narduch
Senior Member
Agreed.
I just wanted to say that people tend to pick and choose where they are trying to help the climate/environment.
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- Thread starter ehlow
- Start date
Agreed.
I just wanted to say that people tend to pick and choose where they are trying to help the climate/environment.
crs1026
Superstar
I keep hoping that some developer with oceanside property notices that their billion dollar development has an inch less freeboard than it used to have, and goes "ulp". Or the Russians stage a full-scale fleet-level naval exercise in the Arctic. But that's probably still decades away, and at the rate we are warming, it may be too late by then.
I agree, environmental benefits won't sell rail service expansion in Ontario. Happily, Ontario roads are getting so congested that alternatives may soon be attractive. Having said that, I look at my own life and consider my ability to live without a car, and I realise how lucky I was to live in the age before all this had to change. I cannot imagine how we will deliver mobility in the future, without rebuilding every city and town, and foregoing the ability to reach destinations that we assume today. The vast majority of Ontarians are oblivious to what is coming..... it's a hard sell, and nobody likes a negative message. So the service has to be sufficiently appealing to sell itself without preaching about the future.
- Paul
MisterF
Senior Member
HSR for relatively small populations isn't unheard of. Belgium and the Netherlands have small (but highly centralized) populations. Uzbekistan has a smaller, significantly poorer population than Canada and has an HSR system with trains going up to 250 km/h. I agree - it's not cheap, but it can be done.
I'd argue that the directly relevant population for HSR is higher than 11 million though. The CMAs of Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Kingston, Oshawa, Guelph, Kitchener, and London have 13 million between them (2016 numbers). But more to the point, any HSR system relies on conventional speed feeder lines that go to cities without direct HSR service. Even if HSR is only ever built between London and Montreal, plenty of other cities in the Corridor, with a collective population in the millions, would still be very relevant to it.
Development hasn't actually skipped over the Greenbelt, at least not anymore than it did before the Greenbelt existed. The growth rates of most cities and towns just outside the Greenbelt haven't increased. In some cities growth has gone down. The highest growth areas like Milton tend to be inside the Greenbelt.
kEiThZ
Superstar
Comparisons like this are pointless. It wouldn't cost $25 billion to build HSR between 3 major metros and their regions in Uzbekistan.
@Urban Sky has great analysis on how Spain and France's rail networks evolved with population over time. And where that maps out for Canada. So I do support his thesis that HSR will be a tall order for Canadians. And something aspirational for us. At this point, I am just hoping for HFR that is upgradeable. Let them pick a route that allows them to improve speed through capital investment over time. Whatever the travel times are at launch, if they can get Toronto to Montreal under 3.5 hrs eventually, that alone would shift a good bit of aviation traffic. Get it under 3 hrs and you all but save aviation for largely feeder traffic and the most time-sensitive of travellers.
I know VIA tries with that productive time comparison, to sell the virtue of train travel for business. But let's face it, VIA sucks for business travellers. The lounges are okay for business travellers. Not as great as most airline lounges, surprisingly. Onboard connectivity is very unreliable. And they don't have meeting spaces like say on the Italian HSR. Much of this will have to be addressed before they can truly sell a 3-4 hr transit time as productive.
kEiThZ
Superstar
There's billons in real estate on the line in Florida. And you have Republicans there calling for action:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/florida-republicans-demand-climate-change-solutions/
Yet, you'll never see actual action from the US. It'll be a real long time before something happens. Even when Floridians start drowning. Canada has less of this to worry about. So the concern for climate change is even less here.
This is an interesting paradox. Self-driving cars might actually reverse urbanization. And there's urban theorists struggling with that idea now.
On topic, a major issue here is that Canadians are still getting used to the idea of cities. And still aren't fully grasping with the reality of the country being urbanized. So we get lot of suburbs and then dense pockets of 1BR condos. Midrise is still limited. Family sized apartments are condos are unicorns. And I'm not talking about the 1000 sqft unit that passes for a 3BR in Toronto these days. Density is fundamental to making so much else sustainable. And we've failed at it so miserably.
crs1026
Superstar
A good model/discussion point for Ontario is not Norway or Uzbekistan..... it's Ireland. They have a very effective, but very modest, rail network. No high end HSR, enhancements funded and implemented incrementally, with a long-term growth plan. Auto competitive. Ambitious but not grandiose. Linking dense population centers. Well used.
But - to the urban vision thing - here's the catch: While Ireland's rail system is great, its roads are still crammed with cars, especially in the hinterland. Why? Because the system is a great backbone, but to get to the wee places (which tourists especially want to see, and that's a huge moneymaker for Ireland) you need a car.
What happens to little places like St Jacobs (or Milbrook, or Baileeboro, or even Paul Webers’) when we urbanise, and the Saturday and Sunday city folk stop coming and stopping in to buy pies and butter tarts and have tea and see local theatre and fill up their gas tanks?
We are reversing a hundred years of auto dependent business development, based on personal freedom to set our own schedule and itinerary and stop when and where we feel like it. And build our own bubble around ourselves...play our own tunes as we drive, etc.
A hundred years ago, when auto ownership was less universal, you could take any number of ferry cruises from downtown Toronto across the lake, for picnics or for an evening of dancing. We've talked in another thread about destinations like Wasaga Beach being amenable to this, in that one can get a large number of people to the beach for the day on a single GO train. But - in those hundred years, we have become accustomed to personal mobility which involves freedom to set agendas, itineraries, pull over when we feel like it, and play our tunes in our air conditioned private auto environment. Heck, we can't even empty the Rogers Center and get people onto GO Trains very effectively as an alternative to driving.
We can't just build HSR and say "there - we have urbanised". A lot of other pieces need to fall into place first.
Which is why when I visit Ireland, I rent a car, and don't ride their quite wonderful trains. We need to do better for Ontario.
- Paul
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innsertnamehere
Superstar
because cars are used in that fashion globally, regardless of nation. If the country is wealthy and generally fairly developed, auto ownership rates are high enough that those trips occur en mass. Europe has a huge camper-van / road trip culture. Even hyper-dense japan has a huge car culture. It is the empirically better way to perform trips like that, and there isn't anything wrong with that. Cars have their place and are ultimately common as they are extremely efficient machines at getting people around, especially to remote destinations.
That doesn't mean that we can't have train networks that serve other trips though. Europe's network's are great at serving business and city-city type trips. Countryside relaxation? not as much.
Sure before the automobile there were other ways to enjoy the countryside, but they are far inferior methods of transportation and are long abandoned for a reason.
Car culture will never disappear. You will never see large portions of the province being car-free households. Nowhere in the world is like that. What we can aim for is more single vehicle households though, as the dual car ownership culture of NA is relatively unique to Canada / the US. And train networks will allow for that, as routine trips can be made without a vehicle.
That doesn't mean that we can't have train networks that serve other trips though. Europe's network's are great at serving business and city-city type trips. Countryside relaxation? not as much.
Sure before the automobile there were other ways to enjoy the countryside, but they are far inferior methods of transportation and are long abandoned for a reason.
Car culture will never disappear. You will never see large portions of the province being car-free households. Nowhere in the world is like that. What we can aim for is more single vehicle households though, as the dual car ownership culture of NA is relatively unique to Canada / the US. And train networks will allow for that, as routine trips can be made without a vehicle.
steveintoronto
Superstar
Actually not. Murmansk alone is on the Arctic Circle being 167 miles from it. (edit to add: "Murmansk is set to be the Russian terminus of the Arctic Bridge, a sea route linking it to the Canadian port of Churchill, Manitoba." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murmansk ) And not only that:
Northern Fleet conducted 4,700 exercises this year
The same level of intensity is planned for 2018, Head Commander Nikolay Yevmenov says.
https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/security/2017/11/northern-fleet-conducted-4700-exercises-year
https://sputniknews.com/tags/tag_NorthernFleet/
Absolutely agreed on that.
I think Ontario/Canada would do themselves great favour by not using the term "High Speed Rail" as it has definitions that *stymie* what Paul calls 'HxR', or I call 'HFR+'. It allows the ability to do virtually the same as HSR at a slight time penalty, but vastly cheaper and easier to build and institute, let alone sell to the public and investors alike.
The marketing by Ontario on this has been especially terrible. It should have been a partnership (effectively or actually) of extending VIA's proposed HFR, doing both a favour in so many ways, not the least cost.
But alas...
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crs1026
Superstar
I really like the balanced outlook in this post. If more of our urbanists were talking like this, instead of slamming the car (which they do, sometimes unintentionally, sometimes not so much) we would have an easier sell for HxR.
It amazes me how little tolerance we have for the concept of paradox. Everything is debated in such binary terms in our body politic - if one thing is right, other things must be wrong. Often opposing views are both right. It's the balance, or the cooexistence of opposing views, that gives us a path forwards.
- Paul
KevinT
Active Member
I'm a fan of rail transit but have never thought that what Ontario needs is HSR. I'd be happy with HFR at better speeds than what we see now, for example Kitchener to Toronto should be 90 minutes tops. What I do recognize though is that HFR really needs electrification, and thanks to the attitudes of CP and CN that electrification requires dedicated corridors. I see HSR as giving us that, and on the assumption that it will share its corridor with HFR local trains to feed it, I am all for it.
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KevinT
Active Member
There's a lot of anti-HSR sentiment in Oxford county and beyond due to concerns about farmers' fields being chopped up.
Pie in the sky ideas:
I wonder if the province could provide free surveys and land transfers, perhaps even with a bonus paid as a percentage of the transferred value, in order for farmers to swap blocks of land so that no farm is cut in half by HSR? Would such an offer change the tone in places like Oxford?
Could one or two standard portals be developed to support farm road underpasses, to reduce the associated design and construction costs for them? There's often something to be said for mass production, but I don't know how tied in this type of thing is to the local geology. Could you design for the worst case and use it in every case? I wish I knew a civil engineer that I could ask...
Pie in the sky ideas:
I wonder if the province could provide free surveys and land transfers, perhaps even with a bonus paid as a percentage of the transferred value, in order for farmers to swap blocks of land so that no farm is cut in half by HSR? Would such an offer change the tone in places like Oxford?
Could one or two standard portals be developed to support farm road underpasses, to reduce the associated design and construction costs for them? There's often something to be said for mass production, but I don't know how tied in this type of thing is to the local geology. Could you design for the worst case and use it in every case? I wish I knew a civil engineer that I could ask...
TOareaFan
Superstar
What and where are these other cities in the millions of population?
mdrejhon
Senior Member
Duh! Toronto and its related municipalities, of course.
He said other cities than London and Montreal, as a direct reference to the list in his previous sentence.
HFR is more sensible to begin.
But we need dedicated corridor so HSR talk is unavoidable. HSR is a politically easier sell in some ways, but still difficult. If both HSR+HFR utilize the corridor, even better.
Over the long term, taxpayers will have the final say.
While Canada is a big country -- I do recognize almost one-third of Canada is within 2 hours drive of the west tip of Lake Ontario, and a HSR corridor is going to make sense in less than 20 years. Beginning HSR EA now is sensible for a 2030s completion. KW, London and Toronto are in the midst of rapid transit growth that all converges to this timing.
Fundamentally, the fastest HFR (177kph) is only 23kph slower than the slowest HSR (200kph). The major cost difference essentially boils down land purchases and grade seprations the entire way.
If "we" have to sell HSR to sell the plan (and get a dedicated corridor and grade separations) then by all means, HSR as long as it is sensibly planned, costed, built to replace a freeway expansion, and still supports HFR/RER traffic too.
Even France's RER trains are capable of 200kph, fast enough that GO RER and HSR may theoretically overlap in the ability for a future government to market it. And grade separations does mean less chance of delays/rail disruptions/crashes, enhancing reliability of HFR anyway.
If we can get HFR built instead for cheaper to begin with, sure.
But HSR Lite may be required to sell HFR (whether it be VIA or long distance GO RER or both) spending to skeptical taxpayers who may be won over by a unified grade separated passenger dedicated corridor capable of handling HSR+HFR+GO win-win scenario. If this is what it takes.
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crs1026
Superstar
The compensation offered for the land usually sorts this kind of thing out. Certainly, some sort of standard subsidy for expenses such as legal and survey fees could be offered as part of an offer. Sometimes there are individual needs.... for example, the land being bought may have a structure on it, and the owner wants to retain the structure. so the deal may be about covering the cost of moving a garage or shed as much as the price per acre. If farmers want to swap blocks of land around, they can generally figure that out for themselves afterwards. There might need to be relief on rules for severing and merging lots, yes. That kind of sweetener is a good idea to build goodwill, although it has to be carefully managed to avoid becoming a bottomless trough.
Competent engineers do reuse templates and forms/components from job to job. So long as one doesn't let the design of each crossing to a different engineering firm, economies of scale will prevail.
The issue with farm crossings is just how big farm equipment is becoming. A small underpass may not do. A new line will likely mean farmers taking "the long way around" to reach different pieces of land, or to move equipment from one farm to another. This is an unavoidable and lasting impact of building a new line, but it's hard to say it renders farming impossible. Some other quid pro quo might have to be considered to mitigate the inconvenience and sweeten the deal .... eg maybe some sort of tax relief for farms within x meters of the line for y years, or widening/paving local roads.
- Paul
ssiguy2
Senior Member
This idea that HSR is about climate change is pure crap. This is the similar argument that somehow urban transit is going to reduce emissions which also has proven to be crap. The very MOST they can hope for is a small decline in the growth of those emissions and even that is really pushing it. To say it`s about climate change might make for good politics and keep David Suzuki and friends happy but it has no basis in reality.
Any VERY temporary reduction in auto traffic between any 2 areas whether they be local with urban transit or regional with HSR rail simply creates temporarily smaller reductions in traffic. Of course that in turn results in those highways quickly filling up again as people flock to these temporary reduction traffic roads and within months you are back to square 1. It`s called induced demand.
This is not about reducing emissions but rather giving people realistic alternatives to driving. The Corridor is growing at nearly 300,000 a year and no amount of HSR is going to result in reduction of auto use. If rail is backed up by the climate change agenda then HSR is the kind of project that should be the very LAST thing to get built. It won`t make a hoot of difference with our polluting trucks and long distance highway driving results in far fewer emissions per km drove than urban stop and start car use.
Any VERY temporary reduction in auto traffic between any 2 areas whether they be local with urban transit or regional with HSR rail simply creates temporarily smaller reductions in traffic. Of course that in turn results in those highways quickly filling up again as people flock to these temporary reduction traffic roads and within months you are back to square 1. It`s called induced demand.
This is not about reducing emissions but rather giving people realistic alternatives to driving. The Corridor is growing at nearly 300,000 a year and no amount of HSR is going to result in reduction of auto use. If rail is backed up by the climate change agenda then HSR is the kind of project that should be the very LAST thing to get built. It won`t make a hoot of difference with our polluting trucks and long distance highway driving results in far fewer emissions per km drove than urban stop and start car use.