King-Victoria Transit Hub

[ac3r]

I doubt construction will start for another few years. We'll be waiting on Metrolinx I believe as they will handle the platforms where the region will handle the station building. I don't think they're in a rush until all of the Kitchener Line improvements are complete.

[danbrotherston]

I doubt construction will start for another few years. We'll be waiting on Metrolinx I believe as they will handle the platforms where the region will handle the station building. I don't think they're in a rush until all of the Kitchener Line improvements are complete.

The project is currently unfunded. We won't see construction this decade.

[danbrotherston]

Out of the loop, when do we get our train station? Do we need to vote conservative?

That would only work if it was in the middle of the green belt.

🔥

No, but seriously, voting Conservative won't get it built.  Voting Liberal *might* help, but realistically, it's mostly a local issue.

Honestly though, I'm so cynical about this project, I don't see any path forward on this besides building a vastly overpriced white elephant sometime in the mid 2030s.

What a fucking disaster.

[Acitta]

I doubt construction will start for another few years. We'll be waiting on Metrolinx I believe as they will handle the platforms where the region will handle the station building. I don't think they're in a rush until all of the Kitchener Line improvements are complete.

The project is currently unfunded. We won't see construction this decade.

I thought that the urgency to get rid of the unhoused encampment at Weber St. was that they needed that property for staging for construction starting this fall.

[ac3r]

The plan was for fall indeed, but as mentioned they lack the funds. Remember when they were planning on selling the naming rights to it? So we could end up with some corny corporate themed train station which I think is the worst idea. I suspect if the pandemic didn't hit us then we would have been able to start earlier, but that made a lot of money vanish and will take years to recover from.

I know I did see them doing some drilling near the tracks a month or two ago but I don't know if it was related to the project or not. And I presume the fencing set up was just to keep homeless and addicts from camping out there, rather than signifying any potential construction.

[danbrotherston]

The project is currently unfunded. We won't see construction this decade.

I thought that the urgency to get rid of the unhoused encampment at Weber St. was that they needed that property for staging for construction starting this fall.

I mean, maybe, frankly, I don't really trust the city to be honest about construction dates when trying to evict the encampment.

That being said, it would turn our white elephant into a far darker story if it got built for the express purpose of evicting a homeless encampment. I can think of no better plaque that should be placed on the empty courtyard when completed.

[ac3r]

I think they'd prefer the station get built anyway. Public facilities like that offer shelter from the elements, washrooms, sinks and if the region has any sense: a place to purchase things (though I know they didn't want to offer and retail). So long as they keep the premises clean then them using it is fine.

Besides, the region has allocated tens of millions to invest in permanent tent encampments elsewhere in addition to other services. That would be better for everyone downtown - individuals and businesses - to shoo them away from camping in parks and disused gravel lots. It's unsightly, dangerous and breeding crime. Having them in designated areas would be preferable. And once the station gets completed and all day GO service, improved VIA and intercity buses can use it as a hub it'll bring in a more economic investment which is good for everyone be they homeless or otherwise.

[dtkvictim]

I think they'd prefer the station get built anyway. Public facilities like that offer shelter from the elements, washrooms, sinks and if the region has any sense: a place to purchase things (though I know they didn't want to offer and retail). So long as they keep the premises clean then them using it is fine.

Something I hadn't considered before, but you seem to be making an assumption about the open hours of the new station. Isn't the old VIA station only open shortly before and after a scheduled train? It looks like Metrolinx owns the VIA station, who operates it? Who will operate the new station and will it be run the same way?

[ac3r]

It's an assumption but you raise a good point.

I would hope it would be open the majority of any given day, maybe closing when all city buses are finished the same way Charles Street Terminal would close. Spending hundreds of millions of dollars on a train station to only open the doors when a VIA or GO train come in or depart would be crazy. It's supposed to be a multimodal station so I would expect bus and LRT users to use it as well...which is one reason why I think some small retail inside makes sense. Just somewhere to buy a sandwich, coffee, newspaper, charge your phone while you sit around eating it, to get out of the rain or cold and to use the washroom. Otherwise why the hell do we even need to spend so much money on this thing?

[danbrotherston]

I think they'd prefer the station get built anyway. Public facilities like that offer shelter from the elements, washrooms, sinks and if the region has any sense: a place to purchase things (though I know they didn't want to offer and retail). So long as they keep the premises clean then them using it is fine.

Besides, the region has allocated tens of millions to invest in permanent tent encampments elsewhere in addition to other services. That would be better for everyone downtown - individuals and businesses - to shoo them away from camping in parks and disused gravel lots. It's unsightly, dangerous and breeding crime. Having them in designated areas would be preferable. And once the station gets completed and all day GO service, improved VIA and intercity buses can use it as a hub it'll bring in a more economic investment which is good for everyone be they homeless or otherwise.

Obviously the region would prefer to open the train station immediately. But they do not prefer that enough to actually spend the money (or pick a reasonable design/figure out why their small station costs an unprecedented 100 million dollars and fix that). So we wait.

[Spokes]

And the longer we wait to build the more expensive it'll get

[danbrotherston]

And the longer we wait to build the more expensive it'll get

If you project out current trend lines we're going to spent a billion dollars on a gravel platform with a sign post in 2050.

Fortunately, we're in good company, all of Ontario's infrastructure costs are going....as the cryptobros say to the moon.

[nms]

The Regional Airport expansion is largely being funded by passenger landing fees, is it not?

Unfortunately, since the only transportation users of the new station would be government owned agencies (eg GRT, GO/Metrolinx, VIA), there's not much room in ticket prices to slide in an equivalent fee.

The current station was built by the private railway operator (Grand Trunk Railway) and then absorbed into the nationalized Canadian National Railway system before being divested to VIA Rail. As it is only open around the time that trains operate, presumably, as the trains operate closer together, the station could be open for longer periods of time.

[SF22]

The only benefit I can see to being forced to wait for construction to start, is that we might get to revisit the current design choice. I am continually baffled that they didn't even make space for one (1) single coffee shop inside the hub. Sure, you could go across the street to get something to eat (crossing two busy streets to do so), but Cavan Coffee only opens at 8am, so that's not helpful for most of the people taking a GO train towards Toronto every morning. It just feels like such a standard feature for a major transit station; hell, there are NYC subway stations that have stalls selling magazines and chocolate bars on the platform directly beside the train. Surely we can have one place to buy a warm drink.

[Chris]

Is Cavan still open? I haven't seen anyone in the front shop for months and I walk by it twice every day. I like their cold brew but as I never see anyone in the shop I have stopped in since around the end of Sept. They also haven't put the sandwich board out during this time so I've just gone on the assumption that it's no longer operating.

If Cavan is closed, The Dispensary is the only option on this corner now.