News   Mar 28, 2024
 103     0 
News   Mar 28, 2024
 174     0 
News   Mar 28, 2024
 247     0 

VIA Rail

Forking the Stouffville line a couple of hundred metres north of Major MacKenzie to run 7km east from 43.916412, -79.258181 to the CPR line would seem to me a reasonable cost way to get non-VIA service to a Pickering airport site. It would also provide a diversion route for VIA in the event that it could not access the CP/Metrolinx Don Branch into Toronto for any reason.
 
Forking the Stouffville line a couple of hundred metres north of Major MacKenzie to run 7km east from 43.916412, -79.258181 to the CPR line would seem to me a reasonable cost way to get non-VIA service to a Pickering airport site. It would also provide a diversion route for VIA in the event that it could not access the CP/Metrolinx Don Branch into Toronto for any reason.
Was this not Metrolinx's solution to offer rail service to Peterborough and avoid CP's Agincourt yard and mainline when the studied it?
 
It depends. I’m not clear on what you are collecting data about.
If you are trying to define the universe of passenger trips that are happening between Toronto and Quebec City - certainly there will be lots of people riding HFR Montreal-Quebec, so they ought to be in that universe.
But if you are trying to capture only trips that are in the universe of originating in the Pickering Airport catchment area, there will be fewer trips between that catchment area and Quebec City, versus trips to Ottawa or Montreal. So you could discount
I can’t imagine the business case for Pickering surviving on top of HFR, especially if the two are held to the same financing model and thresholds and the same cost recovery expectations.
Even $1B of that airport investment added to upgrade HFR would give a service that is fast and frequent enough that east enders would find preferable to a Pickering-Ottawa or Pickering-Montreal flight. That’s the gap in economics that would bring a 125 mph+, grade separated, almost HSRish quality to HFR instead of it being a slightly better than LRCish thing.
A further $2-3B with the right push to CN and CP, would fund enough RER capacity across the top or middle of the City so that access to Pearson from Markham and Durham would be very convenient, as well as meeting other needs.
Pearson will remain the hub for international and transocean flights, I can’t see much incentive for any airline (except maybe Air Canada, and only to a couple of destinations) to split this traffic across two airports. Getting people to Pearson for that traffic, and using VIA to reduce short haul flights, sure seems like a better strategy.
Having said that, it’s great that the Pickering data is brought up to date, if only so that we can try to level the playing field with HFR.

- Paul

By the numbers I can’t imagine an efficient transportation system with out both Pickering Airport and HFR.

The question is, how many shorthaul slots and passengers could be shifted from air to rail to free up airside capacity at Toronto Pearson, and could VIA take it?

Currently 4.1 million passengers take Via rail on the Toronto , Ottawa , Montreal line.
Of the 49.5 million passengers handled by Pearson, We have determined that an estimated 6.4 million people travelled by air between Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Quebec City in 2017, on 232 daily flights. The number of flights is important as they are using about 15% of Pearson’s slot capacity, carrying 12% of it current passengers flow.

Using the GTAA’s master plan forecast of 3.1 percent annual passenger growth means theoretically there might be an additional 5 million air passengers travelling between Toronto and Ottawa-Montreal-Quebec City by its max point, 2036 (YYZs maximum airside capacity). Most of this growth would be achieved by upsized aircraft not by taking up additional slots.

Assuming that we followed the German model, which calls for a banned on local flights to save airport capacity for international flights and for which we have a reasonable same day rail service. That’s 11.4 million more via riders , for 15.5 yearly rail passengers.

Meanwhile at Pearson, which is already a level 3 slot allocated airport, the draconian action has just bought a bit more time on the passenger growth curve, about 2-4 years depending on which forecast you believe. More importantly it provided the slots to service the new routes to other parts of the world enabling more efficient point to point service.

Between 2014 to 2018 passenger numbers grew by 10 million, from 39 million to 49 million, this growth is well above projections and is accelerating.

So maxing out HFR to Ottawa and Montreal bought us another 2-4 years of Capacity before Pearson hits the slot wall ( this would shift it from 2028 to 2032 ), and the max passenger wall (70 -85 million, 2030- 2036)

Part of this assumes that smaller regional aircraft are banned from Pearson ( exec jets, RJs & Q400 service to Timmins, thunderbay etc ) to free up slot space. These would be Pickerings first customers assuming that at least one runway is open at the new Pickering airport by 2028.

These two to four years are more important that you might think, as it is the difference between rushing Pickering ( cutting corners) and doing it right, which will take a minimum of 10 years. Either way we need to start build Pickering now, and we need to wake up VIA to the issue and it’s possible roll. But the real question is , do we have the political will to do even half of what is needed?
 
In Asia, the response is to build or expand airports, in Europe this is also being debated. Istanbul’s new airport is the latest example.
The European problem, although less extreme than Toronto’s due to existing high levels of
rail service and much lower growth, is captured in this graphic:

027ADD65-01C1-406D-B75B-F7E49AB3D4EC.jpeg
 
Forking the Stouffville line a couple of hundred metres north of Major MacKenzie to run 7km east from 43.916412, -79.258181 to the CPR line would seem to me a reasonable cost way to get non-VIA service to a Pickering airport site.
Seems unfortunate, not to use the CP line that literally borders the airport, rather than build a new link. Could build the airport at the current Markham Airport location, which borders the Stouffville line ... politically impossible though I'd think.

Was this not Metrolinx's solution to offer rail service to Peterborough and avoid CP's Agincourt yard and mainline when the studied it?
I don't think I've seen that study - is it available somewhere?

Yes, it was one of the options
I'd hope one option was doing something along the 407 corridor and/or the CN/Hydro corridor ... though serviing Unionville might be advantagous.

Though perhaps that line would work better if it had two spurs ... one to Stouffville/Uxbridge (and Lindsay?) and the other to Claremont and Peterborough.
 
Between 2014 to 2018 passenger numbers grew by 10 million, from 39 million to 49 million, this growth is well above projections and is accelerating.

This trope again. Why won't anyone call him on it? This growth has mostly happened because of the growth of Air Canada's hub. That is not regional demand for travel. So if there's a need for capacity, the GTAA can very easily compel operators to prioritize local traffic and have AC grow their other hubs. Incidentally, this is exactly what is happening in Montreal.
 
In Asia, the response is to build or expand airports, in Europe this is also being debated.

Ignores the massive investment in rail in Asia which dwarfs the investment in airports. Europe is not expanding substantially or building new airports. Mark himself mentions the German policy of discouraging short-haul flying.

Istanbul’s new airport is the latest example.

A replacement for an existing airport. Not a supplement to it. Not to mention Turkish airlines is simply stealing traffic from the Middle Eastern carriers rather than generating lots of new traffic at this stage. That said, Turkey is 80 million and growing and industrializing. They genuinely need more capacity and Istanbul is their national hub. There's also that whole vainglorious dictator factor. Surely it's a meme by now.....an authoritarian leader building a massive and luxurious airport. How much of all this applies to the GTA and Canada?
 
Why is Pickering being discussed when there is a thread specifically for it?

The thing that ticks me off about the VIA plan for higher-frequency and more exclusive line service is that it puts a higher priority on the Montreal to Quebec segment than it does on Union to London which has far higher ridership and much more so on a passenger per km travelled basis. That seems like Politics 101 and is made worse by the fact that the highways and congestion between London and Toronto are far busier than the ones between Quebec and Montreal making the issue of reliable transportation far more crucial in SWO than Central Quebec.
 
Why is Pickering being discussed when there is a thread specifically for it?

The thing that ticks me off about the VIA plan for higher-frequency and more exclusive line service is that it puts a higher priority on the Montreal to Quebec segment than it does on Union to London which has far higher ridership and much more so on a passenger per km travelled basis. That seems like Politics 101 and is made worse by the fact that the highways and congestion between London and Toronto are far busier than the ones between Quebec and Montreal making the issue of reliable transportation far more crucial in SWO than Central Quebec.

This is called buying votes from as many people as possible. A line ending in Montreal would not garner enough Liberal votes in Quebec. For the foreseeable future, rail to the west is all about GO. VIA is not the top priority even if there is great merit for improving London to Toronto. GO upgrade projects need to happen first.
 
Why is Pickering being discussed when there is a thread specifically for it?

The thing that ticks me off about the VIA plan for higher-frequency and more exclusive line service is that it puts a higher priority on the Montreal to Quebec segment than it does on Union to London which has far higher ridership and much more so on a passenger per km travelled basis. That seems like Politics 101 and is made worse by the fact that the highways and congestion between London and Toronto are far busier than the ones between Quebec and Montreal making the issue of reliable transportation far more crucial in SWO than Central Quebec.
Presumably VIA want to make a case for buying the track between Montreal and Quebec on the north shore, and therefore have to persuade government that it's worth the $. The London-Bayview Jct. route isn't likely to be purchasable at any price.
 
Presumably VIA want to make a case for buying the track between Montreal and Quebec on the north shore, and therefore have to persuade government that it's worth the $.
Nothing to do with that. It's everything to do with politics.

Recall that VIA's 1983(?) high-speed rail proposal included Edmonton-Calgary in addition to Windsor-Quebec City (and wasn't there a Mirabel spur?). Which was all about politics too.

Thanks!!

I guess I did see it, as there was already a copy in my downloads folder from 2017!

Option C adds about 5 km and 10 minutes to the travel time to Union, over Option A (the original alignment). (Option B is just an alternative routing around Agincourt yard).

The costing is fascinating. Using the current corridor to Union, and grade-separating the CP, the capital cost is $1.5 billion - and this is a 2010 report.

I keep saying that there's no way that VIA is going to get in and out of Toronto for less than $1 billion. This implies it's closer to $2 billion. I don't understand how they claim to do the entire project to Quebec City for $4 billion. It makes no sense to me.
 
Last edited:
Why is Pickering being discussed when there is a thread specifically for it?

Because a troll got away with hijacking another thread, to flog his business proposition.

The thing that ticks me off about the VIA plan for higher-frequency and more exclusive line service is that it puts a higher priority on the Montreal to Quebec segment than it does on Union to London which has far higher ridership and much more so on a passenger per km travelled basis.

They didn't even go west to Pearson. The reality is that the west of Union is a mess. And until Metrolinx figures it all out, VIA can't plan expansions in that direction. And lest we forget, Queen's Park didn't even involve VIA with their High Speed Rail plan to London. Are we sure that Queen's Park wants VIA to increase service beyond Union?
 
Last edited:

Back
Top