VIA Rail

[Allandale25]

anyone know whats the status of the new fleet testing?

any update on whats happening at the factory?

Received via email today:

​

​ ​ ​ ​ ​ VIA Préférence # ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Hello, A few weeks ago, VIA Rail’s Transportation Training Centre in Toronto allowed exclusive access to our state-of-the-art New Fleet simulator. Be sure to check out this never-before-seen footage right here! Before riding the rails towards Windsor or Québec City aboard a brand-new train, our locomotive engineers are spending several weeks honing their skills on the simulator. For Jonathan Cooke, Senior Manager, Operating Practices and Transportation Training, providing world-class technology to a team of seasoned men and women ensures a safe and enjoyable travel experience under any conditions. Happy travels! ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​

 

[Bordercollie]

The Canadian, or any transcontinental service, might never again achieve high ridership. It is just impractical. The one way trip from Toronto to Vancouver takes 4 days. I remember that back in the late 199x, it was running faster and taking 3 days. Still - you can take a 7-days vacation, allocate 2 of those days for the air travel, and have 5 days remaining for your destination. But traveling by train, you would need 11 days in total to get the same 5 days at the destination. Who has time for that?

The Canadian can remain in place as a niche service, partly for the rail fan tourists, and partly for places that have no highway connection. As such, its total carbon footprint will remain a very tiny drop in the whole bucket, even if the CO2 output per passenger-mile is high.

But speaking of rail services as a way to reduce the carbon emission by air travel, the focus should be on medium length corridors, up to 1,000 - 1,500 km total length and the whole trip taking less than 24 hours. Obviously, Quebec City - Montreal - Toronto - Windsor / Niagara Falls is the prime choice. Other candidates could be:

Banff - Calgary - Edmonton ( - Jasper)
Ontario Northland
Maybe, "The Ocean" is not hopeless. The distance from Montreal to Halifax is 1,200 km, a reasonably fast train (80 kph) could cover it in just 15 h or less. An evening + night. There are many destinations in between, too.
Winnipeg - Regina - Calgary - Banff, and Regina - Saskatoon - Edmonton - Jasper might work as well. Many small towns in between, and the landscape is generally friendly for adding extra tracks where needed.

Dont forget that it's not for everyone to travel from Toronto to Vancouver. It's also for stop in between, which you cant travel by plane.

 

[Rainforest]

Dont forget that it's not for everyone to travel from Toronto to Vancouver. It's also for stop in between, which you cant travel by plane.

Of course. I am not saying "cancel The Canadian"; let it operate and serve its existing market.

However, when planning additional services, shorter routes could work better for a number of reasons:

1) Departure and arrival times. Trips up to ~ 7 h long could be scheduled to run during daytime; longer trips could operate overnight. A single transcontinental trip can't be scheduled to depart / arrive at the perfect time for every segment.

2) Equipment to better match the usage. Shorter trips can use economy cars only, longer trips can have sleepers.

3) Delays that happened in another segment won't affect your segment.

 

[Bordercollie]

Of course. I am not saying "cancel The Canadian"; let it operate and serve its existing market.

However, when planning additional services, shorter routes could work better for a number of reasons:

1) Departure and arrival times. Trips up to ~ 7 h long could be scheduled to run during daytime; longer trips could operate overnight. A single transcontinental trip can't be scheduled to depart / arrive at the perfect time for every segment.

2) Equipment to better match the usage. Shorter trips can use economy cars only, longer trips can have sleepers.

3) Delays that happened in another segment won't affect your segment.

Is that convenient for customers?

 

[Rainforest]

Is that convenient for customers?

For local customers, that should be the most convenient.

 

[Bordercollie]

For local customers, that should be the most convenient.

But then travelling cross country you would need to stay in a hotel before catching your next train. And if the trains only run in daylight it will take longer than 4 days to travel from Toronto to Vancouver.

Local trains make sense to connect urban areas. But other than Winnipeg there are no fancy stations.

Edmonton should have a lounge at least for sleeper customers, and it doesn't help that it's in the middle of nowhere.

 

[Urban Sky]

For local customers, that should be the most convenient.

What exactly is the problem you are trying to fix and why can’t buses deliver the same (if not: better) frequencies, travel times, connectivity and reliability at a dramatically lower cost to the taxpayer?

 

[cplchanb]

Of course. I am not saying "cancel The Canadian"; let it operate and serve its existing market.

However, when planning additional services, shorter routes could work better for a number of reasons:

1) Departure and arrival times. Trips up to ~ 7 h long could be scheduled to run during daytime; longer trips could operate overnight. A single transcontinental trip can't be scheduled to depart / arrive at the perfect time for every segment.

2) Equipment to better match the usage. Shorter trips can use economy cars only, longer trips can have sleepers.

3) Delays that happened in another segment won't affect your segment.

they should split the canadian into an east and west route catered towards commuters, with the full segment as the more touristy train.
yes there are remote communities who rely on this train but they dont need it to go to the other side of the continent. that way the service can be more reliable and
you wont have the snowball effect of delays from the polar ends.

 

[Rainforest]

But then travelling cross country you would need to stay in a hotel before catching your next train. And if the trains only run in daylight it will take longer than 4 days to travel from Toronto to Vancouver.

Local trains make sense to connect urban areas. But other than Winnipeg there are no fancy stations.

Edmonton should have a lounge at least for sleeper customers, and it doesn't help that it's in the middle of nowhere.

Obviously, riders that travel all the way across prefer a train that goes all the way across.

My idea is that there exist other potential markets: riders who want to travel 300, 600, 1000 km or so by train. And, it might be easier to serve those with shorter train routes. In addition to the existing transcontinental, not instead of it.

 

[Rainforest]

What exactly is the problem you are trying to fix and why can’t buses deliver the same (if not: better) frequencies, travel times, connectivity and reliability at a dramatically lower cost to the taxpayer?

Basically, trying to figure out where trains can be (somewhat) competitive. Wherever buses can do the job, and there isn't enough demand for a train, let it be handled by buses.

However:

1) An overnight trip in the sleeper train car is a lot more comfortable than an overnight bus trip. Say, a Montreal-Halifax or Toronto-Halifax trip on a train could be somewhat pleasant; if there is enough potential demand to upgrade the tracks and improve The Ocean's speed and frequency. In contrast, noone but a person who really has no other choice will make that kind of trip on a bus.

2) For shorter connections, trains may be viable if there is enough demand. Toronto and Montreal are connected by flights, buses, and trains. So, the riders have many choices, and yet the trains do not run empty.

 

[Urban Sky]

But speaking of rail services as a way to reduce the carbon emission by air travel, the focus should be on medium length corridors, up to 1,000 - 1,500 km total length and the whole trip taking less than 24 hours. Obviously, Quebec City - Montreal - Toronto - Windsor / Niagara Falls is the prime choice. Other candidates could be:

[...]

Winnipeg - Regina - Calgary - Banff, and Regina - Saskatoon - Edmonton - Jasper might work as well. Many small towns in between, and the landscape is generally friendly for adding extra tracks where needed.

Basically, trying to figure out where trains can be (somewhat) competitive. Wherever buses can do the job, and there isn't enough demand for a train, let it be handled by buses.

I would like to urge anyone dreaming about new intercity rail services outside the Q-W corridor to purchase the newest edition of the Canada and Alaska Timetable and to explore the sad state of intercity bus service in most parts of this country. With only one single bus per week (!) linking Winnipeg and Regina, there are currently twice as many trains linking Western and Eastern Canada than there are buses:

Source: Canada and Alaska Timetable (July 2022 Edition)

However:

1) An overnight trip in the sleeper train car is a lot more comfortable than an overnight bus trip. Say, a Montreal-Halifax or Toronto-Halifax trip on a train could be somewhat pleasant; if there is enough potential demand to upgrade the tracks and improve The Ocean's speed and frequency. In contrast, noone but a person who really has no other choice will make that kind of trip on a bus.

2) For shorter connections, trains may be viable if there is enough demand. Toronto and Montreal are connected by flights, buses, and trains. So, the riders have many choices, and yet the trains do not run empty.

Obviously, riders that travel all the way across prefer a train that goes all the way across.

My idea is that there exist other potential markets: riders who want to travel 300, 600, 1000 km or so by train. And, it might be easier to serve those with shorter train routes. In addition to the existing transcontinental, not instead of it.

Don't get me wrong, I'm a huge fan of VIA's non-Corridor routes and at a combined cost of approximately $1 per Canadian ($37.8M in 2018: $20.0M for Remote Services, $11.3M for the Ocean and $6.5M for the Canadian), I believe they provide good value for money for Canadians. However, I struggle to see any way to provide any intercity passenger rail service outside of the Quebec-Windsor Corridor, as the cost of upgrading, doubling or realigning the tracks in order to gain travel times and reliability which would be remotely competitive against driving a car would be prohibitively expensive, especially given that the operating costs for rail in a non-Corridor context seems to be one order of magnitude higher than for buses (VIA's direct operating costs per timetable-km are approximately 10 times that of Ontario Northland's bus operations).

 

[Urban Sky]

they should split the canadian into an east and west route catered towards commuters, with the full segment as the more touristy train.
yes there are remote communities who rely on this train but they dont need it to go to the other side of the continent. that way the service can be more reliable and
you wont have the snowball effect of delays from the polar ends.

Splitting the Canadian in Winnipeg would either exacerbate the OTP issues (by stealing dwell time from Toronto and Vancouver) or force the cancelation of the (already partially suspended) third frequency, while the forced break of journey would impose the triple inconvenience of an even longer travel time, having to switch trains and adding a forced layover in a city which ranks very low at most tourists' priorities.

Generous padding has allowed VIA to mitigate the worst impacts on its tourists in Sleeper Class (Train #2 only arrived once in the last 2 months late enough to miss the last connections to Montreal and Toronto and Train #1 only arrived once late at all):

Train #1 dep. date in TRTO	Arrival time in VCVR (scheduled: 08:00)	Train #2 dep. date in VCVR	Arrival time in TRTO (scheduled: 14:29)
May 11	Presumably on-time (1:50h early in Abbotsford)	May 13	19:35 (5:06h late)
May 15	08:07 (7' late)	May 17	13:56 (33' early)
May 18	05:03 (2:57h early)	May 20	15:49 (1:20h late)
May 22	07:43 (17' early)	May 23	12:14 (2:15h early)
May 25	Presumably on-time (2:05h early in Abbotsford)	May 27	13:05 (1:24h early)
May 29	Presumably on-time (54' late in Boston Bar)	May 30	14:39 (10' late)
June 1	05:42 (2:18h early)	June 3	13:52 (36' early)
June 5	04:30 (3:30h early)	June 6	12:31 (1:58 early)
June 8	04:16 (3:44h early)	June 10	18:06 (3:37h late)
June 12	05:31 (2:29h early)	June 13	Presumably on-time (1:13h late in Parry Sound)
June 15	Presumably on-time (1:34h late in Boston Bar)	June 17	13:23 (1:06h early)
June 19	05:51 (2:09h early)	June 20	Presumably on-time (30' early in Washago)
June 22	05:10 (2:50h early)	June 24	16:40 (2:11h late)
June 26	05:28 (2:32h early)	June 27	13:33 (56' early)
June 29	04:20 (3:40h early)	July 1	17:34 (3:05h late)
July 3	05:22 (2:38h early)	July 4	14:50 (21' late)
July 6	Presumably on-time (48' early in Boston Bar)	July 8	16:04 (1:35h, late, but departed 0:30h late in VCVR)
July 10	06:02 (1:58h early)	July 11	16:48 (2:19h late, but departed 3:28h late in VCVR)

However, for intercity passengers, there is unfortunately no amount of padding which would simultaneously achieve a competitive travel time and an acceptable on-time performance. Therefore, I really struggle to imagine a schedule which improves anything over the Status Quo, without risking VIA's business with international tourists (i.e. the only reason this service recovers anything close to its direct operating costs)...

 

[Bureaucromancer]

The only real fix would seem.to be bringing in a series of regional trains in addition to through runs…. whicih with alternate day schedules does start to open a path to increased frequency without having to run the actual transcon daily.

Rainforests actual proposal would seem to be treating the route as series of basically point to point operations rather than a true corridor, and frankly it seem the only way to provide an even marginally viable service for both transcontinental and intercity passengers.

 

[smallspy]

The only real fix would seem.to be bringing in a series of regional trains in addition to through runs…. whicih with alternate day schedules does start to open a path to increased frequency without having to run the actual transcon daily.

Rainforests actual proposal would seem to be treating the route as series of basically point to point operations rather than a true corridor, and frankly it seem the only way to provide an even marginally viable service for both transcontinental and intercity passengers.

But there's a very, very serious problem with it that it can not possibly fix.

The sleeper passengers, and especially those in Prestige, are the ones paying the way for the rest of the passengers on the Canadian.

If you "fix" the train by running a series of regional trains, all you are doing is increasing the costs (dramatically) without allowing for more of those high-paying (and therefore subsidizing) trips in sleeper.

Dan

 

[Rainforest]

I am comparing to other places on the planet. In Europe, train is the preferred mode for intercity trips 100 km to 500 km long; flying is not much faster when the time to get to / from the airport is taken into account, while driving is tiresome. For distances > 500 km, flying is faster but train trips are easy for those who wish to take a train. No problems with scheduled frequencies, no multi-hour schedule padding to account for the freight priority.

Of course, the environment in Canada / North America is different. Lower density except within a few metropolitan areas, much fewer rail lines with 2+ parallel tracks, and a different ownership structure.