[sacred]

Can you explain how this constraint makes a lineup necessary or desirable? If access routes to the platform are a choke point, would it not make more sense to grant access to the platforms sooner, so that people can trickle up/down to platform level as they arrive?

Keeping people queued at the gate only exacerbates narrow stairways - by the time the gate is opened, there’s a crowd lined up waiting to plod single-file to the platform. If escalators are involved, and the head of the line stops moving, it’s unsafe. I would have thought lineups are undesirable, let alone unpleasant for the customer.

I would have thought that the underlying concern might be the problem of people attempting to board before the outgoing crew is ready to receive them.…. and/or unable to find their car efficiently……. and wandering along the platform creating needless traffic and feeling lost, or going beyond where they should be eg ends of platforms, crossing tracks, using train doors that were intended to remain closed, etc.

Being an old guy, I can remember the days at Toronto Union when boarding was triggered by the train crew/platform stationmaster signalling to the gateperson downstairs that they were ready to receive passengers…. by turning on the stairwell lights, which could be controlled at top and bottom. When the light came on, it was time to open the gate. No squawking radios required back then.

- Paul

The fix for boarding isn't abolishing the practice of people lining up, it's adding vertical access. The boarding/unboarding process itself just takes a very long time.
Montreal should knock out the McDonalds, the ticket booth and some parking/PPUDO and double or triple the vertical access points. It's a bit insane not to. Yet another case of the train acting like a plane. (Of course, much of the station is privately owned).
I know this isn't planned but I would love it if VIA would get one wide, *high* platform with lots of vertical access.

 

[T3G]

The fix for boarding isn't abolishing the practice of people lining up,

Maybe not, but we abolish it anyway, because it's completely ridiculous.

 

[MovingBlock]

We need to stop adding the unpleasant aspects of plane travel to train travel.

 

[Urban Sky]

PSA: nobody forces you to queue up before the queue has disappeared. Also, Business Class tickets qualify for queue-jumping, but that‘s a different story…

 

[Urban Sky]

View attachment 448401
I would say it's more on mentality. JR has plenty of narrow platforms and 10x the crushload yet they seem to get along just fine. If they can do it it should be no problem here.

Let‘s compare Apples to Apples (not: JR‘s RER-Style services in Tokyo with VIA‘s intercity services), this is how a Shinkansen platform in Tokyo looks like:

 

[Bordercollie]

PSA: nobody forces you to queue up before the queue has disappeared. Also, Business Class tickets qualify for queue-jumping, but that‘s a different story…

But you still need to lineup and get your tickets checked before you board.

If they converted each of those sitting areas to "gates" so that you can sit and wait until your train car is boarding that would make more sense

And to enter the area you need to weigh your luggage and get your tickets checked.

 

[cplchanb]

Let‘s compare Apples to Apples (not: JR‘s RER-Style services in Tokyo with VIA‘s intercity services), this is how a Shinkansen platform in Tokyo looks like:

it still doesnt matter based on the argument of concern of density on the platform as an excuse for airline queuing. In fact its more argument against via since JR trains are much more frequent and
a lot more packed than via will ever be yet they are able to do it on the same if not narrower platform width with hardly any issues. its just once again via is stuck on the old timer mentality, just like cowbells at stations.

 

[crs1026]

^Actually, airports tend to be constructed and laid out *better*… because the gates tend to have moderate sized waiting and assembly areas around them. Not everywhere, mind you… but commonly one can sit and wait somewhere with line of sight to the gate itself, (at least until enough people crowd the gate with intent of getting on early and fighting for some overhead luggage bin space). So it is possible to sit and wait without getting in the way or needing to do anything until boarding is called.

The problem at Union and Montreal is that there is no such gathering space (the alcoves which TTR opened up around 1970 have never served that purpose well) and one gate’s queue is an impediment to others’ pedestrian flow.

Putting people onto the platform is sensible as it “stores” people out of the main concourse where space is limited.

More generally, I do agree that VIA continues to ritualise the gate check, which is quite at odds with major urban terminals in many countries with better rail systems. Montreal, Ottawa, and Toronto are all amenable to modified track layout that creates a larger track level concourse…. just convert two middle tracks to stub end, and fill in the track area with more platform space.

- Paul

 

[Urban Sky]

But you still need to lineup and get your tickets checked before you board.

If they converted each of those sitting areas to "gates" so that you can sit and wait until your train car is boarding that would make more sense

And to enter the area you need to weigh your luggage and get your tickets checked.

As @crs1026 already pointed out, if you want a closed-off Boarding Gate area (and I naïvely thought we wanted VIA’s boarding processes to look less and not more like airlines!), you need sufficient space to create such facilities - and unlike with Eurostar’s stations, the space simply doesn’t exist at most of VIA’s stations…

it still doesnt matter based on the argument of concern of density on the platform as an excuse for airline queuing. In fact its more argument against via since JR trains are much more frequent and
a lot more packed than via will ever be yet they are able to do it on the same if not narrower platform width with hardly any issues. its just once again via is stuck on the old timer mentality, just like cowbells at stations.

I can assure you that if VIA operated RER or Subway services, its boarding processes would match those of JR Rail or GO Transit (unrestricted platform access, enabled by proof-of-payment ticketing) or the TTC (fare gate being the only barrier to access). Problem is that VIA operates intercity services and that your observations are irrelevant for those (especially at VIA’s terminal stations, like Union Station). If you want to compare apples to apples, you need to find an apple tree first…

 

[cplchanb]

I can assure you that if VIA operated RER or Subway services, its boarding processes would match those of JR Rail or GO Transit (unrestricted platform access, enabled by proof-of-payment ticketing) or the TTC (fare gate being the only barrier to access). Problem is that VIA operates intercity services and that your observations are irrelevant for those (especially at VIA’s terminal stations, like Union Station). If you want to compare apples to apples, you need to find an apple tree first…

I can assure you as well that it's the same for the shinkansen and rer in Japan in terms of boarding practices. I rode them. At the station there's a main gate that you scan your ticket in. Afterwards if you're in a reserved seating car, when you've boarded, the conductor also checks your ticket again to make sure you're in the correct seat. It's the exact same practice that via does. There's no PoP. It's much more controlled than you assume

 

[Urban Sky]

I can assure you as well that it's the same for the shinkansen and rer in Japan in terms of boarding practices. I rode them. At the station there's a main gate that you scan your ticket in. Afterwards if you're in a reserved seating car, when you've boarded, the conductor also checks your ticket again to make sure you're in the correct seat. It's the exact same practice that via does. There's no PoP. It's much more controlled than you assume

I’ve been in Japan and travelled extensively - on everything from tourist steam train over cable cars, rack railways, RER and monorails to Shinkansen (once even splurging on Gran Class). I have no idea why you keep insisting that the Japanese equivalent of a VIA train operating out of Union Station would be a RER train stopping at a random station somewhere in Tokyo. As I keep reiterating: if you want to compare apples with apples, you need to first find an apple tree…

 

[cplchanb]

I’ve been in Japan and travelled extensively - on everything from tourist steam train over cable cars, rack railways, RER and monorails to Shinkansen (once even splurging on Gran Class). I have no idea why you keep insisting that the Japanese equivalent of a VIA train operating out of Union Station would be a RER train stopping at a random station somewhere in Tokyo. As I keep reiterating: if you want to compare apples with apples, you need to first find an apple tree…

I'm not. The whole argument is about density and how in Japan they aren't afraid or too stuck up to have passengers en masse on the platform waiting for a train like a train station should rather than to wait like a plane. Whether it's shinkansen or rer or whatever is irrelevant. I'm not arguing for a mode of transport, just for more efficiency instead of old world via mentalities

 

[T3G]

I'd argue VIA's mentality is a "new world" one, not an "old world one". There is no place in the old world that I know of that treats trains like planes the way VIA and Amtrak do!

 

[Urban Sky]

I'm not. The whole argument is about density and how in Japan they aren't afraid or too stuck up to have passengers en masse on the platform waiting for a train like a train station should rather than to wait like a plane. Whether it's shinkansen or rer or whatever is irrelevant. I'm not arguing for a mode of transport, just for more efficiency instead of old world via mentalities

Okay, let’s try it the other way around. Faced with the same infrastructure as VIA and unable to “fix” the infrastructure to suit their needs, JR would come up with very similar boarding procedures as VIA for its intercity services. Infrastructure drives bording processes…

I'd argue VIA's mentality is a "new world" one, not an "old world one". There is no place in the old world that I know of that treats trains like planes the way VIA and Amtrak do!

Eurostar let’s people check-in like for airplanes and queue in a waiting area, Spain apparently performs safety checks before boarding a train (same as China, if I recall correctly) and the UK let’s people wait in large waiting areas at its major terminal stations until the train is ready for boarding. As a German, I wholeheartedly dislike these boarding procedures, but how are they that different from VIA’s?

 

[robmausser]

I'd argue VIA's mentality is a "new world" one, not an "old world one". There is no place in the old world that I know of that treats trains like planes the way VIA and Amtrak do!

The strange thing is many of the plane-like practices were not the case until recently. VIA used to have static priced tickets and you could sit anywhere you wanted on the train, unlike now where they have demand priced tickets and assigned seats.