Maple/Kleinburg councillor drives petition for new GO station in north Vaughan

Yorkregion.com
April 16, 2014
By Adam Martin-Robbins

 

 

Vaughan commuters are getting on board with a local councillor’s efforts to fast-track construction of a new GO Transit station in the city’s north end.

Maple/Kleinburg Councillor Marilyn Iafrate has launched an online petition, http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/kirby-on-the-go, calling on the provincial government, GO Transit and provincial transit agency Metrolinx to give the green light to building a station at Kirby Road and Keele Street, to better serve riders on the Barrie line.

“The population is growing, everybody needs to get downtown for school, for work and we just haven’t had the capacity here,” Mrs. Iafrate said.

“What really sparked all of this was when I found out there are actually people coming from as far north as Innisfil to use the Maple GO station. That means there is all this traffic coming through the Maple core that is unnecessary, if the Kirby station was open sooner.

“So, it’s a win for the commuters and it’s also a plus for people who are using their own cars to get to work because we’d be taking all these cars off the road that don’t need to be here.”

Mrs. Iafrate said opening a new station would also free up spaces at the Maple and Rutherford GO station parking lots, which are jammed by 8 a.m., leading people to park illegally and risk getting a ticket.

“You’ve got (to fight) traffic congestion to get here, you can’t find parking and then you’re standing your entire train ride, it can’t be a pleasant way to start your day at work,” she said.

And it wouldn’t cost the provincial government much money to build the new station, at least not initially, Mrs. Iafrate added.

The development group that is slated to put up about 8,000 homes in the area known as Block 27 - bounded by King Street in the north, Kirby Road in the South, Keele Street in the east and Jane Street in the west - is willing to cover the cost of constructing the station and recoup it through a public-private partnership, Mrs. Iafrate said.

“Here’s a community that isn’t asking really for anything,” she said. “We’re not asking for the millions or billions (of dollars), we’ve got people to help us with that. We just need the signal that we can go ahead and that’s what the petition is hoping to achieve.”

She’d like to see the new station built in the next six to seven years and that would require the provincial government to get the planning process under way now.

The local councillor braved the cold Wednesday morning to pass out information cards to commuters at the Maple GO station and encourage them to sign the petition.

And the response was largely positive.

Nadeem Ladha, a Maple resident who regularly rides the GO Train to get downtown, said it’s “a really good idea”.

“There’s a lot of parking here and there aren’t any free spaces, it tells you there’s a problem,” he said. “Vaughan is a growing area and anything to free up the congestion would be great.”

Many of his fellow commuters agree.

Mrs. Iafrate’s petition has garnered dozens of signatures since it went live online.

Vaughan Liberal MPP Steven Del Duca also supports her proposal.

“I think it’s a great idea,” he said. “I think it’s evident with the growth that we have in our community that we do need to continue to invest in crucial public transit infrastructure, like the GO service, that we have. If you spend any time at the existing Maple or Rutherford GO stations, you know that the service is very popular to the point of being borderline oversubscribed.”

He noted the provincial government has added additional train service to the Barrie line and hundreds of additional parking spaces at the Maple GO Station since 2003, but the demand continues to grow.

“I think Councillor Iafrate is 100 per cent right,” Mr. Del Duca said. “As the MPP, it is something I support. It is something I believe in and it’s something I’ve spoken to the minister of transportation and his office and the folks at Metrolinx about. ... I am optimistic, because I know our community has a tremendous ability to advocate successfully for important investments that, over time, we will be able to say something that is positive and meaningful around this particular issue.”

The Transportation Ministry declined to comment, directing questions instead to Metrolinx.

Alex Burke, a Metrolinx spokesperson, wrote in an email that the agency is “investigating several potential options for additional stations on the Barrie line, including Kirby Road.”

She also noted that GO Transit is exploring a number of initiatives to try to alleviate parking congestion and create more seat spaces so riders don’t have to stand for their entire journey.

Those initiatives include looking at options for improving pedestrian access to the stations; better timetable integration between York Region Transit services and GO train services and extending station platforms to accommodate 12-car trains, which can carry an additional 315 people.

Starting this month, the Barrie line saw the addition of a 12-car train once, heading southbound, in the morning train and once, heading northbound, in the evening.

And there will be two more trains departing Maple GO Station for Toronto’s Union Station, during the morning, starting in June.

To sign the petition, visit http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/kirby-on-the-go