Woodbridge_Heights
Senior Member
Yikes how did i miss that!!! Lets add the qualifier "without a regional transit system" then the comment should still work. (Im counting the OC transpo as a regional transit system)
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- Thread starter ehlow
- Start date
kEiThZ
Superstar
London doesn't have a transit network. Apparently doesn't want one either. They should focus any HSR/HFR/long haul rail effort on connecting Waterloo to Pearson airport and to speed up trips to Union. Reward the city that actually built transit and has a strategic sector.
ericmacm
Active Member
London is too concerned with kneecapping half of their own population to care about having suitable transit. Part of the reason they cut two of the BRT lines was in regard to not wanting "degenerate" Western students to benefit off of it, and not wanting the buses to interfere with the car-centric lifestyles of wealthy northwestern residents.
I'm pretty confident that London will end up getting a GO connection. The demand for it clearly exists, given that more people are commuting between London and the GTA. The city is also growing fast and I can see why Metrolinx would want to tap into the London area.
I just hope that a GO station will change some minds on rapid transit in London. If it happens, city council will find out pretty quickly that they need to step it up.
I'm pretty confident that London will end up getting a GO connection. The demand for it clearly exists, given that more people are commuting between London and the GTA. The city is also growing fast and I can see why Metrolinx would want to tap into the London area.
I just hope that a GO station will change some minds on rapid transit in London. If it happens, city council will find out pretty quickly that they need to step it up.
kEiThZ
Superstar
Nothing will propel HSR like lots of folks having 2.5 hr GO Train rides from London. I absolutely support this.
Midtown Urbanist
Superstar
Any discussion about HSR and GO trains to London need a serious discussion about who the users of the service will be, and what are their destinations and if they can reach those destinations in the vicinity of their alighting station.
If these are day-trippers or weekend commuters, the question is how many of them are there and are there enough to support that kind of massive infrastructure investment?
If these are meant to be daily commuters, how do you resolve the last mile problem? In many cases there will be a first mile problem too. And of course you still get the question of whether there are enough daily commuters to support that kind of massive infrastructure investment.
Has any HSR advocate looked at the ridership numbers for the Kitchener GO Station? That should give you an indication of what kind of numbers HSR would attract (hint: it is not a large number).
I like HSR as much as the next rail fan, but I don't want to spend the equivalent of 10 Mirabel's on something that would get maybe 1/5th the usage of the UPX.
If these are day-trippers or weekend commuters, the question is how many of them are there and are there enough to support that kind of massive infrastructure investment?
If these are meant to be daily commuters, how do you resolve the last mile problem? In many cases there will be a first mile problem too. And of course you still get the question of whether there are enough daily commuters to support that kind of massive infrastructure investment.
Has any HSR advocate looked at the ridership numbers for the Kitchener GO Station? That should give you an indication of what kind of numbers HSR would attract (hint: it is not a large number).
I like HSR as much as the next rail fan, but I don't want to spend the equivalent of 10 Mirabel's on something that would get maybe 1/5th the usage of the UPX.
jordanmkasla2009
Active Member
Perhaps you should reexamine those numbers because I can tell you from my own personal experience the ridership from Kitchener GO has grown substantially since the implementation of more trains this past September.
lrt's friend
Active Member
Speed and frequency will make a big difference in who will choose to use the train service. In the past, we have only improved highway infrastructure and naturally most people use private vehicles. If we improve rail infrastructure sufficiently, there is no reason not to believe that we will see a significant switch-over.
Midtown Urbanist
Superstar
Since I brought it up, I will provide link to source. Even if ridership has grown 50% since September, that is still very low daily ridership.
The low-frequency local neighbourhood bus routes in Toronto draw bigger numbers of daily riders. If we took a fraction of the capital cost of HSR and invested it in local service in Toronto, York Region, Mississauga, Hamilton, Durham, and K-W, we would service many many many times more people.
crs1026
Superstar
^There’s no question that current ridership is way below what it could be if the service were faster and more frequent. The right question is, what is the upper end of that demand and what kind of envelope does that justify? I have trouble believing that the “most positive scenario” would justify full HSR. And, if one did offer HSR, what price point does that imply and what is the upper limit of price? An example is student travel - with improved GO, it’s quite possible for students to find daily commuting to be cost effective as compared to living in residence. But suppose an air-competitive HSR were built, and the price point was shifted to charge what the air travel market might bear. That student market might vanish. Students may appreciate a one hour commute, but would not pay a premium to go Kitchener to Union in 40 minutes.
My gut says that merely equalling or beating road travel is the optimum service model, even if it leaves some business travellers flying at higher fares.
- Paul
My gut says that merely equalling or beating road travel is the optimum service model, even if it leaves some business travellers flying at higher fares.
- Paul
jordanmkasla2009
Active Member
A 29% increase in ridership is nothing to scoff about. In my own experience there is about a fifth of that reported average daily ridership on the 14:57 train to Union Station alone.
Why does it need to be a one-size-fits-all though? In Japan they have 3 classes of Shinkansen travel, each with their own price point. You could run the milk run trains that have a lower price point that are about the same time amount as driving, and you can have the express trains that compete with flying.
As long as you build all the stations with 4 tracks so the express trains can pass the stopped local trains, it should be fine.
kEiThZ
Superstar
HSR is first and foremost about connecting KWC to Toronto. Specifically the tech sector there to Pearson and Toronto's Financial District. A 1-hr long trip from KWC to Union is the goal. Give or take. With hourly departures. Anything that London gets out of this is tablescraps they should be happy with.
1 hr from Union to KWC with stops only at Bloor, Pearson, Brampton and Guelph is not some hugely ambitious affair. VIA takes about 1.5 hrs today.
The fact that there are air taxis and private shuttle buses doing this trip shows that there's a market. Hopefully, it simply gets rolled into another phase of HFR. Leave GO to run the hourly all-stop service.
1 hr from Union to KWC with stops only at Bloor, Pearson, Brampton and Guelph is not some hugely ambitious affair. VIA takes about 1.5 hrs today.
The fact that there are air taxis and private shuttle buses doing this trip shows that there's a market. Hopefully, it simply gets rolled into another phase of HFR. Leave GO to run the hourly all-stop service.
ssiguy2
Senior Member
Better and much faster VIA service is what London & SWO needs, not GO.
London, unlike KWC, is not nor will it ever be in the Toronto commuter shed. KWC is becoming just another Toronto suburb as the years pass just as Oshawa has. London is very much an independent and regional centre for everything. London is Ontario's 3rd most important city due to it's size and especially it's location. It really is the heart of SWO and therefore a made-in-Toronto transportation plan won't work.
For those who think KW is more important, go ask ANYONE, ANYWHERE in the province what the capitol of a new SWO province should be {one that stretches and includes KWC to Windsor to Sarnia}, and it wouldn't even be a discussion. Let VIA connect the different regions of the province together and let GO service the local commuter needs ie Toronto GGH, Ottawa Valley, and London SWO.
London, unlike KWC, is not nor will it ever be in the Toronto commuter shed. KWC is becoming just another Toronto suburb as the years pass just as Oshawa has. London is very much an independent and regional centre for everything. London is Ontario's 3rd most important city due to it's size and especially it's location. It really is the heart of SWO and therefore a made-in-Toronto transportation plan won't work.
For those who think KW is more important, go ask ANYONE, ANYWHERE in the province what the capitol of a new SWO province should be {one that stretches and includes KWC to Windsor to Sarnia}, and it wouldn't even be a discussion. Let VIA connect the different regions of the province together and let GO service the local commuter needs ie Toronto GGH, Ottawa Valley, and London SWO.
kEiThZ
Superstar
Yeah.... nobody gives a damn about hurt pride and the capital of some fictitious province. Infrastructure decisions are made on what benefits the most people and/or the economy. As that HSR study made clear, the case to get to KWC is a lot stronger than elsewhere.
MisterF
Senior Member
The HSR plan to Kitchener and London included both express high speed trains and all stop commuter trains. Think faster, electrified GO trains running on the same tracks as the hourly intercity trains. That kind of setup is common on basically all HSR lines and there's no need to choose between different types of markets.