Willybru21
Active Member
Is the route shortened? I thought it was outright canceled for the time being.
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GO Transit: Service thread (including extensions)
- Thread starter drum118
- Start date
WillTo
Senior Member
Why does Hamilton GO Centre get no love?
Bordercollie
Senior Member
It was my understanding that some trips end at Aldershot.
nfitz
Superstar
Odd - I can't get the Lakeshore West one either ... that presumably others are looking at with the Hamilton fiasco - https://www.gotransit.com/static_fi...Planning/FullSchedules/FS03092022/TABLE01.pdf
It's working for others?
Edit - looks like it's working today. Not that I believe the schedules are correct - even the old ones don't make sense looking at the Niagara Falls trains.
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reaperexpress
Senior Member
I don't get it. The timetables still show half-hourly westbound service until the end of the evening, it's only eastbound which is cut to hourly.
So 2 + 2 tph + VIA is too much with the Hurontario LRT construction, but 2 + 1 + VIA is fine? They don't seem to be single-tracking through Port Credit given that westbound trains are scheduled at :41 past the hour and eastbound trains at :46.
https://www.gotransit.com/static_fi...Planning/FullSchedules/FS03092022/TABLE01.pdf
The trains which terminate at Aldershot arrive at :20 past the hour and head back eastbound 50 minutes later at :10 past the next hour. If there's a shortage of train crews, why did they schedule so much time sitting around doing nothing? It only takes 30 minutes to do a round trip from Aldershot to West Harbour so with this schedule they'd still have a generous 20 minute layover if they continued to West Harbour.
I think the timetable is just totally wrong, and the westbound page hasn't been updated yet (despite being dated 3 September 2022). I think they posted it just to have something online, regardless of the fact that it would be misleading customers.
Another issue: on Table 12 (Lakeshore West - Niagara), the 17:00 westbound weekday train ends at Aldershot, while on Table 01 (Lakeshore West - Hamilton) it continues all the way to Niagara. The morning Niagara train is shown on both timetables.
Table 12
Table 01
In other news:
- On Lakeshore West the current 3 weekend trains/day to Niagara are maintained, rather than the 2/day described by Ford in his press conference.
- On Barrie, the current midday weekday and weekend service to Allandale is maintained.
So 2 + 2 tph + VIA is too much with the Hurontario LRT construction, but 2 + 1 + VIA is fine? They don't seem to be single-tracking through Port Credit given that westbound trains are scheduled at :41 past the hour and eastbound trains at :46.
https://www.gotransit.com/static_fi...Planning/FullSchedules/FS03092022/TABLE01.pdf
The trains which terminate at Aldershot arrive at :20 past the hour and head back eastbound 50 minutes later at :10 past the next hour. If there's a shortage of train crews, why did they schedule so much time sitting around doing nothing? It only takes 30 minutes to do a round trip from Aldershot to West Harbour so with this schedule they'd still have a generous 20 minute layover if they continued to West Harbour.
I think the timetable is just totally wrong, and the westbound page hasn't been updated yet (despite being dated 3 September 2022). I think they posted it just to have something online, regardless of the fact that it would be misleading customers.
Another issue: on Table 12 (Lakeshore West - Niagara), the 17:00 westbound weekday train ends at Aldershot, while on Table 01 (Lakeshore West - Hamilton) it continues all the way to Niagara. The morning Niagara train is shown on both timetables.
Table 12
Table 01
In other news:
- On Lakeshore West the current 3 weekend trains/day to Niagara are maintained, rather than the 2/day described by Ford in his press conference.
- On Barrie, the current midday weekday and weekend service to Allandale is maintained.
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Allandale25
Senior Member
Why unlocking future GO service means interrupting service today - Metrolinx News
Construction-related GO Transit service interruptions are occasionally necessary to make time for work that’s necessary for future GO service improvements.
blog.metrolinx.com
LNahid2000
Senior Member
This is expected until Thanksgiving since the service was supposed to be seasonal until Thanksgiving. I suspect they'll cut it to 2 trains then.
It may very well actually be both. There may be some kind of track restriction around Port Credit in the evenings that caused Metrolinx to add another couple minutes to the schedule. If trains continued to West Harbour, that may have extended the run time past what could reasonably be accomplished with an hourly headway, without adding more trains and crews (which they don't have). I know that typically on an hourly schedule the inbound and outbound trains meet around Port Credit, so it may be that only one can proceed at a time.
In essence, they may be having to use the running time from Aldershot to West Harbour to pad the schedule around Port Credit instead. If they didn't, and the train got delayed around Port Credit, with running times being what they are it would have made the inbound trip from West Harbour delayed in leaving. If that inbound train catches the same delay at Port Credit, it's even later coming into Union. And then you just get a cascading series of delays.
Just a guess though.
The Hunter St tunnel. CP maintains tight control over when GO can use it. That's one of the main reasons Metrolinx has put all of their eggs into the West Harbour basket (well, that and being able to continue trips further east if desired).
Willybru21
Active Member
No I just looked at the schedule, the 17:00 Niagara train is completely cancelled, not shortened.
LNahid2000
Senior Member
I think this is an error on the Niagara schedule. The 17:00 train still shows on the new Lakeshore West schedule:
Allandale25
Senior Member
With only hourly service, it's much harder to respond to an increase in running time without adding another train, especially when you're looking at a route cycle time of around 4 hours (assuming thru-running between LSE and LSW). When you're running 15 min headways and running times increase as a result of construction, it's a lot easier to scale back to 20 min frequencies to keep the same route length and number of trains.
If they wanted to keep the same number of trains operating AND keep West Harbour, I suspect they would have needed to scale headways back to 1h10m or 1h15m, neither of which is preferable, because it impacts everyone on both LSE and LSW. Dropping West Harbour at least only inconveniences those going to West Harbour.
I suspect that once they have an additional train crew available, we'll see West Harbour return, with a lot more recovery time at West Harbour and Oshawa, with maybe a few extra minutes thrown in at Union too.
If they wanted to keep the same number of trains operating AND keep West Harbour, I suspect they would have needed to scale headways back to 1h10m or 1h15m, neither of which is preferable, because it impacts everyone on both LSE and LSW. Dropping West Harbour at least only inconveniences those going to West Harbour.
I suspect that once they have an additional train crew available, we'll see West Harbour return, with a lot more recovery time at West Harbour and Oshawa, with maybe a few extra minutes thrown in at Union too.
Allandale25
Senior Member
I'll just note that there is a Metrolinx board meeting coming up in case anyone wants to do a written deputation. There's been some constructive comments here and feedback on the rolling of of schedules, online version vs PDF schedule versions, and opinions on communication in explaining what is happening and why/why not. I think they tried to address some of the over-arching issues via that blog post I linked to above and in the GOExpansion twitter replies.
The letter will get a URL for the PDF which could then be sent to the Minister/MPPs.
The letter will get a URL for the PDF which could then be sent to the Minister/MPPs.
crs1026
Superstar
FWIW I took in the Jays last night, coming home on LSW. The 22:45 Union-West Harbour train took a 20 minute delay at Union, because a) it took that long to load, to absolute full and b) it then took that long for the crew to clear several passenger alarms - which under the crowded conditions required instructing enough passengers to offload to allow crew and security to enter the coaches and verify that the alarm was false. It did appear that one of the alarms involved a passenger who possibly fainted but was not seriously ill.
When the train reached Exhibition, that platform was quite full of passengers but only a few managed to board (mostly by being utterly aggressive).
There were plenty of GO security people at both Union and Exhibition, and they were attentive as far as ensuring that the crowding would not prevent the doors from closing - but did not attempt any real crowd control. There were announcements about how there was another train following, but that only had any credibility by virtue of the first train being delayed. There was a lot of grumbing about "yeah, sure"...which I can't blame people for making.
I have to say that having the upper levels of bilevel coaches that full of people is profoundly unsafe and cause for concern. Unless someone pulled the emergency brake (from the lower level, so unreachable from upstairs) and brought the train to a stop, even the emergency window exits would be unusable.
It's a single point of data, but it says to me that the situation is not merely inconvenient or needing improvement - but actually rather desperate.
ML brass need to publicly acknowledge it as such. If GO can't handle easily predicted peak crowds on a Tuesday evening....
- Paul
When the train reached Exhibition, that platform was quite full of passengers but only a few managed to board (mostly by being utterly aggressive).
There were plenty of GO security people at both Union and Exhibition, and they were attentive as far as ensuring that the crowding would not prevent the doors from closing - but did not attempt any real crowd control. There were announcements about how there was another train following, but that only had any credibility by virtue of the first train being delayed. There was a lot of grumbing about "yeah, sure"...which I can't blame people for making.
I have to say that having the upper levels of bilevel coaches that full of people is profoundly unsafe and cause for concern. Unless someone pulled the emergency brake (from the lower level, so unreachable from upstairs) and brought the train to a stop, even the emergency window exits would be unusable.
It's a single point of data, but it says to me that the situation is not merely inconvenient or needing improvement - but actually rather desperate.
ML brass need to publicly acknowledge it as such. If GO can't handle easily predicted peak crowds on a Tuesday evening....
- Paul
Allandale25
Senior Member
^ remind me of the frequency at that time? Hourly or half-hourly?