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Maybe they couldn't. Decades worth of administrative and regulatory creep and Baumol's Cost Disease.
Liberal Minority Government 2025 - ???
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as one who has taken VIA numerous times in the past, I found that the 5 hours between Toronto and Ottawa wasn't much different from flying and the cost for a business seat with all its conveniences was the same as a last minute ticket on Air Canada. Where the train loses is in scheduling. There aren't enough of them and spending an extra 15 minutes in, for instance, Kingston because of a 100 unit freight train having priority can screw up your plans royally at the other end. Construct a passenger-dedicated track following either the current 401 corridor or the old Peterborough line that will accept 100 mph travel. That will produce a maximum 4 hour trip stopping every 40 miles on either or you could build both for half the price of the fancy hardware needed for HSR. Those trains don't come cheap and maintenance is high.And yes I read comments above re: the 401. CP owns the tracks from Toronto through to Havelock so that won't come cheap. Perhaps looking just a few miles north of the 401 on a parallel routing would serve. As I recall, housing basically ends within a mile or two no matter what side road you follow.
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No engineer but I have read that a double track rail corridor requires about 200' for tracks, separation, access, drainage, etc. There are a lot of variables, grade being one. I can think of a couple, like around Cobourg, that would be too steep for rail. I highly doubt there is 200 extra feet in the 401 corridor and it would require the rebuilding of every interchange.
The goal of high-speed passenger rail is not to compete with the car but with aircraft. City centre to city centre, travel to/from the airports, eliminate the need to show up hours before, etc. France has decreed the elimination of short haul flights between cities served by high-speed rail.
HavokFour
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More movement on that Canola/EV deal.
Someone can finally show them how to make a decent vehicle.
Someone can finally show them how to make a decent vehicle.
Stellantis in Talks to Make Chinese EVs at Idled Canadian Plant
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MilEME09
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exactly this, short haul flights dont really exist in europe because of HSR, no need to show up 2h before, its about 1/3 the cost for a ticket. For your average person its most economical. People wanting a summer vacation in Montreal can afford a round trip on HSR for the price of one way with air canada.
daftandbarmy
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Or any railways...we're in a huge mess trade transportation-wise across the country.
The fact that they're pumping the (money losing) high speed passenger route over the need for a more efficient (money making) trade infrastructure says alot about the current government's priorities i.e., get re-elected so suck up to Central Canada where all the voters are ...
Challenges in Canadian trade infrastructure
- Lack of investment: Canada invests less in infrastructure than many Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) peers. In 2018 (latest year available), Canada invested 0.6% of its gross domestic product (GDP) on infrastructure, compared to an average of 0.72% in France, Germany, Italy and Japan. Over the past four decades, the ratio of Canadian infrastructure investment to trade volumes has declined. Transport Canada estimates that $4.4 trillion in trade-enabling infrastructure investments will be needed by 2070. Canada’s infrastructure deficit is estimated between $110 billion and $270 billion.
- Structural and regulatory challenges: Productivity growth in the Canadian transportation sector has plateaued since 2010, with declining logistics performance and aging infrastructure. Regulatory complexity and fragmented governance add inefficiencies and discourage private sector participation.
- Consolidation of key players: Limited competition and slow regulatory processes have led to consolidation among major operators, including the Canadian National Railway (CN) and Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC).
- Supply chain bottlenecks: Congestion and poor maintenance in key export regions disrupt the movement of goods by air, rail, marine and roads.
Maxman1
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"But THIS time it'll be different!"
if you can get the time down to 4 hrs between Toronto and Ottawa you will beat Air Canada and Pearson travel times. 4 Hours doesn't require HSR. Fast, yes but 100 mph is within normal trackage standards so no new standards are required. Hell, they were up to close to 85 40 years ago on the Lakeshore run. If you were to twin the Lakeshore CP line so that one is dedicated passenger with train passage occuring at scheduled station stops you would eliminate most delays. Give CP a property tax break and you will quickly get them on side.
QV
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A bit of a head scratcher. This would service a massive chunk of the countries population (~7,777,205 Canadians).
This after all the banging he's done about getting projects started.
Poilievre calls for cancellation of multibillion-dollar high-speed rail project
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is calling on the federal government to cancel a proposed high-speed rail line between Toronto and Quebec City.www.ctvnews.ca
Blanchet doesn’t support it either.
GK .Dundas
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From what little I remember from my early childhood holidays I do remember the lakeshore route. Dad worked for CP from 45' till he retired in 81'.
It was beautiful compared to the current VIA Rail route. It's lovely if you've a thing for swamps and muskeg .
ArmyRick
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My own views are this.
These are HIGHER priority on a spending list (which we should really pare down much further as we can not afford what we are doing)
-Top up RCMP spending (including man power increases)
-Increase immigration boards to speed up asylum hearings and immigration claims
-Top up CBSA spending (including man power increases)
-Get defence spending up to 5%
-ONLY the necessary spending required to get pipelines and any other resource extraction rocking
-Additional essential health care funding to provinces
That is not a big list, but to my these are all far more important than a HSR line between TO to Montreal
Truth be told, we really need to lick our wounds and pay down our debts awhile first, or the "unseen" economic damage will persists and for real, our children and grandchildren will pay for it. Badly.
These are HIGHER priority on a spending list (which we should really pare down much further as we can not afford what we are doing)
-Top up RCMP spending (including man power increases)
-Increase immigration boards to speed up asylum hearings and immigration claims
-Top up CBSA spending (including man power increases)
-Get defence spending up to 5%
-ONLY the necessary spending required to get pipelines and any other resource extraction rocking
-Additional essential health care funding to provinces
That is not a big list, but to my these are all far more important than a HSR line between TO to Montreal
Truth be told, we really need to lick our wounds and pay down our debts awhile first, or the "unseen" economic damage will persists and for real, our children and grandchildren will pay for it. Badly.
It's more than that. It's transformative in ways people don't understand. Make Ottawa-Montreal 1 hr and that becomes commutable essentially making it one job market. Ditto for Peterborough-Toronto, Trois-Rivieres - Montréal and Trois-Rivieres - Quebec City. Indeed, the biggest beneficiaries are probably Peterborough and Trois-Rivieres. They are going to be become rich exurbs 5 mins after this thing launches. And those places growing will actually provide some housing relief in the big metros.
The other thing is how it changes economic interaction region wide. Flying is expensive. And cumbersome. You aren't going to go from Toronto to Ottawa or Montreal for a meeting and coming back in the same day most often. The security and drive to the airport is a hassle. With HSR? People will absolutely do that. Cause it's only 2 hrs from Toronto to Ottawa and 3 hrs from Toronto to Montreal. And you can work on the way. This means a single market for all kinds of things but notably professional services. Need some kind of highly specialized patent lawyer? No need to just look in Ottawa. Hire the best one from Toronto. In my last posting at ADM(Mat), we couldn't find a properly qualified aerodynamicist in Ottawa. We hired in Montreal and let him work remote. With something like this we could get him into the office occassionally.
The closest analog to Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal is Madrid-Zaragoza-Barcelona. Similar distance. Similar population. You know what Spain doesn't have? Our winters. Or our expensive airfares. And that line is still wildly successful. I expect when Alto is built, it will be just as successful here.
Physics says otherwise.
But also the only way to get faster and more frequent service is for passenger rail to get separated from freight. And if you're going to through the trouble if doing that, you might as well spend to do it properly and do the geometry and grade separation necessary.
Debatable. And can be debated different ways.
Take my pet peeve. Old Age Security. $80 billion this year. Going to $100 billion by 2030. Doesn't even start phasing out till $90k income. And fully phases out after $140k. So beer money for seniors with six figure incomes is okay. But 21st century infrastructure for a region with 60% of the country's population and 50% of the GDP is a reach? I'm tired of people pretending they care about how money is spent when shit like this is not even talked about.
And most of the country gets this. An opposition group commissioned a national survey. Boy were they disappointed with the results. Every part of the country, every part of the political spectrum and every age group supports this. Canadians are smarter than the average partisan.
Source: https://www.altno.ca/_files/ugd/f1a60d_f91a3f0ada144cb981f03a0da603e347.pdf
Halifax Tar
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A funny take considering how much they pushed for the Montreal-Quebec City portion in the past.
And to be clear, his motivation is not to cut the spending. He just wants it all spent in Quebec. What he doesn't like is that link to Ottawa and Toronto and what that would do to his sovereignist cause.
Oldgateboatdriver
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PrairieFella
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Nevermind the added benefit of stepping off the train downtown instead of some far flung sub/exurb that takes an extra hour off your time calculation too.
HSR is a slam dunk in the golden horseshoe - Montreal, probably really nice in the Edm - Cal corridor too. This is the actual productuve infrastructure people cry for, I dont get the opposition.
HSR is a slam dunk in the golden horseshoe - Montreal, probably really nice in the Edm - Cal corridor too. This is the actual productuve infrastructure people cry for, I dont get the opposition.
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You’re surprised that a Separatist doesn’t want a project that will bring people together within Canada to be built? A project that will bring down barriers between regions, that will create simplicity in travelling from say Montreal to Toronto?
When you travel between Paris and Bordeaux or London and Cardiff or London to Glasgow or Brussels to Munich, etc etc, you simply get to the train station in your home city and stand at the platform into the train arrives. Once there you either walk in the train and find an empty seat and sit down or if assigned seats, you find your seat and sit down. Train leaves, eventually someone comes and checks your ticket and walks away. Train keeps moving, finally your city, your destination comes and you walk off the train down the platform and up into the station. Voila, your done.
Is it that simple to drive from your home city to your destination city 4+hrs away? Is it that simple to get to the airport in your home city, go through security (which the train station has none), walk endless distances to your gate, wait like cattle at the gate to board, arrive in your city and walk endless distances to the baggage claim, find a taxi to your destination?
The travelling by train is easily the most stressful free and easiest experience of the 3 modes of travel.
It’s because of this that a Separatist wouldn’t want it built, it breaks down barriers, it doesn’t keep them up like air travel and car travel does.
PrairieFella
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Oh Im well aware of the convenience. Ive holidayed in Europe a half dozen times or so - Ive never once rented a car. The train is superior in every way for short to medium dostance travel.
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