Ten years ago, I wrote about travelling to Stratford, Ontario by train, lamenting the slow ride and the limited schedule. Now that limited GO train service has returned to Festival City, I thought I’d go for another ride, on Sunday October 18. I also took the opportunity to ride on country roads between Stratford and St. Marys and back while the weather was still good.
Earlier this year, GO Transit introduced one daily train between Stratford and Toronto, a partial restoration of an ill-fated train that went all the way to London. On weekdays, one of the peak express trains to and from Kitchener was extended to Stratford. On weekends and holidays, a new train departs Union Station at 8:49 AM; the return trip departs Stratford at 6:07 PM.
The weekend GO train has operated sporadically throughout the summer and fall of 2026; the Kitchener Corridor is partially closed on certain weekends between Union and Mount Dennis and between Mount Pleasant and Kitchener/Stratford for construction work at the new Stockyards Station, improvements at Guelph Station, construction at the Grand River bridge near Kitchener, and other track work. Though Stratford’s tourism office promotes the service, it can take some thoughtful planning to actually take advantage of the ride.
GO previously called at Stratford as part of a two-year pilot extension to London between October 2021 and October 2023. The problems with that service were two-fold. The track conditions west of Kitchener makes for a very slow ride, taking over four hours between Toronto and London, while VIA trains through Aldershot and Brantford could do the trip in almost half the time. By 2021, there were new bus operators between Toronto and London, competing on price and schedule, typically a 2-3 hour ride between the two cities.
The London departure time of 5:20 AM was very early in the morning, even for commuters to Kitchener-Waterloo. The scheduled arrival at Union at 9:13 AM was too late for many office workers. A four hour ride on a GO train is just too long with quad seating intended for much shorter 30-60 minute rides. For Stratford commuters, however, the 6:43 departure made for a more attractive option.
Despite GO’s return to Stratford, VIA still stops here once a day. Until 1990, VIA offered five trains between Stratford and Toronto, that was cut to just two after the devastating cuts that year. The second train (mornings westbound and evenings eastbound) disappeared during the pandemic and never returned. A few dozen people were waiting for the 11:20 eastbound midmorning train, which had to wait for the GO train to get out of the way, departing Stratford at 11:41.
Despite the loss of one of the two VIA trains, Stratford has more travel options in 2026 than it has in many years. There is a daily Flixbus run between Toronto, Stratford, and London. PC Connect‘s routes link Stratford with Kitchener/Waterloo, St. Marys, and London six days a week. There’s still the Festival shuttle for ticketholders. And now there’s the GO train.
Despite the resumption of GO service, there are still some issues that will have to be addressed. After Metrolinx acquired the Georgetown-Kitchener section of track from CN, it made several improvements including a new passing siding east of Kitchener and improving speeds through Downtown Guelph, up to 45 MPH from 10 MPH (railways in Canada still use miles instead of kilometres). West of Kitchener, the track continues to be owned by CN (which took over operations from the Goderich-Exeter short line several years ago) but remains in fair or poor condition, with bolted rail and multiple permanent slow orders. Through western Kitchener, the train crawled at 16 km/h (10 MPH), before increasing somewhat to 45-48 km/h in Wilmot Township. West of New Hamburg, the train reached speeds of just over 90 km/h. The Kitchener-Stratford section took just over an hour, despite a distance of just 42 kilometres. The screenshots from a GPS app on my phone below depict the speeds along this part.
For a weekend excursion train, the added delays from these slow zones (an additional 10 minutes) do not really matter but they have been causing trouble in the morning peak, with the late departures causing delays and overcrowding at the Brampton stations. On Monday, October 26, the departures and arrivals at Stratford were adjusted to account for this.
As GO Transit’s Stratford service is not yet a permanent, long-term commitment, there are no Presto or fare vending machines at Stratford; customers must purchase their fares on their smartphones. On weekends, GO still offers a $10 day pass, otherwise the fare is $25 one-way. The weekend trains are just six cars long, with only the cab car and the accessible car opening at the short Stratford platform. Bringing a bike on or off can be a challenge if the two spots in the cab car are taken — it will mean getting it up and down the stairs and between the coaches, as I had to on my return trip — to get to the next bike-permitted area.
Unfortunately, the PC Connect bus service may be cut back, as the Town of St. Marys is no longer interested in helping to subsidize it. Instead, St. Marys is more interested in a local service, likely an on-demand system, rather than the limited fixed-route. That might mean the end of the London connection, if not the entire service. Though there is still Flixbus and GO, it might make it harder for students and commuters to get to universities and colleges in neighbouring cities, or for residents to get to work, health services, or social connections.
If the provincial government is committed to the Stratford service, it should either pay CN to upgrade the track to at least the standard it was in the 1980s, when VIA trains were consistently travelling at 70 MPH (110 km/h), or purchase the corridor outright, as it did east of Kitchener. In the meantime, it should ensure the continued operation of PC Connect, perhaps with better integration with the GO services in Kitchener-Waterloo. Metrolinx, as it continues to expand far beyond the Toronto/Hamilton area, should also consider different car configurations for longer trips for passenger comfort, especially as it takes over markets previously served by VIA.
Furthermore, Stratford should be a minihub for Midwestern Ontario, with connecting buses to places like Clinton and Goderich on Highway 8 and up to Listowel, Wingham on Highway 86, even as far as Kincardine.
Ride to St. Marys
St. Marys is about 20 kilometres from Stratford, easily bikeable by way of mostly flat country roads parallel to Highway 7. Though the ride to St. Marys was made difficult by a strong, cold wind from the southwest, the ride back to Stratford was very pleasant. Traffic on Perth South Road 122 was light, with every passing motorist courteous and giving lots of space. Short sections of the ride were on unpaved roads, however.
St. Marys was once the junction between the Grand Trunk Railway’s 1850s Toronto-Sarnia mainline and a branch south to London. After the Grand Trunk merged with the Great Western, whose southern Ontario mainline passed through Hamilton and London, the old Sarnia route, which served communities such as Forest and Lucan, became a branch line, eventually abandoned in the 1980s. Happily, the bridge over the North Thames River remained in place and was later converted to a short trail within town.
The historic stone St. Marys Junction station, abandoned and fenced off for years, recently became an independent brewery. Despite being a bit of a way from St. Marys’ downtown, the place was busy, and worth the stop on the way back to Stratford.
Leave a Reply