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This new late night service to Oakville isn't showing up on GO's schedule on their website, even after April 7th it's still showing the last train out of Union at 00:43
 
Streety McCarface said:
Still no Kitchener Weekend Service?
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Nope

Streety McCarface said:
Wasn't that promised back in 2016?
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Promised in the 2016 budget to be running (evenings and weekends) by the end of Fiscal 2017 (ie. March 31 2017)

Streety McCarface said:
And what about 12 car trains? nothing has been done at Bramalae.
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Minister promised (during a rare press conference....on the platform at Bramalea) that 12 car trains would be running on the corridor by the end of 2017.....he did not say whether that was fiscal 2017 or calendar 2017....but it does not matter...both have passed.
 
TOareaFan said:
Promised in the 2016 budget to be running (evenings and weekends) by the end of Fiscal 2017 (ie. March 31 2017)
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As discussed before in this thread (maybe @Streety McCarface hadn't see the posts from the time so posting for their information), it has been pointed out that the general public probably doesn't read the entire budget PDF or have time to consider or find disclaimers. So, some are of the view that it doesn't matter if the budget text on various parges is consistent or not; a promise is a promise no matter where it appears.

Just to provide all the 2016 Budget links that specifically relate to the off-peak for the Kitchener Line, here's a quick overview.

The 2016 budget page (still active) shows "2016 Ontario Budget" and "Backgrounders" with links below. If you go to the HTML "Infrastructure" page under the Backgrounders header and scroll down it says:
As a first step to phasing in GO RER, Metrolinx is continuing to implement short-term service improvements that will result in new travel options across the seven corridors of the GO rail network. In 2016–17, planned network-wide GO rail service improvements include the addition of up to:
  • 10 new trips during midday/evening (i.e., off-peak) on the Kitchener corridor to/from the City of Brampton; and
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I assume that these HTML pages are designed to provide 'quick reads' of the budget. The text is the same as the full budget but it's just divided up into the sections.

For "2016 Ontario Budget" there is a "Table of Contents" and "Highlights". Highlights has this:
  • Reducing commute times and making travel more convenient by implementing Regional Express Rail, improving GO Transit services and continuing to roll out the PRESTO fare card system on Toronto transit.
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However, if you click on "Table of Contents" and then "download PDF" you get the entire full budget PDF and on page 68 there is a disclaimer for the Kitchener Line off-peak service. The promise noted above is repeated but this is included:
The additional service is dependent on a number of factors, including negotiations with freight rail companies, the implementation of infrastructure and the delivery of new rail equipment.
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If you stay on the page after clicking on "Table of Contents" and go to "Inside the GTHA", the site takes you to a HTML page of the full budget for this section with the disclaimer included.

In the 2017 budget, webpage not only looks different, but there are different steps (one option is here then here and then here) to get to the full budget PDF. For the 2017 budget, rather than any specific promise or promise with disclaimer, they simply wrote: "Planning and technical analyses are underway to enable two‐way, all‐day GO rail service along the Kitchener corridor".
 
^are you suggesting that a page with the url: https://www.fin.gov.on.ca/en/budget/ontariobudgets/2016/bk2.html

which on google search pages has the headline
upload_2018-3-16_17-50-47.png


and contains the words:
upload_2018-3-16_17-51-35.png


Does not constitute a promise from the government of Ontario to its citizens?

Is that what you are suggesting?
 

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^ The link you provided and the image included (I provided the same text in my previous post) is found with the same path as https://www.fin.gov.on.ca/en/budget/ontariobudgets/2016/ then Backgrounders:
There is also on that main page (as noted above) this option:

2016 Ontario Budget Table of Contents
Section B: Building Tomorrow’s Infrastructure Now
Re "constitute a promise" - already addressed that in my previous post: "So, some are of the view that it doesn't matter if the budget text on various pages is consistent or not; a promise is a promise no matter where it appears."

Re "Is that what you are suggesting?" Wasn't sure if @Streety McCarface (only a member since December 2017) had seen all these links. So, I wasn't trying to suggest something in any direction rather just provide the links. Folks here have offered and continue to offer views on this.
 
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^ And, how specific he/the platform gets in terms of CN/CP or calling for federal intervention. Does he portray himself as someone who can get a deal (compared to others) and/or use words similar to what Trump has done about companies and offshoring/countries and trade deficits?
 
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For those who still think this is a new issue - here's a blast from Nov 11 2015 Ontario Legislature Standing Committee on Public Accounts

Ms. Harinder Malhi:
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Thank you so much.

In Brampton, we’ve seen a number of added GO train services to all of our stations, but I wanted to talk a little bit more about the challenges that we’re having in rolling out the all-day, two-way service because of some of the rail tracks that are owned by CP or CN. I wanted to ask about how you’re proceeding to overcome those challenges.

Mr. Bruce McCuaig: Thanks for the question. Yes, in the context of both the Milton corridor and the Kitchener corridor, we do need to work very closely with CN and CP. In the case of the Kitchener corridor, the stretch between Bramalea and Georgetown is owned by
Canadian National and is their mainline freight track for, basically, east-west traffic in Canada. In the case of the Milton corridor, it is almost fully owned by CP Rail and again is their mainline track.

We need to build agreements with the railways in order to increase the level of service. Typically, those agreements come with a requirement that we build infrastructure so that in essence, the freight railway companies are made whole so that they can continue to serve their customers as well as continue to grow their customers in the future.

We have been in active discussions with both CN and CP in terms of both incremental additions of service as well as trying to identify strategies to rationalize the network more generally so that we do not have this ongoing question or discussion or negotiation about what additional services can be put into place.

We were successful in terms of being able to add an additional train in both directions on the Milton corridor this past year. As I said earlier on, we were able to introduce 14 midday trains on the Kitchener corridor from Mount Pleasant into Union Station. So those are all outcomes of negotiations with the railway companies and an agreement on infrastructure that needs to be built to support more service and then the construction of that infrastructure.

I think our core challenge going forward is to have a more fundamental conversation with the railways about how to co-exist in an environment where we don’t just want to add one or two or even 14 trains to a corridor in a given year; we want to have the same level of service that we have on the Lakeshore West or Lakeshore East corridors in these other corridors. That means that we have to have a very broad and deep conversation with the railways that involves the municipalities, that involves the federal government, to try to identify how we can take advantage of the opportunities to look at how we move people and how we move goods in this region on a going-forward basis.

There’s no question that goods movement is critical to our economy and to this region. We don’t want to jeopardize the ability of CN and CP to move freight because that is intrinsic to our economy, but we do want to find more ways to move more people and more trains through places like Brampton, Mississauga, Milton and Kitchener. That’s our objective over both the short and the longer term.
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- Paul
 
Allandale25 said:
^ And, how specific he/the platform gets in terms of CN/CP or calling for federal intervention. Does he portray himself as someone who can get a deal (compared to others) and/or use words similar to what Trump has done about companies and offshoring/countries and trade deficits?
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Yes. And then he has to cave to CN's demands, and CP as well.
 
The provincial agency （Metrolinx) also plans a “weekend blitz,” 74.5 consecutive hours of work, to rebuild the east GO Train platform at Kennedy Station, and add a west platform, a ticket building and new pedestrian underpass west of the Don Montgomery Community Centre.

Stouffville GO Line service will stop during this work, from Thursday, March 29 at 11:30 p.m. to 12:30 a.m. on Monday, April 2.
 
^ I wonder if it's an automated tweet in the Metroland system based on when any article is posted. If you click on the link in the tweet it says "Mississauga News". Fully agree that Metroland should calibrate their system because I can see how Brampton commuters could get frustrated with this.
 
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