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robmausser said:
I really have to disagree with this, there are large portions of that section of the GEXR thats super straight. Yes there are some curves but they pale in comparison to how many straight sections there are. This isn't a constantly wavering track through a valley or something.
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The line is definitely very straight, and definitely can (and should) be upgraded for speeds much higher than its historical 70 mph limit. I'm not questioning the number of straight sections, I'm questioning the length of each straight section.

Here are the 3 longest straight segments along the line:

20.3 km from Stratford to New Hamburg. Flanked by a ~ 60 mph curve to the west, and a stop in New Hamburg or Baden to the east. The curve in the middle has a radius of approximately 3000 m, which is suitable for 110 mph.
Capture7.JPG


16.6 km from outside St. Mary's to near London Airport. Flanked by ~70 mph curves.
Capture9.JPG


14.3 km between Stratford and St. Marys, flanked by ~55 mph and ~40 mph curves.
Capture8.JPG


My intuition is that the first two may be suitable for upgrades to 110 mph, but the second one may be cutting it a bit tight as far as how much time trains can save by exceeding 100 mph. If someone has time to do a back-of-the-envelope estimate assuming acceleration and deceleration rates, I'd be interested to see the difference. This blog suggests that at 79 mph, the acceleration rate of a similar consist is 0.1 m/s/s.

The remaining straight segments are quite short, so I don't see them accelerating by 40 mph (64 km/h) from 70 mph to 110 mph, just to immediately shed off all that energy by hitting the brakes.
robmausser said:
As for the F59's I find that very surprising, i'd love to see some documentation on that. Most F59's have a 110mph top speed, and the ones own by GO were refurbished in 2011. I can't imagine they would be run down by now.
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https://www.metrolinx.com/en/electrification/docs/Appendix3.pdf
Capture0.JPG


https://www.dart.org/newsroom/trefacts.asp
Capture.JPG


My understanding is that the top speed of GO's F59's is lower than some other F59 variants because GO selected a gear ratio which would allow them to reliably pull 10 BiLevel coaches despite only having 3000 hp.

https://cptdb.ca/wiki/index.php/GO_Transit
Capture5.JPG


robmausser said:
Regardless, once they replace the bridge on this section, which would coincide with retracking I am sure, they could use the MPI's or other locos.
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Definitely. Any track upgrade project would definitely need to repair/upgrade the St. Mary's bridge to support normal train loads. The F59's aren't going to last forever.
 
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reaperexpress said:
The line is definitely very straight, and definitely can (and should) be upgraded for speeds much higher than its historical 70 mph limit. I'm not questioning the number of straight sections, I'm questioning the length of each straight section.

Here are the 3 longest straight segments along the line:

20.3 km from Stratford to New Hamburg. Flanked by a ~ 60 mph curve to the west, and a stop in New Hamburg or Baden to the east. The curve in the middle has a radius of approximately 3000 m, which is suitable for 110 mph.
View attachment 391197

16.6 km from outside St. Mary's to near London Airport. Flanked by ~70 mph curves.
View attachment 391195

14.3 km between Stratford and St. Marys, flanked by ~55 mph and ~40 mph curves.
View attachment 391196

My intuition is that the first two may be suitable for upgrades to 110 mph, but the second one may be cutting it a bit tight as far as how much time trains can save by exceeding 100 mph. If someone has time to do a back-of-the-envelope estimate assuming acceleration and deceleration rates, I'd be interested to see the difference. This blog suggests that at 79 mph, the acceleration rate of a similar consist is 0.1 m/s/s.

The remaining straight segments are quite short, so I don't see them accelerating by 40 mph (64 km/h) from 70 mph to 110 mph, just to immediately shed off all that energy by hitting the brakes.


https://www.metrolinx.com/en/electrification/docs/Appendix3.pdf
View attachment 391200

https://www.dart.org/newsroom/trefacts.asp
View attachment 391203

My understanding is that the top speed of GO's F59's is lower than some other F59 variants because GO selected a gear ratio which would allow them to reliably pull 10 BiLevel coaches despite only having 3000 hp.

https://cptdb.ca/wiki/index.php/GO_Transit
View attachment 391199


Definitely. Any track upgrade project would definitely need to repair/upgrade the St. Mary's bridge to support normal train loads. The F59's aren't going to last forever.
Click to expand...
Another trivia point to point out. On MPI's website it states the top speed of the mp54s is 110 mph but I believe GO ordered a difference gear ratio for 93 mph max for quicker acceleration.
 
Somewhere (won’t have time to hunt for it today) I saw a document with the actual curve data for the Guelph Sub…. the numbers were actually a little better than one’s naked eye might think. The bigger issue may be specific level crossings eg Baden, New Hamburg.

In any event, without getting into precise math, 27 miles at 110 mph = 14 minutes, 27 miles at 95 mph = 17 minutes. Three minute potential saving less whatever acceleration and deceleration penalties one wishes to assume. That’s not worth bending stars and moon for. 95 is so achievable with one basic upgrade program that I would not argue for more, at least until there is capacity and demand for express runs over and above local service.

- Paul
 
Willybru21 said:
It was just announced that all 56 Bi-Level Series II coaches are being sent to North Bay to be refurbished. The entire project will be completed in 2025.
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so 56 + previously 94 + previous 15
wikipedia says MX has 950 coaches so thats about 15% of the fleet currently being refurbrished.

this could be because mx is going to run more diesel and electric locomotives than they thought. not as many emus as they probably wanted for the GO expansion
 
Need for the bi-levels would cover a range of reasons from timing (electrification isn't going to happen across all the lines for quite some time), non-electrified network (Lakeshore West beyond Burlington, Milton line, Kitchener-London line beyond Bramalea, Richmond Hill line, and Lakeshore East beyond Oshawa) which will grow significantly in service levels, and electric locomotives used to allow higher capacity during peak services. On Lakeshore West as an example there is unlikely to be less bi-levels because off-peak there is 30 minute service to Burlington today, and after electrification the service model shows (in addition to the electrified service every 15min or less) an hourly express to Burlington and an hourly express to Confederation (or beyond as Casablanca Road is being planned as the next step after Confederation) which is going to use as many bi-levels as the current off-peak services do.
 
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EnviroTO said:
Need for the bi-levels would cover a range of reasons from timing (electrification isn't going to happen across all the lines for quite some time), non-electrified network (Lakeshore West beyond Aldershot,
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Actually its beyond Burlington but the point still stands :)

However I do also think that generalcanada has a point - it is looking like db is likely to be chosen to operate GO, and DB runs many of their services using electric locomotives. As such I think its looking more and more likely that initial electrification might simply involve electric locomotives, and EMUs will come way later - say 10 years from now.
 
EnviroTO said:
Need for the bi-levels would cover a range of reasons from timing (electrification isn't going to happen across all the lines for quite some time), non-electrified network (Lakeshore West beyond Aldershot, Milton line, Kitchener-London line beyond Bramalea, Richmond Hill line, and Lakeshore East beyond Oshawa) which will grow significantly in service levels, and electric locomotives used to allow higher capacity during peak services. On Lakeshore West as an example there is unlikely to be less bi-levels because off-peak there is 30 minute service to Burlington today, and after electrification the service model shows (in addition to the electrified service every 15min or less) an hourly express to Burlington and an hourly express to Confederation (or beyond as Casablanca Road is being planned as the next step after Confederation) which is going to use as many bi-levels as the current off-peak services do.
Click to expand...
Exactly. Even with the inner portions of many lines approaching subway-level frequencies (or at least subway-level frequencies in most other parts of the world), the outer portions of the lines will still be getting pretty substantial frequency boosts, with most of those runs still running express over those inner portions. So while the service will become more stratified, the number of KMs each diesel train will have to travel won't really decrease.
 
ARG1 said:
Actually its beyond Burlington but the point still stands :)
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Fixed... I'm surprised they can't electrify to Aldershot because the freight doesn't mix much until beyond that station, but I guess they didn't figure out a way to own the south side of the corridor.
 
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