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Alto - High Speed Rail (Toronto-Quebec City)

robmausser said:
I believe any Don Branch routing would refurbish the bridge to the CP line, which, is not the problem area for the flooding. Thats more northerly on the Richmond Hill track.
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Really?

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WB62 said:
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Based on who's involved in the consortium, and who's in power - I'm putting my chips on Woodbine. Not that I think it *should* or *should not* be Woodbine, but that I think that's where value engineering and the involvement of an airline will take us: Woodbine and some sort of people mover to connect Pearson flights and HSR much in the same way as an airport terminal change.

Whether some services also end up touching downtown Toronto somehow is an open question, and might be a compromise - some services from Union, some services from Woodbine / Pearson.

Remember that many proponents of this project in government aren't already bus and train people - they're very much car and airplane people. If you see the airport or HSR station as a place you drive to in order to then catch a fast thing that takes you somewhere else, then Woodbine with its proximity to the airport and freeway connections makes sense.

(Woodbine also makes it easy to expand service westward in a later phase)

I would be delighted to eat this comment in a year, so long as it's not because someone's decided that a dead-end track right into Pearson itself is the preferred option 🤢
 
Quoting from the Toronto Today story:

Senator Donna Dasko, who lives in Toronto, asked whether Alto intended to build the high-speed rail station in a suburb outside Toronto.

Vincent Robitaille, an assistant deputy minister of Transport Canada, suggested that wouldn’t be the case, noting Ottawa requested Alto build stations in downtown cores, including in Toronto and Montreal.

“We're not talking about the station [being] very far in the suburbs,” he said. “But at this point, we want to let the experts do their work. We want the consultation to take place before any final decision is made.”
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So, on the one hand, I'm not sure that Pearson and environs quite meet the brief.

On the other hand, "somewhere inside the city centre, but also budget-friendly and minimally disruptive and suitable for high speed trains" is a nonsense brief.

To rip off an old meme about a triangle: close to downtown; cheap to build; administratively convenient; suitable for high speed rail. Pick any two.
 
cabanabanana said:
Based on who's involved in the consortium, and who's in power - I'm putting my chips on Woodbine. Not that I think it *should* or *should not* be Woodbine, but that I think that's where value engineering and the involvement of an airline will take us: Woodbine and some sort of people mover to connect Pearson flights and HSR much in the same way as an airport terminal change.

Whether some services also end up touching downtown Toronto somehow is an open question, and might be a compromise - some services from Union, some services from Woodbine / Pearson.

Remember that many proponents of this project in government aren't already bus and train people - they're very much car and airplane people. If you see the airport or HSR station as a place you drive to in order to then catch a fast thing that takes you somewhere else, then Woodbine with its proximity to the airport and freeway connections makes sense.

(Woodbine also makes it easy to expand service westward in a later phase)

I would be delighted to eat this comment in a year, so long as it's not because someone's decided that a dead-end track right into Pearson itself is the preferred option 🤢
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I mean you're not wrong that there's a small chance they'll have trains running all the way to Pearson, but there's no chance that this would come at the expense of building a station at or near downtown. The consortium is trying to make money here, they're not so stupid as to kneecap the entire project by forcing people to backtrack and take GO/UP to reach Downtown, just to uh... make catching the plane out of Toronto more convenient?
 
Urban Sky said:
I think the search for a way to avoid serving Union quickly ends when you start to consider which locations with a link to any existing high-capacity regional or urban rail links would provide enough space to build:
  • At least two platform tracks
  • One very wide or two reasonably wide platforms
  • A waiting area
  • Ticket counters
  • Shops and restaurants
  • A taxi stand
  • Kiss & Ride facilities
  • A business Class lounge
  • Sufficient washroom facilities
  • Staff facilities
Oshawa is the only place for which I can imagine that it could possibly satisfy most requirements, but still an obviously sub-standard choice once you consider its geographic location at the egde of the GTHA…
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The easy place of course is at Summerhill - where the old Toronto North station is still sitting there. Just need to get rid of the LCBO (which would be a shame, because it's a great store).
 
lenaitch said:
Really?

View attachment 701827
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I believe this is Dundas?

That's not a spot where I think the track is prone to flooding. I believe it's a but further north, north of Gerrard, where the old CN and CP tracks are no longer adjacent.

Looking at the City of Toronto 0.5 metre topography, the ground next to the tracks is about 0.5 m to 0.75 m higher than the Gardiner. And there's the track bed too.

A little extra gravel, etc., could solve a problem there, if there is one. Look how much they've raised the track level on the Lakeshore East line from the Don to Gerrard during the ongoing upgrades.
 
McGillicuddy said:
"somewhere inside the city centre, but also budget-friendly and minimally disruptive and suitable for high speed trains" is a nonsense brief.
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Yes. Yes it is. Could people smarter than I tell me if Union could even lose two platforms (one in each direction) for this to serve Union, but have limited dwell time?


ARG1 said:
they're not so stupid as to kneecap the entire project
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ARG1 said:
make catching the plane out of Toronto more convenient
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If they're modeling their catchment area more like that of an airport (a thing to which most people drive), and the marginal capital / interest costs of serving downtown outweigh the marginal gain in passengers according to them modeling their catchment area like that of an airport, then I think they could be precisely that stupid.

I don't want them to be precisely that stupid, but it's quite within the realm of possibility. Toronto is a city where TSP isn't an assumed part of opening day on a $3bn LRT line and it takes a special council motion to fix after people complain.

(As for the CEO's comment about "not very far into the suburbs": for all we know, he could have looked at a map and meant "it's not in Markham or Brampton")
 
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nfitz said:
The easy place of course is at Summerhill - where the old Toronto North station is still sitting there. Just need to get rid of the LCBO (which would be a shame, because it's a great store).
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If Doug Ford and Galen Weston and the rest get their way, LCBOs may soon be going the way of the Beer Stores
 
The Don Valley floods at various spots, including train tracks, and there is no plan to eliminate that risk due to the prohibitive cost of raising the land and replacing all the bridges.
Apparently CP built its mainline through midtown Toronto partly because Union Station was taking too long to finish construction. It seems the line has always been an alternative of sorts to Union Station and could be again. But perhaps at Spadina where there is a connection to the subway and space above and around the rail corridor for a new station.
 
I don't know the current status of the Railway Lands/John Tory linear park idea.... but if Union is somehow a bad choice for a terminal, a new terminal just to the west or east of it above the USRC might not be all that expensive.

Lille France has two adjacent terminals, the second one built new to keep through TGVs from encumbrance in the legacy stub-end station. Walking between the two is quite convenient.

I can see the appeal of having a new, modernist terminal instead of Union with all its warts....but delinking from the Union transit hub would be utterly foolish.

And if the decision is to build across the North Toronto.... it cuts the legs out from arguments about cheaper options.

- Paul
 
I'm listening to the Senate session referred to in that article (I made coffee first :)). One honourable member referred to the McGill Study released last month that looked at public opinion. One interesting chart shows preferences for the location of stations. Toronto was strongest on a downtown station linked to a transportation hub, Montreal was understandably a bit more mixed, while Ottawans seem to assume the existing station will be retained, which I think is the safest bet in the whole project. The two smaller cities seem to favour, or at least accept, something out of the downtown area.

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The study gets into ridership and financial estimates, but not routing, apart from a highly schematic and rather unfortunate graphic of the general corridor.
 
crs1026 said:
I don't know the current status of the Railway Lands/John Tory linear park idea....
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Going absolutely nowhere.

crs1026 said:
but if Union is somehow a bad choice for a terminal, a new terminal just to the west or east of it above the USRC might not be all that expensive.
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This is being looked at........but it is pricey. There is one other cardinal direction that can be looked at.
 
dowlingm said:
That’s the sort of thing the new spillway further south is meant to put a stop to, no?
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A complete stop, 'no', a reduction in frequency, yes. The East Harbour Berm will actually increase the likelihood of flooding on the Parkway since it would keep water from spilling eastward.

But there are other projects and plans that can further reduce the risks here.
 
Takeaways from the Senate Committee video. (Transcript not yet on line.)

Corridor/alignment. Senators mentioned farmland, but a panelist also stressed corridors with existing infrastructure maintained. So highway, hydro, and other industrial corridors are still under active consideration. Some shared track with other railways may be inevitable, but is clearly the last choice. Freight is outside the mandate, and not considered.

We will see an initial corridor which will be wide and imprecise in the rural areas, and will narrow towards inner cities. This will be revealed and consulted on starting in early 2026, and the process will narrow it down through 2027 to identify precise alignments. They seek to minimize separation and detour impacts to land owners and user, which may involve purchasing extra land.

Union Station. Imbleau has a preference but will not share it at this time as it is a work in progress. But it will be in the vicinity of Union, in the downtown area, if at all feasible, and the experts are studying various options, and not yet committed to one solution. The selected option must be both economical and reliable. It is too soon to outline the route into Toronto.

My guess is Imbleau and team want to find a way to make Union Station work, but it may not be easy so nearby options are being looked it. Get out yer crayons, I know I have.​

VIA legacy. Nothing new. There will be a consolidation of the new and legacy services at some point in the future.
 
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