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Peterborough Commuter Rail

Rail study expected by end of month
http://www.thepeterboroughexaminer.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=2246846

Posted By BRENDAN WEDLEY , EXAMINER STAFF WRITER

Posted 18 hours ago

A study on how to operate commuter rail service between Peterborough and Toronto should be complete by the end of the month, Peterborough MPP Jeff Leal says.

Metrolinx, the provincial agency responsible for completing the study, is putting together the final version of the report then the document will go to Transport Canada for a peer review, Leal said yesterday.

The introduction of GO Transit bus service between Peterborough and the Oshawa rail station last year was a good first step, Leal said.

"It's important for Peterborough to be part of that system," he said.

A Peterborough Rotary Club member asked Mayor Paul Ayotte for an update on the implementation of commuter rail service to Peterborough during a lunch meeting.

"Jeff Leal gave me a heads up before Christmas that there would be an announcement shortly," Ayotte said.

Metrolinx is being more vague about when the study will be complete and when it will be available to the public.

The agency will give the study to the provincial and federal transportation ministers in winter 2010, states John Howe, Metrolinx vice-president of investment strategy and project evaluation.

"Our federal and provincial partners will decide whether the study will be released to the public," he states in an email provided by a GO Transit spokeswoman yesterday.

The Peterborough commuter rail study needs to be a thoughtful and careful process, Howe states.

Metrolinx is in the process of finalizing the report to ensure this study is accurate, complete and thorough, he states.

Ontario and the federal Conservative government committed as much as $150 million each in the Building Canada Fund agreement towards the Peterborough commuter rail line in July 2008 -- contingent on the results of the Metrolinx study.

The Building Canada agreement the provincial and federal governments signed in July 2008 states the parties "agree to make best efforts to complete the study within one year."

Peterborough MP Dean Del Mastro said in August 2008 that the report was due by March 31, 2009.

In December 2008, Del Mastro said the study should be done by the end of April 2009 or sooner.

Howe said in April last year that Metrolinx was targeting for a fall 2009 completion.

A Metrolinx spokeswoman maintained the fall 2009 completion timeline in an email toThe Examineron Nov. 13.

"We are in the very last stages of finalizing the report to ensure accuracy and completeness," Jacquie Menezes states. "We expect to be ready to submit the final report to our federal and provincial partners in the next few weeks."
 
I think it's a little more complex than that. CP would like the freight line upgraded for reasons related to its own profitability. However, so long as there's the prospect of getting the feds to pay for upgrades as part of a plan to shovel pork into a swing riding, it won't lift a finger to upgrade it itself.
 
Well according to the article the money has already been allocated for this, but it's been delayed because they are awaiting the metrolinx commuter study before doing any upgrades. I suppose because they don't want to make any changes before they know if the line is going to be used for passenger rail in the future.

It bugs me because there is sizable heavy industry in peterborough that would use this rail line a lot more if it was in proper condition.
 
Well then the one to blame is CPRail not the government, they are the ones that have owned the line for 100+ years and are far more reluctant about putting any money into it. Clearly they feel that this "sizable heavy industry" doesn't merit any kind of proper freight service.
 
That's not really the point though, the issue here is that 150 million for improvements to this line has been appropriated for years and the government is not doing anything with it because of this pie in the sky passenger rail dream which is a much sexier issue for the local mp (he basically campaigned on it last time around).
 
What is it about Canadians calling things "pipe dreams" and "pie in the sky" when so many other countries achieve the same things without a second thought? Are we that defeatest in this country?
 
Yes, we are. We're also a country without any sort of vision or forward thinking. Most politicians here are very short-sighted and don't think of what future generations will need. Thats why Canada has a joke of a rail system and why our country's largest urban centre has one of the most inadequate transportation infrastructure in the western hemisphere ( for a 1st world country). Think about it. For a large city region of almost 6M people, we have only 2 subway lines and 1 E-W semi-regional rail line. This city was built without any co-ordinated planning or foresight.
 
lead82 said:
Yes, we are. We're also a country without any sort of vision or forward thinking. Most politicians here are very short-sighted and don't think of what future generations will need. Thats why Canada has a joke of a rail system and why our country's largest urban centre has one of the most inadequate transportation infrastructure in the western hemisphere ( for a 1st world country). Think about it. For a large city region of almost 6M people, we have only 2 subway lines and 1 E-W semi-regional rail line. This city was built without any co-ordinated planning or foresight.
Click to expand...

I'm forced to agree with lead82's assessment. Public transit and rail transit in particular in Toronto, Ontario, and in the ROC are a joke. Unless your measuring stick is the United States, in which case we're doing just dandy.
 
lead82 said:
Yes, we are. We're also a country without any sort of vision or forward thinking. Most politicians here are very short-sighted and don't think of what future generations will need. Thats why Canada has a joke of a rail system and why our country's largest urban centre has one of the most inadequate transportation infrastructure in the western hemisphere ( for a 1st world country). Think about it. For a large city region of almost 6M people, we have only 2 subway lines and 1 E-W semi-regional rail line. This city was built without any co-ordinated planning or foresight.
Click to expand...
You could say that for just about every single possible thing in Canada and it'd be true. Honestly, we have pretty much all the money we need, we have the public will to do things like infrastructure and sustainability, but we just have some of the most incompetent and least visionary leaders in the entire world.

And don't forget that Go is supposed to serve the GGH, so maybe count that closer to around 8 million people.
 
MisterF said:
What is it about Canadians calling things "pipe dreams" and "pie in the sky" when so many other countries achieve the same things without a second thought? Are we that defeatest in this country?
Click to expand...

Well I cant speak for the entire country, but re this passenger rail project, it makes no sense at all. The ridership numbers just aren't there. It's why the service was stopped in the early nineties. I think we will see as much when the study is finally released.
 
nrb said:
Well I cant speak for the entire country, but re this passenger rail project, it makes no sense at all. The ridership numbers just aren't there. It's why the service was stopped in the early nineties. I think we will see as much when the study is finally released.
Click to expand...

I could not agree more, the reintroduction of passenger service is is a political project to benefit a Tory riding. It is ridiculous to compare Europe to Canada - we have FAR less population density. That said, I do wish that there was a serious non-political study of our long and medium distance rail needs; I think we can probably justify better/faster longer distance passenger rail in the Quebec and Windsor (and maybe Niagara Falls) corridor, both would link to proposed US high speed lines. As these lines would have little or no freight traffic they could also serve 'commuter traffic", such as the Lakeshore east and west parts of the present GO network.
 
nrb said:
Well I cant speak for the entire country, but re this passenger rail project, it makes no sense at all. The ridership numbers just aren't there. It's why the service was stopped in the early nineties. I think we will see as much when the study is finally released.
Click to expand...
The service was stopped in the early 90s because the track was (and still is) in terrible shape, and trains moved at a snail's pace. When you let let your infrastructure fall into disrepair, of course ridership is going to suffer.

DSC said:
I could not agree more, the reintroduction of passenger service is is a political project to benefit a Tory riding. It is ridiculous to compare Europe to Canada - we have FAR less population density.
Click to expand...
That's just not true and it's about time we stopped hanging onto this self-defeating myth. Much of Europe has the same or lower population density than the Windsor-Quebec corridor, including places with highly developed rail systems like France, Spain, Turkey, Scandinavia, Scotland, and Ireland.
 
MisterF said:
The service was stopped in the early 90s because the track was (and still is) in terrible shape, and trains moved at a snail's pace. When you let let your infrastructure fall into disrepair, of course ridership is going to suffer.


That's just not true and it's about time we stopped hanging onto this self-defeating myth. Much of Europe has the same or lower population density than the Windsor-Quebec corridor, including places with highly developed rail systems like France, Spain, Turkey, Scandinavia, Scotland, and Ireland.
Click to expand...
For most things, I agree with the argument that poor service is the cause of low ridership. But in this case, it really isn't. Peterborough really isn't very well connected with Toronto or the rest of the GGH, and unless it's willing to pursue such connections, a commuter or regional rail would be almost useless. Of course, Peterborough could become an integral part of the GGH, with it's own industry and businesses and population that interacts heavily with the rest of the GTA. But for now, extending Go service can only be explained as a political action.
I'd love to see the tracks upgraded and worked on to help the industry in Peterborough and to add more shipping routes, but a passenger system would currently get a very low ridership, especially if it's a commuter system as Go currently is.
EDIT: When I say "connections," I don't mean actual infrastructure connections, but business and industry connections. For instance, the entire population of Peterborough county that commutes to the GTA everyday is probably about equal to ONE full Go train. On top of that, transit from the Go station may be inconvenient to some people, and so they'll drive instead. So that ends you up with less than one full Go train a day per direction, which could be served much better and much more flexibly with a bus.

The second point is actually really, really true and I don't understand how people fail to understand that we're very much capable of supporting not only Quebec-Windsor HSR, but also many regional and local systems in between. The St. Lawrence/Great Lakes region is very comparable to places in Western Europe like TGV corridors. Add to that the fact that the entire corridor is going to be increasing substantially in population, probably with a base increase of 1/4, probably quite higher depending on future government's take on immigration. Aaaand add that it connects the brunt of the two most populous provinces and two most populous cities in the country with the capital and together... you get the point.
 
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