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VIA Rail

EnviroTO said:
It is mainly driven by a desire for frequent service on the Kitchener lines (beyond Bramalea) and Milton lines. Ford government's assures us it isn't necessary "because they have found a way that doesn't require it" which is absolute nonsense unless they are really saying the way not to do it is to not be frequent. Seriously they expect us to believe they have the ability to increase service on the line without the by-pass, but for some reason a the frequent service planned and electrification will end at Bramalea instead of Brampton downtown or Mount Pleasant (Metrolinx station naming rule error detected). Who believes that? End service in Bramalea?? Makes no sense for what they are saying.
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Could it be because of a planned separation of local and express trains from Bramalea to Union? Intuitively it would make sense for the majority of Kitchener-Union trains to have limited stops within the GTA in order to maintain a competitive trip time, ideally with transfers to local trains somewhere in Brampton to allow access to the otherwise skipped stops. Honestly, HFR to Kitchener seems to make more sense than all day frequent GO service. Of course, neither is possible without dedicated tracks.
 
ManyQuestions said:
Could it be because of a planned separation of local and express trains from Bramalea to Union? Intuitively it would make sense for the majority of Kitchener-Union trains to have limited stops within the GTA in order to maintain a competitive trip time, ideally with transfers to local trains somewhere in Brampton to allow access to the otherwise skipped stops. Honestly, HFR to Kitchener seems to make more sense than all day frequent GO service. Of course, neither is possible without dedicated tracks.
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Service to Kitchener should be semi-express, yes, regardless of whether it’s GO or VIA. That is indeed what the four-tracking will enable. The end service pattern may be a mixture of GO and VIA trains, although one hears interesting rumours otherwise.

The “HFR paradigm“ would indeed suggest that passenger should have its own row to remove conflict with freight. It sounds like ML has discarded this approach ie has killed the bypass and has found some as yet unannounced accord with CN over the Bramalea-Georgetown segment. One wonders how this can be workable west of Toronto when the playing field that VIa faces with HFR east of Toronto is said to be so slanted against passenger. The Halton line is just as busy as the Kingston Sub and the track is more space constrained. Did ML simply cave to whatever CN wants? Or is ML about to get burned?

The other bigger question is whether a new alignment ought to be considered to enable the Pearson Union Station West concept. This might imply a new HSR-friendly alignment running west from Pearson. The Collenette study appeared to contemplate this. While it’s easy to dismiss as “too expensie” and “too far off”, it ought to be inserted in the local land use planning, before more big expensive buildings are built in the way.

- Paul

PS - CN’s use of the Kitchener-London segment is much less intensive. This line is a good candidate to be upgraded in the same way Ottawa-Brockville was, with the “second tier” mixed use format that has been discussed here. People overlook that Smiths Falls-Brockville is used by freight daily, in the wee hours. While freight is handled Kitchener-Stratford-London, making it a predominantly passenger line would not crimp CN’s style as it would on the Kingston Sub or east of Georgetown.
 
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crs1026 said:
Service to Kitchener should be semi-express, yes, regardless of whether it’s GO or VIA. That is indeed what the four-tracking will enable. The end service pattern may be a mixture of GO and VIA trains, although one hears interesting rumours otherwise.

The “HFR paradigm“ would indeed suggest that passenger should have its own row to remove conflict with freight. It sounds like ML has discarded this approach ie has killed the bypass and has found some as yet unannounced accord with CN over the Bramalea-Georgetown segment. One wonders how this can be workable west of Toronto when the playing field that VIa faces with HFR east of Toronto is said to be so slanted against passenger. The Halton line is just as busy as the Kingston Sub and the track is more space constrained. Did ML simply cave to whatever CN wants? Or is ML about to get burned?

The other bigger question is whether a new alignment ought to be considered to enable the Pearson Union Station West concept. This might imply a new HSR-friendly alignment running west from Pearson. The Collenette study appeared to contemplate this. While it’s easy to dismiss as “too expensie” and “too far off”, it ought to be inserted in the local land use planning, before more big expensive buildings are built in the way.

- Paul

PS - CN’s use of the Kitchener-London segment is much less intensive. This line is a good candidate to be upgraded in the same way Ottawa-Brockville was, with the “second tier” mixed use format that has been discussed here. People overlook that Smiths Falls-Brockville is used by freight daily, in the wee hours. While freight is handled Kitchener-Stratford-London, making it a predominantly passenger line would not crimp CN’s style as it would on the Kingston Sub or east of Georgetown.
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To be honest, if they could run at 90-100mph for the majority of the route, it would be better than driving.
 
I think VIA should tell Queen's Park that HFR West is conditional on Metrolinx building the freight bypass. In exchange, the feds need to get rolling on the Pearson hub.
 
kEiThZ said:
I think VIA should tell Queen's Park that HFR West is conditional on Metrolinx building the freight bypass. In exchange, the feds need to get rolling on the Pearson hub.
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The conspiracy theorist in me thinks that all this delay is all, indeed, a poker match over who pays for what. But you give VIA a lot of credit for having leverage. My theory was the reverse - it’s QP telling VIA to pay for the bypass because QP can live with whatever CN allows GO, and for all they care VIA can take the table scraps.

- Paul
 
VIA can use the Dundas sub. They don't need to use the line to Kitchener.

Also VIA is a crown corporation which has a federal mandate, has no relationship with the province of Ontario.
 
Bordercollie said:
To be honest, if they could run at 90-100mph for the majority of the route, it would be better than driving.
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That is the idea behind HFR in general. Be fast, frequent, reliable and affordable enough to be competitive with driving. There is a trade-off between speed and ticket price, something that HSR or bust zeolites seem to ignore.
 
Bordercollie said:
VIA can use the Dundas sub. They don't need to use the line to Kitchener.
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They can't use the Dundas Sub to serve Kitchener, which is a huge market on its own.

Also, don't assume that VIA has the option to add service on the Dundas Sub. The may be close to the limit of what CN will allow. Same issue as east of Toronto - the key element to boosting ridership is frequency, but freight interference prevents that. VIA should not try to push CN much further on the Dundas, but work towards something on the Kitchener line where CN may be more flexible.

Bordercollie said:
Also VIA is a crown corporation which has a federal mandate, has no relationship with the province of Ontario.
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VIA and Ontario have a huge interdependency in transportation delivery. We will only have effective transportation if they are able to cooperate and work to common purpose. Siloing the two on a "no relationship" theme is exactly what has been getting in the way. Plus, in the end Ottawa does pay a share of provincially mandated transportation costs, and the Province is forced to negotiate with CN/CP under federal governance, so let's not pretend Ottawa is absent from that relationship.

I believe VIA's mandate in the Ontario-Quebec corridor is "intercity". It's perverse how that mandate mostly ends at Toronto, leaving Southern Ontario service to the Province. High Frequency service needs to be pushed further west.

- Paul
 
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The Province's cancellation of the Missing Link project was justified based on the fact that CN would permit all-day GO service to Kitchener on an upgraded CN Halton sub, presumably 1 or 2 GO trains per hour.

But the Missing Link wasn't just a way to bring an hourly service to Kitchener, it would have been a total game-changer for passenger rail west of Toronto, creating a passenger-rail-controlled corridor from Toronto to London. HFR West would become totally practical, as well as frequent local service which actually makes it from Toronto to downtown Brampton rather than turning back one stop short at Bramalea. As @crs1026 mentioned, CN's traffic is pretty light between London and Kitchener, so they probably wouldn't mind selling that segment to ML or VIA (while retaining trackage rights). The main reason that hasn't happened yet is that without the bypass in place, the passenger agencies can't count on running enough trains to justify their investment in the line.

Here's how that dedicated passenger line could fit into our mainline rail network:
Green = Metrolinx/GO
Red = CP
Blue = CN
Capture.JPG


In this scenario I showed ML owning the line all the way to London, but VIA could equally own the segment west of Kitchener if that works out better logistically.
 
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reaperexpress said:
The Province's cancellation of the Missing Link project was justified based on the fact that CN would permit all-day GO service to Kitchener on an upgraded CN Halton sub, presumably 1 or 2 GO trains per hour.

But the Missing Link wasn't just a way to bring an hourly service to Kitchener, it would have been a total game-changer for passenger rail west of Toronto, creating a passenger-rail-controlled corridor from Toronto to London. HFR West would become totally practical, as well as frequent local service which actually makes it from Toronto to downtown Brampton rather than turning back one stop short at Bramalea. As @crs1026 mentioned, CN's traffic is pretty light between London and Kitchener, so they probably wouldn't mind selling that segment to ML or VIA (while retaining trackage rights). The main reason that hasn't happened yet is that without the bypass in place, the passenger agencies can't count on running enough trains to justify their investment in the line.

Here's how that dedicated passenger line could fit into our mainline rail network:
Green = Metrolinx/GO
Red = CP
Blue = CN
View attachment 305492

In this scenario I showed ML owning the line all the way to London, but VIA could equally own the segment west of Kitchener if that works out better logistically.
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It's a shame really that despite all the posturing about improving passenger rail, CN still has us by the balls in one of the most critical corridors. At this point I rather the country or province just build the track and force CN to move onto that track. Obviously no one has the political spine to touch this corporation while they can hold Canadian passenger rail hostage to their whims
 
reaperexpress said:
But the Missing Link wasn't just a way to bring an hourly service to Kitchener, it would have been a total game-changer for passenger rail west of Toronto
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Would the missing link also have allowed some CP trains to use the CN line to by-pass Toronto freeing up part of the Milton like for all-day service? Or was it focused only on CN trains?
 
trebello said:
Would the missing link also have allowed some CP trains to use the CN line to by-pass Toronto freeing up part of the Milton like for all-day service? Or was it focused only on CN trains?
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The missing link was only between Milton and Brampton. To free up the midtown line it would require paralleling of the CN track from Brampton to Scarborough.
 
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