VIA Rail

[lenaitch]

None of this implies building stations in between. I am firmly opposed to any erosion of the Northumberland Forest and related Greenbelt. GO stations along that line would be toxic as they would inevitably drive development where it should not be tolerated.

That would be a virtually impossible to sell and maintain, considering that both the Barrie, Richmond Hill and Stouffville lines do just that.

 

[nfitz]

Guelph is just as much (if not more so) a bedroom community for Kitchener-Waterloo-Cambridge - a population of about 600,000.

There's now only about 7 km from the eastern suburbs of Kitchener (east of Breslau) to the western Guelph suburbs. And about the same from Guelph to Cambridge.

The area in that triangle is designated for development by the provincial government.

 

[lead82]

If only politicians understood that the way to fix the housing crisis is to build more in smaller towns. We need the Guelphs and Peterboroughs to boom and grow. Then connect them with other centres by rail with frequent service. Yes they become somewhat bedroom communities but they also inject life into these retirement communities and bring much better services. Families move in and make use of near empty schools. They bring demands for retail and other services and improvements to parks and recreational facilities. This is what’s needed. We can’t fit everyone into the GTA. We should use the built cities and towns we have and intensity and expand them. Each small city should be a growth area especially if it’s on a rail line. London, Guelph, Kitchener. Brandtford, Cobourg, etc..

 

[micheal_can]

If only politicians understood that the way to fix the housing crisis is to build more in smaller towns. We need the Guelphs and Peterboroughs to boom and grow. Then connect them with other centres by rail with frequent service. Yes they become somewhat bedroom communities but they also inject life into these retirement communities and bring much better services. Families move in and make use of near empty schools. They bring demands for retail and other services and improvements to parks and recreational facilities. This is what’s needed. We can’t fit everyone into the GTA. We should use the built cities and towns we have and intensity and expand them. Each small city should be a growth area especially if it’s on a rail line. London, Guelph, Kitchener. Brandtford, Cobourg, etc..

The problem with growth in the GTA/southern ON is tied to why people settled there in the first place. It is effectively one of 2 of Canada's "grocery store".You cannot eat concrete. If Via were to run daily trains between Toronto and Sudbury, and the Northlander returns and runs 7 days a week each way, Then it helps open up central ON for real development. Double the populations of the towns along those routes. They have the land that is not nearly as valuable for food production.

 

[roger1818]

If only politicians understood that the way to fix the housing crisis is to build more in smaller towns. We need the Guelphs and Peterboroughs to boom and grow. Then connect them with other centres by rail with frequent service. Yes they become somewhat bedroom communities but they also inject life into these retirement communities and bring much better services. Families move in and make use of near empty schools. They bring demands for retail and other services and improvements to parks and recreational facilities. This is what’s needed. We can’t fit everyone into the GTA. We should use the built cities and towns we have and intensity and expand them. Each small city should be a growth area especially if it’s on a rail line. London, Guelph, Kitchener. Brandtford, Cobourg, etc..

That would only be sustainable if they banned (or severally limited) the construction of single family homes. Sprawling suburbs cost the municipality more in infrastructure maintenance than they raise in taxes (See Hemson Consulting Report, 2021). If the focus is on the so called missing middle (duplexes, townhomes, and low rise apartments), especially if in the form of a walkable neighbourhood to reduce car dependence, the development will be sustainable, as the infrastructure maintenance can be amortized over more taxpayers . A further advantage of this approach is that construction of missing middle buildings are the fastest, way to build housing, with the least amount of labour on a per unit basis (a duplex takes less than twice as long to build than a SFH and a 4 unit townhome takes less than twice as long as a duplex).

The problem is, most people move to these exurbs so that they can afford a McMansion, not a sustainable community.

 

[Admiral Beez]

I've booked my first VIA rail trip since before the pandemic, Toronto to Quebec City and return.

• Toronto-Ottawa-Quebec shows a total transit time of 11 hours, 54 minutes, including a 55 min layover in Ottawa.
• Quebec-Montreal-Toronto shows a transit time of 10 hours, 23 minutes, including a 1 hour, 57 min layover in Montreal.

The Ottawa route was cheaper but a little longer. Wife and I both went to university in Ottawa and haven't taken the train there together since 1995, so it will be a little nostalgic. The longer two hour layover in Montreal will give us time for shopping at the station, though it doesn't look like much. What do you recommend we do around the Montreal station for a weekday between 11:25 am and 1:25 pm?

We'll see how long the actual transit times are due to freight trains or other delays. But no matter, we're taking the train for the experience so we'll pack lots of snacks and reading. The time to drive the same trip would be at least nine and half hours including meal and gas stops, so not much savings there, and the train is far more pleasant.

 

[Urban Sky]

The problem with growth in the GTA/southern ON is tied to why people settled there in the first place. It is effectively one of 2 of Canada's "grocery store".You cannot eat concrete. If Via were to run daily trains between Toronto and Sudbury, and the Northlander returns and runs 7 days a week each way, Then it helps open up central ON for real development. Double the populations of the towns along those routes. They have the land that is not nearly as valuable for food production.

Nobody moves from Toronto towards Sudbury just because there suddenly is a daily train service between the two…

 

[yrt+viva=1system]

If only politicians understood that the way to fix the housing crisis is to build more in smaller towns. We need the Guelphs and Peterboroughs to boom and grow. Then connect them with other centres by rail with frequent service. Yes they become somewhat bedroom communities but they also inject life into these retirement communities and bring much better services. Families move in and make use of near empty schools. They bring demands for retail and other services and improvements to parks and recreational facilities. This is what’s needed. We can’t fit everyone into the GTA. We should use the built cities and towns we have and intensity and expand them. Each small city should be a growth area especially if it’s on a rail line. London, Guelph, Kitchener. Brandtford, Cobourg, etc..

What I've always found peculiar is how in the Northeast US there's literally dozens of small towns that have direct train service on a daily basis to a from major urban centres: eg. Boston, New York, Newark, Providence etc. Then there is also Chicago and META. The stations in these towns/smaller cities are very basic usually something akin Markham GO but without a huge parking lot. Perhaps this is due to historical development and how rail service shaped development.

 

[Irishmonk]

Guelph is just as much (if not more so) a bedroom community for Kitchener-Waterloo-Cambridge - a population of about 600,000.

There's now only about 7 km from the eastern suburbs of Kitchener (east of Breslau) to the western Guelph suburbs. And about the same from Guelph to Cambridge.

The area in that triangle is designated for development by the provincial government.

I wonder how long it'll take for the triangle to fill in, and what the anticipated population will be of that merged 4 city not-quite-a-metropolis. Certainly it could top 1 million. Hopefully there is a legit HSR/HFR system at that point.

 

[roger1818]

What I've always found peculiar is how in the Northeast US there's literally dozens of small towns that have direct train service on a daily basis to a from major urban centres: eg. Boston, New York, Newark, Providence etc. Then there is also Chicago and META. The stations in these towns/smaller cities are very basic usually something akin Markham GO but without a huge parking lot. Perhaps this is due to historical development and how rail service shaped development.

Yes, a lot of that was historical development. Compared to even those American cities, Toronto is very young. Don't forget, until the 70's, Montreal was Canada's major business centre. It was the FLQ crisis that caused many businesses to flee Montreal and Toronto took its place.

 

[lenaitch]

What I've always found peculiar is how in the Northeast US there's literally dozens of small towns that have direct train service on a daily basis to a from major urban centres: eg. Boston, New York, Newark, Providence etc. Then there is also Chicago and META. The stations in these towns/smaller cities are very basic usually something akin Markham GO but without a huge parking lot. Perhaps this is due to historical development and how rail service shaped development.

I think you have to look at the comparative population densities and how it is distributed. The US 'northeast corridor is around 50Mn. The Chicago Metropolitan area ('Chicagoland') is comparable in both population and area to the Greater Golden Horseshoe Area, and some of its included communities are significant industrial areas, ports, etc. in their own right. They aren't just bedrooms feeding the centre (OK, we have Hamilton).

They also have state funding of AMTRAK.

The US is slightly smaller than us in area but has ten times the population. At least on both coasts, they don't have to deal with the concept of multiple hours between major population centres.

 

[Sunnyside]

Guelph is just as much (if not more so) a bedroom community for Kitchener-Waterloo-Cambridge - a population of about 600,000.

There's now only about 7 km from the eastern suburbs of Kitchener (east of Breslau) to the western Guelph suburbs. And about the same from Guelph to Cambridge.

The area in that triangle is designated for development by the provincial government.

Since when is the “triangle” actually designated for development? I know Kitchener and Cambridge have plenty of land to expand into to the east/NE, but not nearly enough to reach Guelph- especially since Guelph seems to mostly plan on growing southward.

 

[reaperexpress]

I think you have to look at the comparative population densities and how it is distributed. The US 'northeast corridor is around 50Mn. The Chicago Metropolitan area ('Chicagoland') is comparable in both population and area to the Greater Golden Horseshoe Area, and some of its included communities are significant industrial areas, ports, etc. in their own right. They aren't just bedrooms feeding the centre (OK, we have Hamilton).

They also have state funding of AMTRAK.

The US is slightly smaller than us in area but has ten times the population. At least on both coasts, they don't have to deal with the concept of multiple hours between major population centres.

In terms of population density and distribution, southern Ontario and Québec are far superior to the U.S. Northeast. In Canada we have a lot of suburbs, but at least we don't have much exurbs.

Open up Google Maps and zoom into any spot in the Northeastern U.S. which appears to be an undeveloped area outside of a city.

Chances are you will actually find houses scattered arbitrarily across the landscape.

Now do the same in Canada.

Chances are you will find farms or forests. The houses which do exist are either grouped into hamlets or are former farmhouses.

So while the population of the Northeastern U.S. is far higher than southern Ontario/Québec, a shocking number of them are living in single-family houses randomly scattered through the countryside. Those people would be nearly impossible to serve using anything other than cars. At least Canadian suburbs are built at a sufficient density that there can be some basic transit service, and a reasonable chance that there is a grocery store within cycling distance.

Keep in mind that it not only matters how many people/destinations are accessible from train stations, it also matters what percentage of people/destinations can be reached. Because in order for a trip to be served by rail, the origin AND the destination both need to be accessible, it's not good enough to just have one or the other. In the U.S. if there are residences or destinations accessible by train, there is a much higher chance that the opposite end of their associated trips is not reasonably reachable by train/transit, making those land uses much less relevant in the calculation of potential rail demand.

In other words, the potential rail demand generated by a given building near a train station in Canada will be higher than an equivalent building the same distance from an equivalent train station in the U.S.

 

[nfitz]

Since when is the “triangle” actually designated for development? I know Kitchener and Cambridge have plenty of land to expand into to the east/NE, but not nearly enough to reach Guelph- especially since Guelph seems to mostly plan on growing southward.

2005. McGuinty's Places to Grow Act

Look in this article about how the province is overriding the Region of Waterloo's growth plan - pushing the edge of the urban area, for the next few decades, to Shantz Station Road - much further east than the Region had planned, in only the next 30 years - adding an additional 200,000 to the Region's planned 2051 population - mostly through sprawl rather than densification.

I don't have my hands on the City of Guelph 2051 plan - but as you can see below, Guelph's border on the west already matches the urban boundary - so their growth can't be there.

The 3-km between Guelph and Waterloo Region is part of the Guelph/Eramosa township (north section) and of Wellington County. The province also meddled with Wellington's plan, but not much in this area. But Wellington are planning a new industrial estate along the Highway 25 corridor, north of the CN Guelph Subdivision, between County Road 32 and Whitelaw Road - further pushing urbanization into the triangle. Certainly the entire triangle isn't designated. But encroachment continues. And this is just the 2051. How long until the urban area combines? 2081? 2101?

BTW, note in the changed plan that the urban area of Baden will join the urban area of St. Jacobs.

With all the fuss about the new lands being taken out of the Greenbelt plan, I'm surprised there's been less discussion about these particular changes - which are very granular, and designate particular lots of land - some quite small!

REGION OF WATERLOO - 2022 PLAN

PROVINCE OF ONTARIO 2023 PLAN - UNAPPEALABLE

 

[lead82]

Nobody moves from Toronto towards Sudbury just because there suddenly is a daily train service between the two…

Daily no, but what if the services was 3-4 times a day? What if housing was so much cheaper and one could come to Toronto for office trips or medical / shopping 2x a week. It would make Sudbury a community that is an easy commute to Toronto.

My point is that it opens up more possibilities. Not just in Sudbury but places in between from Parry Sound to Orilia and so on. Better transportation options make places more liveable and attractive.

Why don’t people move to Sudbury now? Well it’s hard to get there and hard to travel from there and not many services there. It’s a sprawling small city and has poor links to the massive population centre 300km to its south.

This is just one example. Why don’t people move to Niagara? Same issue. It’s closer to the GTA but limited transportation options.

Trains unlock possibilities. I look at a country like Sweden. 10M people, yes much smaller but similar cool climate. Stockholm is only 1.5M people but their train services puts Canada to shame. You can live in a city like Uppsala (pop. 200K) and take a train to Stockholm that’s about 70km away. It takes 40-50mins and runs hourly. Compare this to Barrie and Toronto. Barrie is similar distance but has much slower and less frequent service. It limits development and ability to live there. Yes with the restoration of GO train to Barrie. South Barrie is booming.

If only VIA had expanded and provided more service to SW Ontario or even between Toronto and Ottawa/Montreal it would let more people live in smaller communities yet still enjoy reasonable access to big cities services.