VIA Rail

[steveintoronto]

Been ruminating Paul's earlier post, and realized that some probable answers can be had by inverting the logic presented, and since some posters have now touched on exactly this, it's *political expedience*...and why Ontario might now be running with the ball instead of the Feds on HFR (and associated manifestations)...and it comes down to votes, and *not alienating the rest of the nation* by showing 'favouritism' to Ontario and to a lesser extent, Quebec.

I've said this before, and I'll say this again. The VIA HFR project is a great political bullet, and would demonstrate the worth of the Canada Infrastructure Bank.

I'm thinking less the InfraBank, and their need to kick-off with more remote regional goodies to prime the vote pot for the Fed Liberals.

This comes as a surprise. Overall, I'd say this is a positive. A curious line in the release is "The Government of Canada is contributing up to $65,000 towards this project, which will build on economic and engineering work already completed". Could this already completed work be HFR-related? Maybe the extra $65,000 will go towards studying upgrades to the spur to Blue Mountain (not the ski resort), and towards examining if longer sidings are required for freight trains or yard upgrades in Havelock. Maybe the Feds are throwing CP a bone so they can subsequently implement HFR?

It's really nothing in terms of money, a pittance actually. It's purely for the purpose of priming the electorate's attention. It's an intro for something much bigger.

I hope that this shows that unlike Metrolinx and CP (in reference to the Milton Line), maybe the Feds and CP can have a viable working relationship. A Federal investment in HFR plus freight specific infrastructure like sidings specific means a better Peterborough Corridor for both CP and the Feds. HFR would require VIA to run in the CP corridor from Agincourt Yard to the Don Branch (there is space for a VIA specific track, with caveats) so maybe this is early signs of cooperation? Fingers are crossed.

I don't think this is about CP directly as much as it is having them 'still in the game'. *IF* HFR is the end game here, this is about priming John Q Public and press releases for *temporally separated freight services* over a Privately Financed Project, and so both levels of government saying "see what good boys we are?". There's something very odd about this announcement. It's 'curious' to say the least. It's really nothing, the studies have already been done. This is a first shot at PR.

Remember, we were discussing (and the exact quotes stated) by Il Duce on the CBC interview a few weeks back as to (gist) "An announcement early in the New Year" and "a meeting with the Federal Transport Minister" on something 'big' to do with the K/W line, or something associated that it's a part of.

Consider for a moment as to who would get the biggest vote windfall from this: The QP Libs or the Parl Hill Libs? Almost all of the regions affected are already Fed Lib ones. Their need to sway lies outside of the HFR geographic catch area. Meantime, the QP Libs are struggling to hang on to what they have, and an announcement of some form of HFR/Ont HSR combined (even if it is privately financed and vertically integrated as to owning/building/operating own rolling stock) would have a huge political benefit. Metrolinx, as one poster mentioned, is already leaning this way, for good reason. Just think "BBD" and "Fug-up real good" in one sentence.

So behind closed doors, take a good guess at how the pieces are being divvied up. Note that Ont is putting as much money in on the announcement as the Feds. Curious?

Paul hit on this a few posts back, and the more I think about this, the more it makes sense from almost every angle. Sure it will involve VIA, but not the VIA as we now know it. All technical jobs there will be safe, but think of the advantage of Ontario via Metrolinx absorbing many of VIA 'corridor and commuter trunk' lines, and the rest left to being what VIA was always intended to be: Money losing but an asset to keeping the nation together "sea to sea". The business model, as VIA is presently set-up, hobbles the best part of VIA becoming truly successful.

Meantime the 'corridor' becomes a separate division working with Ont/Quebec/Private Enterprise to *capitalize* on their strengths, not weaknesses. This is happening in other nations. London, UK, for instance, via TfL is absorbing many of the nationally owned, privately franchised routes into London. It doesn't equate exactly to Ontario, as there is no regional level in the UK to compare to, but the *absorption* of London oriented services does translate to Toronto, and to a lesser extent, Montreal. And all that's in-between on a mainline.

The Market is there! VIA's Corridor has proven that beyond doubt. It's time to kick it up a huge notch.

Addendum:

16.09.16
TfL picks London routes ripe for devolution ahead of DfT approval
Transport for London (TfL) has targeted four groups of suburban rail services across southeast London that would suit its intention to absorb a larger number of devolved routes into its network.

The organisation first announced in January that a new partnership with the DfT meant all rail services that operate mostly or entirely within Greater London could be transferred to TfL when current franchises expire in the coming years.

As well as adding more routes to its devolved portfolio, which includes London Overground and TfL Rail, the organisation would also take the lead on a new London Suburban Metro service.

In papers published ahead of a board meeting on 22 September, TfL revealed that it had already identified routes – currently part of the South West Trains, Southeastern and Govia Thameslink Railway franchises – where such devolution would work, subject to governmental approval. These include:

• To/from Charing Cross, Cannon Street and Victoria serving southeast London (current franchise ends in June 2018)
• To/from London Bridge and Victoria serving south central London (current franchise ends in September 2021)
• To/from Waterloo serving southwest London (current franchise ends in June 2017)
• To/from Moorgate serving north central London (current franchise ends September 2021)

The services targeted are considered “suitable” for devolution because they would be ‘stopping’ suburban services that terminate inside, or just beyond, the London boundary.

Gareth Powell, director of strategy and contracted services at TfL, added in the board paper: “The suburban rail network in south London provides excellent geographical coverage in many areas but frequencies are low compared to both London Underground and some other suburban routes, journey times are relatively long, services are complex and many trains are heavily crowded at peak times.

“The concept of ‘metronisation’ that we have developed would introduce more consistent stopping patterns, clearer routes, and new interchanges. It would also implement improvements to track, junctions and signalling to increase capacity.

“New rolling stock would have better acceleration and braking to reduce journey times, which combined with wider doors and more active dispatch staff would enable reduced station dwell times and increased train frequencies.” [...continues at length...]

http://www.railtechnologymagazine.c...tes-ripe-for-devolution-ahead-of-dft-approval

This is somewhere between RER and VIA, and Metrolinx is already clearly signalling this approach, financed through IO as P3.

More here on the TfL example:
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/...ached-breaking-point-rail-transport-mayor-tfl

It's time to start melding HSR/RER and HFR, and attracting inward heavy rail manufacturing again. BBD is on the edge of selling off the Rail operations of the Transport Division, time for a deal all around.

 

[crs1026]

The freight study is interesting, and it does suggest that both levels of government are concerned about sustaining freight service to Peterboro and beyond. That's good news all by itself.

If, as @alexanderglista suggests, planning for HFR is in full swing, the engineering for the Havelock-Agincourt portion would have to address mixed use. I can't see how there would be a separate study for that, it would be part of the HFR engineering from the get go.

But I could also read the initiative as suggesting the opposite - ie, the passenger service is not coming to dave the day, and without some government bailout, the line is ready to disappear into the weeds from lack of maintenance. Already, the mine at Nephton is bringing its output to Havelock by truck for transfer to rail. That's a lot of road traffic (back roads, perhaps, but back roads that aren't built for that volume of heavy truck use). Putting the rail to the mine in better shape and renewing the Havelock Sub for continued freight operation avoids abandonment (which would lead to all those mine trucks coming down to the Belleville Sub, and impacts economic development in Peterboro proper). That is well worth government subsidy.

I don't see the word "passenger" anywhere in the announcement.

- Paul

 

[robmausser]

the engineering for the Havelock-Agincourt portion would have to address mixed use.
- Paul

The entire purpose of using the Havelock sub was for DEDICATED passenger rail, completely separate from freight.

If there is increased freight on this corridor, the VIA HFR project is DOA.

 

[SaugeenJunction]

The entire purpose of using the Havelock sub was for DEDICATED passenger rail, completely separate from freight.

If there is increased freight on this corridor, the VIA HFR project is DOA.

If freight trains run at the same time as VIA trains, then yes that would be too bad. If freight ran at night, and VIA during the day then it would be fine, and would make the corridor a more productive asset. I don't see a reason why freight trains couldn't be loaded and marshalled during the day, then run after VIA service for the day wraps up, kind of like how freight runs at night, and LRT in the day on the same tracks in Waterloo.

 

[Allandale25]

Already, the mine at Nephton is bringing its output to Havelock by truck for transfer to rail. That's a lot of road traffic (back roads, perhaps, but back roads that aren't built for that volume of heavy truck use). Putting the rail to the mine in better shape and renewing the Havelock Sub for continued freight operation avoids abandonment (which would lead to all those mine trucks coming down to the Belleville Sub, and impacts economic development in Peterboro proper). That is well worth government subsidy.

So there's no rail service between Blue Mountain and Nephton and Havelock or just Nephton and Havelock?

 

[SaugeenJunction]

So there's no rail service between Blue Mountain and Nephton and Havelock or just Nephton and Havelock?

I don't know the answer, and this is a bit off topic, but here is a picture of a GO Train on this stretch of track in 1997. Extremely rare mileage for GO. I wonder if this excursion used the Don Branch in Toronto?

 

[steveintoronto]

The entire purpose of using the Havelock sub was for DEDICATED passenger rail, completely separate from freight.

If there is increased freight on this corridor, the VIA HFR project is DOA.

You misquoted or misunderstood the intent of the proposal. Since the the RoW was always proposed to be *privately owned*, with VIA having *operational control* (And I think this may or may not be the eventual outcome, the builder/financier of the line might run their own operations, passenger and freight, perhaps partly using their own rolling stock, esp electric locos for premium freight), VIA's problem of being 'always second fiddle' is addressed completely. The problem with running freight is not that it's incompatible, as many European operations show. It's just that passenger has to have dispatch priority.

What isn't an option is for double stack freight, since it's not compatible with catenary. Premium freight would run at a very high speed relative to the present CN and CP mainlines, quite possibly over 80 mph. Amtrak's North-East Corridor franchises freight operations over it's Acela routes, as well as regional trains and local commuter operations.

It's highly unlikely for the Havelock route to see any track improvement for freight alone, this is part of the peculiarity of the "freight study". Freight demand alone wouldn't justify it economically. However, temporally, even local freight service, at slow speed, would be justified economically and operationally if a higher speed mostly passenger line was to happen. It would be a dead asset at night to not use it for freight and recover more from the investment. It would also be great PR for the locals too. It would keep many industries alive in terms of shipping costs.

 

[crs1026]

So there's no rail service between Blue Mountain and Nephton and Havelock or just Nephton and Havelock?

I may be mistaken that the Nephton branch is closed altogether. But there is now a transfer 'terminal' in Havelock and some amount of material is brought to Havelock by truck.

This article sheds a little light on why this study may be going on, and it makes no mention of HFR.

- Paul

 

[lenaitch]

I haven't been over that way since last year but the transfer facility may be for Kawartha Ethanols (near the former 3M pit but does not use the spur) and IKO over near Marmora. Best as I could tell the Nephton Sub was still operating (again, summer of 2016). I believe the major customers are Quaker Oats and Cavan Agra down the line a bit in Cavan. General Electric was an infrequent customer but their moves were often large. I don't believe there are any other customers in Peterborough since CP pulled the various industrial spurs.

 

[yrt+viva=1system]

I've been thinking lately, what would happen if ViaRail completely disappeared? I mean would anyone really care or notice if they folded?

Gauging by the discussions on here about the dismal state of ViaRail, the lack of information release pertaining to the recent RFP on a new fleet procurement, the opaqueness of the high frequency-high speed-whatever-you-want-to-call-it-at-this-point and reading articles/commentary/interviews with Greg Gormick. It really seems like ViaRail is doomed. Perhaps it's better for ViaRail to fail (if it hasn't yet) and burn to the ground and start anew? The various comments about Via Rail management has me wondering why they haven't been turfed yet and does the Federal Government even know about this issue. *end of rant*

If anyone is interested, I came across a nice chart making a comparison of Amtrak's Empire Builder and ViaRail's Canadian: https://wawa-news.com/index.php/201...as-flagship-canadian-train-all-across-canada/

-Only a few more hours till a new year!-

 

[jys]

I've been thinking lately, what would happen if ViaRail completely disappeared? I mean would anyone really care or notice if they folded?

Gauging by the discussions on here about the dismal state of ViaRail, the lack of information release pertaining to the recent RFP on a new fleet procurement, the opaqueness of the high frequency-high speed-whatever-you-want-to-call-it-at-this-point and reading articles/commentary/interviews with Greg Gormick. It really seems like ViaRail is doomed. Perhaps it's better for ViaRail to fail (if it hasn't yet) and burn to the ground and start anew? The various comments about Via Rail management has me wondering why they haven't been turfed yet and does the Federal Government even know about this issue. *end of rant*

VIA Rail is doing okay and it's management is fine. Their routes in the Quebec-Windsor corridor are actually profitable, so I don't think VIA Rail will disappear anytime soon. If anything, they are doing better every year. What they really need at this point is some capital funding for fleet replacement.

 

[SaugeenJunction]

I've been thinking lately, what would happen if ViaRail completely disappeared? I mean would anyone really care or notice if they folded?

Gauging by the discussions on here about the dismal state of ViaRail, the lack of information release pertaining to the recent RFP on a new fleet procurement, the opaqueness of the high frequency-high speed-whatever-you-want-to-call-it-at-this-point and reading articles/commentary/interviews with Greg Gormick. It really seems like ViaRail is doomed. Perhaps it's better for ViaRail to fail (if it hasn't yet) and burn to the ground and start anew? The various comments about Via Rail management has me wondering why they haven't been turfed yet and does the Federal Government even know about this issue. *end of rant*

If anyone is interested, I came across a nice chart making a comparison of Amtrak's Empire Builder and ViaRail's Canadian: https://wawa-news.com/index.php/201...as-flagship-canadian-train-all-across-canada/

-Only a few more hours till a new year!-

Tons of people would care if VIA folded. Between January 1st, 2017 and September 30th, 2017 VIA moved 3.2 million people (source, page 30). For elderly people, those in remote communities, students (I regularly take the train from Oakville to London), and business people it is a well-used service, and has seen massive ridership gains in recent years in the Quebec City-Windsor Corridor.

 

[steveintoronto]

It really seems like ViaRail is doomed. Perhaps it's better for ViaRail to fail (if it hasn't yet) and burn to the ground and start anew?

Yes and no. Would a 'rebirth' that spins off the profitable and thriving corridor to a new entity, and the 'rest' remain as VIA under the current legislative choke-hold be a good thing? With provisos, yes, albeit absolutely no kudos to Parliament for the way VIA has been so "mismanaged" within the Ministry...not the VIA Board itself.

Under Desjardins-Siciliano, VIA has shown dramatic increases in riders for successive years now...*in spite of VIA being hobbled by the Feds*. I can't find a Google result right now to reference, but I posted it some weeks back in this forum.

What is showing Googling is this by Gormick, who might help his rant...err...case, if he got his facts straight, but alas:

Federally, there’s currently a $1 million study of VIA’s desperate need for $1.5 billion of new rolling stock to maintain its current service. Without new cars, says VIA’s corporate plan, they’ll have to start trimming services by 2020. Never mind that proven cars are rolling off production lines right now to serve VIA’s U.S. counterpart, Amtrak. No, VIA has to study the issue, which allows its federal masters to avoid making a decision.

https://www.thestar.com/opinion/com...es-and-improve-train-service-now-opinion.html

Which is absolutely false. I won't even bother to itemize why unless challenged by others.

Gormick continues:

Next, there’s a $3.3-million, three-year study of VIA’s proposal to create a new route linking Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal at breathtaking speeds of, perhaps, 200 km/h. It would use a meandering route through the backwoods of eastern Ontario that Canadian Pacific abandoned more than 40 years ago.

"Breathtaking?" Whatever Greg. Odd how other nations are doing exactly that for higher speed lines. I think Gormick has a railway tie stuck in his eye.

Rather than say no to this fantasy flyer, Transport Minister Marc Garneau commissioned the study. It will investigate VIA’s claim that this multi-billion-dollar project will pay for itself and cross-subsidize VIA’s other Quebec-Windsor Corridor trains.

Well Greg, you can't blame VIA for that. We're all "Waiting for Garneau" (Apologies to Godot)

*Someone* is going to build that line, the demand is clearly there.

The various comments about Via Rail management has me wondering why they haven't been turfed yet and does the Federal Government even know about this issue. *end of rant*

Desjardins-Siciliano, having turned 'profits' (a misleading term due to VIA not having corporate status, so "revenue growth") for the last five years or so, would be the first person *poached* from VIA if/when private capital steps in.

Addendum: Kudos to @alexanderglista for his link:

[...]
we have witnessed several impressive achievements, including our 14th consecutive quarter
of revenue growth and our 7th consecutive quarter of ridership growth — both increasing by
double digits compared to last year. Over the summer, we also posted record results in August, which is now our highest revenue month on record, and experienced double-digit growth over Labour Day weekend, compared to last year. Growth of this kind is extraordinary, and every day I take pride in the work that all VIA Rail employees perform in service to their fellow Canadians.
[...]

 

[kEiThZ]

VIA Rail is doing okay and it's management is fine. Their routes in the Quebec-Windsor corridor are actually profitable, so I don't think VIA Rail will disappear anytime soon. If anything, they are doing better every year. What they really need at this point is some capital funding for fleet replacement.

If the Corridor is profitable, why do VIA's annual reports show subsidies for those services?

 

[micheal_can]

VIA Rail is doing okay and it's management is fine. Their routes in the Quebec-Windsor corridor are actually profitable, so I don't think VIA Rail will disappear anytime soon. If anything, they are doing better every year. What they really need at this point is some capital funding for fleet replacement.

If that is the case, they need to work on their other major routes. I am thinking Canadian and Ocean.