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GO Transit: Service thread (including extensions)

crs1026 said:
I don't dispute that ML has a staffing challenge generally, but.... I'm a bit hard nosed on this topic.

As the role of transit grows, we will have to see a different employment bargain that exchanges (whatever) for an expanded requirement to work holiday shifts, or any other time when the public needs peak service.

I'm quite familiar with the realities of what workers do to improve their lot....and I get some interesting input from people who hold union rep roles about what today's workers will and won't accept.... sounds like there is a generational shift .... but at the end of the day, if the employer needs staff for more trains on New Years, the employment bargain should enable that (with appropriate consideration in the other direction, I would stress).

- Paul
Click to expand...
I gather aircraft crew members were paid triple-time to work on NYE at small airlines.
 
Interesting comment on Twitter. Maybe GO should invest in an RDC pair to get train crews across town as required?
1704226440415.png
 
Maybe this is the push needed for GO to introduce more frequent services all cross the board for this year, and for TTC to create a better and efficient crowd control plan.

For next year, a thing that could've been done differently is to try to divert people throughout the 2 concourses depending on the platform of the train instead of making both concourses available. For example if LSW was on Platform 8/9 and Kitchener was on 10/11, make York concourse handle the former only, while Bay handles the latter. Letting people know ahead of time through updates like days before the new year would be nice so the detour wouldn't come as a shock or confusion and people would know where to go.

They should close streets and give them to pedestrians/transit only. Maybe closing Lake Shore to them only would help a lot and GO buses can get in and out of the city efficiently. If they can close Lake Shore for summer weekends, they can definitely do it for New Years as well.

As for the TTC, they should either only run 1 side of Line 1 at Union while detouring riders for the other side, or completely detour both sides to St Andrew/King so we have a better flow despite the short walk, but it is a massively better idea than what had actually happened.

But another thing that should happen are the improvements to the overall public transit itself that should be the focus of this entire year.

GO finally introducing more frequent all day service to Bramalea and Unionville while bringing back 15 min service to Oakville will be a nice start, and making new express trips on these lines a little before peak times could help a lot more.

UPX should run at least until 2AM to match with the subway, and for events it should aim to run at a 10 min headway if the Kitchener line can't do 15 min Bramalea service just yet.

Aside from the mentioned TTC idea above which they could also do during events, aiming to get Eglinton and Finch open for sure this year should be the plan. Although both are far from downtown, they both can help in different cases in other parts of the city that needs relief badly.

That's just my take on the situation. Not sure if its the best plan, but there needs to be change as this might be the tipping point. 2023 for transit in the GTA as a whole had routes and lines at the highest capacity they've ever been and at times it made travelling completely insufferable, so for it to end like this was unfortunately extremely fitting but it obviously shouldn't be like this at all. Let 2024 be the redemption year as we know ourselves that there's so much potential for Toronto to change into a potential transit city.
 
anb said:
Maybe this is the push needed for GO to introduce more frequent services all cross the board for this year, and for TTC to create a better and efficient crowd control plan.

For next year, a thing that could've been done differently is to try to divert people throughout the 2 concourses depending on the platform of the train instead of making both concourses available. For example if LSW was on Platform 8/9 and Kitchener was on 10/11, make York concourse handle the former only, while Bay handles the latter. Letting people know ahead of time through updates like days before the new year would be nice so the detour wouldn't come as a shock or confusion and people would know where to go.

They should close streets and give them to pedestrians/transit only. Maybe closing Lake Shore to them only would help a lot and GO buses can get in and out of the city efficiently. If they can close Lake Shore for summer weekends, they can definitely do it for New Years as well.

As for the TTC, they should either only run 1 side of Line 1 at Union while detouring riders for the other side, or completely detour both sides to St Andrew/King so we have a better flow despite the short walk, but it is a massively better idea than what had actually happened.

But another thing that should happen are the improvements to the overall public transit itself that should be the focus of this entire year.

GO finally introducing more frequent all day service to Bramalea and Unionville while bringing back 15 min service to Oakville will be a nice start, and making new express trips on these lines a little before peak times could help a lot more.

UPX should run at least until 2AM to match with the subway, and for events it should aim to run at a 10 min headway if the Kitchener line can't do 15 min Bramalea service just yet.

Aside from the mentioned TTC idea above which they could also do during events, aiming to get Eglinton and Finch open for sure this year should be the plan. Although both are far from downtown, they both can help in different cases in other parts of the city that needs relief badly.

That's just my take on the situation. Not sure if its the best plan, but there needs to be change as this might be the tipping point. 2023 for transit in the GTA as a whole had routes and lines at the highest capacity they've ever been and at times it made travelling completely insufferable, so for it to end like this was unfortunately extremely fitting but it obviously shouldn't be like this at all. Let 2024 be the redemption year as we know ourselves that there's so much potential for Toronto to change into a potential transit city.
Click to expand...
While I’m generally supportive of more pedestrian areas, closing Lakeshore to traffic on new years when the Gardiner was already slammed with traffic strikes me as insane.
 
Dan416 said:
They only had 2 outbound Milton trains, which seems really sparse. I’m sure that didn’t help.
Click to expand...
Were you on any of those 2 trains going in or out???

I was on the first one both way and a huge different in ridership both way. Very few on the one going on, but full load leaving and no clue on the 2nd one..

The QQ was to be closed between X-X, but it wasn't adding to traffic issue.

Lake Shore is a gridlock at peak time without pedestrian flow not like New Year Eve 10'000's of pedestrian using Bay and Yonge St. The only way onto the Gardiner going west is at Jarvis and York St well Going east is at Spadina and Bay.

Bay was the worse compared to Yonge that it goes back to my 2008 recommendation that it be close permanently from QQ to Queen as a pedestrian transit mall

Police hard a hard time trying to stop the flow of the crowd crossing the intersections that they gave up.
Yonge & Lake Shore
53438816265_d705aed8f3_b.jpg

53438816285_57cf675472_b.jpg

53438815965_44e845bccd_b.jpg
 
drum118 said:
Were you on any of those 2 trains going in or out???

I was on the first one both way and a huge different in ridership both way. Very few on the one going on, but full load leaving and no clue on the 2nd one..

The QQ was to be closed between X-X, but it wasn't adding to traffic issue.

Lake Shore is a gridlock at peak time without pedestrian flow not like New Year Eve 10'000's of pedestrian using Bay and Yonge St. The only way onto the Gardiner going west is at Jarvis and York St well Going east is at Spadina and Bay.

Bay was the worse compared to Yonge that it goes back to my 2008 recommendation that it be close permanently from QQ to Queen as a pedestrian transit mall

Police hard a hard time trying to stop the flow of the crowd crossing the intersections that they gave up.
Yonge & Lake Shore
Click to expand...

I was not, but I take the Milton train frequently and it's pretty full on a normal day, especially when there's big gaps, like 30 minutes between the 5:25 and the 5:55 trains.
 
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