# Subsidize Via Rail?



## FeXL (Jan 2, 2004)

Linky



> Even if Ottawa paid for all the upgrades to rolling stock, rail lines and terminals that Via desires, even if federal taxpayers assumed all of Via's debts, the public rail carrier would still lose money.


Thoughts?


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## Manatus (May 11, 2009)

I would love to love the train. I really, really would. However, it's just not practical. At these "subsidised" rates, it costs $120 for a one-way between Ottawa and Toronto - a 4 hour trip. Even with these gas prices that everyone complains about, it's far cheaper to drive if you have a car (not to mention more private). If you just want to relax and let someone else take you there, a plane ticket is about $100 each way now including fees, and much faster.

So what's the benefit of the train? You get to see the countryside, it's nostalgic, etc etc. Basically, it's being relegated to tourism, and people who don't have cars or an airport near them. Honestly I enjoyed my experience on VIA, but it's just not practical on a regular basis, at least not as it is right now.


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## EvanPitts (Mar 9, 2007)

Via is a failure - too expensive and far to inconvenient, with a bunch of overpaid empire builders looking to swipe more money from te Government, to pump into their obsolete system.

This country is a failure as well, as every excuse possible is brought forth to continue in the wasteful ways we engage in that only serve to profit the big oil interests. What we need is a real, high speed train that connects all major centers, starting with the Windsor-Quebec City Corridor. Not some cheap hokum built by Bombardier - but real technology, like the EuroStar or Japanese Bullet Train, which run at real high speeds, not a piddly 5MHP faster than a steam train used to in 1892. Once built, there would have to be a complete ban on air transit between Toronto and Montreal, so that people will actually use the train.

This kind of thing can't be done with Via Rail - they are too much about doing things the way it was done a century ago. We need a real system, like in Europe. But then again, these are only dreams, because even after over a quarter century of endless studies and piles of money wasted, we still can't get a regular train service between Hamilton and Toronto.


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## EvanPitts (Mar 9, 2007)

Manatus said:


> If you just want to relax and let someone else take you there, a plane ticket is about $100 each way now including fees, and much faster.


The trip itself, sure, but there are other costs. How about the $200 or so one will spend at Pearson for parking, and the Sherpas you will need to haul luggage the fifteen miles from the car to the terminal. Then the need to show up two hours ahead of time, during that time when one gets scalped for a bad cup of coffee, then lining up for half an hour while they figure out how to destroy or misroute your luggage, then sitting on a smelly plane that hasn't seen a cleaning crew in a decade. By that time, the plane takes off, and because it is some old piece of obsolete junk, the forced landing back at the airport to replace the faulty part (and replace a half dozen tires). Then one finally gets into the air for a 45 minute flight (but no peanuts anymore, because they are verboten). Landing at Montreal dumps one off at Dorval, er... Trudeau Airport, where one gets to wait a half hour to see if the luggage actually made it, then the trek out to the car rental, where they scalp you for that, or perhaps getting on a smelly bus for the trek into town.

At least going to Montreal - you get to go to Montreal. Going to Ottawa is far more depressing, stranded at a dump of an airport, and when you finally get there - it is less interesting than say, downtown Bathurst, New Brunswick...


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## MazterCBlazter (Sep 13, 2008)

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## Macified (Sep 18, 2003)

I too would love to love the train. Every time I consider taking the train though, even for tourist runs, I just shake my head at the inconvenience and price.

It's time for a complete overhaul. Don't dump money into this pig, kill it and start over with a system that works. Unfortunately I don't know what that system would look like.


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## Darien Red Sox (Oct 24, 2006)

Solution1: Do as Europe dose and place a hefty tax on gasoline, rail fairs would them be more attractive and perhaps we could go back to the days when passenger rail was a private industry in North America.

Solution2: Put in more tolls and make people driving pay for when they are using. As someone who takes the train most of the time and drives very little I don't see it fair that more of the taxes I pay are going to pay for the roads than the rails.


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## dona83 (Jun 26, 2005)

Maybe Amtrak should buy VIA.

When I went on a tour across Ontario, Quebec, and New York in 2006, I went Greyhound. VIA proved to be too inflexible schedule wise with no speed advantages vs. the Greyhound.


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## ertman (Jan 15, 2008)

Via Rail shouldn't do as bad as they do... as for subsidizing, no way.


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## chas_m (Dec 2, 2007)

Simple solution to the problem: high-speed rail between the cities, WIFI ON BOARD, extra tax on cars and/or petrol and/or roads to provide more incentive to use rail.

I think Via Rail does deserve some subsidies or tax breaks, but since I don't know what they're already getting, I couldn't say how much they should get.


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## MazterCBlazter (Sep 13, 2008)

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## EvanPitts (Mar 9, 2007)

^^^
They could just use the reactor at Bruce that has been shut down because of "lack of demand".

Of course, they could build a new reactor at Nanticoke, which would supply power to this neck of the woods, but that was taken off the table this week as well. Looks like we don't have a power shortage after all, once all industry and manufacturing is closed down, and a few million are left unemployed. Not to mention the sumemr we are having thanks to Global Warming. If it gets any colder, I'm digging out the winter clothes...


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## Dr.G. (Aug 4, 2001)

"I would love to love the train. I really, really would. However, it's just not practical." I'm with Manatus. Sadly, there are no longer any trains here on the Island of Newfoundland.


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## Macfury (Feb 3, 2006)

You coud quadruple the price of gas and the rail sytem would be a fiasco. We're too spread out with too few population centres. Don't even bother comparing it to Europe. AM-TRAK? Another colossal and blundering money loser.


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## SINC (Feb 16, 2001)

As much as I love to ride the train, the sad truth is that it is not a viable option for transportation in this country. As McFury notes, it is simply too vast.


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## ertman (Jan 15, 2008)

SINC said:


> As much as I love to ride the train, the sad truth is that it is not a viable option for transportation in this country. As McFury notes, it is simply too vast.


And yet alot of goods are transported via roads, less efficiently by trucks, but some how cheaper. The real usefulness of the rail lines would be between corridors such as montreal-ottawa-toronto, calgary-edmonton, etc... I think its more of an issue of being ran poorly in some areas, and running useless routes.

On a personal note, I would take a train to commute to school in ottawa, but there is no REAL rail system in this city or for those around it...


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## MazterCBlazter (Sep 13, 2008)

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## Manatus (May 11, 2009)

MazterCBlazter said:


> All this talk about not enough population to support a half decent train system is just a bunch of BS.
> 
> The population was much smaller years ago, and there was much more rail service both freight and passenger, and it was profitable.


I think part of it is that there are more reasonable alternatives now, so people aren't forced to take the train anymore. Flying is safer and much cheaper than it used to be, with multiple flights a day on several airlines between most cities in Canada. Similarly, driving is easier, cars (generally) are more reliable than they used to be, highways are wider, etc etc. In contrast, it looks like trains haven't changed at all in terms of the technology or level of service they provide. For example, VIA still employs people to walk up and down the carriages to check the little paper flags they stick above the seats to tell them when someone boarded the train, so they know whose tickets to check. Seriously, what century is this?


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## Macfury (Feb 3, 2006)

MazterCBlazter said:


> The population was much smaller years ago, and there was much more rail service both freight and passenger, and it was profitable.


Of course it was profitable. Nobody had much of a choice and it was expensive. Great formula for profit!


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## bsenka (Jan 27, 2009)

Considering how spread out our population is, it's shame that our rail system is not faster/cheaper/more efficient. The last trip to BC I took a couple years ago, I looked into taking the train. Plane was a lot cheaper and faster, so there was no choice to make for me. Pity too, because I was quite interested in the idea of seeing the country by train.


I really not sure if rail travel in this country ever could be what it should be. First, it would have to be VERY fast. Like, directly competing with air travel fast. I can't see that happening any time soon. Next, it would have to be cheap. Cheaper than air, cheaper than driving. Again, I can't see than happening either, but to get enough people riding passenger trains that they even have a rational reason to exist anymore, it would have to be pretty much the cheapest way to travel.

Thing is, even the New York Subway operates at a loss. They're looking at $1.2 billion in the hole this year, and are cutting back service. If that concentration of people in a tight geographic area can't make the numbers work, there's no way we can for nation-wide passenger rail.


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## ComputerIdiot (Jan 8, 2004)

I do love the train -- prices, lousy scheduling and all, and even though they've effectively killed off a weekend visit with my mom next Friday -- went to e-mail my brother to say I'd be there and found out, hahahaha, you fool, they're on strike ...

But I have to agree that in its present incarnation, VIA is just not that practical for much travelling. It's not unlike the bus system in the city in which I live: not many buses on the road, thus long waits, plus bare-bones routes, but not many people use it so the money/usage isn't there to justify more buses or expanded routes, but unless you do that people have no incentive to take it ... etc., etc., etc. It's a vicious circle. (I seem to remember VIA having lots more stops/routes but there was a _huge_ amount of pruning done under Trudeau.)

I like the idea of the high-speed trains but don't hold your breath on that one. No politician is going to seriously push the idea of spending the amount of money that would take.


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## chas_m (Dec 2, 2007)

SINC (and others): this is exactly why Canada would be the PERFECT place to put high-speed rail. There are a lot of us out here (particularly in the western part of the country) who would LOVE to see more of this beautiful land and her great cities, but at present there is simply NO practical affordable way to do this.

A good western example would be a HS rail from Vancouver to Calgary -- a 14-hour drive that could be done in as little as four hours using a 300km/hour train. Imagine getting from Toronto to Montreal in 90 minutes. It might even be possible to go from Vancouver to Ottawa in 12-15 hours!

If you ask me, Canada's missing a huge business and tourism opportunity by not linking more of their cities by HS rail. It has worked very well for linking a number of equally-spread-out European cities, and they had to deal with many more layers of government and bureaucracy than we have.

More info: http://highspeedrail.ca/

It's a pity the current plans are mostly for US/Canadian HS rail, though I can certainly see the value. I would be a regular customer of a Vancouver/Seattle HS rail.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

At $16 million a mile we don't have the density.

Same reason it works in Europe and not in Australia.

China and India could certainly entertain it.....Canada and to a less degree most of the physical space of the US ...fugedaboudit.

Electrify the vehicles. Without high density high speed passenger is a joke.

Only Japan's small foot print, high population and linear geography allows it to prosper there.


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## Trevor... (Feb 21, 2003)

chas_m said:


> A good western example would be a HS rail from Vancouver to Calgary -- a 14-hour drive that could be done in as little as four hours using a 300km/hour train.


Kettle Valley, Kicking Horse Pass and Rogers Pass at 300km/h?

Sounds like a four hour roller coaster,


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## FeXL (Jan 2, 2004)

Funny, that's exactly the same thing I first thought. I'd be blowing lunch all over the place. Thanks, but no thanks...


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## eMacMan (Nov 27, 2006)

Trevor... said:


> Kettle Valley, Kicking Horse Pass and Rogers Pass at 300km/h?
> 
> Sounds like a four hour roller coaster,



Makes as much sense as running the Grand Canyon in a jet boat. You *might *be able to do it but it would pretty much defeat the purpose.


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## EvanPitts (Mar 9, 2007)

SINC said:


> As much as I love to ride the train, the sad truth is that it is not a viable option for transportation in this country. As McFury notes, it is simply too vast.


However, most people in this country live in specific corridors that are poorly serviced by rail. Something like 12,000 people take the train everyday already in the Windsor-Quebec City corridor (on VIA Rail), and that does not include the tens of thousands that commute on GO Transit. If we had a proper, high speed rail service in that corridor, and ban airplane service between those points, we could have at least 50,000 people every day commuting by rail, perhaps more, in the most populous region of Canada. If it remains the slow speed style of rail service, it wouldn't be feasible, but with a high speed bullet train, travel from Toronto to Montreal by rail would be faster and more convenient by all means, with perhaps the exception of flying out of the Toronto Island Airport, which wouldn't be much faster in the end.

Amtrak is a big cash loser because they cling to obsolete technologies, and their "high speed" service is pathetic. There is only one way to go with high speed, and that is with the real high speed, meaning something like EuroStar, Shinkanzen, or TGV. It would be a hard political sell since sich technology is entirely foreign and would need to be imported, and the cash lobby represented by Budd and Bombardier would surely derail any attempt at modernizing and rationalizing our system.


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## EvanPitts (Mar 9, 2007)

MacDoc said:


> At $16 million a mile we don't have the density.


However, we do have such density in the GTA.

Why do people go on about how such rail service would have to be "profitable". Air Canada has certainly shown that they are not profitable, with infinite numbers of bailouts, and all kinds of subsidies, coupled with monstrosities like Pearson that serve to massively clog roads in Toronto because there is no rail or public transit link with the city itself.

Then we can add in the massive damaged caused by having half filled jets spewing pollution directly into sensitve parts of the atmosphere, or the fact that Air Canada doesn't service many important and populous areas of Canada - large cities like Hamilton or London which, given the population, would have air services in pretty much every other country.

Density is such a bogus excuse - because the Russians are now looking at building a Trans-Siberian High Speed railway using Korean technology. Most progressive minded places are going high-speed, like the well known EuroStar service in Europe, the Shinkanzen in Japan, the new Korean rail service that is even faster than the TGV, or the expanding network in China. Instead, we sit back and continue to cram millions of cars and trucks onto our limited road network, and herd people onto the obsolete and unsafe airplanes that Air Canada operates - because we have this death wish to be retrograde.

No one is saying that we need to build some crazy high speed system through the Rockies - but what we really need is to have some decent service in the Windsor-Quebec City corridor, since that is the route that has the highest densities, most population, and a proven number of travellers that would entirely use a high speed train because it would be faster and more comfortable.

Sure, I can jump in the car and get to Montreal in 6 hours - blowing out much of a day in the process. It would be pretty cool if one could take the same trip on a high speed train, enjoy a nice meal on the way, and spend time using WiFi or whatever. But then again, I'd be pretty happy if they just ran a GO Train into Hamilton, rather than having to drive half the way to Toronto to catch one.

The cost per mile thing is silly, because really, how much does a highway like the 401 across the top of Toronto cost, not only in putting down pavement, but in the massive economic losses sustained because of endless gridlock and the severe damage to the environment by having a half million cars idling because some dufus wipes out their car across the highway?



> Only Japan's small foot print, high population and linear geography allows it to prosper there.


Rail propers elsewhere, and in fact, the RENEF High Speed link between Madrid and Barcelona clobbers the air service there, simply because of convenience, speed and reliability. Other routes are also profitable, British Rail operates a high speed service between Scotland and London (from both Glasgow on the old western route, and Edinburgh on the old LNER route), not to mention that my cousin in London regularly takes the high speed over to Cardiff to go to football matches.

Japan doesn't have a "small footprint", Japan is longer end to end than Canada is coast to coast. Not only that, Japan has a difficult topology, coupled with the difficulty that with the exception of the standard gauge Shinkanzen, their rail network is narrow gauge, so there is no interchanging of rail vehicles. It "makes money" because the government funds it as a way of moving people around, as the topology makes highway construction expensive.

The only reason we haven't started is that our Government is controlled by special interests, like big oil and the automakers, as well as all of the payola that goes on with Air Canada.


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## Manatus (May 11, 2009)

EvanPitts said:


> Rail propers elsewhere, and in fact, the RENEF High Speed link between Madrid and Barcelona clobbers the air service there, simply because of convenience, speed and reliability. Other routes are also profitable, British Rail operates a high speed service between Scotland and London (from both Glasgow on the old western route, and Edinburgh on the old LNER route), not to mention that my cousin in London regularly takes the high speed over to Cardiff to go to football matches.


I think one of the barriers to this in Canada is political. The examples above are very successful I agree, and a lot of that success comes from those countries realising that certain routes are far more popular than others, and giving them the technology. Imagine if Sth Ont-Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal-Quebec City was made high speed, which probably makes the most sense given the populations involved. All of the other provinces would have something to say about it, I'm sure, and there would be tons of arguments that "if one gets it, all have to get it!", especially with the amount of government funding involved. Everyone talks about how rail built Canada and joins us all together, but we have to get past that if we're going to improve rail, at least when it comes to assigning new technologies.


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## krs (Mar 18, 2005)

People seem to have a strange notion how much it costs to run a car.
The gas you pay for on a trip only covers a third to a quarter of the total cost of a trip, but people forget about car maintenance, repair, insurance financing etc.
Via has had a $59 and now $69 fare between Toronto and Montreal for a long time - there is no way you can run a car for that amount of money between these two cities. 
There is actually even a $32.50 fare if you're flexible as far as the specific train is concerned.

As to high speed train travel - for the corridor I think it makes more sense to build a monorail. For one the MagLev technology will allow higher speeds that "wheel-on-rail" will ever allow; a high speed conventional rail service would require completely new facilities anyway and I'm not sure how one could ensure safety running trains at 300 or 400 kms through populated areas at ground level. The monorail would be elevated eliminating that issue.

As to subsidizing public transportation - absolutely!
Long distance bus service is subsidized with tax dollars, so is the freight service by truck.
They all use the public highways that my tax dollars paid for.

Even today, I prefer travelling by train between Toronto and Montreal. It's faster, cheaper and more convenient than by car - not as flexible however, and it's a lot faster and more comfortable than by bus.
And if Via brought back the 4-hour trip from Toronto to Montreal, they could even compete with air travel between the two cities.


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## Manatus (May 11, 2009)

krs said:


> People seem to have a strange notion how much it costs to run a car.
> The gas you pay for on a trip only covers a third to a quarter of the total cost of a trip, but people forget about car maintenance, repair, insurance financing etc.


But that's assuming you don't already have a car. Maintenance/repair (assuming you don't hit anything on your trip!) and insurance don't cost any more whether you drive for 5 hours or just drive to work, if it's just a one-off trip. You pay for those things whether you're actually using the car or not. Yes, cars are expensive, but if you have one then the costs are sunk - you can't get them back by choosing to leave the car at home in order to take the train.


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## krs (Mar 18, 2005)

Pretty much all the maintenance and repair costs are mileage related, even the insurance to a degree and the financing.

People always only look at the cost of gas, nothing else.

Tires, tune-ops, oil changes even replacing the timing belt is directly related to mileage; insurance and financing more indirectly, but if your annual driving is less, your insurance rate is less (less risk of an accident I suppose) and if you drive less then your car will last you longer and you don't need a new one that often which in turn reduces your financing cost.

It all gets a bit complicated, all I'm saying is that the cost of gas is only a small portion of the annual cost to run a car and many people don't seem to recognize that.

Now calculating the true incremental cost gets tricky and varies for each individual situation.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

150 million people, a narrow landmass and 1350 miles including side branches









_These Shinkansen represent a distance of 2,175km (1,350 miles), with new lines and extensions in hand. Other routes similar to Shinkansen operation are Morika-Akita, Fukushima-Shinjo, Hakata-Minami and Gala-Yuzawa. 
_

When Ontario and Quebec get to 100 million people THEN it might make some sense 

•••

GTA needs light rail network that the idjits in Ottawa are holding up.










TTC Transit City

That's hardly a Via issue.

•••

Air taxis made of composites with 10 per capacity are emerging with very high fuel efficiencies and 










The cost of one mile of high speed track will buy 4 of the above with change left over...

Airport Journals

Point to point commuter jets will grow like crazy especially once the FAA gets off its ass and allows use of the smaller airports and automated traffic control.

Right now average landspeed for airflights in the US is 81 mph - you can almost drive as fast 



> Air taxi riding high in tumultuous economy
> Atlanta Business Chronicle - by Giannina Smith Staff writer
> 
> Despite a drop in air travel stemming from the weakened economy, Atlanta-based ImagineAir is seeing a boom in business.
> ...


Flexibility is the key over trains - for high speed trains you need European density...period.
Even for regular passenger trains a decent level of density is required....

We do have some corridors appropriate for the latter at this point but it becomes increasingly a challenge with the composite air taxis in the picture.


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## chas_m (Dec 2, 2007)

The only flaw in your argument, MacDoc, is that you're forgetting the tourist population.

If the population of Canada were just the 32M or so who permanently live here, you'd have an outstanding point; but if you included both the current tourism populations AND the natives, I think we've got (or could reach if we had HS rail) the numbers.

A quick example: the total population of our provice (BC) is 4.4M, but even in a VERY off year for tourism, we got an additional 8M in tourists, and I'm sure Quebec, Montreal, Ontario and Toronto did better than we did on those fronts. If all the provinces could say they got 2x their population in tourists, that 32M becomes 96M, and if tourists had an easy way to get to the major cities, they might well stay longer and attract larger numbers.

Even just a line that connected Montreal - Toronto - Ontario would have tremendous economic benefits for tourism and business, particularly if talk of some US/Canada HS rail lines (like NYC-Buffalo-Toronto or Vancouver-Seattle-Portland) came to pass as well.

I'm not suggesting we can just do this tomorrow, but Canada's unique layout of its major cities makes it a tempting candidate for investments in some HR rail lines that could then grow out if demand warranted.

But I should add that I'm not just stuck on trains, I like your lightweight, inexpensive air taxis idea as well!

PS. Do you have a source for this statement:


> Right now average landspeed for airflights in the US is 81 mph - you can almost drive as fast


I ask because as a frequent air traveller that is in pretty direct contradiction to the timings and stated speeds of the commercial aircraft I'm on ... for example, even including wait times for homeland security, taxing, and so forth, I can get from Seattle to Orlando in about 10 hours door-to-door. Driving for 10 hours would most definitely NOT get me anywhere NEAR that far ...


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

It was a NASA study for - this guy refers to it - have to chase it. If you search on SATS 
Small Aircraft Transportation System

You'll get a ton of info.



> a NASA study had determined that driving in a car is just as fast as flying commercially for distances of less than 500 miles.


The Warfields.com

••

Don't confuse the need for light rail with high speed rail.

Light rail serves tourists very well..and there are many rail facilities geared around tourists already.

Different issue.


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## chas_m (Dec 2, 2007)

MacDoc said:


> Don't confuse the need for light rail with high speed rail.
> 
> Light rail serves tourists very well..and there are many rail facilities geared around tourists already.
> 
> Different issue.


Yes, agree, though I'm a fan of light rail as well. But having lived or spent significant time in Chicago, Boston and NYC, where the subway/rail systems serve the locals and business/commuters far more than tourists), light rail to me is much more of an intra-city solution, not inter-city. The current system, VIA Rail, is too slow and expensive to work as it should, but HS rail on some select routes (at first, with longer routes later if needed) could be highly beneficial for both tourism and business, and could largely be paid for with tourism money and private investment rather than tax increases.


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## SINC (Feb 16, 2001)

chas_m said:


> I ask because as a frequent air traveller that is in pretty direct contradiction to the timings and stated speeds of the commercial aircraft I'm on ... for example, even including wait times for homeland security, taxing, and so forth, I can get from Seattle to Orlando in about 10 hours door-to-door. Driving for 10 hours would most definitely NOT get me anywhere NEAR that far ...


chas_m, consider this:

I want to go to Calgary for the day, some 300 km from my home. I book a flight on WestJet leaving Edmonton International at 8:00 a.m. arriving at Calgary International at 8:45 a.m.

A 45 minute flight versus a three hour drive. Or is it?

To catch that flight, I have to leave my home at 6:30 a.m. since it is a 45 minute drive through city traffic to the airport. Add a half hour extra to park and walk to the park and ride to catch the shuttle to the terminal to arrive one hour before flight time as suggested on my ticket.

I arrive in Calgary on time and rent a car, so I get out of the airport at 9:15 and drive into downtown Calgary some 30 minutes away so make my arrival time 9:45.

Had I left my home and drove to Calgary, I would have arrived in the city centre at 9:30, 15 minutes ahead of the plane arrival time with far less hassle and spent only about $25 on gas for the one way trip, $50 return versus well over $250 for flight, parking, car rental, etc. I would have arrived 15 minutes ahead of the plane on the way home too, for a total time saving of half an hour.

In all the years I travelled to Calgary, I only flew a handful of times. I always drove.

If you do the math on the time from my home to downtown Calgary via the plane, the ground speed equivelent is about 61 mph. (I run 70 mph on the freeway on the way down.)

That to me, more than validates MacDoc's numbers as longer haul flights would up the average. People tend to forget about the total time they spend waiting and parking, etc. in airports.


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## eMacMan (Nov 27, 2006)

I keep careful track of all costs and find that tripling the cost of gas will give a fairly accurate total cost of operation. Everyone needs to do their own calculations as insurance and depreciation are fairly static remaining almost the same no matter how few or many miles are driven. Repairs vary wildly and are impacted strongly by both age and miles driven.

In Sincs case he is still saving ~$100.


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## krs (Mar 18, 2005)

I was checking what sinc's options would have been by train - just the travel time and the fare; schedule is another issue.

Well, it seems there is no train option at all.
No train between Edmonton and Calgary? Is that right? I can hardly believe that.

Seems to me this would be a prime candidate for a MagLev connection - 300kms in less than an hour.


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## Macfury (Feb 3, 2006)

If we had VIA operating HSR right now--the tourists would be sunk.


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## SINC (Feb 16, 2001)

krs said:


> I was checking what sinc's options would have been by train - just the travel time and the fare; schedule is another issue.
> 
> Well, it seems there is no train option at all.
> No train between Edmonton and Calgary? Is that right? I can hardly believe that.
> ...


Nope, no passenger train between Edmonton and Calgary. That is unless you ride from here to Kamloops, then back to Calgary or here to Regina, then back to Calgary. A high speed connection is currently under consideration between the two cities, albeit like it has been many, many times before.


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## chas_m (Dec 2, 2007)

SINC: Yeah, I see what you mean. I included wait time and such in my "10 hours" to Orlando (it actually only takes seven-and-change of actual flying time), but on shorter hops I see where the average could drop considerably.

I think krs is right though: it's pretty shocking that Alberta doesn't have a fast train between it's two biggest cities!


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## SINC (Feb 16, 2001)

chas_m said:


> SINC: Yeah, I see what you mean. I included wait time and such in my "10 hours" to Orlando (it actually only takes seven-and-change of actual flying time), but on shorter hops I see where the average could drop considerably.
> 
> I think krs is right though: it's pretty shocking that Alberta doesn't have a fast train between it's two biggest cities!


Even more shocking that passenger train service does not exist, don't you think? Mind you neither does BC have train service between its capitol and largest city!


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## chas_m (Dec 2, 2007)

SINC said:


> Even more shocking that passenger train service does not exist, don't you think? Mind you neither does BC have train service between its capitol and largest city!


Well, at least we have a good excuse ... which reminds me, why can't someone invent a submersible train?


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## Ottawaman (Jan 16, 2005)

Via Rail strike ends


Binding arbitration after 2 1/2 years without a contract.


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## krs (Mar 18, 2005)

Ottawaman said:


> Binding arbitration after 2 1/2 years without a contract.


Are you making a point here?


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## Ottawaman (Jan 16, 2005)

Via didn't improve its image.


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## krs (Mar 18, 2005)

I didn't know Via had an image.

I'm happy with Via right now.
Trains that used to be consistently late are on time now. Late trains, which used to be the norm, are now the exception.
Staff is friendly, price especially when you get the 50% and more discounts, is reasonable.
I can use the travel time productively not having to sit behind the wheel.
For longer trips, mine are usually three hours, the train is much more comfortable than the bus and even the car. Not that the car seats aren't comfortable - I drive an Audi - but not being able to move around can drive me bonkers.

Downside on Via is the food they serve in coach. The sandwiches are discusting and the coffe is often cold.
I now bring my own sandwich and buy a beer to get around the 'coffee' problem.
Some of the cars seem to have lost their round wheels - in others the ride is OK.
And Via could speed up their service - travel time is still less than by car but I think with the current track and maybe some better equipment, they could easily shave 30 minutes off a 3 hour trip.

Haven't used their WiFi option yet, but that is certainly a nice touch.


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## WestWeb (Jul 11, 2009)

*Someday, Maybe...*

I speculate what would happen if VIA rail ever came to face direct competition(in the form of another competitive rail company) in their target market? I wonder, would they both crash and burn or would we see heightened levels of service due to the competition? 
Not that that would ever happen of course...

Well... maybe Someday we will see these maglev trains come to Canada. It's most likely going to be a LONG time before the, rather prohibitive, start up costs are low enough for us to ever consider such a solution though.


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## MacGYVER (Apr 15, 2005)

I say forget Via Rail all together. They are like Microsoft of the rail industry that hasn't innovated in many years. They are truly holding back any "real" railway action in Canada, and most importantly in the most populated areas. 

I always go back to how the Japanese think "If we can build it, no matter what the cost issue, then lets do it." They have done this with many hard engineering difficulties, and by spending millions and millions on projects that have not been repeated elsewhere. Truly amazing things have happened with the attitude of just doing it.

WestWeb: Direct Competition? The first person, or company to come along and put in and pay for a highspeed rail access in major populated areas in Canada will put Via Rail out of business, in those areas. 

krs: Via Rail fast? Great mode of transportation? Really? Why does Via Rail take longer then a Greyhound Bus from Kitchener to Toronto? and have extremely limited and I mean limited times of travel through out the day? Via Rail takes 2 hours by train to travel from Kitchener to Toronto. Greyhound Bus takes 1hour and 25 minutes or less at times, up to 2 hours depending on traffic. Imagine that, a bus can beat a train to a destination? What is wrong with that picture? Tell that to the Europeans and we would be looked at as a 3rd world country in the rail business. Heck even the SkyTrain in Vancouver moves and runs faster then the railway link via Via Rail between Kitchener and Toronto. That's pretty embarrassing. Even the express train with Via Rail still takes 1.5 hours to travel from Kitchener to Toronto. WOW!! I can drive faster then that on the 401 and still beat the train to Toronto, and at half the cost of the ticket. 

On the other hand, get me a fast bullet train, that gets me to Toronto in under 25 minutes, then I will pay whatever the ticket costs, as time is money these days. I would rather enjoy life a little more, then waste half a day sitting in traffic or on public transit that stops everywhere or moves at snail pace on a set of tracks.


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## krs (Mar 18, 2005)

MacGyver -
Where did I say Via rail was fast?
Under "downside" I actually mention that Via could speed up their service.
But even right now, on the stretch east of Toronto to Montreal, if you don't take the milk run the elapsed time is faster than by car and a lot faster than by bus.
Right now the schedule is set up so that the train arrives 5-7 minutes early at each station and then sits there waiting for the departure time. Cutting those 5 minutes chunks out at each stop would reduce the travel time by 20 minutes automatically.
Via used to have one express train a day between Toronto and Montreal - no stops other than Dorval and downtown to downtown in 3 hrs 59 minutes. That beat driving by a long shot.
Now that train takes 4 hrs 47 minutes, still beats driving but not by that much; bus takes over 6 hrs 30 minutes depending on the time of day.

Kitchener - Toronto must really be a milk run


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## chas_m (Dec 2, 2007)

WestWeb said:


> I speculate what would happen if VIA rail ever came to face direct competition(in the form of another competitive rail company) in their target market? I wonder, would they both crash and burn or would we see heightened levels of service due to the competition?
> Not that that would ever happen of course...


Well of course it would never happen, because it never HAS happened. It's difficult enough for a company to negotiate the land rights and use clearance for ONE set of tracks, there's never been two passenger rail companies competing in either the US or Canada that I know of.

Railroads are one of the few things where competition is pretty impractical, particularly if the government wasn't the one to build the infrastructure.


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## krs (Mar 18, 2005)

chas_m said:


> ...........there's never been two passenger rail companies competing in either the US or Canada that I know of.


Depends how one defines "competition"

Can one not consider the Rocky Mountaineer competition to Via Rail on the stretch between Calgary and Vancouver.

And Via rents the track rights from Canadian National; it would theoretically be possible for another company to do the same and run a competitive rail service - not that this is likely to happen.


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## Amiga2000HD (Jan 23, 2007)

krs said:


> Depends how one defines "competition"
> 
> Can one not consider the Rocky Mountaineer competition to Via Rail on the stretch between Calgary and Vancouver.
> 
> And Via rents the track rights from Canadian National; it would theoretically be possible for another company to do the same and run a competitive rail service - not that this is likely to happen.


Even if it did happen, the new competing passenger service would still run up against the same limitations to speed imposed by CN's infrastructure.

A lot of people don't understand that mainline freight railways are slow operations. This has serious implications for how fast you can run passenger trains on the same infrastructure - especially when you're sharing it with freight trains.


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## SINC (Feb 16, 2001)

Exactly. A high speed train would tear the rails right out of the ties when cornering on current track technology.


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## EvanPitts (Mar 9, 2007)

chas_m said:


> Well of course it would never happen, because it never HAS happened. It's difficult enough for a company to negotiate the land rights and use clearance for ONE set of tracks, there's never been two passenger rail companies competing in either the US or Canada that I know of.


Canada had three for a while: Canadian Pacific, Grand Trunk, and Canadian Northern. The Grand Trunk and Canadian Northern were rolled into Canadian National Railways. CP and CN offered passenger services cross country until they spun off their passenger services in the mid-70's, of which the Government took and formed Via Rail as a Crown Corporation.

In the US, most major railways were also passenger operators, with large networks. Notable was the Santa Fe, Illinois Central, Union Pacific, Pennsylvania, B&O, New York Central and others. When the railways began to spin off their passenger services, they were amalgamated under the AmTrak banner by Congress.



> Railroads are one of the few things where competition is pretty impractical, particularly if the government wasn't the one to build the infrastructure.


There was lots of competition in the United States, with many major operators. The main problem is that railroads are capital intensive to set up and to maintain, while the return on investment is low. However, railroads create other benefits that do not show up as "profits", through efficient movement of bulk items that open up vast lands for farming, mining and other ventures, as well as the settlement that follows. This is not only true "out West", but also in Ontario, which was pretty much opened up because of rail transport because it brought about the ease of transportation of people and goods in an manner more affordable than hiring a pack of natives to canoe everything in from Montreal.


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## krs (Mar 18, 2005)

Amiga2000HD said:


> A lot of people don't understand that mainline freight railways are slow operations. This has serious implications for how fast you can run passenger trains on the same infrastructure - especially when you're sharing it with freight trains.


Via Rail has that problem today and they are managing pretty well switching back and forth from track to track to get around freight trains in both directions.

You couldn't of course run 300km trains on the current infrastructure - there are a lot more issues than just the freights and the track work, but a competitor could for instance deploy tilting trains like the Pendolino that can use existing tracks at much higher speed and more comfort.
Make the Toronto - Montreal run in say 3 hours - that would compete time wise with air travel.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

Sure - let's double up infrastructure so TWO companies can't survive. 

THERE IS NOT ENOUGH DENSITY FOR HIGH SPEED IN CANADA

What don't you understand about $16 million per MILE - that's before the cost of the trains....

There is really not enough density for passenger at all beyond touristy scenic stuff outside of LRT which is only urban.

Planes can compete as there is lot's of sky - and decent landing facilities....

there is one railbed and it is needed for freight.


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## WestWeb (Jul 11, 2009)

*Hmmm...*

Well it sure seems like VIA rail is only there because it "always has been, always will be..." kind of thing: not because it offers an exceptional solution to the problem that it's supposed to be solving... It sounds like we need some imaginative, out of the box thinking to replace this clearly obsolete system we're using here. Let's at least see what kind of ideas we can come up with here people!

Off the top of my head... What about starting a new trucking business/industry devoted to transporting passengers and competing with buses mainly. Semi trailers could be re-designed with windows, seating: and of course all of the necessary safety and luxury accommodations for human cargo. New licensing and insurance policies would need to be made available for truck driver's of course: but, think of all the out of work, owner/operator's in Canada and the rest of North America right now that are desperate to pick up high paying work to pay for their expensive rigs. Hehehe just think... you could hang out and wait in the same container while waiting for a layover instead of switching planes at an airport or buses at a bus stop; they could even park you somewhere with a nice view while you wait for another truck to pick up your container

Well hopefully someone has a better idea to contribute than that, but I still like the idea of having a nice view for a layover :lmao:


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## Max (Sep 26, 2002)

High speed trains by their nature cannot share railbeds with freight trains. It's a whole other beastie.

Parts of Canada can indeed implement and support Hi-speed rail. The Quebec City-Windsor corridor could. Certainly Hamilton on through to Montreal. But we are no longer in the age of big visions for transport. Once upon a time we built a national railroad but that was so long ago it has passed out of public memory. No politician wants to commit to a project as massive as this. Even credible private consortia would expect a significant degree of public money to design and build the requisite infrastructure. So we will continue to have this bad compromise of passenger trains and ancient rolling stock competing for space and scheduling on tracks owned by other companies who are ill-inclined (naturally) to give passenger trains a higher priority ranking.

If population growth continues to trend upwards in western cities then the hi-speed rail link Sinc speaks of may yet come to fruition. To do so it must first vault over a substantial reluctance to embrace public transit - it's just not part of the culture. Perhaps even more so in the west than in central Canada.

We only have a select few areas of the country where the current and projected urban population densities make hi-speed a possibility. The notion of building a line that stretched from the Pacific to the Atlantic is so gargantuan, so obscenely expensive, it will likely never be seriously considered. There are probably scores of other national infrastructure projects the Canadian public would greater benefit from. But that said, certain parts of the country could pull it off. That is, provided the public and political will were great enough.

I think we're far more inclined to keep things as they are and hope that alternate fuels will let us operate our cars in a manner which soothes our consciences while enabling us the greatest flexibility in terms of scheduling our trips across our respective provinces and across the nation itself.


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## krs (Mar 18, 2005)

Anybody remember the Turbo?
It ran just over 100 mph and made the Toronto to Montreal, downtown to downtown trip in lust under four hours.
That was 30 years ago.

You'd think today we would have technology that can shave that travel time to three hours on the existing track and with the freights. It's not black and white - existing passenger train or 400 kph high speed which you couldn't run on the existing track anyway - freight or no freight.
What you need is something that competes with air travel time and cost wise but is more relaxing, more comfortable and more reliable. The railways have a definite advantage there especially during the Canadian winter.


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## EvanPitts (Mar 9, 2007)

MacDoc said:


> THERE IS NOT ENOUGH DENSITY FOR HIGH SPEED IN CANADA


So what you are saying is that there isn't six million people living in the GTA - and that it is more cost effective to fly people between Kitchener and downtown Toronto than to have a train? Density is BS - the Chinese have a High Speed Rail service from China to Lhasa, Tibet - and there is no "density" in Tibet, just endless chains of mountains and gorges.



> What don't you understand about $16 million per MILE - that's before the cost of the trains....


Put it this way, the 407 ETR cost taxpayers $1.6 Billion for the construction of 100km of road - punching that into a calculator reveals that in 1997 dollars, a highway costs $23.7 million per mile. That is before the cost of acquiring land, which is estimated to be in the neighbourhood of $104 Billion, adjusted for inflation, which is about $160 Million per mile. 

So your point only goes to show that High Speed Rail is more economical when it comes to construction costs. Airplanes also carry great costs, so one needs to factor in the entire cost of the infrastructure of operating giant airports, maintaining large fleets of aircraft, and the time wasted by having three or four hundred people waiting around for hours for pre-screening, screening, boarding, then waiting while the patch the jet up.

Put into costs, $4.4 Billion has been poured into "redeveloping" Pearson, plus all of the ongoing costs, etc. It is estimated that a rail link from Pearson to downtown will cost a further $500 Million - and that is not even counting "redeveloping" anything at the Montreal end of things.

We can talk about fuel consumption. 12,000 people would pile into say, 4,000 cars getting 25 MPG for the trip to Montreal. That would use up 48,000 gallons of fuel. To transport the same number by aircraft, 12,000 would pile into say, 40 airplanes. That would use up, at the average of 49 passenger miles per gallon, 176,400 gallons of fuel. With High Speed Rail, running electrically off of nuclear power, 0 gallons of fuel are used - while running a typical diesel-electric unit that gets 1 MPG, with 12,000 passengers piled into say, 30 trains, that amounts to 9,000 gallons of fuel. On fuel - rail is champion, while airplanes are the worst off.

So as far as "costs" go, rail wins. And with High Speed Rail, rail also wins on elapsed time as well as convenience at either end, with stops right in the downtown that do not require hour long commutes from distant, outlying airports.



> What's to understand, it is comparable to the construction of a highway. The 407


One could built a nickel-plated railroad that is quite swank, with entirely subsidized ticket prices - for the cost of the 407. Highways are slow in comparison to High Speed Rail, and waste land, the drive wastes people's time, detracts from comfort, and produces smog in huge quantities. Airplanes may get there faster, but getting to the airplane is definitely slower, and the jets inject smog directly into the sensitive parts of the atmosphere.

High Speed Rail would take advantage of existing land holdings, without need to buy massive swaths of land allowances that highways need. The cost per mile is less than a highway, as shown, and the cost of maintenance is also less in the long term.

High Speed Rail entirely runs off of clean electricity produced at our nuclear plants, or by hydroelectric generation. It is convenient, downtown to downtown. Besides, the route already serves 12,000 passengers per day - while the high speeds and short travel times of HSR would pound many more passengers into taking the train.

Modern, advanced, progressive minded countries have already developed extensive networks of convenient high speed trains - and not just in the high density areas of Japan, but all over the place. With the amount of people that are on the move every day in the Windsor-Quebec City corridor, the only thing going against High Speed Rail is the dull minds of the Canadian naysayer.



> Planes can compete as there is lot's of sky - and decent landing facilities.


No one is saying that we delete all planes - just that in the most congested corridor, High Speed Rail has the potential to be an entire success. Decent landing facilities are absent in this country - Pearson is a disaster and a mess, with spaghetti junction on top of spaghetti junction, where you are robbed of more money for parking than you would be robbed by a gunman at the ATM, and that our aging fleet of aircraft is not only based on obsolete 747s, but our airlines can not compete and regularly put their hat out for bailouts.

We can not continue to burn all of the fossil fuels doing things that are stupid, of supporting modes of transportation that are obsolete and do not fit the bill. High Speed Rail, done properly, like the TGV or EuroStar, entirely makes sense, and would serve to reduce the congestion on the 401, and offer Canadians a chance to visit other places in their own nation, with safety and convenience and timeliness. Airplanes are not convenient and are not timely - especially when they are overhauled in speed by advanced forms of rail service that are currently used elsewhere.



> there is one railbed and it is needed for freight.


That is just nuts - there are at least three main lines driven across much of the country, with lots of branch lines in service. No one is going to purloin freight services for HST. HST needs it's own rails in order to operate at high speeds. Freight in this country is a joke, the railroads are so slow at moving stuff that most companies went to trucks decades ago, and haven't looked back.


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## EvanPitts (Mar 9, 2007)

WestWeb said:


> What about starting a new trucking business/industry devoted to transporting passengers and competing with buses mainly. Semi trailers could be re-designed with windows, seating: and of course all of the necessary safety and luxury accommodations for human cargo.


First, wouldn't that just be an articulated bus? Second, the immigrant smugglers already do that, though without luxuries like windows, seats, a bathroom, safety or ventilation.

Putting trucks on the highway doesn't solve the problem of getting there fast, especially after McGuilty adds the 105 km/h speed limiters to all trucks this fall...


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## MazterCBlazter (Sep 13, 2008)

.


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## EvanPitts (Mar 9, 2007)

MazterCBlazter said:


> Is Canada going forwards and progressing, or backwards and regressing?


It has lapsed into a stasis where even the most simple problems are bungled beyond belief. The people of this country have lost out because hope lost during the interminable years of hope and anger. We have become a fractured people with no vision of a future, and no capability of finding leadership within ourselves. It is more about greed, shoving other people aside in order to score a few stale peanuts that are left.

Canadians are disillusioned. They can no longer see those things that are bitter ironies in our nation. They cling to the outmoded, the obsolete, and the liars that promise deliverance to a land of milk and honey. They close their eyes to the robbery that goes on before us, and that ignorance has grown so bad that the whole impulse of anger is easily politicized.

For instance, VIA engineers went on strike because they had not had a contract in over two years, a situation that was resolved by not coming up with a contract. This resulted in endless "union bashing", the kinds of stuff that go on every time workers are ripped off in this country. Complacency had become the faith of this land. Instead of realizing that the politicians like Mayor Miller have ripped the people off, not just because they didn't settle with the union, but because they rogered the people by voting themselves huge pay hikes, and choose not to give the same consideration to the people that do the work.

Other forms of complacency has stepped in. In the last election, the people of Ontario voted to return a despicable government to power, a government that broke over 200 election promises, ripped off the people, and stomped on the land rights of Natives, land that is clearly Native land by treaty, land that was sold for graft money and payola by a Government that had no right to issue title deeds for land they did not own. Really, no one cares about it. People are all about telling the Natives to "go home" so that useless stapled together homes can be built in a floodplain, a hundred miles away from the nearest jobs.

We have a nation that talks the big talk, like on cleaning up the environment - but can not take any of the steps needed, like getting some real transit that runs in the commuter corridors. We have other acts of perversion, endless acts that are buried simply because people don't care anymore. Everyone is freaked out about Chalk River, not because it is an ancient rusted out obsolete reactor that can't do the job - but because of cancer. Everyone is freaked out about hospital waiting times - but no one seems to care that many hospitals are infested with diseases of filth because of cutbacks that saw janitorial jobs disappear so that hospitals can build some new Taj Mahal.

High Speed Rail is on obvious problem, because building it would chew into the cash scored by big oil and the big airlines - even though it would bring about so many positive benefits. Montreal would no longer be a far away place that people would be reluctant to visit. If it was a two hour train ride, I'd be there, and so would many thousands of others.

In the days after the many debacles of the 80's, I think leadership has become limp. No one wants to say anything controversial because it is polarizing. But it has become generic, pathetic at best, a nation of pork and beans kinds of fake issues that mean nothing. We are no longer able, as a people, to make rational decisions based on science, technology and economics.

Furthermore, we have fallen behind the curve when it comes to technology. When it comes to Internet, we are becoming third world or worse. We pay top prices for some of the worst service, provided to us by a cabal of profiteers, who run their shoddy networks based on retrograde technology. It is a sad day when Canada, where the telephone was invented, and for a century was at the forefront of progress and communications - is overhauled by a consortium of East African nations that have adopted Fiber Optics. Not only are we behind because of greed, but because of the want on the part of the people to support the oligarchy of monopolies that use their profits to rip people off even more.

What happened is that people gave up, and no longer cared, when they couldn't get their own way. The West was alienated because of numerous attacks that were strictly political punishments; Quebec was alienated because of parochialism and inequality; Natives became angry because the "white man" spent a few hundred years making endless promises while attempting cultural and de facto genocide; and so on.

Without strong leadership, like that of MacDonald, where things were decided on the best for building the nation premise - it has entirely degenerated into the cesspool of pathos that grips the nation entirely. Most of all, we have lost the ability to ask the key questions - and though I endlessly ask those questions myself, no one else cares because my questions are uncomfortable for people to deal with.

The death of Canada will not be a big drama, it will just peter out because of the twin powers of apathy and lethargy on the part of the people.


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## Max (Sep 26, 2002)

I don't subscribe to such downeriffic scenarios myself. It's too easy to dump on Canada... it's been done so often it's by now an entirely pat exercise... a cynical romp of put-downs bereft of weight or substance.

I can only hope that those Canadian citizens typically most eager to denigrate Canada leave the country permanently, as soon as humanly possible. Otherwise it's a broken record. Gets tedious after a remarkably short period of time.


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## Darien Red Sox (Oct 24, 2006)

dona83 said:


> Maybe Amtrak should buy VIA.


Would never happen, all of Amtrak's perfected stock is owned by the US Government, many trains are subsided ether by the US federal government or State's Governments (and in the case of the Cascades the British Columbia Government). Depending upon who is in the white house effects what kind of funding Amtrak gets. I don't think Congress would ever go for taking over operations of the Via trains.

One thing I would like to see is some sort of Rail alliance between Amtrak and Via so you could earn each others points on both and you could use one site for ticking with flawless connections between trains.


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## chas_m (Dec 2, 2007)

MacDoc said:


> What don't you understand about $16 million per MILE - that's before the cost of the trains....


No we understand it ... we just don't believe it. There's no hard-and-fast figure for per mile rail. Every community has different challenges, some might be considerably easier/cheaper than others. 



> Planes can compete as there is lot's of sky - and decent landing facilities....


This is kind of where your argument falls to the ground though, doesn't it? If air travel's so much cheaper, then why isn't it ... you know ... cheaper??

We *do* have competition for air travel in Canada, but it's *still* ridiculously overpriced and unaffordable to most.

I was recently trying to price a trip to Toronto and found that it cost **4X** what it could cost to ferry down to Seattle, fly to Buffalo, rent a car and cross the border. That's just plain ridiculous.



> there is one railbed and it is needed for freight.


Ever heard of a double-decker highway? Or parallel tracks?

I'm not saying your proposal's bad -- I sincerely wish cheap air travel WOULD connect the cities of Canada, as it's obviously the fastest way to go -- but so far it hasn't happened, and I don't see that changing anytime soon ...


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## MazterCBlazter (Sep 13, 2008)

.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

Chas you are grasping at straws.....

As to high speed rail costs....look it up yourself - "_if wishes were horses_" 
I was being conservative ....

Here is the actual cost in Spain....



> A Brief History of High-Speed Rail - TIME
> 20 Apr 2009 ... brief history high speed rail bullet train shinkansen Fastech ... Many high- speed train initiatives have been derailed due to their exorbitant cost — *recent rail construction in Spain averaged some $22 million per mile*.
> ...


A Brief History of High-Speed Rail - TIME

and last time I checked Spain did not have to deal with frost heave and muskeg and the Rockies.

••••

Air travel - you made my case - there is higher density and competition for air travel in the US and even in the density in the Ottawa/Montreal/Toronto triangle fares are very low off hours.

The air taxis have not yet emerged fully and will be a hellishly lot cheaper than trying to build facilities. That's what the Toronto Island Airport is all about - they know the small composite jets are coming offering point to point and flexible scheduling...

There is already moves afoot for pooling - it is a taxi after all...

The biggest barrier is the air traffic issues in the US and the hub linking - that is what is making it so inefficient - there are some 3,000 small airports not being used for passenger travel.

••

Double decker - what are you raving about ???

Parallel tracks???...Canada has been trying to double up for decades at a cost of billions and much of the critical lines are already double tracked

Here are the numbers

Canada at a Glance 2008 - Travel

and Via was so excited this year when they reached 4.9 million passengers......less than 10% of the air passenger count.

| VIA Rail


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