Richard White
Senior Member
Not fast enough for the 1500 pi**ed off passengers. Refunding their transport costs is fine but what about hotel bookings, excursion passes, etc.
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- Thread starter drum118
- Start date
Not fast enough for the 1500 pi**ed off passengers. Refunding their transport costs is fine but what about hotel bookings, excursion passes, etc.
anb
Active Member
I guess when you have a public outrage and probably 1500+ furious riders it’s enough to make anything happen.
Bordercollie
Senior Member
Richard White
Senior Member
No they can't. By the time the next train arrives they will have missed it.
LNahid2000
Senior Member
The next train is 76 minutes delayed, so it'll be past 5pm by the time by the time people get to the tourist district. Waste of a day.
anb
Active Member
If some are spending the entire weekend and/or the minority that have Monday off then they can still recover from this and enjoy themselves, but it’s a complete waste for the single day trip passengers. It doesn’t help that the trip normally spans 2-5 hours for most people who’s from the north or east end of the GTA, so those are the ones that definitely has the day ruined for them.
lenaitch
Senior Member
crs1026
Senior Member
LOL - Actually, bridges swing pretty easily... they are counterweighted, after all. Whatever broke or seized would have been misaligned or awkward to dislodge.
I don't know what one can do when there is no alternate route or alternative transport available. No different than weather closing an airport, really - there will be disappointed people, but it's not like these folks were flying to take a cruise.
- Paul
WillTo
Senior Member
Northern Light
Superstar
Perhaps not, though for some low-income people, the time and $ commitment, never mind if you have little kids in tow is not immaterial.
I would add, a fair few international tourists to Toronto want to make a 1-day side trip to see the Falls and may not pass by this way again for years (or ever).
That's not to say there was an easy solution; rather, I'm simply sympathetic to those who lost several hours of their time and a planned excursion.
crs1026
Senior Member
Lots of disappointment, certainly, especially for families with kids.
The saving grace is that the breakdown happened before the train got over the bridge. Had it happened with the load of people already at the Falls, and unable to get home, the issue would change from inconvenient to a much more serious situation.
I wonder what level of response GO can or would muster in that situation.
- Paul
reaperexpress
Senior Member
Based on my experience the when my weekday Niagara local train failed to take me to St. Catharines a few years ago, GO won't refund the tickets, because the delay was CN's fault.
My experience:
The Maple Leaf a half hour earlier had apparently reported unsafe track conditions on the track in St Catharines station, so our train had to take the other track, which doesn't have a platform. They gathered everyone (20 people) accessibility car, and the plan was to unload across the other track using the station's asphalt crossings which are there for that purpose. But for whatever reason, they decided that they couldn't do that and ended up running non-stop to Niagara Falls. They said they would run a shuttle bus back to St. Catharines for us.
There was indeed a bus waiting in the parking lot of the train station, but upon exiting the parking lot (bottoming out on the steep ramp in the process) the bus just went to the bus terminal and started the regularly scheduled Route 12 trip to Burlington. So we stopped at Niagara College and were told that we'd need to transfer at St Catharines Fairview mall to another bus. The passengers basically revolted at this notion and demanded to be driven direct to St. Catharines Station. So the drivers arranged to instead swap buses at Fairview Mall, so the people heading to St. Catharines Station stayed on the bus, while people continuing on the 12 needed to get off switch to the other bus. There were a group of Route 12 customers upstairs who didn't speak English, but fortunately there was someone onboard who spoke Spanish and could explain to them what they needed to do.
I called GO afterwards to ask for a refund, and they told me that they wouldn't since the track conditions were CN's fault, not theirs. They only refunded the difference between the trip to Niagara which I had been forced to take, and the trip to St Catharines which I had been trying to take.
My experience:
The Maple Leaf a half hour earlier had apparently reported unsafe track conditions on the track in St Catharines station, so our train had to take the other track, which doesn't have a platform. They gathered everyone (20 people) accessibility car, and the plan was to unload across the other track using the station's asphalt crossings which are there for that purpose. But for whatever reason, they decided that they couldn't do that and ended up running non-stop to Niagara Falls. They said they would run a shuttle bus back to St. Catharines for us.
There was indeed a bus waiting in the parking lot of the train station, but upon exiting the parking lot (bottoming out on the steep ramp in the process) the bus just went to the bus terminal and started the regularly scheduled Route 12 trip to Burlington. So we stopped at Niagara College and were told that we'd need to transfer at St Catharines Fairview mall to another bus. The passengers basically revolted at this notion and demanded to be driven direct to St. Catharines Station. So the drivers arranged to instead swap buses at Fairview Mall, so the people heading to St. Catharines Station stayed on the bus, while people continuing on the 12 needed to get off switch to the other bus. There were a group of Route 12 customers upstairs who didn't speak English, but fortunately there was someone onboard who spoke Spanish and could explain to them what they needed to do.
I called GO afterwards to ask for a refund, and they told me that they wouldn't since the track conditions were CN's fault, not theirs. They only refunded the difference between the trip to Niagara which I had been forced to take, and the trip to St Catharines which I had been trying to take.
EnviroTO
Senior Member
Hehe, C Major and it is played with 3.5 whole notes in the ever popular 10/15 time. I feel like they did miss a note.
Allandale25
Senior Member
Display board issues at Union? Or they can't upload the data fast enough?
APTA-2048
Senior Member
Saw this last weekend too. Traffic is so bad on Lakeshore, GO cancelled service to Union and rerouted the buses.