Public Relations and Advertising Department
Windsor
Station Montreal Que. H3C
3E4
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Volume 11 Number 15
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Nov. 18, 1981
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GO Train Uses Company Line
Stephen
Morris
Inaugural
Train: GO Train 4 rips through a banner at Milton, Ont.,
to officially begin the first regularly-scheduled
GO Transit commuter service on CP Rail
lines.
Milton Ont. - The first
regularly-scheduled GO Transit passenger train to
operate on CP Rail lines ripped through a ceremonial banner
here 25 Oct 1981 to inaugurate the commuter
service to and from Toronto.
At the controls
were CP Rail veterans Vince Campbell and Frank Bunker who were
accompanied in the locomotive cab by Chairman and Chief
Executive Officer F.S. Burbidge, Executive
Vice-President R.S. Allison, and Ontario's
Minister of Transportation and Communications, James Snow.
Called GO Train 4, the commuter service operates
three trains to Toronto during the morning
rush-hourwith an equal number returning to Milton
in the evening. Along the 31.2 mile route are seven new train
stations. The Milton-Toronto run is the fourth GO
Train service operating in the Toronto area.
MANY SPECTATORS
Meeting the
inaugural train at each of the stations were municipal,
provincial, and federal officials. Also on hand were hundreds
of spectators.
The new rail service is the
result of five years of planning and construction which has
cost the Ontario government $60 million. The service can be
expanded to five trains a day as passenger traffic increases.
Along the route - CP Rail's main line - much
upgrading has taken place so the trains can operate
comfortably and safely at speeds up to 75 miles an hour.
Thirty miles of 100-poundbolted
rail has been replaced with 136-pound continuous
welded rail and more than 280,000 tons of ballast has been
installed. A three-track holding yard has been
built at Guelph Junction, seven miles west of here, to store
the trains and a new dispatching office has been set up at
Toronto's Union Station.
Though much has been
done, work along the route is continuing. Another 30,000 tons
of ballast will be installed next year and the railway is
putting in eight miles of new track in a busy area near
Toronto to prevent any delays. When all the work is completed,
123 new turnouts, 63 of them designed for
high-speed operation, will also have been
installed.
Mr. Burbidge praised GO Transit as a
model of transportation and regional planning which has
captured the attention of city and transportation officials
across North America.
First ticket: Chairman and Chief Executive
Officer F.S. Burbidge (left) receives a large rail ticket as a
souvenir from L.H.Parsons, chairman of GO
Transit.
This CP Rail News article is
copyright 1981 by Canadian Pacific Railway and is reprinted
here with their permission. All photographs, logos, and
trademarks are the property of the Canadian Pacific Railway
Company.
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