King-Victoria Transit Hub

[SF22]

Okay, I've got some information from the region regarding what's going on with Lancaster at the tracks. Emphasis is my own:

The Lancaster Street Railway Grade Separation Feasibility Study is being done following the process used for Municipal Class Environmental Assessment studies. This requires that after background studies are done to gather all relevant information regarding existing conditions, that a problem statement be determined and a list of alternative solutions be prepared. These alternatives are evaluated and presented for public input before a recommended solution is brought forward for consideration by Regional Council.

To date we have gathered existing and projected vehicular, pedestrian and rail traffic volumes to isolate issues and determine contributing factors to the conflicts that are occurring at the existing at-grade crossing. Metrolinx owns the railway tracks through Kitchener and is also doing a study of the at-grade crossings in Kitchener and Guelph. At this time we are scheduling a meeting with Metrolinx staff to discuss our mutual interests at the Lancaster Street crossing and what alternative solutions may be available. Since the cost of a grade separation at this location would be significant,  potential cost sharing for these solutions will also be discussed. The results of these discussions will determine our approach going forward. At this time, we do not have sufficient information for review by the public. We expect that once meaningful discussions have been held with Metrolinx staff, that we will be in a position to present information for public comment early in 2025.

[kps]

Imagine if someone had thought ahead and swapped the freight sidings with the GO yard a kilometer east. Lancaster would hardly ever be blocked until we get 2WAD GO at 15-minute intervals, by which time it won't be a problem because we'll all have flying cars and jet packs.

[westwardloo]

There should be an exciting announcement about this project in the near future. This is all I can say.

[the_conestoga_guy]

There should be an exciting announcement about this project in the near future. This is all I can say.

I'd be happy with literally any sort of progress towards their published designs at this point!

Though, it's very apparent that the provincial conservatives are gearing up for an election. So if it's an "announcement" from them, I don't think it'll be worth much more than their other election promises.

[danbrotherston]

There should be an exciting announcement about this project in the near future. This is all I can say.

I'd be happy with literally any sort of progress towards their published designs at this point!

Though, it's very apparent that the provincial conservatives are gearing up for an election. So if it's an "announcement" from them, I don't think it'll be worth much more than their other election promises.

Oh come now...Fords promises on beer--those he makes good on--no matter the cost.... to say nothing of his promises to developers.

We should play into this.... we already failed to find a developer.... maybe we can play into our Oktoberfest specialty.

[tomh009]

I'd be happy with literally any sort of progress towards their published designs at this point!

Though, it's very apparent that the provincial conservatives are gearing up for an election. So if it's an "announcement" from them, I don't think it'll be worth much more than their other election promises.

Oh come now...Fords promises on beer--those he makes good on--no matter the cost.... to say nothing of his promises to developers.

We should play into this.... we already failed to find a developer.... maybe we can play into our Oktoberfest specialty.

Maybe he could offer free parking at the transit hub to appeal to his core constituency?

[timio]

Oh come now...Fords promises on beer--those he makes good on--no matter the cost.... to say nothing of his promises to developers.

We should play into this.... we already failed to find a developer.... maybe we can play into our Oktoberfest specialty.

Maybe he could offer free parking at the transit hub to appeal to his core constituency?

With no bike parking spots within a 15 km radius.

[KevinL]

Have we seen this render before? Happened upon it elsewhere online.



Extremely bare-bones, but certainly allows for expansion.

[panamaniac]

Oh come now...Fords promises on beer--those he makes good on--no matter the cost.... to say nothing of his promises to developers.

We should play into this.... we already failed to find a developer.... maybe we can play into our Oktoberfest specialty.

Maybe he could offer free parking at the transit hub to appeal to his core constituency?

His core constituency would probably drink sewage before using public transit.

[westwardloo]

Have we seen this render before? Happened upon it elsewhere online.



Extremely bare-bones, but certainly allows for expansion.

My understanding is that this is Phase 1 rendering, while the Region secured funding for the complete station. Phase 1 is technically already underway with most of the early work required by metrolinx.

[the_conestoga_guy]

Absent any other exciting announcements for the rail corridor, this news from the UT forum states that some of the work on passing tracks has reached the commissioning phase.

https://urbantoronto.ca/forum/threads/go...st-2159129

For all of our talk about AD2W service, it's little projects like these that are creating meaningful gains towards the goal!

[Bytor]

Absent any other exciting announcements for the rail corridor, this news from the UT forum states that some of the work on passing tracks has reached the commissioning phase.

https://urbantoronto.ca/forum/threads/go...st-2159129

For all of our talk about AD2W service, it's little projects like these that are creating meaningful gains towards the goal!

Now if only Metrolinx would actually make public the the list ofthen that they decided need to be done for them to implement #2WADGO all the way to Kitchener. 

Not a timeline, not a full project cost. Just a simple frigging list of the individual things (i.e. a new switch here, new tracks there, better signals over there, dead-ending roads A, B & C to reduce at-grade crossings, etc…) a so that we can check off what has been done and see what still needs to be done in order to gauge whether or not Mx is making reasonable progress.

But Mx is the opposite of transparent. 

[the_conestoga_guy]

For what it's worth, the Region's 2025 Preliminary Budget Book projects that the Transit Hub will be funded from 2027-2029 for a total of $120M.

$35M of "Early works" will occur from 2025-2028. The Duke underpass will be $3M and funded from 2026-2027.

All of this is on page 70 of 210 in the link below:
https://www.regionofwaterloo.ca/en/regio...t-Book.pdf

I would suspect that the "Early Works" will allow for the bare-bones station to be constructed at the King/Victoria site, and that the larger budget will be the construction of the larger building at the site.

However, since these budgets completely overlap, it's hard to tell if they ever plan to open the interim bare-bones station in advance of completing the main building.

[ac3r]

The cynic in me is thinking all we'll get IS the bare-bones station, with "plans" to proceed with a larger one which will not happen for decades.