vehicles off the QEW to Niagara, when for the same money we could divert far more single-occupancy vehicles elsewhere? Surely you'd get far more vehicles off the road by providing a (for example) 40% discount for all trips.

Claiming that the $10 round trip to Niagara is a worthwhile investment in transit affordability can only make sense if you assume that there is an unlimited amount of funding available for GO Transit's operations, which is not the case. There is a finite budget, and funds which are bankrolling day trips to Niagara are funds which are not providing discounts on trips within the GTA, or between other nearby cities. Those are also funds which are not being used to run additional service - something which is also known to attract people out of cars.

And besides, the baseline on GO is not $40 round trip, the baseline is $25 round trip including a WEGO day pass, which is what most passengers were paying prior to the $10 pass. A price of $12.25 each way already undercut all of the competing services and was already attracting very solid ridership on weekends.

Here are the cheapest round trip tickets I could find for next Saturday, on competing services:

Flixbus: $43

Megabus: $50

VIA Rail: $54

Rider Express: $60

To reiterate: my point is not that these are reasonable prices, the point is that the marginal number of riders attracted by reducing the GO round trip from $25 to $10 is definitely fewer than the number of riders which would be attracted by the spending the same amount of money on discounts elsewhere.

 

[crs1026]

Again, the affordability argument is a straw man in the context of the $10 weekend passes, because those passes do little to nothing to address affordability for most potential GO Transit trips.

I have no problem with a short-term loss leader - it gets people coming in the doors. Doesn’t have to be any particular product, although it often coincides with oversupply. It seems counterintuitive however to offer a loss leader where demand exceeds capacity. The capacity issues need to be sorted out anyways, on the premise that a fare calibrated to supply/demand will optimise at a full train - but creating a demand that can’t be satisfied is not sensible strategy.

In terms of ongoing fare structure, however, your point is right on…. as a for instance, the weakest point in the market data right now is the peak commuting, driven by the trend to work at home for at least a couple days a week.. Would a “$10 Mondays” return commuter fare bring some of that ridership back? Maybe, maybe not… but there’s nothing magical about Niagara. Once we have solid weekend 2WAD on all the GO routes, there should be a strategy to maximise use of that entire system.

As for affordability, that is a good discussion to have, but the discussion should address the whole fare structure - there are places that people need to go more, every day of the week.

- Paul

 

[Northern Light]

Again, the affordability argument is a straw man in the context of the $10 weekend passes, because those passes do little to nothing to address affordability for most potential GO Transit trips.
A 260 km round trip to Niagara Falls on a $10 pass works out to $0.04/km. Meanwhile a 34 km round trip from Downsview Park works out to $0.29/km.
Or relative to the normal ticket price, a round trip from Downsview Park gets a 3% discount, while a trip to Niagara Falls gets a 72% discount.

Why is it that we are arbitrarily dumping money into getting high-occupancy vehicles off the QEW to Niagara, when for the same money we could divert far more single-occupancy vehicles elsewhere? Surely you'd get far more vehicles off the road by providing a (for example) 40% discount for all trips.

Claiming that the $10 round trip to Niagara is a worthwhile investment in transit affordability can only make sense if you assume that there is an unlimited amount of funding available for GO Transit's operations, which is not the case. There is a finite budget, and funds which are bankrolling day trips to Niagara are funds which are not providing discounts on trips within the GTA, or between other nearby cities. Those are also funds which are not being used to run additional service - something which is also known to attract people out of cars.

And besides, the baseline on GO is not $40 round trip, the baseline is $25 round trip including a WEGO day pass, which is what most passengers were paying prior to the $10 pass. A price of $12.25 each way already undercut all of the competing services and was already attracting very solid ridership on weekends.

Here are the cheapest round trip tickets I could find for next Saturday, on competing services:

Flixbus: $43
View attachment 413248

Megabus: $50
View attachment 413247

VIA Rail: $54
View attachment 413246

Rider Express: $60
View attachment 413245


To reiterate: my point is not that these are reasonable prices, the point is that the marginal number of riders attracted by reducing the GO round trip from $25 to $10 is definitely fewer than the number of riders which would be attracted by the spending the same amount of money on discounts elsewhere.

While I'm happy to agree with all of the above; I think the fundamental argument being made was not the relative value of the Niagara discount as compared to other transit investments; but rather the principle that if transit uptake is high, (which one would hope for); the answer is more service to meet demand, rather than implementing measures which either drive (pun intended) that traffic into the car/onto the highway or results in no trip being taken at all.

 

[innsertnamehere]

I love how a transit trip made, no matter how superfluous like a recreational trip to Niagara, is considered sacred at all costs but a car trip eliminated through demand destruction is nothing but good news (yes, it's more complex than that, just pointing the perspective out).

The reality is most trips on the Niagara services are induced trips (i.e. didn't exist before the seasonal GO train and $10 pricing). I'm sure the GO Trian is helping keep traffic on the QEW down, but it's still a disaster out towards Niagara on weekends anyways.

The reality is if we lower demand on GO, most trips will disappear, not shift modes. The highway network is effectively at capacity already for Niagara trips. Most of those trips were created by the $10 policy, and most would disappear if you removed the $10 policy.

We can debate if that's worth it or not, but I'm of the opinion if there is no easy way to increase capacity on the network and the $10 trips aren't really even making GO money, why is GO subsidizing cheap recreational trips to Niagara? Increase pricing to bring crowding down and increase profitability. Perhaps a Niagara pass becomes $15 or something even just to drop demand a bit.