The LINK Train is a Missed Opportunity

-
Hello!

If you've ever parked at Pearson Airport, chances are you've taken the Terminal LINK Train. It's a short elevated line that links the terminals with the parking lots near Viscount. In general, while it serves a purpose, it's kind of just a blip within the broader transit network of the GTA. 

On April 30, 2022, I decided to take a trip on the LINK Train, in order to identify the potential that the line has (and get pictures for this article). This article has two sections: the first is to speak about the Union Station West proposal at Pearson, and the second is more specific to the LINK Train.

Union Station West

The Greater Toronto Airport Authority (GTAA) has long proposed a Union Station West at Pearson. The rationale here is that Pearson's car-centric present has limited days remaining, and switching modes is critical for the future. The GTAA, acknowledging the number of business near the airport, wants to take the lead on pushing transit. While specifics are rough, the plan is for a large, multi-modal transit station at one of the terminals, with a dense node of employment there, and connections elsewhere.

The main critique of this plan is that it fails to account for the expansiveness of the airport industrial zone. While there are no official borders, the contiguous industrial area is something like 182 square kilometers large. The airport is central in this zone, and as such, much of the industry orients towards it. Some parts of this block has no transit service, and would be difficult to serve, so the assertion that one dedication station will seemingly 'solve' all issues and satisfy all need is laughable. MiWay tried this with Renforth, Orbitor and Spectrum Stations, on the Mississauga Transitway, just south of the Airport. They are on the southern portion of the Airport Corporate Centre, along Eglinton, and some offices are more than a kilometer walk away. They don't satisfy all transportation needs, no matter how fancy the stations are.

This crosses four municipalities! It's huge!

I'm not arguing that the Union Station West is not needed, it totally is (change the name though), but more dedicated improvements to current transit infrastructure would make a more material difference for the vast majority of customers. A LINK Train extension would satisfy some demand, and Union Station West would satisfy the remainder: neither can satisfy all at once.

One thing I do appreciate the GTAA for identifying is that those actually going on flights from Pearson make up a minority of the broader transportation impact at the airport. Hundreds of employees at the airport, for each airline, for the cargo carriers, and everyone else, are a much larger group of the movements that occur in the space. 70% of the LINK's ridership is airport employees, and that doesn't account for any of the industry surrounding. I do think reconceptualizing airports as a whole is a critical first step in improving transportation and access. These plans are presently on hold due to the pandemic.

So much space dedicated to cars, yet this. Wasn't even a busy day! GTAA has this part right.

The Terminal LINK Train

The Terminal LINK Train is not a unique piece of infrastructure: it's one of many peoplemovers at airports across the continent. It's not a very old line; it opened in 2006. The LINK Train runs between Terminal 1 and Viscount, with a single intermediate stop at Terminal 3. It's so short and simple that the only map online is pretty terrible, but I have included it below for reference.


At Terminal 1, connections can be made to the Union-Pearson Express, GO Transit routes 34 and 40, TTC daytime routes 52, 900, and 952, as well as night routes 300, 332, and 352, Brampton Transit's route 115, and MiWay's route 7. It also was serviced by MiWay's 100 route, but that has been gone since the start of COVID. This is the busiest stop at the airport, especially considering it is an inter-municipal transfer point. Many switch buses here who otherwise have no business at the airport.

Terminal 3 has connections to all the above TTC routes, but nothing else (MiWay doesn't go here, but it's in Mississauga). Viscount makes connections to MiWay routes 24 and 107, but neither has weekend service.

My Tour of the LINK Train

For my tour, I boarded the train at Terminal 1, rode it out to Viscount, headed back on to Terminal 3 to grab lunch, and then returned to Terminal 1 to catch the UP Express downtown. This piece won't really explore each step of my journey, but more general comments.

I took TTC route 52A Lawrence West to Pearson. All buses drop off and pick up on the lower arrival level, on the middle ring. Holy fuck, is the transfer terrible. You have to cross the inner ring, go up two floors, enter the bridge, turn about ten times, then you arrive on the platform. This really has to be the worst transfer in the GTA. I know that the buses on the lower level and the train up high make things difficult, but could it not be more direct? Anyone on Lawrence West who wants to take the UP Express downtown is surely dissuaded by this if anything. Since TTC serves both terminals, there is literally no reason to get off the bus at Terminal 1 if you want Terminal 3 (but vice versa you must). 

The transfer from the LINK to the UP Express, however, is super easy. They board on the same level, maybe 100 feet apart, no turns required. The LINK uses the outside tracks, the UP Express the inside, and they share the same station building. It's kind of insane how Pearson Terminal 1 is both the best and the worst transfer location in the GTA. 

At least the LINK Station is bright.

The train ride itself is pretty short. A one-way trip is just four minutes, and trains operate every four minutes during busy times, and every eight during less busy times, 24/7. From a statistics point of view, that's quality transit! It's pretty cool riding above the spaghetti mess that is the Pearson freeway system, especially when it's full of traffic.


The main purpose of Viscount Station is to serve the parking lots. I suppose some people switch to the bus routes here, or walk to nearby employment, but man, is the environment unwelcoming. The MiWay stop is shelter-less, in a parking lot, across from the cargo trailer storage zone, apparently. The buses here aren't frequent either: this is a miserable wait for the only way to the employment lands immediately north of the airport.


I think my feelings riding the line were: that's it? Like sure it does something, and people use it, but it feels as if it dead-ends on both ends, and that it should go further. Especially considering how much money went into the stations, it makes you wonder if there were plans for the line to go further, to serve more. 

Just in case you forgot which of the three stations is next.

So, How is the LINK Train a Missed Opportunity?

The GTAA, the line's operator, is not obliged to provide service to the industrial areas around the airport. That said, I think they fully should: the concentration of employment is a direct consequence of and is completely reliant on the existence of the airport, and vice versa. The GTAA's comments concerning the need for the Union Station West, yet their unwillingness to extend the line are in direct contradiction of each other. You can improve transit for the airport industrial zone without even having a massive central station!

I guess that's the missed opportunity. The LINK train doesn't have to be incomplete, it could fully be extended to serve nearby transit hubs, and the broader employment area. This would require a conversion from peoplemover to proper light rail, but I feel like this would be worth it.

I have drafted a sample route that connects to the GTAA Administration office and Renforth Station to the south (using the old Terminal 2 lands to dip below the runways), and north to Malton GO Station. It's not perfect, I would have much rather had the northern terminus be Westwood Mall, but that may be a bit excessive, and Malton GO is a better terminus than any other choice. If there were switches near Viscount and Terminal 1, frequencies could be better set to match demand: say, every 3 minutes between Viscount and Terminal 1, every 6 minutes south of Terminal 1, and every 12 minutes north of Viscount.

My LINK Train idea!

I won't explain each of the benefits for this routing in depth, but here are some key bullet points:
  • Faster trips;
  • Shorter walks to many places of employment around American Drive, Northam, and Northwest Drive Stations;
  • Direct rail access to the GTAA Administration, which includes a connection to MiWay's route 57 Courtneypark, which runs through the airport infield and to many industrial areas west of the airport;
  • Additional transit connections, including:
    • TTC routes 32 and 112
    • GO's Kitchener Line, and routes 19, 31 and 38
    • MiWay routes 30, 35, 39, 42, 43, 57, 74 and 109
    • Brampton Transit route 505
    • VIA Rail's once-daily train to Sarnia via London
  • Reduced cost for commuters, as the fare-free LINK train replaces a potential second fare for those who would otherwise switch between TTC and either MiWay or Brampton Transit;
  • More customers who would benefit from having a part of their trip taken using the UP Express, and then the LINK train, instead of multiple local buses;
  • Those staying at the airport hotels (Sheraton and Alt) would have many more options when going places, now that they aren't linked to only the airport;
  • Potentially faster trips for those on GO routes 34 and 40 who are not bound for the airport, as the routes could be rerouted via Highway 427, bypasses the airport entirely due to improved connections at Renforth;
  • Easier access to destination to the west, available at Malton GO, instead of having to take the UP Express to Weston and double-back on the Kitchener Line. Notably, easier access to Guelph, Kitchener, and London;
  • Significant reduction in transfer times for those who wish to take the 18:00 VIA Train bound for Sarnia.
While I am sure that there are more benefits, and probably more negatives, these are the ones that came to the top of my head. As you can see, extending the LINK Train to fill this gap would significantly improve transit in the immediate airport vicinity. 

My one potential issue is if the Line 6 Finch West LRT is extended to the future GO Station at Woodbine Racetrack. If this occurs, maybe a branch splitting at Viscount and heading northeastbound to the Racetrack, with a stop at Disco Road, would be able to limit inconvenience.

I really do not have any practical solution to the annoying transfer at Terminal 1. The only thing I could think of are large elevators from the middle ring bus stops directly up the two floors to the LINK train, accompanied with a new tunnel. Maybe if Terminal 1 station is relocated to the east-most part of the terminal, part of the adjacent former Terminal 2 lands can be rebuilt into a bus station, but this would also require adjustments to the UP Express, so I'm not super thrilled on this.

Will this Happen?

Nope! Literally three days ago as of writing, the Ministry of Transportation announced a study for the extension to the currently under construction extension of the presently unopened Line 5 Eglinton to the airport, following the route in my plan to Terminal 1, but without the stop at the GTAA Administration. While I don't think this is bad, it does limit future extensions to the line elsewhere, increases unreliability on such a long line, and makes the administration very difficult to access.

Ah well. I guess my plan would have been good four days ago.

Concluding Thoughts

The Terminal LINK Train is not a bad line, it just suffers from not reaching its potential. If the GTAA is serious about connecting the airport industrial zone to the airport more tightly, and through transit, reworking the LINK Train to be less of a peoplemover within the airport to a true rail line for the benefit of the region is a solid first step. The idea is there, the solution has clearly yet to be realized by them.

A LINK Train approaches Viscount, as seen from the UP Express.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Good, Better, Barrie?

-
Image
Yesterday, I decided to take a quick day trip up to Barrie, where I hadn't been in quite a while. The trip was my first experience of Barrie being a lively, fun city, and I think things are only looking up. In this blog post, I will take a look at some of Barrie's positives, and what they can improve upon to make the City that much better. The Good Good Geography Barrie is situated on Lake Simcoe's Kempenfelt Bay, and the City wraps cleanly around it. This helps the City's focus point be towards the water. Any city that has a downtown closely integrated with a major body of water is a city I want to go to. The presence of water allows for additional activities: Barrie has a beach, boating, and fishing, as well as an inflatable water park in the bay. I saw a pirate ship doing boat tours, and people actually catching fish, right downtown. Additionally, downtown's centrality in the City makes it close to every part of the City. Nowhere is truly 'far' from downt...
Read more

Walking the Garrison Creek

-
Image
Recently, we have seen unprecedented levels of rainfall, causing dangerous and disruptive flooding. Impermeable surfaces are often cited as a reason why our cities flood. We also have answer for where  cities flood as well, because the land remembers.  There have been numerous recent examples where former environmental features have become present during a major flooding event. In Abbotsford, a flood in 2021 matched the location of Sumas Lake , which was drained in the 1920s for farmland. Just last week, a flood in West-Island revealed numerous filled waterways . Toronto is no exception to this rule: as you can see in the map below, Toronto had a significant number of waterways crisscross the City, with most filled in by 1949. Only the waterways in blue still exist. You can explore this map here . While many of these waterways really only make appearances during floods, one particular waterway influences geography in Toronto today: the Garrison Creek. Filled between 1920 and 1...
Read more

Transit On-Demand: The Good and the Bad

-
Image
Recently, I was reading through Sean Marshall's attempt to visit every city hall in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area, which included a blog post about his experience with on-demand transit. Despite using transit extensively, I had never found the need to use on-demand service. This, coupled with me realizing that I had never adventured to two of the twenty-six municipalities in the GTHA, inspired me to venture to some of the region's more rural locales, on public transit. I think my conclusions are similar to Sean's, but I have some more particular thoughts about the services I used. What is on-demand transit? On-demand transit is a catch-all term for all transit that does not operate on a traditional, fixed schedule. Passengers are required to use an app or call a number to order a vehicle, which is usually a car or van, but can sometimes be a regular bus. On-demand transit, also known as dial-a-bus, can take a number of different forms: Door-to-door, which can inclu...
Read more