VIA Rail

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

Around Christmas, the Canadian was actually 48 hours late at one point due to engine failures.

And my sister was on a train from Montreal to Ottawa (normally a 2.5 hour trip) that was delayed several hours (I think it was about 3) because of engine failure. That is over double the normal travel time.

Isolated cases are just that. My point is that a shorter delay on a shorter trip is as significant as a longer delay on a longer trip. The latter just sounds worse.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by roger1818

And my sister was on a train from Montreal to Ottawa (normally a 2.5 hour trip) that was delayed several hours (I think it was about 3) because of engine failure. That is over double the normal travel time.

Isolated cases are just that. My point is that a shorter delay on a shorter trip is as significant as a longer delay on a longer trip. The latter just sounds worse.

Which only argues my point in the first place.

[GoTrans]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

Around Christmas, the Canadian was actually 48 hours late at one point due to engine failures. Now, if they separated services at Winnipeg, they could have kept some of it on time.

You are quite correct. Having separate services on the prairies and through northern Ontario would allow for better on time performance and increase ridership as a result.

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

Right now, Calgary is isolated from the passenger rail network. Even returning regular rail passenger service to it would be a good start.

I think that Via should operate 3-4 trains a day between Edmonton and Calgary with a potential extension to Lethbridge as a place holder until higher speed rail can be implemented between Edmonton and Calgary. Even if the Via service was only a placeholder it would make sense to improve the level crossings and build a few more grade separations to improve safety. This would prevent the level crossing accidents that led to the demise of the RDC service run by Via Rail.

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

Actually, I am someone who will argue for a return of the old CP The Canadian route. Why should the cities in the Prairies be ignored?

There should be daily service between Calgary and Winnipeg. This would service the larger population centres on the prairie which were neglected by the Via Rail cuts. In addition there should be service from Regina, Saskatoon, North Battleford, Lloydminster, Fort Saskatchewan and Edmonton.

The segment from Winnipeg to Toronto should be routed via CP to Thunder Bay and the north shore of Lake Superior. Frequencies could be split between the CN and CP lines with the majority of the frequencies being on the CP route.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

Which only argues my point in the first place.

Which point would that be? That delays on long distance trains aren’t important or that HFR is very important?

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by milomilo

I have to say that even though I think trains are an innefficient and unfair way to provide resources to low demand routes, it still would usually be better off keeping them in some way than scrapping them completely (I'm not actually as absolute as my posts come off as). As soon as you scrap the route, then the capacity is filled, the demand finds another mode of transport and the case for reinstating passenger rail evaporates. Had different decisions been made in Alberta, and passenger rail muddled through we might be talking today about incremental upgrades that build on each other. Instead we have to start from scratch.

I agree that they should not be scrapping routes, in fact they should be upgrading them to make train travel a more attractive alternative to other forms of travel.

I'm thinking that despite all the hoopla about climate change, initiative seems to be lacking in some ways to improve transportation from a carbon footprint point of view. When I see a train with a locomotive or two pulling a huge line of cars traveling on low friction steel on steel wheels/rails it just seems so much more efficient than huge planes burning tons of fuel to propel a couple hundred people in the air at high speeds, or thousands of buses/trucks/cars moving people about. And it turns out that it is. Just did a quick search and turned up this article: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-49349566

The chart in the above BBC article illustrates this (European modes of travel shown, but it illustrates the point):


In many cities they are building bike lanes as part of the infrastructure to try to encourage people to use cycles instead of cars to get around. There is no payback to the city for this expenditure, but it is felt to be a necessary expense to help the environment.

I don't see why the government should not look at trains in the same light. In other words, perhaps there should be more government money spent on maintaining and upgrading rail service to encourage people to take the train instead of flying or driving, in the name of helping reduce CO2 emissions for climate change.

Part of that might have to involve some kind of societal change where we are encouraged to slow down a bit - meaning that rather than expecting to fly somewhere in 2 hours we become more accepting of taking a day or two to reach our destination. Lots of moving parts there, but it's sounding like we are going to have to rethink a lot of things in the face of the climate crisis anyhow...

[roger1818]

^^^Trains are only environmentally friendly if they are well used. Having a large locomotive towing a heavy passenger car with only a dozen people on board results in a huge carbon footprint per passenger. In that case, a bus is much more environmentally friendly.

The problem in Canada is there are few routes that will fill a "large line" of passenger cars. The BBC article is showing usage in the UK, where population densities are higher than in most of Canada (the Corridor being an exception). Even in that article, it shows that a coach (bus) has a lower carbon footprint per passenger than domestic rail.

[Coldrsx]

Thanks blockades... thanks a lot.

My trip from Edmonton to Vancouver on the Canadian has officially been cancelled.

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[milomilo]

Originally Posted by roger1818

^^^Trains are only environmentally friendly if they are well used. Having a large locomotive towing a heavy passenger car with only a dozen people on board results in a huge carbon footprint per passenger. In that case, a bus is much more environmentally friendly.

The problem in Canada is there are few routes that will fill a "large line" of passenger cars. The BBC article is showing usage in the UK, where population densities are higher than in most of Canada (the Corridor being an exception). Even in that article, it shows that a coach (bus) has a lower carbon footprint per passenger than domestic rail.

Exactly. The massive diesel clunkers VIA use hardly scream efficiency.

And to be truthful, the absolute numbers of people that might take trains, even if we put massive improvements into rail, is not likely to be high enough to make a huge difference to Canada's overall CO2 emissions.

[OldDartmouthMark]

...So the solution is to give up on trains, since we already know nobody will ever use them?

[jawagord]

Originally Posted by Coldrsx

Thanks blockades... thanks a lot.

My trip from Edmonton to Vancouver on the Canadian has officially been cancelled.

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Welcome to the club. Although my trip got cancelled 30 years ago when Via stopped servicing Calgary.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by roger1818

^^^Trains are only environmentally friendly if they are well used. Having a large locomotive towing a heavy passenger car with only a dozen people on board results in a huge carbon footprint per passenger. In that case, a bus is much more environmentally friendly.

The problem in Canada is there are few routes that will fill a "large line" of passenger cars. The BBC article is showing usage in the UK, where population densities are higher than in most of Canada (the Corridor being an exception). Even in that article, it shows that a coach (bus) has a lower carbon footprint per passenger than domestic rail.

This. Imagine what the per pax footprint is for that train to Churchill.

I would argue that if there isn't enough traffic to have at least 70% load factor on a daily service with half a dozen cars (be they sleepers or recliners) year round, it shouldn't be running. And any regional service that can't at least sustain half a dozen daily trains, isn't worth infrastructure investment.

The above number do make a solid case for electrifying HFR though.

[OldDartmouthMark]

You folks make a good point. I suppose now that our expectations are based on flying nobody would ever want to go back to a multi-day train ride, unless it's for the experience in itself.

So with low usage, why are we discussing VIA at all, other than for the areas with high population density? And then, that's only a glorified commute, not a 'trip level' excursion.

I'm actually sorry I wasted my time with my above post - I should have considered that there's no point in trying to preserve a system that nobody uses. I'll be sad to see it go, though...

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

...So the solution is to give up on trains, since we already know nobody will ever use them?

No. The solution is to have trains where they make sense. People use trains, you just need population densities to be high for them to be well used in today's society.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by roger1818

No. The solution is to have trains where they make sense. People use trains, you just need population densities to be high for them to be well used in today's society.

So I gather.

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

...So the solution is to give up on trains, since we already know nobody will ever use them?

No, it is to increase our development of public transit infrastructure of all kinds, appropriate to the nature of demand. Where that is best served by rail, improve that. Where buses best serve it, do that. And if a distance is large enough that air travel is the only good way of making the journey, then that should be allowed for.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by GoTrans

You are quite correct. Having separate services on the prairies and through northern Ontario would allow for better on time performance and increase ridership as a result.

I think that Via should operate 3-4 trains a day between Edmonton and Calgary with a potential extension to Lethbridge as a place holder until higher speed rail can be implemented between Edmonton and Calgary. Even if the Via service was only a placeholder it would make sense to improve the level crossings and build a few more grade separations to improve safety. This would prevent the level crossing accidents that led to the demise of the RDC service run by Via Rail.

There should be daily service between Calgary and Winnipeg. This would service the larger population centres on the prairie which were neglected by the Via Rail cuts. In addition there should be service from Regina, Saskatoon, North Battleford, Lloydminster, Fort Saskatchewan and Edmonton.

The segment from Winnipeg to Toronto should be routed via CP to Thunder Bay and the north shore of Lake Superior. Frequencies could be split between the CN and CP lines with the majority of the frequencies being on the CP route.

In short, the service is not where it should be in terms of routes. Slice the Canadian at Winnipeg, add a southern route, add a route between Calgary and Edmonton, add service on Regina to Saskatoon...... In short, return us back to services that were available, many up into the 90s.

Originally Posted by roger1818

And my sister was on a train from Montreal to Ottawa (normally a 2.5 hour trip) that was delayed several hours (I think it was about 3) because of engine failure. That is over double the normal travel time.

Isolated cases are just that. My point is that a shorter delay on a shorter trip is as significant as a longer delay on a longer trip. The latter just sounds worse.

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

Which only argues my point in the first place.

Originally Posted by roger1818

Which point would that be? That delays on long distance trains aren’t important or that HFR is very important?

That on the longer distance trains, an issue is more noticeable. Using the trip between Toronto and Vancouver and Toronto and Montreal

Route Normal time 10% delay total time
T-V 80 hours 8 hours 88hours
T-M 10 hours 1 hour 11 hours

What would upset you more, 8 hours or 1 hour?

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

I agree that they should not be scrapping routes, in fact they should be upgrading them to make train travel a more attractive alternative to other forms of travel.

I'm thinking that despite all the hoopla about climate change, initiative seems to be lacking in some ways to improve transportation from a carbon footprint point of view. When I see a train with a locomotive or two pulling a huge line of cars traveling on low friction steel on steel wheels/rails it just seems so much more efficient than huge planes burning tons of fuel to propel a couple hundred people in the air at high speeds, or thousands of buses/trucks/cars moving people about. And it turns out that it is. Just did a quick search and turned up this article: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-49349566

The chart in the above BBC article illustrates this (European modes of travel shown, but it illustrates the point):


In many cities they are building bike lanes as part of the infrastructure to try to encourage people to use cycles instead of cars to get around. There is no payback to the city for this expenditure, but it is felt to be a necessary expense to help the environment.

I don't see why the government should not look at trains in the same light. In other words, perhaps there should be more government money spent on maintaining and upgrading rail service to encourage people to take the train instead of flying or driving, in the name of helping reduce CO2 emissions for climate change.

Part of that might have to involve some kind of societal change where we are encouraged to slow down a bit - meaning that rather than expecting to fly somewhere in 2 hours we become more accepting of taking a day or two to reach our destination. Lots of moving parts there, but it's sounding like we are going to have to rethink a lot of things in the face of the climate crisis anyhow...

Originally Posted by milomilo

Exactly. The massive diesel clunkers VIA use hardly scream efficiency.

And to be truthful, the absolute numbers of people that might take trains, even if we put massive improvements into rail, is not likely to be high enough to make a huge difference to Canada's overall CO2 emissions.

Originally Posted by roger1818

No. The solution is to have trains where they make sense. People use trains, you just need population densities to be high for them to be well used in today's society.

The solution is to make sure all route attract people to them. Why is the Corridor well used? Part of it is distance. Part of it is time.

Part of it is due to the fact that it is relatively on time. Knowing you will make it to your destination on time is important for all modes of transportation.

Another part is that there is at least 1 train that goes both ways each day.

Do those last 2 things to the Canadian and Ocean and ridership will climb.

[Urban_Sky]

Originally Posted by roger1818

^^^Trains are only environmentally friendly if they are well used. Having a large locomotive towing a heavy passenger car with only a dozen people on board results in a huge carbon footprint per passenger. In that case, a bus is much more environmentally friendly.

The problem in Canada is there are few routes that will fill a "large line" of passenger cars. The BBC article is showing usage in the UK, where population densities are higher than in most of Canada (the Corridor being an exception). Even in that article, it shows that a coach (bus) has a lower carbon footprint per passenger than domestic rail.

Well, it's not that difficult to work out VIA's overall fuel consumption and carbon footprint from the passenger-mileage, passenger-km-per-litre-of-fuel and CO2-equivalents-per-passenger-km figures and I believe that 2.9 litres per 100 km travelled and 89 grams of CO2-equivalents per km travelled are pretty decent values once you consider that the 41 grams reported for "domestic rail" in the UK are achieved with multiple units or fixed-length trainsets (locomotive-hauled variable-end passenger trains are virtually non-existant in the UK), which are much more energy-efficient, especially where operations are electric:


Compiled from: VIA Rail Social Mobility Report 2018 (p. 62)

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

This. Imagine what the per pax footprint is for that train to Churchill.

In order to estimate the environmental footprint on a per-route basis, we will need a metric to allocate the fuel consumption and emissions. The most obvious (and easiest-to-calculate) metric would be train-mileage, which I have calculated in the following table:


Compiled from: VIA Rail Annual Report 2018 (p. 9)
Note: 2016 figures used for Winnipeg-Churchill, as this is the last available year with data unaffected by the closure north of Gillam between May 2017 and December 2018. Click here for a high-resolution version of above table.


Calculating the route-by-route environmental footprint based on train-miles results in 78 g CO2-equivalents per passenger-km and 2.6 liters per 100 passenger-km for Corridor services, only slightly higher values for the transcontinental services and dramatically higher values for the Mandatory services, given their significantly lower passenger load:


Compiled from: VIA Rail Annual Report 2018 and previous table
Note: Click here for a high-resolution version of above table.


However, above table assumes that all of VIA's routes have the same footprint per train-km operated, which is quite an over-simplification once you consider that vary considerably between 2 RDCs (Sudbury - White River) and 2 locomotives with more than 20 cars (a typical Ocean or Canadian during peak season). Therefore, a much more appropriate metric to allocate the environmental footprint would be gross-ton miles (GTMs), which is the product of train-mileage and the train's weight. Using average train lengths somewhat arbitrarily set at 1 locomotive, 5 cars for Corridor services and 2 locomotives and 15 cars for transcontinental services and typical train lengths for the various mandatory routes, results in a footprint of 64 grams of CO2-equivalents per passenger-km and 2.1 litres per 100 passenger-km for Corridor services and about 3 times that for transcontinental services and 6 times that for mandatory services, with the latter showing much more uniform values than under the previous metric:


Compiled from: VIA Rail Annual Report 2018 and previous tables
Note: Click here for a high-resolution version of above table.


So, to answer your question, I would estimate that the footprint of the Winnipeg-Churchill service is 416 grams per passenger-km or 13.6 litres of fuel per 100 passenger-km. However, I wouldn't be surprised if we would find a comparable range among the UK routes as with VIA Rail (i.e. the worst route producing 7 times as many emissions as the best route and 5 times as many as the national average). A hot contender for being the "worst" route would be the ScotRail service from Inverness to Kyle of Lochalsh or Wick, which is a highly scenic, but gruesomely slow service in the sparsely populated Northern Scottish Highlands. Also, one should keep in mind that mandatory services like the one to Churchill operate precisely because there are no other ground transportation modes available year-round to communities along the way and that there therefore are no less carbon-intensive alternatives available to the service currently offered.

I would argue that if there isn't enough traffic to have at least 70% load factor on a daily service with half a dozen cars (be they sleepers or recliners) year round, it shouldn't be running. And any regional service that can't at least sustain half a dozen daily trains, isn't worth infrastructure investment.

The above number do make a solid case for electrifying HFR though.

As I just wrote in my last big post, VIA's non-Corridor routes operate because the government is obliged to running them and expecting them to operate year-round with a load factor of 70% on at least 6 inventory cars is simply unrealistic. That said, Corridor services should of course be less carbon-intensive than all competing modes and I believe that the new fleet and HFR will substantially reduce the carbon-intensity of VIA's Corridor services and that even if it wasn't electrified at all...

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

In short, the service is not where it should be in terms of routes. Slice the Canadian at Winnipeg, add a southern route, add a route between Calgary and Edmonton, add service on Regina to Saskatoon...... In short, return us back to services that were available, many up into the 90s.

Just because they used to exist doesn't mean they should exist. Similarly, just because they don't exist doesn't mean they shouldn't exist. You just need a stronger argument than because they are more comfortable than buses.

That on the longer distance trains, an issue is more noticeable. Using the trip between Toronto and Vancouver and Toronto and Montreal

Route Normal time 10% delay total time
T-V 80 hours 8 hours 88hours
T-M 10 hours 1 hour 11 hours

What would upset you more, 8 hours or 1 hour?

That really depends on my situation. If the purpose of the trip is the train ride itself (like it is for most people on the Canadian) and I am enjoying the 5 star service on-board, then an 8 hour delay only extends my vacation and in't too bad and could be a good thing. If the purpose of my trip is to get to my destination as fast as possible, then a 1 hour delay (or even less) would be a bad thing.

The solution is to make sure all route attract people to them. Why is the Corridor well used? Part of it is distance. Part of it is time.

True, but most of it is the demand for transportation options between the destinations. Demand tends to be proportional to population (though there are exceptions).

If you compare Toronto-Montreal with Winnipeg-Regina. Both city pairs are in differnt provinces and just over 500 km apart (540 km vs 575 km respectively). From Wikipedia, their 2016 CMA census populations are as follows:

• Toronto - 5,928,040
• Montreal - 4,098,927
• Winnipeg - 778,489
• Regina - 236,481

Thus the combined populations of the city pairs are 10,026,967 & 1,014,970 respectively, thus the Toronto-Montreal route has about 10 times the population base to draw upon.

According Urban_Sky's previous post, this route has an average pax-load of 170. If you assume the relative demand based on population would be the same, and you provided identical service (in both frequency and travel time) that would result in an average pax-load of 17. Is it worth putting all the money needed into providing this level of service if you are going to only have 17 people on each train on average?

Some might suggest reducing the number of trains in a day to have everyone travelling in the same day to take the same train, but if you decrease the frequency of service, it makes it less convenient, and a large number of people would otherwise have taken the train, would find a different option. VIA has actually noticed on their Ottawa-Toronto corridor, that increasing the number of trains by x% results in a greater than x% increase in passengers (obviously there are limits to this, but it holds true when going from what is perceived as infrequent to frequent service). Conversely, decreasing the the number of trains by y% will result in a greater than y% reduction in passengers.

Part of it is due to the fact that it is relatively on time. Knowing you will make it to your destination on time is important for all modes of transportation.

Another part is that there is at least 1 train that goes both ways each day.

Do those last 2 things to the Canadian and Ocean and ridership will climb.

You are right and the ridership would climb by a small amount. For the Canadian, the vast majority of riders are tourists, taking it for the experience. For them frequency and reliability are far less important as they will adjust their schedule to match the train. Those using it as a form of transportation are such a small minority that any overall gains from the above improvements would be minuscule.

When you compare that to the costs involved, you have to question if it is worth the investment.

The Ocean would likely see more significant gains, as it is used more for transportation than the Canadian is. The infrastructure improvements required would need cooperation from all levels of government though as it is not within VIA's budget to do it alone.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

The solution is to make sure all route attract people to them. Why is the Corridor well used? Part of it is distance. Part of it is time.

Part of it is due to the fact that it is relatively on time. Knowing you will make it to your destination on time is important for all modes of transportation.

Another part is that there is at least 1 train that goes both ways each day.

Do those last 2 things to the Canadian and Ocean and ridership will climb.

This was pretty much the reason behind my post. Dropping routes because they aren't used enough is like the death spiral that many businesses undergo when they are about to close. When a business becomes less attractive to its customers for whatever reason, people tend to use the business less, so the business has less revenue to work with and therefore it cuts back, making itself even less attractive to customers, more customers stay away, and so on.

My line of thought was that increasing the usage of trains could actually provide a net benefit to our country by potentially cutting down on car and air travel. Train usage could be increased if it were made more attractive (i.e. a viable alternative through reduced travel time, increased frequency, improved comfort, improved convenience, etc.) to customers. Of course you would expect initial losses before it caught on, but if the government were to step in and (temporarily) cover those losses with an objective of increasing ridership it could result in increased usage.

However, I realize it's very complex, and we can't expect people to avoid using their cars or trucks, or to avoid flying on the premise that it may be better for the environment. Understandable as our society seems to be wanting things to be faster and faster, rather than choosing a slower, perhaps more relaxing travel method. Plus the work environment is not conducive to people taking more time for business travel or allowing more vacation days to choose a slower mode of travel.

With the arguments presented by others, I decided it wasn't worth the time to try to advance my argument as it was already decided by others to be a non-valid point.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by roger1818

Just because they used to exist doesn't mean they should exist. Similarly, just because they don't exist doesn't mean they shouldn't exist. You just need a stronger argument than because they are more comfortable than buses.

Well, the southern route was dropped due to politics. So, maybe the strongest argument is the same - politics. Could you imagine if Trudeau said they would restore the southern route. Do you think the Conservatives would vote against it? With more unionized jobs, the NDP wouldn't dare vote against it either.

Originally Posted by roger1818

That really depends on my situation. If the purpose of the trip is the train ride itself (like it is for most people on the Canadian) and I am enjoying the 5 star service on-board, then an 8 hour delay only extends my vacation and in't too bad and could be a good thing. If the purpose of my trip is to get to my destination as fast as possible, then a 1 hour delay (or even less) would be a bad thing.

What is the purpose of the train for the Corridor? I would argue that it is time for VIA to look at all routes as transportation of people first and tourism second. That means that a delay is unacceptable.

Originally Posted by roger1818

True, but most of it is the demand for transportation options between the destinations. Demand tends to be proportional to population (though there are exceptions).

If you compare Toronto-Montreal with Winnipeg-Regina. Both city pairs are in differnt provinces and just over 500 km apart (540 km vs 575 km respectively). From Wikipedia, their 2016 CMA census populations are as follows:

• Toronto - 5,928,040
• Montreal - 4,098,927
• Winnipeg - 778,489
• Regina - 236,481

Thus the combined populations of the city pairs are 10,026,967 & 1,014,970 respectively, thus the Toronto-Montreal route has about 10 times the population base to draw upon.

According Urban_Sky's previous post, this route has an average pax-load of 170. If you assume the relative demand based on population would be the same, and you provided identical service (in both frequency and travel time) that would result in an average pax-load of 17. Is it worth putting all the money needed into providing this level of service if you are going to only have 17 people on each train on average?

Some might suggest reducing the number of trains in a day to have everyone travelling in the same day to take the same train, but if you decrease the frequency of service, it makes it less convenient, and a large number of people would otherwise have taken the train, would find a different option. VIA has actually noticed on their Ottawa-Toronto corridor, that increasing the number of trains by x% results in a greater than x% increase in passengers (obviously there are limits to this, but it holds true when going from what is perceived as infrequent to frequent service). Conversely, decreasing the the number of trains by y% will result in a greater than y% reduction in passengers.

Lets talk bigger. Lets talk Corridor, not just city pairs.
Windsor to Quebec City is 1161km
https://www.google.ca/maps/dir/winds...9!2d46.8138783
Calgary to Winnipeg is 1332km.
https://www.google.ca/maps/dir/Calga...44!2d49.895136

The Western Corridor is less than 200km longer than the current Corridor. Calgary is bigger than Edmonton. Regina is about the same size as Saskatoon. So, the southern western Corridor makes sense.

Start with a train a day each way. Build it up. This head in the sand attitude is why nothing is happening.

Originally Posted by roger1818

You are right and the ridership would climb by a small amount. For the Canadian, the vast majority of riders are tourists, taking it for the experience. For them frequency and reliability are far less important as they will adjust their schedule to match the train. Those using it as a form of transportation are such a small minority that any overall gains from the above improvements would be minuscule.

When you compare that to the costs involved, you have to question if it is worth the investment.

The Ocean would likely see more significant gains, as it is used more for transportation than the Canadian is. The infrastructure improvements required would need cooperation from all levels of government though as it is not within VIA's budget to do it alone.

The Ocean and Canadian run about as often. However, the Canadian goes through a lot more larger population. So, why would the lower population run be more viable to be improved upon?

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

This was pretty much the reason behind my post. Dropping routes because they aren't used enough is like the death spiral that many businesses undergo when they are about to close. When a business becomes less attractive to its customers for whatever reason, people tend to use the business less, so the business has less revenue to work with and therefore it cuts back, making itself even less attractive to customers, more customers stay away, and so on.

My line of thought was that increasing the usage of trains could actually provide a net benefit to our country by potentially cutting down on car and air travel. Train usage could be increased if it were made more attractive (i.e. a viable alternative through reduced travel time, increased frequency, improved comfort, improved convenience, etc.) to customers. Of course you would expect initial losses before it caught on, but if the government were to step in and (temporarily) cover those losses with an objective of increasing ridership it could result in increased usage.

However, I realize it's very complex, and we can't expect people to avoid using their cars or trucks, or to avoid flying on the premise that it may be better for the environment. Understandable as our society seems to be wanting things to be faster and faster, rather than choosing a slower, perhaps more relaxing travel method. Plus the work environment is not conducive to people taking more time for business travel or allowing more vacation days to choose a slower mode of travel.

With the arguments presented by others, I decided it wasn't worth the time to try to advance my argument as it was already decided by others to be a non-valid point.

But it is a very valid point. A line that shut down - the Northlander did have service daily... except on SUNDAYS!!! This means no one could use it for a weekend trip.