# Toronto Transit



## Kevin L. (Nov 30, 2008)

Looking at the spiffy CAA Toronto map, I've located the Toronto Subway, which seems to go a fair distance, though not be that expansive as it is just an inverted "T". After a while, I found the Toronto Light Rail, which was a feat as it is marked in green, which doesn't stand out too well on the map. It seems that the light rail just goes from the eastern subway terminus up to just past the Scarborough mall.

VIA has 2 stops that I've seen on the map, so it seems that the rest of Toronto--which is reputed to have incredible public transit--is served by this GO rail organization, which just seems to have stops the pop up in random places along tracks, with no routes marked. Of course, the GO rail website's map is largely worthless for seeing where it truly goes. Is there a better map of GO rail out there?

(*By public transit I mean trains. City buses are something I'm not touchin')

Does the Lester B. Pearson airport have transit access? I can't find anything going to it. Ironically, the Toronto City Centre Airport is due south of Union Station, but the TCCA only serves local flights and small craft.

Also, did anyone here have the chance to ride the Toronto->Rochester Car Ferry before they deported it to Africa? I still hold the disappointment when I followed the toronto signs to a seedy barbed wire dock yard where the "terminal" to the ferry was, only to be informed by the rather friendly port authority that the ferry was deceased.

For maps of other cities, what maps do you experienced travelers recommend for viewing public transit? The internet maps are great, but I like to have a solid paper map to use. Guess I'm a bit of a cartographile.


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## GG-1 (Dec 1, 2008)

Aloha

It has been a long time but I seem to remember a lot of transit in Toronto


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## AlanB (Dec 1, 2008)

No subway access to Pearson at this time, you'd have to ride a bus to a free transfer point to the subway.

And the best map for figuring out Go and where it is in relation to anything is the series of PDF maps found here.


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## TransitGeek (Dec 1, 2008)

Though I'm not a Torontonian (or even Canadian), I am a bit of a transit geek and I do have some information on public transport up there.

1- Toronto not only has the Scarborough RT (what you refer to as the "light rail"), but it has an extensive network of streetcars. The network has been operating continuously since 1861, and currently runs on 11 lines. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto_streetcar_system

Even if you don't want to touch city buses (which are a valuable form of public transport), these rail denizens are worth your time. There's a map on the linked Wiki article.

2- There is no rail link to Pearson International. There is bus service between the airport and the subway. A rail link has been proposed, but not yet constructed, and the plan is reportedly quite controversial.

3- There is a system map for GO Transit at its corresponding wikipedia page, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GO_Transit . Note that this is a commuter rail system, and so might not serve your travel needs. Also note they apparently replace non-peak time/direction service with buses, which you've said you want to avoid. So good luck!


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## AlanB (Dec 1, 2008)

TransitGeek said:


> 2- There is no rail link to Pearson International. There is bus service between the airport and the subway. A rail link has been proposed, but not yet constructed, and the plan is reportedly quite controversial.


Actually a new $50 Billion dollar plan may see a rail link being built within the next 10 years or so.



TransitGeek said:


> Note that this is a commuter rail system, and so might not serve your travel needs. Also note they apparently replace non-peak time/direction service with buses, which you've said you want to avoid. So good luck!


Not all lines run buses off peak, only some do. And some of those lines that do run buses off peak, only run the bus for part of the route, the train runs the rest of the route.


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## TransitGeek (Dec 1, 2008)

AlanB said:


> TransitGeek said:
> 
> 
> > 2- There is no rail link to Pearson International. There is bus service between the airport and the subway. A rail link has been proposed, but not yet constructed, and the plan is reportedly quite controversial.
> ...


Hence "a link has been proposed."  Good luck to Toronto on building it.

Thanks on the bus service info though, the site makes it sound like most off-peak service is bustituted, but I didn't actually look at the timetables.


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## AlanB (Dec 1, 2008)

TransitGeek said:


> AlanB said:
> 
> 
> > TransitGeek said:
> ...


Well it's been proposed for many, many years. I just wanted to make sure that you knew that it was much closer to reality now than it ever has been.


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## TransitGeek (Dec 1, 2008)

Good to hear it's getting there. It seemed like such a strange oversight in an otherwise well-connected city.


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## Kevin L. (Dec 1, 2008)

Buses may be a valuable form of transit, but growing up with the DC/Baltimore/Annapolis buses has turned me away from them for good. From the East to the Midwest, buses have only let me down. Trains are vastly superior anyhow 

Sadly, I looked at the GO map and saw the almost grid-like pattern and thought everything was connected, and said to myself "wow, canada really is progressive", but then I realized that the gridlines were buses and the only trains were the ~5 spurs coming out of Union Station. Good ole wikipedia says that Toronto's Union Station is the most impressive train station in NA. Is there any truth to that?

Maybe Canadian buses are better, due to higher standards and stereotypical friendliness. All of the bums on the streetcorners were bilingual, though I hear that in Canada, that's not a feat because everyone is expected to speak French and English. Sadly, there was the one bum on the corner who tried to demand _more_ money from us. My friend decided to bestow the Canadian change he didn't want to carry around upon the guy, and he insisted that the charitable donation was not good enough for him. I now understand the motivation for the orphanage staffer's line in Oliver Twist: "More?! You want _MORE?!!_"

My point being that even Canadian buses probably won't be rideable, or on time. I think the sad state of buses is universal, though perhaps outside of B'more you can sit on the seats (Many a seat on their buses has been, shall we say, "fertilized"?)

For such a massive city, Toronto certainly does have an impressive rail network, far more impressive than DC's, which is the best that I have experienced in America so far. (Why the metro doesn't stop near the west end of the Mall for the monuments, despite going right past them, is beyond me.)

Oh, and I called it the "light rail" because that's what the CAA maps call it.

Thanks for the replies.

EDIT:

Hold on a second. While these buses seem more luxurious than the half-past-dead things I've been on, wikipedia says that they have 12V *AC* outlets at each seat. I've never heard of those before. It's just a typo, right?


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## NS VIA FAN (Dec 1, 2008)

Kevin L. said:


> Maybe Canadian buses are better, due to higher standards and stereotypical friendliness. All of the bums on the streetcorners were bilingual, though I hear that in Canada, that's not a feat because everyone is expected to speak French and English. Sadly, there was the one bum on the corner who tried to demand _more_ money from us. My friend decided to bestow the Canadian change he didn't want to carry around upon the guy, and he insisted that the charitable donation was not good enough for him. I now understand the motivation for the orphanage staffer's line in Oliver Twist: "More?! You want _MORE?!!_"


Bi-lingual Bums! (French-English) certainly not in Toronto but maybe Montreal. You would be more likely to find someone speaking Chinese or Italian in Toronto. Not everyone in Canada is expected to speak English and French......only some government departments and large businesses require it.

I would consider Toronto Union to be the most impressive station in Canada but not in all of North America. Washington DC and Grand Central NY are pretty impressive to me.

Toronto Union will be extensively restored over the next several years: here’s a link:

http://www.toronto.ca/union_station/

GO Buses are clean, well run and everything connects. Check out the new Double-Decker on the GO Home Page:

http://www.gotransit.com/publicroot/en/Default.aspx


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## Guest (Dec 1, 2008)

Kevin L. said:


> Looking at the spiffy CAA Toronto map, I've located the Toronto Subway, which seems to go a fair distance, though not be that expansive as it is just an inverted "T". After a while, I found the Toronto Light Rail, which was a feat as it is marked in green, which doesn't stand out too well on the map. It seems that the light rail just goes from the eastern subway terminus up to just past the Scarborough mall.


There's good info on the ttc.ca and gotransit.ca websites. As much as we Torontonians like to whine about our transit system, it really is very good, especially in the City of Toronto, itself. The streectar network is also excellent and runs primarily on street. The Spadina and Harbourfront routes as well as a segment on the west end of the Queen line are on private right of way which could be considered LRT.

The St. Clair streetcar line is currrently being restored tor.o.w. and should be finished in the next year or so. NIMBY's delayed the project for quite a while.

The RT is similar technology to Vancouver's Skytrain and Detroit's, people mover. It was politically forced on the TTC which wanted nothing to do with it.



Kevin L. said:


> VIA has 2 stops that I've seen on the map, so it seems that the rest of Toronto--which is reputed to have incredible public transit--is served by this GO rail organization, which just seems to have stops the pop up in random places along tracks, with no routes marked. Of course, the GO rail website's map is largely worthless for seeing where it truly goes. Is there a better map of GO rail out there?(*By public transit I mean trains. City buses are something I'm not touchin')
> 
> Does the Lester B. Pearson airport have transit access? I can't find anything going to it. Ironically, the Toronto City Centre Airport is due south of Union Station, but the TCCA only serves local flights and small craft.


Lot of bus service, limos and taxis to Perason

Porter airlines is now flying to NYC (NJ)Chicago as well as scooping a lot of Ottawa-Montrealbusiness from Via Rail and Amtrak's, Maple Leaf. Porter flies from the Island Airport and is increasing flights all the time making many of us downtown very unhappy.

They've been talking for thirty years about a rail service directly to he airport. GO gets very close on it's Gerorgetown line (CNR Weston Sub.) an all that is needed is a spur to the terminal(s). SNC-Lavalin proposed a service using Budd RDC's and GO Transit has considered providing service. Thereare about 800 NIMBY's along the line in Weston complaining about increased rail traffic and elimination of grade crossings thtat have been holding things up. Their main mouthpiece was defeated in our Fed elction so maybe tings will happen now. Our current govt. is hostile to cities as we didn't vote for them so we'll see if any funding shows up for Toronto. So far, it's been for buying only hybrid buses which have had a high failure rate.

On GO Rail Service, all the main corridor lines run hourly service with increases at rush hour. Some of the secondary lines, Milton, Stoufville and Barrie are rail at rush hour only.



Kevin L. said:


> Also, did anyone here have the chance to ride the Toronto->Rochester Car Ferry before they deported it to Africa? I still hold the disappointment when I followed the toronto signs to a seedy barbed wire dock yard where the "terminal" to the ferry was, only to be informed by the rather friendly port authority that the ferry was deceased.


I was going to use it to connect with the westbound LSL at Rochester. By the time I was ready to make the trip they cancelled the ferry service. They were planning on making their money hauling tractor trailers across the lake but I understand that there was much red tape between the differenet levels of govt. in both countries.



Kevin L. said:


> For maps of other cities, what maps do you experienced travelers recommend for viewing public transit? The internet maps are great, but I like to have a solid paper map to use. Guess I'm a bit of a cartographile.


Contact the TTC and GO. They'll likely send you some.

Gord, Toronto


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## jamesontheroad (Dec 1, 2008)

> For maps of other cities, what maps do you experienced travelers recommend for viewing public transit? The internet maps are great, but I like to have a solid paper map to use. Guess I'm a bit of a cartographile.


You should hunt down a copy of this book...

http://www.amazon.com/Transit-Maps-World-M...3249&sr=8-1

...although of course beware, not all the maps in the book are up to date any more 



> Bi-lingual Bums! (French-English) certainly not in Toronto but maybe Montreal. You would be more likely to find someone speaking Chinese or Italian in Toronto. Not everyone in Canada is expected to speak English and French......only some government departments and large businesses require it.


Montréal's transit systems (bus and métro run by the STM, train run by the AMT) are not bilingual. Federal bilingual laws have been passed, but Québec's provincial government overruled them by introducing local (provincial) laws that state French must be more prominent than English... i.e. where two languages are spoken or written, the French must come first and is usually larger as well. The Montréal metro is now predominantly signed and orientated in French (including on board audio announcements etc). The blue collar employees of the STM on front line duties only rarely speak more than a smattering of English, reflecting the many decades of class and language divisions in the city.

For all STM info, history, architecture, art etc, see the great (and almost perfectly bilingual) site metrodemontreal.com

*j* :blink:


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## CTANut (Nov 21, 2019)

There is a train from Union Station to Pearson now. It is called the UP express. It takes about 25 min to get downtown.


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## MikefromCrete (Nov 22, 2019)

I imagine there's been a lot changes in Toronto transit since this was an active topic 11 YEARS AGO!


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