High Speed Rail: London - Kitchener-Waterloo - Pearson Airport - Toronto

[Allandale25]

• A commitment to proceed with an Environmental Assessment. I don't know what the status of this is but I recall it being in the Ontario 2016 budget as well.

Just to be specific, there is a projected date attached with the EA as noted here. The government says it will start in May 2018.

 

[Midtown Urbanist]

I think this is a worthwhile investment.

Places like London and Windsor are not only growing themselves, but becoming long-distance suburbs of Toronto.

The number of Toronto workers telecommuting from such locations is growing.

A city like London has a lot to offer - this kind of connection will be great for the region.

Are you suggesting that people from London or Windsor become daily commuters to Toronto?

This is very rarely the case with automobiles. HSR would be a more challenging and difficult commute between London/Windsor and Toronto than by car.

If HSR is uncompetitive with driving, and daily commuting by automobile does not currently occur due to the difficult and arduous nature of the distance involved, then who is going to be consist the daily ridership of the HSR?

 

[crs1026]

I don't understand this attitude.

Given HSR's large capital cost, it also seems pretty obvious for the government to move prudently. For one thing, I doubt that the provincial or federal governments have much in the way of bureaucratic expertise in HSR (which is why, I'd expect, that they appointed a Special Advisor in the first place). So, it seems pretty reasonable to seek outside and hopefully independent counsel. Second, we don't really have the financing models in place for a transit/transport project like HSR in Ontario. Third, no matter how you slice it, this is a project that will be decades long in the making. We know that the govt needs to conduct an Environmental Assessment. While this is going on, would it not make sense for the government to create an advisory body to oversee all the other aspects of the project?

Collenette's report has a very detailed section outlining Next Steps, none of which mention creating an advisory panel. He does propose creating a number of working groups that would do, you know, work. I don't see any announcement that any of these are being formed or given terms of reference or assigned deliverables. For the moment, the plan is just to talk about stuff.
The TPAP is also just a promise, as yet not commenced. It was supposed to have been started this year.
I guess we will see if these steps actually happen.

- Paul

 

[lead82]

Its sad that we have government that continues to waste money on pet projects like these. We do not need HSR and it’s a colossal waste of money. Improve the current VIA and GO service first to build a base. Waterloo and London as very spread out small cities. Having HSR will only he convenient to those who live right near the station. If one has to drive 20+ mins to get to a train and then take transit from the arrival station to get to final destination it won’t attract riders. There is no business case. It’s a pet train for the elite politicians. HSR would be too expensive to commute regularly. It would have the same business case pricing as UPX. At $27/trip it was a colossal failure. Even now it requires subsidies at a 1/3 the new price. HSR would need to be in the realm of $70-100 each way from Kitchener to Toronto. Who could afford that? Very few, so we would need mass subsidies to get riders.

Here is a case and point: Yesterday I had to drive out to Waterloo to visit a vendor. Their office is like many others close to highway 85. Yes it is a gruelling 2 hour reverse commute from Toronto. However, how would HSR or even VIA/GO help? I live 25 mins away from Union by subway. Taking the train would not only be longer but would only get me to Kitchener station. I could take the new LRT but that would require another 20min plus walking. In total even with HSR it would be ~3+hrs each way (25min subway+15min transfer+ 45min ride on HSR+5 min LRT transfer + 20min on LRT+10min walk). My point here is that HSR will not solve the last leg problem. If Kitchener had a dense downtown with most jobs surrounding a 10-15min walk/transit radius from the train station then it would work. That is not the case and most jobs are not in downtown Kitchener.

We are not Europe and we don’t have the densities nor the city structures to justify HSR. We have to build a base around conventional or HFR first. That is much cheaper to build and operate and would build up ridership over time.

HSR would be costly and most people would not afford.

The best investment would be to widen the 401 with HOV/HOT lane and expand conventional VIA HFR and GO service for a lot less cost and higher benefits to more people.

 

[Midtown Urbanist]

Nailed it, @lead82

If daily commuters are not an option for passengers, the only way HSR makes any sort of sense is if it is designed to compete with air travel and that whole market.

 

[kEiThZ]

It seems as though (once again) some people can’t get that a province is expected to cater to different needs in different parts of the province at the same time.

For Southwestern Ontario, HSR is about a lot more than commuting. It would connect the country’s financial centre, with the country’s technological centre of innovation, with the largest aviation hub. And if you add London, the regional centre for Southwestern Ontario. I fail to see why that should be held hostage to only the interests of GTA commuters. Last I checked Queen’s Park worked for more than just the 416 and the 905.

 

[Midtown Urbanist]

It seems as though (once again) some people can’t get that a province is expected to cater to different needs in different parts of the province at the same time.

For Southwestern Ontario, HSR is about a lot more than commuting. It would connect the country’s financial centre, with the country’s technological centre of innovation, with the largest aviation hub. And if you add London, the regional centre for Southwestern Ontario. I fail to see why that should be held hostage to only the interests of GTA commuters. Last I checked Queen’s Park worked for more than just the 416 and the 905.

Or we could take the large sums of money that HSR would cost and actually benefit Ontarians through tax breaks, dealing with hydro costs, or actually investing in a Relief Line that would serve more people per week than HSR would a year.

 

[kEiThZ]

Or we could take the large sums of money that HSR would cost and actually benefit Ontarians through tax breaks, dealing with hydro costs, or actually investing in a Relief Line that would serve more people per week than HSR would a year.

And how would that address what is a transportation need for Southwestern Ontario? The tech community has been asking for this. And they’ve said it puts them at a competitive disadvantage to other jurisdictions with better transport. San Jose and SF for example at least have links that allow their tech guys in SJ to work with their finance guys in SF. In Ontario, you need half a day for that meeting with traffic.

And $5 billion for HSR till London, is hardly “large sums of money”. Seems to me that you think Southwestern Ontario should sacrifice their priorities for the benefit of the whole province. By your logic, why should anybody in Kingston or Ottawa support the DRL? Doesn’t benefit them. Can that and give them “tax breaks” and help “dealing with hydro costs”.

Alson, once again the nice fallacy of mixing up regional transport with local transport. Should we shut down VIA Rail and Pearson Airport? The Scarborough Subway Extension will carry more riders than VIA. So by your logic.....

 

[crs1026]

That "gruelling 2-hour reverse commute" might not be so gruelling if you could have bought a coffee, did email, or just napped. None of which you can do in a car. For gosh sakes, we cannot keep creating bigger transportation solutions based on our current intensive use of the automobile. The 401 is jammed. A single HSR is cheaper than adding two lanes to the 401, and carries more people. We are spending more money widening and maintaining the 401. There is no viable route to twin it (and that would require more land and money)

Yes, we need to figure out the first and last mile, which means transforming local transit in small communities....and maybe not building key plants so far out in the hinterland (where we lose agricultural land, another hidden hit)

- Paul

 

[innsertnamehere]

No, HSR is certainly not cheaper than adding lanes to the 401. A widening of the 401 from 6 to 10 lanes for 5km in Cambridge is costing about $20 million per km. Doing that from Highway 8 to the 407 would therefor cost around $1 billion. $1 billion buys you half of the freight bypass, yet alone any of the actual infrastructure upgrades required to get GO to Kitchener in a meaningful way.

The entire 401 widening project from Highway 8 to the 403 will probably end up costing around $2 billion once you factor in the Collector-Express expansion from Milton. Still WAY less than all day GO to Kitchener. And that is doubling the width of the 401 for quite a length.

 

[rbt]

Nailed it, @lead82

If daily commuters are not an option for passengers,...

Why would anyone believe Ontario HSR is not for commuters? Most HSR lines have a fairly strong commutter ridership (whether daily or weekly between family home and a pied-a-terre). In some cases (Shikansen and Zurich/Bern/Basel) commuters make up 75% of all passengers.

I would expect a non-trivial %age of Ontario HSR ridership, if it is built, will be temporary commuters (contract work) who spend a couple weeks in a location. It will be a welcome alternative to sleeping in a hotel.

 

[Woodbridge_Heights]

Why can't HSR serve multiple profiles? There is the obvious profile as a connection to Pearson airport (and thus an extension of it's network). But for the daily commuters as well, while I don't see people commuting in to Toronto from London or Windsor, however the intervening stations would be used by commuters. Just as the UP Express, an service designed to be an airport shuttle, is used by commuters.

 

[Urban Sky]

And $5 billion for HSR till London, is hardly “large sums of money”.

I don't know where you get your cost figures from, but these are the cost figures I'm using and they are more like $10.78-$43.58 billion

http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/publications/pdfs/preliminary-business-case-hsr.pdf (pp.8+13)

http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/publications/pdfs/preliminary-business-case-hsr.pdf (pp.50+51)

 

[MisterF]

Its sad that we have government that continues to waste money on pet projects like these. We do not need HSR and it’s a colossal waste of money. Improve the current VIA and GO service first to build a base. Waterloo and London as very spread out small cities. Having HSR will only he convenient to those who live right near the station. If one has to drive 20+ mins to get to a train and then take transit from the arrival station to get to final destination it won’t attract riders. There is no business case. It’s a pet train for the elite politicians. HSR would be too expensive to commute regularly. It would have the same business case pricing as UPX. At $27/trip it was a colossal failure. Even now it requires subsidies at a 1/3 the new price. HSR would need to be in the realm of $70-100 each way from Kitchener to Toronto. Who could afford that? Very few, so we would need mass subsidies to get riders.

Here is a case and point: Yesterday I had to drive out to Waterloo to visit a vendor. Their office is like many others close to highway 85. Yes it is a gruelling 2 hour reverse commute from Toronto. However, how would HSR or even VIA/GO help? I live 25 mins away from Union by subway. Taking the train would not only be longer but would only get me to Kitchener station. I could take the new LRT but that would require another 20min plus walking. In total even with HSR it would be ~3+hrs each way (25min subway+15min transfer+ 45min ride on HSR+5 min LRT transfer + 20min on LRT+10min walk). My point here is that HSR will not solve the last leg problem. If Kitchener had a dense downtown with most jobs surrounding a 10-15min walk/transit radius from the train station then it would work. That is not the case and most jobs are not in downtown Kitchener.

We are not Europe and we don’t have the densities nor the city structures to justify HSR. We have to build a base around conventional or HFR first. That is much cheaper to build and operate and would build up ridership over time.

HSR would be costly and most people would not afford.

The best investment would be to widen the 401 with HOV/HOT lane and expand conventional VIA HFR and GO service for a lot less cost and higher benefits to more people.

No offence but "We are not Europe" is just about the most useless thing people on this forum regularly say. And just because HSR (combined with RER in the GTA and LRT in Waterloo Region) doesn't help your situation that doesn't mean it won't be incredibly useful for a lot of people. Vastly upgraded rail service between Toronto and Kitchener is badly needed and will have a big price tag even if it's conventional speed. But these investments will help make the corridor less car dependent and create more concentrated growth. Of course we're not Europe but that doesn't mean there's no business case for this and, more broadly, we can still shift the transportation balance away from driving.

 

[zmonkey]

They better put a price on the train for riders before they do anything significant. Go transit passes from the GTA suburbs push $400/month. If this is higher than that, it won’t be a commuter line. If it need’s massive government subsidies, it won’t get built.