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GO Transit: Service thread (including extensions)

No. We are a province of 15 million people. We can do more than one thing at once.
Yes. We should prioritize projects as we have limited funds and a limited workforce. We should focus on existing plans before promising the world to every little city in Ontario.
 
Proper 30 min service to Bramalea and Unionville is already a done deal. Construction for it is already nearly complete and service could start this coming year. Discussing longer term plans for Cambridge will have no effect on that rollout.
True, but both of these stations are barely across the border into either city. It will be a huge improvement, don't get me wrong, but there's still years of work left on both lines to fully service those cities.
 
Proper 30 min service to Bramalea and Unionville is already a done deal. Construction for it is already nearly complete and service could start this coming year. Discussing longer term plans for Cambridge will have no effect on that rollout.

Somewhat true, although the 401-409 tunnels are sitting doing nothing and Woodbine station hasn't started. The work to upgrade the CN portion of the Halton Sub west of Bramalea hasn't even had a groundbreaking.... and certainly isn't paid for. Same with Bowmanville. LSE has been started west of Scarborough Jct, but projects east of there which should be on the front burner aren't moving yet. The Guelph Sub between Georgetown and Kitchener is barely creeping forward. The Unionville double tracking is still waiting on a bridge. The Barrie line has subgrade but no new trackage yet.

Lots of balls in the air, and lots of bills that will come due in the near future. Personally I would like to see these completed before we add another tranche of projects.

- Paul
 
True, but both of these stations are barely across the border into either city. It will be a huge improvement, don't get me wrong, but there's still years of work left on both lines to fully service those cities.
Brampton already has good transit connections at Bramalea including direct connections to Shoppers World, BCC, Meadowvale, Humber College, and Trinity Common which all takes about 15-25 mins on a good day to get to so it wouldn't be as bad. As for Unionville, GO pretty much does a better job than YRT with one stop connections to Richmond Hill and Cornell but it is a nightmare if you are trying to get anywhere else.
 

Starting Jan. 7, UP Express is increasing service - with the return of late-night service through to 1 a.m. The first trips of the day will remain the same. [Currently the last train is at 11pm]

On Jan. 6, Metrolinx is adjusting schedules on the Milton, Barrie and Stouffville GO Lines.

Most notably, Milton Line trips will be 10 minutes faster at some stops as maintenance work was recently completed and trains can return to regular speeds.

Barrie and Stouffville Lines will see minor time adjustments to some trips starting in early January – be sure to check your schedules before leaving the house.

Finally, Metrolinx is increasing the length of some trains on the Kitchener Line to better meet increasing demand.
 

Starting Jan. 7, UP Express is increasing service - with the return of late-night service through to 1 a.m. The first trips of the day will remain the same. [Currently the last train is at 11pm]

On Jan. 6, Metrolinx is adjusting schedules on the Milton, Barrie and Stouffville GO Lines.

Most notably, Milton Line trips will be 10 minutes faster at some stops as maintenance work was recently completed and trains can return to regular speeds.

Barrie and Stouffville Lines will see minor time adjustments to some trips starting in early January – be sure to check your schedules before leaving the house.

Finally, Metrolinx is increasing the length of some trains on the Kitchener Line to better meet increasing demand.

I just came on here to post that tidbit from the Milton train trips:

We’re adjusting service on the Milton line, starting Jan. 6
Starting Jan. 6:
  • All eastbound trips will arrive at Union Station 10 minutes earlier.
  • All westbound trips will arrive at Milton GO 10 minutes earlier.

However I see no evidence of this in the PDF schedules that have been posted.

For example, I most often take the 8:09 am trip from Erindale and it's still scheduled to arrive at Union at 8:48 am. So where is this magical "10 minutes earlier" exactly?

I double-checked the Milton departure times in the morning and arrival times in the evening and they are unchanged as well.

Maybe they haven't updated the schedules correctly?

However, the trip from Erindale is 39 minutes currently. Is it really possible for them to get it down to 29 minutes? Doesn't seem likely to me. Maybe 10 minutes from Milton and maybe 5 minutes earlier from Erindale. It's really not clear and as far as I can tell, the schedules don't show any change at all.
 
As regards Cambridge - there have been calls on this thread to have that conversation in the fantasy thread rather than here, but it does feel to me like it is in a category of projects where it is more than crayons / photoshop of alignments which have been trails for decades, but also wouldn’t cost a ton of money.

Maybe there needs to be a thread for projects which have been professionally studied and for which there is some government support, but not enough for shovels in the ground.

Double tracking the Galt sub west of Guelph Junction and/or rehabbing the Fergus for passenger ops would be comparatively simple projects when one considers what is being proposed for Oshawa/Bowmanville’s route between GO and CP, closer to what is being done between Silver Junction and Kitchener. Expanding the reservoir berm the Galt passes through could be done in winter when the lower part is drained anyway

Business cases say what senior government want them to (e.g.both Northlander closure and reopening, GO to London inception) but also depend on current data. Ultimately rail transportation in the context of this thread is about transporting people, and anyone who has been following the immigration visa numbers for the colleges sector knows that we are seeing explosive population growth in southern Ontario to the extent that many national, provincial and local projections are horribly out of date.
 
However, the trip from Erindale is 39 minutes currently. Is it really possible for them to get it down to 29 minutes? Doesn't seem likely to me. Maybe 10 minutes from Milton and maybe 5 minutes earlier from Erindale. It's really not clear and as far as I can tell, the schedules don't show any change at all.
I am not sure if you noticed but GO had added 10-11 minutes to the schedule earlier. Cooksville to Union is supposed to take 32 min but had been showing 43 minutes for about a month. Trains would normally reach anywhere between 32 and 40 minutes to Union. Maybe they are going back to the original schedule, which is what they mean by 10 minutes fewer.
 
I am not sure if you noticed but GO had added 10-11 minutes to the schedule earlier. Cooksville to Union is supposed to take 32 min but had been showing 43 minutes for about a month. Trains would normally reach anywhere between 32 and 40 minutes to Union. Maybe they are going back to the original schedule, which is what they mean by 10 minutes fewer.
But the January schedules show no time differences.
 
I am not sure from where else they are getting 10 min off.
Yeah that’s why I asked. They keep talking about it on the train and they say to check online and online doesn’t reflect what the hell they’re talking about. Way to confuse your customers. I’d say I’m pretty knowledgeable about this kind of stuff, and if I can’t figure it out, what will other people think?
 
I can’t believe it’s already that time of year again! They should operate this service more often
You_Doodle+_2023-12-02T16_40_06Z.jpeg
 

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