YEG - Edmonton Int Airport

[LO 044]

Regardless of who brings up HSR, i think it's a dead issue. The mindset of North Americans in general is to travel point to point that's why a big majority will take the car over a train. Everyone says it's a "cool" idea but how many would use it? Not many. It works in Europe because you can take the train to the city center and see what there is to see. Here, people would have to travel to Edmonton's city center, then take a bus to WEM. Same goes with business travel, many simply rent a car in Edmonton to do business in Calgary. It would be really interesting to see what the difference is between business/connecting/vacationing travellers on the YEG-YYC run. Every flight i take seems to be packed with connecting passengers more than business travllers going to Calgary.

The government has said that if the rail line was built with private money, they would be ok with it. That is not going to happen. Pretty much all railways in the world are state owned and/or state funded to some extent. I know for a fact that the Alberta Government is pumping money into highways in the next couple of years. The amount will be increasing dramatically every year and cities/consultants/contractors have been told to get ready for it.