Tabled Tuesday, the budget says legislative changes will streamline approvals and reduce regulatory uncertainty for the planned high-speed rail line between Toronto and Quebec City.
Prime Minister Mark Carney announced in September that the government would speed up engineering and regulatory work on the project to get construction underway within four years.
Still skeptical since HSR gets dangled every election by the LPC, but it seems it’s getting closer to reality. Still a while till the planned construction start but if it starts, I think it’ll likely be built, at least between TO and MTL. A three-hour trip for a low price would be a significant economic boost for the region and bring ON and QC closer together.
I did not read the article or any of the recent proposals, but I don’t see this being truly beneficial unless the HSR can go downtown to Gare Central in Montréal, just like I assume it’d go to Union in Toronto. However Montréal is so densely packed due to its geographical location, the regular ol VIA rail barely makes it in there on shared tracks. I currently can’t see how this would work out, unless the HSR made the last 30 km on the same snail-trail that the current services use.
That’s how it was in Italy. The train can go slow on the snail-trail within the city, then go pedal to the metal on the new track outside. That said I suspect Alto might be able to buy dedicated track to downtown MTL. The Lakeshore corridor in the GTA which goes through Union has gov’t owned track for GO.
I hope there’s enough political will behind it, like there is behind the REM in Montréal. Those dudes are working miracles in contrast to the shit show that is the Eglinton LRT.
The Eglinton LRT is a special kind of PPP hell. 😄
Or a new hub forms around the train station where it ends up.
This is just pessimism. A project like high speed rail makes Montreal closer to Toronto than Ottawa was. People will build around it just like the build around every huge transportation project.
There are a number of ideas of how to go through Montreal, one alternative is making like a Y shaped pattern through Lucien-L’Allier (a commuter rail end station). Still would require a big detour.