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Waterloo Region Transit Developments (ION LRT, new terminal, GRT buses)

nfitz said:
Yeah, that's not too bad. I'm surprised it's only once every 10 minutes at peak - for some reason I thought it was going to be every 7.5 minutes.

Gosh, first trains into UW arrive at around 4:30 AM. But last southbound departure at night is just after midnight. I'd have thought shifting that all about an hour later would have worked better. I remember trying to get home at 1 or 2 AM. But never going anywhere at 5 AM!
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That's probably because of where the storage and maintenance centre is located (north of UW), but I suspect more students are heading northbound late in the evening from Downtown Kitchener and Uptown Waterloo restaurants and bars towards the campus and off-campus housing than the other way around.

It's also good to see extra Route 7 service between Uptown Waterloo and Conestoga Mall during rush hours - probably an acknowledgement that the LRT route doesn't serve WLU and the high-rise off-campus housing cluster at King and University that well.
 
This schedule is for summer when frequencies and usage are less. It will be more frequent starting in September.
 
On a different topic, I kinda wish they had chosen not to use the same old TTC door chime on the Ion trains. It would have been nice to have something different, since KW isn't the GTA.

Those chimes seem to be reprogammable after the fact, at least on the Citadis and I assume on Flexities too, so the fact they piggy backed on the metrolinx order shouldn't be a barrier.
 
nfitz said:
Presumably Conestoga Mall as well.

Gosh, I wonder how may people will be treating the shopping malls as park-and-rides. :)
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This has been happening at the three malls with iXpress service for ages. I used to drive to Conestoga Mall to take the bus back to UW to save on parking.
 
Kyle Campbell said:
On a different topic, I kinda wish they had chosen not to use the same old TTC door chime on the Ion trains. It would have been nice to have something different, since KW isn't the GTA.

Those chimes seem to be reprogammable after the fact, at least on the Citadis and I assume on Flexities too, so the fact they piggy backed on the metrolinx order shouldn't be a barrier.
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Dreaming here, but can we have a more aggressive chime like in Asia?
 
TransitBart said:
There is a certain irony on a transit forum of transit geeks in driving and parking to see a new transit line. @W. K. Lis this gave me a good chuckle.
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When I go to the areas that have rail transit, I like to just go for a ride.

Now, If I could figure out how to do a cost effective ride on all the GO trains, I will.
 
Kyle Campbell said:
On a different topic, I kinda wish they had chosen not to use the same old TTC door chime on the Ion trains. It would have been nice to have something different, since KW isn't the GTA.
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Be careful what you wish for. Kitchener's musical sound is Oom Pah Pah. :)
 
micheal_can said:
When I go to the areas that have rail transit, I like to just go for a ride.

Now, If I could figure out how to do a cost effective ride on all the GO trains, I will.
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You could do it on New Years when they are free. But only after 8. So it will be dark out and of course some GO trains are unidirectional. However on NYE they have bi directional service.
 
Take the VIA train one way, and take GO back. The 7 day/week express 25C runs between Square One and University of Waterloo make the trip much more bearable (the regular 25 route makes so very many stops along the way).
 
robmausser said:
There are VIA rail trains however.
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A day trip is quite feasible on VIA - and much faster. Depart Union around 11 AM, arrive in Kitchener around 12:30. Shame it didn't stop at Bloor ...

Return at about 9:40 pm arrive Toronto about 11:20 pm. 7 days a week. Only 2 trains a day now.

Shame that the federal Tories cut the service from 5 trains to 3 trains ... and then more recently to 2 trains under Harper.

robmausser said:
More expensive of course.
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About 19% more expensive if you book ahead ... being a relatively short trip, the pricing isn't horrific. You can get tickets for Sunday for $32 each way. And there's some (late) Saturday tickets left at $23 ... which is what you can normally get a week in advance. GO is $19.40 cash

For frequent travellers, you can get the 20 ride ticket (10 round-trips). At $14.70 that's cheaper than GO ($16.32 with Presto)!
 
Kyle Campbell said:
On a different topic, I kinda wish they had chosen not to use the same old TTC door chime on the Ion trains. It would have been nice to have something different, since KW isn't the GTA.

Those chimes seem to be reprogammable after the fact, at least on the Citadis and I assume on Flexities too, so the fact they piggy backed on the metrolinx order shouldn't be a barrier.
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Lol, until just a few months ago the next stop displays were cycling through Crosstown stop names during their 'walk through an LRV' PR events.

nfitz said:
Be careful what you wish for. Kitchener's musical sound is Oom Pah Pah. :)
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We moved beyond that in the 90's, now it's the chicken dance...
 
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