Union Pearson Express will be ready for 2015 Pan Am Games
Posted July 11, 2013 3:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Work gets underway this summer on the hub that will link downtown Toronto to Pearson International Airport in two years.
This August, construction on the Union Pearson Express station will start in the Skywalk just west of the Union Station train shed.
The service, to be operated by the provincial transportation agency Metrolinx, will run every 15 minutes and will shuttle passengers from the city to the airport in about 25 minutes. The trains will stop at the Bloor and Weston GO stations.
“I’m pleased that we’re on track to build the Union Pearson Express in time for the 2015 Pan/ParaPan American Games,” Transportation Minister Glen Murray said in a release.
“The Union Pearson Express will [remove] an estimated 1.2 million car trips from Ontario roads in its first year of operation alone.”
Construction has already started on a station at Terminal 1, a three-kilometre expansion of the existing rail line and upgrades to the Bloor and Weston GO stations.
Sumitomo Corporation of America is now building diesel trains, which can be later converted to electric.
More than five million people travel between downtown Toronto and Pearson every year and that number is expected to reach nine million by 2020.
The Pan Am Games run from July 10-26, 2015 and the Parapan Am Games, from Aug. 7-14, 2015.
