Mihairokov
Senior Member
China's solution is elevated everything, in this case three separate HSR/standard rail lines:
Otherwise pretty flat:
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Alto - High Speed Rail (Toronto-Quebec City)
- Thread starter innsertnamehere
- Start date
Otherwise pretty flat:
micheal_can
Senior Member
China - the place where OSHA is not applicable.China's solution is elevated everything, in this case three separate HSR/standard rail lines:
View attachment 681649
Otherwise pretty flat:
View attachment 681651
I am thinking ours will be more like something in Europe.
CapitalSeven
Senior Member
The Canadian Shield occupies about 8 million square kilometers. The HSR ROW once complete, will occupy about 2 square kilometers, some of which is already graded (if the straight parts of the old line are reused). I'm all for minimizing the wetlands impact but I'm not panicking. Methinks the beavers will survive.
urbanclient
Active Member
The NIMBYs of b-f-nowheresville when the line cuts through the outskirts of town will be out in force though, how dare you filthy city slickers try to take my "prime" real estate? Who do you think puts food on your table huh (Sarcasm)
micheal_can
Senior Member
Those types of people exist everywhere. I remember a road in Halifax was being widened from 3 lanes to 4 lanes which would require the cutting down of 4 trees. The protesting was cray over it. We need to do things in a smart way that is both progressive and respectful of the environment. Lean one way or the other and either costs go up or the project does not proceed. This is where a slow moving passenger train serving the communities along the line may placate them, as they will see they are benefiting in some way.
urbanclient
Active Member
Seriously where were the NIMBYs when we needed them? Back when the pioneers and colonists chopped down hundreds of thousands of square kilometres of Canadian forest to get cheap construction materials and firewood?
micheal_can
Senior Member
I hate to say it, but they were the FN peoples, and we all know how that turned out.
CapitalSeven
Senior Member
CapitalSeven
Senior Member
This is a real concern, and here I'm repeating myself. With the move from HFR to HSR, the benefit to rural residents nears zero, while the inconveniences imposed by the smoothing and segregation of the ROW increase. Do we really think rural politicians won't turn on the project and use the luxury train of the liberal laurentian elite as a big beating stick? If I were planning this, I'd be looking at any way possible to avoid impacting places like Tweed and Perth, or find a way to run one or two Toonerville Trolleys that actually benefit them.
Mihairokov
Senior Member
If people want to live in the woods they 1) shouldn't expect services and 2) shouldn't have a say on things that the rest of the population wants and needs.
Understand the issue if the line is cutting through a town but if it's just plowing through trees I don't see why they should have any say whatsoever. Letting everyone have an opinion and veto is how we've ended up where we are today.
micheal_can
Senior Member
That is why we can't have nice things. Obviously HSR to Tweed and Perth does not make sense. It does not mean they should just be ignored.
lenaitch
Senior Member
Then perhaps people living in the urban shouldn't get to use the 'the woods' as a playground.
You see how this works?
Mihairokov
Senior Member
I agree with this, actually; but not all of us own cottages we can escape to every weekend, either.
Regardless, people in small towns making requests of large-scale infrastructure projects isn't really equivalent in this scenario. I don't think they should have the ability to block and/or alter projects that would otherwise benefit millions.
urbanclient
Active Member
Rail to Tweed and Perth can be an entirely separate project. Those two towns have a population so low (6000) that if teleported to a CMA, they wouldn't even warrant a tram, subway or regular rail station, much less a high speed rail station. But worst case let's say they do get ignored, these two towns get nothing but negative externalities; exaggeration here, but would a tyranny of the small minority be preferred over a tyranny of the majority? Should the government kowtow to 12,000 people and risk project costs ballooning for a project likely to cost nearly $100 billion? Best case scenario, those two towns have an economic output of $840 million a year (12,000*70,000). Alto by conservative estimates is supposed to raise Canadian GDP by $20 billion a year. It just makes environmental and economic sense to bear some social costs in rural areas to reap benefits for the whole country. If I assume correctly that rural residents care about protecting the clean air and water, the pristine wilderness, then the drastic reduction of car and plane emissions in the long-run from a high speed rail project would be one of the best ways to do it. Hastings and Lanark counties are about 8000 square kilometres total, even if Alto took up all 8000 sqkm of their land, that would still be a drop in the bucket compared to the 7 million square kilometres of untouched Canadian wild land. In this pristine wilderness there are countless ecosystems that would benefit from reduced carbon emissions, the majority of which is generated by urbanites. Lastly, large portions of Hastings and Lanark counties are not even considered untouched wild land as they have been developed by humans for agriculture and natural resource extraction.
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Northern Light
Superstar
This take, phrased like this, is essentially inciting people to engage in maximum conflict with maximum indignation.
Why would you want to do that?
No different than in cities, people should always be heard when raising legitimate concerns.
I've spent a lot of time explaining to Planners, Builders, Architects and UT'ers how to smooth acceptance of change.
It need not involve confrontation, nor patronizing talk. That strategy almost always backfires. Many here have benefited from my advice and seen projects move much more quickly as a result.
HSR would be no different.
You don't understand why a citizen of Canada, and a Resident of Ontario should have any say at all in how their government behaves and how their money is spent, and how their quality of life is affected?
I don't understand that at all.
Of course we ought not to let people ardently opposed to change to be needlessly obstructive; nor should we allow the ill informed to alter or delay a project for imaginary problems.
But allowing people to have input, to request information, to be consulted at some level is not at all unreasonable, in the absence of same, you just abolished both democracy and minority rights.
No need for all this inflammatory stuff.
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