Sean Marshall

Tag: Waterloo Region

  • Ion: An Ontario LRT that somehow works

    Ion: An Ontario LRT that somehow works

    There is a light rail system in Ontario that works in the snow. ION LRT at University of Waterloo.

    Less than a two hours drive or train ride from Toronto, where that city’s first light rail line opened to universal disdain, a light rail line has been operating without incident for over five years. Trains operate like clockwork, signal priority works, and it has become the backbone of a regional transit system.

    Though the Ion LRT project was subject to several delays, opening eighteen months behind schedule, operations have been notably smooth since the public opening on June 21, 2019. The delay is attributed to Bombardier’s late delivery of their Flexity light rail vehicles, which were built on the same assembly line as the TTC’s new streetcars.

    A southbound Ion LRV turns from Charles Street to Borden Avenue. Note the white bar signal and the “no right turn – train” sign lit up.

    Funded by all three levels of government, the Ion LRT was constructed and operated by GrandLinq, a public-private partnership (P3) consortium that includes operator Keolis and engineering and construction firms such as Aecon, Kiewit, and Plenary Group. Though design-build-operate P3 models are common for Canadian transit infrastructure projects, they have their challenges, as Waterloo Region would later find out. Fares and service are integrated into the Grand River Transit bus system, which is owned and operated by the regional government.

    Waterloo Region is the smallest urban region in North America with a light rail system, and it works largely because of Kitchener-Waterloo’s geography. Many important regional destinations line up along the corridor: the terminals are both major suburban shopping centres that already functioned as major bus transfer points. In between the two malls are Downtown Kitchener and Uptown Waterloo, the two historic town centres, University of Waterloo, Wilfrid Laurier University, and Kitchener-Waterloo Hospital. The LRT serves or passes near all these destinations (though Laurier’s campus is centred a few blocks east of the LRT corridor). Furthermore, the region’s master plan focuses urban growth along the LRT corridor with new high-rise residential and mixed-use development. A planned extension of the LRT into Cambridge south to the historic Galt town centre will further support regional urban intensification goals.

    Ion trains operate every 10 minutes during weekday daytime hours; they operate every 15 minutes on weekends and weekday evenings, with 30-minute service from about 10:30 PM to the end of service starting around midnight.

    Map of Waterloo Region’s urban system, which directs growth to existing and planned transit corridors and limits growth outside the cities of Kitchener, Waterloo, and Cambridge. From the regional official plan.

    Despite following a linear corridor, the LRT winds its way along city streets, railway rights-of-way, and hydro corridors. This allowed the region to reduce property and road construction costs as well as achieve higher speeds in specific off-road sections. The fastest section is north of Uptown Waterloo, where the corridor makes use of a freight railway spur line between Kitchener and Elmira that also happens to run directly past University of Waterloo. In the south end, a different railway corridor and a hydro corridor allow trains to reach Fairview Park Mall on a mostly off-street alignment. These off-road segments are protected by railway signals and barriers, like those in along LRT lines in Calgary and Edmonton.

    This ability to switch between different alignment types is a clear advantage of light rail transit for medium-capacity transit systems. During overnight hours, freight trains headed to a plastics plant in Elmira use the same rails north of Uptown Waterloo as the LRT does during the day, making it an example of the “tram-train” model more common in Europe.

    The on-street sections, though slower than the off-road portions, provide access to Downtown Kitchener and Uptown Waterloo, including the planned new transit hub in Downtown Kitchener that will provide a better connection to GO Transit trains to Toronto. Unlike Toronto’s streetcars and Finch West LRT, however, the signal priority system works. On King Street between Downtown and Uptown, there are many intersections with traffic signals, but the LRTs generally do not have to stop at any of those red lights. At intersections, LRVs continue at regular speed, typically 40 km/h through this section.

    A southbound LRV on King Street. It just passed two signals with a clear (white vertical bar) signal; the next signal ahead will soon change to allow the LRV to proceed. Note that there are no “transit signal” signs, as Waterloo Region worked to have these approved by the province.

    Waterloo Region also worked to permit unique transit signals, which feature only white bar aspects. A vertical bar indicates “proceed” while a horizonal bar indicates “stop.” A flashing horizontal bar lets the operator know that it will soon switch to “proceed” while a flashing vertical bar warns of an upcoming stop signal. This reduces the sign clutter that is found on Toronto’s streetcar and light rail corridors.

    A typical Toronto assembly, with red, amber, and green transit signal aspects that look similar to the larger traffic lights above and accompanied with a “transit signal” sign. Of course, the Finch West LRV approached an amber signal, rather than being given a go ahead.

    To be fair, the advantage in Waterloo Region is that most of the on-street sections of the LRV corridor are on narrower urban streets rather than suburban arterials like Finch Avenue. King Street and Charles Street in Kitchener only have two general traffic lanes and are not major throughfares (a provincially-maintained freeway between St. Jacobs, Waterloo, Kitchener, and Highway 401 absorbs much of this traffic). The regional government also widened a section of Weber Street to four lanes to divert traffic from King ahead of LRT construction. This resulted in the loss of about two dozen houses and businesses.

    But by maintaining a narrow right-of-way on King Street, the LRT runs with minimal delays. It is easier to provide aggressive transit signal priority with short pedestrian crossing distances, narrow intersections, and lower traffic volumes.

    The video below illustrates how the LRT runs along King Street northbound from Kitchener Central Station.

    View from the front of a train heading north towards Waterloo

    Despite the LRT working well, it is still far from perfect: there are several sections in which the trams crawl at a 10 or 15 km/h speed, particularly on the south end. At Hayward Avenue the route switches from a railway corridor to an alignment alongside Courtland Avenue; this section has two tight turns and crosses an industrial driveway. Had a few more properties been expropriated (at additional cost) this would not have been an issue. Until a proper protected pedestrian crossing is installed at a path connecting Trayner Avenue to Fairway Road (a critical pedestrian link that was overlooked during the planning phase), LRVs must also slow down along the hydro corridor approaching Fairview Park Mall.

    The P3 contract also limits the ability to make service improvements. In 2024, Waterloo Region proposed revising the LRT schedule to run trains every eight minutes during peak periods, but because of a fixed staffing contract, it would have resulted in 30-minute service after 8PM. Luckily, local transit advocates successfully opposed that change. Had the LRT been operated directly by Grand River Transit, they could have simply trained more operators on the LRT service, even transferring bus drivers to the rail division.

    Overall, however, the LRT works in Waterloo Region both as a transit service and a planning tool. It provides useful lessons on what to do (real signal priority and proper signal aspects, make effective use of on-street and off-street routing where each makes sense), and what not to do (enter strict operating contracts) when building a new transit line. Waterloo Region made its rail transit work for its geography and its needs, and that is the most important thing.

  • The case against transit advertisement wraps

    The case against transit advertisement wraps

    A Go Transit double decker bus completely covered by a vinyl wrap, with the exception of the front windows and entrance door. The wrap advertises the transit agency’s wifi and music streaming gimmick.

    Apart from unscheduled short-turns, lengthy delays, or missed transfers, the thing that bothers me most about riding buses or streetcars is an obstructed view caused by a vinyl advertisement wrap.

    Though transit advertisements have been around almost as long as there have been transit services, these advertisements have generally been limited to posters and cards mounted outside the vehicles, or placed inside, above the windows or beside doors. Advertisements have long been placed inside train and subway stations, and in outdoor transit shelters.

    TTC photograph of streetcar advertising, 1935. The advertisement can be found below the left dash window of the streetcar. City of Toronto Archives Fonds 16, Series 71, Item 11134.

    For advertisers, transit ads provide an ideal vehicle for promoting their goods and services: they can be targeted to specific neighbourhoods that a bus, streetcar, or train passes through; the advertisements move around unlike static billboards, potentially drawing more eyeballs. For transit operators, advertising provides an easy revenue source. Most transit agencies outsource their advertising to larger firms, who are responsible for maintaining accounts and installing and removing ads from vehicles and transit facilities. These companies typically provide an annual payment for the right to advertise on transit vehicles, and at stations and stops.

    A GO Transit coach bus departing Bramalea Station, wrapped for a newspaper’s investment news service; all passenger windows are obscured by the advertising wrap

    Though vinyl decals on transit vehicles are not a new innovation (advertisements in the late 1980s and early 1990s were typically opaque, sometimes covering parts of passenger windows) more recent technology has allowed for perforated vinyl wraps that fully cover windows, while providing an obscured outside view through small dots. While the vehicle is moving, a passenger inside may be able to see where they are, but not be able to read signage or see details. For some, not having a clear view of forward motion can contribute to motion sickness.

    The view from the inside (via Chris Livett, on X/Twitter)

    In TTC subway stations and some GO Transit stations, surfaces such as walls, floors, pillars, faregates and even stairways have also become advertising surfaces, a tactic called “station domination.”

    An example of Pattison Outdoor’s “station domination” advertising, with a traditional ad poster at right, an installed video screen and ad pillar at centre, and stairs covered in ads, at left.

    On occasion, vehicle wraps are used for public relations, rather than advertising. GO Transit and the TTC’s Pride buses are a good example of this. A more shameful example was the TTC’s messaging about fare evasion which took place in late 2019 and early 2020, just before the COVID-19 pandemic.

    “Forgot to tap” – part of a TTC streetcar wrap used in late 2019 and early 2020

    For the most part, the TTC does not allow ad wraps to completely obscure bus and streetcar windows, but allows up to 70 percent of the passenger windows to be covered, either in a “strip” format (where only the lower parts of the windows are kept uncovered) or “mural” format (where three of five sections of a streetcar are fully covered). Other agencies, like the Hamilton Street Railway, allow for complete vehicle wraps.

    St. Catharines/Niagara Region Transit
    Hamilton Street Railway
    It is difficult to get on a bus in Burlington, Hamilton, Niagara, or Brantford without your view being blocked by a certain real estate agent

    In Waterloo Region, Regional Councillors just considered a motion to increase the number of wrapped Grand River Transit buses and — for the first time — on ION LRT cars. The appendix to the staff report recommending the increased number of advertising wraps depicts a rail car in a Tropicana wrap, with the windows partially obscured.

    Depiction of what an advertising wrap would look like on an ION LRT rail car, from the October 10 agenda of the Regional Municipality of Waterloo Planning and Works Committee

    According to the report, the Region of Waterloo/Grand River Transit has a contract with Pattison Outdoor — one of Canada’s largest advertising firms — that allows for a total of five buses to be wrapped at any one time. GRT and Pattison want to increase this to ten percent of the total bus fleet, which numbers over 250. It also seeks to wrap one ION rail car at a time, with the promise that windows would not be fully covered and convert some static back-lit shelter ads to digital ads.

    Currently, Waterloo Region receives guaranteed revenue from its contract with Pattison, averaging $1,546,500 a year, though the total revenue is projected to reach $1,800,000 for 2023, as ridership increases. Allowing for wraps on 20 more buses and one ION railcar is estimated to net an additional amount up to $500,000.

    It’s worth noting that the report notes a 2018 recommendation against advertising on the exterior of LRT vehicles “due to concerns of diminishing the ION brand.” This restriction was also carried to ION-branded buses that follow the planned LRT extension between Fairway Station and Cambridge. It also notes strong public feedback against covering windows, and proposes to do so, “to maintain the customer experience.”

    The Region of Waterloo’s entire Transit Services budget — including paratransit — for 2023 is $207,203,000, with transit fares bringing $46,143,000 of that – a 22.3% farebox ratio (property tax and provincial grants cover the difference). $2.3 million brought in from all advertising revenue — traditional poster ads and transit wraps — is not an insignificant sum, but it makes up just over 1% of the entire transit operating budget. In Toronto, the TTC’s 12-year, $324-million contract — also with Pattison Outdoor — brings in a total of $27 million a year, or 1.1% of the entire TTC budget.

    At least Waterloo Region staff recognize that transit customers don’t like advertisements that obscure windows. They also acknowledge that transit wraps diminish the transit brand. For a revenue source that represents a mere drop in the bucket, why do transit agencies keep allowing them on their vehicles?

  • GO’s gaping gap, gone

    GO’s gaping gap, gone

    Route 17 bus arriving at University of Waterloo Station

    On Monday, April 10, 2023, GO Transit filled a big hole in Ontario’s intercity transportation web with Route 17, which connects three major urban centres, four universities, and two existing GO Transit rail corridors. On that day, I made my way to Waterloo and rode one of those first buses south towards Hamilton. Nearly a month later, I made a second trip, from Guelph and Downtown Hamilton, on May 5.

    Sign post at University of Waterloo indicating the stops for Route 17

    The bus originates at the new University of Waterloo bus terminal, located adjacent to the Ion LRT corridor and on the far east side of the university campus. It then stops in front of Wilfrid Laurier University, on Victoria Street North in Kitchener’s east end, at Guelph Central Station, University of Guelph, the park & ride lot in Aberfoyle, Aldershot Station, McMaster University, and Hamilton GO Centre.

    Waterloo-bound Route 17 bus at Guelph Central Station, May 5, 2023

    On the first day, the experience was more interesting than I expected, as the driver, new to the route, missed the turn from the Hanlon Expressway (Highway 6 through Guelph) towards Downtown Guelph. Luckily, dispatchers were able to guide the driver back on route after a short delay, so it only made for a roundabout tour of some of Guelph’s residential neighbourhoods, where GO Transit has certainly not gone before (and probably won’t, ever again).

    On congested Highway 7 between Kitchener and Guelph

    Sitting at the top of the front of a double decker bus (so far, I had my choice of seats as the route is still new and not too busy) gave me a view of the traffic congestion in the western Greater Golden Horseshoe. Highway 7 between Kitchener and Guelph is still a two-lane road, without even paved shoulders to make it a bit more cycling friendly. Though there are a few GO trains on the adjacent railway, the service is sporadic and only runs on weekdays. A new four-lane freeway has been planned for decades, with some preliminary work started, but a regular two-way, all-day train service, and more bus links to places like Cambridge, would be even more effective in meeting travel demands in the region.

    Highway 6 south of Highway 401 is also very congested, and a new highway bypass is planned to divert traffic around a two-lane section through Morriston and Puslinch Station. Clearly, there’s a lot of travel demand between Kitchener-Waterloo, Guelph, and Hamilton, but transit options have always been severely limited.

    Thankfully, Metrolinx is upgrading the western portion of the Kitchener Line, with a second platform under construction at Guelph Central Station, and work started on new passing sidings between Kitchener and Georgetown. But it will be several years at least before the upgrades allow for regular, two-way, daily passenger rail, so the bus will have to do.

    At Aldershot Station

    In my review of GO’s service changes earlier this month, I argued that Route 17 was trying to do too much with a single bus route. Riding the corridor from end-to-end (albeit on two separate occasions), I could not help but feel frustrated by the southern end of the route, where the GO bus goes east on Highway 403 to connect with Aldershot Station, then backtracks to get to McMaster University, then turns around to get to Downtown Hamilton. I understand that all three destinations are important trip generators (Aldershot allows passengers from Burlington, Oakville, and southern Mississauga to get to Guelph and Waterloo, McMaster University is a reliable trip generator, and Downtown Hamilton is a busy urban hub), but for someone to get between Hamilton and Guelph or Waterloo, it’s a long way out of their way.

    I am hopeful that GO Transit uses the summer down time to see where passengers are going and coming from and make route adjustments or add express runs once classes resume in September.

    Map of GO Transit Route 17

    A note on Route 21

    Last month, when previewing the new GO Transit changes, I discussed the changes to Route 21 (the Milton Corridor train-bus service), in which most buses were pulled from Union Station, instead diverted to three stations on the Lakeshore Line. Though at the time, I explained that the change made sense given severe traffic delays on the Gardiner Expressway and around the new GO Bus Terminal, it would mean a longer trip, and an unpopular transfer.

    I underestimated the aggravation and anger transit riders had when the new schedules were put into service. The loss of direct GO bus service between Milton and Mississauga along Derry Road is also a new gap that should be re-filled.

    I suggest three changes, though I acknowledge that the continued shortage of train crews and budget issues might make these more difficult:

    • Restore 15-minute rail service on the Lakeshore West corridor. This would at least ensure that transferring Route 21 customers aren’t stranded up to 30 minutes at Oakville, Clarkson, and Port Credit stations. Since GO Transit’s ridership has recovered faster off-peak versus peak periods, the extra capacity will be helpful.
    • Restore all-day, regular bus service on Derry Road between Milton and Meadowvale, perhaps extending to Bramalea Station and/or Highway 407 terminal. This would provide new connections, including the new weekend Kitchener Line trains.
    • Extend more buses between Square One and Kipling Terminal. Though the new Kipling Station bus terminal was a Metrolinx project, only Route 29 (Guelph-Square One-Kipling) uses it. It could then be an alternative to transferring to Union Station for some passengers.

  • Reviewing GO Transit’s big April changes

    GO Transit bus on the Gardiner Expressway. Route 21 will se major changes with the new schedules

    On Saturday, April 8, GO Transit will introduce big changes to its rail and bus services. Brampton and Waterloo Region will see the biggest benefits, while a major gap in Ontario’s intercity bus network will finally get filled.

    However, major construction work on the Barrie and Stouffville Lines will require the bustitution of most trains on those two corridors for at least a few months. Most buses serving the Milton Line will no longer operate to or from Union Station, but instead connect with the Lakeshore West Line. Finally, one of GO Transit’s oldest bus routes will finally disappear for good.

    Though the scale of these service changes is truly impressive, there are some drawbacks that hopefully will be addressed in the near future.

    Kitchener Line/Route 30

    Map of the GO Transit Kitchener Line, with bus routes 30, 31, and 33.
    From the official timetable.

    As part of the April 2023 changes, GO Transit will finally introduce hourly weekend service on the Kitchener Line between Union Station and Mount Pleasant GO in northwest Brampton. Most Route 31 “train-bus” trips will be cancelled, while Route 33 (Guelph-Brampton-North York) takes over the Guelph via Highway 7 service completely.

    With the exception of weekday counter-peak periods, early mornings, and late evenings (when Route 31 will still operate), Brampton finally has the all-way, two-way, every day train service it has been requesting for decades. Because of schedule constraints, and limited track space, weekend trains will not be stopping at Etobicoke North.

    Route 30, the Bramalea-Kitchener-Waterloo bus, will also operate 7 days a week, with an easy transfer at Bramalea GO Station. This is the fastest and most frequent service between Toronto and Kitchener-Waterloo (private intercity bus service to Kitchener are limited, and they only stop at Sportsworld, near Highway 401), and should help build ridership for future train service expansion.

    Unfortunately, there remains no quick GO bus service between Toronto, Brampton, and Guelph; passengers must still endure the Route 33 milk run on Highway 7 through Georgetown, Acton, and Rockwood. Weekend service on Route 48, the Guelph-Bramalea-Highway 407 route, timed to connect to Kitchener Line trains, could provide this useful link until track capacity is improved west of Bramalea and through Halton Region and Wellington County.

    But finally, Bramalea GO Station, with its new bus loop and easy transfers, fulfills its promise as a useful intermodal transit hub.

    Route 17: where GO Transit has never gone before

    Map of GO Transit Route 17, connecting Waterloo, Guelph, and Hamilton.
    From the official timetable.

    The introduction of GO Transit Route 17 between Kitchener-Waterloo, Guelph, and Hamilton is, in my view, even more significant than the new weekend train service on the Kitchener Line.

    This new bus route is the first time a GO Transit service has gone against its 55-year-old business model of a Toronto-centric system, where all train services converge on Union Station, and all bus services supplement the train corridors or connect to a suburban Toronto terminal. This might even be the most significant GO Transit service change since the first Highway 407/York University bus service began in September 2000. The 407 Corridor, originally a single bus route connecting Oakville, Mississauga Square One, Bramalea, York University, and Markham, has expanded into a multi-branched 24-hour/7-day corridor that now extends to Oshawa, Guelph, and Hamilton.

    Route 17, which will run hourly on weekdays, directly serves four university campuses (University of Waterloo, Wilfrid Laurier University, University of Guelph, and McMaster University), a record for any single bus route in Canada (only the TTC Yonge-University Subway serves as many university campuses in a one-seat ride). It also provides a direct Guelph-Kitchener-Waterloo link (which was only provided by infrequent Greyhound buses before 2020) and replaces former Coach Canada/Megabus routes abandoned prior to or during the COVID-19 pandemic.

    Though Route 17 finally fills several gaps in the Greater Golden Horseshoe, it is, at best, a first good step.

    For one thing, Route 17 is too slow to effectively serve as a great Kitchener-Waterloo/Hamilton connection. The travel time from University of Waterloo to Downtown Hamilton is between two hours and twenty minutes and two hours and thirty minutes. The typical driving time is about one hour. It is more competitive between Guelph and Hamilton, though the route diverts to Aldershot GO Station to connect with the GO Transit Lakeshore West corridor, adding 15-20 minutes of travel time over a direct McMaster/Downtown Toronto routing.

    Finally, there is no weekend service offered at this point, and the new route misses Downtown Kitchener, diverting via the Conestoga Parkway, though a stop at Victoria and Frederick Streets east of downtown provides connections to several GRT bus routes. There is also a need for better connections between Cambridge and Guelph, something that GRT, Wellington County, and Guelph should work together to fix.

    I am hopeful that the new hourly weekday service is attractive to students and commuters, and that ridership grows to a point that GO considers weekend service and either express runs, or a restructuring of the corridor to provide more direct services.

    On Wednesday, March 29, I spoke to Craig Norris on CBC Kitchener’s Morning Edition about new Route 17, weekend service on Route 30 and the implications for Waterloo Region and beyond.

    Untangling Route 21

    Map of the Milton Line and Route 21, after the April 8 2023 service change.
    From the official timetable.

    Route 21, the Milton GO bus corridor, provides Milton-Mississauga-Toronto service at all times except the weekday peak period direction, when GO operates seven trains between Milton and Union Station. Unfortunately, the busy Milton Corridor is Canadian Pacific’s mainline between Toronto and Chicago. Unlike CN (whose mainline is used by GO’s Kitchener Line between Bramalea and Georgetown), CP has been less amiable to GO service expansion outside the peak period window.

    Because of passenger demand in central Mississauga, Route 21 has traditionally been one of GO Transit’s most complex routes, with ten distinct branches, with service to each station every 15-30 minutes at most times. With increasing traffic into and within Downtown Toronto, especially on summer weekends, Route 21 can be very slow and unreliable, with GO Transit forced to divert its buses on Route 21 and 31 away from its Union Station Bus Terminal to Port Credit GO.

    Though weekend train service on the Kitchener Line solves the problem for Route 31, without access to CP’s tracks, Milton Line passengers must ride buses, which have to go somewhere.

    The solution, then, was to permanently divert Milton Line buses to the Lakeshore West rail corridor. Route 21A will operate between Milton GO Station and Oakville GO Station, serving Sheridan College’s Oakville campus and the 407 Corridor at Trafalgar Road (allowing for new transfers from Milton to Hamilton/McMaster and Mississauga/Pearson Airport). Route 21B will run from Lisgar GO, serving Meadowvale GO, Streetsville GO, and Erin Mills Transitway Station before connecting to trains at Clarkson GO. Route 21C runs between Erindale GO, Square One, Cooksville GO, and Port Credit GO. Only during early mornings and late evenings will Route 21 serve Union Station, making all stops to and from Milton.

    Dixie Station also loses its weekday Route 21 service. The station is not well connected with local transit nor is it in a walkable area, so it is completely dependent on drive-up traffic. That should be fine for commuters who can rely on the regular train schedules, and who don’t need to leave Toronto early or late, but it worth pointing out.

    These changes simplify Route 21, and provide a reliable and predictable, albeit slower, connection to Downtown Toronto. They provide new connections to the busy Highway 407 bus corridor, and allow GO to divert buses and drivers to other services.

    One thing GO can do to improve the utility of its realigned bus service is operate the new branches at all time periods to maximize ridership. For example, Route 21A, while providing new useful links between Milton, the Highway 407 corridor, and Sheridan College, does not run in the peak direction when the Milton Line trains are running, with no southbound buses from Milton to Oakville between 5:03 AM and 9:28 AM. A similar gap exists northbound in the late afternoon on weekdays.

    Other changes

    The Stouffville Line, which enjoys hourly train service seven days a week, goes down to just peak period rail service starting April 8. Work to double-track the corridor through Scarborough has been continuing, albeit slowly, so hopefully the suspension of off-peak trains will help speed up construction. Work to expand the Lakeshore East/Stouffville corridor through Toronto’s east end has also forced train service reductions between Toronto and Oshawa.

    On the Barrie Line, there is similar ongoing work to double track sections of that line continue, including a new viaduct over the CP mainline near Dupont Street. Off-peak trains that normally go as far north as Aurora are being replaced by buses, with limited weekend trains to Allandale Waterfront Station in Barrie continuing in service.

    Route 81, one of the older bus routes in GO Transit’s network, will finally disappear. The bus route, connecting Whitby GO Station, Port Perry, and Beaverton, has seen low ridership, with alternative service provided by Durham Region Transit’s Route 905 to Port Perry and DRT’s rural on-demand service.

    Finally, though they are not amongst the major upcoming changes, GO Transit’s services to Orangeville and Peterborough remain inadequate. Route 37, between Brampton and Orangeville, still does not operate on weekends, nor is there a morning northbound bus from Brampton. Ironically, there is better service leading north from Orangeville towards Shelburne, Dundalk, and Owen Sound operated by Grey County’s rural bus system.

    Meanwhile, Route 88, which connects Oshawa GO Station with Peterborough and Trent University, was diverted several years ago to serve Bowmanville, replacing since-cancelled Route 90. Unfortunately, this results in a long, nearly two-hour bus ride between Oshawa and Trent University, or four hours between Toronto Union Station and Trent. The drive, with moderate traffic, is less than half that. Though Rider Express now operates a bus from Toronto to Ottawa via Peterborough, it only runs once a day, four days a week.

    It would be great if GO Transit could speed up Route 88 to make it a viable and attractive option between Toronto, Durham Region, and Peterborough.

    Finally

    On the whole, I am pleasantly surprised by GO Transit’s April service changes. Weekend service on Route 30 and the new Route 17 between Hamilton, Guelph, and Kitchener-Waterloo close some major gaps in that part of the province. The Route 21 changes make a lot of sense and open up new connections, though many bus passengers will not be happy with the new forced transfer to get to or from Downtown Toronto. Though bustitutions on the Barrie and Stouffville Lines are not ideal, they will allow for important work to improve rail service on those two corridors. Finally, attention to bringing faster and fuller service on some bus routes – like 21A, 37, and 88 will help build a complete transit network across the Greater Golden Horseshoe.

  • A patchwork of new intercity connections in Ontario

    IMG_6956-001.JPG
    RideNorfolk buses at Norfolk County Hall, Simcoe

    Over the last three years, I wrote about the gaps in intercity rail and coach services in Ontario, and how some companies were working to fill them.

    In Northern Ontario, Ontario Northland and Kasper Transportation worked to fill the void left by Greyhound’s departure from Western Canada, with both companies offering new links to towns such as Hearst and Fort Francis.

    Unfortunately, there have also been some setbacks. Wroute, a shared taxi service in the Kitchener-Guelph-Hamilton triangle, was operational for less than a year. Though GO Transit added new weekday trains between Guelph and Kitchener, none allow for Kitchener-bound commutes, and there has not been interest in serving those gaps identified by Wroute.

    Outside of Northern Ontario and the Golden Horseshoe, many cities and towns remain disconnected from nearby communities and larger centres. Though every city and town in Ontario had daily bus and/or rail service in the 1980s, many communities are now completely inaccessible for anyone without access to a car. Though GO Transit expanded to Peterborough, Brantford, Niagara, and Kitchener in the last fifteen years, they are extensions of GO’s radial network from Toronto rather than a true intercity network.

    St. Thomas, population 41,000, is the largest city in the province without any passenger links, despite being a short drive to London. Many other cities and towns — particularly in Midwestern and Eastern Ontario — find themselves in similar situations. A few other cities, such as Sarnia (which has just one train a day each way to London and Toronto), are grossly under-served.

    But thanks to municipal innovation and a new provincial grant program, this is finally changing. Though several municipalities addressed this problem early on, three new inter-municipal bus systems began operations in 2019, with many more launching this year.

    (more…)