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Transit Tangents
The Podcast where we discuss all things transit. Join us as we dive into transit systems across the US, bring you interviews with experts and advocates, and engage in some fun and exciting challenges along the way.
Transit Tangents
Canada’s High-Speed Rail Moment
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Canada has talked about high-speed rail for half a century, and we might finally be watching the moment it turns into steel in the ground. Alto, a new federally owned Crown company, is proposing a 1,000 km high-speed rail line from Toronto to Quebec City with fully grade-separated, electrified tracks and top speeds up to 300 km/h. That’s not “slightly faster rail” that’s the real global standard, and it would instantly change how people move between Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, and Quebec City.
We dig into the part that surprised us most: once Canada started studying high-frequency rail, the math pushed them toward true high-speed rail because the jump in cost looks more like a step than a leap. We compare the early cost ranges, talk about why this corridor is uniquely strong for ridership, and explain why a three-hour Toronto to Montreal trip competes with both Highway 401 congestion and the real door-to-door time of flying.
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Canada’s High-Speed Rail Gap
SPEAKER_02Canada has spent the last 50 years disgusting high-speed rail and has yet to get a plan off the ground. That is until now with a new project called Alto. Alto would be a 1,000 kilometer high-speed rail line stretching from Toronto to Quebec City, and Canada is finally treating this as a national economic priority.
SPEAKER_00For many Canadians, this project can feel like it is long overdue. Let's take a comparison by looking at other G7 countries. Of these seven countries, five of them have high-speed rail networks. Japan has high-speed rail, France has high speed rail, Germany has high speed rail, England has high speed rail, the United States sort of has high speed rail, kind of, but Canada has none. So if Canada is actually able to pull this off, they're not only going to be at the same level of rail service that we have in the Northeast in the US with the Acela and our high-ish speed rail, but they're actually going to blow right past us.
What Alto Is Building
SPEAKER_02So what is the Auto plan? Well, starting off with ALTO, that is the name of the Crown Company that has been formed to build this service. And a crown company is really just a federally owned company in Canada. Uh, think similar to Amtrak here in the US. But this company has been established to build this 1,000 kilometer line that is around 620 total miles. And the path would go through Toronto, uh Peterborough, Ottawa, Laval, Montreal, uh, Troit Briviers, and ending in Quebec City. And for the uh Quebecois who may be watching the video, sorry for any mispronunciations there. The uh trains on this line would actually be fully grade separated, electrified, fenced, and would achieve speeds of up to 300 kilometers per hour, which again for us Americans is close to 186 miles per hour.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I mean impressive speeds and like at the level that we actually see in a lot of systems uh in Europe uh as well as other parts of the more developed world that has this technology already. What's
High-Speed vs High-Frequency Costs
SPEAKER_00interesting about this plan though is that initially Canada was not really setting out to just build a high-speed rail line hitting that you know 186 mile per hour mark. Uh, they were actually mostly aiming at creating a high frequency rail network. So the idea was to get their via passenger trains, again, they're equivalent to like an Amtrak in the United States, to a point where they were running much more frequently and you could have a much more reliable schedule traveling between these different cities. Because again, Toronto to Montreal aren't they're not that far apart. But when you only have a couple of trains per day making the journey, it's a little bit hard to plan around and to use on a regular basis.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_02So during this process of evaluating what would be the best solution, would it be higher frequency rail or something else? They found that building a true high-speed rail network would only be around 20 to 30 percent more expensive. And so the law, the logic or the argument came down to if we are already going to be building a brand new railway, why not just go all in and make it a world-class high-speed rail network?
SPEAKER_00Totally. And in this case, when you look at the actual numbers, it makes all the sense in the world. So the preliminary price estimate to build this high-speed version uh is roughly 60 to 90 billion Canadian dollars, uh, converted to the US right now at today's exchange is roughly 43 to 65 billion US dollars. Um, but those same price estimates for the high frequency rail network were 45 to 75 billion Canadian dollars. So again, that comparison, 60 to 90 compared to 45 to 75, it's basically it's basically the same thing. You might as well go out and do this.
SPEAKER_02Or we can compare that 60 to 90 billion to California's high-speed rail network, which is of around 125 billion by most recent estimates. And all we can say is that California could really take some notes from Canada. So why this corridor?
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Why This Corridor Works
SPEAKER_02At the top of the episode, we did make some comparisons to other G7 nations and pointed out that Canada is the only one without some form of high-speed rail. And a large part of that may be due to Canada's general population density. And in fact, Canada is at the very bottom list of the G7 when it comes to population density at around four people per square kilometer. Now, to be fair to Canada, that is because it is a vast country that is largely empty, with the exception of the area closest to the US border. In fact, 90% of Canadians live within a hundred miles of the US border. It is a country of about 42 million people, which again, when you are comparing it to the G7, that doesn't really stand up to a country like the United States, but is very comparable to countries like the UK and France and Italy in total population sizes.
SPEAKER_00To narrow down the population even more, 44% of Canada's population lives in this corridor in question, stretching from Toronto to Quebec City, which is exactly where they're planning to put this high-speed rail route. So that's roughly 17 million people living in this chain of cities that are really such an ideal distance for high-speed rail to be competitive with driving, flying, and would be great city pairs to compare to these other countries like you're talking about in Italy, in the UK, which do have very successful systems like this. So we're looking at potential city pairs like Toronto to Ottawa, Toronto to Peterborough, Ottawa to Montreal. Um, you know, I lots of different pairs here, but I do think that this Toronto to Montreal connection will be so important for Canada, connecting these major cities together where there are already lots of people making this trip on a regular basis.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, in fact, Alto is estimating that this could serve up to 24 million annual riders by 2055, which you can compare that to the roughly uh 3 million that are currently riding via on this corridor, or you can compare it to uh the United States to the south with our 34 and a half million that ride the entire Amtrak system as a whole. So if Canada can pull off a high-speed rail network that is serving 24 million annual passengers, and we're only doing 34 and a half million in the entirety of the United States, they're definitely gonna blow us out of the water with this.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and currently just to look at what already exists in Canada, VIA does already serve this corridor, like we've said.
Time Savings vs Driving Flying
SPEAKER_00Um, and for a little bit of a time comparison to get from Toronto to Montreal on the via rail today, it generally takes about five hours. And this new plan with ALTO is saying that they would be able to pull it off in three hours. So shaving two hours off of the journey, which is a really impressive time savings.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, your only other option really is to take Highway 401, which is one of the most congested highways in North America, and that's also going to take you roughly five and a half hours, not including major delays.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and uh, I don't even know that you know this, Chris, but I actually spent basically every other weekend in Toronto uh as a kid because my dad lived in Toronto for a while. So I would be driving back and forth between Rochester and Toronto from my mom's house to my dad's house, and I have not so fond memories of sitting on traffic sitting in traffic on the 401. So um I don't recommend that to folks. Uh beyond that, though, the other option is to fly. And the flight between Toronto and Montreal currently sits at about 75 minutes, but we know that flying, you don't just take the flight time into consideration. The airport is usually further outside of town than the train station would be. You have to account in for extra time for security. So if you add two hours to that 75 minutes, um, and then you also start to factor in things like uh, you know, being dropped off on the outskirts of town, you already have high-speed rail being competitive with flights on
Airlines Joining The Rail Plan
SPEAKER_00time.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and actually on the air travel side of it, surprisingly, Air Canada is fully on board with this plan. They are not only a supporter of a high-speed rail network, but they are actually a member of Cadence, which is this consortium of companies and consulting groups that have come together that are really responsible for designing and ultimately delivering this system. But they are looking at this as potentially uh something that will help their operations and allow them to do more airport and rail pairings. They already do this in partnership in places uh in Europe and some Asian destinations, but this ultimately could help streamline their operations where they're not having to spend all these extra resources and all this extra money to do these short haul flights, which aren't really efficient for the airline or the airport. And they could put more of their focus on longer distance flights, international flights, uh, that sort of thing. So it kind of surprised me that Air Canada was all for this, considering they are the primary transportation, it seems, in Canada. But I can't imagine that being the case in the US, like Delta or American Airlines or even Southwest saying, Oh, no, no, no. Yeah, that's what I say.
SPEAKER_00I wish, yeah, I wish Southwest had this attitude when high-speed rail in Texas gets floated, because I mean Southwest could could similarly focus on some longer. Actually, you know, the issue for Southwest probably is that they don't do like those international really long-haul flights. They make their money on some of the smaller flights. I mean, they still fly like obviously like across the US and whatnot. But yeah, I mean, I wish Southwest would have taken that stance in Texas because they could help get shuttle people between the dis different destinations. I mean, heck, they could they could run the high-speed rail. You never know. I mean, in Texas, there's a good chance that if they ever pull off high-speed rail, it would probably be privatized. Um, anyway. So it could be, you know, Southwest high-speed rail in Texas.
SPEAKER_02But whatever. I've always thought that the airlines should just invest in trains. Like set up high-speed rail, and then you could take a Delta train from Atlanta to Charlotte. Like, I'd be fine with that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I mean, and yeah, you brought this up, but it it is really common. And again, even Air Canada does this. Uh, they're part of the Star Alliance. So any of the Star Alliance uh flights, like Deutsche Bahn in Germany, uh, you can book a flight from um from you know where you are in Austin to uh let's say Berlin, but instead of flying direct to Berlin, because a lot of the flights going to Germany go through Frankfurt first, you might have a flight that goes to Frankfurt and then you transfer on to the Deutsche Bahn for the last leg, but it is all on your flight ticket. So um potentially interesting thing for Air Canada be to be able to do
Public Support And Political Fault Lines
SPEAKER_00in the future.
SPEAKER_02Well, I love that they're in support of it. Uh, it's not just Air Canada that is in support of this system. There was a poll done by an anti-Alto group really trying to set the stage to say, oh, Canadians don't want this, but the poll absolutely backfired on them. The public support in Canada is actually very high, sitting at an average of around 62% in support. There's about 18% opposed, with about 20% of the population that's just undecided.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And those numbers improve even more when you start to look geographically in the areas that would be affected by it most. So Ontario and Quebec, which would directly benefit, have support above 65%. Um, but again, even in these uh uh provinces that would not benefit directly from this, for example, British Columbia, the exact opposite side of the country, 60% of residents in British Columbia support it. So uh it does seem like a slam dunk, politically speaking, hilarious to see this NIMBY group um having their poll backfire on them.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, absolutely. And the fact that they they probably had to pay for it as well. Uh, and politically, the support is also there. The Liberal Party in Canada supports it by 72%, uh, block voters by around 68%, the NDP at 65%, and even conservatives in Canada at around 58%.
SPEAKER_00You love to see it. Uh, I would say that the last number is pretty interesting because at least as of late, the conservatives in Canada are not for the project, at least as far as the political leaders are concerned. The head of the Conservative Party in Canada, Pierre Pollavier, announced on March 31st that the Conservative Party officially opposes ALTO and that a potential future conservative government uh would actually cancel it. Uh, they describe it as a get ready for the ultimate NIMBY word here, a $90 billion boondoggle. Very creative, these people are. They all use the same word. They argue that the money could be better spent elsewhere, uh, and that this project is negative for rural property impacts.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and it's incredibly frustrating because as late as 2023, the party actually supported high-speed rail in Canada. So this complete about face is is just mind-boggling to me. And uh, you know, Canadians make it make sense because I can't I can't make it make sense.
SPEAKER_00I will say though, in reading some articles about this, there are members of the Conservative Party who are at least like lukewarm or potentially still in support of this. Um Doug Ford. Is Doug Ford the one who did crack, or is that Rob Ford? I get them backwards. The one who is currently the premier of Ontario, uh, he is in support of this.
SPEAKER_01Hold on, I don't think we can leave. I don't think we can leave. I mean that's real.
SPEAKER_00If you're the one who did crack uh in the past, Doug Ford has had some statements that are generally positive speaking about this. He is the premier of Ontario. Um, so you know, it would directly impact his constituents. So it makes sense to see him uh in support there.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and the political side of this is probably where the biggest risk to this project actually lies, especially as the government has been promoting this as a national priority.
The Economic Case Beyond Farebox
SPEAKER_02But the true impact of the land acquisition and road closures, impacts of protected lands, farm disruptions, wildlife, all of those things will surely grow some of the opposition to this as the plans uh start to solidify.
SPEAKER_00Alto and current supporters in the liberal government are arguing that all of these things ultimately will be worth it, and that there will be a huge economic benefit to come as a result of enacting this plan, including a permanent GDP increase of 1.1%, which is equivalent to roughly 24 and a half billion Canadian dollars annually.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, that also would include uh estimated 50,000 construction jobs and around 5,000 permanent uh ongoing operating jobs after. And and this, when you're looking at these models that are trying to look at the economic impact, they are including things like a larger labor market, which you know happens when people are able to travel between these cities more easily, um, more business opportunities, uh, more access to these workers, tourism, time savings, uh, reduced congestion, increased productivity, all of these things. It's really hard to necessarily come up with a really clear calculation of how they will impact the economy. But these groups are saying all of these things together will result in that 1.1% GDP increase, which that number seems staggeringly optimistic, but it really might not be that far-fetched. Uh, there was a peer-reviewed study done in Italy to look at the first 10 years of their high-speed rail network. Uh, and it was estimated that their high-speed rail contributed to about 2.6% of additional per capita GDP uh nationally over 10 years. So there is some precedent for this sort of economic success in peer countries to Canada.
SPEAKER_00Another talking point against this is that the price point for building this out uh is not going to ever be paid back with the expected revenue that would be generated from folks actually riding the train. And to be clear, they're not entirely wrong, right? But the the economic benefits that come with building infrastructure like this are not just coming from folks actually paying to ride the train. It is all of the extra things that get tacked on that Chris just laid out. Um, you know, you you end up with extra tourism. You end up with folks who maybe live in Toronto and are spending an extra weekend in Montreal or two weekends in Montreal a year that they weren't before, spending money in Montreal, including, you know, the tax revenue that's generated when they're spending their money in those places, uh, attracting, you know, creating more job opportunities, all of these different things compound over time to grow the economy writ large, which then brings in that additional tax revenue to make these huge investments worth it. Now, on the operation side, I mean, like you could probably operate this system at a profit, but not when you're accounting for the immense infrastructure cost right off the bat.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, this is more this should be considered more like a nation building type of expense. It is truly an investment into Canada's future. And that is sometimes really difficult. We say in the US, but I think it's more of a North American thing. It is very difficult sometimes to think of these big projects as one-time investments that we're not necessarily getting paid back for on their operating side. We are investing in this because it is a good thing for the economy, it's a good thing for the country, and the economic benefits down the road in 20, 30, 40, 50, 100 years are going to be, you know, so much greater uh because of this thing. And, you know, in the US, we have this drive for profitability from the start. We're looking at this at the you know, Bright Line is a good example. We did a whole episode on Brightline. Uh, if you haven't seen it, definitely go and check that out. But we talked about their economic model and how they are six billion dollars in debt. And the vast majority of that debt is from the initial build-out of this system. You know, if we had approached the high-ish speed rail in Florida, similar to what Canada's looking at, the US could have taken on that debt as an investment, and then Brightline, you know, could be operating it maybe at a profit, maybe, uh, with the current fares they have. So uh there's a lot of arguments against spending this kind of money, but uh to me, the economic benefits in the future just so far outweigh the cost.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and I mean, just having the ability to go to other places and see the benefits that those societies have as a result of the rail networks. You know, obviously I've been living in Germany for over a year now, and we take so many little weekend trips to different cities and all this different stuff, and it is so nice to number one, like be able to just take the train there and not need to worry about going to an airport or driving all these places, but the experience and just like the benefits that you get being able to take advantage of that is it's so nice to have, but it really does spark the extra economic piece to the puzzle. So, um, yeah, I mean, I I hope they're able to continue to put to push us forward. Go ahead.
SPEAKER_02I'm incredibly jealous of your experience in Germany and taking the trains. If you haven't seen uh our Germany episodes, I was just in Berlin uh with Lewis, and we took the train from Berlin to Dresden and then Dresden to uh to uh Jena where where Lewis is living, and it's so nice, y'all. It's so nice to just be able to hop on a train and go places.
SPEAKER_00Back to Canada here, though.
Route Fights Engineering And Timeline
SPEAKER_00Uh, what is next to actually get this thing off the ground? The first big piece is sorting out the alignment, and Canada is going big in terms of trying to make this thing. As fast as possible. So they're aiming for 300 kilometer an hour speeds, which is at the upper end of what a lot of countries in Europe are doing. You'll find some of the European alignments, they're at 350, but in Germany, a lot of them are around 300. I know in Italy a lot of them they're aiming for around 300. France and Spain, I think, are more at 350 or so, but 300 kilometers an hour is fast. So to be able to stay going that fast, the turning radius of any curves on this route is literally a seven kilometer turning radius, which makes much of the existing via rail alignment that currently serves this region not quite feasible for this. So there will be a good bit of land acquisition and planning that needs to happen to be able to get the actual final route sorted out. There's also a bit of an argument going on right now about where exactly this will stop. I know that Kingston is currently pushing to try to have the rail run through Kingston or at least near Kingston, even though it is not the most direct route. So I know that there are a couple arguments going on right now over whether or not that alignment should be chosen.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's a it's you know delicate argument. You have to decide do you want to slow the trains down for more catchment, more you know, passengers, or do you really try to make this as fast as possible with a more direct route? And uh be really interested to see how that argument eventually gets resolved. But for the steps that need to be taken to get this thing really off the ground, I would say that's probably step one is finalizing the general alignment of the rail. Uh, if you've looked at a map of this currently, it's kind of funny. The the line is it's not really a line, it's a zone uh between the cities, and they haven't uh quite narrowed it down to that, you know, 60 foot or however however wide the actual rail line is going to be going through. Um so it's this vast area that they're currently studying. So first thing they have to do, finalize the route and the stations. Uh, then of course you have to move into the engineering phase, and this is where uh the cost for that 60 to 90 billion range is really gonna start to come into focus. Will they actually be able to do it for 90 billion? Will it be closer to a California cool 125 billion, you know, US? Who knows? Uh, and then you have things like environmental approvals, uh indigenous consultations, uh acquiring the right-of-ways.
SPEAKER_00There's tons and tons of little things that need to happen along the way. Uh, they are aiming for a target of 2029 where they would like to actually begin construction first on the segment between Ottawa and Montreal. That is kind of the shortest segment. Phase two would then move into going between Ottawa and Toronto. So that would then have the bridge between Toronto and Montreal connected, and then phase three uh connecting up to Quebec City uh in the north as phase three. So um, I mean, it's a really exciting project, and Canada has a real shot to try to make this happen. And I think that what they really should be focused on. I know that like there's a lot of conversation about adding Kingston, and I'm sure there are other communities along this route that really want to be included in it right away. But I think they have an opportunity when you have so much of the population, I forget it was like 47% of the population living in this area, to build out this real core trunk line that is top line, high-speed service that goes as fast as possible between, but really also implement improving the existing via line and maybe even building additional kind of regional rail lines to help feed people into that trunk line versus trying to satisfy everybody's needs in the first go. And I think if they get it right, uh they they're they're setting themselves up for a really bright future in terms of transportation in that whole region. It's pretty cool to look at.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's absolutely it's it's amazing to look at. I think if you were comparing it to the US, the closest thing we could even compare it to would be the Northeast Corridor, where the Acela is kind of high speed, high-ish speed. It's really our only it's really our only operating like high speed train. But even that corridor, which is not uh too much larger in in geography than this part of Canada, that corridor has 50 to 60 million people living in it. We should have better better trains than what Canada is proposing here, but that's a whole other whole other discussion. But I will say uh there are a lot of steps the Canada needs to take to make this a reality, and I really hope that they do it. Uh, I think they will, and I would honestly bet money that they're gonna beat us to it. Like they will have a high-speed rail that is operating, at least between Montreal and and Ottawa, before Canada or before uh California is done.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, there's uh add that to the list of things that the United States and Canada are currently competing on at the moment. I can add that to the to the news cycle.
US Comparisons And Closing
SPEAKER_00Sorry, Canada. Uh but but um if you enjoyed this video or you have, I'm sure you've got thoughts on it as well, uh, especially if you live in Canada, definitely let us know in the comments down below. We'd love to hear your thoughts on it. Um, you can like the video, subscribe if you have not done so already. If you want to support the show directly, the best ways to do so are via our uh YouTube member link or by joining our Patreon. We've got a merch store, all that sort of stuff. Um also big thanks to SOR for sponsoring this week's video. Again, if you sign up with the link in the description, you actually get 25 bucks off your first flight. So worth taking advantage of that. Also, thanks to all the we've we've had a couple, uh quite a few new signups for YouTube memberships recently. I didn't mention that to you yet, Chris, but quite if quite a few new people signing up. So uh thanks for doing that. It helps us be able to spend more time working on transit tangents, doing more trips to places like Berlin, like we did in last week's episode. In a couple weeks, we'll have an episode from Dresden coming out as well. So stay tuned for all of that. But with all of that being said, thank you all so much for watching and enjoy the rest of your Transit Tangents Tuesday.