GO Transit: Service thread (including extensions)

[crs1026]

I'm also curious about dropping service to Etobicoke North, are they abandoning it entirely?

This one caught my eye also. It seems that the weekend schedule is a bit different than weekday - with westbounds departing Union at :51 on weekends instead of :34 and eastbounds arriving at Union at :36 instead of :28.

Eastbound, trains leave Malton on :08 arriving Weston at :17, Westbound depart Weston at :07 arriving Malton at :18

This puts the meets between eastbounds and westbounds right around Etobicoke North, and since there's only one platform, that doesn't work.

My speculation would be a) they want to use different trackage paths to provide work windows - possibly to enable quad tracking and/or connectivity to the Barrie line - and/or b) it saves a trainset (and crew) somehow.

We will have to wait and see if this changes later.

- Paul

 

[Metroscapes]

No, it goes to the University of Waterloo bus terminal. There’s also a stop at Victoria and Frederick in Kitchener, just east of Highway 85. I guess that’s why GO was testing route options, to see what could work with a 45-foot bus on a timetable: the UW/WLU connection was more important than the direct Downtown Kitchener service.

It's only a 12 minute local bus to downtown from Victoria and Frederick, but honestly I thought it'd be more efficient to have direct service to downtown Kitchener and make UW/Laurier students / visitors use the LRT (14 minutes).

 

[ShonTron]

It's only a 12 minute local bus to downtown from Victoria and Frederick, but honestly I thought it'd be more efficient to have direct service to downtown Kitchener and make UW/Laurier students / visitors use the LRT (14 minutes).

That makes sense, but there's still not full fare integration between GRT and GO, right? Only when travelling to/from a GO train? It'll be better (I hope) once the Kitchener Central station is finally constructed.

 

[Metroscapes]

That makes sense, but there's still not full fare integration between GRT and GO, right? Only when travelling to/from a GO train? It'll be better (I hope) once the Kitchener Central station is finally constructed.

No, which is always a sore point for me, as I have the (controversial) opinion that Presto (or open payment via Presto) should be imposed on all southern Ontario transit agencies. That said:

• There is limited integration for GO Train service
• This will work as it's ultimately a Monday to Friday, student-focused service for now
• When it's expanded to weekends, serious thought should be given to branching or shifting the route to serve a greater number of residents in Kitchener's booming core

 

[Sunnyside]

There's 'frequency' routes and there's 'coverage' routes. Based on the expected demographic for this route (students without cars) they, correctly, chose the 'coverage' option.

I agree that this was probably the right way to go about things. Imo, it is less about KW-Hamilton (even though that is what I am more interested in personally) than KW-Guelph and Hamilton-Guelph, two sorely needed links. I had heard that the time to run this bus was actually less than 2hrs, closer to 1:45, so they may be playing it safe with these numbers- time will tell. The 17 will still beat travelling to Square One and backtracking, of course; what an abhorrent 3-4 hour trip that is.

The other benefit of course with this change is that KW/Guelph residents now have access to the Lakeshore West line. While somewhat redundant with the 30's new weekend service, I would imagine riding to Aldershot and taking the train from there would be a preferable alternative for some to the existing weekend situation of travelling to Square One and choosing a slow bus to Union, or a bus to Line 2/LSW to get downtown from there. With the 30 in mind, I can see cases where you take the 17 simply because the Lakeshore has reliability on its side. Ditto for the bus itself; there is rarely grinding traffic on Highway 7 or 6.

 

[ShonTron]

No, which is always a sore point for me, as I have the (controversial) opinion that Presto (or open payment via Presto) should be imposed on all southern Ontario transit agencies. That said:

• There is limited integration for GO Train service
• This will work as it's ultimately a Monday to Friday, student-focused service for now
• When it's expanded to weekends, serious thought should be given to branching or shifting the route to serve a greater number of residents in Kitchener's booming core

Look what GO did to Route 25:

This really bothers me. If GO really wanted to speed up Route 25, they should have cut the Sportsworld and Aberfoyle stops, not the stops within Kitchener itself.

 

[anb]

Guessing they did that because they thought the Sportsworld stop could get riders to downtown Kitchener and more specific points via the ION. 30 will still serve these stops, and the new 17 route will have a new stop near the DT area, so they might’ve thought there was no point in having another route continue to do this. The Aberfoyle stop makes sense now especially with the new Hamilton connection. This helps Sportsworld and Cambridge riders more than it does with KW.

Anyways heres hoping that the new Waterloo-Hamilton route can get enough success to run on weekends. With that Aldershot connection, getting to Niagara would be a really nice attraction for KW and Guelph residents.

 

[Mr Finish Line]

The fact that the massive service cuts on Barrie and Stouffville were only announced with 2 weeks notice is shocking. This isn't a few trains here and there or a pandemic lockdown, it's a return to the 2018 days (on Stouffville at least) of rush hour only service. It's a cut of 20 train trips per weekday and 60 trips per weekend on Stouffville alone. And the only justification they give normal riders (not UT followers) is a vague "construction". This flies in the face of the bragging ML News does about carefully scheduling track work to minimize disruptions. I guess it's not a disruption if they just pull the service? Finally, for a timeline all we get is "temporarily". How are people suppose to plan their lives and trips? This is transparency and accountability at its worst. Despite the politics of ML with various projects, they've given me reason to remain hopeful because of the tangible benefits that have gradually come to me on the Stouffville line. This is a gut punch and vindicates all the hatred towards ML.

 

[ShonTron]

Guessing they did that because they thought the Sportsworld stop could get riders to downtown Kitchener and more specific points via the ION. 30 will still serve these stops, and the new 17 route will have a new stop near the DT area, so they might’ve thought there was no point in having another route continue to do this. The Aberfoyle stop makes sense now especially with the new Hamilton connection. This helps Sportsworld and Cambridge riders more than it does with KW.

Anyways heres hoping that the new Waterloo-Hamilton route can get enough success to run on weekends. With that Aldershot connection, getting to Niagara would be a really nice attraction for KW and Guelph residents.

The Cambridge stop also has a connection to the 302 Ion bus, so there's no need for both Sportsworld and Eagle/Hespeler.

 

[DatTranzitGuy]

I’m a little bit disappointed that they are discontinuing the 81 Beaverton-Port Perry-Whitby bus but at the same time it does see low ridership

 

[Garuda]

So happy to see weekend service. It’s not all the way but does the job and beats the 3 hour milk run that is bus 31

The new bus to Hamilton / Waterloo is great to see. I advocated for this at meetings and I’m so happy to finally see it come to fruition

 

[TTCdinosaur]

The fact that the massive service cuts on Barrie and Stouffville were only announced with 2 weeks notice is shocking. This isn't a few trains here and there or a pandemic lockdown, it's a return to the 2018 days (on Stouffville at least) of rush hour only service. It's a cut of 20 train trips per weekday and 60 trips per weekend on Stouffville alone. And the only justification they give normal riders (not UT followers) is a vague "construction". This flies in the face of the bragging ML News does about carefully scheduling track work to minimize disruptions. I guess it's not a disruption if they just pull the service? Finally, for a timeline all we get is "temporarily". How are people suppose to plan their lives and trips? This is transparency and accountability at its worst. Despite the politics of ML with various projects, they've given me reason to remain hopeful because of the tangible benefits that have gradually come to me on the Stouffville line. This is a gut punch and vindicates all the hatred towards ML.

Every here is aligned on the short term pain long term gain narrative.

You know like most normal folks, that we have no time to wait for transit wonks to make life easier.

 

[anb]

The more I think about it, the more its like they were like "hey we're going to cut huge chunks of train service on Barrie and Stouffville, but here's a list of massive changes we'll make to other parts of the region that has nothing to do with the area that will severely affect you to compensate for this circumstance". Its still nice to see these changes be mostly positive, even if its mostly on the west end of the GTA that will see a bigger benefit to all this however. But then we have to be reminded that this is Metrolinx and with every win they have, there most always has to be a compromise.

 

[Bordercollie]

Relocation of Oriole GO Station Offers New Connections at The Residences at Central Park | UrbanToronto

Delivering a project that enjoys convenient connections to the rest of the City was paramount to Amexon's approach developing The Residences at Central Park community. With the planned relocation of Oriole GO Station, the community will benefit further from the existing transit infrastructure.

urbantoronto.ca

So will they need to widen the bridge? The bridge is built for two tracks and if they build the platform on the current ROW there will be no space for a second track.

 

[Northern Light]

The more I think about it, the more its like they were like "hey we're going to cut huge chunks of train service on Barrie and Stouffville, but here's a list of massive changes we'll make to other parts of the region that has nothing to do with the area that will severely affect you to compensate for this circumstance". Its still nice to see these changes be mostly positive, even if its mostly on the west end of the GTA that will see a bigger benefit to all this however. But then we have to be reminded that this is Metrolinx and with every win they have, there most always has to be a compromise.

My first thought on the reductions is that if these were to happen in order to advance construction speed on improvements, they ought to have been done at the height of the pandemic for six weeks or w/e and then finished (at least to the point of permitting substantial improvements in service thereafter.

***

My second thought if that if these reductions are to serve advancing construction Metrolinx ought to be explicit about that and identify:

1) What improvement will be achieved as a result of this inconvenience?

2) When will that improvement begin?

3) They really ought to keep that inconvenience as short as possible and again be clear on exactly why its needed (ie. to achieve 'x' km of new track, or a new tie-in or 2 new signal gantries or new platform at 'y' station etc.

Delivering the reductions in the way that they have seems like a sloppy after thought that disregards the difficulty they are imposing on many riders.