rbt
Senior Member
If HSR fares are the same as a flight then they won't be winning over very many people. Half the people flying in the corridor have flight connections.
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- Thread starter isittimetomoveyet
- Start date
If HSR fares are the same as a flight then they won't be winning over very many people. Half the people flying in the corridor have flight connections.
reaperexpress
Senior Member
allabootmatt
Senior Member
Yes, agreed. If implemented properly HSR should be a real force multiplier, for lack of a better word, for airports--and reductions in necessary air capacity should be included in cost calculations. One of the main reasons a country the size of France gets by with exactly one major hub airport is seamless rail connections far and wide from CDG. Frankfurt is similar for western Germany.
rbt
Senior Member
You forsee Air Canada selling HSR tickets for $200 when they currently provide the flights for significantly less and have control over the process?
If it isn't more profitable for them, they simply won't be doing it.
Very few will want to take HSR from Ottawa to Union, then the airport train from Union to Pearson, then fly to Hong Kong and they certainly aren't going to pay more for that experience than the equivalent connecting flight ($100 including taxes in November). HSR needs to be $70 or less in today's dollars to win over a large portion of existing travellers.
Before you jump on me, re-read this quote from the article:
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k10ery
Senior Member
Seriosuly, gang, if we need to subsidize it to be cheaper than air to get people to take it, then why bother having it?
I don't think it will need to be subsidized. The question is only how long is a reasonable length of time to get the capital investment paid off? That determines how much extra is added to the ticket price from what they would consider "break even". If they can break even at $110 for a Toronto-Montreal one-way trip, then how much of a fare increase from that is economical in order to help pay off the infrastructure? At what point do you maximize the amount of profit collected before people start saying "screw it, it's better for me to fly"? A $20 surcharge per trip leads to $220 million per year to help pay off the infrastructure. If a $130 one-way trip is reasonable for most people, I'm sure it would work. If the break even cost is $150, then $170 for a one-way trip is a whole different story.
k10ery
Senior Member
Transport Canada's discount rate is 10%. So the capital cost is $2 billion per year, or $200 per passenger per year.
kkgg7
Banned
It will never be built but will always be talked about. It is sad that Canada doesn't have the vision to build a high speed rail linking its two largest cities. The current 6 hour drive is simply ridiculous. I don't think it will change within the next 30 years.
Hipster Duck
Senior Member
^It's worse. Canada is the only country in the world where the fastest train today is slower than the fastest train 40 years ago.
nfitz
Superstar
Off the top of my head without looking it all up somewhere, I don't think so. Even in the few countries I've been to, I don't think this is true. New Zealand? Cambodia?
What about all those African countries along the Nile and the Great Rift Valley that used to have decent rail service - though you might have to go back 60 years there ...
reaperexpress
Senior Member
No I don't. K10ry said that, and I wrote a long post disagreeing with that statement.
The point of a Pearson Airport station is not to serve the demand from downtown Toronto, it is to serve cities such as Guelph, Kitchener-Waterloo and London. I know full well that the Air-Rail Link will serve downtown Toronto.
Hipster Duck
Senior Member
Comparing Canada to Cambodia and the African countries along the Nile doesn't inspire much confidence.
nfitz
Superstar
Your position was that Canada was the only country in the world where the fastest train today is slower than the fastest train 40 years ago. Now that it's been demonstrated that you are completely wrong, you try and change you point? It's like saying 2+2=5 ... and when it's pointed out that the answer is 4, to reply that 4 isn't really that many.
The Turbo itself by the late 1970s, when it was finally operating reliably, had a lower speed limit than it was later on when the LRC was introduced - as far as I recall. Kind of like how it's irrelevant that the current Toronto streetcars are designed operate at 110 km/hr, when the highest posted speed limit as far as I know is 60 km/hr.
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Hipster Duck
Senior Member
You know what your problem is, fitzy? You're a humourless literalist who takes offence at the drop of a hat.
I couldn't give two shits if Burkina Faso also had a faster train 40 years ago; Canada is an advanced industrial country which had a train with a faster run time in 1971 (3h59 min to Montreal) than it does today (4h30). In 1971, Canada was considered to be on the forefront of high speed rail technology, along with Japan. The French had only tested their gas turbine TGV prototype by the time we were running the Turbo in revenue service. Where are we on the HSR map today?
nfitz
Superstar
I don't see the need for personal insults here. Such extreme rudeness isn't necessary. Perhaps you should apologize for telling such huge whoppers.
I don't believe that they did ... I'm not quite sure how you equate New Zealand with Burkina Faso though. You clearly stated that Canada was the ONLY country in the world. Yet you discount New Zealand? There's probably another dozen countries out there with similar stories. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised if most US services outside Boston-Washington run slower than they did back then. Certainly the two Montreal Amtrack trains don't (heck, the track on one is so poor these days, they stop it before the border!).
3h59? Was that the best the Turbo can do? VIA has had the same time within the last decade or so with the current equipment. I'm not sure the Turbo could even sustain that. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the best time either the morning or evening Turbo had was 4h30 ... I used to take the afternoon Turbo frequently back then. It's nothing to do with the train - it's the track, signalling, and freight that the issue.
That's not my recollection. The Turbo was an oddity. CN never put in the work necessary to upgrade the track and signals to allow a fast service to run. The only upgrade I recall was the bypass and new station they built in Kingston in the early-mid 1970s.
The Turbo itself was a disaster. Damn thing set itself on fire more than once. It was barely operational for the first few years, and was a joke. It must have been about 1974 before it finally was running regularly, and they withdrew them only 8 years later in 1982. The trains themselves were pretty unpleasant, without the doors separating the cars, the entire train became a smoking car. You seem to be remembering the 1970s with some pretty rose-coloured glasses.
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