There is decent evidence that they aren't. For example: ONR's website says, "The trainsets each include one locomotive and three passenger cars." There is no mention of baggage or dining cars, and while a sleeper could be considered a "passenger car" typically that term typically refers to...

If developing overnight amenities (like baggage car, dining car and sleeper) could be done quickly and easily, ONR would have done it for the Northlander trains. I would love to see the LD fleet order use modified venture coaches for trains out of MMC, but that would require significant design work.

A bus from Ottawa that meets the NB train (and a bus to Ottawa the connects from the SB train) would be more interesting, as there isn't a direct bus from Ottawa to Cochrane (like there is from Sudbury). The current bus leaves Ottawa at 10:15 and arrives in North Bay at 15:25. That's a long wait...

It is probably way to early to say with any certainty. The question is how many people would take a bus 125 km east to transfer to the train north or south instead of taking a direct bus north or south. Maybe if they are going to an intermediary stop that they can't get to directly on one bus...

It just goes to show how much money it must cost to maintain track in good working order. The money they are spending in crew and equipment costs to make that trip must be huge. CPKC will have crunched the numbers and will have found that despite that, it isn't worth the investment to upgrade...

That estimate in the Ecotrain study seems low to me. If you assume that each grade separation costs about $500-million and there are like over 100 grade separations required for HSR, that would be over $50-billion in grade separations alone. Maybe on greenfield segments, this could be cheaper...

The cost would be massively impacted by which bid is chosen and if it is HFR or HSR. The previously speculated cost between $6-billion and $12-billion would have been for HFR only. If HSR is selected, the cost could balloon to something near $100-billion for full HSR, depending how long the HSR...

I thought this was an interesting video explaining diesel tractive effort.

A gravity model works well to help compare transportation demand (not just rail) between markets with similar sinergies. In this case we have two cities in the same province, one of which is the provincial capital, with very little population between them. The most obvious compariale in the...

And it would probably cost about $200 in tolls...each way. People might start thinking twice about driving between cities though. 🤔

Exactly. It is tolled to maximize profitability. If doubling the toll results in 40% reduction in ridership, that improves profitability. Imagine if all 400 series highways in Ontario were privatized like the 407.

Exactly. If we were to see something like Brightline in the Corridor, they wouldn't want to serve either Toronto Union Station or Montreal Central Station, but instead want to build new stations that are surrounded by land that is owned by investor. They could buy the land around the exiting...

Agreed. Similarly I hope the entire 401 (from Windsor to the Quebec boarder) gets shut down, since it looses massive amounts of money every year. That would save taxpayers a bundle.

It’s amazing how many Canadians don’t know anything about our Constitution. Many will talk about their constitutional rights and then quote the American Constitution.

If PP defunded VIA (which is unlikely), Amtrak would be far more likely to obtain them than Ontario. If OntatioToronto did get them, they would cut all trains to Montreal (and east) and reduce the number of daily trains to Ottawa, from 10 down to 2 (like it was in the “glory days of rail”)...

Agreed, *adds “thumbs up” underneath trip report* :p

I haven't watched the video yet, but is this a video clip of a VIA Rail representative saying that, or did the reporter claim that VIA claims this? If the latter, I wouldn't trust reporters as far as I could throw them to get their facts straight. It is very likely that the reporter is...

Exactly! Air Canada has a codeshare agreement with SNCF, which increases their penetration into France. Air Canada co-owning HxR, gives them the opportunity to block other airlines from having that same opportunity in Canada.

And when they know that food and water isn’t coming even after they begged and pleaded? I’m curious how many people on this forum believe that they are perfect have never, ever made a bad decision that they later regretted?

If there isn't money to maintain the Newcastle Sub, what makes you think there would be money to reactivate the Fredericton Sub?