Train Dream
At precisely 10:23 this past Sunday morning, at the recently constructed Bloor Station of the Union Pearson Express, one of the short, gunmetal trains glided quietly to a halt. I was heading to meet my sister at the airport for brunch before her flight out and had arrived on the platform only a minute before. In my borderline obsessive quest to maximize the efficiency of my daily transit, I tend to cut it close. Today, in what would usually be a 50 minute trip from my house to Terminal 1 via the TTC, I would attempt to travel in half of that. Walk to the station: ~1 minute. Buy ticket: ~40 seconds. Climb stairs: ~10 seconds. Leaving home at 10:20 I allowed myself a buffer in excess of a minute. Plenty of time.
The UP Express (pronounced “up” rather than “you pee,” I discovered) boasts a twenty-five minute travel time between Union Station and Pearson Airport, with stops at Bloor and Weston along the way. My own journey from Bloor was to be a speedy 17 minutes, it’s terminus being directly inside Terminal 1. At 22 dollars from Bloor ($27.50 from Union), the price is a hefty jump from the $3 $3.25 that the Toronto Transit Commission charges, but it’s apples to old, mushy oranges. The UP is quick, clean, direct. The TTC, while not entirely terrible, is none of those things.
There’s something distinctly utilitarian about the UP that makes it so appealing. The stop at Bloor is plain: tall, exposed concrete ceilings extend skyward, finally giving way to large glass panes that allow the natural light to flow in. The trains keep with the colour scheme: greys upon greys, from seats, to walls, to carpets, with subtle highlights of ochre and sage scattered throughout. The muted colours aren't gloomy, however. Rather, they give off almost a Nordic vibe. Dispassionate? Perhaps, but also calming. You’re going somewhere fast, but you aren’t in a hurry.
That calmness is undoubtedly also related to the utter lack of people aboard. The entire train was empty but for myself, three other passengers, an attendant, and an engineer. Built with a capacity of 173, in the dozens of trains I’ve seen speed by since the line opened in June, on only a couple of occasions have I not thought that the cars looked drastically empty. Yet, for me, that’s part of the draw. Fewer people means a cleaner car (and fewer reading distractions).
But the UP is by no means inhuman. A courteous attendant checks your ticket upon boarding. An engineer announces that the doors are closing, asking that you “please stand clear.” The people are there, but only as much as they need to be. The automated announcements, welcoming passengers aboard and announcing the few stops along the way, straddle a pleasant middle ground between the no-nonsense, gruffly bureaucratic male voice that occasionally sounds off on TTC subway platforms, and the heavily-medicated female coo that narrates the Air Canada safety video. The anonymous UP woman is professional, yet friendly. Her voice puts you at ease at a time when your mind is likely to be running through a list of possible minor emergencies. Did I lock the door? Did I remember my passport? Will I make it to my flight in time? Of course you will. You’re on the UP Express.
The mystery of the UP is that, despite its minimalist aesthetic and its basic functionality, the service feels oddly decadent. Part of this can be attributed to the price. It’s natural to feel a little indulgent paying upwards of twenty dollars for a ride to the airport when you can go the same distance for a little over three. But there’s something more to it than that. It’s too well designed. It’s a little too easy, a little too good. In a city whose favourite past time is fussing and fighting, sometimes literally, over transportation, when we get something that works as seamlessly as the UP it almost doesn’t feel deserved.
In fact, many people think that it isn't deserved at all. With construction costs topping out at $456 million, critics feel that the money could have been better spent trying to relieve the already strained public transit system, rather than creating a luxury line that relatively few will use. Transit advocacy group TTCriders, in an interview with the Toronto Star, argued that the line should be integrated with the TTC. “We need this line to be useful for everyone in this city,” spokesperson Jessica Bell said. “And that means doing the right thing […] and turning it into a proper transit line.”
Maybe that will happen. Maybe the UP Express is just a misanthropic fever dream, one in which you can escape from the city without having to contend with congested roads or subway cars, where you can spread yourself over three seats and dig into a book without the distractions of a taxi driver’s cell phone conversation or a teenager’s blaring headphones. Integrating it with the TTC may be more profitable, more useful, and more beneficial for the city. But until that happens, I’ll be enjoying the ride.