Raised tracks and a new platform: What it will take to build Waterloo region's new transit hub

CBC News

· Posted: Apr 17, 2025 9:35 AM EDT | Last Updated: 1 hr ago

Construction of Waterloo region's caller transit hub is acceptable to statesman successful March 2026.

For existent this time.

The transit hub astatine the country of King Street W. and Victoria Street N. has been much than a decennary successful the making. The region's acting commissioner of proscription services Doug Spooner says Metrolinx is acceptable to get shovels successful the crushed successful March 2026.

That means radical volition commencement to spot demolition statesman on the obstruction corridor this summer, including parts of the erstwhile Rumpel Felt Co., gathering connected Victoria St. N.

"We've besides got immoderate preparatory enactment for the Victoria Street modification task and past we request to commencement getting the tract ready," helium said successful an interrogation with CBC News Wednesday.

Spooner noted practice aspects of the erstwhile mill volition beryllium maintained.

"We're looking for mixed-use, development, housing, assemblage usage oregon different uses of that site," helium said.

The portion has besides indicated it plans to walk a bylaw that would region radical surviving successful an encampment from the 100 Victoria St. N. tract by Dec. 1 to statesman remediation enactment up of Metrolinx starting its work.

WATCH | Region makes plans to determination guardant with transit hub construction:

Land purchases day backmost to 2008

The portion began purchasing the 1.6 hectares of onshore successful the country successful 2008 with the extremity of gathering a multi-modal proscription hub.

In a Nov. 17, 2015 study to determination councillors, unit said the portion had already completed biology assessments, a preliminary tract design, practice interaction assessment, municipality plan little and a marketplace scoping and sounding analysis.

The program is to person it nexus walking and cycling trails, Grand River Transit buses, the ION LRT, Via, and GO Transit.

After receiving $43 cardinal from the state for the task successful 2016, enactment was initially expected to statesman successful 2020.

It was past pushed to 2021.

Then pushed again to 2023.

Then, 2025.

Now, Spooner says, it's astir spell clip and Metrolinx is expected to statesman on-the-ground enactment successful March 2026.

Regional Coun. Colleen James, who is besides the committee seat of the sustainability, infrastructure, and improvement committee, said successful an interrogation successful December that the caller transit hub is indispensable due to the fact that the portion expects to turn to 1 cardinal residents by 2050.

"We person to pb transformational projects and this is 1 of them," James said.

Raised tracks and a caller platform

The enactment that needs to hap includes seeing Metrolinx rise a conception of obstruction tracks betwixt King Street and Weber Street and relocat the bid level from the existent bid presumption betwixt Weber Street and Ahrens Street to its caller spot astatine King Street and Duke Street.

Metrolinx volition besides conception a diversion way down 100 Victoria St. N.

The transit hub, called the Kitchener Central Transit Hub successful a unit study acceptable to spell earlier determination councillors astatine their gathering connected April 23, is seen arsenic an accidental to meld transit, residential and commercialized abstraction into 1 area.

"I similar to deliberation astir the hub arsenic a gateway to the region. So evidently there's a transportation from GO Transit obstruction and bus, but that comes into GRT buses and trains, Neuron scooters and bikes, truly each trips that you know, passim the portion tin commencement and extremity astatine the hub," Spooner said.

As for whether this task volition effect successful two-way, all-day GO trains betwixt Kitchener and Toronto, Spooner says that the 2 projects are separate.

"We cognize that the state continues to bash enactment successful the corridor betwixt Toronto and Kitchener. So we're hopeful that that volition travel online. But these projects are not tied unneurotic astatine this constituent successful presumption of timelines," helium said.

In a caller interrogation connected CBC K-W's The Morning Edition with Craig Norris, Waterloo MPP Catherine Fife was captious of the state and Metrolinx for not moving faster to bring two-way, all-day arsenic good sa play GO bid work to Waterloo region.

"We person 2 universities and a college. We person students commuting backmost and forth — the economical lawsuit for play and for faster and much reliable service is agelong standing," Fife said. "We truly request to spot upgrades to that play service."