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Peterborough Commuter Rail

Rainforest

AnarchoSocialist said:
Because if private enterprise takes over long distance passenger rail service one of the first things they will do is cut most every stop between major centers. One of the benefits of a nationalized rail service is that it provides the best chance for smaller markets to receive service.

Not too say that the private shouldn't have a role to play in long distance passenger rail. When a serious investment is made in high speed rail service partnerships with the private sector should absolutely be undertaken and would provide a lot of benefit. But the public sector should still be the primary actor in delivering services and ensuring that not just those living in the largest cities get service.
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I see the point; however, Canadian airlines are private, and do not mind flying into smaller communities.

For the rail carriers, why ignore passengers from smaller towns, if they bring in extra revenues at virtually zero capital expenses.
 
If this happens I hope the City of Peterborough rethinks how they want to handle the station(s). One location is designated in the Parkway/Sir Sandford Fleming Dr area. Another is needed downtown. A significant portion of the riders will be coming from downtown and the north and east ends of the city, especially students. It would be much easier for them to get on the train downtown than taking a taxi or transit to the suburban station.
 
Rainforest said:
I see the point; however, Canadian airlines are private, and do not mind flying into smaller communities.
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Canada is a country defined by distance. In many cases places are only accessible (within reasonable time) by plane. Natural resources are also critical to many smaller communities too and it is because of that there are enough business travellers too make it worth airlines time to serve those communities. Do you think Northern Alberta would see the service it does were it not for the oil sands? Same with James Bay and Hydro Quebec as an example.

Rainforest said:
For the rail carriers, why ignore passengers from smaller towns, if they bring in extra revenues at virtually zero capital expenses.
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Except private industry has already stated that if they were in charge of high speed rail service in the corridor they would in fact cut out small markets. This was part of what they proposed in the mid 90's with the Lynx Consortium high speed rail proposal (which would have been very profitable for them, after the government made all the expensive infrastructure investments of course). The C.D. Howe Institute also released a study in 2001 on high speed rail in the corridor which said the exact same thing. In the 90's when VIA was encouraged to adopt a more 'business like' method of operating what did it do? Get rid of service to smaller communities and focus on the corridor and expensive tourist routes.

And adding stops might not necessarily add capital expenses, but it does affect the marketability of the product. Every stop adds more time to the total trip, which, especially in the case of high speed rail, reduces the advantages over car or plane travel, which reduces the number of customers it attracts. And if you start adding enough stops and enough time to trips you also need to purchase more rolling stock in order to keep the same frequency of train departures from major centers, which does directly increase capital expenses.
 
MisterF said:
If this happens I hope the City of Peterborough rethinks how they want to handle the station(s). One location is designated in the Parkway/Sir Sandford Fleming Dr area. Another is needed downtown. A significant portion of the riders will be coming from downtown and the north and east ends of the city, especially students. It would be much easier for them to get on the train downtown than taking a taxi or transit to the suburban station.
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The problem is getting it downtown. Until the line reaches downtown, Peterborough Transit will have to upgrade its bus service so that you're not sitting on a bus for 1 1/2 hours to get from one side of the city to the station. In that amount of time you could of hopped into a car and driven all the way to Whitby already.
 
lesouris said:
The problem is getting it downtown. Until the line reaches downtown, Peterborough Transit will have to upgrade its bus service so that you're not sitting on a bus for 1 1/2 hours to get from one side of the city to the station. In that amount of time you could of hopped into a car and driven all the way to Whitby already.
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The line already goes downtown - the old station is on George St just south of Sherbrooke. The long bus rides and expensive cab fares from East City or Trent University are exactly why a downtown station is needed, especially for students without cars. Not to mention serving downtown itself.
 
MisterF said:
The line already goes downtown - the old station is on George St just south of Sherbrooke. The long bus rides and expensive cab fares from East City or Trent University are exactly why a downtown station is needed, especially for students without cars. Not to mention serving downtown itself.
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The line goes through a lot of residential areas and has many level crossings that could cause a problem. Trains come so rarely now you barely notice it. Many use the railway tracks as a short cut when walking - people here aren't used to rail safety. It's too bad the line is coming from SW...from any other direction it would have a shorter distance through the city to get downtown.

I'm not sure how much work the downtown station would need before it could accomodate modern trains, but I would love to see it happen as long as they don't tamper with the original station. We've lost too many beautiful old stations. The other problem with a downtown station would be the lack of parking, but I think if you have the Parkway station for drivers and the downtown one for transit riders/pedestrians/cyclists it might work.

It'd really help the area though if they invested in transit connections to Lindsay, Lakefield, etc. in addition to the train.
 
That's more or less the arrangment I was thinking. That line has daily freight trains, so it's not like the idea of trains is foreign or something. The old downtown station is in good shape and is being used by the Chamber of Commerce and MTO.

Coach Canada provides bus service to surrounding communities like Lindsay and Lakefield. It's obviously not very frequent, but it exists.
 
I think this is the issue that Dean Del Mastro needs to get re-elected. Peterborough is a pretty liberal city surrounded by Tory blue farmland, so the riding swings back and forth. But the rail proposal is very popular in Peterborough and has been a recurring issue for close to 20 years. I think this will make a lot of people vote for Del Mastro when they otherwise wouldn't.

Peterborough should have rail servive without a doubt, but it's a shame that it's being done as a vote-buying scheme instead of a provincial or national rail plan.
 
MisterF said:
I think this is the issue that Dean Del Mastro needs to get re-elected. Peterborough is a pretty liberal city surrounded by Tory blue farmland, so the riding swings back and forth. But the rail proposal is very popular in Peterborough and has been a recurring issue for close to 20 years. I think this will make a lot of people vote for Del Mastro when they otherwise wouldn't.

Peterborough should have rail service without a doubt, but it's a shame that it's being done as a vote-buying scheme instead of a provincial or national rail plan.
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I don't think so many people would use the line especially compared with the costs but I agree that the residents of Peterborough would like it simply because it's once instance where the Province isn't ignoring the Kawarthas. In the past Peterborough was happy not to be associated with the GTA but they've learned their lesson over time. It's not surpising the local politicans aren't about to throw this one back in Del Mastro's face like the provincial people are doing.

Back in the 80's my father commuted from Peterborough to North York using VIA and really liked the service. It filled a niche but wasn't vital to Peterborough's growth. Peterborough has grown a bit since then but nothing compared to the GTA and I don't know if this would spur growth up there or end up being a white elephant.
 
There's no way that a few trains a day would become a white elephant. We've got to stop looking at every new project with an individual profitability analysis. First of all, I think the route has a lot of potential to be lucrative, but more importantly, we have to build a network of intercity rail in Canada. That involves serving every place, not just the busiest routes. It's like the TTC's bus network. Sure, the subway is more profitable than the buses, but transit in Toronto would certainly be a lot less successful if the subway was all that we had. That's what VIA service is like in Ontario right now. Just the subway, no feeder buses.
 
unimaginative2 said:
There's no way that a few trains a day would become a white elephant. We've got to stop looking at every new project with an individual profitability analysis. First of all, I think the route has a lot of potential to be lucrative, but more importantly, we have to build a network of intercity rail in Canada. That involves serving every place, not just the busiest routes. It's like the TTC's bus network. Sure, the subway is more profitable than the buses, but transit in Toronto would certainly be a lot less successful if the subway was all that we had. That's what VIA service is like in Ontario right now. Just the subway, no feeder buses.
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I'm all for a proper rail network throughout Canada, especially seeing as flying becomes less of an option with each passing year. I just don't know that Peterborough has the numbers to justify the costs and hey, I lived there for a number of years and on a personal level would love to see train service there. There's already the 407 coming which would serve the Peterborough region well, gas prices notwithstanding.

Peterborough should not be leading the way because it leaves this marginally popular plan prone to cuts from anyone; rather, it should be part of an overall plan that has more people on board, one in which individual cuts or cancellations will be harder to apply. This plan is especially risky seeing as service was cut once already and if cuts happens again I'm sure Peterborough would once again be at the top of the list. All this talk about recession will shine an unwanted spotlight on projects such as these.
 
in Durham most of the route goes through the Greenbelt/Oak Ridges Moraine.... it does reach the edge of the Pickering Airport, Claremont, and a few other small towns. There is also the potential for people from the northern area of urban Durham (which will go up to 8th Con/Brawley/Howden) and Port Perry/other smaller towns to bus in or park and ride
 
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