GO Transit: Service thread (including extensions)

[innsertnamehere]

My point is that it is a major part of introducing all day 2 way. Once the entirety of the GO lines feeding into Georgetown are finished, they will be getting the major service increases expected. You've ant run expanded services on lines if only half of the line is upgraded to provide that service. When (if) the transit tax is passed, the funding will be secured (around a billion for each corridor) to upgrade the rest of the corridors and get all day 2 way GO running on them. They needed to do upgrading for the ARL in the corridor regardless, so instead of constructing just the infrastructure necessary for that they also decided to upgrade the whole corridor to prevent it from being under construction for 15 years. It will be a waste of money unless all day 2 way GO gets implemented.

 

[TOareaFan]

My point is that it is a major part of introducing all day 2 way. Once the entirety of the GO lines feeding into Georgetown are finished, they will be getting the major service increases expected.

Which GO lines feed into Georgetown? It is a stand alone line that runs from, now, KW to Union......no one (not I not anyone I have read) is suggesting that all day 7 day a week service is required all the way to KW.......but to Georgetown? Perhaps? MtPleasant/Brampton/Bramalea....for sure.

You've ant run expanded services on lines if only half of the line is upgraded to provide that service.

The whole line out to Mt. Pleasant has been upgraded....from what I have read from people who know far more about train ops than I do, the two track section going through DT Brampton causes some operational issues but certainly does not preclude operating 2 way 7 days a week on an hourly basis during off peak. Large segments of the Lakeshore line were two tracks only and they managed to run that level of service mixed in with some freight and VIA (far more VIA than the Georgetown corridor deals with) for many years....they only needed to make it 3 track all the way to allow for the half hour service.

When (if) the transit tax is passed, the funding will be secured (around a billion for each corridor) to upgrade the rest of the corridors and get all day 2 way GO running on them.

Why would all day service on one corridor (KW) have to wait until the other corridors were upgraded?

They needed to do upgrading for the ARL in the corridor regardless, so instead of constructing just the infrastructure necessary for that they also decided to upgrade the whole corridor to prevent it from being under construction for 15 years. It will be a waste of money unless all day 2 way GO gets implemented.

Maybe you have missed some of my other posts....go ahead and ask them when they plan to bring all day service to the corridor. They will tell you (as they have told others) that they have no plans.

 

[nfitz]

The whole line out to Mt. Pleasant has been upgraded...

There's still massive amounts of construction going on on the line. Try walking down Strachan south of King!

Check out the GTS project site - http://www.gotransit.com/gts/en/default.aspx

Or just look at this chart. The brown lines are construction.

 

[TOareaFan]

They dropped an AM and PM peak VIA train shortly after GO added 2 AM and PM peak trains to Kitchener, that cost half-as-much.

Question (bit off topic but you might know the answer) do you know how they picked which trains they cancelled? There used to be a VIA train that left Union towards KW that left somewhere around 10 pm (can't remember if it was just before 10 or just after 10)....I used it on ocassion as a train home after Leaf or Raptor games (it was a sprint to get to but you could do it). It was one of the cancelled trips.

Yet, they maintained their 17:40 departure. It looks kinda silly now that VIA quotes fares/does booking for GO trains on their web....they show two departures 5 minutes apart....would seem to me that they would have been better off cancelling that trip and keeping the later one. (certainly from my own personal selfish perspective).

Why focus on the minimum Day 1 service. Metrolinx has already promised they are going to electrify the service after 2015. Service increases are coming. I think you are focusing too much on something that will either be short-term, and may well be far different from what actually happens in 2015.

Why focus on that? Well it is the next service upgrade, it comes after a very long expansion project and significant spend and I like to see good service offered and smart efficient use of public dollars. Sure they have said they will electrify...no date promised (that I can see) and if the suggestion is that the corridor should/will wait until the line is electrified before it gets full service that does not please me at all.

I could ask why, as someone who obviously cares and follows the transit file, you think that this level of service in 2015 is adequate/satisfactory/acceptible?

 

[TOareaFan]

There's still massive amounts of construction going on on the line. Try walking down Strachan south of King!

Check out the GTS project site - http://www.gotransit.com/gts/en/default.aspx

Or just look at this chart. The brown lines are construction.

Sorry, "has been upgraded" was meant to be "will have been upgraded by 2015".....sorry, my error. I fully understand that the line is not ready today to offer full service....my question remains why would they not offer full service when it is.

 

[DKsan]

You know what?

I'm slightly uncomfortable with Georgetown and Halton Hills demanding all-day GO service when they have no local transit system in town.
I have reasons for this:
1) They get all-day GO! Great! Where are all those people going to park if there are people coming and going all day?

2) Great! GO has decided to build a five billion storey parking garage on the site of their existing one! How are people getting to the GO station when the lot is being ripped up?

I think it's a bit rich. Hell, run loop-de-loop shuttle bus routes through town whose sole purpose is getting to the GO station. Don't run very frequently. I mean, it's not like Georgetown isn't built up. We drove through it recently. It's not all sprawl. There are mid-rises and some apartment buildings in town.

Hell, pay Brampton Transit to run some sort of route through town.

 

[rbt]

That's a Toronto Star article. We're supposed to trust that Tess Kalinowski didn't once again misquote someone? All it says is "the 30-minute Lakeshore line boost is expected to attract 50 per cent more GO riders almost immediately". I'd have assumed that if the quote was correct talking about a 50% increase in off-peak ridership. It makes no sense otherwise ... you can't get a 50% increase for ridership for the entire line ... that doesn't seem conceivable.

It's possible they're expecting a large number of shift workers to start using the line. Noon to 8pm or similar shifts would have been a pain previously; but I agree they likely meant offpeak ridership would increase. That quote provided wasn't even a quote, but was the journalists interpretation of what was said. It's both without context and without the exact wording.


I can also see 30 minute service having a large impact for event goers (baseball, basketball, hockey, etc.). Going to something like that (variable end time) where you may or may not go for a drink after was difficult to plan around for GO without a large wait on the platform.

TTC has had very large growth in off-peak ridership over the last 10 years. I don't doubt there is a lot of latent demand for frequent and reliable GO service on all lines. The question is, is 30 minutes enough or do they need to get to 15 minute or better.

 

[nfitz]

Question (bit off topic but you might know the answer) do you know how they picked which trains they cancelled? There used to be a VIA train that left Union towards KW that left somewhere around 10 pm (can't remember if it was just before 10 or just after 10)....I used it on ocassion as a train home after Leaf or Raptor games (it was a sprint to get to but you could do it). It was one of the cancelled trips.

Yet, they maintained their 17:40 departure. It looks kinda silly now that VIA quotes fares/does booking for GO trains on their web....they show two departures 5 minutes apart....would seem to me that they would have been better off cancelling that trip and keeping the later one. (certainly from my own personal selfish perspective).

Ah, your correct!

What they did was cancel the morning train from London, that did the KW commuter service. However this didn't return until late evening to KW/London ... because the 17:40 departure could provide service for commuters ... but actually goes to Sarnia.

The late evening train is too late to go to Sarnia. So there has been the loss of late evening service. Thank-you Stephen Harper.

Sigh ... I remember when there were 5 VIA departures a day to Kitchener ... and quite well used they were. I certainly became a lot more familiar with Gray Line (I think that is who used to run it back then) when Brian Mulroney cut it to 3 trains.

Hmm, Mulroney ... Harper. There's a pattern there ...

Sorry, "has been upgraded" was meant to be "will have been upgraded by 2015".....sorry, my error. I fully understand that the line is not ready today to offer full service....my question remains why would they not offer full service when it is.

I fully expect they will offer near hourly service when it's done. Though I'd suggest those that want it hassle their MP, the Transport Minister, and Premier.

 

[TOareaFan]

I fully expect they will offer near hourly service when it's done. Though I'd suggest those that want it hassle their MP, the Transport Minister, and Premier.

Done......all have been absolutely quiet/non-responsive on the subjects you and I have been talking about over the past few days.

 

[innsertnamehere]

Maybe you have missed some of my other posts....go ahead and ask them when they plan to bring all day service to the corridor. They will tell you (as they have told others) that they have no plans.

http://www.bigmove.ca/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/NxWave_GO2WAD.pdf (warning: PDF)



and I was unaware about them upgrading to mount pleasant, I though the upgrades were only going up to where ARL splits off to the airport.

Both Barrie and Milton lines feed into the kitchener corridor..

 

[TOareaFan]

You know what?

I'm slightly uncomfortable with Georgetown and Halton Hills demanding all-day GO service when they have no local transit system in town.
I have reasons for this:
1) They get all-day GO! Great! Where are all those people going to park if there are people coming and going all day?

2) Great! GO has decided to build a five billion storey parking garage on the site of their existing one! How are people getting to the GO station when the lot is being ripped up?

I think it's a bit rich. Hell, run loop-de-loop shuttle bus routes through town whose sole purpose is getting to the GO station. Don't run very frequently. I mean, it's not like Georgetown isn't built up. We drove through it recently. It's not all sprawl. There are mid-rises and some apartment buildings in town.

Hell, pay Brampton Transit to run some sort of route through town.

Couple of points.

The line in question passes through Brampton.....a city that will be about 600k in population by the time the line work is done and a city that provides 70% of the riders on the GO line in question and a city that has been investing heavily in its own local transit system. If G-Town is to be punished for its lack of investment, is the inverse not true for Brampton?

Not only will Georgetown not pay BT to serve Brampton, they have told Brampton they cannot run their buses into town (one of the contemplated plans for Zum 505 was to take it into Georgetown).

 

[TOareaFan]

http://www.bigmove.ca/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/NxWave_GO2WAD.pdf (warning: PDF)

No dates attached so more of a wish than a plan. Ask them "when"....i did and the answer is "no current plan". Ask them how much of that $4.9B figure is for each line. I ask for the KW line (context was since you have spent so much on that corridor already, how much more makes up their share of the $4.9B).....the answer was "we don't know".....really left that discussion with a real lack of faith/confidence in their cost estimates.....how do you get to a total of $4.9B for multiple lines if not by summing up the per line costs plus the common costs (ie upgrades to Union would be a common cost).

and I was unaware about them upgrading to mount pleasant, I though the upgrades were only going up to where ARL splits off to the airport.

Both Barrie and Milton lines feed into the kitchener corridor..

Maybe semantics but they do join the corridor at the southern end but feeding in (to my ear) implies trains connecting and passengers exchanging.....in any event, in the time frame we are talking about (ie post 2015 work completion) the corridor there will be plenty wide enough and has no impact on the decision to provide (or not) hourly off peak service on KW .

 

[innsertnamehere]

but a lot of the 1.2 billion is paying for tracks that serve Milton and Barrie.

if you don't call the funding for all day 2 way a plan, I don't know what a plan is. Every single one of Metrolinx's plans after 2015 require the transit tax, so saying it isn't planned for is like saying the yonge line isn't planned for, or the DRL isn't planned for, or the Hurontario isn't planned for. It is planned for, and was a cornerstone of the Liberals 2011 election platform. It may not have funding, or exact dates, but it is most certainly planned for.

 

[TOareaFan]

but a lot of the 1.2 billion is paying for tracks that serve Milton and Barrie.

if you don't call the funding for all day 2 way a plan, I don't know what a plan is. Every single one of Metrolinx's plans after 2015 require the transit tax, so saying it isn't planned for is like saying the yonge line isn't planned for, or the DRL isn't planned for, or the Hurontario isn't planned for. It is planned for, and was a cornerstone of the Liberals 2011 election platform. It may not have funding, or exact dates, but it is most certainly planned for.

Since the line upgrades are happening prior to any new revenue tools....the question I ask (and I am not sure why I am having a hard time making it clearl what I am asking) is why this all day service is reliant on the revenue tools....the line will be, at least, double tracked all the way to Mt Pleasant...the population is there....the density is there.....so why not the service.

 

[reaperexpress]

It is a stand alone line that runs from, now, KW to Union......no one (not I not anyone I have read) is suggesting that all day 7 day a week service is required all the way to KW...

I am. And I'm not alone, but I'd have to go look through threads to find usernames.

The Kitchener Line is a perfect candidate for all day every day service, since it has trip generators at many different stations, and it should extend the entire length of the line since Kitchener-Waterloo is being its second largest trip generator

In contrast, most other GO lines serve few destinations other than Downtown Toronto.

The Kitchener Line would make a great Regional Rail (not commuter rail) line, serving the downtowns of Kitchener-Waterloo, Guelph and Brampton in addition to serving Downtown Toronto. Guelph recently opened its new transit hub at Guelph Central GO station, and Waterloo Region is starting work on its new transit hub as well, so the catchment area for those stations will be very large. Sure there isn't as much demand for commutes from KW to Toronto as from Brampton, but there is a lot of demand from KW to Guelph, as well as between other stops along the line.

The Kitchener Line would have much better off-peak ridership than many other lines since its outlying stations have more than houses and parking lots.