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GO Transit: Service thread (including extensions)

Leo_Chan said:
Does the Richmond Hill Line always depart and arrive on Platform 3 at Union Station. Does this apply to any other line?
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Not sure about the midday trains but in peak hours you are pretty safe heading to platforms 9/10 for a Kitchener train.

I think all the trains have regular tracks.....but there is always the caveat of “*subject to change”.
 
Leo_Chan said:
Does the Richmond Hill Line always depart and arrive on Platform 3 at Union Station. Does this apply to any other line?
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I think each scheduled train has a "planned" platform for both arrival and departure...but GO always highlights it is subject to change each and every trip.

Here's the last round of changes:

gotransit.com/platformchanges

When I park at Gormley, the RH train is almost always on Platform 3 (arriving and departing).

Barrie is more of a mash-up:

Afternoon peak is a mix of 11/12 or 13.
Morning peak varies.

I arrived on today's 10:33am on platforms 9/10. The electronic signs displayed platform 24 for the 10:40 NB.
 
Reecemartin said:
When is the Bay Concourse operning? Do we have any progress info? Has anyone tried any of the new shops that seem to have opened below the great hall?
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I believe it is set to finish construction in late 2018 or early 2019 and be handed over to Metrolinx at that time. I have heard that it would likely open in Mid 2019 on that timeframe.

I've tried a few of the new shops:
  • Pilot Coffee is very good, approaching the level of the best coffee I've had, few places in Toronto surpass it; they seem to have some nice cookies and other small food items that I hope to try.
  • Danish Pastry House was disappointing; we tried a loaf of cinnamon bun-esque bread (horribly stale), a chocolate log (overly sweet), some chocolate-covered meringue balls (plain mediocre), and some gingerbread cookies (dried to a crisp). Won't be going back.
  • Amano is excellent, some of the best pasta I've had in the city, but it's horribly overpriced and the portions are tiny. They have a nice takeout counter with some sandwiches and desserts that I hope to try. Nice to have somewhere in the main part of the station to have a glass of wine after a long day if desired--the Mill St lounge in the UPX station has terrible/nonexistent customer service so I've stopped going there.
Still need to try Union Chicken. Looking forward to WVRST, the Biscotteria, and the food court (especially Loaded Pierogi) opening. Shame that Burger's Priest was cancelled, I was looking forward to it the most by far.
 
Which freight train would be holding this up? The one that serves the chemical plants and the plastic plant between the 407 and Finch?

2EVwwNj
 
Allandale25 said:
Which freight train would be holding this up? The one that serves the chemical plants and the plastic plant between the 407 and Finch?
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It says SB trains begin at Rutherford, and NB trains end at Rutherford, so it's north of Rutherford. There's spurs serving industrial yards at Keele and McNaughton, King Rd and Dufferin, and north of Bradford station. It could also be coming down from Barrie's south industrial area or Collingwood. Take your pick.
 
Reecemartin said:
Do we expect GO/UP's ridership to increase due to the new fare integration? Will be interesting to see if 2018 experiences a ridership jump from 2017.
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A savings of $1.50 wouldn't suddenly start making me ride more, but it will be interesting to see if it has an impact.
 
DonValleyRainbow said:
It says SB trains begin at Rutherford, and NB trains end at Rutherford, so it's north of Rutherford. There's spurs serving industrial yards at Keele and McNaughton, King Rd and Dufferin, and north of Bradford station. It could also be coming down from Barrie's south industrial area or Collingwood. Take your pick.
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CN only goes north of Rutherford a couple of times a week, whereas they go south of Steeles just about every day. And so I suspect that it's the train that went south that caused the delays. Because of the new Barrie line schedule, it's much harder for an off-peak late train to make up its time until it gets to Union Station - it needs to be in just the right place, and at the right time - and so short-turning it at Rutherford would allow it to head southbound and be in the right slot for the meet to happen.

Dan
Toronto, Ont.
 
Is it possible that the "freight train traffic" was south of Rutherford but impacted on the schedule so much that would have lost their Union 'slot' if they didn't re-jig?

I can't remember the last time I saw a freight run down the Newmarket Sub. from. Barrie. All Barrie industrial traffic is handled by BCR to CP Mactier Sub. The line to Collingwood is embargoed.
 
DonValleyRainbow said:
But that doesn't make sense. If CN were south of Steeles, GO wouldn't be able to run from Union to Rutherford.
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Not necessarily. If they took too long to get off of the single-track section, and then occupied one of the two main lines between Snider South and Steeles while the GO trains passed, the delays could be such as to have resulted in the issues we saw.

lenaitch said:
I can't remember the last time I saw a freight run down the Newmarket Sub. from. Barrie. All Barrie industrial traffic is handled by BCR to CP Mactier Sub. The line to Collingwood is embargoed.
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BCRY does not interchange with CN - only with CP at Utopia. CN does have a number of freight customers as far north as Bradford on the line, however.

Dan
Toronto, Ont.
 
smallspy said:
Not necessarily. If they took too long to get off of the single-track section, and then occupied one of the two main lines between Snider South and Steeles while the GO trains passed, the delays could be such as to have resulted in the issues we saw.
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I guess that would arise from not using the wye on the south side of the York sub for some reason? Or maybe not getting clearance to occupy the southernmost track on the York sub?
 
Here's my end-of-2017 summary of Canadian commuter rail schedules:

Improvements during 2017 highlighted in green, deteriorations highlighted in red
screen-shot-2017-12-29-at-19-59-52.png


The Barrie line is now more frequent on weekends than the Deux-Montagnes line in Montreal. The DM line continues to provide disappointingly poor service for such a densely-populated urban railway operated by EMUs.

When I started making these summaries in January 2015, the Toronto and Montreal lines were fairly interspersed on the chart, as ranked by weekday frequency. But now in 2018, the chart is looking more sorted, with Toronto at the top, Montreal in the middle, and Vancouver on the bottom. In those 3 years, the number of weekday GO Transit train departures has doubled from 123 per direction to 248, and the number of weekend departures has more than doubled from 64 per direction to 158. Meanwhile the number of departures on the other systems has remained the same.

If anyone can find more updated ridership stats it would be greatly appreciated. Metrolinx constantly publishes extremely detailed ridership data for UP Express, but I can't find much for the other lines. And speaking of UP Express, it's now averaging around 11,000 passengers per day, which is five times the 2200 passengers per day it was averaging before the fares were cut in half.

Full text from https://ontariotrafficman.wordpress.com/2017/12/30/canadian-commuter-rail-summary-2017/

For the third year in a row, there have been major expansions of train service in Ontario, but no improvements anywhere else in the country.

Frequency

On June 24th, all-day weekday train service was introduced on the GO Transit Stouffville line with off-peak trains every hour between Toronto and Unionville. Trains cross each other using the pre-existing double-track between Unionville and Milliken stations, as well as the triple-tracked mainline between Scarborough and Union. But because the line is still mostly single-track, there is a gap in service during peak periods in the counter-peak direction.

On December 30th, the GO Transit Barrie Line also received all-day weekday train service, with off-peak trains every hour between Toronto and Aurora. Those trains cross each other using a new segment of double-track between York University and Rutherford stations, which was completed mere days before the start of service. But as with the Stouffville line, there is no service on weekdays in the counter-peak direction, because there are not enough sidings to encounter all the frequent trains heading in the peak direction. The new track also allowed the weekend service to improve from every 75 minutes to every 60 minutes.

When I started making these summaries in January 2015, the Toronto and Montreal lines were fairly interspersed on the chart, as ranked by weekday frequency. But now in 2018, the chart is looking more sorted, with Toronto at the top, Montreal in the middle, and Vancouver on the bottom. In those 3 years, the number of weekday GO Transit train departures has doubled from 123 per direction to 248, and the number of weekend departures has more than doubled from 64 per direction to 158. Meanwhile the number of departures on the other systems has remained the same.

The big news outside of Ontario has been a restructuring of the former Agence Métropolitaine de Transport (AMT) into separate operating (RTM – Réseau de Transport Métropolitain) and planning (ARTM – Autorité Régionale de Transport Métropolitain) agencies. As far as I can tell, the train service is the same as always, though there are now fewer restrictions on bringing bicycles onto trains.

Speed

There has unfortunately only been negative change in average speeds, as measured during the AM Peak period in the peak direction.

The GO Transit Barrie Line is now 2 minutes slower because York University GO station has remained open despite the opening of the new Downsview Park station nearby. The Barrie is now no longer the fastest commuter line in Canada during peak periods, but it retains that title at other times, when trains skip York University station and average 62 km/h.
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