GO Transit announced today that it will purchase the CN Weston Subdivision for $160-million. The line in question runs from roughly the Strachan Avenue grade crossing to the junction with the CN York Subdivision at Steeles Avenue.
CN and VIA run comparatively few trains (3 and 6 respectively) each day on the line, although VIA has planned improved service in this corridor for some time. GO plans greatly expanded service both in frequency and in destination (extending to Kitchener), and this corridor will also host the Blue 22 Airport link should that line ever get beyond the drawing boards.
By purchasing the corridor, GO will not only have better control of train operations, it will be able to retain ownership of the substantial improvements needed to accommodate all of the new services.
The press release is silent on the matter of funding.
Steve Munro 
This makes total sense. GO runs the majority of the trains and they should own as many lines as possible. This gives them the Weston Sub, the Gault Sub from Union to the North Toronto Sub, the Uxbridge Sub, the Newmarket sub (at least above the York sub, I don’t know about south but if they don’t I bet they soon will), and the GO sub from Pickering to Oshawa and I believe that they also own the TTR at Union Station. It would make sense for them also to get at least some control over the Lakeshore lines given the amount of investment they have in them and the level of service that they plan. They may try to get the CP line from Agincourt to Peterborough but probably not all of it. I like the idea.
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GO should buy all the rail lines in Toronto, and get government money to do it. Passenger trains should always come#1 in priority. Freight can wait.
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Here is a map of this rail line
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&om=1&oe=UTF8&msa=0&msid=101714683938336514556.00046717b9f7afdd364c1
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GO won’t have greater control over daily operations unless they take over the dispatching and maintenance of the line. This is a distinct possibility however, since GO, through their contract with the Toronto Terminal Railway, dispatches and maintains the rail corridor through Union Station. This can now be extended to the northwest up the Weston Sub., as well as the adjacent GO Galt Sub., which GO owns up to West Toronto.
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This would be a great opportunity to get another 2 tracks (heavy or light rail) built to provide local service to Toronto along this corridor. If only GO would think beyond extending service to Guelph and Kitchener and to rich business travellers at Pearson.
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This is great news–and a welcome leap toward managing tracks for people, not stuff, instead of prior baby steps. But forgive me this one query: isn’t $160-million, uh, a LOT for what’s on offer here? Particularly considering that what’s on offer has, presumably, been improved and maintained over the years with substantial public monies?
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I make the subvision about 26km long, mplying a price of about $6.1m per km… seems rather high to me.
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Matt C: As a former Georgetown passenger, the line has seen little to no improvement over the past 20 years.
Most of the Weston Sub is still bolted rail (the Newmarket Sub is now welded rail, like most of GO’s track) which rides rough. The work now on the West Toronto Diamond is the first time money’s been spent on the Weston sub in years. GO’s work to date on the Georgetown line has been centred on the much busier Halton Sub past Bramalea GO.
This is, for the most part, good news.
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Presumably, if VIA ever is in a position to increase service on the line, it will also be easier for them to deal with GO – both haul passenegers not freight which is a totally different way of thinking.
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$160 million for a 25 km long strip of land running through Toronto? It’s a steal.
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Maybe this can be the first line that gets electrified?
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For the amount of service that GO transit will run on those tracks it’s a great deal. It takes CN completely out of the picture. While CN will retain ‘running right’ on the corridor for those 3 trains, it will be under GO’s jurisdiction meaning they’ll only be allow to do so only when GO allows it and that will be at night and not during the day time when they would of presented a potential source of regular delays to all-day trains running on the corridor.
Aside from that GO transit is going to invest a huge amount of money into this corridor, it only makes complete sense for them to own that investment.
All the track upgrades on the Lakeshore corridor have been paid for by GO transit, and yet the ownership of the corridor still belongs to CN who was quite content to do nothing to improve the line and spent only the minimal amount of funds necessary to maintain it. Yet they stand to benefit from these track upgrades that they didn’t pay for as well and at the same time they retain full control. They scored a quite the coup on that one if you ask me. It would make absolutely no sense for GO transit to repeat that on an even greater scale on the Weston sub.
Also this sets a precedent bargaining point so to speak for future corridor purchases.
160 million for 17 miles
Next up should be the Kingston sub (Lakeshore East) from Union to Durham Jct. where the Kinston connects with the GO sub.
19 miles
And then the Oakville sub (Lakeshore West) from Union to Burlington West where it connects with the Halton sub just east of Burlington station.
32.2 miles
A little over 51 miles of track in total – 3 times that of the Weston sub. Though no doubt the price for this will excess 3 times that of the Weston sub simply because CN uses this corridor more frequently than the Weston sub and there are many more tracks already in place. However it is not their ‘main line’ (That being the Halton & York subs) so it should be more than possible, with CN retaining running rights of course, and that should be only at night.
The dispatching will still be done by CN simply because all of the connections to the signal system on all CN subdivisions are located at Macmillan yard. Not sure exactly but I would have to assume that there would many logistical problems involved in relocating the wiring, though I’m sure that once GO starts buying even more corridors, relocation will eventually take place. The other issue is that CN does have the most experienced people when it comes to dispatching trains. Becoming a RTC (railway Traffic Controller) is no simple task to begin with and becoming a good RTC takes years of experience. However just because CN does all the dispatching, it doesn’t mean that they will control who runs on the track when. Many years ago RTC’s had full control of deciding such movement, these days however such decisions are made higher up (in case of the Weston sub it will now be made by GO transit authorities) and the RTC are only responsible to ensure that the requested movements are carried out smoothly.
The maintenance for the track will likely now be given to GO’s preferred contractor – PNR (Pacific Northern Rail) they maintain all of GO’s currently owned track.
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I forgot to mention, in terms of price comparison, just compare this purchase and the length of track involved to the cost of any one of the TTC’s new Transit City lines.
The corridors were estimated to be worth 1 billion for each – Lakeshore & Lakeshore West. That included the added value of the 3rd track that was paid for by GO transit in many parts of the corridor. Obviously GO would pay for that added value to the corridor for a track they had installed themselves.
That price again is a starting point and seemed to be somewhat excessive to the purchasing party and no doubt extensive negotiations were being carried out. That was when CN was dealing in a position of strength before the current recession. Because of the downturn, freight volumes have dramatically decreased and it may no longer be economical for the freight companies to retain ownership of tracks that are expensive to maintain and yet are not vital for the company’s operations (i.e. the Lakeshore corridor).
The eventual price for both corridors should fall in the range of 1 to 1.5 billion. This is for a stretch of track 52 miles/82 km in length. Its about the same cost as any one of the shorter Transit City lines.
Steve: Don’t forget that GO is purchasing, not building, corridors, and they already own their trains and stations. TTC has to build all of the infrastructure including some tunnels, stations, selected road widening, carhouses and vehicles. They will run a much higher capacity than GO affecting both fleet size and station passenger handling requirements.
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The GO Georgetown proposal shows most of the Weston SUb being four tracked to handle all the service They are looking at five tracks up to Landsowne where the Newmarket Sub splits off. These lower tracks might also include the inner part of the Galt Sub as GO apparently has bought this up to the North Toronto Sub. GO would probably run the Bolton trains on the Weston Sub up to the split just before the 401. The Blue 22 trains would split off just after the tracks cross the 427.
I do not see this line as an early candidate to be electrified for two reasons:
1 It does not have anything east of Union to balance it. This is important because it makes for better terminal operations if the trains can run through Union instead of reversing. To perform a reversing manoeuvre they need to perform a full brake test and this takes terminal time which will be at a premium as they try to run all their service through 7 or 8 tracks.
2 The total line is too long and the service drops off in intensity. They would probably only electrify to Mt. Pleasant and that would mean that off peak trains would require a train change at Mt. Pleasant or would be run with diesels. Don’t think about dual service locomotives because you do not want locomotive hauled trains for electric commuter service. The Deux Montagnes line in Montreal reduced the running time from 53 to 35 minutes when they went to electric self propelled cars instead of locomotive hauled cars or sets with one motor and two or three trailers. You want all axles powered to get the higher acceleration rates needed.
The other thing to consider is the cost of electrification. Until you get to the point were the time and equipment saving from running fewer faster self propelled electrics is great enough to justify the cost for electrification then the economics will not allow it. This point will be reached first on the Lakeshore lines. It will probably happen on the Goergetown line but not as early.
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Now if only Go could also own all the tracks from CP’s North Toronto Subdivision down to Union as well. How many freight trains does CP actually run between Union and their North Toronto Sub? I would assume very few. Again, this would give GO more tracks to control, meaning more flexibility – there are three “main” routes there – Milton, Georgetown, and Barrie. GO could then operate those tracks more efficiently to all for better service.
CN and CP trains could operate either at night or during the day – again, with GO being able to use all those tracks, a midday GO train could easily move around a freight. This would also help VIA should it wish to increase service on its line through Georgetown and Kitchener (which again would also benefit GO.)
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Overall, this is good news, but we must also be thinking of ensuring that we get somewhat local TTC-based service through much of this corridor, even to the point of somehow expanding it through purchase. And even though I like bikes a lot, the highest best use of this corridor is for transit, though we should try to incorporate bikes along it, or atop any TTC rail/route that gets built.
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You can incorporate bikes by ensuring that there is adequate supervised bike parking at every station, and that stations are accessible by bike. In Holland, many people own two bikes — one for their hometown, and one for the town where they work. In the morning, they bike to the train station, park their bike there, take the train to their work, and then take their second bike the rest of the way to work.
They also have sensible bikes there, as opposed to here, but that’s not the topic of discussion.
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Wotan Says:
April 9th, 2009 at 2:22 pm
“Now if only Go could also own all the tracks from CP’s North Toronto Subdivision down to Union as well. How many freight trains does CP actually run between Union and their North Toronto Sub? I would assume very few. Again, this would give GO more tracks to control, meaning more flexibility – there are three “main” routes there – Milton, Georgetown, and Barrie. GO could then operate those tracks more efficiently to all for better service.
“CN and CP trains could operate either at night or during the day – again, with GO being able to use all those tracks, a midday GO train could easily move around a freight. This would also help VIA should it wish to increase service on its line through Georgetown and Kitchener (which again would also benefit GO.)”
CP has (Had?) only two lines to run any trains from the North Toronto Sub to Union, the first few miles of the Galt Sub and the inner end of the Belleville Sub. I was told by a consultant for GO at their Georgetown meeting that GO owns the Galt Sub from Union to the Junction and that CP does not operate over the Belleville sub in the Don valley so they don’t run any trains there.
Steve jumps in: I live right beside the Don Branch and it hasn’t seen a train in years.
If they want to go south they use the Canpa Sub from Kipling GO station to Willowbrook. I doubt that they would sell the North Toronto Sub as it is their main freight line across Toronto. That said there is probably room for two more tracks as their industrial leads are not used much if at all and they could be replaced by two dedicated GO lines. Put CP on the North side and GO on the south.
You still have the problem about what happens if this line becomes popular and you start dumping 10 000 passenger at Summerhill in the peak hour. A large number of the passengers who get off GO at Union walk to work; this will not happen at Summerhill. Also should GO put in a Station at Spadina to connect with the Spadina subway and should there be an interchange station at the points where it crosses all of the other GO lines? This would add to the travel time on all lines but make for better connectivity. GO at the moment does not have the mind set to allow for train to train passengers.
In their new growth document they imply using Summerhill for any trains that they add to the CP Belleville sub to Seaton (North of Oshawa) and to East Markham on the Peterborough line as it would require the building of the Crosstown Line.
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Re: GO stations on North Toronto Sub
Even though stations at Summerhill and Dupont would be way too close by GO standards, I think it would be worth [it] for the trains to stop at both those stations, given the potential volume of transfers to Yonge and Spadina subway, respectively.
Not so sure about interchanges with Union-bound GO lines that cross North Toronto Sub. Will the volume of transfers justify the service slowdown and the cost of building more stations? It seems that interchanges with major local transit lines will be more useful. East of Yonge: probably Eglinton, then Agincourt.
West of Spadina: maybe Jane if it gets LRT, then Kipling, then stations in Mississauga. Btw, frequent GO service through both central Toronto and central Mississauga might have quite a bit of potential, now untapped. Regarding the Union – Airport service, it will be difficult to build an interchange station between that route and North Toronto GO, given that they cross so close to Dundas GO station. Rather, 1/2 of North Toronto trains could head directly to the Airport rather than towards Kipling, provided that the Airport link is able to handle them.
Steve: There is a small problem at West Toronto Junction with the track layout and the new grade separation that would make a direct service from North Toronto Station to the Airport via Weston difficult.
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Steve said: “There is a small problem at West Toronto Junction with the track layout and the new grade separation that would make a direct service from North Toronto Station to the Airport via Weston difficult.”
Too bad … Another option is that the North Toronto trains head to Kipling Stn, and the 192 Rocket bus takes passengers to the terminals and surrounding businesses. But the extra transfer and extra travel time will make the route somewhat less attractive.
Steve: At the risk of pointing out the obvious, any extra speed that you might gain by travelling on the GO network will be offset by the longer wait times for trains, and you would be just as well riding the Eglinton LRT or the BD subway to Kipling, or the Finch LRT if it ever reaches the airport. Don’t forget that many people going to and from the airport won’t conveniently start their trip right beside a GO station that happens to have direct service. This is the same fallacy as we hear from Metrolinx all the time.
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Steve: There is a small problem at West Toronto Junction with the track layout and the new grade separation that would make a direct service from North Toronto Station to the Airport via Weston difficult.
Actually there is a curve on the CP that goes from the North Toronto Sub to The MacTier Sub as it is the main CP line from Agincourt yard to Western Canada. Even after the grade separation is in that curve will still exist. It would not be difficult to add GO to it though it would be a slow speed turn. I am not sure that the Yonge Subway could handle the extra traffic. It would surely require the building of the downtown relief line first. I don’t think that the crosstown GO line is going to be the panacea that many people believe it to be because of the problems mentioned.
Steve: My concern with that curve was that if GO has to get across the CP main line to access the Weston Sub via that less-than-ideal connection, especially for two-way traffic, and then get over to the west side of the Weston Sub, well the potential for conflicts with other traffic are severe. The grade separation has limited any potential change in this track layout.
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Steve said: ” … any extra speed that you might gain by travelling on the GO network will be offset by the longer wait times for trains, and you would be just as well riding the Eglinton LRT or the BD subway to Kipling, or the Finch LRT if it ever reaches the airport.”
I guess that depends on the distance from the origin to the airport. For someone from midtown / Yonge, frequent Eglinton LRT should be a better way to the airport than not so frequent GO trains. But for passengers from the north-east of 416, it would probably make sense to transfer to a GO station and wait for the train, as the trip is long enough for the speed to pay off. Finally, there will be some passengers from Seaton and other places outside 416 and along that new GO line; for those, GO is the only meaningful public transit connection to Pearson.
Steve: Exactly. The point is that we cannot solve all of the transportation problems of one destination, the airport, with one line any more than we can serve downtown Toronto with one subway or commuter rail corridor.
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Back about 1978, there was a plan for a Milton – Midtown – Malvern line on the CP Galt, North Toronto & Belleville subs. If I recall, there would have been transfer stations at West Toronto (with the Georgetown trains) and Leaside (with Richmond Hill trains using the CN Oriole spur, now lifted, and CP Don Branch). Milton – Malvern trains were to operate between West Toronto and Leaside via either Union or Dupont-Summerhill.
It is unfortunate that a direct heavy rail access to Pearson between Bramalea and Etobicoke North has not been announced. Bramalea – Pearson west of Airport Road on the airport perimeter or subgrade through the airport; Pearson – Etobicoke North partly along the hydro corridor. GO could run through trains Georgetown – Pearson 1 – Union – Richmond Hill / Stouffville / Oshawa. VIA could run Pearson 1 – Union – Ottawa / Montreal and London – Pearson 1 – Union. Blue 22 could use this line as well, with an additional stop at Pearson 3. GO and VIA passengers would transfer at Pearson 1 for Pearson 3 using either Blue 22 or LINK cable cars (LINK is out of service for 3 months for extensive maintenance (rebuilding) April 1-June 30, 2009).
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“CP has (Had?) only two lines to run any trains from the North Toronto Sub to Union, the first few miles of the Galt Sub and the inner end of the Belleville Sub. I was told by a consultant for GO at their Georgetown meeting that GO owns the Galt Sub from Union to the Junction and that CP does not operate over the Belleville sub in the Don valley so they don’t run any trains there.”
“Steve jumps in: I live right beside the Don Branch and it hasn’t seen a train in years.”
The Belleville sub from Leaside to the USRC limits (mile 206.3 to 209.5 – 3.2 miles total) is currently out of service and has been for many years.
To begin with the track throughout is in rough shape. But the primary reason why the track is out of service is because the long bridge over the Bayville extensions & Don river is in such poor condition its considered hazardous to travel over even at 5mph. Its in need of extensive rehabilitation or perhaps even complete replacement.
CP is quite content to leave the track as it is since they of course route all of their main line traffic over the North Toronto sub. The road switchers that work in the portlands area used to come out of Agincourt yard and travel down this route to get there. However once the seriousness of aforementioned problems were discovered or acknowedged, the job switched over to Lambton yard in the West Toronto area and now uses the Galt sub to get to the portlands area. And so the track has been essentially left to rot. CP even removed the turnouts that connect this portion of the sub to its mainline at Leaside.
Interestingly enough the track is actually used once a year and that is for when the holiday train comes into town. CP reinstalled the connections at Leaside just so this train could travel down and through Union station before going back up the Galt sub. I believe that train is restricted to just 5 mph when passing over this track (the actual speed limit for freight trains is 15mph due to the steep grade over which the track passes though I understand it was significantly more than this back in the days when it saw regular usage).
A few years back CP tried to sell the tracks to GO transit but GO was apparently not interested at the time in purchasing them. Though that seems somewhat unusual considering GO transit’s plans for expansion along the CP lines which connect to this route. Thus perhaps my source was wrong about that or quite simply CP was requesting greater remuneration then GO felt the trackage was worth considering the poor condition.
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Governments have a notoriously bad reputation trying to consolidate freight rail lines, especially trying to move them outside cities. Since the main railways in Canada are private, this is very expensive and the shareholder owned companies have little incentive to cooperate (though this was also the case when CN was publically owned). In major cities like Toronto, since we accept that transit should be public, the main inner-city rail corridiors should be public too. Unfortunately railways are federal, so even the province has limited clout to achieve this, but this should change. If highways are provincial, then certainly a case could be made to devolve railways to the provinces, and allow them to consider the full range of public interests (like urban transit) in regulating them. Won’t hold my breath though on that one.
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Re the Junction of the North Toronto Sub and the Weston Sub
Steve: My concern with that curve was that if GO has to get across the CP main line to access the Weston Sub via that less-than-ideal connection, especially for two-way traffic, and then get over to the west side of the Weston Sub, well the potential for conflicts with other traffic are severe. The grade separation has limited any potential change in this track layout.
I don’t believe that this that great a problem. The train would probably need to be on the north track to turn north but the curve take 89 foot intermodal cars so it would take 85 foot GO cars, mind you at slow speed. Once around the corner there is lots of room and time for the trains to move over to the Weston Sub. It would not need to get to the far west side immediately but just get into the corridor. Changing track between parallel lines is much easier to do than to have a crossing at a diamond. Diamonds forces all cross traffic to stop but changing tracks only affect those two tracks for a short time and not the other two or three tracks in the corridor. There is plenty of time and room to get to the correct track before the next split off at Woodbine. I know that it is not the as good as fully grade separating the curve but it is not as serious problem as it could be. There should be room to put in a second curve at the Junction. It would be similar in operation to the junctions of the Halton and Oakville sub or the Oakville and Dundas sub at Bayview Junction
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“LINK is out of service for 3 months for extensive maintenance” Don’t I know it. They shut it down three days before I was due to fly, parking in the long stay (I have used 192/BD but value my marriage too much to inflict it on my spouse).
The GTAA seem to have sold their minibuses, with longer buses dumping you at the entrance and a long walk back to your car. My mocking references to the rollercoaster, with its platform door and to-the-section arrival notifications, seemed foolish at 12.01am Saturday morning in the cold having returned from somewhere rather warmer.
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