dsantesteban
New Member
Exactly. If you live within reasonable proximity of a city, you'll get a regional railway. Otherwise, it's city or bus.
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On track for high speed
- Thread starter M II A II R II K
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Exactly. If you live within reasonable proximity of a city, you'll get a regional railway. Otherwise, it's city or bus.
nfitz
Superstar
What a bizzare coment. Why would you post something so completely and obviously false?
dsantesteban
New Member
Frankly, burn me if you must. The only useful Via Rail stops in the corridor that have a useful purpose are Toronto, London, Windsor, Kingston, Montreal, Kingston, and Ottawa. Maybe Sarnia and Belleville. Everywhere else, the regional bus network kills the railways day and night. That's why I think that VIA Rail should partner up with some bus companies (maybe ON and Greyhound) and cancel service to those useless stations.
nfitz
Superstar
Your kidding right? Dorval has more passenger traffic than many of these stations. Brantford and Kitchener are also well used. Many trains don't stop at any of the other stations.
I'm really not sure you've thought this out very well. I can't imagine anyone would advocate eliminating the local services!
But then again, you wre so completely wrong about Regional Rail in Europe ... why then should we trust you on Ontario?
reaperexpress
Senior Member
Since you are about to post that you're not letting off this position, let's just stop arguing about this. You're wrong. If you don't want to stop in small towns then take the express train. It's that simple.
dsantesteban
New Member
Ok, I've only been to europe twice, and i never saw a regional train outside of paris and venice. So I might've been wrong. But Brantford is a mostly useless station. Forgot about Dorval, and put Kitchener in with Sarnia and Belleville.
But I'm not letting off of this position. The bus network is GREATLY SUPERIOR to any service that currently is or has ever been provided by Via Rail. In a reasonable time frame, you can get anywhere by bus, more frequently and conveniently than by railway. There's a huge number of useless stations in the corridor that waste time and money, cause countless delays, and those stations are the reason why railways aren't profitable in Canada. My idea is based on a train called the Wolverine. It runs from Chicago - Ann Arbor - Detroit - Pontiac. The only local service they run on that line is the last one of the day, because there aren't any trains that will be delayed after it. Amtrak sells tickets on Greyhound buses from many places (Lansing, Flint, Kalamazoo, Toledo, Ortonville, Auburn Hills, just to name a few), and it is by far one of the best services on Amtrak, having basically wiped out the airlines between Chicago and Detroit. If you take the Acela Express, it has to stop frequently because of local service that's in the way, and you will rarely ride an Acela service that arrives on time.
But I'm not letting off of this position. The bus network is GREATLY SUPERIOR to any service that currently is or has ever been provided by Via Rail. In a reasonable time frame, you can get anywhere by bus, more frequently and conveniently than by railway. There's a huge number of useless stations in the corridor that waste time and money, cause countless delays, and those stations are the reason why railways aren't profitable in Canada. My idea is based on a train called the Wolverine. It runs from Chicago - Ann Arbor - Detroit - Pontiac. The only local service they run on that line is the last one of the day, because there aren't any trains that will be delayed after it. Amtrak sells tickets on Greyhound buses from many places (Lansing, Flint, Kalamazoo, Toledo, Ortonville, Auburn Hills, just to name a few), and it is by far one of the best services on Amtrak, having basically wiped out the airlines between Chicago and Detroit. If you take the Acela Express, it has to stop frequently because of local service that's in the way, and you will rarely ride an Acela service that arrives on time.
golodhendil
Active Member
That's a very different attitude from just a couple of posts ago when you said so assuredly that:
Ignorance is not an excuse for repeatedly spewing nonsense. You can, you know, look up stuff before actually writing down words.
Not the best maps, but give a pretty good idea of the coverage by regional passenger service outside of the "cities".
Wrong wrong and wrong again. By FAR the best service for Amtrak (in terms of ridership, revenue and market share) is the Northeast, where it has taken half the rail/air market, a percentage that the Chicago-Detroit corridor doesn't even come close. And if airlines between these two places have been wiped out, what's with all the flights in the air right now going back and forth every 20-30 min?
The cause of problems for Acela also is not the local services (NER and all commuter services, etc) per se, but the lack of dedicated or bypass tracks throughout much of the section south of RI, and certain rules and regulations within CT that make matters worse than need be. The local services on the NEC with their "huge number of useless stations" carry more passengers and earn more revenue than the Acela Express.
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nfitz
Superstar
Good grief ... are we trying to emulate Amtrak? Why not just skip to the endgame and pave the railway tracks to create express highways.
golodhendil
Active Member
There is nothing wrong with emulating the truly positive aspects of Amtrak's experience. Canadian rail transport would have gone a big step forward if its share of Corridor traffic even comes close to approaching Amtrak's share of the NEC, for example.
Mapleson
Active Member
Canadian passenger rail service would take a large step forward owning and operating their own tracks. VIA is handicapped as much as GO is by CN/CP allowances. Passenger rail is mostly unprofitable. That's why the Federal goverment allowed CP/CN out from the obligation to provide passenger service and created VIA. Bus/road service is superior to train/rail service. However, that doesn't mean there is a place for passenger rail. Every destination you cut reduces overall ridership levels.
Second_in_pie
Senior Member
While this is true, I don't see why we can't just skip out the middle man and turn our rail network straight into a Europe-style one. It's quite possible, and trying to recreate the rail networks of old, mixed with the technology of today, would be fantastic for worse-off places like Northern Ontario, the Prairies, and the Maritimes that already have great rail networks, not to mention also enticing more decentralized growth in "Old Canada".
I'd go for an express service that just does Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal-Quebec, which are by far the biggest cities in the corridor. Then, there would be a regional service that does Windsor-London-Kitchener-Brampton-Toronto-Oshawa-Kingston, etc. Then, a local service to the tune of Toronto-Pickering-Oshawa-Coburg-Trenton-Belleville, etc. Ditching any of those services would be a bad move, and that's exactly how European rail systems work.
golodhendil
Active Member
Perhaps because, like it or not, as fellow North American autocentric societies with a relatively low density we face challenges to rail transport more similar to those faced by Amtrak than most European countries? Of course, Europe-type service should be our ultimate goal, and I don't think it's impossible that one day we will have something that approach that level of service, but that day would probably be some time from now, and sometimes we just have to take things in small(er) steps.
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Second_in_pie
Senior Member
Well I guess what I'm trying to figure is whether American rail is the logical next step for Canada's. Just concerning the NE Corridor, I think that style service should be the immediate goal for VIA rail and between Ontario and Quebec, on the Quebec-Windsor corridor. But for any other Canadian route, I don't think it'd be a huge upgrade to mimic American-style service.
saiho
New Member
i agree the we have went too far down route to low density sprawl, to make any major continental wide changes to the way we take transit in our lifetimes but that shouldn't stop us from starting and putting down the foundations for better transit. Contrary to what the politicians think.
reaperexpress
Senior Member
I don't know how well rail travel would work in the prairies, but your point is very valid. It's true that Amtrak faces many of the same problems that we do, but still have some differences.
While Amtrak shares many of the issues that we have and will have in the future, we do have some differences. Most notably, we have much more space, so building new tracks is much more viable. In a sense, Europe would be a middleman between us and the Japanese (who in my opinion have the best rail system in the world), but Japan is so insanely dense and different that we probably wouldn't do much good trying to copy them.
I would add an other service between the express and regional, just adding Kingston, because that would allow us to couple trains and split them between Ottawa and Montreal, providing faster service to Montreal.
Actually, if we are going to run super-local (Toronto-Pickering-Oshawa-Coburg...) service, then maybe that would be better served by buses, since few enough people would take it that it wouldn't be worth the track fees that CN and CP would charge VIA.