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VIA Rail

Urban Sky said:
OC Transpo's insistence on referring to the service operator rather than identifying the function of the destination served (i.e. "rail station") is repeating the same mistake Metrolinx did when putting up the signage for their UP Express: tourists (i.e. the type of transit systems the least familiar with the names and logo of local/national transport operators) don't look out for and recognize brand names like "UP” (or “UP Express"), "VIA" (or "VIA Rail"), "TTC", "STM", "OC Transpo" or "O-Train" since they generally don't know them. Metrolinx learnt this the hard way and had to add signs with "Trains to the Airport" and "Trains to Downtown" next to their cherished and supposedly self-explanatory UP logo as that was what tourists were actually looking for. Confusing wayfinding with branding (or just being stubbornly ignorant like OC Transpo) is the best way to have tourists take the taxi instead and to mention back home how awfully confusing transit is when asked by their families and friends how they liked the cities and places they've visited. So call your damn transit station at the rail station just that: "Rail Station" and make sure that the railway lines are actually visible in your damn map!
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Wow! It really sounds like we have poked the bear. :oops:

Urban Sky said:
As a side note, I always thought that Ottawa's name was also "Union Station", which is also how the European Rail Timetable calls it (see below), but it seems like "Union Station" was only the name of the old station in what is now the Government Convention Center:
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Source: European Rail Timetable, Summer 2016 Edition
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I am surprised as a VIA Rail employee you don't even know the name of your companies train stations. Even according to VIA's website, it refers to it as "Ottawa train station" yet Toronto's station is "Toronto Union Station" and Montreal's is the rather wordy "Montréal Central Station train station." As you pointed out Ottawa's Union Station is the former train station on Rideau Street which is now being used as the temporary Senate of Canada Building (it was the Government Conference Centre before the Senate moved in during restorations of Centre Block.

I probably shouldn't be surprised that a European Rail Timetable is over 50 years out of date when it comes to Canadian station names. They probably still have the address as 2 Rideau Street. ;) It is interesting that they make a better schedule for the TOM corridor than VIA rail does though. They put both the Montreal-Toronto and Ottawa-Toronto on a single page, where as VIA puts them on separate pages, requiring you to flip between two schedules when looking for a train along the lakeshore.
 
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roger1818 said:
Wow! It really sounds like we have poked the bear. :oops:
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My apologies for my continued rants, but the main problem of transit networks in North America is that it’s only made with the needs of frequent users (esp. Commuters) in mind. I had to take a taxi in New York City because I wasn’t able to pay the cash fare of $3.25 in coins (i.e. the only form of payment they accepted), as they apparently expect infrequent passengers (i.e. those without a Metropass in their wallet) to make sure to have no less than thirteen $0.25 coins on them before boarding a bus).

As I noted before, wayfinding at Union Station used to be so disastrous that you couldn’t walk around for one minute in a high-visibility vest without getting asked for directions, but I have to concede that signage has improved in recent years (with UP being described as “Trains to the Airport” and TTC as “Subway”). Unfortunately, this can’t be said about Gare Centrale, where you have to spot the tiny “METRO” symbol in the corner next to the “Bureau En Gros” (Staples) and then follow a ridiculously long and convoluted path underground before reaching “Bonaventure” (Metro) station. In the opposite direction, the correct way to Gare Centrale is just as difficult to find: I was once supposed to meet my mother (visiting from Germany) after work to catch train #37 to Ottawa and I texted her since I couldn’t find her less than 10 minutes prior to departure and she texted back “I am at platform 17, but this doesn’t look like a rail station”. I could only identify where she was because she mentioned an indoor hockey rink (which meant she was at the AMT’s “Terminus Centre-Ville” bus terminal in 1000 de la Gauchetière, i.e. diagonally across Gare Centrale).

All this to say that wayfinding in Canada (and elsewhere in North America) is far too often a frustrating struggle for many non-locals and I invite everyone to visit Japan, where I did not even once found myself on the wrong platform or in the wrong train, as everything is so clearly indicated...

I am surprised as a VIA Rail employee you don't even know the name of your companies train stations. Even according to VIA's website, it refers to it as "Ottawa train station" yet Toronto's station is "Toronto Union Station" and Montreal's is the rather wordy "Montréal Central Station train station." As you pointed out Ottawa's Union Station is the former train station on Rideau Street which is now being used as the temporary Senate of Canada Building (it was the Government Conference Centre before the Senate moved in during restorations of Centre Block.
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For the records: I did of course notice that the name “Union Station” was neither used by VIA nor anyone else, but the incorrect reference mislead me into thinking that it was still somehow the name of the “new” station...

I probably shouldn't be surprised that a European Rail Timetable is over 50 years out of date when it comes to Canadian station names. They probably still have the address as 2 Rideau Street. ;)
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As you can read on Wikipedia, the “European Rail Timetable” (formerly known as “Thomas Cook European Timetable) is highly respected as the definitive planning guide for individual rail travellers. It used to have a sister publication, the “Beyond Europe” timetable, but that section was reintegrated a few years ago (also note that they have the correct mileage between Montreal and Ottawa: 187 km from Gare Centrale via Coteau and Alexandria to the current station on Tremblay Road):

The European Rail Timetable, more commonly known by its former names, the Thomas Cook European Timetable, the Thomas Cook Continental Timetable or simply Cook's Timetable, is an international timetable of selected passenger rail schedules for every country in Europe, along with a small amount of such content from areas outside Europe. It also includes regularly scheduled passenger shipping services and a few Coachservices on routes where rail services are not operated. Except during World War II and a six-month period in 2013–14, it has been in continuous publication since 1873. Until 2013 it was published by Thomas Cook Publishing,[1]in the United Kingdom, and since 1883 has been issued monthly.[2]

[...]


Although minor changes to the publication's title have been made over the years, every version included "Continental", rather than "European", from 1873 through 1987 — except for a brief period (1977–1980) when the coverage was expanded to worldwide and the name became the Thomas Cook International Timetable. From 1981, most non-European content was moved into a new publication named the Thomas Cook Overseas Timetable. "Rail" was added to the title only relatively recently, in 2005, making it the Thomas Cook European Rail Timetable, but its coverage continued to include some non-rail content, such as passenger shipping and ferrytimetables. The Timetable has been recommended by several editors of travel guide books for Europe, one of whom described it as "the most revered and accurate railway reference in existence".[4]

In 2013, Thomas Cook discontinued publication of the Timetable, in accordance with a decision to close the company's publishing business altogether, and the final Thomas Cook edition was published in August 2013, ending a 140-year run.[5][6] However, within a few months a new company was formed to take over publication of the Timetable, having secured permission and legal rights from Thomas Cook Group to do so.[1] The new, independent company was named European Rail Timetable Limited.[6] The first issue compiled by the new company was published in March 2014,[7] with the publication title now being European Rail Timetable, no longer including "Thomas Cook" in the name.[8]
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roger1818 said:
It is interesting that they make a better schedule for the TOM corridor than VIA rail does though.

They put both the Montreal-Toronto and Ottawa-Toronto on a single page, where as VIA puts them on separate pages, requiring you to flip between two schedules when looking for a train along the lakeshore.
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You are not the first person to lament this and I agree. There have been VIA timetables before (e.g. in the 1980s), which had the Toronto-Ottawa/Montreal services organized by direction rather than route (same for Toronto-London-Windsor/Sarnia)...
 
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Urban Sky said:
As I noted before, wayfinding at Union Station used to be so disastrous that you couldn’t walk around for one minute in a high-visibility vest without getting asked for directions, but I have to concede that signage has improved in recent years (with UP being described as “Trains to the Airport” and TTC as “Subway”). Unfortunately, this can’t be said about Gare Centrale, where you have to spot the tiny “METRO” symbol in the corner next to the “Bureau En Gros” (Staples) and then follow a ridiculously long and convoluted path underground before reaching “Bonaventure” (Metro) station. In the opposite direction, the correct way to Gare Centrale is just as difficult to find: I was once supposed to meet my mother (visiting from Germany) after work to catch train #37 to Ottawa and I texted her since I couldn’t find her less than 10 minutes prior to departure and she texted back “I am at platform 17, but this doesn’t look like a rail station”. I could only identify where she was because she mentioned an indoor hockey rink (which meant she was at the AMT’s “Terminus Centre-Ville” bus terminal in 1000 de la Gauchetière (i.e. diagonally across Gare Centrale).
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Which is interesting because Montreal and now Ottawa have very clear and specific logos for their metro systems. Toronto, by contrast, has no specific metro symbol, instead using the TTC corporate logo. Montreal and Ottawa should in theory be easier to navigate but I guess they fall into the trap of navigating by agency rather than mode.
 
roger1818 said:
Wow! It really sounds like we have poked the bear. :oops:

I am surprised as a VIA Rail employee you don't even know the name of your companies train stations. [...]
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These comments seem excessively harsh. @Urban Sky has stated previously that he's not born/raised in Canada, which means he has had less time to acquire miscellaneous station names by osmosis. But in any case, he has on countless occasions provided valuable in-depth (but not confidential) knowledge of the VIA Rail system. I for one am not in the slightest bit concerned that he doesn't know absolutely everything. If anything it's a good sign that he is willing to openly discuss what he didn't know.
 
micheal_can said:
As long as he does not have to discuss adding new service elsewhere. You would figure a worker at a passenger rail company would like to see growth in ridership.
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Nevertheless, to anyone who wonders why I would not want to see growth in ridership: VIA's train mileage has actually increased by 12.5% since 2014, its ridership by 31.8% and its revenues by 46.7% and I couldn't be prouder to have been part of this period of substantial growth since I joined VIA in July 2015:

1602436750471.png


The only trick which allows him to avoid acknowledging this substantial turn-around from decade-long decline (exacerbated by occasional cuts imposed - directly or indirectly - by the federal government) is that he deliberately ignores everything which is east of Sudbury. Therefore, if anyone feels tempted to engage in this discussion with him, I would appreciate if you could create a separate thread, as I don't want to see also this thread being drowned by the same endless discussions revolving around his one sole topic of interest (which is certainly beyond the scope of anything which should be discussed in a forum called "Urban Toronto") as what happened with the "VIA Rail" thread he created on Skyscraper Page...

Thank you very much and Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!
 
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reaperexpress said:
These comments seem excessively harsh. @Urban Sky has stated previously that he's not born/raised in Canada, which means he has had less time to acquire miscellaneous station names by osmosis.
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You are right and I apologize to @Urban Sky. I was feeling frustrated at the time and lashed out, but that’s no excuse. I hope he knows that I appreciate his presence on here and on skyscraper pages.

Urban Sky said:
There is little point to bother replying to a sad coward who has blocked me (here and on Skyscraper Page, where he posts as "swimmer_spe")
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Ahh. That explains a lot! ;)
 
roger1818 said:
You are right and I apologize to @Urban Sky. I was feeling frustrated at the time and lashed out, but that’s no excuse. I hope he knows that I appreciate his presence on here and on skyscraper pages.
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No worries, it could hardly be clearer that you value my contributions here and on SSP and trust me, I have been compelled into backtracking from overly harsh comments with quite a few people here and it hasn't negatively affected our mutual appreciation for each other's posts! :)


Ahh. That explains a lot! ;)
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Yes, it almost makes me feel a bit bad for him that we "broke" his thread on SSP by outsourcing all discussions related to the Quebec-Windsor Corridor into a dedicated thread and seeing him desperately trying to revive the discussion in "his" thread now that there is a place where you can chose to have a discussion about something VIA Rail-related without being constantly interrupted by his attempts to deviate the discussions towards daily passenger rail service in Western Canada, but if you really want to have a discussion about your special interest, it might help to actually acknowledge what people bring to the discussion rather than just trying to missionize them into adopting your own beliefs...
 
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micheal_can said:
I blocked him on both pages as he very much tows the company line and when he tries to ague with you and presents data which you then show means that he is actually wrong, he spends the next several pages effectively spamming the forum of why he is still right.

He still cannot admit that the southern Canadian should have been kept as it was less subsidized.
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Been following this thread for better part of the year, mostly reading people's responses instead of posting. I think we can all agree having someone like @Urban Sky has added tremendous value and content to these discussions.
 
Where was the station in Welland in the latter years, when the Penn Central/Conrail tracks were rerouted into the Townline Tunnel? Was there a physical building, or a passenger shelter?
 
Wayfinding is my pet peeve in Canadian cities. It's not just in transit. It broadly sucks everywhere. If you don't have a phone with an active simcard, finding your way around a Canadian city can be tough.

On topic, something else lacking at our stations is amenities. We don't have the kind of storage lockers you see in Europe. Most of our stations barely have a vending machine because they don't have much traffic. But I'm always surprised at places like Ottawa, which to me should have enough pax to support more than just a coffee shop. But maybe that'll improve with HFR levels of traffic.
 
Ottawa station has a cafe, and is open most of the time. Most other stations in the corridor have nothing more than a coffee machine. You would think that those instant pizza machines would be a bit hit in these places.
 
kEiThZ said:
Wayfinding is my pet peeve in Canadian cities. It's not just in transit. It broadly sucks everywhere. If you don't have a phone with an active simcard, finding your way around a Canadian city can be tough.
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General Canadian philosophy on wayfinding/signage - doesn't matter whether it works or not - slap as many of it as you can everywhere, call it a day. If anyone complains - say - "but we have signage everywhere!"

AoD
 
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