YVR guy

Why don't you buy a book of 10 Faresaver tickets? The $5 AddFare for departing YVR-downtown is waived when using pre-purchased fares.

bmabnorth

There are existing CPR tracks that run along slightly north of Dupont. That is only approximately 800m. This way you speed up commute times for millions of people.

Instead of curving down at the Junction to go towards Bloor GO station - go straight to Dupont and extend the tracks slightly south to Spadina interchange.

People working downtown would have the same commute time and it would probably be even more convenient. It is quicker/easier to catch a cab/ttc from nearby Spadina than it is from Union.

m.y

That CPR track is the main line route for CPR, they won't give up space for a train that runs every 15 minutes. There is no more space for more tracks unless you want to expropriate properties along the line.

Again, building tracks "slightly south to Spadina interchange" is an extremely costly proposition, since you need to expropriate properties or tunneling, especially given the radius the train needs to turn south. It'd be even more costly trying to tunnel to reach Union after Spadina.

If you propose train ending at Spadina instead of Union, that would be a terrible idea too. At least there is the financial district, many downtown hotels and condos within walking distance of Union. Union station is also a hub for GO and UPX may draw some passengers coming from eastern GTA wanting to avoid traffic on 401. Spadina isn't the hub of anything and there's no major traffic generator near Spadina and density is low. It'd be even less convincing for people to take this train versus staying on Bloor line and take 192 bus.

The whole UPX project costed less than $500 mil, one km of subway tunnel costs about $300 mil. So your proposal would cost more and draw less passengers.

B1

Hmm - We're getting into Ali G's material about railroad tracks:
Ali G: How come there ain’t much security on trains?
James Ziegler: Well, for one thing, it’s hard to hijack a train and run it into something.
AG: But what’s to stop a terrorist taking over a train, driving it into, ja forbid, the White House?
JZ: It can’t. There are no tracks…
AG: Well…
JZ: There are no tracks to the White House.
AG: Not that we know of!

sokolov

Can UPX ease transfers between YYZ and YTZ? As in: Take UPX to Union Station, then the free YTZ-Shuttle from there (or the other way round).

BTW: "VIA (Rail) customers will be able to purchase tickets online at viarail.ca starting May 11, 2015, for trips starting June 6, 2015, the date of UP Express's service launch." Really progressive would be intermodal tickets with plane tickets from many airlines, UPX and Via Rail. Like the Rail&Fly offered in Germany.

Currently, I wouldn't take VIA Rail to catch a flight. What if the train is late?

mkjr

I must say that last Saturday with the Gartner closure all the way to the 427, we opted for the subway and 192. First time ever I did this in the 15 years I have lived in YYZ. As a family, I would not pay for the UP express and given how easy it was, depending on time of day, I'd probably do this over a cab or the up express.

TTC worked great.

neuron

The TTC works quite nicely, and they have recently increased the number of buses on the route, reducing the time between buses to 10 minutes or less. If you are going anywhere other than the DT area, it may be the choice for the frugal consumer. Having said that, if you have the Presto card, the price goes from $27.50 to $19. Unfortunately, there is no family discount, but at that point a limo/car would be better.

Given the traffic these days in Toronto and if I were heading DT, the UP would not be a bad option with Presto, and certainly cheaper than the Pacific Western bus that used to run

They will also be offering various other fares (meet n greet, long layover, employee).
http://www.upexpress.com/en/docs/Uni...re_FAQs_EN.pdf

Antonio8069

fyi, the hyperlink in this information does not work!

As for the suggestion that PRESTO works in both Toronto & Ottawa, I beg to disagree. I have PRESTO cards for both systems - one is an earlier technology, the other a more recent version. Guess what? They are not reciprocal! One province, two systems................I have seen this movie before, and I don't like how it ends!

neuron

that's odd, it should pull up a PDF FAQ and provides pricing. I was able to pull it up on 2 different computers.
If others are having problems with the link, I can post the relevant pricing items.

WRT Presto, not the system I would have favored, but I agree that it would be nice if they could be reciprocal, esp since it is from the same manufacturer, though it is not surprising as it is PRESTO and they have been disappointing.

cvkyyz

Our office is right near Yonge and St Clair, and we were talking the other day about whether we would take it or not. The consensus ended up being we probably would use it. The subway down to Union is only 15 mins. The problem with a cab is that area is the middle of nowhere for highway access (except the the parking lot in the Don Valley), and we usually need to be at YYZ around rush hour. None of us live downtown, so it's still a cab/limo on the way home.

gspurr

Good point. I guess neither (a cab or Pearson express is ideal) from this area. I was calculating an hour from a home in the Yonge and St. Clair area as 15 minutes to get to the subway platform, 5 minutes waiting for subway train, 15 minutes to Union subway station, 10 minutes from there to Pearson express platform and a 5-15 minute wait for the train (50-60 minutes in total). I calculated the times with luggage.

B1

A less expensive and pretty quick route from Yonge and St. Clair is subway to York Mills and one-stop GO bus to YYZ (Route 34). The schedule allows 40 minutes from York Mills and the subway trip is about 10 minutes. The GO buses follow an infrequent schedule but there are lots of cabs at York Mills in case you miss the connection. The bus costs $6 - less with Presto. So the time is the same as UPE and you avoid Union Station.

m.y

The link works just fine. The newer version of Presto card works on both systems.

https://www.prestocard.ca/en-US/Page....aspx#General3

tentseller

If the timing works this is my uptown(badboyland) office/residence transit method to YYZ.

bmabnorth

That is another good point about maneuvering inside Union Station itself takes at least 5 minutes even after you arrive.

Well, I think the poster above has a good point. People can more easily get to Pearson from say, Oshawa, Ajax, Pickering etc. Also business travelers wanting to access downtown Toronto rapidly. Also cheaper to build than linking with TTC at Spadina/St. George

It would be nice though if they extended the subway from Kipling to Pearson. A similar situation to the eventual Downsview-York University extension. Another illustration of terrible infrastructure that needs to be improved.

I guess numerous flights to NYC have made me very annoyed with Toronto's largely useless subway.