This morning I wander down to Newmarket Public Library to get some new information from Metrolinx on their much hyped plans for a 15 minute all-day two-way GO Train service on the Barrie Corridor. The first phase would bring the fast service to Aurora on our southern border. 
I am a big fan of GO train expansion plans. What’s the alternative? Ford’s fantasy tunnel?
We need fast trains but we also want more details from Metrolinx. They can’t keep kicking the can down the road, promising answers tomorrow. And, in the meantime, serving up endlessly reheated announcements. (Graphic right: Newmarket GO station: the vision in 2017)
At the Metrolinx table I am joined by a little group of people pressing for answers on a variety of topics.
Questions (not difficult)
I have three straightforward questions to put to the Metrolinx staff which, unfortunately, they are unable to answer:
When will the Aurora-Toronto 15-minute service start?
When will Newmarket get the 15-minute service?
And how is it possible to get a 15-minute service to Newmarket without a grade separation at Davis Drive?
I’ve been asking these questions in one form or another for over a decade. And, astonishingly, still no answers. I am yelling into the void.
Timelines and deadlines
Metrolinx won’t commit to giving timelines or deadlines, But why not?
Are there capacity problems? Do they need more engineers? More construction workers? Are we dealing with another Eglinton Crosstown?
Or does Metrolinx need more money from the Province? If so, why is Ford giving away $3B next year to everyone in Ontario? Couldn’t that money be better spent? (Yes)
Do we need Grade Separations?
A few years ago, Metrolinx said it hoped to avoid hugely expensive grade separations by using sophisticated signalling allowing the barriers at the level crossings to stay down for relatively short periods. The trains will be electric with rapid acceleration and they will be shorter. Traffic would not back up significantly.
So, show us the math as it applies to the level crossing at Davis Drive. Metrolinx knows the trains will be shorter, faster and more frequent. So how long will the barriers stay down at Davis Drive with a 15-minute service?
Stumped for answers, the Metrolinx people say they could bring in the experts for a local Town Hall here in Newmarket. I am enthusiastic. I am standing next to Bob Kwapis, the affable councillor for Ward 5, who seems to like the idea. And now I am talking to someone from the Mayor’s Office who doesn’t rule it out but says local venues are booked up months in advance.
Just set a date.
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Click "read more" below for Me and Metrolinx: A Ten Year Engagement
Me and Metrolinx: A Ten Year Engagement
Ten years ago I was asking when Newmarket would get an all-day two-way GO train service. 
Was it fact or fiction? By 2015 we were being told we’d get a fast train service but the details would follow.
In 2016 Metrolinx rejects a 15 minute service to Mulock.
By 2017 I am wondering if we shall have to wait 24 years to get our fast trains. In 2018 we are back to talking about grade separation again.
In 2019 the future of the Mulock GO Rail Station is uncertain.
By November 2020 I am back to wondering if Newmarket will ever get that 15 minute service to Toronto.
Still no answers by January 2021 as Metrolinx winds down its public consultation on the Barrie Corridor. In August 2021 Metrolinx confirms plans to extend the all-day two-way 15-minute GO train service north from Aurora to Bradford. Metrolinx says
"the change is possible thanks to further study and optimization of service plans."
Now East Gwillimbury asks Metrolinx to accelerate their program, pressing for the 15-minute service to be extended north into their patch.
Metrolinx’s decision to take the 15-minute service up to Bradford is nowhere to be found in the York Region’s draft Transportation Master Plan. It is subsequently amended.
But to what effect?
