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GO Transit Electrification | Metrolinx

gweed123 said:
Agreed. I think we're going to see a lot of incremental improvements. There are probably quite a few track enhancements beyond the stringing of catenary included in this project, so we will likely see increases in diesel service levels before the electric component even comes online.
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Exactly. And we should not assume that the successful bidder will rush out and buy a new fleet. GO has enough equipment today to run 15-minute AWAD on all its lines, at least to the current outlying terminal points. That equipment was performing 15-minute headway service on just about every GO line at peak periods up until Covid. The reason we haven't seen full 2WAD yet is, the necessary amount of track isn't there yet to handle 2-way operation at those headways. So some of these trains are used to run 2-way at hourly headways, because that's all that today's tracks can handle....while the rest don't turn back but instead head to layover yards on arrival at Union.

New equipment may only be ordered at whatever volume is necessitated by current cars reaching end of life. Considering that most of GO's oldest bilevels are already life-extended, newer equipment that isn't life extended may be what gets scrapped first. And, if electrification is phased in, procurement will only need to happen on a pace to match that installation. There will doubtless be some balancing calculation of how many electric locos are procured versus how many new EMU's. But again, that's a careful calculation, not a wholesale replacement of any existing rolling stock. And one EMU matched to 2-3 existing bilevels is possible. It makes poor business sense to discard the existing fleet until it is worn out.

It will be interesting to see if the proponent continues to life-extend the existing bilevels. If they do, that work might be directed to an Alstom facility rather than ONR at North Bay or CAD in Montreal. I wonder how those politics will play out.

- Paul
 
crs1026 said:
Exactly. And we should not assume that the successful bidder will rush out and buy a new fleet. GO has enough equipment today to run 15-minute AWAD on all its lines, at least to the current outlying terminal points. That equipment was performing 15-minute headway service on just about every GO line at peak periods up until Covid. The reason we haven't seen full 2WAD yet is, the necessary amount of track isn't there yet to handle 2-way operation at those headways. So some of these trains are used to run 2-way at hourly headways, because that's all that today's tracks can handle....while the rest don't turn back but instead head to layover yards on arrival at Union.

New equipment may only be ordered at whatever volume is necessitated by current cars reaching end of life. Considering that most of GO's oldest bilevels are already life-extended, newer equipment that isn't life extended may be what gets scrapped first. And, if electrification is phased in, procurement will only need to happen on a pace to match that installation. There will doubtless be some balancing calculation of how many electric locos are procured versus how many new EMU's. But again, that's a careful calculation, not a wholesale replacement of any existing rolling stock. And one EMU matched to 2-3 existing bilevels is possible. It makes poor business sense to discard the existing fleet until it is worn out.

It will be interesting to see if the proponent continues to life-extend the existing bilevels. If they do, that work might be directed to an Alstom facility rather than ONR at North Bay or CAD in Montreal. I wonder how those politics will play out.

- Paul
Click to expand...
Greening strategies notwithstanding. There is this additional factor at play, not to mention that electrification will provide significant noise reduction, which should keep residents near rail lines happy despite the planned higher frequencies.
Whatever the decisions, it boggles my mind that place with an energy mix like Ontario's made it this far, still using diesel.
 
felix123 said:
Greening strategies notwithstanding. There is this additional factor at play, not to mention that electrification will provide significant noise reduction, which should keep residents near rail lines happy despite the planned higher frequencies.
Whatever the decisions, it boggles my mind that place with an energy mix like Ontario's made it this far, still using diesel.
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Like its fair, but we just need to focus on what we have right now and what we focus on. Getting rid of a ton of perfectly good bilevels early because we want to move on to new shiny EMUs isn't ecologically friendly, we're just creating waste.

Remember, nobody is really saying that electrification isn't important. Its just that in the grand scheme of things, GO has bigger fish to worry about than hanging up electric wires. A GO Expansion that gets its double tracking and service improvements without electrification is a GO Train that is magnitudes better than what we have today. A GO transit that has electric trains but the same infrastructure we have today in terms of trackage and stations is only mildly better.
 
ARG1 said:
Like its fair, but we just need to focus on what we have right now and what we focus on. Getting rid of a ton of perfectly good bilevels early because we want to move on to new shiny EMUs isn't ecologically friendly, we're just creating waste.

Remember, nobody is really saying that electrification isn't important. Its just that in the grand scheme of things, GO has bigger fish to worry about than hanging up electric wires. A GO Expansion that gets its double tracking and service improvements without electrification is a GO Train that is magnitudes better than what we have today. A GO transit that has electric trains but the same infrastructure we have today in terms of trackage and stations is only mildly better.
Click to expand...
even though this entire thread is about the electrification. honestly, it really isnt the biggest part of the Go expansion, union station platform widening, double tracking on the barrie line and stouville line, faster travel times, all of this is much more visible than shiny new electric trains.

Thats to say that worrying about whether we get EMUs or whether we keep the diesel locos doesnt matter in the grand scheme of things because barrie is finally going to get 2wad 15 minute service to barries downtown. which is much more visible than just a shiny new locomotive that comes once an hour peak service to downtown
 
ARG1 said:
Like its fair, but we just need to focus on what we have right now and what we focus on. Getting rid of a ton of perfectly good bilevels early because we want to move on to new shiny EMUs isn't ecologically friendly, we're just creating waste.

Remember, nobody is really saying that electrification isn't important. Its just that in the grand scheme of things, GO has bigger fish to worry about than hanging up electric wires. A GO Expansion that gets its double tracking and service improvements without electrification is a GO Train that is magnitudes better than what we have today. A GO transit that has electric trains but the same infrastructure we have today in terms of trackage and stations is only mildly better.
Click to expand...
I'm pretty sure the stated position of MX in the past is that the bilevels (with bi-mode locomotives) will be used for express trains and for trains that go beyond the core electrification area. EMUs would be likely used within the areas that are fully electrified. There has never been any proposal to fully scrap the entire bilevel fleet at this stage, beyond speculative posting on UT. We will need some additional trains as we increase frequencies so we might as well make those EMUs, and then use bilevels for where they make sense.
 
TossYourJacket said:
I'm pretty sure the stated position of MX in the past is that the bilevels (with bi-mode locomotives) will be used for express trains and for trains that go beyond the core electrification area. EMUs would be likely used within the areas that are fully electrified. There has never been any proposal to fully scrap the entire bilevel fleet at this stage, beyond speculative posting on UT. We will need some additional trains as we increase frequencies so we might as well make those EMUs, and then use bilevels for where they make sense.
Click to expand...
That is the plan yes, but remember, we have A TON OF BILEVELS. Even if we used out existing fleet only for express services, we still have a lot of BiLevels left.
 
TossYourJacket said:
I'm pretty sure the stated position of MX in the past is that the bilevels (with bi-mode locomotives) will be used for express trains and for trains that go beyond the core electrification area. EMUs would be likely used within the areas that are fully electrified. There has never been any proposal to fully scrap the entire bilevel fleet at this stage, beyond speculative posting on UT. We will need some additional trains as we increase frequencies so we might as well make those EMUs, and then use bilevels for where they make sense.
Click to expand...
I thought mx was getting electric locomotives instead
 
I'm fine with the current plan. EMUs for the higher-frequency, local and off-peak services and electric loco's/diesel trains for the lower-frequency/further out and express services.

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