The Union - Pearson Express

The history of the Union-Pearson Express gives it a label of "political hack job" long before the issue of pricing came to bear. The line was in many ways a vanity project, and in particular (originally, when it was a federal project with SNC Lavalin dominating the consortium) a project driven by the ego of David Collennette. Only in 2010 did it become a Metrolinx project, and by that time the cost and design decisions which make it a premium service were baked into its bones. (It wasn't helped by a shotgun addition of two dollars to the fares to "compensate" the Airport Authority for potential lost parking revenues.)

(A number of the changes made to support the UPX also provided a direct benefit to the Georgetown GO line (note that the tracks were originally purchased by the province for GO, not to allow them to take over the UPX project). I would be interested in knowing what the cost recovery model is as regards the two beneficiaries -- it's just possible that this could be sold as dinging business travellers and well-off tourists to provide cost recovery benefitting ordinary GO commuters. Maybe.)

However, it's not quite as bad a deal as many people in the Twitterverse are making out. The 27.50 price being quoted is unrealistic for three broad reasons -- two already present, one probable.

First, there's a sizeable Presto discount, and with the TTC shifting to Presto, it won't be just GO riders who will be likely to have Presto cards. Note that the price of a Presto card is less than the difference for one trip.

Secondly, there's the fact that for many people in the city (those whose primary immediate subway is the Bloor-Danforth Line), it would make sense from a purely functional point of view to take the express not from Union, but from Bloor (cheek by jowl with Dundas West Station). At that location, it costs $15.20 with Presto.

Finally, there's a much bigger pricing issue that's gearing up with regard to Metrolinx and the TTC. The local transit agencies in the 905 and the GO system have discounted fares on transfers between systems (GO to bus is 75 cents in York region, for example). The TTC has no discount or interoperability as far as fares go with Metrolinx. (There's one tiny exception. If you take the TTC to a GO station, GO to a TTC station, and then the TTC again, it doesn't count as a new TTC trip and you can use your transfer for the second leg of the TTC trip. The GO cost is still full-fare, though.)

With the introduction of Presto, there's a great deal of pressure building up to have real fare integration between Metrolinx and the TTC -- whether it's TTC/GO transfers or York Region/TTC transfers (such as the double fares on certain bus routes). This will, at a guess, take the form of discounts rather than full fare integration in many cases, although a single timed trip on routes like the 102D seems like a likely result. This sort of fare integration was a significant part of Tory's "Smart Track" proposal (and one of the features which distinguished it from the generic RER Metrolinx plans).

I wouldn't be surprised, after the tussle that's coming up on fare integration (which is really about who bears the costs, which in turn is tightly coupled to the question of provincial operating subsidies, which is not going away), to see a discount applied to the UPX as part of an integrated trip with Presto. This might (at a wild guess) lower the price by most of the cost of the TTC trip, which might be on the order of a couple of dollars; so that Bloor-transferral trip would then be an incremental thirteen dollars or so, and about sixteen dollars for the entire trip. At that point it becomes competitive with a taxi even for two people. (For that matter, even the Union connection is competitive with a taxi for two people, even if a TTC fare is tacked on, if the Presto fare is used.)

That's still a luxury service cost, higher than GO rates for the same distance, but it's still a reasonably attractive trip cost for the occasional flier.

And there really is a market for this. For a single traveller, especially one with Presto, it's cheaper than the Express Bus (and a bit more convenient); for a traveller from outside the city (excepting travellers from Bramalea, for whom this would be an insane connection in any case) with a good GO connection it will still be much cheaper than a direct link with a taxi or limousine. (Taxi rates begin at 19 dollars for locations just across the city boundary from the airport, and for the downtown / uptown area range between 44 to 56 dollars (for limousine service, add between two to five dollars to the fare).

Note that the parking at Pearson is pricey -- the cheap parking lot is $3 for 20 minutes, $15 maximum per day (and it`s not convenient; it requires a connecting shuttle); express parking is $5 per half hour with a daily maximum of $90. For drop-offs with no parking, driving a car may be the cheapest way to get to the airport after factoring in gas and depreciation (and stress driving), but as soon as parking is factored in -- pick-ups, departures where the driver stays with the party being dropped off for a while -- there`s no "cheap" way of getting to and from the airport. You would still do better driving on a "meet and return" model (one greeter goes up, two go back down) with about an hour`s parking ($60 for UPX to downtown; $10 plus gas plus depreciation for the car). For flying oneself, even on a one-day business trip, the UPX is probably a shade cheaper than $15 for parking plus gas.

My guess is that the market is not large enough, though: I foresee fare alternatives introduced with the aim of increasing use in order to maximize revenue by pricing between specific price points. (Midday use, off-season use, much reduced family fares (one thing to note is that if you're travelling with, say, four people and their luggage it's a challenge to get to Union Station in the first place, so a heavier discount is probably needed to make it attractive), pre-booking discounts, multi-trip discounts, heavier Presto discounts when it's a connecting trip with GO, same-day returns, etc.) As a further complication, the fact that it shares track space with Tory's "Smart Track" proposal, with its lower fare model, will also have effects on the fare structure.

Short of a direct command -- after 2010, when the design and some of the preliminary work had taken place -- from the provincial government to change the mandate of the service from a premium service to a GO service component, this sort of fare structure was pretty well inevitable as a starting position. Whether that structure remains in place without significant modifications by 2017 or so is another question.

Disclaimer: I have used the airport bus from downtown several times, and used taxi/limo services to the airport from various places in Toronto as well as Markham, so I'm probably part of the UPX target market, especially as I go to the airport so infrequently that the cost per annum is negligible.

• In the Etobicoke cases, (pretty near to the airport) the taxi model would be much preferable to the UPX on both price and time, but that's hardly a surprise.



• For the connections I made on business travel from Kennedy and the 401 (I used to work there for Carswell in the 1990s) the price would be good for UPX assuming RER on the Markham line (GO from Agincourt to Union, UPX to the airport), as the taxi is $63 (total for GO + UPX + taxi to Agincourt would be about $35), but the time is much reduced (about half an hour for the taxi depending on traffic but about an hour or a bit more for the multi-leg option (22 minutes plus about 5 minutes taxi plus about 20 minutes GO + waiting time).



• Interestingly, for the connection from Markham, an RER + UPX connection is very attractive, both in time and money. The only cheap way to get to Pearson via transit is GO + TTC, which involves going downtown and then all the way out to Islington, which just takes too long.



• From Uptown (roughly Moore Park) I`d probably go with TTC + UPX via Bloor: the total trip would be under an hour for less than $20. UPX via Pearson would be slightly faster but cost $4 more.

LCBO and the Beer Store

In the wake of the Clark recommendations regarding the handling of what used to be "Brewers Retail", and then the subsequent publication of the details of the 2000 agreement between the Brewers and the LCBO, there's been a push to boycott the Beer Store, and beers brewed by the 3 international breweries who run it.

The fundamental argument is that profits made by the LCBO go to the province and feed back into services, whereas profits at the Beer Store go to the foreign-owned breweries. On its own, this isn't compelling; preferring public over private sales outlets where there is no compelling public interest in the government being in the business is pretty well a non-starter; and there's no push not to buy beer directly from local breweries such as Mill St. or Bellwoods.

The major problems that have been listed are specific to the way the Beer Store is run.

First, it's not a private enterprise engaging in level-playing-field competition. It's very nearly a monopoly. As Clark pointed out, the government is licensing a monopoly for which the BR is paying nothing (he recommends that they should be charged a reasonable sum for it by the province, and be prevented from passing on the cost to the consumer (easy to do because the LCBO sets the prices the breweries sell by for any beers also listed with the LCBO)).

That monopoly is run to avoid it looking as though it is profitable by funnelling revenues back to the owners by mechanisms other than declaring a profit.

Secondly, it engages in discriminatory pricing against smaller breweries, charging listing fees which act as barriers to access. (It used simply to refuse to carry any beers not made by the owners: they had to change that after a successful challenge under the Free Trade Agreement with the US by an American brewer.)

Thirdly, the agreement between the LCBO and the BR is clearly in restraint of competition (and so against public policy) and has in fact been challenged in court on that basis under the Competition Act. That agreement also seems to involve no consideration flowing to the LCBO and is therefore not an enforceable contract -- it could be voided at any time. (Clark recommends changes to it such as allowing the LCBO to sell twelve-packs.)

Fourth, with a very few exceptions, the beers produced by the three owners are, to put it mildly, not good beer. The obvious exception in Canada is beers by Uinibroue (owned by Sleeman, which is owned in turn by Sapporo). There are also some small breweries owned abroad by InBev which have retained quality after acquisition, such as Goose Island, acquired by Anheuser-Busch InBev in 2011, and Leffe (an "abbey" beer actually brewed under licence to the abbey at the Stella Artois brewing facilities). Note that Bass, which is Anheuser-Busch InBev's flagship brand in the UK, is not what it used to be. There is really nothing redeeming to be said for Molson and Labatt products.

In fact, there are a limited number of good beers carried by the Beer Store at all (more of the effect of those barriers to entry). I'm partial to IPAs: the only really good ones carried at the Beer Store are Boneshaker (produced by Amsterdam) and Mad Tom IPA / Twice As Mad Tom IIPA (Muskoka Brewery). The LCBO also carries (at present) Great Lakes Brewery's Lake Effect IPA and Central City Brewers' (BC) Red Racer IPA, and carries many more during the summer from foreign and local craft brewers. (At present, it's more heavily invested in stouts, porters, and a few winter ales and barley wines -- none of which you will find at the Beer Store; the pricing barriers make seasonal brews uneconomical.)

Finally, the Brewers' Retail group is dishonest in its self-presentation -- note the campaign against selling beer in alternate locations suggesting that corner store operators were more likely than Beer Store operators to flout the laws restricting the sale of alcoholic beverages to minors.

So I'd support the general boycott. Note that aside from the obvious major labels (Sapporo. Sleeman, Molson, Labatt, Coors) there are a number of subsidiary labels which should be avoided: Unibroue, Alexander Keith's, Lakeport, Kokanee, Creemore Springs, Shock Top, Stella Artois, Leffe, Bass, Charrington, Hoegaarden, Beck's, Budweiser, Löwenbräu, Rolling Rock, Spaten, and St. Pauli Girl. In addition Corona, Miller and Heineken are marketed by Molson in Canada.