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If I understand correctly, the HFR plan is modeled off the conventional intercity rail services found throughout western europe and these services rarely offer checked baggage. While I do not have the statistics from VIA, I understand that the fraction of total passengers using checked baggage on corridor trips is low; especially because most trains do not offer it. While checked baggage can be a nice service to offer, it is my understanding that the need for it can be almost entirely eliminated through good design of passenger carrying railcars. Personally, I would much rather carry my luggage (and bike if I traveled with one) directly onto the train with level boarding instead of arriving early to make the 30 minute baggage drop off and waiting again at the destination.

Also, does anybody know why the current double ended trains still reverse out of Central Station rather than switching ends? Is there a complex procedure that needs to be followed to change which engine is used for control? Does that mean that the rear engine is just a dead weight until the terminus?
 
ManyQuestions said:
Also, does anybody know why the current double ended trains still reverse out of Central Station rather than switching ends? Is there a complex procedure that needs to be followed to change which engine is used for control? Does that mean that the rear engine is just a dead weight until the terminus?
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If VIA was unable to reverse the direction of their trains, this would defeat the purpose of running trains with a locomotive on both sides. Given that a change in train/car/seat orientation seems to be no problem in-between different revenue moves (e.g. TRTO-62-MTRL-69-TRTO), but is avoided half-way through one and the same revenue move (e.g. OTTW-26-MTRL-26-QBEC), this points more towards an IT constraint (e.g. in managing the fleet and seat allocation) than any technical constraints of the physical fleet…
 
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Urban Sky said:
If VIA was unable to reverse the direction of their trains, this would defeat the purpose of running trains with a locomotive on both sides. Given that a change in train/car/seat orientation seems to be no problem in-between different revenue moves (e.g. TRTO-62-MTRL-69-TRTO), but is avoided half-way through one and the same revenue move (e.g. OTTW-26-MTRL-26-QBEC), this points more towards an IT constraint (e.g. in managing the fleet and seat allocation) than any technical constraints of the physical fleet…
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Could it be a customer satisfaction issue, whereby people want to be assured of a forward facing seat for the entire trip? Seems odd though as the time savings of not having to use the wye mid way trough the trip should compensate for that.
 
roger1818 said:
Could it be a customer satisfaction issue, whereby people want to be assured of a forward facing seat for the entire trip? Seems odd though as the time savings of not having to use the wye mid way trough the trip should compensate for that.
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There are good reasons why VIA currently replaces its ancient reservation system with one which has actually been designed for the passenger rail industry…
 
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trebello said:
Wonder what impact, if any, this will have on VIA's corridor services. I suspect almost all Greyhound passengers will move to other bus services, but I can also see it helping ridership for VIA in post-pandemic southern Ontario/Quebec
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I think that with Greyhound not coming back, western ontario now will need more VIA service to make it easier for people to travel, especially past London.
 
Bordercollie said:
I think that with Greyhound not coming back, western ontario now will need more VIA service to make it easier for people to travel, especially past London.
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I think there is a good chance that megabus will takeover many of Greyhound's routes in both Western and Eastern Ontario and Ontario Northland will takeover many of the more northern routes.
 
Bordercollie said:
I think that with Greyhound not coming back, western ontario now will need more VIA service to make it easier for people to travel, especially past London.
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Honestly, I'd rather GO take over since it's HST-free, and they don't have variable pricing. And they have fare capping (for the commuters).
kEiThZ said:
I am most curious to know how pricing would work. I am hoping for fares competitive enough to kill Greyhound and Megabus.
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Are you happy?
 
Bordercollie said:
Since when does GO have service to Windsor?
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I meant as a future service. They'd probably have better frequencies since they have busses that can operate during off peak hours. And it's unfair that other provinces are subsidizing intraprovincial travel in Ontario through VIA.
 
littlewill1166 said:
I meant as a future service. They'd probably have better frequencies since they have busses that can operate during off peak hours. And it's unfair that other provinces are subsidizing intraprovincial travel in Ontario through VIA.
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The only reason why GO can offer frequent services on some of its routes is that they were able to acquire these network segments. As much as I would love to see the entire TRTO-BRTF/KITC-LNDN-WDON/SARN corridor under public control, I struggle to see how CN’s shareholders would accept their sale for any price which would be remotely defensible in the public eye.

Also, given that direct&indirect cost&revenue figures disclosed by VIA in recent (but of course pre-Covid) Corporate Plans suggest that its corridor services generated revenues 30% higher than the costs which their operation caused, I would assume that at least TRTO-WDON breaks even and thus saves rather than costs the federal taxpayer by reducing rather than increasing its operating subsidy need. Nevertheless, I don’t think that any federal bureaucrat or politician would mind if the Ontarian taxpayer volunteered to assume the funding responsibility for those VIA services which actually depend on operational funding…
 
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roger1818 said:
You you are happy that towns that don't have train stations will become more car dependant? We don't have tracks to every town in the Corridor.
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That's an empirical question. It's unambiguously clear that HFR would steal market share from Megabus and regional air, but whether people currently travelling by bus services that end up being cancelled or having reduced service would fully substitute to car vs. substituting to car+train is not something we can just theorize about. How large is the population base in towns that don't have stations on either the existing corridor (which would still be served by rail) or HFR? You need to know that, at least, before we can even pull numbers out of thin air to support our varying claims on bus usage. Personally, I imagine a dense and frequent bus intercity bus network would be a net complement to better intercity rail service in that they might generate network effects towards car-free travel if suitably integrated.

This brings to mind a question. How close are the Megabus stations to Via stations, current or proposed?
 
Frank_Lee said:
That's an empirical question. It's unambiguously clear that HFR would steal market share from Megabus and regional air, but whether people currently travelling by bus services that end up being cancelled or having reduced service would fully substitute to car vs. substituting to car+train is not something we can just theorize about. How large is the population base in towns that don't have stations on either the existing corridor (which would still be served by rail) or HFR? You need to know that, at least, before we can even pull numbers out of thin air to support our varying claims on bus usage. Personally, I imagine a dense and frequent bus intercity bus network would be a net complement to better intercity rail service in that they might generate network effects towards car-free travel if suitably integrated.

This brings to mind a question. How close are the Megabus stations to Via stations, current or proposed?
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I don't have numbers but here is a map of Greyhound routes in eastern Ontario and western Quebec pre-COVID. Some were express routes, but many were stopping routes.

Grehound Eastnern Ontario Map.png


I then overlaid the map with VIA Rail's network (blue) and the proposed HFR route (orange). There is some overlap, but there are also a lot of routes that won't be covered by VIA.

Grehound and VIA Eastnern Ontario Map.png
 
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