GO Transit

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GO Transit
Image:Gotransit logo.gifGO Transit
Reporting marks GOT
Locale Greater Toronto Area
Years of operation 1967 – Present
Track gauge 4 ft 8½ in (1435 mm)
Headquarters Toronto, Ontario

GO Transit, officially known as the Greater Toronto Transit Authority (GTTA), is Canada's first, and Ontario's only, interregional public transit system, established to link Toronto with the surrounding regions of the Greater Toronto Area (GTA). GO carries 45 million passengers a year in an extensive network of train and bus services. Since it began regular passenger service in May 1967, more than three-quarters of a billion people have taken GO trains and buses.

GO trains are easily identifiable; they are double-decked, green and white, and the cars are shaped like elongated octagons. These Bombardier BiLevel carriages were originally designed for GO in the 1970s, and are now used by a number of other commuter railways across the continent. GO buses are not double-decked (although a BC Transit bus was used in an experiment during May 2002), but they are also characterised by a green and white colour scheme. Most GO buses are inter-city coaches (see directory below).

Although it owns its locomotives and carriages, GO contracts out the operation of its trains to the Canadian Pacific Railway on the Milton line, and to CN on all others. As a result, GO service is sometimes disrupted by labour disputes in which it is not a direct participant.

Contents

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Service area

Image:GOTrain.png

GO trains and buses serve a population of six million in a 3,000 sq.mi. area (8,000 km²) radiating from downtown Toronto to Hamilton and Guelph in the west; Orangeville, Barrie, and Beaverton to the north; and Port Perry, Oshawa, and Newcastle in the east. The buses extend GO's service as far as over 60 miles (about 100 km) from downtown Toronto. GO connects with every municipal transit system in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton areas, including the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC).

The Greater Toronto Area consists of the City of Toronto and the surrounding Regions of Halton, Peel, York, and Durham. GO Transit also serves the neighboring City of Hamilton, and reaches into Simcoe, Dufferin, and Wellington Counties.

The GO system map shows seven train routes, all departing from Toronto's Union Station and mostly named respectively after the outer terminus of train service:

A
 Lakeshore West line (to Hamilton)
B
 Lakeshore East line (to Oshawa, with buses to Newcastle)
C
 Milton line
D
 Georgetown line, with buses to Guelph
E
 Bradford line, with buses to Barrie
F
 Richmond Hill line
G
 Stouffville line, with buses to Uxbridge

However, GO's timetables show a single Lakeshore line, which is perhaps a more appropriate nomenclature since many trains provide through service between stations east and west of Toronto.

Most of the GO Train route network operates only in peak rush-hour periods and then only in the primary direction of travel. For example, as of February 2006, the Milton line service consists of six trains leaving Milton each weekday between 6:25 and 8:00 a.m., and six trains leaving Toronto each weekday between 4:30 and 7:00 p.m.

There is off-peak train service on parts of the Lakeshore and Georgetown lines. Hourly trains operate on weekdays between Oshawa and Burlington; on weekends this is shortened to a Pickering–Oakville service. The Georgetown line has a more limited off-peak train service between Toronto and Bramalea.

Image:Go Train 044.jpg Image:Go Train 046.jpg Image:GO Transit Orion V 2000.jpgEach train route has a corresponding GO Bus service for the times (and directions) when the trains are not operating. These accept the same tickets as the trains and in many cases serve the same stations. For example, buses operate from Toronto to Milton, and from Burlington (on weekends Oakville) to Hamilton, at all times except the weekday evening peak when trains are available. Some train routes are similarly extended by buses at all times, as noted in the list of routes, with through buses when the trains do not run. Thus buses to Barrie operate from Bradford in the evening peak, and from Toronto at other times.

Image:GO Transit MCI D4500 2109.jpg Still other GO Buses are independent of rail services. Some parts of the route network use expressways (such as the frequent Toronto–Hamilton express bus via the Queen Elizabeth Way) while others are more local in character. Toronto Pearson International Airport is served by a route from Brampton to Yorkdale and York Mills subway stations. Buses serving downtown Toronto operate to a terminal adjacent to Union Station.

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Connections

Many municipal transit systems connect with GO Trains. The Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) provides the most connections with GO Trains and convenient connections can be made between the trains and TTC buses, streetcars, and subway trains. Immediately adjacent to the GO concourse at Union Station is the Union station on the TTC's Yonge-University Spadina subway line. Connections at Union Station with the TTC's Harbourfront (509) and Spadina (510) streetcar lines are also possible.

Four stations on the TTC's Bloor-Danforth subway line and one on the Sheppard line are close to GO Train stations;

All GO Train stations within the City of Toronto except GO Exhibition are adjacent to TTC bus routes, and GO Danforth, GO Exhibition, GO Bloor, and GO Long Branch are also on streetcar routes.

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Ridership

GO runs 178 train trips and 1,166 bus trips daily, carrying about 170,000 passengers on a typical weekday — 145,000 on the trains and 25,000 by bus. GO says that their ridership growth has continually exceeded expectations. In the first year of operations, 2.5 million passengers were carried. The combined rail and bus system today handles more than 45 million riders annually.

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History

GO Transit was created and funded by the provincial government in 1967 as Government of Ontario Transit (hence the acronym 'GO') and was financed entirely by the Province of Ontario until the end of 1997. The Province subsidized any operating costs that were not recovered through revenue, as well as all capital costs. Responsibility for the system was then transferred to the Toronto Area Transportation Operating Authority (TATOA) and later to the Greater Toronto Services Board as part of the province's 'downloading' initiative, before finally returning to the province as a Crown Agency under Greater Toronto Transit Authority (GTTA).

GO began as a three-year experiment in May 1967 running single-deck diesel multiple units on a single rail line along Lake Ontario's shoreline. All day GO Train service ran from Oakville to Pickering with limited rush hour train service to Hamilton. Lakeshore GO trains carried 2.5 million riders that first year and was considered to be a success. GO Bus service, which started out as an extension of the original Lakeshore train line, has since become a full-fledged network in its own right. It feeds the rail service and serves communities that trains do not reach.

Expansion continued in the 1970s with the introduction of the Georgetown line in 1974 and the Richmond Hill line in 1978. Also in 1978 the GO Transit bi-level railcars were introduced, although many of the bi-level trains had to run with a single level cab car at first. Finally in 1979 the current GO Train concourse at Union Station was built.

The 1980s proved to be the most exciting time for GO Transit as in 1981 the Milton GO Train line opened. Then just one year later in 1982 the Bradford line and Stouffville line opened after the newly created VIA Rail Canada cut passenger rail service to these corridors. Towards the end of 1982 came GO Transit's moment of truth, as the Ontario Minister of Transportation and Communications, James Snow, announced the launching "GO ALRT" ,an interregional rapid transit program. This is a transit system that would have allowed computer controlled trains to run at a maximum frequency of two minutes instead of the usual twenty minutes during rush hour. One line would have replaced the Lakeshore GO Train line and would have run from Hamilton to Oshawa. The other would have connected Oakville with downtown Mississauga, Pearson Airport, downtown North York and downtown Scarborough before finally terminating at Pickering. A short lived third line would have run north-south connecting Brampton with Mississauga. The rail cars (designed by The Urban Transportation Development Corporation) started out as a ICTS train similar to the Scarborough RT later evolved in 1983 to the length of roughly a Toronto subway train. Further redesign in 1984/85 indicated that greater carrying capacity was going to be required resulting in cars similar in length to VIA's LRC coach car. Meanwhile Hamilton residents were strongly opposed to the plan which caused the proposal to go under in 1985 which was also a result of long time Ontario PC premier Bill Davis being replaced by the late Ontario PC leader Frank Miller who served only a few months in office.

With the end of GO ALRT and the creation of a coalition provincial government between the Ontario NDP and Ontario Liberals, it was decided that certain parts of the GO ALRT proposal would live on, in the form of a GO Train extension of all-day GO Train service to Whitby and Burlington. The tracks between Pickering and Whitby were originally built for the GO ALRT system but were soon converted to handle conventional GO Trains. All day GO Train service was brought to Whitby in 1988. It was at this time that the people of the Greater Toronto Area gained a sense of confidence in the idea that anything was possible as the much anticipated new home of two major Toronto sports franchise was to open right at the very end of the 80s.

Enter the 90s, the decade that saw an end to the neverending growth of GO Transit. Ridership shrank as a result of the early 90s recession. In spite of this GO extended limited rush hour GO Train service to Barrie, Guelph, Acton and Oshawa in 1990. In May, 1992, while GO Transit celebrated its 25th birthday, all-day GO Train service was extended to Burlington with the building of a new station at Aldershot. However in 1993 former Ontario premier Bob Rae announced the Social Contract, which would see a "Temporary" reduction in spending on services. Consequentially GO Train service to Barrie, Guelph and Acton was eliminated. All day GO Train service to Whitby and Burlington was reduced to rush hours only (while limited Rush Hour train service to Oshawa and Hamilton remained in place. All day lakeshore train service existed only between Pickering and Oakville. In 1995 a new set of tracks and a station were built in Oshawa, allowing for frequent rush hour GO Train service to Oshawa.

With the election of former Ontario premier Mike Harris in June, 1995, plans for expanding GO Transit were put on hold in order to gain control of provincial spending and deliver its policy of lower taxes, balanced budgets and more jobs.

In January 1997, the province announced it would hand over funding responsibility for GO Transit to the Greater Toronto Area municipalities (which consist of the City of Toronto, and the Regions of Halton, Peel, York, and Durham) as well as the neighbouring Region of Hamilton-Wentworth (which became the new City of Hamilton on 1 January 2001). In exchange, the province would assume certain other funding responsibilities from municipal governments.

A year later, on 1 January 1998, the GTA municipalities and Hamilton-Wentworth (now the city of Hamilton) began to fund GO Transit, cost-sharing all of GO's capital expenses and any operating costs that are not recovered through passenger fares and other revenue. On 1 January 1999, a new municipal agency created by the province came into being: the Greater Toronto Services Board (GTSB), composed of regional chairs, municipal mayors, and local councillors from the GTSB's service area. GO Transit transferred over to the municipal sector as an arm of the GTSB on August 7, 1999, thus completing the process that had begun with the funding change of 1998.

In 2000 all day GO Train service was restored from Burlington to Whitby and finally brought to Oshawa (although weekend Lakeshore GO Train service would still only see service between Pickering and Oakville).

On September 27, 2001, Ontario Premier Mike Harris announced that the Provincial government would be taking back responsibility for GO Transit, and putting $3 billion into public transit in Ontario. For the practically impoverished GO, it was a welcome funding commitment.

The GO Transit Act, 2001 was passed by the Ontario Legislature on December 5, 2001. As of January 1, 2002, GO Transit is no longer the responsibility of the municipalities of the Greater Toronto Area and Hamilton. GO has returned to provincial responsibility as a Crown Corporation, and the Greater Toronto Services Board no longer exists.

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Future expansion

GO Transit has a ten-year plan in place, which includes provisions for new train stations, more parking spaces at existing stations, and increasing service on some (or all) existing train lines. While no new train lines are being planned, here are some of the improvements being planned, or in the process of completion:

Larger-scale infrastructure improvements are also being planned, including:

  • Rail-to-rail grade separations where the Bradford and Stouffville lines cross CN's east-west freight line, to allow for increased service, and at the "West Toronto diamond," to take the CN tracks on the Georgetown line under the CP tracks so that more trains can run more reliably
  • Increased track capacity on the Georgetown line's busy section between Brampton and northwest Toronto to allow more frequent train movements, and a new train layover facility near Mount Pleasant station
  • Track upgrades on the Milton line to run more peak and off-peak trains
  • A third track from Burlington to Bayview Junction (between Aldershot and Hamilton) on the Lakeshore West line, and one from downtown Toronto to Scarborough on the Lakeshore East, to facilitate improved schedule reliability and increased service on the Lakeshore and Stouffville corridors
  • Improvements to Union Station to increase passenger access and capacity-handling

Expansions beyond GO's present service area — initiatives that are part of the project funding announcements made by the Ontario and the Canadian federal governments, including:

  • Extending the Bradford line train service to the Barrie area, using track corridor owned by the City of Barrie
  • Introducing commuter bus services to Peterborough, to Niagara Region, and to Guelph and Waterloo Region to build the market for train service.

Theoretically, GO Transit can serve any region in Ontario and set up service in other areas as well, as it is a provincial agency; however, there is no real market for inter-regional service in other regions (such as in/near the larger cities in Southwestern Ontario and in the National Capital Region) that is not provided by private agencies.

GO is also developing a bus rapid transit (BRT) system that will provide extensive east-to-west express service across the GTA, using transit priority measures and park-and-ride stations with links to local transit. GO's already popular Highway 407 Express buses are the BRT's precursor, showing that demand for such service is already there.

The provincial Minister of Transportation has announced plans to introduce the GTA Farecard, an unified smartcard-based payment system for the entire Greater Toronto Area similar to the Octopus Card used in Hong Kong.

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Vehicles and staff

Vehicle: 211 buses, 45 locomotives, 375 coaches (2005) Employees: 1,193 (1991)

Source: Toronto Region, Ontario http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~wyatt/alltime/toronto-suburbs-on.html

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Locomotives

The GM loco were manufactured at the Diesel Division in London, Ontario:

The only locos in use now (as of 2006) are the F59PH I, II, III and IV type locos. However, GO is ordering new, more powerful locomotives for delivery by 2007.

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Multiple units

The HS MU were manufactured at the HS transit shops in Thunder Bay, Ontario, now owned by Bombardier Transportation Limited:

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Coaches

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Buses

GM buses were manufactured at the Diesel Division in London, Ontario and OBI buses in Mississauga, Ontario:

Image:Wheelchair.png Denotes wheelchair-accessible vehicles.

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Contractors

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Terminals

Image:4fad.jpg

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Facilities

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External links

Template:Canadianmetros

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