Moose Rail (National Capital Region)

[JohnnyRenton]

Without stating VIA's mandate, and cause d'etre, that's highly unlikely. It hasn't happened in the past, if anything, alliances with local providers has proven mutually beneficial. Keep in mind also that HFR is not going to run on its own RoW! That is to be privately financed, and almost inevitably electrified.

And all that is why the details matter so much. Maybe VIA didn't operate that way in the past, and if I had to put money on one outcome, I would probably put it on VIA continuing down the same path. But this is also a proposal they wouldn't have put forward in the past, so if that can change, so to can other aspects of their operations.

With a privately financed RoW, VIA can avoid the often unsavoury situation of having to sleep with a partner in an 'arranged marriage'. That will be the role of the owner of the RoW, and that will include freight provision as well as passenger, albeit VIA won't sign-on unless passenger gets to choose and control usage, at least during daylight hours.

I can't see anything but a win for both VIA and Moose, or whomever provides local service. In the case of Halifax, for instance, VIA was *invited* to bid.

In theory it should be a win for VIA and MOOSE. And in some ways it is an opportune time for MOOSE to be attempting this proposal. But if VIA doesn't want to play ball and bring them along for the ride its going to be a tough battle to get anything together for those lines.

 

[steveintoronto]

Don't know if this has been discussed prior, I know that there are doubts as to the financial viability of Moose, even though the concept itself looks excellent, so I too have a question for Mr Potvin:
If Moose does get financing to build, would it then be pragmatic, if not desirable, for this to become a PPP with OC Transpo running the operation fully integrated with Presto, while ownership remains private? Would it not be more practical to attract investment with a guaranteed operating contract with OC Transpo in hand?

 

[JohnnyRenton]

Don't know if this has been discussed prior, I know that there are doubts as to the financial viability of Moose, even though the concept itself looks excellent, so I too have a question for Mr Potvin:
If Moose does get financing to build, would it then be pragmatic, if not desirable, for this to become a PPP with OC Transpo running the operation fully integrated with Presto, while ownership remains private? Would it not be more practical to attract investment with a guaranteed operating contract with OC Transpo in hand?

I think an approach like that would almost immediately shut down the idea of this proposal.

The proposal is about making real estate in the places it serves more lucrative to developers by attracting people who might not consider living there with the current commuting situation, but would if they could just commute by train. For the most part there is nothing particularly wrong with that idea (you could argue it is an attempt to skip over the Greenbelt and could lead to sprawl but lets just ignore that).

From a skeptics perspective the concern would be that MOOSE goes through the regulatory hurdles, gets the stations in place, gets the service going, and then cannot financially sustain it, leaving the cities, municipalities, or province in a position where they either have to pick up the service or let it disappear completely. Then you have governments who are going to face backlash by people accusing them of picking up a financially unviable service that only benefits developers, or backlash from people who have had their service cancelled if no one takes over it. In either case you will have some very livid people.

I think a very real scenario like that is part of the reason why this proposal is only getting a lukewarm response right now.

 

[SaugeenJunction]

I'm in a digging mood and found this on TVO from this summer:

Can a private company profit from commuter rail service in the Ottawa-Gatineau region?

 

[steveintoronto]

I'm in a digging mood and found this on TVO from this summer:

Can a private company profit from commuter rail service in the Ottawa-Gatineau region?

[...]
Director general Joseph Potvin says Moose, unlike other transit operators, will make its money on the real estate around train stations and not simply from the fare box.

“It’s a property-oriented project, which means we’re not just thinking about this from a transit planner’s point of view,” Potvin says. That means, for example, that Moose isn’t simply thinking about morning and evening rush hour service.

So it it's based on being a "loss-leader" for real-estate, how is 'competition' by HFR going to harm their operation? If HFR is carrying traffic that they wanted to, it *saves* them money!

[...] Asked about potential risks—if, for example, the hoped-for 35,000 daily riders don’t materialize—Potvin emphasizes that what matters most in the beginning is the demand for real estate around stations, so long as the long-term ridership potential is there.

And, he says, the first steps of Moose’s plan are relatively modest and incremental. He says a train station doesn’t need to be costly to work, and all the rail on which lines Moose is planning to operate already exist. [...]

HFR should bull ahead, and Moose should follow.

 

[JohnnyRenton]

From the TVO article...

The group’s business plan is to offer its train service on rail lines that already exist (but are owned by other companies, such as Via) and recruit local communities and landowners to own the train stations they would serve. In exchange, Moose would get some fraction of the increase in property values in the form of a fee paid for the train service.

I would be curious if others read this statement the way I do. What it sounds like is that as a tradeoff for Moose providing this service, they are able to collect fees every time there is an increase in property values, which essentially amounts to a tax on all future property value increases, but paid to a private company instead of a local government.

Now, if this only applied to brand new developments, built within the vicinity of a station, and purchased by people who understood these conditions ahead of time, then I guess that is a choice those buyers make. But what if there is existing development within the vicinity of one of these new stations? Would they still be subject to this same fee if the value of their homes went up, even though they had lived there prior to Moose and had never agreed to what amounts to an agreement between a consumer and private company?

If you take the example of Smiths Falls, which already has VIA service, and could have much greater frequency with HFR, how would such an arrangement make sense? They would get the benefit of potential property value increases and better marketability as a commuter town without having its home owners having to pay a "fee" for increased service. Maybe I am reading it all wrong, but that is the impression I am getting.

 

[JohnnyRenton]

Relevant to this are a number of stories I came across this afternoon doing some research.

In Gatineau they are looking at the possibility of a Tramway that would run from Aylmer to to downtown Gatineau (aka Hull), with possible connections over the Prince of Wales bridge and connection to the Le Plateau area to the North (which is the route that would also lead to Wakefield).
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/tramway-ottawa-gatineau-proposal-1.3769612

There are also STO public consultations taking place on the West-end transit discussion.
http://www.sto.ca/index.php?id=658&L=en

You also have the Gatineau and Ottawa mayors meeting to discuss better transit connections between the two cities for when the Confederation line opens (this might seem like nothing but the two cities have often been hostile towards each other when it comes to interprovincial transit so this is a very positive development).
http://www.ottawasun.com/2017/01/19/ottawa-gatineau-mayors-talking-seamless-transit-system

And the NCC has also started to talk about, even if just for a half hour, regional transportation policies, something it has basically avoided doing for as long as I've followed Ottawa-Gatineau urban development news.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ncc-meeting-nepean-point-lrt-transit-1.3942853

I bring these up because I think the climate in which Moose was first proposed is changing very quickly. None of these are about commuter rail, but Gatineau would be using one of the corridors Moose has flagged for its purposes, and with the discussion of interprovincial transit actually becoming meaningful a proper, modern, cross border transit link could become a reality, or at least under construction within a decade. That might seem like a long time but a long term, expandable transit connection between the two cities would be no small task.

Not to say Moose couldn't have its place somewhere in the National Capital Region, in some form, but its current proposal looks less and less plausible as attitudes towards transit and rail seem to be rapidly evolving.

 

[steveintoronto]

I would be curious if others read this statement the way I do. What it sounds like is that as a tradeoff for Moose providing this service, they are able to collect fees every time there is an increase in property values, which essentially amounts to a tax on all future property value increases, but paid to a private company instead of a local government.

The answer is right in the TVO article, it's a *loss leader* (when a supermarket sells something below cost):

[...]
“The train is to the properties the way an elevator is to a building: you can imagine if a building owner said, ‘We’re only going to run the elevator a few times at rush hour, when everyone needs it.’ That’s not going to work,” he says.

The general concept is called land-value capture, and it’s not mysterious: while the exact numbers vary, there’s a long history of transit improvements increasing the value of real estate around major bus and rail stations. And some public transportation operators have capitalized on it. Los Angeles built a streetcar network in the early part of the 20th century as a real-estate development scheme, and Hong Kong is widely considered a world leader in the practice. [...]

http://tvo.org/article/current-affa...er-rail-service-in-the-ottawa-gatineau-region

Many turn of the last century railways did this. The Metropolitan Railway in London had it as its major 'cause d'etre'. The Belt Line in Toronto was based on this.

[...]
There was a final period of Metropolitan expansion after the war. In 1925 the Met opened a branch from Moor Park to Watford in partnership with the London and North Eastern Railway. Meanwhile, the Met had become increasingly involved in the suburban housing boom, speculatively developing residential estates on property it owned in Middlesex, Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire. Its surplus lands committee had administered the Met estates.

The first development was the Willesden Park Estate, laid out near Willesden Green station in the mid-1880s. In 1919, developments were taken over by the Metropolitan Railway Country Estates Limited, which handled the sale of building plots, and (in the earlier years) the design and construction of houses. The Metropolitan estates built between the wars became known as Metro Land. As part of Metro Land, an extension built from Wembley Park to Stanmore opened in December 1932. The branch was the first in the country to have centralised traffic control; all train movements were controlled from the signal box at Wembley Park.[...]

http://www.ltmcollection.org/museum/glossary.html?IXglossary=Metropolitan Railway (Met Rly)

As this pertains to HFR, again, I must make clear: If HFR does this for local estate development, then how can the backers of Moose be affronted?

 

[JohnnyRenton]

The answer is right in the TVO article, it's a *loss leader* (when a supermarket sells something below cost):

I am aware of what loss leaders are and I know that supermarkets are also not just doing it as a goodwill gesture. It is a calculated move that will result in other purchases being made when someone goes in for that super cheap item that will ultimately make up for what they are losing on that one specific product, and then some. If it wasn't good for the overall bottom, line they wouldn't bother.

Moose is a real estate company. You could also consider them an investment company because they are hedging future profits on the fees they collect from estimated, but ultimately unknown, future property value increases. Offering rail service is simply an ancillary service to help increase revenue through real estate transactions and those property value increase fees. And it is that last point that I have a lot of questions and concerns about. Are they collecting fees for new developments only, developments in which the property owners have agreed to this arrangement? Or do they get to collect fees on existing properties near the stations? What say do existing residents have in brokering a deal with Moose? Can Moose even get by providing service to these communities if only new developments pay the fee, or do they need existing property owners to pay up as well? There are a lot of concerns with that particular aspect of the business that have not been adequately focused on.

Many turn of the last century railways did this. The Metropolitan Railway in London had it as its major 'cause d'etre'. The Belt Line in Toronto was based on this.

http://www.ltmcollection.org/museum/glossary.html?IXglossary=Metropolitan Railway (Met Rly)

As this pertains to HFR, again, I must make clear: If HFR does this for local estate development, then how can the backers of Moose be affronted?

There is nothing wrong with development being driven by a rail line. And there is nothing wrong with Moose wanting to make a go of it either.

But with HFR I don't see how Moose's proposition would work in communities that would get better, or perhaps all new, rail service with VIA (and just commuter service, but intercity service as well). If HFR is bringing your community increased rail service that local developers could leverage as a way to market new home sales, and result in an increase to peoples property values, then why would you need an alternative? Not just an alternative, but one that also requires those communities to pay a fee on future property value increases in order to bring the service to them? All your doing is adding an additional tax on people for a service that is largely going to redundant if the town/community has increased service with VIA HFR. Moose could have made sense when they were the sole option for increased or new rail service. But along the proposed HFR route, their pitch is a really tough sell.

Not only that but the lines to Smiths Falls and Alexandria were the best opportunities Moose had for getting some kind of rail service started as those lines are in fully working order and would require little to no investment in the infrastructure.

For the options that Moose does have left to make a go of it they not only have to invest in a fleet of commuter trains, but they are going to have to invest in fixing up the rail lines to a suitable standard. And since the rail lines on the Quebec side would have to terminate on the Quebec side, as there is no chance they will be allowed to use the Trillium Line right of way, that leaves them with just 2 possible lines they can offer the kind of exclusivity in service they need to make their business model work. Both those lines are also in pretty rough shape, in the sections where the rail is even still in place, and would require a substantial amount of money to bring up to an operable condition.

There are also a lot of other issues with trying to start a commuter rail service of any kind in Ottawa but perhaps the biggest problem that exists right now is any service would not provide a direct link downtown. I get that the station on Trembley is kind of close, and will have an LRT connection in just under a year and a half. But this is far from ideal and makes commuter rail a tough sell as being a good value for money when it doesn't even offer convenient, direct to downtown service. For commuter rail on either side of the river to really be worth while there needs to be a connection with both downtown Ottawa and downtown Gatineau (formerly Hull). And that means a tunnel, and interprovincial cooperation, and the NCC, and money. So in short, not a project that is going to happen anytime soon (at least not until the NCC makes a serious attempt to address cross border transportation in the National Capital region). And without that missing link there is only so far expansion of commuter and intercity service can go. In fact Ottawa itself provides a perfect parallel example, its LRT network. If they hadn't spent the money to put a tunnel through the downtown core, opting to run it on surface streets instead, it would have resulted in a rubbish LRT network that would have the same bottlenecks that the buses do right now. So before they started sending LRT out to the the suburbs they built the backbone needed. Commuter rail is no different and until a missing link is in place it'll never have a real chance of being something useful and worthwhile.

 

[SaugeenJunction]

From Moose Facebook page:

NEWS FROM THE CANADIAN TRANSPORTATION AGENCY (CTA)… as you know Moose Rail has applied for a “Certificate of Fitness”. The response has been both gratifying and instructional. Staff of the CTA are continuing to guide Moose through the next phase in development.

Moose is therefore moving forward with financing Phase II– Financial Model Feasibility Study. Interestingly Moose has found a couple of other initiatives that are moving to an “open market” infrastructure investment platform.

While there are similarities in models nothing yet compares to Moose's sustainability financing. Stay tuned for more information.

 

[JohnnyRenton]

From Moose Facebook page:

NEWS FROM THE CANADIAN TRANSPORTATION AGENCY (CTA)… as you know Moose Rail has applied for a “Certificate of Fitness”. The response has been both gratifying and instructional. Staff of the CTA are continuing to guide Moose through the next phase in development.

Moose is therefore moving forward with financing Phase II– Financial Model Feasibility Study. Interestingly Moose has found a couple of other initiatives that are moving to an “open market” infrastructure investment platform.

While there are similarities in models nothing yet compares to Moose's sustainability financing. Stay tuned for more information.

Having seen that update I decided to Google it up and do some more reading on this project, initially to see if I could find some of the CTA documents for some truly exciting reading. There was really only one document related to their filing, a letter to the CTA by MOOSE that is a response to the initial feedback the CTA gave to their application for a Certificate of Fitness. It is interesting from a process perspective and the main message the CTA seems to be sending is that "you need to be more prepared and more serious about being a railway operator".

But much more interesting were a few articles on their complaints against the City of Ottawa and their handling of the Prince of Wales Bridge. In 2011 MOOSE actually filed its first complaint to the CTA, saying that the city had allowed the bridge to fall into a state of disrepair thus impacting its ability to be used for rail services. This may have been fine, if the city had followed procedure and let the CTA know its intent and allowed them to rule that this was okay, which it did not. The CTA actually ruled in favour of MOOSE, essentially stating that the rail line was still an active railway and the city had an obligation to keep it ready for future use.

After that ruling the conflict seems to have subsided, publicly at least, and nothing much was said about it for several years.

Edit: It seems I was wrong. In February 2015 MOOSE put out a release asking the CTA to enforce its earlier 2012 ruling when the City of Ottawa released a proposal to convert the Prince of Wales bridge into a multi-use pathway. Though the release didn't get much media attention they have clearly been very vigilant about the issue of access to the Prince of Wales bridge.

In July 2016 MOOSE once again raised the issue in the media when the City of Ottawa altered the approach to the bridge, which severed rail access to it. There are several articles relating to this issue but one in particular from Ottawa Valley Insider is super interesting. This line in the article is what first caught my attention "Moose Consortium director general, Joseph Potvin, explained it is the Ottawa-owned stretch of track that travels out of the province of Ontario and into the province of Quebec that makes the Moose commuter rail project a federally regulated railway."

It then follows that up with a quote by Potvin, who says "That’s by the far the most important single kilometre of the entire 400 kilometres,”

Then, after discussing the earlier 2011 filing to the CTA, Potvin makes this statement "Our purpose is not to create grief to the City of Ottawa but to protect an asset…if we cannot cross that bridge, we don’t have Moose.”

So here is the question I have...why would they not have MOOSE if they cannot cross the bridge? Is it because the potential real estate market on the Quebec is really so strong that it will be what makes the difference between success and failure for MOOSE? Is it about being able to bring some of the lines trains to Bayview station? Or, is it that something about this project hinges on them being a federally regulated railway as opposed to starting off being a provincially regulated one if they decided to simply start service only on the Ontario or Quebec side? The earlier comment by Potvin, about them being a federally regulated railway, really stands out to me. Perhaps someone here has some insight into what differences being federally or provincially regulated could mean for the MOOSE business model.

The story does not stop there though. An article from early January 2017 stated that MOOSE is preparing a legal challenge against the City of Ottawa and the CTA if they fail to get a response in regards to their proposal. Perhaps the positive tone of their recent Facebook post suggest they are not going to pursue that route at the moment, but we will see how long that goodwill lasts.

This also leads to another very important question, who would win if this became a legal battle. In order for MOOSE to operate it needs to use what is currently the Trillium Line, which the city plans to expand and utilize further. But because its an LRT line, heavy rail cannot be mixed in with that traffic. So essentially a court would have to decide if this remains a rail line, killing the Trillium Line, or if it becomes decommissioned for that purpose and becomes an LRT line, killing MOOSE (according to Potvin's remarks).

It is easy to see this becoming a very big story in Ottawa as Phase 2 plans for LRT network continue to ramp up which means they will need to settle this once and for all before they can start construction on the Trillium Line expansion in a few years.

 

[steveintoronto]

Having seen that update I decided to Google it up and do some more reading on this project,...

Excellent post! Whether I agree with all points or not, great research and reference, will elaborate on a few points later.

 

[dowlingm]

Maybe this is why I'm reading about Ottawa and Gatineau talking about bringing O-Train across the POWB when for years this has been poohpoohed - they are being forced to do *something*.

 

[steveintoronto]

Maybe this is why I'm reading about Ottawa and Gatineau talking about bringing O-Train across the POWB when for years this has been poohpoohed - they are being forced to do *something*.

Two stories up on-line just in the past few days:

Ottawa approves Stage 2 LRT, turns to planning Gatineau crossing
Jim Watson gets go-ahead to start formal talks with Gatineau about rail link over Ottawa River
By Kate Porter, CBC News Posted: Mar 08, 2017 6:58 PM ET Last Updated: Mar 09, 2017 8:50 AM ET

Even as Ottawa city councillors voted Wednesday to approve a sweeping, expensive plan to extend light rail east, west and south by 2023, they were already contemplating the next stage and finally connecting the rail system to Gatineau in the north.

Councillors gave Mayor Jim Watson a mandate to start formal talks with his Gatineau counterpart in the hope of speeding up plans to convert the old rail bridge over the Ottawa River to light rail.

"This is something that has been talked about for a couple of decades," said Watson.

• O-Train extension to Gatineau urged in NCC report

"The reason why a previous council bought the Prince of Wales Bridge was ultimately to connect to (Gatineau's) transit system because so many people live in Ottawa and work in Gatineau, and vice versa. It just makes good sense."

But the file has been a complicated one because it entails two cities and two provinces, in addition to the federal government. The plan on the books has been to create a pedestrian bridge until the crossing could be used for transit more than a decade from now.

What's changed, Watson suggested, is that federal Liberal MPs in the region are very interested in linking the two cities' transit systems.

Watson underlined that the city still doesn't have the money to extend the O-Train to the Taché station of Gatineau's Rapidbus system, but the city wants to lay the groundwork in case money becomes available and the project could happen in the next five to seven years.

In the second stage of Ottawa's LRT project, tracks would extend to Moodie and Baseline in the west by 2023, Trim Road in the east by 2022, and to the rural south and Ottawa airport by 2021. (City of Ottawa)

Council OKs $3.6B Stage 2 LRT procurement
The main discussion at council Wednesday led council to approve the second stage of its light rail project, to begin construction after the downtown line opens in 2018.

• Stage 2 of Ottawa's LRT to extend to Moodie, cost more
• Airport CEO asks city for more seamless LRT ride to downtown
• Barrhaven, Riverside South councillors make peace with new LRT plan

"The plan with Stage 2 is the largest and the most extensive and detailed infrastructure work program in the history of the City of Ottawa," said the city's transportation general manager John Manconi as the discussion began.

Most councillors took time to thank staff for all their work, and while councillors supported the project overall, some had outlying concerns.

Kanata-North's Marianne Wilkinson, for instance, was disappointed Orléans will see light rail when Kanata doesn't even have a rapid bus line yet, but said she would "hold her nose" and vote for the extensions.

She said she was hoping for a "golden tree to provide the funds" to take light rail out to Kanata, given the city has sped up the environmental assessment for it.

College Ward's Rick Chiarelli reiterated his concerns about transparency. He's suggested the expropriations and land transactions the city will undertake for Stage 2 should be public and not left to an audit after all deals are finished.

Riley Brockington urged the city to spend as much as possible of the $10 million set aside for public art on local artists.

The plan is for the city to put out requests for proposals by late May, but it must still secure more than $1 billion in federal funding — or tendering and construction could be delayed, said the mayor.

The provincial funding was lined up last June.

Councillors also made minor tweaks to the sprawling Stage 2 plan, such as asking staff to look into building a park and ride lot at the future Moodie station and building public washrooms in the Place d'Orléans station.

The motion to give the mayor a mandate to start talks with Gatineau about improved transit linkages:
[...continues with on-page document reader...]

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ottawa-lrt-stage-2-gatineau-1.4016013

City looks to work with Gatineau on rail crossing
Council gives mayor formal go-ahead to start formal talks about converting Prince of Wales bridge

By Jennifer McIntosh
Not a day goes by without Mayor Jim Watson being asked about connectivity across the river into Gatineau, he said.

As council debated the procurement plan and alignment of the city’s Stage 2 light rail plan, they also voted to go full speed ahead on plans to work with the city of Gatineau and the province of Quebec on a project that would use the Prince of Wales bridge to extend transit across the river.

Watson said with so many Ottawa residents working in Gatineau and vice versa, the project would just make good sense.

Watson noted former mayor Bob Chiarelli's insight in purchasing the bridge.

“This is something that’s been talked about for a couple of decades,” he said.

An interprovincial report by the National Capital Commission in 2013 recommended the extension of the OTrain across the Prince of Wales bridge to better integrate transit between the two downtown cores.

Watson also pitched the idea again at the last NCC board meeting in January. He told the board of directors that the intent of purchasing it several years ago was to convert it to a rail bridge.

The bridge would connect the OTrain to the Taché Station of Gatineau’s Rapidbus system.

The city’s numbers show that just converting the bridge for pedestrian use would cost $10.5 million.

The estimate for converting the bridge for rail would be anywhere from $20 to $40 million.

Watson said there’s definitely not enough money in the city’s coffers for the project, but expressed hope that the project could get funding given the support of area Members of Parliament, including Greg Fergus, who represents Hull-Aylmer.

Watson said it would likely be five to seven years before the project really gets underway.

“If the federal government came to the table with funding today, we’d be prepared to start the environmental assessment process,” he said. “Connectivity between the cities will benefit tourism for both Ottawa and Gatineau.”

http://www.ottawacommunitynews.com/...looks-to-work-with-gatineau-on-rail-crossing/
(Pics and links removed from both articles to save character space)

 

[Allandale25]

Some news from Moose Rail:

https://www.letsgomoose.ca/wp-conte...sortiaNA-MooseConsortium_2017-07-01aPDF-1.pdf