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Rail: Ontario-Quebec High Speed Rail Study

Traffic flows at 120 between Windsor and London. If you aren't going that fast, you're either going to get tailgated or quickly passed... its simply safer to "go with the flow".

The 100 km/h posted is a joke, and I think even the government realizes this. That's about 60 miles per hour, and most US freeways go 70, or about 115 km/h. In much of Europe its 120-130 posted, not to mention unposted sections.

But back to HSR, a line would really reduce recreational/tourist traffic between cities on the 400-series.

My idea for the stations (not sure this is accurate):
-Detroit- link to US Midwest network to Chicago
-Windsor- boarder station. Must declare customs just like at the airport and crossing the boarder
-London
-Maybe one in the K/W area (London is a better midway station between Windsor and Toronto being almost right in the middle. Trains could go faster if there wasn't a station here but I think there should be one.)
-Mississauga/Pearson Airport or connection via RT. Another line could split near here to connect with Hamilton, Niagara, and Buffalo continuing on to the US Northeast network.
-Downtown Toronto or connection via RT
-Pickering area (not sure about the specific location east of Toronto)
-Kingston- track splits. One line continues to Montreal and Quebec while another goes to the Ottawa Region. The Ottawa line would reconnect in Montreal. Just north of Kingston another line could connect with the US Northeast network to New York
 
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Haljackey said:
My idea for the stations (not sure this is accurate):
-Detroit- link to US Midwest network to Chicago
-Windsor- boarder station. Must declare customs just like at the airport and crossing the boarder
-London
-Maybe one in the K/W area (London is a better midway station between Windsor and Toronto being almost right in the middle. Trains could go faster if there wasn't a station here but I think there should be one.)
-Mississauga/Pearson Airport or connection via RT. Another line could split near here to connect with Hamilton, Niagara, and Buffalo continuing on to the US Northeast network.
-Downtown Toronto or connection via RT
-Pickering area (not sure about the specific location east of Toronto)
-Kingston- track splits. One line continues to Montreal and Quebec while another goes to the Ottawa Region. The Ottawa line would reconnect in Montreal. Just north of Kingston another line could connect with the US Northeast network to New York
Click to expand...

An international stop makes this much more unfeasible. You are potentially delayed by any security hick-ups. Better to stop at the border and let people cross on foot.

I wouldn't try to route it through Downtown Toronto, but leave it north of the 401 and use local/regional transit to service transfers. Airport/Downtown traffic is serviced by ARL.

My stops:

Windsor
London
K-W / Guelph (alternating train service)
Brampton
Markham
Oshawa
Belleville / Kingston (alternating train service)
Ottawa
Montreal
Trois-Rivieres
Quebec City


The Markham-Oshawa-Belleville-Kingston-Ottawa alignment could be switched to Markham-Peterborough-Ottawa for a straighter alignment or if Belleville/Kingston don't warrent the level of service.
 
reaperexpress said:
If you want to AVERAGE 120, you'll have to be going faster than 120 to make up for the time that you spend on slower sections, such as going into city centers.
Click to expand...
I'm not really aware of any 400-series highways going into city centres, they always seem to run through suburbia. Off peak, it's pretty easy to set the cruise control to 120, and not change it for an hour or so.

But I find that for long-haul it's difficult to average much more than 100 km/hr, with country roads, side streets, bathroom breaks, meals, gasoline, etc.
 
nfitz said:
I find that for long-haul it's difficult to average much more than 100 km/hr, with ... bathroom breaks, meals, gasoline, etc.
Click to expand...

That's why trains were invented. You can do all that aboard along with no need for gas.

Hopefully HSR consctuction will start by the end of the decade.
 
Agreed. To average 120 kph on a long trip, you'd need to cruise at 140 to 150 kph to make up for fuel stops, meals, etc.

I don't think going more than 120 makes much sense. Fuel efficiency rapidly drops off at that point, as well as collision survival rates (if you hit something at 140 you're basically toast).
 
Haljackey said:
That's why trains were invented. You can do all that aboard along with no need for gas.

Hopefully HSR consctuction will start by the end of the decade.
Click to expand...
Hopefully! But I've been saying that now for over 30 years. I remember hearing at one point that it should be finished by 1989 and thinking that was such a long way in the future that it just seemed silly.
 
Don't pillory me for the question. It's a musing I've had for a while. I have always wondered if a Prairie HSR initiative would be feasible.

ie. Winnipeg-Regina-Medicine Hat-Calgary...and eventually decades after, right through the Rockies to Vancouver.

The point of this would be twofold:

1) To help secure buy-in from the Prairie provinces for a full Quebec-Windsor HSR
2) To lay the foundations of a Prairie and eventually (long after I've left the Earth) national HSR network.

The way I see it, the feds would pay half, just like for the Quebec-Windsor corridor. The provinces would pay the rest. But maybe the provinces would also have to pick up the tab of the branches. So Alberta would pay for a Calgary-Edmonton link. Saskatchewan would pay for a Regina-Saskatoon link.

Winnipeg-Calgary is about 1300 km. So it would be about 13 billion. Toss in that project with 10 billion for a Quebec-Windsor HSR, and the feds would be on the hook for 11.5-12billion.

What do you guys think?
 
^ Not really worth it except for Calgary and Edmonton. The money would be better spent on local transit networks. There just isn't enough demand for travel to justify anywhere near the expense. Building a link from Vancouver to either Edmonton or Calgary would at least generate ridership. For everywhere else air travel just makes more sense, except for maybe a medium speed line (~200km/h) between Regina and Saskatoon where the province already owns a one track corridor apparently. HS rail isn't a political support problem - it is just the sheer size of the expense.
 
Regional bickering has always, and will always, be a part of Canadian politics. There is no way around it given that Canada is so vast and diverse and different parts of the country have different needs.

I don't see the problem being that the rest of Canada won't approve of the project. The Quebec-Windosr corridor is the most urbanized part of Canada and has unique sets of needs that go along with it. Complainers aside most people know and understand this. The problem isn't that it is not a viable project or that those from the rest of Canada won't agree with it. It has just never been sold and marketed to the public very well.

HSR is not going to be cheap. There is no way around it. If you want to get support for it then it has to be something that people outside a 5km radius of Union Station or Gare Central will be excited about, and have a use for.

There is a lot that could be done to sell, and make HSR a better project. Taking cues from Porter and its customer service and lounges is one (though VIA 1 is great doing a bit more for economy passengers may make a difference). Making HSR accessible to those in Markham, or Hamilton, or Laval, as just a few examples, would help increase the ridership (if you live in Markham and want to take HSR to Montreal for example having to spend an hour or more just to get to the station immediately detracts from a service which could easily serve these customers directly). Not dropping service to most communities in between major centres is also important. Stations at Pearson and Trudeau are also hugely important (and not just stations on the edge with another transfer to a people mover but real stations right in the terminal like Schiphol or CDG) along with code sharing and co-operation with airlines.

There are many more ways HSR could be improved and made useful to a large part of the corridor population. But unless a large part of the population (or at least a majority of the voting population) can see how this will better their lives and be a worthwhile investment, it won't happen. Basically, there needs to be a TGV Canada plan that is *made for Canada*.
 
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^ AS,

Personally, this is why I support having more stations than most.

For a TOM routing, I would see the following stops:

Union - GTA East (current Guildwood or further east) - Cobourg - Belleville - Kingston - Brockville - Smiths Falls - Fallowfield - Ottawa - Alexandria - Dorval - Montreal.

I think that's the minimum you'd need to garner support. And whoever is running the HSR would have to offer shuttle buses to the communities that got cut from VIA's current service: Oshawa (not necessary because of GO), Trenton, Napanee, Gananoque, Casselman and Coleau.
 
I agree that the stations you picked should be the minimum. I would also add that if the stations you marked for deletion could be kept by simply adding a couple kilometres of siding and a simple station platform on the existing line (and in a location that is useful, not 10 km outside the city), then it would be worthwhile to keep a couple trains a day serving these communities.

I think a lot of people underestimate how important it is to provide better service within the major centres. Montreal and Toronto would hugely benefit from having more stations (and it would not need to add that much more cost). In Toronto the most likely alignment west of Union would be to Pearson, then K/W and onward to London. But, if you had some trains that served a station in the Markham/Vaughan/Newmarket area (probably at a station close to the 407) via the Barrie or Stouffeville line you would really increase the attractiveness of the service. Yes there is a station at Pearson but one further east would make the trip shorter and also avoid a lot of parking and traffic hassles. Same with service to Hamilton, and maybe a stop somewhere in the Oakville area along the way. Yes there is GO, but, don't underestimate how many people will be swayed by the idea of a 20 minute drive and getting on one train instead of having to connect at Union and adding even more time (and crowds) to the trip. A few years ago this would have been somewhat costly but with electrification plans at least much more likely, it makes it relatively easy to extend service into these areas. The same is true for Montreal and service to the South Shore and Laval, though there are a lot of challenges with that which I won't really worry about here.

One thing I always believed held up HSR was the lack of good regional rail and infrastructure in the major centres. Luckily, I think this at least one factor which is being overcome.
 
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kEiThZ said:
Don't pillory me for the question. It's a musing I've had for a while. I have always wondered if a Prairie HSR initiative would be feasible.

ie. Winnipeg-Regina-Medicine Hat-Calgary...and eventually decades after, right through the Rockies to Vancouver.

The point of this would be twofold:

1) To help secure buy-in from the Prairie provinces for a full Quebec-Windsor HSR
2) To lay the foundations of a Prairie and eventually (long after I've left the Earth) national HSR network.

The way I see it, the feds would pay half, just like for the Quebec-Windsor corridor. The provinces would pay the rest. But maybe the provinces would also have to pick up the tab of the branches. So Alberta would pay for a Calgary-Edmonton link. Saskatchewan would pay for a Regina-Saskatoon link.

Winnipeg-Calgary is about 1300 km. So it would be about 13 billion. Toss in that project with 10 billion for a Quebec-Windsor HSR, and the feds would be on the hook for 11.5-12billion.

What do you guys think?
Click to expand...
I honestly like it, but it'd require immense growth in the prairies first, something that's not the direction that we're going. I think that at bare minimum, the entire country's network should be 160 km/h capable with current demographics. That means an Ottawa-Vancouver trip in about a day, which I think could actually be competitive with air travel and garnish many more trips than the current 5 day journey does. And that's not too hard to do, especially since half is through 100% flat prairie. If you're gonna be doing that, something like 240 km/h on Calgary-Vancouver could make a bunch of sense, but again I think it'd require growth throughout the country.

Canada is in a position to ascend to much higher greatness than it currently has now. We have an economy growing at breakneck speed, tonnes of resources to utilize to build our country and grow our economy, and a barely existent manufacturing industry. If you look at the built form of places like Western Europe, China, Eastern US, India, etc, places like the Prairies could hold many, many people by allowing an organically grown economy gone out, in the type of style that all the aforementioned regions have. Agriculture, mixed in with small towns with manufacturing sectors and a large service sector. Canada could support many, many millions more people, and I believe we have the capacity to do it. Perhaps if/when we tap into that currently existing potential, we'll be able to see 2 or 3 Ontario-Quebec HSR lines, and European-style rail throughout the country. I think that your dream is very possible, Keithz, it's just a matter of political will to get all the pieces in shape. Because we're not even getting HSR in a corridor that should have had it 20 years ago by international standards, and there's hardly a shred of demand in most of the country right now. But that could all change.

As for your stop spacing on Toronto-Montreal, it'd have to be split into 3 different categories: Express, Regional, and Local. Express would be strictly Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal-Quebec. Regional would be Toronto-Oshawa-Kingston-Ottawa-Dorval-Montreal, etc. Local would be (probably coordinated with local regional rail,) Toronto, Pickering, Oshawa, Port Hope, Trenton, Belleville, etc. All these would run on some sort of improved trackage, with at least Express and Regional using HSR, and Local either sharing HSR trackage and merging off frequently, or using some similar improved trackage, possibly shared with freight vehicles.
 
Would it be too much to start a thread dedicated to high speed rail routing, just so we can keep discussion between routing and station spacing vs technology and politics separate?
 
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