Two more trains for Kitchener by fall – and dissecting the news
By shost at 8:57 am on Wednesday, June 15, 2016
Announced yesterday – a special GO train was ran west in the morning and east in the afternoon from Toronto for this event at the Kitchener station.
http://www.therecord.com/news-story...-two-way-all-day-go-train-service-wynne-says/
Bottom line is due to the Shirley Ave layover facility, GO will add two more departures out of Kitchener this fall.
Now here’s the interesting part, with respect to all-day service by 2024: “The Premier said her government is very confident the commitment will be met now that there’s an agreement in principle between transit agency Metrolinx and CN that will result in the construction of a new freight line to run from Bramalea to about Milton.”
What is this new freight line? This is the ‘missing link’ – in effect, if a new freight corridor is built from Milton to Halwest (Bramalea) along the 407, when completed CN trains can be taken off the Georgetown to Bramalea corridor and free this corridor up for all day service and , eventually, electrification. It has little effect on us in the KW/Guelph regions, except for the fact that Georgetown-Bramalea is the bottleneck stopping any additional departures or all-day service to our areas.
So now Metrolinx will pay for this new ‘missing link’ – work with CN (and potentially CP) to construct the corridor, once completed, purchase Bramalea to Georgetown (Metrolinx will own the entire route from Toronto t0 Kitchener at that point) and then have the potential to add all-day service to even Kitchener. *Phew*. That’s 8 years of work.
The ‘missing link’ also has the potential to re-route CP trains off the Milton to Toronto corridor to allow all-day service on the Milton line, and also would allow GO to add service on the now un-serviced CP North Toronto subdivision – but agreements with CP are still forthcoming.
The ‘missing link’ has yet to go for Environmental Assessment approval, but planning for it is well under way. watch for more soon once details arise.
- Steve