VIA Rail

[amnesiajune]

I remember posting this in-depth a while ago, but when you do the math, the belief that the vast majority of people travelling between Toronto and Montreal/Ottawa are on the 401 is obviously not true. Air travel alone has around 17,000 seats between Toronto and Montreal/Ottawa on an average weekday. Via Rail now has 16 round trips, which is another ~10,000 seats per weekday. Megabus has ~1,800 seats between Toronto and Montreal, and Greyhound has ~800 between Toronto and Ottawa. That's more than 29,000 seats between Toronto and Ottawa or Montreal by mass transit.

The 401 has 27,400 cars, trucks and buses travelling between Gananoque and the I-81 interchange, and a lot of those cars (obviously) are coming from somewhere nowhere near Toronto and/or going somewhere nowhere near Ottawa or Montreal. Some of those bus and rail passengers are coming from an intermediate stop too, but most are not.

So all of this goes to support something that should be plainly obvious - hardly anyone is driving by themselves between two of the corridor's three major cities. Given any mass transport option, they'll take it. When someone is driving alone on one of those trips, it's usually because their trip has no mass transit alternative. People travelling with others (families in particular) aren't likely to take mass transport regardless of the speed or frequency - even with whatever driving costs you pile onto the math, it's still significantly cheaper for them to drive, and neither HSR nor HFR will lower the cost of rail travel.

 

[crs1026]

The 401 has 27,400 cars, trucks and buses travelling between Gananoque and the I-81 interchange, and a lot of those cars (obviously) are coming from somewhere nowhere near Toronto and/or going somewhere nowhere near Ottawa or Montreal. Some of those bus and rail passengers are coming from an intermediate stop too, but most are not.

A nitpick - you should add the volume of cars on Highway 7, since it's a busy alternative route for those who don't like the 401 to/from Ottawa. But that likely won't shift the numbers by an order of magnitude. I do also wonder what the passengers/auto count might be, although if people are travelling together it's unlikely that you could pry a single person onto a train.

If I take your point, then VIA is attempting to woo as many air travellers as auto travellers onto their trains. A single 5-car train each way has maybe 350 seats. Suppose HFR retains all existing passengers and fills three additional trains each way. That's 2100 seats (You didn't say if those numbers are one way or both ways, I will take the more conservative assumption). Is it plausible that we could attract that many people out of the 17,000 air seats and 30,000 cars (reflects my rough guess at the Hiway 7 increment) ? That's only 4% of the current volume. Would the current VIA ridership plus 2100 ( a 20% improvement) give VIA the financials they need to attract investors?

- Paul

 

[interchange42]

The personal attacks in this thread are over, or participants will be going on holiday.

42

 

[amnesiajune]

A nitpick - you should add the volume of cars on Highway 7, since it's a busy alternative route for those who don't like the 401 to/from Ottawa. But that likely won't shift the numbers by an order of magnitude. I do also wonder what the passengers/auto count might be, although if people are travelling together it's unlikely that you could pry a single person onto a train.

Traffic volume in Madoc is 3,400/day, and I think virtually all of that is people driving to/from one of the towns along highway 7.

If I take your point, then VIA is attempting to woo as many air travellers as auto travellers onto their trains. A single 5-car train each way has maybe 350 seats. Suppose HFR retains all existing passengers and fills three additional trains each way. That's 2100 seats (You didn't say if those numbers are one way or both ways, I will take the more conservative assumption). Is it plausible that we could attract that many people out of the 17,000 air seats and 30,000 cars (reflects my rough guess at the Hiway 7 increment) ? That's only 4% of the current volume. Would the current VIA ridership plus 2100 ( a 20% improvement) give VIA the financials they need to attract investors?

Via is a crown corporation - they don't need to attract investors. I think they're trying to be more competitive with air travel in the Toronto-Ottawa route. Air travel to Ottawa isn't as frequent as the 3-4 flights per hour that Air Canada, Porter and WestJet offer to Montreal. Train passengers also have the fully grade-separated LRT into downtown that's opening next year. Travelling by air means a convoluted transit trip (one bus and one or two LRTs) or a taxi down the over-capacity airport parkway to get into the city centre.

 

[steveintoronto]

Via is a crown corporation - they don't need to attract investors.

This was in reference to HFR:

[...]
Then, two years ago, in the twilight of its 10-year rule, the Conservative government made what seemed like a routine elevation of Via Rail’s general counsel to the presidency: Mr Yves Desjardins-Siciliano, a Montreal-born lawyer and dutiful bureaucrat.

[...] After a few months in the job, Desjardins-Siciliano sloughed off his sheepskin disguise and began to howl against the tyranny of freight train dispatchers and austerity’s starvation diet. The new CEO hit the luncheon circuit to promote the notion of a dedicated passenger railway - starting with Montreal, Ottawa and Toronto - that would be funded through public-private partnerships or what he prefers to call “public-public partnerships,” referring to Canadian public sector pension funds that invest the world over in passenger railways.

Desjardins-Siciliano sketched the outline of a dedicated right-of-way that would be cobbled together by some future, more sympathetic national government - with track and trains financed by investors seeking a safe haven in a country whose foundational motto is “Peace, order and good government.” Boring, perhaps, but “nice boring,” if you are a global investor looking for a safe haven. The government responded with resounding silence. Desjardins-Siciliano’s after-lunch speech tasted like pie-in-the-sky. [...]

Via Rail seeks private sector partnership for Toronto-Montreal upgrade

VIA Rail looks to private investment for $3-billion dedicated track plan ...
What to do with Via Rail? Ottawa weighs multibillion-dollar boost to ...
Transport Canada reviewing studies on multibillion-dollar Via Rail ...
Via Rail's $4B plan for Quebec-Ontario route opts for 'frequency' over ...

All that aside, it would be very interesting to find a study on travel patterns on the highways between Tor, Ott, and Mont. Someone somewhere must have them. I'm intrigued by your figures for Madoc. Ontario MoT must have done studies for extending 407 east of Peterborough.

or a taxi down the over-capacity airport parkway to get into the city centre.

This remains a crucial point positive for travelling by rail in many inter-city runs. Especially bearing this in mind:


Traffic jams: Ottawa is third most congested city in Canada, says survey

[...]Ottawa ranked 10th in North America — just behind San Jose in the U.S. and Toronto.

Vancouver again led the list for congestion in Canada — and was third-worst in North America — followed by Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal. Edmonton and Quebec City tied for fifth. [...]

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/traffic-jams-ottawa-third-most-congested-city-in-canada

There's another survey that states "fourth" 'most congested', so it's not just a wildly selective and misleading claim.

This also has implications for MOOSE Rail.

 

[steveintoronto]

If I take your point, then VIA is attempting to woo as many air travellers as auto travellers onto their trains.

I was going to add this on as an edit to my previous post, but it's such an important 'target drift' that it's worth discussing in a new post.

My belief that the InfraBank is going to ride to the rescue is now greatly diminished, but I also sense the *viability* of HFR is greater than ever, so much so that the huge wells of investment looking for a home will not only be looking at this closely, but also weighing the option of kicking it up a notch or two.

If I'm an investment company (and the ones I'm thinking of also own railway building/rolling stock companies) and I'm 'in' for $4B, why not invest another $B to see an even greater return for my initial investment? Especially if that showcases my technology to North America with rolling stock already tried, trued and tested abroad?

And then there's the 'competing with aircraft' aspect. It doesn't have to be full (true) "High Speed"...but once you grade separate crossings, it can approach that (HFR+ or 'Higher Speed') and suddenly your investment appeals to not just getting people out of cars, it's also out of planes.

I see the HFR concept evolving away from begging the Feds for investment, and looking to someone with *far deeper pockets and dedication* to seeing a return, and showcasing their equipment at the same time, and *leasing* to VIA, MOOSE, Metrolinx and premium express freight.

And all the second guessing on the now growing tedious InfraBank dialog disappears. It was a great idea, done wonders in many other nations, and collectives (EU), but already it's dripping of political baggage. Not to mention that any corporation with the kind of capital needed would by-pass the prying fingers of the Infra-Bank for their paltry contribution.

Not contingent to the above, but likely: Bombardier Rail (part of BBD Transportation) is now looking to be 'offed' by the Caisse for their 30%. Europeans are looking at taking back EU factories to merge in with Siemens/Alstom (BBD only ever bought their way into their rail operation there to begin with) and then what happens to the Cdn BBD rail operations? They can't survive on their own.

Someone's knocking at the door...

Edit to Add: Whoa! I swear I was just projecting in the above, but then thought to Google on it to buttress my case....I had no idea that this has already become news, I'd somehow missed this:

Caisse CEO says Bombardier should consider rail deal with China’s CRRC
Matt Scuffham
TORONTO
Reuters
November 1, 2017 November 1, 2017

Bombardier Inc should look at all options for its transportation business including partnering with China's state-owned CRRC, one of Bombardier's biggest shareholders said on Wednesday.

"I think we have to look at everything. Every opportunity that comes up ought to be looked at," Caisse de depot et Placement du Quebec Chief Executive Officer Michael Sabia told reporters when asked about a deal with CRRC.

Germany's Siemens and France's Alstom said they are merging their train manufacturing operations in September. The move will leave Bombardier competing in a market dominated by CRRC, the world's largest train maker, and a combined Siemens and Alstom group as the second biggest.


Sabia said Bombardier should consider a partnership with CRRC rather than selling the business to the Chinese.

"I think the transportation business is a long-run asset of Bombardier. I don't see an opportunity or reason to go down the sale path," he said.


French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire has said that the combination of Siemens and Alstom could be expanded to include Bombardier and create a business capable of competing with CRRC but Sabia said such a combination would be difficult.

"A three-party dance is a complicated dance. It's hard not to step on people's toes," he said.

"If a door opened and there were an interesting transaction to be done, would we have any objections in principle? No. But those are very difficult to get done."

The Caisse, which invests on behalf of workers and retirees in the Canadian province of Quebec, took a 30 percent stake in Bombardier's money-generating rail division in November 2015.

https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/re...36799318/?ref=http://www.theglobeandmail.com&

HFR is coming closer to a station near you!

 

[kEiThZ]

Via is a crown corporation - they don't need to attract investors.

Sadly, they do. See the current government's stalling on the Dedicated Tracks projects. $3 million for a study is either a joke or simply an attempt to buy time until some investors get in. I am thinking the government is heavily banking on the pensions funds putting in a proper proposal through the CIB.

I think they're trying to be more competitive with air travel in the Toronto-Ottawa route. Air travel to Ottawa isn't as frequent as the 3-4 flights per hour that Air Canada, Porter and WestJet offer to Montreal. Train passengers also have the fully grade-separated LRT into downtown that's opening next year. Travelling by air means a convoluted transit trip (one bus and one or two LRTs) or a taxi down the over-capacity airport parkway to get into the city centre.

I'm with you. I think a lot of the single drivers you see on the 401 are likely to be traveling between smaller cities and towns in the middle. Jives with my personal experience. I can count on one hand the amount of times I drove alone between Toronto and Ottawa, living there for years. If alone, the train was far less fatiguing and as shown here, overall bound to be cheaper.

I think VIA realizes that for any of this to work they have to capture market share from every other mode of transport. Getting share from air is far more valuable. And they can get that in Toronto-Ottawa. But with Montreal, largely limited to steal share from driving and buses. That means pricing pressure.

 

[crs1026]

Don't forget Ottawa-Montreal and Montreal- Quebec City. It wouldn't take huge enormous trip time improvement to be air competitive here, downtown to downtown. Quebec City's taxi industry still has a virtual monopoly over the airport. Ottawa-Montreal would be the perfect, lowest cost route to do a demonstration project.

- Paul

 

[steveintoronto]

Ottawa-Montreal would be the perfect, lowest cost route to do a demonstration project.
- Paul

Normally, I wouldn't have considered this cost to return positive, but the value of a "demonstration" isn't looking to be profitable, it's to showcase what can be done, and then skittish investors can climb on-board.

If CRRC were to merge with BBD Rail (more likely a complete buy-out but leaving middle management in place, perhaps a few hands-on executives), they could easily absorb the costs of doing so, and to tout this as a 'greeting gift' could assuage some/much of the inevitable howls of outrage from CRRC's arrival. (They're already here in New Brunswick as a rail-car builder, but the Public has missed the implications of that).

CRRC have a number of proven designs, some now in their third generation perfect for doing a sub-HSR connection. Whether they would be 'kits' assembled in Montreal or completed units from China would be more a political/diplomatic question than an engineering one.

Rolling Stock

CRRC undertakes design, manufacture, testing, commissioning and maintenance of locomotives and rolling stock, including: electric locomotives, diesel-electric and diesel-hydraulic locomotives from 280 kW to 10,000 kW for mainline and shunting duties; high-speed trains of speed over 350 km/h; DMUs and EMUs for urban, suburban and regional transport; trams and light rail vehicles; metro cars and passenger coaches; as well as full line of freight wagons, such as covered wagons; open-top wagons for coal, ore, steel and timber; hopper wagons for grain, ore, fertilizer; flat wagons; double-deck container flat wagons; tank wagons for all types of liquid and chemicals; tipper wagons, schnabel and depressed center wagons, as well as track machinery.

http://www.crrcgc.cc/g6628.aspx

See:
http://www.crrcgc.cc/zjen/g1736.aspx

The opportunities are not just for HFR. Metrolinx would also have *many more options* for forms of RER.

This story is still under the radar in the mass media. Thomson-Reuters are the only copy I've seen in Cdn media, but that being said, that same copy has appeared world-wide in the business press.

 

[dowlingm]

Don't forget Ottawa-Montreal and Montreal- Quebec City. It wouldn't take huge enormous trip time improvement to be air competitive here, downtown to downtown. Quebec City's taxi industry still has a virtual monopoly over the airport. Ottawa-Montreal would be the perfect, lowest cost route to do a demonstration project.

- Paul

Agreed, but need to deal with ($$$) the CN bottleneck at Coteau unless another route was what you were thinking of.

 

[crs1026]

Agreed, but need to deal with ($$$) the CN bottleneck at Coteau unless another route was what you were thinking of.

I would flip it over to adjacent to CP around Dorion if not before ... and then round the corner at De Beajeu. Instead of solving CN’s problen at Coteau, use the money for a flyover to cross CP or perhaps CP would even allow an expansion of its ROW, which is underutilised as a double track line. That idea might seem like a needless bell and whistle, but it might present a cheaper option if only to drive CN’s price down.

Of course, the M&O sub still sits idle, but that wastes the money that VIA has invested in its existing route.

- Paul

 

[kEiThZ]

Don't forget Ottawa-Montreal and Montreal- Quebec City. It wouldn't take huge enormous trip time improvement to be air competitive here, downtown to downtown. Quebec City's taxi industry still has a virtual monopoly over the airport. Ottawa-Montreal would be the perfect, lowest cost route to do a demonstration project.

- Paul

I absolutely haven't. Ottawa-Montreal could be commutable if VIA HFR is fast enough. Sadly, I don't think VIA can get it close to an hour, the threshold of commutability with station access times on both ends. Would be great for those who don't commute daily though. Turn Ottawa into a Montreal exurb effectively. It's unfortunate that Greyhound couldn't be compelled to move to Tremblay from the current digs. Would have been far more attractive to have a real hub at the VIA station. Now that the LRT is up and running, the current mayor needs to have discussions with the bus operators and VIA again.

With hourly service though, they can eliminate the few RJ and turboprop flights the regional airlines run. And the shuttle buses that Air France, KLM, Lufthansa and Swiss provide from Ottawa's VIA rail station itself. The issue here is the crap location of the Dorval station. They need to do something in Montreal to better integrate the station into the train station. The current location is horrible. I've walked it with luggage. I don't see most people wanting to do that.

Great point about Quebec City. I guess it's natural to forget about QC. In part, because it wasn't originally part of HFR proposal and in part because it's not a place Torontonians have strong ties to. But for QC this connection would be great. Again, get it fast enough and QC becomes an exurb of Montreal. But it's my understanding the VIA doesn't have a plan yet to address that would be caused by their loss of access to the Mt. Royal tunnel. If so, where does service from QC to MTL terminate?

 

[steveintoronto]

This is equally pertinent to the streetcar threads at this site, but here's how close CRRC is in terms of breaking into the Cdn rail passenger market, even if it is LRVs:

Nov 2, 2017 2:02 PM by: Gary Rinne

THUNDER BAY -- Numerous rivals of Bombardier Transportation are lining up for a possible bid on an anticipated order for streetcars for the Toronto Transit Commission.

Twelve manufacturers from around the globe, as well as Bombardier, attended a pre-bidding event held at the TTC's Leslie Barns on Tuesday.

It was a response to the commission's request for information, a means of gauging market interest and capabilities of potential designers and suppliers of up to 100 streetcars by 2023 or 2024.

They included European and Chinese-based companies such as Siemens and CRRC, and CAF USA, among others.

The TTC's planning process has not advanced to a request for formal proposals, nor has the commission made a commitment to issue an RFP in the months to come.

A TTC spokesperson said in an interview in September that the TTC had not yet decided whether to seek an alternate supplier to Bombardier. [...]

https://www.tbnewswatch.com/local-n...xpress-interest-in-future-ttc-contract-756088

 

[crs1026]

Great point about Quebec City. I guess it's natural to forget about QC. In part, because it wasn't originally part of HFR proposal and in part because it's not a place Torontonians have strong ties to. But for QC this connection would be great. Again, get it fast enough and QC becomes an exurb of Montreal. But it's my understanding the VIA doesn't have a plan yet to address that would be caused by their loss of access to the Mt. Royal tunnel. If so, where does service from QC to MTL terminate?

For the life of me, I can't understand why VIA and CN can't get it together over the Drummondville route. The freight activity on that line is so sparse! Since VIA has introduced its moving maps, I have paid some attention to timekeeping on that line. I have seen trains arrive at Drummondville a full 30 minutes plus Ahead of schedule, and sit there waiting for their departure time. Other days, when they have to meet freights en route, the advantage disappears. There must be some sum of money - much less than what it will cost to renovate the Trois Rivieres line - that would satisfy CN's legitimate profit interests and assure freight velocity while letting VIA increase frequency and improve running times.

Quebec City's airport is as painfully located as Dorval, such that a Montreal-Quebec City downtown to downtown trip involves taxi rides longer than the flight time. And a taxi fare that is equal or higher than a discount air fare. Quebec City taxi's charge a flat rate to/from the airport, but there is effectively no public transit option. With suburban stops at Ste-Foy and St Lambert, a certain proportion of the market doesnt need to go downtown and their end to end trip time improves accordingly. VIA does a good job in Ottawa of running through. The value of hanging onto the Mount Royal tunnel may not be in accessing Trois Rivieres, but rather in allowing Via to originate trains in the north and run through Montreal Central. Perhaps an origin in Dorval would do as well.

Looking at this as a CN shareholder - CN has a book value of about $77B with a return on assets of 9.54% (per Yahoo). Let's suppose that the Quebec-Montreal segment has a value of $1B of that amount (my guesstimate, simply for illustration). And let's suppose that VIA actually is making use of (appropriating, in CN's view) half of that capital amount while paying no return but only avoidable costs, while CN earns its 9.54% by using the other half to move freight. So, suppose VIA commits to paying the institutional rate of return that a pension fund would seek on the half of the capital that it is using. On CN's books, that's a half billion earning 2% - $10M per year- while the return on the other half billion is now earning (from freight) 19.08%. As a stockholder, that's a better deal. No Investment Bank is required. The lower ROA on the VIA allocated assets is appropriate as there is little risk and an earnings guarantee. If VIA needs more investment, they supply the capital.

Sadly, if CN is declaring its price to be the TR route's price, less a dollar, then they are just pissing on their own shoes and forcing VIA into a corner where VIA goes to Quebec the hard way and everybody loses.

- Paul

 

[aquateam]

It's unfortunate that Greyhound couldn't be compelled to move to Tremblay from the current digs. Would have been far more attractive to have a real hub at the VIA station. Now that the LRT is up and running, the current mayor needs to have discussions with the bus operators and VIA again.

Plz no. The Greyhound station is so convenient, just at the edge of Centretown. I can reliably and quickly walk there... not possible with Tremblay station where I need to give myself extra margin and usually an uber ride to get there. The LRT isn't running yet btw, not until next summer.

Via rail stopping at Tremblay is another one of the disastrous consequences of the Greber plan (along with razing deBreton flats, depopulating Hull, etc.): passenger rail should have never left downtown Ottawa, but getting Greyhound to leave too won't fix that. Generally if you are already taking Greyhound then you are not taking Via Rail and vice versa.

With hourly service though, they can eliminate the few RJ and turboprop flights the regional airlines run. And the shuttle buses that Air France, KLM, Lufthansa and Swiss provide from Ottawa's VIA rail station itself. The issue here is the crap location of the Dorval station. They need to do something in Montreal to better integrate the station into the train station. The current location is horrible. I've walked it with luggage. I don't see most people wanting to do that.

When I started working in Montreal I remember the first time I got off at Dorval circle... so depressing and isolated. For some reason Montreal picks remote parking lots surrounded by highways/transformers for all its major bus interchanges (Panama, Chevrier, Dorval Circle, etc.) At least in Toronto we do it at shopping malls (Yorkdale, Square One, STC, etc.)

But it's my understanding the VIA doesn't have a plan yet to address that would be caused by their loss of access to the Mt. Royal tunnel. If so, where does service from QC to MTL terminate?

It would terminate at "A40" station and you would take the REM the rest of the way.