GO Transit

[Bytor]

Of course, I think we should have both Guelph and Milton, and the Lakeshore West Hamilton→Brantford extension that takes back the Paris rail trail and loops up to Cambridge.

You don't have to take back the Cambridge to Paris rail trail, the old line through Branchton and Harrisburg to Lyndon will get you to the same spot in Cambridge without the time consuming jog through Brantford. Will it ever happen? No.

You can have trails beside active rail lines. You could easily shift the walking trail over with enough width for double-tracking all the way from Cambridge to Paris.

And with a proper 110mph (177km/h) intercity rail system, it's not a time-consuming jog through Brantford.

Cambridge → Paris ~21km, ~8 minutes
Paris → Brantford, ~12km, ~6 minutes
Brantford → Hamilton, ~36km, ~13 minutes, using the Hamilton-Brantford rail trail right of way.

With a 1 minute dwell time at Paris and Brantford, that's 29 minutes.

Going through Branchton, Harrisburg and Lynden instead 

Cambridge → Harrisburg Wye, 22km, ~8 minutes
Harrisburg Wye, 2km, 2 minutes
Harrisburg Wye → Lynden ~6km, ~ 4 minutes
Lynden→Hamilton, ~30km, ~14 minutes

With a 1 minute well time at Lynden, that's also 29 minutes. Again, the 90° curves around the RBG and Main / Dundurn, but also a very tight wye track at Harrisburg to turn towards Lynden which reduces one's speed significantly. And that means from the wye to Lynden the train can only get up to ~55mph (87km/h) instead of 110mph.

I rounded the Lynden mileage down and the Brantford route up, and it also depends on the actual geometry of what that wye through Harrisburg was, which I was also generous as to speed for it. It could ad as much as 5 minutes instead of 2 onto the Cambridge to Lynden portion.

So, overall, If both routes existed with modern electric inter-city rail, you'd probably get to Hamilton 5 minutes faster going through Brantford if all these rails had not been abandoned and had been kept in use and upgraded over time.

[coriander]

We could have a bus service to Guelph tomorrow...the fact we aren't shows we're either bad at this, or not serious about this.

But we _do_ have a bus service to Guelph -- GO Transit route 17 (admittedly, only hourly on weekdays): https://assets.metrolinx.com/image/uploa...ABLE17.pdf

In addition to, of course, the GO Kitchener line trains. It may be inadequate, but it's not non-existent.

Edit: Unless you mean Cambridge-Guelph specifically, which yes, is lacking. (It's hard to tell, because a similar point was made in the Hwy 7 thread.)

GO route 17 is painfully slow getting into Guelph. Moving between the universities and Guelph Central takes up a literal hour, or three times longer than the train travel time between Kitchener GO and Guelph Central. Adding additional rail service is leaps and bounds better for the speed alone.

[tomh009]

But we _do_ have a bus service to Guelph -- GO Transit route 17 (admittedly, only hourly on weekdays): https://assets.metrolinx.com/image/uploa...ABLE17.pdf

In addition to, of course, the GO Kitchener line trains. It may be inadequate, but it's not non-existent.

Edit: Unless you mean Cambridge-Guelph specifically, which yes, is lacking. (It's hard to tell, because a similar point was made in the Hwy 7 thread.)

GO route 17 is painfully slow getting into Guelph. Moving between the universities and Guelph Central takes up a literal hour, or three times longer than the train travel time between Kitchener GO and Guelph Central. Adding additional rail service is leaps and bounds better for the speed alone.

That's not an apples-to-apples comparison, though: from Victoria/Frederick to Guelph Central seems to be about 32-34 minutes.

If you want to compare train travel time then you need to add the 15 minutes (plus connection time) for the LRT as well--or the bus ride from Laurier.

[neonjoe]

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener...-1.7241032

Region buys lands in Breslau for future GO Station

[Bytor]

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener...-1.7241032

Region buys lands in Breslau for future GO Station

I guess the land by Woolwich St S was too expensive? That would be more convenient to walk to from Breslau. Though I guess they don't want those darn Cantabridgians driving up through Breslau to a park 'n' ride.

[danbrotherston]

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener...-1.7241032

Region buys lands in Breslau for future GO Station

I guess the land by Woolwich St S was too expensive? That would be more convenient to walk to from Breslau. Though I guess they don't want those darn Cantabridgians driving up through Breslau to a park 'n' ride.

Walk? What is this “walk” you speak of. The verb (and the only verb) for travelling to a large suburban GO park and ride is “drive”.

[westwardloo]

This Go station location is still 100% better than the original Greenhouse road location. I still think they should build the station between fountain and Woolwich on the north side of the tracks, but this is not a bad location for walking if they are smart about the build.  The station needs to be as close as possible to fountain street, it would be even better if the station could straddle fountain street, but that is probably too much to ask. They do need to make sure there is pedestrian pathways to the station from various subdivisions around Breslau. The Mixed-use housing needs to be built right beside the station along fountain street. There needs to be a bus drop-off right up to the station entrance.  Then the sea of parking can be located behind all the housing, even better would be to have Metrolinx build a parking garage so we don't have to use too much potential developable land for parking.

[SF22]

There's an entire Breslau plan that's going to probably double the housing and employment areas, and I think they're taking all that into account instead of just the existing townscape (because you absolutely know it's not like they're going to get this station built within the next 10 years). The Breslau Secondary Plan has a few options, but they aren't too wildly different from each other - here's one, for example. Their road plan shows that the major road leading to the new GO station isn't meant to be built until 2031+.

I imagine that the people who live in the original heart of Breslau are also not huge fans of the idea that tons of people will be pouring down Woolwich St, and would rather redirect them to Fountain. I believe the new highway 7 supposed to have an on/off ramp that lines up with Fountain/Ebycrest, so that would track, and the road plan shows that a new bridge crossing the Grand will link Ottawa St to Breslau as well (currently scheduled for 2041+, but maybe they'll bump up the priority if there's strong Breslau GO usage or they finally decide to build Phase 3 of the LRT down Ottawa).

[KevinL]

There's only enough room for the two tracks under the Fountain bridge, no way could they fit station platforms or even a path I don't think. It's still good to hear it's moving closer to the village proper.