[crs1026]

I strongly agree with this, though I think a service pattern like this will get a level of ridership which doesn't justify the costs. In my opinion, Cambridge's geographical location along with its population make it such that it can never support passenger rail.

I think you are selling Cambridge short.....it's too big a population base, and growing, to not have connectivity to the GTA as well as to the rest of K-W, plus neighbouring population centers such as Brantford, Paris, Guelph, and Hamilton. I do agree that we can mostly bridge the next decade or so with bus, but we should be planning new heavier connections. There really aren't many extant rail lines to support that.... there may be good reason to plan some new light or semi-heavy rail lines to create a new network. The old radial electric lines weren't wrong for their day, they just ceased to be competitive as roads took over.

The key issues that I would put into the mix
- Waterloo Region is approaching gridlock in many places, especially on the periphery where roads into densifying communities such as Elmira and Breslau remain two lanes ( As an old UW alumnus, the idea of Highway 85 thru Waterloo being stop and go during afternoon rush seems preposterous....but thats the everyday reality now). There is only so much that bus can improve without spending a fair amount on roads.Far better if that money go to transit investment.
- Expansion of Hiway 401 from 8 to 25 is still a decade away, whereas a GO service could be planned and built in five.. The congestion on 401 west of 25 is one of the GTA's most pressing traffic problems imho, I don't feel the term ´crisis' is too strong. I suspect we may be overly fixated on bringing people to Union Station, I wonder where all the cars heading east towards 25 actually end up. I do suspect that many head to work in places short of Toronto ( and may have a last mile challenge along the way).... wherever they go, GO needs to build. If the data is there, thru GO trains through Guelph are worth the investment... but I don't have data to know that.
- And ML needs to grow a sense of urgency about full 2 way service to Kitchener, period.
- 2WAD on the Milton line is now a certainty, eventually. Starting a skeleton extension to Cambridge on that line is not money wasted as it will be. logical extension some day (comparable to the Bowmanville extension to LSE)

- Paul

 

[Bureaucromancer]

- 2WAD on the Milton line is now a certainty, eventually. Starting a skeleton extension to Cambridge on that line is not money wasted as it will be. logical extension some day (comparable to the Bowmanville extension to LSE)

The more I look at it, the more I really don't like that option with GJR available. I really can't think of any thing that Cambridge via the Galt Sub does better than Guelph via GJR OTHER than creating a single seat ride from the less than ideal Cambridge station of choice to Union.

 

[crs1026]

The more I look at it, the more I really don't like that option with GJR available. I really can't think of any thing that Cambridge via the Galt Sub does better than Guelph via GJR OTHER than creating a single seat ridge from the less than ideal Cambridge station of choice to Union.

What Milton does better is connect to employment and commercial destinations along the 401 into Mississauga.No coincidence that the GO bus stops at Square One today.
What Guelph (I think you mean the G&G, not the GJR) does better is connectivity to Brampton and Malton and possibly into Vaughan.
How these compare we don’t have data to argue over - I do know several Cambridge and Brealau people who commute to the airport area, But that’s a small anecdotal data point.

- Paul

 

[Bureaucromancer]

What Milton does better is connect to employment and commercial destinations along the 401 into Mississauga.No coincidence that the GO bus stops at Square One today.
What Guelph (I think you mean the G&G, not the GJR) does better is connectivity to Brampton and Malton and possibly into Vaughan.
How these compare we don’t have data to argue over - I do know several Cambridge and Brealau people who commute to the airport area, But that’s a small anecdotal data point.

- Paul

No, I definitely mean the Guelph Junction Railway*, and I do agree with your point about on-line destinations for the Milton corridor. What I'm highlighting is that Guelph is a (slightly) larger market than Cambridge in isolation, and offers good connectivity (geographic potential for connectivity anyway) for passengers coming from Waterloo region, even if they arrive by bus. Cambridge on the other hand serves... Cambridge; and even the Galt station is a far from ideal location.

In other words, my best guess is that extending Milton trains to Guelph does a lot more for the network and region overall than extending them to Milton would. And does it on a corridor that's already publicly owned, without anything awkward like Mountsberg Reservoir.

*If we're going to try and untangle the corporate name mess I'll mostly defer to others but while Guelph and Goderich was the name is use longest, we're talking about the corridor from Campbellville to Guelph, which is the original GJR and has always been called as much by the City, regardless of who the current operator was.

 

[crs1026]

*If we're going to try and untangle the corporate name mess I'll mostly defer to others but while Guelph and Goderich was the name is use longest, we're talking about the corridor from Campbellville to Guelph, which is the original GJR and has always been called as much by the City, regardless of who the current operator was.

Ah, I see the confusion.... by G&G I was referring to the Galt & Guelph rather than the Goderich Sub. One of those terms that you hear senior railroaders still using.

- Paul

 

[crs1026]

No, I definitely mean the Guelph Junction Railway*, and I do agree with your point about on-line destinations for the Milton corridor. What I'm highlighting is that Guelph is a (slightly) larger market than Cambridge in isolation, and offers good connectivity (geographic potential for connectivity anyway) for passengers coming from Waterloo region, even if they arrive by bus. Cambridge on the other hand serves... Cambridge; and even the Galt station is a far from ideal location.

It's a digression - but I agree with you that Guelph is a valuable hub to enable routes that fan out particularly to the north and northwest without forcing people to go all the way down to central Kitchener to get anywhere.

However - I don't see the practicality of using the GJR - as the cost and complexity of building a second terminal in Guelph, and then managing a two-terminal network, is substantial. Growing the bus connections out of the existing Guelph GO station seems a better use of that money.

But if there were ever a "Guelph Bypass" that took all of the through traffic coming down into KW from the north and northwest and rerouted it north of both KW and Guelph, over towards Acton.... the GJR if extended up to Elmira would meet that need, but on pure cost considerations I think I have reached a fantasy idea.

We need to have a far more apples-to-oranges examination of roadbuilding vs railway building in the area west of the GTA. It's not a fantasy discussion to suggest that we not upgrade roads and build new rail lines instead. The rail lines are not expensive to build, when compared to highway construction - and what we get as an outcome from transit lines is a lot better than a bigger road network. Highway 7 Kitchener to Guelph is an example, upgrading the Hanlon is another. Upgrades Highway 6 to Hamilton versus a light rail connection on a new right of way? I'd like to see the two costs side by side.

- Paul

 

[robmausser]

Just totally throwing this out there without any sort of looking into it, but did the study look at creating a spur of the ION LRT along the fergus spur instead of a separate EMU?

Would mean catenary would need to be hooked up but potentially could be a phase 3 of the LRT? Similar to how the LRT uses the Waterloo Spur.

If we are examining the benefits of an EMU over a spur of the GO train from Union, more frequency, more of a connection between Cambridge and Guelph etc, why don't we look into creating an LRT spur off of Pinebush.

The top speed of the Flexities is 80kmh however, maybe thats not fast enough. I'd be curious to know what the expected speed of the EMU is, considering there will be many at grade crossings along this route etc.

 

[Sauga89]

the cost and complexity of building a second terminal in Guelph, and then managing a two-terminal network, is substantial.

I don't know if it would be worth the cost, or if the ridership would justify it, but could you perhaps create a junction between the Kitchener Line and the GJR which would allow trains on the GJR to use Guelph Central? Between the two lines there is a city park called Royal City Jacees Park, and north of that is a used car dealer and some industrial land that you could expropriate for a connection perhaps.

No, I definitely mean the Guelph Junction Railway*, and I do agree with your point about on-line destinations for the Milton corridor. What I'm highlighting is that Guelph is a (slightly) larger market than Cambridge in isolation, and offers good connectivity (geographic potential for connectivity anyway) for passengers coming from Waterloo region, even if they arrive by bus. Cambridge on the other hand serves... Cambridge; and even the Galt station is a far from ideal location.

In other words, my best guess is that extending Milton trains to Guelph does a lot more for the network and region overall than extending them to Milton would. And does it on a corridor that's already publicly owned, without anything awkward like Mountsberg Reservoir.

I measure the route to Guelph via the GJR and the Milton Line as being 10 km longer than the current route via the Kitchener Line (88 km to Union vs 78), and the Milton/GJR route has a lot more curves, so I imagine the travel time to Union would be a lot longer that way. I do like the idea of a more direct Guelph-Milton-Mississauga train service though.

It doesn't sound like it would help Cambridge much, unless you ran a few trains from Kitchener GO via the GJR/Milton route to serve Kitchener to Mississauga demand, and freed up slots on the Kitchener Line to go to Cambridge via Guelph. I think however Cambridge to Union via the Kitchener Line is longer than direct to Campbellville and Milton along CP's tracks (102 km via the Kitchener Line vs. 91 km via the Milton Line).

 

[reaperexpress]

The amount of new track (and row space) needed to lay over even short d(b)mu’s at Guelph implies some expensive construction. I am doubtful there is a quick fix here. We are assuming that a layover schedule and service plan is feasible without understanding what role the only two available tracks may play in allowing GO and VIA trains to Kitchener to meet on an otherwise single track line. The ROW is narrow and punching in additional track may be impractical. Through trains are less of an issue as they just flow through and are gone.

The fact that it's a single-track line is precisely what gives me the confidence that we know what the service pattern will be. We know where they're building passing tracks and we know the travel times so there are only two possible hourly service patterns: one with meets in Georgetown and Guelph and another with meets in Acton and Breslau. Between those two, the Guelph/Georgetown option seems far more plausible to me because it produces a more optimal terminal time in Kitchener and doesn't require a second platform at Acton or Breslau.

If the meet between eastbound and westbound Kitchener trains happens at Guelph as I suspect, then here's how the meet would work. Let's say that the meet happens at :30 past the hour.

0:24 DMU arrives on eastbound platform, dropping people on the same platform where they catch the train to Toronto

0:26 DMU departs eastward across the bridge and sits in the tail track
0:29 Westbound GO Train arrives at westbound platform

0:30 Eastbound arrives arrives at eastbound platform
0:31 Westbound GO Train departs

0:32 Eastbound GO Train departs
0:34 DMU moves to westbound platform, picking up GO passengers in the same spot where they were dropped off

0:36 DMU departs to Cambridge.

At this point both of the single-track lines on either side of the station are occupied by the trains that just departed so no other train can arrive in Guelph for at least 30 minutes. Even if one or both of the GO trains is delayed, the DMU can sit around and wait for them without being in another train's way. The other slot available for CN / VIA / GO trains is offset by 30 minutes from when the DMU would be around, so during that half of the hour the DMU wouldn't be anywhere near Guelph.

I showed the meet being timed pretty precisely to minimize transfer time, but there's plenty of time available to pad out the headway between DMU and GO trains if desired.

The bridge east of the station was always designed for two tracks, and Metrolinx recently replaced the cross-beams so adding a second track across the bridge should be pretty straightforward. The same cannot be said for trying cram a third platform into the station somehow, which would involve widening an embankment, building a new bridge over Wyndham Street and probably rebuilding the elevators and stairs on the south side of the station.

I figure Metrolinx would want to double track the bridge at some point anyway so the cost is not only attributable to the Cambridge DMU.

I am wondering if the report proposed a third platform simply because Metrolinx wasn't willing to commit to what their service pattern would be (even though the track configuration they are building has already made that commitment), so the project had to spec an expensive third platform. Which is the kind of unnecessary cost escalation we've come to expect from Metrolinx.

 

[crs1026]

^I agree that an O-train like service would be feasible and relatively low cost to build..... the question would be, does it deliver enough ridership and does it meet the stated need of creating the best links between Cambridge and its most important destinations, in a way that draws people out of their cars ? Is full heavy GO required to meet that need ?

Today's O-train opening in Ottawa may be a game changer, especially the airport link.... a lot more people are going to be exposed to that style of medium-weight transit. The appetite may grow as a result.

Still, does this business case create more mobility than, say, intensifying service between New Hamburg and Guelph on the main line? Or making the investment in more double track on the Guelph Sub to upgrade the Kitchener service plan and increase through intercity service? Is it preferable to correcting the egregious bad track west of Kitchener to London?

To my mind, while it is doable, it may still only be a B priority.

- Paul

 

[robmausser]

I figure Metrolinx would want to double track the bridge at some point anyway so the cost is not only attributable to the Cambridge DMU.

You can sure as hell bet they will try to attribute it to it though.

"Metrolinx says costs of Guelph-Cambridge train have tripled, wont say why"

"Governor General inquiry into tripling cost of Guelph-Cambridge train find that costs were associated with bridge that was not originally part of scope"

"Unfortunately Guelph-Cambridge train has been cancelled due to escalating costs, Metrolinx spokesperson says"

There I wrote the articles in advance

 

[andrewmaps]

Would it not be possible to have a small siding, capable of holding one 2 or 3 car DMU? A retaining wall would be needed and a connection to the new (currently unused) southside platform. The Wynham bridge (nor any other bridge) would not need to be widened. Also a storage siding could be easily accomodated between Alma and Edinburgh, furher West in case a train needed to be stored for whatever reason.... The only downside is if the service wanted to ever use larger trains, this scenario would not work...

 

[reaperexpress]

Would it not be possible to have a small siding, capable of holding one 2 or 3 car DMU? A retaining wall would be needed and a connection to the new (currently unused) southside platform. The Wynham bridge (nor any other bridge) would not need to be widened. Also a storage siding could be easily accomodated between Alma and Edinburgh, furher West in case a train needed to be stored for whatever reason.... The only downside is if the service wanted to ever use larger trains, this scenario would not work...

View attachment 623691

It looks like that might be feasible but it looks like it would be less convenient and more expensive than building a tailtrack east of the station.

The construction cost for this design would be much greater than just ordering some additional spans to place on the existing abutments east of the station. This design requires significant regrading and retaining walls - even more signifcant than shown in your image because the existing eastbound platform actually extends much further west than you've shown.

The main issue with the design is the transfer distance between the westbound train and the DMU. If you get off the east end of a westbound train, you need to walk up to 400 metres, including an elevator and a long ramp. And the distance from the east end of the bus terminal is even more.

Such a long transfer distance means that there needs to be a long transfer time from westbound GO trains to the DMU that is always provided even if the GO train is late, to accommodate people with limited mobility. Longer transfer times make the connecting service less time-competitive, and the long transfer distance is physically exhausting, especially for more elderly passengers, which also makes the service far less attractive than a same-platform transfer.

So while it may be technically possible, it would provide a significantly worse passenger experience and would be more expensive than building a trailtrack east of the station.

 

[andrewmaps]

It looks like that might be feasible but it looks like it would be less convenient and more expensive than building a tailtrack east of the station.

The construction cost would be much greater than the tailtrack option due to the significant regrading and retaining wall required. The existing eastbound platform actually extends much further west than you've shown, which precludes the illustrated design due to the short distance to the Wilson St bridge.
View attachment 623703

The main issue with the design is the transfer distance between the westbound train and the DMU. If you get off the east end of a westbound train, you need to walk up to 400 metres, including an elevator and a long ramp. And the distance from the east end of the bus terminal is even more.
View attachment 623704
Such a long transfer distance means that there needs to be a long transfer time from westbound GO trains to the DMU that is always provided even if the GO train is late, to accommodate people with limited mobility. Longer transfer times make the connecting service less time-competitive, and the long transfer distance is physically exhausting, especially for more elderly passengers, which also makes the service far less attractive than a same-platform transfer.

So while it may be technically possible, it would provide a significantly worse passenger experience and would be more expensive than building a trailtrack east of the station.

Wouldn't a station east of the bridge be a lot further? I would think my option at least you could connect from the same station - I would imagine a seperate station being a much worse passenger experience? Also, seasoned regular users would position themselves closer to the transfer point. Also, the east end solution REQUIRES double tracking the Speed River Bridge. I figured a retaining wall and some grading much less costly. Maybe the spur track come around next to the existing platform? Where did you get your image? (much more up to date than google!)

 

[reaperexpress]

Wouldn't a station east of the bridge be a lot further? I would think my option at least you could connect from the same station - I would imagine a seperate station being a much worse passenger experience?

Nobody is proposing a station east of the bridge. It's just a tail track. See the diagrams in my post above, the platforms are just the two existing ones.

Also, seasoned regular users would position themselves closer to the transfer point.

You need to design the transfer time around the slowest user, not the fastest user. And no matter how well you position yourself on the bay platform, you're never going to match the convenience of the tail track option that drops you off on the same platform where the next train picks you up.

Also, the east end solution REQUIRES double tracking the Speed River Bridge. I figured a retaining wall and some grading much less costly. Maybe the spur track come around next to the existing platform?

Adding retaining walls and acquiring property would definitely be more expensive than adding a second set of spans to a bridge that already has the abutments for them.

Where did you get your image? (much more up to date than google!)

That was the image Google Maps gave me, not sure why you're getting an older one. Maybe you have 3D buildings on, they don't update 3D imagery very often.

In any case my go-to for recent images is Google Earth via its Time tool. Many cities also have their own online mapping tool that may have more recent imagery than Google Maps.