Toronto Union Pearson Express | ?m | ?s | Metrolinx | MMM Group Limited

nfitz said:
I'm there at least 15 times to 20 times a year, for over 15 years. Including when there's been 40,000 there (in the 2016 playoffs).

TTC service is normally excellent - I'm not sure what went wrong - but I do try and avoid the Dufferin bus because it's so crap. And if I do take it, I'm certainly using the app to make sure there's one coming. If there's a 45-minute just pay the extra 40¢ and take the GO train to the subway.

The Ossington bus has never failed me, even during the G20 rioting - though if there is none coming I'd keep walking up Atlantic to King and catch the 504. The GO train is fantastic, now it runs more than once an hour. Every 15-minutes for Saturday games, and they often toss in an extra on weeknights when the frequency is only 30 minutes.

And even though the crowd for the streetcar can look big, the worst I've had is not getting on the one that was already stopped to load before I got there (and that was with the short CLRV cars). Another one is there quick, and they usually have extras sitting at Exhibition loop for the crowds. I just take a 509 or 510, whichever one looks less busy (usually the 510 to Bathurst station).

I've driven once to a TFC game. Driving there wasn't too bad. But I parked in the lot on the north side of the tracks, in Liberty Village. Trying to come home was a nightmare, heading east. (In retrospect I should probably have headed down Dufferin, and crawled onto the Gardiner). It took an extra 45-minutes to get home. Never again! I doubt it's improved since they built all those condos along Liberty Street.

I was at one game this season where my brother who lives nearby chose to drive, while I took the GO train. I got on the train about 5 minutes before he pulled out. I was up in the stands for a good half-hour before he appeared - parking seems more of a challenge with both Ontario Place lots closed. (before he had kids, he used to cycle ... and yes, that was faster).
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I hear ya, I was a season ticket holder at TFC for over 10 years (Usector, what!). I've driven, walked, cycled (bit far and uphill home and only if I went myself) and transited it down there many many times. Man, it took me less time to get home from the first MLS cup final (2016) in my car, just wound my way home through Dundas to Roncesville and then Bloor, once you escape the vicinity of King and Dufferin you're clear so I don't mind walking a bit further and park further away ( would almost never go south of King Street). I would/could take the Go train, if I could guarantee a parking spot at Long Branch or Mimico but using transit and then no beers:eek:. The Dufferin bus is a pain from Bloor, even worse than before they did the underpass at Queen. I find it restrictive and under prioritized but always very very busy. Been stuck there going to EX as well. Maybe the proposed priority lanes will help.

I'd go around on the subway but I'm all the way to Islington or Kipling. Given this thread, maybe the Go Train to the UP to the Subway!! Again, fare integration?

I do use the transit app all the time, there was no real time data happening or we would have just walked to Bloor to be honest, I'm not really averse to walking at all. Not sure what happened but nothing was done about it. They could have turned some of the south bound busses at Queen but even they were sparse. The locals I was chatting with were not happy with the service either. We had just missed the bus at the Loop so we walked north to avoid waiting with the crowds. I could take the King streetcar, but I've been dumped off at the corner of King and Roncesvilles at 11pm with two small kids as well, we ended up in a Taxi from there that time and that junction has horrendous traffic for the streetcar. Frankly our system is so disjointed it's not funny, why can't there be a GO/UP station at King and Dufferin or thereabouts. Would help tremendously, I might, might take the subway all the way once Line 3 is done, but that's a long way out the way for something that just ain't far from me. With my kids only a few years left of high school, then I can change my lifestyle for the better!!

I was all in for SmartTrack when I voted for it. Lol.
 
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grammin said:
...Frankly our system is so disjointed it's not funny, why can't there be a GO/UP station at King and Dufferin or thereabouts. Would help tremendously, ...
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Typical GTA shortsightedness. "Why put a GO station there when there's already one about 1 Km away". Well because they are on two different lines, and sure when you are heading to the DT core it makes no difference but when heading out to the 'burbs they don't.
 
grammin said:
"why can't there be a GO/UP station at King and Dufferin or thereabouts"
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There kinda sorta was one, albeit temporary, in 1979:
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Source.

That was an old, repurposed former Grand Trunk/GO station and I think you can still see the staircases there.
 
ShonTron said:
I wrote more about UP Express’ changing role, and what needs to be done. If only we had clear plans and public transparency at Metrolinx and Queen’s Park.

Right now, UP Express looks to be the unholy spawn of SmartTrack.

seanmarshall.ca

The revenge of SmartTrack

Metrolinx is looking to serve new Kitchener Line SmartTrack stations with its UP Express trains only. It’s only fair that the transit agency comes clean to transit riders on how it will make …
seanmarshall.ca seanmarshall.ca
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When I look back to the original Big Move, the whole Blue 22 initiative, and the Georgetown South project - it's amazing to me just how little appreciation there was in those days of the need for intensive regional and commuter transit all along the Kitchener Corridor. The train frequencies in the GS EA don't come close to what RER, er, GO Expansion later added to the plan. It took the Weston debate about "Dalton's Dirty Diesels" to bring focus to the likelihood of GO expansion - it has turned out that Weston residents' fears of frequent GO trains were closer to the future state than what the planners were proposing.

There was a huge strategic error in focussing on serving Pearson as an expensive, exclusive, high performance high priority investment ahead of designing the Kitchener line for the benefit of a larger population. The Pearson focus was all about bolstering the case for the 2015 Pan Am games. If one considers the evolution of the GTA over the last ten years, I'm not sure the Pan Am games were much of an economic stimulus, nor did they move the needle in Ontario's GDP..... whereas the costs incurred by having inadequate public transport in that corridor were and continue to be enormous. It was a case of politicians fixating on bragging rights and ignoring fundamental priorities. And then misapplying the premise of public-private collaboration.... the only way a privatised Pearson link made sense was to charge an enormous fare supported primarily by the business travel market. The whole thing had to be walked back - first, by transitioning to a public investment, then by reducing the fare to "commuter' level and accepting the mission of carrying non-airport passengers. Building for intensive GO service should have been the higher priority all along.

Tory's Smarttrack was technically absurd, but funadmentally astute in promoting better use of GO as a local, as well as a regional, infrastructure. ML did absorb some of the premises and some local focus has evolved, ie Caledonia, Lansdowne, St Clair, Woodbine....but finding the viable technical compromise, and the money, has sure taken a long time.

Park Lawn? Liberty? Finch ? Downsview Park?

Anyways, with respect to UP, I have no problem with it morphing into just another GO line.... the real bogeyman is the concept of a Bramalea terminal, which serves Halton/Peel really poorly. That decision was all about CN not allowing wires on its segment of the GO route. Let's hope that obstacle has been removed by the announced deal, and a good regional service to Halton, Peel, Guelph, and KW is built along with whatever emerges within the City proper.

- Paul
 
taylortbb said:
Whether Metrolinx can competently execute this, or truly understands the MVP process, is of course another question entirely. But I don't think it's an inherently terrible idea.
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It's an entirely reasonable concept in the right environment. To some extent, we have always futureproofed rail infrastructure investment, the most obvious example being building multi-track bridges decades ahead of actually needing the added trackage.

For ML and Onxpress, however, the question is not so much bringing a product to market and then incrementally improving it. It;s a question between the tradeoff of having an end design in hand, and building to the full design today, versus building something less and then having to revisit the project - two procurements instead of one, managing the temptation to change scope or design, two mobilizations, and executing the second phase alongside an operating first phase.

Certainly ML is wise to plan projects in phases, and cash flow likely demands this happen - but fundamentally I'm on the side of measure twice but cut once. Especially when the political level is already declaring victory over the phases that are nowhere close to execution.

- Paul
 
crs1026 said:
If one considers the evolution of the GTA over the last ten years, I'm not sure the Pan Am games were much of an economic stimulus, nor did they move the needle in Ontario's GDP..... whereas the costs incurred by having inadequate public transport in that corridor were and continue to be enormous.
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The 2015 Pan Am games were all about being a rehearsal and resume fodder for the 2024/2028 Olympic bids - which Toronto bailed on.
 
UP Express service will be replaced by GO buses on Nov. 8 and 9 due to construction. Estimated travel time is between 30 and 50 minutes. There will be no UP service at Bloor and Weston stations.

Service changes begin late Friday evening Nov. 7.
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From https://www.upexpress.com/en/service-alerts

If there was a 901 Airport-Eglinton Express bus however...
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But now yet.
 
blaixx said:
The new UP Express schedule is showing up in Google Maps if you set the date to next week. From Mount Dennis it's 15 minutes to Pearson and 13 minutes to Union. The end-to-end trip is now scheduled as 28 minutes.
View attachment 694348
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Ouch. 25 minutes to 28 minutes. So get rid of all the stops and it would be Blue 19!
 
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