High Speed Train Coming?-split from boosting Canada’s military spending"

[Altair]

No clear plan = More trashing activity...

Dan Albas: High speed rail is another Liberal legacy project without a plan​

$90 billion for a train most families will never ride and can’t afford

Conservatives believe Canada is a country ready to build again. For too long, especially in our largest cities, young Canadians have watched governments make big announcements while the cost of living rises, opportunities narrow and major projects stall. After more than a decade of Liberal promises, overspending and delays, Canadians deserve a new approach that delivers real results people can actually afford.

High‑speed rail is an exciting idea. Young Canadians travel abroad and wonder why Canada, a G7 country, still struggles to build so many different things. Conservatives agree: Canada should be building more, building smarter and building faster.

But Alto, announced in the final days of Justin Trudeau’s premiership, doesn’t reflect that kind of smart ambition. It looks more like a legacy project — another big promise without any clear plan to deliver. Conservatives have made our position clear, but doubts are being raised within the Liberal party too, with Liberal MP for the Bay of Quinte, Chris Malette, coming out in opposition to the project proposal.

It is surprising that Prime Minister Mark Carney doubled down on this megaproject without any public fiscal review, independent scrutiny or even a feasibility report. Creating a new state‑run high‑speed rail corporation to build a Toronto–Quebec City line in an already well‑serviced corridor, at a projected cost of at least $90 billion or more, is a serious undertaking.

Dan Albas: High speed rail is another Liberal legacy project without a plan

$90 billion for a train most families will never ride and can’t afford

nationalpost.com

I Don't think anyone has ever refered to VIA rail like this before.

 

[lenaitch]

The money allocated is 60-90b

I assume the 90b is for if they go with the more expensive options, tunnelling in Ottawa and Montreal.

My thoughts are if you're going to do this, do it right, no half measures.

Dropping people off a stones throw from Parliament, Chateau Laurier, Rideau center, byward market, and the Rogers center is way better than Tremblay road which is near...well, there's a baseball stadium. A small baseball stadium.

It could work with one of the speculated routes I have seen as going to Montreal down the Quebec side of the river. Many people assume that it will follow a 'railbanked' abandoned right-of-way in Ontario.

In Montreal, the current HSR ROW does not go to the central station, downtown, but rather on the North side of the mountain. They are talking about swinging South to the central station but that would require digging a new tunnel under the mountain. However, a station North of the mountain works anyway because it would colocate with one of the REM station that would connect you to downtown in less than ten minutes and the main airport at Dorval (I will never get myself to call it the P. E. T. airport) in less than fifteen.

And Altair, isn't the baseball stadium abandoned?

There is apparently a school of thought that HSR simply has to go 'downtown' to 'downtown'.

There is the old CP station that is currently serving as an LCBO. Maybe using that line would be better

I have seen discussions on that. It isn't 'downtown' and only connects with a single TTC subway line. It is anything but a hub. It would require relocating CPKC's sole east-west mainline. Getting into the urban areas of all of the cities is going to be a problem to be solved.

There has been some talk about a Toronto bypass for both CN and CPKC for years, long before HSR. GO covets the CPKC North Toronto sub for all sorts of reasons. Both railways, if they could even sit down together and discuss 'co-production', would want their profitability future-proofed meaning a corridor wide enough for a minimum of four tracks and probably more. Depending on location, both might need new yards (CPKC for certain). Carving a greenfield corridor through the suburban areas north of Toronto would be expensive and difficult, and the locals and municipalities would probably fight tooth and nail to not host high volume freight traffic of dangerous goods.

Many people don't realize that every single freight train that moves from western to eastern Canada has to pass through Toronto.