Sean Marshall

Tag: Orangeville

  • Orangeville’s free ride

    Orangeville’s free ride

    Buses on the Orange and Blue routes await departure at Orangeville Transit’s transfer hub

    Earlier in December 2025, I took a short trip to Orangeville, Ontario, to take a ride on the province’s only fare-free transit system. Though Orangeville Transit provides a vital service for the town’s residents, the fare-free service is not necessarily a model for larger transit systems.

    The town of Orangeville, population approximately 30,000, is on the outer edge of the Greater Toronto & Hamilton Area. Until 2021, it was connected to the Canadian Pacific mainline at Streetsville by a municipally-owned railway; Highways 9 and 10 link the town with Highways 400 and 410. GO Transit runs a limited weekday bus service from Brampton, and the remnant of Grey County’s GTR system runs between Orangeville, Shelburne, and Dundalk.

    Orangeville Transit, GO Transit, and GTR Route 2 signs on Hansen Blvd.

    These three services meet at a curbside stop on Hansen Boulevard at First Street adjacent to the Orangeville Mall on the north side of town, where there is a standard bus shelter. After getting off the GO bus here, a GTR van arrived a few minutes later, dropping off a few more passengers. A few minutes after that, a yellow school bus arrived, sporting an Orangeville Transit sticker on the side. This would be my bus.

    Yellow school bus in Orangeville Transit service

    Though Orangeville has a fleet of four 30-foot buses, there have been reliability issues with those vehicles. First Transit, the contracted operator, uses its school buses to substitute for those.

    After a winding route through several residential subdivisions, circling back on Hansen Boulevard, the bus arrived at the central transfer point located in a field west of the downtown core. The transfer point, located behind a small shopping plaza, is adjacent to the abandoned Orangeville-Brampton Railway corridor. However, the new terminal is not served by GO or GTR. GO Transit buses layover at the old Canadian Pacific Railway station site on Townline before heading south to Brampton GO Station.

    Orangeville Transit map, with two routes operating on 45-minute schedules

    In some ways, the fare-free service in Orangeville is a success. Ridership more than doubled between 2019 and 2023, the year it introduced free fares. The program has since been extended through 2026. However, Orangeville Transit is a very small operation, with only two routes, each on a 45-minute schedule. The two routes are made up of circuitous, one-way loops that provide service to the entire municipality, but do not provide through or speedy service.

    Though large systems, like GO Transit and the Toronto Transit Commission, get more than half their funding from fare revenue (in the late 1990s, fares made up 80% of the operating costs for those two systems due to provincial austerity), smaller systems, with lower costs, can get by with free fares. This is also true of some mid-sized American systems, such as Richmond, Albuquerque, or Kansas City, where fare collection might be more trouble than it is worth. But there’s a trade off; for many riders, a more frequent and faster ride would be worth a few dollars — reliable government funding along with targeted reduced fare programs might be a better solution.

    In Orangeville’s case, the rider gets what they pay for — a slow, infrequent, and circuitous service where you might end up picked up by a school bus.

    Transit journeys, wrapped

    Orangeville Transit was the last of 32 distinct transit services I got to ride in 2025 and was one of 10 systems I rode for the first time (another three of those were in Italy). Unfortunately, my first ride on Deseronto Transit was also my last. With the obvious exception of the Vatican, I have been on at least one transit service in every one of the 21 countries I’ve been to so far.

    Local and regional transit systems taken in 2025:
    Toronto Transit Commission
    GO Transit
    Brampton Transit
    MiWay
    York Region Transit
    Durham Region Transit
    Burlington Transit
    Hamilton Street Railway
    Orangeville Transit (1st time)
    Simcoe County Linx 
    Barrie Transit
    Wasaga Beach Transit (1st time)
    London Transit
    Deseronto Transit (RIP)
    Belleville Transit
    Kingston Transit
    Brockville Transit (1st time)
    River Route (1st time)
    Transit Windsor
    LTW Transit (1st time)
    Thunder Bay Transit (1st time)
    OC Transpo
    Société de transport de l’Outaouais (Gatineau QC)
    Société de transport de Montréal
    Winnipeg Transit 
    Calgary Transit
    TransLink (Metro Vancouver)
    BC Transit (Greater Victoria)
    Azienda Napoletana Mobilità (Naples) (1st time)
    Azienda per la mobilità di Roma Capitale (1st time)
    Ente Autonomo Volturno (Campagna IT) (1st time)

  • Lost in the weeds: OBRY, 18 months later

    Lost in the weeds: OBRY, 18 months later

    After the last train departed from Orangeville on December 17, 2021, the Orangeville-Brampton Railway (OBRY) became yet another abandoned railway, the last chapter of a once-expansive network of rails that branched out across Midwestern Ontario. Orangeville was the divisional point of Canadian Pacific’s Bruce lines, which served Owen Sound, Walkerton, Teeswater, Fergus and Elora, and dozens of towns and villages en route. By 1995, all of those branches were abandoned by CP, so in 2000, the Town of Orangeville purchased the remaining bit of track to serve local industries, and even launched a scenic excursion train, the Credit Valley Explorer, several years later. For about a decade, the future looked bright.

    The Town of Orangeville, which was eager to walk away from the railway it once proudly owned, was quick to tear up the tracks within its boundaries, soon to be replaced by a new multi-use path. In July 2023, the ties are still mostly in place, for now, waiting to be dug up, and while the road crossings are now smooth, signal gantries are still standing on Broadway and Townline Road.

    At the old yards and station grounds, the “new” station building, opened in 2007 for the Credit Valley Explorer and an office for OBRY rail crews, is being used as a temporary branch of the Orangeville Public Library, as the main Mill Street location undergoes major renovations.

    Warped rails and ties on the old railbed at Townline Road, Orangeville
    Railway crossing signal gantries on Townline Road, stripped of their crossbucks and lights
    The “new” Orangeville station, built for the Credit Valley Explorer and an office for OBRY crews; currently used as a temporary location for the Orangeville Public Library

    Through Caledon and Brampton, however, the track remains mostly in place, though it has largely been covered by weeds. Near Alton, the Mile 31 signpost remains erect, though nature has completely taken over the right-of-way.

    The Region of Peel now owns the corridor, with the promise of a new rail trail, though with the impending disbandment of that upper-tier municipality, it will be up to the Town of Caledon and the Cities of Brampton and Mississauga (and possibly Credit Valley Conservation) to follow through with removing the rails and ties and putting down a new trail.

    Mile 31 signpost, north of Alton

    In the meantime, the Region of Peel removed the crossings of Highway 136 near Alton. The rusted track simply disappears into the roadbed on either side. The crossing at Mayfield Road at the Brampton/Caledon border has also been removed to allow for widening of that major arterial road. Otherwise, the tracks are still in place, though weeds, debris, and concrete blocks placed at several bridges to deter unauthorized use, have made the rails impassable.

    The abandoned OBRY track disappears at Highway 136 (Porterfield Road)
    The former Highway 136 (Queen Street) crossing in Alton

    At several crossings, the crossbucks, lights and bells have been removed, replaced with warnings to plow drivers to raise their blades at the disused tracks.

    At Old School Road, the crossbucks are gone; new signs warn snowplow drivers to raise their blades at the abandoned tracks

    In Brampton, though, transit buses still stop at the crossings on Queen Street, Bovaird Drive, and Steeles Avenue as if anytime was still train time. The signals protecting the diamond at the busy CN line in Downtown Brampton are still active, 18 months since the last train passed through on the Orangeville line.

    When I last passed by the diamond, on July 5, I saw work equipment on the old OBRY right-of-way, so perhaps that, too, is not long for this world.

    Looking north to the Brampton diamond; an excavator can be seen just north of the CN mainline
  • Off the rails

    Off the rails

    The tracks have been ripped out from the once-proud Orangeville-Brampton Railway

    Despite calls for the preservation of the Orangeville-Brampton Railway since its discontinuation in December 2021, the removal of rails on the 150-year old line that once connected Toronto with Owen Sound, Teeswater, and points between began this week.

    The Town of Orangeville aims to replace the tracks with a multi-use path through the municipality. The Region of Peel is likely to purchase most of the remaining section, with the right-of-way likely to become another recreational trail through Caledon and north Brampton. I will continue to document the railway’s demise and the route’s future.

    In the meantime, the rusty rails await their removal.

    Looking west at Centre Street, Orangeville, March 30, 2022
    The hi-rail excavator sitting in the Orangeville yard, March 30, 2022. A pile of removed rails sits in front.
    At Brampton, signals continue to protect the CN mainline despite the abandonment of the old CP route
    A Sarnia-bound VIA Train crosses the Brampton diamond, March 25, 2022. Who knows how long it will be before the diamond is removed for good?
    End of the line – video of track removal at Orangeville by Jeremy Williams
  • The end of the line for the Orangeville-Brampton Railway

    The end of the line for the Orangeville-Brampton Railway

    The current end of track of the once-important Owen Sound Subdivision, on the outskirts of Orangeville. Beyond, a new paved trail occupies the former right-of-way.

    On Townline Road on the south end of Orangeville, across the street from the old railway yard and station grounds, two plaques stand, telling the history of the doomed railway next to them.

    The first plaque, a faded provincial marker, commemorates the Toronto, Grey and Bruce Railway, which arrived in Orangeville in 1871 and completed to Owen Sound in 1873. The TG&B was combined with the rival Credit Valley Railway by the Canadian Pacific Railway, and Orangeville became the headquarters of a network of branch lines known as the CP Bruce Division. Passenger service to Owen Sound via Brampton and Orangeville continued until 1970.

    The second marker, installed by the Town of Orangeville, commemorates the municipal takeover of the remnants of the Bruce Division, after CP abandoned all track west and north of Orangeville in the 1980s and 1990s. The plaque proudly boasts of a “successful passenger tourist operation” and how the new short line “enhanced opportunities for the long-term economic development of the region.”

    The municipal plaque is sadly out of date. The Credit Valley Explorer tour train last operated in early 2018, and the Town of Orangeville lost interest in operating the railway, which was costing the municipality $450,000 a year. The last freight train departed Orangeville on Friday, December 17, 2021.

    Toronto, Grey and Bruce Railway plaque
    Orangeville-Brampton Railway plaque

    Together with Dr. Brian Doucet, Canada Research Chair in Urban Change and Social Inclusion at the University of Waterloo, I toured the line in its waning days. At TVO.org, Doucet and I argue that the corridor is worth preserving, even if the Town of Orangeville is no longer interested in paying for the railway. We note how the province is looking to build a new highway through the very same lands that the dying railway cuts across.

    Additional photographs and videos of the once-proud Orangeville and Brampton Railway can be found below.

    (more…)