GO Transit

[Bob_McBob]

Metrolinx puts rail electrification through Guelph on hold

[danbrotherston]

Gee, if only they had some way to gain ownership over the corridor.

Frankly, I'm not even remotely surprised...I don't get any sense of urgency or goals from any of Metrolinx. They're going through the motions...something might get built eventually, but they aren't pushing on it.

[KingandWeber]

Gee, if only they had some way to gain ownership over the corridor.

Frankly, I'm not even remotely surprised...I don't get any sense of urgency or goals from any of Metrolinx. They're going through the motions...something might get built eventually, but they aren't pushing on it.

To be fair, I don't think Metrolinx can expropriate a railway as that's within federal jurisdiction. That being said, why on Earth they haven't worked with the federal govt to expropriate it is beyond me.

[ijmorlan]

Gee, if only they had some way to gain ownership over the corridor.

Frankly, I'm not even remotely surprised...I don't get any sense of urgency or goals from any of Metrolinx. They're going through the motions...something might get built eventually, but they aren't pushing on it.

To be fair, I don't think Metrolinx can expropriate a railway as that's within federal jurisdiction. That being said, why on Earth they haven't worked with the federal govt to expropriate it is beyond me.

Indeed, they cannot. That being said, if rail transport were a real priority I’m pretty sure the provincial and federal governments could come up with a plan between them.

[taylortbb]

I don't think expropriation would fix anything here, and would be incredibly expensive.

The stretch of rail corridor through Brampton is congested, and doesn't have room for more tracks. If Metrolinx expropriated it, and kicked some CN trains out to make room for passenger rail, where would that cargo go? Probably onto trucks, which is hardly an improvement. At the same time, causing CN to lose that much business would make expropriation cost several billion dollars.

The only real solution here is a freight bypass, the "missing link" , which Ford killed because it cost money.

[danbrotherston]

I actually wasn't referring to expropriation...I was referring to the agreement in principle that Metrolinx had with CN to construct a bypass of all the cities for freight to run on, leaving Metrolinx with control over the (much more valuable) route through cities. It was literally almost a done deal.

And for bonus points, that bypass would also have worked for CP to get freight off the Milton line.

Which this government threw away, because they'd rather spend billions on bad highway plans.

Again, this is why I have immense cynicism about Metrolinx. It's a political organization with no ambition beyond the next election cycle.

[taylortbb]

Again, this is why I have immense cynicism about Metrolinx. It's a political organization with no ambition beyond the next election cycle.

It's as much the Ontario government as GRT is the Region of Waterloo. It's a brand for a service, and a way of communicating that all this stuff goes together, but it's still just a part of a ministry. I'm not sure what else you're expecting from it.

[ac3r]

It's easy to think that Metrolinx could just do this and that and then we'd have a utopia, but things don't work like that. Saying it's a political organization with no ambition beyond the next election cycle doesn't even make sense...they continue to work regardless of the political party in power. They are a crown agency, they don't belong to the OPC, ONDP or OLP. Bureaucratic red tape is just something you've got to deal with, nothing short of youthful naïvety could think otherwise. They make plans and work on the projects, but ultimately it's up to who is in power to fund and approve these things and it's up to them to negotiate with private enterprises like Canadian National and Canada Pacific to negotiate the use of existing rail lines.

Frankly, yeah, they're slow but Metrolinx has done nothing but improve and expand over the years, doing everything from new the Line 5 & 6 in Toronto, to expanding GO trains all the way to London, building the UPE, expanding commuter rail, building our new train station, expanding bus service and so much more. They can't just snap their fingers and take over trackage rights which are, as someone else said, both federal jurisdiction and a private enterprise. I mean, Bill Gates owns a huge portion of CN, do you think he'd just let Metrolinx snap up their track? Lol.

[KevinL]

The cancellation of the freight bypass is completely on the current government; once they chose not to fund it, Metrolinx had no choice but consider lesser options. I have my concerns with many things that agency does, but this one is not their fault.

[danbrotherston]

The cancellation of the freight bypass is completely on the current government; once they chose not to fund it, Metrolinx had no choice but consider lesser options. I have my concerns with many things that agency does, but this one is not their fault.

It's "not their fault" only in that they are different from the existing government.

What is their fault is pretending to go along with the lie that cancelling the freight bypass costs us nothing. Even now, nobody is pointing out that this is WHY they can no longer electrify the line.

A true arms length crown corporation should have been able to make these tradeoffs clear. Instead they played along and pretended that cancelling the freight line is just fine and it was just the wasteful liberals who wanted it for nothing more than the usual corruption.

And I'm sure when the liberals return they will act in the same way towards the liberals.

And we will continue to get fucked over with shit transit and wasteful highways.

Metrolinx SHOULD be a political organization, one that advances the interests of transit, not the interests of the governing party.

[dtkvictim]

Metrolinx SHOULD be a political organization, one that advances the interests of transit, not the interests of the governing party.

I think you can argue, unfortunately, that these are one and the same. That kissing the ass of the current government provides better transit outcomes than pushing for optimal transit decisions that don't get funded would.

[danbrotherston]

Metrolinx SHOULD be a political organization, one that advances the interests of transit, not the interests of the governing party.

I think you can argue, unfortunately, that these are one and the same. That kissing the ass of the current government provides better transit outcomes than pushing for optimal transit decisions that don't get funded would.

I disagree. Pushing for good transit would gain metrolinx political power, and governments would seek to appear to be in alignment with metrolinx's policies.

[taylortbb]

https://www.guelphtoday.com/local-news/m...ph-4835471

[tomh009]

https://www.guelphtoday.com/local-news/m...ph-4835471

"The days of waiting for GO trains to crawl through Guelph are over as trains travelling through the city reached the new top speed of 72 km/h on Monday.

Months after the speed tests were conducted and after two months of slowly increasing the speeds through Guelph, the GO Transit trains have reached their top speeds."

[danbrotherston]

https://www.guelphtoday.com/local-news/m...ph-4835471

"The days of waiting for GO trains to crawl through Guelph are over as trains travelling through the city reached the new top speed of 72 km/h on Monday.

Months after the speed tests were conducted and after two months of slowly increasing the speeds through Guelph, the GO Transit trains have reached their top speeds."

While I'm glad that my last trip to Toronto will be significantly faster, I'm still frustrated by the slow pace which we roll out improvements.