Do you mean Snider (Newmarket Line) or Hagerman (Stouffville Line)? I'm pretty sure Hagerman (on the Stouffville Line, also passing under 14th Avenue, is only a single-track wide underpass, even though Stouffville has amazing potential, more so than the other York Region GO lines.
Stouffville may have great potential due to the population base along the line, but the rail corridor itself my prohibit it from reaching its full potential. It has a maximum speed of 50mph and much slower in many areas due to the degree of curvature and numerous level crossings.
This better not end up like the Sniderman diamond where they only left enough space for one track.
As has been mentioned this is indeed not the case at all. Both Sinder (bridge structure) & Hagerman (tunnel) have space for 2 tracks.
I have heard it said that there is no signalling on this line north of Aurora. If this is true, does signalling need to be installed to have bidirectional traffic?
The information that I have shows that north of CN CONCORD (Mile 15.5) the tracks is under Occupancy Control System rules. This means that trains have to call in and receive verbal clearance to proceed. In theory it doesn't need to be upgraded if all trains are always on time, but reality is very different.
It definitely
should not happen.
Its not practical to run a proper all-day service with OCS only.
If GO wants to run a single train back and forth on the line then there is no conflict in OCS. This is what they do now mid-day on the Weston sub. But that service only extends to Bramalea and the distance is half as long (17 miles) as East Gwillimbury (35.5 miles) or Bradford (41.5) and the Weston service is lightly used because it is very limited leaving Bramalea once every hour and a half.
Having one train run on the Barrie line all day to East Gwillimbury or Bradford wouldn’t even be worthwhile to run. It takes a train about an hour & 10 mins to travel from Bradford to Union then add at least 10 minutes at each end for the train to change ends and do the required brake tests. Basically it would take a train almost an hour & a half to travel each way. That means a the train would leave Bradford once every 3 hours!!
But GO may just go ahead and do this to start because there are no addition costs for the start up.
To run an hourly service, the minimum to be worthwhile, you’d need 3 trains on the line at the same time. This would create a meeting point every 20 minutes between these trains and that’s were problems with the OCS system comes into play. Obviously to start ‘passing tracks’ would need to be built in several location as the line is currently single track in its entirety (there is a ‘service track’ for the York University station, this could be used as a meeting point) In OCS there are no signals and thereby there are no electronically/remotely control switches. Meaning every time trains are to met, one train has to come to a complete stop. A crew member has to get off and ‘line a switch’ by hand. Then the train can go into the passing track/siding, usually at a very slow speed (15mph) and then come to the other end of the track and then wait for train traveling in the opposite direction to pass by. That process alone can ‘waste’ 10 minutes.
If there is just one single delay for either train it compounds the problem. If the train that’s going into the siding is delayed, the train that uses the main line has to slow down and come to a stop and wait until the train has entered into the siding. If the main line train is delayed, the train that’s in the siding has to wait until that train has passed them before they can come out. Once the mainline trains has passed then a crew member from the siding train has to line the switch again for there train to come out at a slow speed. This whole process, while working fine with freight trains, is a huge waste of efficiency in terms of time & energy for a passenger train working on a precise schedule.
2 track OCS would never be allow for high-speed GO trains because if a switch connecting the 2 tracks was every turned the wrong way it could lead to a huge disaster, worse than anything Canada’s ever seen. The signal system (CTC) is fail-safe and will not permit this to happen or allow a train into a block (area) where another train is present.
As mentioned OCS on this line begins at Concord which is located exactly at Langstaff rd. in Vaughan.
The line needs to be upgraded to CTC (Centralized Traffic Control system – signaled track) if they want to run frequent all-day two way traffic.
I ride the Stouffville GO daily and can confirm that the Hagerman underpass is designed for two-track operations. In fact they have already begun bringing in material to lay down the second (passing) track from Denison Rd. north to Unionville Station.
Same thing applies on the Uxbridge sub, except that in this case the entire line is OCS. I can’t believe that they’d even consider putting just a passing track there in OCS. They should double-track the line and install CTC – the signal system. But it looks like their going the inefficient route, just because of the costs…
Btw, I run GO trains for a living and I’ve run a train on all the aforementioned lines.
I dislike stopping at Unionville station, its such a ridiculous grade to build a station on. They should have re-graded the track in that area. First you go down into the tunnel at a 2% grade, then you go back up to the 407 underpass at a 2% grade, only to go back down into Unionville at another 2% grade.
I hope that this grade separation results in a depressed Barrie line instead of an enormous bridge.
If you suggest a depressed corridor under Dupont in the Davenport Grade Separation project they will probably draw a whacked out proposal where the rail corridor passes under the existing Dupont underpass which is obviously prohibitively expensive being so deep underground.
I’d have to assume that the Newmarket sub (Barrie line) will pass over the CP North Toronto sub for this grade separation simply because there’s already a downgrade greater than 1.0% approaching the Davenport Diamond from the north. South of the diamond the downgrade is a little more than half as much. Then again the powers that be might want to have Dupont St. pass over the tracks and not under, in that case the Newmarket sub would go under the CP line. The Dupont St. underpass would be removed and made level, making for a much friendlier streetscape. The same thing should have been done just south of the West Toronto Jct.
Raise Dupont and make it level and have the Weston sub pass under it. As it is planed trains going north on the Weston sub will have to go uphill, pass over Dupont, then go downhill and pass under the CP North Toronto sub and then go uphill
again to pass over St. Clair. Instead of being on level ground while passing under Dupont & the CP tracks and then going uphill to pass over St. Clair. But again, cost is an issue.
that's a pretty tight area to work within. it will be surprising to see what kind of solution they will come up with to create the flying junction.
The large building south-east of the Davenport diamond has just recently been demolished. Not sure though if it has anything to do with this project, but i'd would give them some space to play with.
