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VIA Rail

^ Not sure how that comment relates to VIA Rail (and the one added about the cover), which is the topic of this thread. But budgets are political documents. The government of the day highlights their priorities. Take a look at the last CPC budget and the first LPC one.
 
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kEiThZ said:
The Liberals have implemented Gender Based Analysis Plus (GBA+). Required for all major procurement and policies.
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That's certainly more specific to this thread than a previous comment someone else made. Thanks. To that end, here are the specific references in the budget.

The Government also recognizes the importance of ensuring that women-owned businesses have equal opportunity to participate in federal procurement opportunities. In this regard, e-procurement will support the Government’s commitment as part of the new Women Entrepreneurship Strategy to increase the participation rate for women-owned small and medium-sized businesses in the federal procurement supply chain to 15 per cent, and efforts to ensure that diverse suppliers are provided with more opportunities to compete in federal procurement processes.
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The results of GBA+ have informed the Government’s business innovation reforms. A clear result is the new Women Entrepreneurship Strategy—a comprehensive effort to break down the barriers to growth-oriented entrepreneurship that will include new direct funding from the regional development agencies targeted to women entrepreneurs, mentorship and skills training, as well as targets for federal procurement from women-led business. A strong example of GBA+ at work is the Business Development Bank of Canada’s (BDC’s) accessibility review. The BDC conducted the review to examine how accessible its products and services were to women entrepreneurs. The review motivated a number of new actions by the BDC, including a commitment to make available $1.4 billion in financing to women entrepreneurs, as well as service improvements and a renewed focus on training staff on unconscious biases.
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Allandale25 said:
Why? Can you expand on your thinking?
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Haven't VIA themselves said the current situation of sharing with freight is not sustainable?

So what do they do if HFR doesn't happen?

I think the government is probably searching behind the scenes for a private sector partner to take this on. What happens if they can't find one?

I will never understand this country's reluctance to fund major infrastructure.
 
kEiThZ said:
I think the government is probably searching behind the scenes for a private sector partner to take this on. What happens if they can't find one?

I will never understand this country's reluctance to fund major infrastructure.
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The budget statement seems quite definitive that there is an equipment RFP of some sort in play. If so, that’s good news.

But the fact that it’s behind the scenes is puzzling. I know VIA put out a call some time ago, and didn’t get much respose. I also recall a tender for expertise to write a spec, so I’m sure they know what they want.

I could speculate that NAFTA is putting them on the horns of a dilemma, and maybe Bombardier is also. So maybe they do have some really tricky manouvering to do.


- Paul
 
Few things on VIA. I think the Feds have held off on a number for fleet cost because procurement will determine the cost. It’s clear though, via the press and VIA employees on twitter that procurement is a go.

On HFR, it’s too early to straight up green light that. The $8 million for studies very well may include environmental assessments for HFR, and detailed design.

Fleet approval is key, and the new fleet will be up to HFR standards. When we get a better look at what fleet is procured, details like if locomotives are dual-mode (for compatibility in the Mount Royal tunnel) will shed better light on the status of HFR.

I know we all (including me) are impatient for a straight up HFR approval, but we won’t see that in any budget. The infrastructure bank will most likely approve it, with a large-scale announcement to follow (speculation, but the logical process of an announcement of this magnitude). The fleet is the first step, and I’d assume an HFR announcement is to follow at some point.

In the meantime, I’d love for us to speculate on what VIA will buy. There’s a lot of very sexy rolling stock out there.
 
Spent some of Saturday and Sunday at Corktown Common with VIA and GO sets rolling by. The VIA consists in particular are woeful mismashes of liveries and wraps, with the remaining LRCs in yellow-blue especially sad looking. I just wish if the marketing "geniuses" want to have these livery changes and wraps that they only commit to them when they can roll them out fleet wide rather than a car here or there.

Between the Canada 150 wrap and the 40th anniversary wrap there seems to be a leaning away from the green of the LRC rebuilds to a silver based scheme. For a solid loco+trailers consist the 40th scheme would be pretty tasty but so would a consist green - the current situation looks like a six year old was putting together trainsets from a random selection of cars from different agencies - with some of them looking like they haven't been painted or even washed in quite some time.
 
Reecemartin said:
Anyone want to render Via logos on the Brightline Sets? I would not complain about that rolling into Union.
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I don't have time to photoshop right now, but wow, they're beautiful. Would give VIA a very modern look. The only thing I am unsure of is if the passenger cars are compatible with low-floor boarding.

Brightline-High-Speed-Train-Service.jpg
 
alexanderglista said:
The only thing I am unsure of is if the passenger cars are compatible with low-floor boarding.
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Which begs a question. Has there been any indication that VIA is advancing high-platform construction as a corridor wide strategy? They have work going at Ottawa, and eventually may do so at Toronto - but is that the limit? High platforms may not be compatible with stops along way where freights operate, but some further locations (Windsor, London, Kitchener's new station, and possibly Kingston, given some addition of platform trackage) would benefit and do not have conflict with freight.

The various announcements about station upgrades hint at "platform improvements", but I haven't seen direct reference to high level platforms in announcements or VIA's strategy documents.

- Paul
 
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