Barrie is one of the seven train lines of the GO Transit system in the Greater Toronto Area, Ontario, Canada. It extends from Union Station in Toronto in a generally northward direction to Barrie, and includes ten stations along its route. From 1982 to 1990 and again from 1993 to 2007, it was known as the Bradford line, named after its former terminus at Bradford GO Station until the opening of Barrie South GO Station.
The Barrie line runs on the former Northern Railway of Canada route. This is the oldest operating railway line in Ontario, with passenger service beginning in 1853.
History
In 1852, construction began on the Ontario, Simcoe and Huron Railway, which would run from Toronto to Collingwood. The line opened on May 16, 1853, when passenger train service began operating between Toronto and Aurora (then Machell's Corners). On October 11, 1853, service was extended to Allandale, then opposite Barrie on the south shore of Kempenfelt Bay.
In 1888, the Grand Trunk Railway took over operation of the line. In 1923, the bankrupt Grand Trunk Railway was merged into the Canadian National Railway (CNR) network.
Commuter service planning
In 1968, MPP William Hodgson introduced a private member's bill to move that the government of Ontario establish GO Transit services north of Metro Toronto. That year, a community group known as the GO North Committee distributed "GO North" stickers for motorists to adhere to their automobile's windshield to advocate for GO Transit commuter rail service north of Toronto.
Planning for commuter services resulted in the establishment of the Newmarket Bus Terminal by 1970, from which commuters would be taken to the Richmond Hill GO Station to commute to Toronto.
John Crawford Medcof, operating a company named Railroad Boosters, rented a train for one-day service between Barrie and Toronto on 16 October 1969, earning a profit. He gave the proceeds to the government of Ontario to support a north GO train service promised by John Robarts in late 1969, but asked for the government to return the money when the provincial government announced it would not establish a Richmond Hill line service in 1970. He applied for a grant of from the federal government to operate a commuter train for twelve weeks, with one train leaving Barrie in the morning for Toronto, and a return trip at night. The grant was approved per the government's local initiatives program in December 1971. The train was operated by Canadian National Railways, and charged the same fares as those for the GO Transit bus service. Another trial commuter service from Barrie to Toronto was operated in late 1972, carrying 13,483 passengers.
In 1973, the Canadian Transport Commission held a public hearing at Georgian College during which its three-member committee heard presentations from Medcof and councillors from all "municipalities between Toronto and Barrie". All presentations favoured the creation of commuter train service between the two cities, including that of York—Simcoe MP Sinclair Stevens.
On April 1, 1972, CN introduced commuter service from Barrie to Toronto, as required by the Canadian Transport Commission. The service was transferred to Via Rail in 1978. As a result of federal government financial cutbacks to Via Rail, the service was transferred to the provincial government and integrated into the GO Transit network on September 7, 1982, but service only extended to Bradford. On September 17, 1990, the line was extended to Barrie, but was again cut back to Bradford on July 5, 1993.
Service expansion
On September 8, 1998, GO Transit added a second daily round trip to the line. In the early 2000s, GO Transit opened three new stations on the line: Rutherford on January 7, 2001; York University on September 6, 2002; and East Gwillimbury on November 1, 2004. In 2006, the number of daily trains on the line doubled again to four in each direction.
In 2006, GO Transit built a bridge at the Snider diamond, which is the junction between the Barrie Line and Canadian National's primary east–west freight line, the York Subdivision. Since CN controlled both corridors, the passage of passenger trains over the diamond was often delayed by freight trains passing through the intersection. Constructing the bridge and associated trackage resulted in a grade separation of the two lines, eliminating such delays. Construction of the bridge began in February 2006, and the bridge was opened in December 2006. The entire project was completed in June 2007.
