VIA Rail

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by swimmer_spe

In 1991
Calgary 710,795
Edmonton 616,741

Regina 179,178
Saskatoon 186,058

Southern route 889,973
Northern Route 802,799

The northern route in just 2 of their major cities has 87,174 LESS people. This is a FACT

That is only a 10% difference. I would consider that only marginally more populous.

You are right, most don't. However, those that are moderates that gave Trudeau the majority out there might. Do you think the Conservatives want to loose those votes and potentially those seats?

When Pierre Poilievre came to my door about a year ago, I asked him about HFR. He hadn't even heard of it and seemed only concerned about what the annual subsidy would be.

Well, now GO does too. In fact the services are the same between Hamilton and Niagara Falls as far as stations.

Yes they now do serve Niagara Falls, but they didn't at the time those stats were generated.

Cheaper is the same argument for profitable.

You are missing the point. For those routes the bus would be better on almost every front so why do so desperately want vastly inferior service?

I suspect that frequency and delays are the reason that the longer route. I have talked about how a friend who wants to use the train to visit me cannot as the Canadain is lined up not to meet any inbound VIA trains in Toronto.

We keep saying he could take the bus and your only counter argument was that he wants to ride "The Canadian." If he is so desperate to ride that train, he can either do like most do and take a hotel or if he can't afford that, he can take the 9:00pm Greyhound (via Ottawa) that gets in at 6:00am.

Also, a line that got canceled; the Northlander had no Sunday service. It ran 6 days a week. This means that using it on the weekends was not possible.

You keep saying that and I don't know what that has anything to do with the topic at hand. It is like you are spewing out random, unrelated "facts."

Population is and was higher.

By only 10%

There was less of a deficit on the southern line.

By 2.5% ((48,937 - 47,775) / 47,775)

Added costs? Like what? A train that does not meet others?

Extending the Skeena to Edmonton, or do you think having it end at Jasper (population 4,590) without any connection would serve its users well enough?

Well, the Sudbury -White River train that goes by my house does not connect with any other train, even though the Canadian does go within 10km of the route.

As you say, Sudbury Station and Sudbury Jct are less than 10km apart (an easy taxi or Uber ride). Jasper Station is 360km from Edmonton Station and over 400km from Calgary.

I agree that it would be nice if the White River train could be extended to Sudbury Jct, but the track layout doesn't currently work well for that (the CN and CP lines cross but don't connect near the airport).

I guess one option would be to move Sudbury Jct Station there and have 2 stations on separate tracks, but then there is the issue of aligning the schedules.

If you travel around the world, you will find many cities have multiple stations and require you to find your own way between them if you want to make a transfer.

You like to cherry pick too.

Give me an example. I try not to.