Quote:
Originally Posted by Truenorth00
GO RER is a lot more secure than HFR. Even conservatives in Ontario know that their fate is tied to the 905. And improving GO is a huge part of the. Especially given how crowded GO has gotten in the last decade.
HFR on the other hand lacks a sizable enough constituency to move the needle lectorally. Maybe seats in Peterborough. But that's it. Makes it hard to get commitment. I had hoped the Liberals would see it as a project that has both environmental and economic merit. But they seem almost half hearted about it. And that's leading to HFR really being cut down to as bare bones a proposal as it could be. That's really sad.
Expanding the rumoured HFR budget from $4B to $7B for Toronto-Peterborough-Ottawa-Montreal would get us substantial double tracking, full electrification, some straightening and bypasses, getting travel time down to a bit more competitive level. As it stands, Toronto-Ottawa and Ottawa-Montreal will be great, but Toronto-Montreal at 4:45 will be pretty marginal over the bus or car.
The most questionable issue is that VIA kept advertising the $4B price tag (without electrification) but added Quebec City. And they've lost access to the Mount Royal Tunnel. I sincerely hope that segment and its cost and complications is not holding up and causing underinvestment on the rest of the project.
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5 years into this proposal they still haven’t answered some pretty basic questions.
1). How is the line going to get through Montreal? (Between Dorval and St Martin). The Tunnel seems to be off the table (and even if it wasn’t the approach Via currently uses into Montreal is incredibly slow and does not seem easily upgradable). The only option that seems even remotely affordable in their budget window is bypassing downtown Montreal and building a station in TMR, but they seem loathe to admit that in public. Any option assumes CN or CP is willing to yield track or ROW land for dedicated passenger use (their apparent unwillingness to do that is the whole reason for this project).
2) How are they going to get through Peterborough? This is not a high traffic line that was significantly grade separated in urban areas decades ago (like the CN mainline). The Peterborough situation resembles the Guelph situation Metrolinx has to deal with, and the GO solutions are incredibly expensive. Again, the only option that would be even remotely affordable would be to bypass Peterborough and build a “Peterborough Junction” station outside of town, but they are again loathe to admit that in public.
3) The Toronto situation is somewhat more clear because there is a decade-old feasibility study for GO to Peterborough in the public record. But those costs were very high ($2B for the faster option) and inflation adjusted would eat up a huge chunk of the budget. They also would require CP to yield land or track for dedicated passenger use (or some sort of expensive tunnel project).