The point is that paying for passenger railroad infrastructure is a lot easier when the positive externalities on station area real estate values are internalized by the rail operator through things like station area developments.

Try 300 townhouses each. See e.g. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3466847

With all the Brightline discussion, I'm surprised nobody's brought up the other fundamental factor in its relative success (as well as the success of various Japanese rail firms)---real estate. There are enormous economic gains associated with developing the areas around transit hubs. Translink...

It's a massive infrastructure project that is very popular in certain regions with certain constituencies while much of the rest of the country thinks it's a gigantic boondoggle.

As someone who has been involved at various different times as a donor and volunteer with the Liberal Party, it pains me to have to agree with the consensus here. In particular, while I think there are a number of very talented and hardworking ministers trying to do big things (Jean-Yves Duclos...

I think their fuel efficiency and carbon advantage goes a lot further; what prevents longer distance rail travel from being feasible is the time and passenger demand for amenities like sleeper berths for trips longer than 6 or 8 hours. More than that, it's just not economically viable because...

Some new information in the updated story at Railway age. https://www.railwayage.com/regulatory/canada-to-create-separate-railway-for-corridor-hfr/

I wish they could accomplish something where the private sector partner took over construction but not operations, in return for land grants or station site development rights etc. There are billions if not tens of billions of property appreciation that will be captured by landowners around...

Pertinent, but not sure if any new information in here: https://www.railwayage.com/regulatory/canada-to-create-separate-railway-for-corridor-hfr/

Offtopic somewhat, but it's good to hear someone talking about commuter rail expansion here in BC: https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/west-coast-express-expansion-association-commuter-rail-advocacy-vancouver-fraser-valley

I don't know if the demand would be high enough, but one way of enabling a seamless ride would be to require any single seat cross border travelers have Nexus passes. Maybe there would be a way to sync it up so that other travelers could join the cross border train at the respective Niagaras...

And the Canada Line was built for the Olympics in Vancouver.

I also don't mean to say consultants don't provide any value. Expertise always has value. It's just that contracting issues (from an economic perspective) make it extremely difficult to achieve the most efficient outcomes from a social point of view. These are general issues, not specific...

I'm not disagreeing with you that this can be a difficult job. Consultancies =/= construction companies; sometimes they're under the same roof, sometimes not. There are well recognised principal-agent problems with consultancy in many industries, but public transportation can be particularly bad...

Transportation consultants in North America have a pretty poor reputation as far as doing things cost efficiently and fast (see California HSR, for example). They have an interest in dragging out projects and endless redesigns, not prompt execution.

Meanwhile in Alberta/Dreamland: https://www.masstransitmag.com/alt-mobility/press-release/21274993/hatch-hatch-to-support-transpod-with-the-design-construction-of-its-ultrahighspeed-transportation-project I should say that I do think government investment in R&D for new transportation...

As someone from the Okanagan, I can unfortunately confirm the absurdity of the idea of a viable passenger rail corridor between Kelowna and Kamloops.

My interpretation of his main findings thus far are basically: 1. State capacity matters. Government doesn't actually need to do the construction itself, but they need to have the internal expertise to be involved in design, and closely supervise construction, otherwise they get taken for a...

It's pretty clear from Alon Levy's work that there's more than just Freight vs Passenger conflict here.

Potentially large scale engineering study of Vancouver to Portland funded: https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/vancouver-seattle-cascadia-high-speed-rail-washington-state-funding Once again, reaching too high, I think.