Quote:
Originally Posted by Aylmer
I read somewhere that the Canadian used to wait for the Montreal-Toronto night train when it was delayed.
On a related note, I wish VIA ran overnight services. Daytime train service is only really practical if the trip is under 3-4h or 400-500km. But overnight services are competitive for distances upwards of 12h or 800-1200km because it's travelling during times you can't or wouldn't want to be flying or driving anyhow. And with a lot of our rail service being painfully slow compared with driving (I'm looking at you, 50km/h Montreal-NYC), night service turns this from a bug to almost an advantage.
Their effect is multiplied by the connections it allows too; A nightly Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal would mean that someone, say, from Windsor could have a full weekend in Quebec City. Today, the same trip would allow you just enough time to get there before you need to turn right back.
It would be something quite different from the 'land-cruise' Canadian and Ocean of today. If you're just getting on, sleeping, and getting off, you only really need a bed and maybe someplace to get some basic pre-made meals. It would require investments in the equipment - UrbanSky has written in the past about their cost. But I think it would turn some long and useless routes into highly practical options for everyday people, increase the value of the connecting services on either end, and offer the possibility of introducing some attractive new transport products in areas which aren't served.
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One of the many key problems with night trains is that they accommodate a passenger group which has very particular needs: They want to be able to board the train between 9 and 11pm and to leave it the next morning between 7 and 9am, with some passengers being more at the early side and some rather at the late side. Unfortunately, offering a 2 hour window is only possible at a station where the train originates or terminates and thus only works for one city-pair.
Have a look at the various timetable scenarios I’ve outlined below:
Note: start times for boarding (where applicable) are indicated in yellow, end times for deboarding (where applicable) are indicated in orange and timings which have been matched with the current schedule of existing VIA services are
highlighted.
#1 shows the ideal Montreal-Toronto (and v.v.) schedule: Board after 9pm, depart at 11pm, arrive at 7am, leave by 9am. Note that the timings in Kingston fall into the middle of the night and the schedule is therefore highly unattractive for anyone else than overnight passengers.
#2a shows the ideal Montreal-Toronto schedule as above, but with a detour via Ottawa. Note how the train passes through Ottawa at highly unattractive times (1am westbound, 5am eastbound).
#2b shows the same Montreal-Ottawa-Toronto route, but with timings optimized for Ottawa-Toronto (and v.v.). Note how the departure time in Montreal is much too early (only 30 minutes later than Train #669 today) and the arrival time in Montreal much too late (only 27 minutes earlier than Train #60 today) to offer any benefit over the daytime connections offered today.
#3a shows the ideal Quebec-Toronto (and v.v.) schedule. Note that the timings in Montreal are at highly unattractive times (3am westbound, 5am eastbound) and that the route is so long that the train would only arrive at 08:30 at its destination.
#3b shows the same Quebec-Montreal-Toronto route, but with timings optimized for Montreal-Toronto (and v.v.). Note how the arrival and departure times in Quebec (12:30 and 17:30, respectively) are too much in the middle of the day to be attractive for overnight passengers.
#4a shows the ideal Montreal-London (and v.v.) schedule. Note that the timings in Toronto are at highly unattractive times (01:30 eastbound, 04:30 westbound).
#4b shows the same Montreal-Toronto-London route, but with timings optimized for Montreal-Toronto (and v.v.). Note how the arrival and departure times in Quebec (11:15 and 18:45, respectively) are too much in the middle of the day to be attractive for overnight passengers.
But how do these theoretical schedules compare to some schedules we’ve seen for night trains in the past?
#5a shows the Montreal-Toronto (and v.v.) night train together with the Montreal-Toronto-Windsor (and v.v.) through sleeper, which CN operated until April 1969. Shown are the timings from
October 1968, where the boarding start time in Montreal (23:00) and the departure time (23:55) were both rather late. Unsurprisingly, arrival and departure time in Windsor are so far in the middle of the day, that you could comfortably fly arrive/departure in Windsor at the same time, but spend the night at home rather than in a bed on wheels.
#5b shows CP’s Montreal-Toronto (and v.v.) night train together with the Montreal-Toronto-Windsor-Detroit through sleeper, which CP operated until April 1964. Shown are the timings from
October 1963, which has a boarding and departure time in Montreal which is one hour earlier, whereas the arrival time in Montreal is basically the same. The arrival/departure times in Windsor and Detroit are even worse than those of CN, meaning that the journey does cost the passenger half a day (on top of the whole night).
#6a shows the Montreal-Toronto (and v.v.) night train, which VIA inherited from CN and operated until the January 1990 cuts. Shown are the
May 1988 timings, which are basically unchanged compared to 1968, but have a slightly earlier departure and boarding time in Montreal.
#6b shows the Ottawa-Toronto (and v.v.) night train, which VIA also inherited from CN and soon rerouted to run via Kingston east of Napanee and thus combined with the Montreal-Toronto night train west of Brockville until its cancellation in October 1988 (when it was replaced with a fourth day train). Shown are agan the
May 1988 timings, which have a slightly later departure time and earlier arrival time in Ottawa, but both is compensated by extended occupation periods while the train is stationary in Ottawa.
#7 shows the Montreal-Toronto (and v.v.) night train which VIA operated under the name “Enterprise” between 2000 and 2005. Departure time (shown are the
May 2005 timings) is the same as pre-1990 (#6a), but with a slightly later arrival time in Toronto or Montreal, as the train acted as early morning commuter train from Kingston to Toronto and from Brockville to Montreal, whereas I didn’t find any note about at what time passengers would have been accepted to access their cabins.
But what timings could we have if VIA was to resurrect night trains in the Corridor?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Aylmer
Just to take down the strawman, I'm definitely not advocating for a single daily night trains to replace any daytime service.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by roger1818
I didn't expect you were, but without dedicated tracks, this would be a likely outcome.
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Unfortunately, Roger1818 is absolutely correct in stating that the only way to gain a slot for a night train is to forgo one slot currently taken by a day train, as there are no more slots available through bottle necks like Coteau, Durham Junction or into Toronto Union Station. The only way to avoid displacing day trains is to replace them and that means swallow trains #651 (like the “Enterprise” did), 650, 22 and 39. On a plus side, this automatically adds Ottawa onto the route.
#8a shows such a Montreal-Ottawa-Toronto (and v.v.) schedule in which the hypothetical night train would take exactly the same timings as trains 39, 651, 650 and 22 today. The result is, unfortunately, a very early departure in Montreal (18:50) and Toronto (19:35), whereas the departure and arrival times in Ottawa would be fairly early.
#8b shows therefore the same schedule, but with a departure time which is much more reasonable for night train passengers (but try to tell that intercity passengers which would rather head back from Montreal to Ottawa or from Toronto to Cobourg, Belleville or Kingston sooner than later after a long day in the big city). However, the later departure time in Ottawa means that this train can no longer act as a late-evening return from Ottawa to Kingston.
As you can see there certainly is no night train timetable which could fit all Corridor markets which might have enough demand potential to fit at least one sleeper, just like there is no less certainly no demand to operate two separate night train services. Therefore, a revival of night trains in the Corridor seems highly unlikely, regardless of whether HFR gets implemented or not...
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