Seasonal GO train whets commuter appetite
Folks disembarking from the gleaming GO train arriving at the Niagara Falls train station from Toronto Saturday morning got a healthy dose of hospitality, Niagara style.
A small army of men and women wearing matching green vests and caps greeted them on the platform next to Bridge Street, asked them if they needed help, handed out brochures on everything from the local bus service to attractions, and simply said “welcome to Niagara Falls.”
Known as the Niagara Falls Welcome Team, the all-volunteer group has been making a good first impression on folks taking the seasonal trains from Union Station ever since they started rumbling back and forth between the Honeymoon Capital and Toronto each summer 10 years ago. Some, such as Deanna Simon and captain Barbara Burrows, have volunteered since Day 1.
With the start of the seasonal service on Saturday, there was palpable excitement with the looming expansion of yearround, daily GO rail commuter service to a planned new Grimsby train station by 2021 and to the St. Catharines and Niagara Falls stations by 2023.
“We want the GO trains here daily,” said Simon. “That’s why we keep coming.”
Niagara’s regional government said ridership on the seasonal trains soared by 40 per cent last year,
Suniya Kukaswadia, spokesperson for Metrolinx — the provincial agency oversees GO Transit expansion — said there were about 25,000 passenger trips on the seasonal trains in 2015 and 2016, but that ridership soared by 46 per cent last summer. Simon and Burrows don’t need statistics to see how folks from Toronto are flocking to Niagara via rail in ever larger numbers.
“When this started 10 years ago there were very few people coming off,” said Simon. “Now there’s hundreds.”
“It’s exploded,” echoed Burrows. “Last year we broke records.”
Regional Chair Alan Caslin and Niagara Falls Mayor Jim Diodati were also on the platform greeting visitors who poured from the train, including dozens of cyclists planning to tour the sights in Niagara Falls and head into wine country in Niagara-onthe-Lake.
Last year, regional politicians made it clear to officials with Metrolinx that they want GO commuter trains rolling into Niagara Falls and St. Catharines by 2021 in time for the 2021 Canada Summer Games that Niagara recently landed.
Metrolinx chief capital officer Gerry Chaput said during that visit to regional council that would be akin to moving a mountain because of the “massive build” including new train track, crossovers, bridge work, grading, re-signalling, a train layover facility in Niagara Falls, refurbishing of the existing train stations in Niagara Falls and St. Catharines, a new train station in Grimsby, four level crossing upgrades, property acquisition and studies.
But Caslin isn’t buying that, noting the summer train service shows it’s feasible to have GO trains coming here on a daily basis.
“It’s symbolic but it also demonstrates that the technology is already in place and there is really no significant barriers or roadblocks for us to move forward with expansion to daily service,” he said.
“We’ve made it clear to Metrolinx and GO Transit that our timeline is 2021 to have it all the way to Niagara Falls, and that 2023 doesn’t make any sense,” said Caslin.
Pushing for that expansion by 2021 will be a focus of the next term of regional council, as will be reviving the dormant midpeninsula corridor that’s needed as traffic on the QEW fills additional lanes as fast as they’re built, he said.
Fast-tracking the GO commuter service, which has already been a catalyst for growth in the region since the announcement of the planned expansion two summers ago, is key to plan for that growth, said Caslin.
“We’re seeing growth, we’re seeing 12,700 new jobs, we’re seeing both our college and university enrolment growing, we’re seeing new business coming to Niagara,” he said. “It’s a great time to be in Niagara.”
“(But) we won’t stand by idly,” said Caslin. “We’re going to be active in lobbying for what we feel is needed for Niagara to prosper.”
Diodati said people from Toronto and other regions around that city have clued into the fact that Niagara’s real estate is much more affordable and it’s got an unmatched quality of life.
“The rest of Ontario has finally figured it out,” he said. “Now there’s a mass rush of people moving to Niagara. It’s just amazing, the attraction there is now for Niagara.
“It (GO expansion) can’t come here soon enough.”
To prepare for the GO commuter service, work is progressing at a feverish pace, said Matt Robinson, director of the Region’s GO implementation office.
Crucial secondary plans that will serve as master planning documents for land use and road improvements around the train stations where huge growth is predicted to come have now been completed. Gene Beckett won’t be using the daily GO commuter service when it comes because he lives in Florida. But Beckett, in Toronto to attend an international Rotary Club convention, wasn’t about to pass up the deal that gave him round trip GO train trips to and from Niagara Falls and access to the WEGO bus service travelling throughout the city and the Niagara Parks property for just $30.
“The deal is phenomenal,” he said. “It’s fantastic.
“I’m showing my wife of 46 years Niagara Falls for the first time.”
The weekend service will run until Sept. 3, and over the Thanksgiving weekend, Oct. 5 to 8.
Three Niagara-bound trips and four Toronto-bound trips will run on Saturdays, Sundays and holidays, and there will be one trip in each direction on Fridays. Trains running on Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays during the summer months will feature two to four bike cars with room for 18 bikes on each. Additionally, three coaches will have seat covers, and those coaches can hold 16 bikes each, said Kukaswadia.