lenaitch
Senior Member
what I meant was the ONTC infrastructure (trackage, ROW, etc.) is a viable freight operation in spite of the Northlander, not because of it. I'm not sure the Gaspe route is the same.
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VIA Rail
- Thread starter ehlow
- Start date
Urban Sky
Senior Member
I believe the main benificiary of the first two stages was a cement factory owned by Quebec Inc.’s darling, the CDPQ. However, the third segment (which is by far the most expensive), seems to have only VIA as potential users. Therefore, it’s indeed quite questionable value-for-money, but at least it will provide synergies with other VIA services (Ocean) and it shows that Quebec actually doesn’t take the VIA services it receives for granted, whereas elsewhere, the main motivator for demanding VIA services (rather than funding better bus services) seems to be that the Feds would have to pay for it…
Edit (July 4th): I’ve been made aware in the meanwhile that the CDPQ no longer owns that cement plant and that LM Wind Power manufactures wind turbine blades in Gaspé and currently trucks them to New Richmond, in absence of a direct rail link.
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SaugeenJunction
Senior Member
Charger 2206 and associated Venture cars is almost ready to ship to Canada.
Northern Light
Superstar
Here's a (Sincere) question to our many rail experts.
Is there a case for a major subsidy to improve any given section of the freight network in this country solely on the environmental or economic benefits that would accrue from that investment (increase exports, faster/lower-cost imports, spin-off jobs, increased attraction to manufacturing etc etc. )
If yes, is there a material opportunity to achieve a useful gain for the passenger network on that same segment, at the same time, from the same investment or at low accretive cost?
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We often speak unfavourably of subsidies (myself included); yet, of course, we provide highways that largely toll-free (no user fee as such) ; and we seem (surprisingly to me) to be relatively accepting of the largest act of corporate welfare
in Canadian history in absolute dollars (Volkswagen with potential subsides in the 16B range)
In that context is there a 16B freight-rail project (or 16 1B projects etc ) that might deliver as much or more economic utility and cost-recovery through taxes paid?)
Is there a case for a major subsidy to improve any given section of the freight network in this country solely on the environmental or economic benefits that would accrue from that investment (increase exports, faster/lower-cost imports, spin-off jobs, increased attraction to manufacturing etc etc. )
If yes, is there a material opportunity to achieve a useful gain for the passenger network on that same segment, at the same time, from the same investment or at low accretive cost?
****
We often speak unfavourably of subsidies (myself included); yet, of course, we provide highways that largely toll-free (no user fee as such) ; and we seem (surprisingly to me) to be relatively accepting of the largest act of corporate welfare
in Canadian history in absolute dollars (Volkswagen with potential subsides in the 16B range)
In that context is there a 16B freight-rail project (or 16 1B projects etc ) that might deliver as much or more economic utility and cost-recovery through taxes paid?)
dowlingm
Senior Member
I would imagine that from a large rail project POV something in the Port of Vancouver area to increase capacity/reduce conflicts - similar to CREATE in Chicago - would be worth a look.
Increasing the resiliency of rail through the Rockies to natural disaster would be a good idea also, creating additional interconnects between CN and CP to help route around trouble. Difficulty there is proving a cost / benefit when the events are not wholly predictable.
lenaitch
Senior Member
I agree, along with the line to Prince Rupert where CN has built capacity, although I'm not too sure of any marked benefit to passenger rail other improved times and predictability. I don't know how congested the connections into the east coast ports are.
I suppose somebody could say 'double track everything' but it seems the major railways seem to be quite adept at squeezing capacity, which I guess is part of the problem accommodating passenger rail.
I imagine it is a political slippery slope tossing too many public dollars at Big Rail.
Northern Light
Superstar
I concur; though 16B for Volkwagen at $5,300,000 per projected job should be pretty high risk too.
Which just beggars the question in my mind, if we're going to throw around that type of money, would freight rail not be one that potentially benefits other industries in a way that is as, or more beneficial than one industrial site?
If so (and I'm not pre-judging) then we might consider it, while securing any reasonable passenger rail benefits (preferred, non-delayable slots, higher track speeds etc.) as an add-on
The ports seem obvious; I know we periodically hear than grain can't be picked up and moved fast enough.
When I look both at the circuitous routes at the macro-scale; and then more tightly, both mainlines going through Toronto have connections from the near north are insanely windy, presumably both to avoid building some bridges; but also to deal w/grades that perhaps couldn't be otherwise managed in the 19thC.
Would it be a worthwhile investment to straighten segments or rebuild a near-north to Ottawa connection bypassing Toronto? Again, I don't know; just thought it was worth exploring.
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lenaitch
Senior Member
It is interesting that both main carriers had route through the Ottawa Valley but abandoned them. I suppose the issue is a lot of general freight is destined for southern Ontario and it was too costly to maintain two routes.
I'm not sure I (as a government) would push too hard to straighten ROWs and other things to improve speed. First, I'm not sure how much would have to be done to result in a meaningful - in freight terms - improvement in transit times (juice vs. squeeze). A long freight would still be limited in how much advantage it can earn from an arrow-straight ROW.
Secondly, both railways could simply move more traffic to US routes.
Bureaucromancer
Active Member
I’m a huge advocate for re-opening an Ottawa Valley route, most likely under ONTC auspices, but even at that would grant that meaningful speed improvements probably aren’t worth doing right now. To me this is less something that is likely to look good in any kind of business terms today, but is truly a piece of strategic infrastructure that we should be looking at in the same kind of light we would be if the railways DID propose to put all western traffic through the US.
lenaitch
Senior Member
The concept of 'strategic infrasturcture' is something successive Canadian governments have placed very little focus on. To many people think of the issue only in defence or military terms, but it is much broader. There was a time when I think it enjoyed more prominence, such as the trans-Canada pipeline and microwave networks, plus the original CP transcontinental line, but they seem to be outliers.
The strategic (i.e. economic protection) value of the Ottawa Valley routes was they offered an alternative to two mainline routes that, at times, run right beside each other. One problem is, because the alternate routes have more value to the nation than economic value to the owner, there would have to be considerable public money to operate it (let alone re-build it). Who that money went to; a private operator or the ONTC, is rather moot. The CN and CP Ottawa Valley routes generated very little enroute revenue, particularly after a large forestry plant closed in Pembroke.
Bureaucromancer
Active Member
This is right on point to me, and I’ll add that it is why the sale of CN still annoys me so much. Given the type of infrastructure this country needs, and the nature of our railways, a national carrier without enforced monopoly made all the sense in the world.
lenaitch
Senior Member
I suppose there are different ways to achieve the same ends. The US has 'strategic reserves' of all sorts of things. Some are held directly by government agencies, others by private industry enabled by their federal government. The prime example was the US Interstate Highway System. There is some disagreement whether this was purely a national defence-related initiative, but federal funding into an area of state responsibility (which is big hairy deal down there) is not insignificant.
Before they were abandoned, one of the Ottawa Valley routes (pick one) could have been supported, not owned by, the federal government. I would have picked the one that ran through Petawawa. We are now shipping a bunch of main battle tanks to Latvia from, I believe Edmonton, and are trucking them to Montreal. Most military bases used to have a rail spur to move equipment, delivery fuel, etc. - not anymore.
Allandale25
Senior Member
Interesting that this person decided to promote their tweet. Their profile picture seems to indicate their RTC information with VIA and CN?
crs1026
Superstar
As grandiose as it may seem, I would like to see federal capital being used for additional Mount MacDonald style tunnels in the Rockies, to eliminate grades and weatherproof/ natureproof sections of the route that are currently problematic.
Given the huge volume of traffic, there must be an economic case for a Gotthard- comparable bypass tunnel or three in our mountains. It's beyond my capability to crunch the numbers, but the equation is pretty obvious.
To take this to the extreme, imagine a single level, straight double track tunnel route (a chain of tunnels each 10-50 kms in length, with open sections in places) from Hope BC to Crowsnest AB. On a more manageable scale, consider Lake Louise to Golden to Glacier. Not that much more grandiose than Gotthard. It's amazing how short the distances become if you tunnel directly, and how much elevation you eliminate..
A project of this magnitude is beyond the investment base of CN or CP, but if Van Horne had government backing and today's TBM technology.... maybe this kind of public project every 150 years is the same breadth of vision that built the railways in the first place.
Getting back to ground level, I totally support using ppublic dollars to acquire and enhance capital projects including acquiring and enlarging railway infrastructure. That's different than subsidiing operations with taxpayer dollars, which is seldom a good deal.
- Paul
Given the huge volume of traffic, there must be an economic case for a Gotthard- comparable bypass tunnel or three in our mountains. It's beyond my capability to crunch the numbers, but the equation is pretty obvious.
To take this to the extreme, imagine a single level, straight double track tunnel route (a chain of tunnels each 10-50 kms in length, with open sections in places) from Hope BC to Crowsnest AB. On a more manageable scale, consider Lake Louise to Golden to Glacier. Not that much more grandiose than Gotthard. It's amazing how short the distances become if you tunnel directly, and how much elevation you eliminate..
A project of this magnitude is beyond the investment base of CN or CP, but if Van Horne had government backing and today's TBM technology.... maybe this kind of public project every 150 years is the same breadth of vision that built the railways in the first place.
Getting back to ground level, I totally support using ppublic dollars to acquire and enhance capital projects including acquiring and enlarging railway infrastructure. That's different than subsidiing operations with taxpayer dollars, which is seldom a good deal.
- Paul
SashaLemon
Active Member
If we could get the average speed of the Canadian to 200 km/h we could get the travel time under 24h. 