A new railway book titled "GO-Transit, A Historical Review" by Wilfred Sergeant, now VP, Planning and Operations for Sky Train.

The Book

The subject is the inside story of the planning, construction and inauguration of the rail commuter service in Toronto that the Government of Ontario negotiated for Canadian National Railways to build and operate, in the name of GO-Transit.

The purpose of this book (now in draft form) is to present an outline and supporting data for the information of the reader. The text runs to 128 letter-size pages and 160 photographs, many of which are original, never published before.

As the memories of each new personality are introduced into the text, there is a brief outline of how that person came into that responsibility, including background and previous experiences. The above repeats the text on Appendix B.

The source of the material

This is the story of how GO-Transit first came into being, mostly in the words of the people who worked on it. The author called upon his own personal memories and files, and interviewed 42 persons who were employees of CN or the Government of Ontario, to collect what they remember of their responsibilities and tribulations, how they came to be doing that job, and how they did their work. Many of them remarked how surprised they were at how many details they remembered in the course of our discussions, and how it seemed to be so recent in their minds. Frequently there is humor in the experiences they could recollect.

Public appeal of the subject

The book will be of popular interest to the many users of the GO-Transit services today. They will read about and see pictures of the way it was created like a jigsaw puzzle with each person's talents and corporate departments adding to the mix. It will be doubly interesting to those whose memory goes back even before the service started. If offered on the newsstands at the railway stations, both the regular commuters and the long-haul passengers will see it in passing.

It has historic value, not only in the texts that give an inside story of the doing of the work, but also in the pictures that have not been seen before. There could well be requests for summaries and more background from railway technical publications in the USA and other parts of the world. They can marvel at the level of revenue and service it now provides to its constituents as shown in the following article published in the "Railway Gazette International".

A recent update on the system; click here

It will be of interest to rail buffs and railway museums in Canada and the USA, and should attract interest from other countries planning for our level of success..

This highly successful system will serve as case history in project management for use in training sessions and university courses. There are many locations across the world where similar work is being planned. The book will be useful in training sessions elsewhere.

Executive summary

This book tells the story of the group of people in Canadian National Railways and the Government of Ontario, who planned, built and operated the first GO-Transit services. While it tells how the staff did the jobs assigned to them, and gives personal anecdotes of various experiences and tribulations as the work went along.

There was a heavy flow of immigration from European countries following the end of the war in 1945. The heaviest year was 1951, but the flow of new arrivals continues to this day. Many of the newcomers settled in the Toronto area. The first few chapters of the book review the rapid growth of population and industry around Toronto in those years, how it led to highway congestion, the negative influence of commuting by automobile on the economic viability of the city and land uses, and the need for other solutions for a growing region. The Government of Ontario set up a study group to analyze the problem. The book reviews the two reports produced by this study, and the government decision to work with Canadian National Railways to create a new rail commuter service.

The author had 13 years of experience working for CN. He was transferred to Toronto in 1965 to supervise the design and construction by CN of the new commuter service, and carried the responsibility for the on-going operation to the end of 1971. He had already worked in rail commuter services, having had operational training with the underground railways in London, England, and then immigrated to Canada in 1951. A senior officer of the Ontario Government was designated to supervise the construction outside the railway property that was to be government responsibility, so the final service is the amalgam of the railway and government effort together. The design and operation of this GO-Transit service introduced sixteen new concepts that were complete departures from railway tradition up to that time.

The book brings together the personal memories of the author and interviews between 1995-97 with forty-two CN and Government people who worked on the project. Many of the photographs were taken by the author at potential sites for commuter stations, before any construction was undertaken.

It is hoped that these records provide a new insight into the personnel and the tasks involved in bringing a completely new mode of rail transportation into service in the shortest possible time.

Written by Wilfred Sergeant in the year 2000