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MCI102A3

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Went to Winterfest today. Spent some time at the event in Centennial Park and a bit of time at the terminal.

1501, the Holiday Nova, was assigned to the Winterfest shuttle that was advertised, and from the looks of it, it was well patronised. It parked at the front of the terminal just north of where the Hammond and Angel casino buses park.

1937 and 1938 were both out, 1938 on the 8A and 1937 on the 8B, I rode on 1204 (Eldorado) to get to Downtown, and all the Novas were on the road. 1502 was parked at the coach layover slips behind the terminal from when I got there (around 1445), until just before I left at 1608. The bus was haphazardly scheduled by the station staff to do the southbound 4B when I left, but then the southbound already doing the run (1401) arrived behind us, some exchanges between control and 1502 took place, then we were put on 1401.

At the Memorial Square section of Winterfest, Barrie Transit had some sort of pavilion set up, with BACTS 1350 parked there, decked in winter/holiday themed decals, with kids going in and out of it. I think City people were manning it.

The picture of 1350 was taken on the south side of Memorial Square on the Winterfest site, while 1501 was shot while leaving the terminal caught up in traffic. I wanted to get it at the front of the terminal but never had the chance to.

The traffic also tied up the buses quite a bit today, since Simcoe Street was closed along with Bayfield Street south of the Five Points. When I was spotting the Ontario Northland coaches at the Intercity-end of the terminal, it took about 5 minutes for all the BT and ONR buses to sortie the terminal because of traffic.

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  • 3 weeks later...

To keep the thread current, I'll inject some life.

On Family Day, I did indeed make it to Midhurst. The bus was 1501 (2015 Novabus LFS40102, Holiday bus), and I rode the 10:00 AM run from Allandale Recreation Centre to Midhurst via Downtown, Letitia Heights, and Georgian Mall. I did video in the front seat from Georgian Mall to Midhurst and back, it turned out excellent. My grampa and I were the only people on the bus the entire trip. We got off Downtown after getting back and took a southbound 4B to get home. My video of the highway run has been edited and saved on WMM, and will be uploaded to YouTube soon, once my Orion V 9411 videos are done and uploaded. The pictures from the Midhurst run are already on Flickr, with all stops heading northbound being covered and southbound stops between Midhurst and Downtown where I got off.

In other news, the fare structure changes take effect March 1st. 5-ride cards are being replaced with 6-ride cards. 10-ride cards are staying the same, while BT is now introducing a day pass for $7.50, which will be handy for most of our board members who come here to visit of course, while a day pass for a family of four will be offered for $9.00, and monthly passes will go up between three to five dollars from their current level, the Adult pass is $86.00 as an example.

1937-1938 the ex-Fort Mac D40LFs are still here as of my last trip Downtown. I haven't had any chance to tap into the grapevine for anything new though, as I haven't seen my sources for some time.

A picture of 1501 in Midhurst is attached for records. It was taken at the parking lot just across from the Baycats baseball pitch at the Barrie Community Sports Complex.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Just spotted 1940 on the 8A-NB Crosstown at the downtown terminal at 4:20 PM.

No pictures, but they did put the logo and had a destination sign on, but not working though.

Not sure if it was 1937 or 1938 repainted to 1940 or another rental. I haven't seen 1937 or 1938 in a few days.

It will be down at the terminal at

5:20 PM 8B-SB Essa

6:50 PM 8A-NB RVH

7:50 PM 8A-SB Yonge

9:20 PM 8B-NB Crosstown

10:20 PM 8B-SB Essa

11:50 PM Terminus point and then heads back to the garage.

These times are assuming they don't do a trade off with a regular bus.

EDIT: The bus number 1940 I saw was actually a retired bus from the same system where 1937 and 1938 came from.

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According to the Wiki roster, 1940 is a 2004 D40LF. Two were built for Fort Mac then.

I gotta wonder what BT plans to do with them all? I mean, doesn't seem like there's a huge need for more leasers now that 1501-1504 are in town, but maybe more buses broke down?

I'll be making a trip this week to get pictures for sure and find out what's up.

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According to the Wiki roster, 1940 is a 2004 D40LF. Two were built for Fort Mac then.

I gotta wonder what BT plans to do with them all? I mean, doesn't seem like there's a huge need for more leasers now that 1501-1504 are in town, but maybe more buses broke down?

I'll be making a trip this week to get pictures for sure and find out what's up.

So MTB picked up another Fort Mac bus..

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According to the Wiki roster, 1940 is a 2004 D40LF. Two were built for Fort Mac then.

I gotta wonder what BT plans to do with them all? I mean, doesn't seem like there's a huge need for more leasers now that 1501-1504 are in town, but maybe more buses broke down?

I'll be making a trip this week to get pictures for sure and find out what's up.

The five D40LFs from 2002 are still out of service being refurbished (supposedly). That puts a rather large dent in Barrie's relatively small fleet, so yes they still need the leased units as maintenance spares until the other buses come back.

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Yeah, I'm not sure what's up with the 02s. I've read in the newspaper in the summer that four of them were being refurbished, then a driver I know told me they were done, and then one of my friends spotted 66202 at MTB. Last pic I saw of them was 662 in TTC9701's photo on Flickr, and haven't heard anything new with them since. So far 662's the only 02 that's been spotted at MTB according to the photos.

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  • Root Admin

66202 is still in pieces at MTB as of last week. In my opinion, doesn't look like its going to be redone and was possibly purchased by MTB. Absolutely no progress has been made to it for months it looks like. I could be wrong but just stating the obvious. The frame is in horrible condition.

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Just spotted 1940 doing the Route 1A/B today.

Though, I haven't spotted 1937 or 1938 in a couple of days. This is another Fort McMurray unit like 1937 and 1938.

Not sure why they want to continue leasing buses since in the long run, it is much cheaper to buy new than renewing the lease every few months.

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My report for 2.11.2016.

I went Downtown today to do some spotting, while specifically going to look for 1940.

At Downtown, both Eldorados were on the 4A-4B, which I thought was kind of odd. The rest was un-remarkable. 69508, 69909 and the rest of the fleet had those gaudy huge Laurentian adverts removed from the exterior, they look quite nicer.

When I enquired about 1940 to one of my driver friends, the discussion led towards a hunch that 1940 was assigned to Route 90, so I went back to Allandale Station (Stop 732) with my grampa, and then waited there. 1940 showed up just after 4:00, I got a moving shot, and then the bus loaded three passengers and left for Angus.

The specifications based on external observations:

2004 D40LF 1940 (ex-Fort McMurray Transit "WHOOSH", same numbers)

Powertrain's a Cummins ISL EPA2004 with Allison B400R5, same as the 04 and 06 Barrie units. The back end has a flatback, but with no cut-out hole for a rear sign like 1937-1938. I didn't get a chance to look at the interior or determine if there was a farebox in it though, or determine how many seats are in it or what model.

I think since 1940 has decals and working sign, if 1937-1938 are still in Barrie, my hunch is that they're possibly fitting decals and programming the signs on them. They were running around the system with paper route cards and no logos ever since they arrived in September.

On the 26th of Februrary, I took a trip Downtown for a quick ride, and spotted 1937 parked at the Mary Street coach slip on mid-day layover. It was signed to Route 90A that day, and looking at her up close, the body still looked really clean, no rust underneath the doors or anything other damage.

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My report for 2.11.2016.

I went Downtown today to do some spotting, while specifically going to look for 1940.

At Downtown, both Eldorados were on the 4A-4B, which I thought was kind of odd. The rest was un-remarkable. 69508, 69909 and the rest of the fleet had those gaudy huge Laurentian adverts removed from the exterior, they look quite nicer.

When I enquired about 1940 to one of my driver friends, the discussion led towards a hunch that 1940 was assigned to Route 90, so I went back to Allandale Station (Stop 732) with my grampa, and then waited there. 1940 showed up just after 4:00, I got a moving shot, and then the bus loaded three passengers and left for Angus.

The specifications based on external observations:

2004 D40LF 1940 (ex-Fort McMurray Transit "WHOOSH", same numbers)

Powertrain's a Cummins ISL EPA2004 with Allison B400R5, same as the 04 and 06 Barrie units. The back end has a flatback, but with no cut-out hole for a rear sign like 1937-1938. I didn't get a chance to look at the interior or determine if there was a farebox in it though, or determine how many seats are in it or what model.

I think since 1940 has decals and working sign, if 1937-1938 are still in Barrie, my hunch is that they're possibly fitting decals and programming the signs on them. They were running around the system with paper route cards and no logos ever since they arrived in September.

On the 26th of Februrary, I took a trip Downtown for a quick ride, and spotted 1937 parked at the Mary Street coach slip on mid-day layover. It was signed to Route 90A that day, and looking at her up close, the body still looked really clean, no rust underneath the doors or anything other damage.

Spotted 1937 at Can-ar in Concord on Friday 3/11, looks like it has been returned for good.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Haven't actually been fanning lately, but I've noticed while driving around town with family that the Eldorados 1204 and 1205 are getting a lot of use in town instead of on 90, on weekdays in particular. I've previously observed 1940 on 90A and a friend of mine observed both 1937 and 1938 on 90 before they disappeared from Barrie.

I was told that the Eldorados are supposed to be 90A-90B's regular fleet. Guess it isn't the case anymore? I knew that on weekends they made up a tiny spare pool since 90 doesn't run on weekends

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Was on 1501 on the 8B Essa/Southbound today and they removed the holiday wrap from the bus.

No more wrap. Just the normal condition that it was delivered in. Maybe the next holiday shipping season, they will bring back the holiday wrap again.

I think it was a very good design to wrap a bus with holiday wrap during the Winter season.

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According to a sighting from one of my friends, 1937 (2003 D40LF, ex-Fort Mac) is now running with Tokmakjian in Downtown Toronto, on the Porter shuttles, presumably alongside 1938 and confirmed to be running with the ex-Medicine Hat Eldorados. 1937 was spotted at the station at the entrance to the Island Airport tunnel, with the Luminator programmed with Porter shuttle codes, the photo I saw showed "UNION STATION" as the exposure.

Last time I was out, I went Downtown, and saw 1204 and 1205 on the 4A-4B, alongside an XD40 and Nova. Spoke to one of my driver sources, and 1940 she told me is mainly kept on Route 90. I've heard from another source of mine that there's apparently another ex-Fort Mac, 1939 (2003, same order as 1937-1938) that's working tag-team on 90 as well. I plan to head to Allandale for a report when the weather gets better. Also saw 1501 with the wrap removed, looks quite nice. No photos with this report, I had a different camera than my own and was shooting coaches instead.

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On 4/6/2016 at 5:11 PM, MCI102A3 said:

According to a sighting from one of my friends, 1937 (2003 D40LF, ex-Fort Mac) is now running with Tokmakjian in Downtown Toronto, on the Porter shuttles, presumably alongside 1938 and confirmed to be running with the ex-Medicine Hat Eldorados. 1937 was spotted at the station at the entrance to the Island Airport tunnel, with the Luminator programmed with Porter shuttle codes, the photo I saw showed "UNION STATION" as the exposure.

 

TOK has the contract now for the Billy Bishop Airport shuttles.

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