Metrolinx today bought tracks in central-north Toronto from Canadian National Railways for $68 million. Metrolinx now owns the entire 97-kilometre-long (60-mile-long) Barrie - Bradford GO Transit train corridor between downtown Toronto and Barrie.
By buying the southern part of CN’s Newmarket subdivision, Metrolinx fills a gap in the tracks that it owns. It already owns the east-west Union Station rail corridor in downtown Toronto, the Weston subdivision in west-central Toronto and the northern part of the commuter rail-line to Barrie.
Tracks of the Newmarket subdivision branch off the Weston sub, which Metrolinx (apparently) bought from CN earlier this year, in Toronto’s Parkdale neighborhood. The tracks extend north past York University to connect with the commuter line to Barrie that Metrolinx already owned. That line stretches northward beyond CN’s main east-west freight corridor parallel to Steeles Avenue between Keele and Dufferin streets.
GO Transit currently operates eight commuter trains Mondays to Fridays, between Toronto and Barrie over the Newmarket subdivision. The tracks also host a daily CN freight train and VIA Rail Canada’s transcontinental passenger train three times a week.
Under its sales agreement with Metrolinx, CN will continue to serve five freight customers on the lower Newmarket Subdivision between Highway 401 and the main east-west freight corridor.
You can view the Railway Association of Canada’s map of the Newmarket subdivision and other CN, Canadian Pacific and GO Transit railway lines here.
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