Toronto's Rail Systems are Pushed to Perform

Toronto's two rail transit providers are in the midst of upgrades and expansions to cope with growth in Canada's largest city and financial center. Historically a heavy transit use area, behind only New York City and Mexico City in terms of North American transit ridership, Toronto is home to the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) and Go Transit (the Greater Toronto Transit Authority), which together provide more than 500 million passenger trips each year. TTC predates most other major North American systems, and GO Transit is known for having established benchmarks for regional commuter rail transit. Its signature innovation was adoption of lozenge cars from Bombardier, which are double-decker in the middle and single story at each end, permitting push-pull traction and easy communication between cars of different heights and engines for crew and passengers. While capacity needs to be expanded, conflicts with the Canadian Northern and Canadian Pacific freight railroads over track rights need to be resolved. One hopeful development is an advanced signal technology permitting greater use of existing tracks by both freight and commuter trains.