GO Transit: Construction Projects (Metrolinx, various)

[TheHonestMaple]

I’ve noticed that all new signals have been installed from West Harbour/Hamilton Centre to Oakville, and work seems to be continuing beyond that. Much heavier duty gantries and much higher than the old ones. Is this related to electrification? I’m assuming it is.

 

[crs1026]

I’ve noticed that all new signals have been installed from West Harbour/Hamilton Centre to Oakville, and work seems to be continuing beyond that. Much heavier duty gantries and much higher than the old ones. Is this related to electrification? I’m assuming it is.

The old signalling was 60 years or so old, so would have been up for replacement anyways, thanks to advances in LED and microprocessor technology. But you can be sure that it's being done to the electrification spec.

- Paul

 

[crs1026]

I had an errand in Scarborough today also - so I rode the LSE, and I was impressed at the progress along the line from Cherry Street to Scarborough Jct.
The zone from Cherry Street to Pape, where the Ontario line branches off, no longer looks like one big mud pit…. Foundation work and the Lego-style base for the new embankment is being advanced along the entire length.
East of Pape, sound fencing and grading is largely complete all the way to Scarborough Jct, with only one lengthy rough section east of Warden. Concrete work for new bridge footings is clearly in progress.
There were two puzzling gaps in the work: the fourth platform at Danforth station, and the Birchmount bridge, show no signs of initiation let alone progress. Sure hope those do not represent problems or delay in completion.

- Paul

 

[nfitz]

I haven't even seen the public consultation on the changes at Danforth GO yet. There's been several locations over the years - including shifting it further east so it's no longer on the curve! But that seems to have ended now that they've brought in some more competent foreign expertise, that probably laughed at them when they insisted you couldn't put stations on curves.

 

[Wm Perkins Bull]

It actually blows my mind how underserved Hamilton is. It's the third largest city in Ontario, within 50km of Toronto, tons of commuters, two downtown stations. Little service, and poorly taken care of stations. Come on Metrolinx.

Hamilton is the fifth largest city in Ontario, Brampton and Mississauga are significantly larger than Hamilton. And Waterloo Region is also larger than Hamilton, which is why the Kitchener Line is getting a fair bit of attention, that is soon to be 1.5 million people benefiting.

Thank you! I did read through a few posts after searching, but it should be clear that I didn't know what search terms I was looking for with regards to rail plans. I'm more of an outsider looking in when it comes to transit, especially trains and such.



I appreciate you sharing the visualization and the file. It answers a lot more questions that I had. I'm definitely bookmarking this so I don't lose it. My only questions now are what happens when we hit Railroad Street in downtown Brampton, the grade crossings at Mill/Railroad and John/James, and the bridges around Main, Union, Queen, above the Etobicoke Creek, and Centre Street. Obviously I don't expect answers if it's not known, but I'd like to imagine that they'd try to create some sort of bridge or flyover or something of the sort, but I can't imagine what they'd do given just how small that whole area is.

It is worth noting that in order to do Riverwalk, they will need to build stuff to put in a third track over the Etobicoke Creek, then shift all the traffic on to that one track in order to do an open cut and instal culverts under the two current tracks. This will be necessitate stopping midday service beyond Bramalea GO while that is being done. Sylvia dredged that factoid up and talked about it at the end of her article on mobility planning for the Downtown

 

[TheHonestMaple]

Hamilton is the fifth largest city in Ontario, Brampton and Mississauga are significantly larger than Hamilton. And Waterloo Region is also larger than Hamilton, which is why the Kitchener Line is getting a fair bit of attention, that is soon to be 1.5 million people benefiting.

It is worth noting that in order to do Riverwalk, they will need to build stuff to put in a third track over the Etobicoke Creek, then shift all the traffic on to that one track in order to do an open cut and instal culverts under the two current tracks. This will be necessitate stopping midday service beyond Bramalea GO while that is being done. Sylvia dredged that factoid up and talked about it at the end of her article on mobility planning for the Downtown

Brampton and Mississauga are not really cities in their own right. And Hamilton-Burlington is much larger than Waterloo region. Also, none of the cities you listed have a proper urban area. Hamilton is Ontario's third city. Also, the Kitchener line is definetely not getting more attention than Lakeshore West lol.

 

[evandyk]

Even if you include Cambridge, K-W's CMA is around 20% smaller than Hamilton's.

 

[Chris R.]

Brampton and Mississauga are not really cities in their own right. And Hamilton-Burlington is much larger than Waterloo region. Also, none of the cities you listed have a proper urban area. Hamilton is Ontario's third city. Also, the Kitchener line is definetely not getting more attention than Lakeshore West lol.

Yea, this is pretty typical of both Ontario commentary, but also almost every government in Ontario. Hamilton is the third largest CMA in the province but the province always forgets about both Hamilton and Ottawa. Toronto's CMA gets historic investments every year, and then Ottawa, Hamilton, KW and London get forgotten about or are given the scraps, and even the scraps are left delayed, silent, non-transparent.

Hamilton should really be planned for its own all day frequent Go Service, the LRT should have been started like, last year... And they should negotiate with CN and CP to ensure electrification extends from Burlington Station to West Harbour and Confederation at least speeding up trains toward and out of Union. Unlike Brampton and Mississauga, Hamilton is a 3/4 of a million person CMA without a single BRT, LRT, proper train service, or even highway investment from upper levels of government. LRT is supposed to come eventually but it's seeming more and more likely that substantial work won't occur until 2026.

Hamilton is not small, and those that think it is typically haven't explored the urban area that is Burlington's border to Grimsby and seen how massive it is in its own right.

What's even worse is that Hamilton is planned to grow by one of the smallest amounts by the province which I just don't understand. You have empty office buildings, a downtown with 50% of its land as parking lots ripe for redevelopment, underutilized road and transit infrastructure, and yet they're trying to shove more people into Toronto and KW. Hamilton has the bones to be a huge secondary city for the Golden Horseshoe, but instead it's seen as a suburb of Toronto for some reason? 75% of Hamilton residents work in the city. With many not working in Hamilton working in the CMA (Burlington, Grimsby). We are our own city.

 

[evandyk]

To be fair, the GTA has twice as many people as Ottawa, Hamilton, KW and London combined.

 

[Chris R.]

To be fair, the GTA has twice as many people as Ottawa, Hamilton, KW and London combined.

It doesn't really matter though. Hamilton, KW, Ottawa and London still make up millions of Ontarians and by not investing in these communities whatsoever we bolster a housing crisis as Toronto maintains it's stranglehold on almost all industries, and it also ensures these other cities exist in a constant economic slump.

Transit investment, like Go Expansion will have massive positive knock on effects for housing affordability and economic activities. The $10 or $20 billion spent on Go Expansion will be made back quickly from increased economic activities brought on by increased mobility. Spending a bit of that on Hamilton to provide regular 30 minute or 15 minute service to the city would allow people to enter and leave the city with the comfort of having reliable transit. Hamilton is seeing historic private investment into redevelopment, and entertainment, but we still lack good connections to Go which feels like an afterthought for Hamilton, and transit investment which will provide better access to downtown where there is currently a lack of employment options because the parking lots were full pre-covid and continue to be full during the work day despite a 15% office vacancy rate and buses that get stuck in traffic.

 

[Undead]

London doesn't even want their BRT.

 

[Chris R.]

London doesn't even want their BRT.

And that's part of the problem. KW has had great councils that invest in the city, but Hamilton and London historically have not. The province needs to step in and do a bit more of the planning. I'm normally a big fan of local and community focused planning, but when bad council that listens only to NIMBYs gets in, it results in a city that doesn't rebound from an economic slump because it's afraid of touching anything or changing anything.

 

[Northern Light]

It doesn't really matter though. Hamilton, KW, Ottawa and London still make up millions of Ontarians and by not investing in these communities whatsoever.....................

Whoa there........... No investment whatsoever?

Hamilton: B-Line LRT ; West Harbour Station, Confederation Station, 2-way hourly GO service to WH, rush-hour service to downtown.........

Kitchener: ION LRT, investments that introduced GO service to K-W, investments to increase the speed and frequency of said service and build a new intermodal terminal.

You're welcome to critique the amount of investment, or the quality of same, but lets keep it real, the above is billions of dollars, not nothing whatsoever.

Spending a bit of that on Hamilton to provide regular 30 minute or 15 minute service to the city would allow people to enter and leave the city with the comfort of having reliable transit. Hamilton is seeing historic private investment into redevelopment, and entertainment, but we still lack good connections to Go which feels like an afterthought for Hamilton, and transit investment which will provide better access to downtown where there is currently a lack of employment options because the parking lots were full pre-covid and continue to be full during the work day despite a 15% office vacancy rate and buses that get stuck in traffic.

The bolded is coming.......stay tuned.........but it will be headed to Confederation, not downtown.

****

As to improving things into downtown Hamilton, I support that, but someone has to actually proposed digging down in the tunnel so that it can accommodate double-stack freight cars AND two tracks. That will be an expensive endeavour, its also one that will likely temporarily eliminate GO Trains from downtown Hamilton while the work is done.

Until that project happens, there is limited room for service improvement in that corridor (There is some)

I would also support moving ahead with A-Line connecting downtown to the Mountain, but no one seems to be pushing it forward and the LRT is moving at a snail's pace as it is.

 

[TheHonestMaple]

Whoa there........... No investment whatsoever?

Hamilton: B-Line LRT ; West Harbour Station, Confederation Station, 2-way hourly GO service to WH, rush-hour service to downtown.........

Kitchener: ION LRT, investments than introduced GO service to K-W, investments to increase the speed and frequency of said service and build a new intermodal terminal.

You're welcome to critique the amount of investment, or the quality of same, but lets keep it real, the above is billions of dollars, not nothing whatsoever.



The bolded is coming.......stay tuned.........but it will be headed to Confederation, not downtown.

****

As to improving things into downtown Hamilton, I support that, but someone has to actually proposed digging down in the tunnel so that it can accommodate double-stack freight cars AND two tracks. That will be an expensive endeavour, its also one that will likely temporarily eliminate GO Trains from downtown Hamilton while the work is done.

Until that project happens, there is limited room for service improvement in that corridor (There is some)

I would also support moving ahead with A-Line connecting downtown to the Mountain, but no one seems to be pushing it forward and the LRT is moving at a snail's pace as it is.

I feel like expanding the Hunter Street tunnel is not something that needs to disrupt current service levels. It's the 21st century, this can be well planned out to maintain a single track. Metrolinx is spending billions elsewhere for less important projects north of Toronto, im sure they could put some attention to downtown Hamilton.

Also, yes, we're supposedly getting billions of dollars in investment for the Hamilton LRT. But when?? It's now over 15 years since they first proposed it..... still nothing.

 

[ARG1]

I feel like expanding the Hunter Street tunnel is not something that needs to disrupt current service levels. It's the 21st century, this can be well planned out to maintain a single track.

If you have a way of doing so please feel free to share. As of right now the Hunter Street tunnel only has a single track that has the responsibility of running both CP and GO in and out of hamilton. Whilst the tunnel is theoretically wide enough to support two tracks, the tunnel isn't tall enough to support double-stack freight trains in such a configuration (hence why its single track currently). If you want to expand the tunnel to offer more service, there are 2 general ways to do so: Make the tunnel taller so that a track on the side of the tunnel could support double stacks, or make the tunnel wider. The former cannot be done whilst also preserving CP's access to Hamilton GO, so you'd have to somehow build some sort of temporary bypass that CP trains could use whilst work is being done on the tunnel. Then you could theoretically move the track to a side of the tunnel, and deepen the tunnel one half at a time (I'm not an engineer, and there's a really high chance this isn't even feasible, but I'm working with extremely optimistic scenarios here). Even then work could probably be done way faster by just... closing the tunnel and not doing half a tunnel at a time.

You could widen the tunnel, but that would almost certainly have to be done using cut and cover construction, and expropriating/paying heavy easements to all of the residents/business owners along hunter street, and once again while it might be possible to keep current CP/GO service levels here, doing so would almost certainly jack up the construction timeline, and thus increase cost.

Metrolinx is spending billions elsewhere for less important projects north of Toronto, im sure they could put some attention to downtown Hamilton.

"Less Important" is a very loaded statement that unfortunately in your case is very ill-defined. Being as charitable as possible, what exactly does this project accomplish? Well, it would theoretically allow for frequent all day GO train service to directly serve downtown Hamilton. The trouble is, West Harbour exists, and West Harbour is only 1.5km away from Hamilton Centre. So in essence, all this project does is relocate a go station to be 1.5km closer to downtown. Would it be nice if it happened? Sure... but I think you're going to have a really tough time arguing that this is somehow "more important" than projects that's introducing fast and frequent rail to parts of the GTHA that are not only much closer to Toronto, but also don't have any form of high-level regional transit of any kind. Like, do you honestly think that paying billions of dollars so that people can have frequent all day GO service at Hamilton instead of 1.5km north-east at West Harbour is more important than introducing frequent all-day GO service to York Region in the first place?

Also, yes, we're supposedly getting billions of dollars in investment for the Hamilton LRT. But when?? It's now over 15 years since they first proposed it..... still nothing.

Last I checked (and someone could correct me on this), but the capital funding is already there and available to be used. The only thing that's holding it back is Hamilton City Council approving it, and willing to put forth their own money to operate and maintain the line.