GO Transit

[Acitta]

Stratford to get daily GO train service starting in July (CBC)

On weekdays, the train will travel from Stratford to Toronto's Union Station in the mornings, leaving Stratford just after 6 a.m. and arriving in Toronto before 9 a.m. The return trip in the evenings would leave Toronto around 5 p.m. and arrive in Stratford at about 7:30 p.m..

On weekends, the train will start in Toronto and bring people to Stratford in the mornings, then return to Toronto later in the day.

Maybe if they had good train service, then more people could visit the Stratford Festival.

[danbrotherston]

Stratford to get daily GO train service starting in July (CBC)

Maybe if they had good train service, then more people could visit the Stratford Festival.

I don’t think the number of visitors to the festival is limited by transportation. But it has been many years since I have been there. Maybe something has changed. 

That said, there is already bus service there. 

This is a more sensible service than London though.

[Acitta]

Maybe if they had good train service, then more people could visit the Stratford Festival.

I don’t think the number of visitors to the festival is limited by transportation. But it has been many years since I have been there. Maybe something has changed. 

That said, there is already bus service there. 

This is a more sensible service than London though.

I have been there a couple of times, but only by bicycle. If there was a train to London in the morning, I would have taken it frequently, but public transit people think that people only want to go to Toronto.

[bravado]

As a kid growing up in Stratford who regularly hopped on the VIA (unsupervised) to go to Toronto for a day, it's wild that the service has become both awful and expensive in the decades since. Hopefully this is an improvement.

[ac3r]

Stratford getting GO? I feel like that'll just get cut eventually, kinda like the London idea. There surely can't be enough ridership to Stratford to justify expanding an urban commuter rail service that far. If the province wants to expand to cities and towns outside the GTA than they should just redefine and restructure GO Transit at this point, then use the power that could provide to expand. I wouldn't be against a provincial GO Transit system that would handle passenger service across the province. I mean we already have VIA (I know they're federal) and Ontario Northland...amalgamate the lot in whichever way helps and you'd have a larger entity which could have more ability to negotiate with freight operators when it comes to track rights.

[MidTowner]

Metrolinx says that they are expecting 16,000 riders annually, which to me doesn't seem like a lot, but they say it supports making the service permanent. The word "permanent" was used a lot at the press conference.

The business case for this is definitely not as a commuter rail service, at least not to Toronto. Maybe there will be significant commuters to Kitchener, Guelph or Brampton.