Monday, December 7, 2015

GO Transit Fares Between Hamilton and Union Station to Rise By 60 Cents or 5.2%, After 4.5% Increase Last Year

GO Transit has announced that the fees for most rides (those above $5.70) will rise. For those fares above $8.25, the single adult paper fare will rise 60 cents.  That means for the $11.50 Hamilton to Union fare that is now $11.50 will rise to $12.10 which is a 5.2%. That's obviously a lot higher than Ontario's inflation rate and the rates have been rising more than inflation for years. Last year the fare increased by 50 cents from $11 to $11.50 or close to 4.5%.

For most Hamilton trips, I would guess the majority would come from the downtown GO station in Hamilton to Union station express bus. There's only six trains now one way in the morning and six back weekdays, while the buses run almost all day and on the weekends. Other GO Trips would come from the bus to the Aldershot GO station to transfer to the train, the GO bus to York University, buses from McMaster to Toronto, and the bus to Pearson that continues on to Richmond Hill. Thus for Hamilton, the vast numbers of users would be taking buses rather than trains.

Considering that the costs of diesel fuel have gone way down, and that bus driver fares have likely not risen 5.2% in one year, Hamiltonians are effectively subsidizing rides in those communities that have a majority of train users as train service expansion is comparatively more expensive than bus service, plus the costs of building parking lots at GO train terminals.

2 comments:

  1. There's a gradual GO expansion, which I've written about twice at:

    http://www.raisethehammer.org/article/2672/
    http://www.raisethehammer.org/article/2720/

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  2. Hi Mark,
    I have already read those articles and I liked them. Surly Hamiltonian has been around for a while, and one of our core themes is what the province spends per capita in the capital versus what they spend in Hamilton on different things, but especially transit. I take the perhaps somewhat unorthodox stance that they should be the same. Hence my interest in money spent for Hamilton versus other GO cities. Certainly expansion is being planned, but knowing also that the Liberals first announced LRT funding for Hamilton in 2007, when money actually gets spent (and over what time period compared to other projects in Toronto) seems unknown and unclear.

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