High-speed rail in Canada?

[SebC]

Originally Posted by krazycanuck

I think a Edmonton to Calgary train is very much feasable. The QE2 is nearing the point where it is going to need to be expanded to 6 lanes between Calgary and Edmonton, that is not going to be a cheap upgrade. A high speed rail line would delay the need for that.

At the very least you could reasonably say that a majority of those using air travel or bus (Greyhound and Red Arrow) between Calgary and Edmonton would opt for high speed rail.

The Oliver-Wyman report (see figure 8.17 on page 113 by Adobe or 104 by printed page numbers) puts the expected market share of HSR at 2-7% (depending on the speed, faster = higher market share). Air, Greyhound, and Red arrow are less than 2% each and would decrease with HSR.

HSR would put a dent into vehicle traffic on the QE2, but it isn't much of a solution compared to that Autobahn we all want.

===============

Originally Posted by Flash Walken

For a country the size of Canada, our rail system is appallingly bad.

Not talking high speed, but rail in general.

Odd comment. The bigger the country, the more you'd expect air to substitute for rail.

[ken0042]

Originally Posted by krazycanuck

I think a Edmonton to Calgary train is very much feasable. The QE2 is nearing the point where it is going to need to be expanded to 6 lanes between Calgary and Edmonton, that is not going to be a cheap upgrade. A high speed rail line would delay the need for that.

What would the cost of a high speed rail line be compared to adding two extra lanes to the existing highway? As it stands right now there is room under most overpasses for an extra lane each way; and that would also eliminate the need to buy or lease land.

[cal_guy]

We may have terrible passenger rail, but Canada and the US have arguably the world's best freight rail system, and a good freight system is probably more important to the average person then passenger rail.

http://www.economist.com/node/16636101

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by SebC

The Oliver-Wyman report (see figure 8.17 on page 113 by Adobe or 104 by printed page numbers) puts the expected market share of HSR at 2-7% (depending on the speed, faster = higher market share). Air, Greyhound, and Red arrow are less than 2% each and would decrease with HSR.

HSR would put a dent into vehicle traffic on the QE2, but it isn't much of a solution compared to that Autobahn we all want.

===============



Odd comment. The bigger the country, the more you'd expect air to substitute for rail.

I believe air travel is still prohibitively expensive and subsequently lacking the infrastructure to move volumes of goods from Canada's ports and industrial sectors to other sections of the continent.

I think public investment in increased rail capacity would be more beneficial than the costs associated with continuing a large scale, trucking-based infrastructure.

The argument against this, I believe, is that there would be greater infrastructure were there necessary demand, but I think that ignores -- at least partially -- the subsidy trucking, as a means of infrastructure, receives.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by MattyC

My thought was that the Fed and Prov governments would probably front a decent amount of the cost. And I think its a little off to compare prices to VIA rail. Although the initial cost of the train would obviously be massive, because of its nature the turnoverover of people using the train would far outnumber the people who use VIA rail, and thus the revunues would be higher due to more frequent use. I think this would drive down the cost of the train tickets to something reasonable. At a quick glance it looks like it costs $50-$100 to take the high-speed from London to Paris, and that goes under the freaking ocean. Obviously theres a huge amount of traffic between those two cities, but I would think the high-speed has a lot to do with that. (ie build it and people will use it).

Your quick glance is missing the fact that London to Paris is half the distance of Calgary to Vancouver (216 miles vs 428 miles), and of course are much bigger than the Canadian cities.

[mykalberta]

They would need to start small to see if Rail works in a country where everyone has a car and gas is relatively inexpensive.

I just got back from Europe and it works there when I would say only 70% own a car and gas is $2.25/L (but at some places you get a free beer with minimum ~$20CAD purchase .

I am thinking start with

Vancouver-Kelowna
Edmonton-Canmore
Toronto-Montreal-QC

And see how those routes work. If you get decent traction with those then you can start more pieces like Saskatoon-Regina, Edmonton-FortMac etc

In Alberta while I dont think you would ever re-coup the cost of production (maybe in 30 years) I think it would be an excellent investment in the future prosperity of the Province for the Gov to build a Edmonton-Red Deer-Calgary-Canmore line. Much better use of our funds and royalty dollars.

I would even go so far as to say instead of twinning the Ft Mac road, put those dollars in to Rail and make that road a toll road to incentivize people to take the train.

[You Need a Thneed]

Originally Posted by mykalberta

I would even go so far as to say instead of twinning the Ft Mac road, put those dollars in to Rail and make that road a toll road to incentivize people to take the train.

I makes much more sense to transport the wide and large loads by truck rather than by train. That highway simply has to be wider.

[mykalberta]

Originally Posted by You Need a Thneed

I makes much more sense to transport the wide and large loads by truck rather than by train. That highway simply has to be wider.

I think improving transit to Ft Mac should be the priority, and adding a rail line to go with the current road should be more than enough to reduce traffic on the road to make it safe.

Its either twinning or rail, Ft Mac will never get both.

[You Need a Thneed]

Originally Posted by mykalberta

I think improving transit to Ft Mac should be the priority, and adding a rail line to go with the current road should be more than enough to reduce traffic on the road to make it safe.

Its either twinning or rail, Ft Mac will never get both.

The road needs to be twinned, period. Like I said, there is a large amount of oversized freight driving that road, which can shut down traffic. Twinning does a huge part in solving the problem that that creates (bunching up traffic).

[Bigtime]

Originally Posted by krazycanuck

I think a Edmonton to Calgary train is very much feasable. The QE2 is nearing the point where it is going to need to be expanded to 6 lanes between Calgary and Edmonton, that is not going to be a cheap upgrade. A high speed rail line would delay the need for that.

At the very least you could reasonably say that a majority of those using air travel or bus (Greyhound and Red Arrow) between Calgary and Edmonton would opt for high speed rail.

It's only nearing the point? Maybe it's just my opinion but I think we passed that point years ago, it needs to be 6 lanes yesterday (and keep trucks and RV's to the far right lane and middle lane to pass only).

[Phanuthier]

Here is a related useful reply from Quora:

Efficiency at transporting passengers / Passenger throughput:
Passenger throughput is the number of passengers transported per lane per unit time. In simple words, how many passengers can the system move? Factors that affect this are:
Passenger density (no of passengers per unit area)
Cruise speed (speed at which fuel efficiency is maximum)
Traffic density (degree of utilization of the lane)

1.Passenger density:
Passenger density is the number of people that can be transported per square meter of space available. It can be calculated by comparing the floor plans. For a bus, I am considering the ubiquitous Volvo chassis, used all over the world:

As an equivalent to the Volvo in a metro system, I am considering the R143 built by Kawasaki, used in NYC Subway:

The results for passenger density (higher is better) are as below:

Trains have the highest passenger density of 2.9 passengers per square meter

Cruise speed:
Though any vehicle is capable of high speeds, efficiency is maximum at the cruise speed where the factors like engine efficiency, drag, etc come together. The cruise speed (higher is better) of the different vehicles are:



Traffic Density:
Traffic does not denote conventional traffic here. It refers to how efficiently a lane is used. For example, there might be a train every 2 mins or a train every hour. Distribution of traffic affects how many passengers can use the network. So traffic density is also a factor to be considered. If traffic density is 100%, that means that the lanes are utilised fully - maximum passengers are boarding an unlimited number of vehicles and moving at the cruise speed.

Passenger throughput:
As assumed earlier, consider a 100 km stretch of lane(s) for each of the transport medium. Only other vehicles of the same type and speed are allowed, so that there is no hindrance in their movement. To calculate the throughput, the number of passengers in the lane at any given point of time and the number of passengers who reach their destination are to be calculated. This is similar to volumetric flow rate of fluids, which is given by:

(change in volume and change in time are parameters)
The passengers mid way in the lane are eliminated for consideration. The size comparison of all the transportation modes are:

The passenger throughput for each of the transportation medium, is a pretty big dataset, so I am considering one particular case- passenger occupancy 60%, traffic density 30%. The lane width is 3.5 meters for vehicles and 4 meters for metro trains. So the passenger throughput (higher is better) is:


Trains are more more efficient at transporting people per lane - 153000 passengers an hour.

Energy Efficiency:
Energy efficiency of a particular transportation mode depends on two main factors:
1.the vehicle/ engine efficiency
2.the support infrastructure

Most studies I have come across neglect factor 2, which introduces a huge bias. For instance, when comparing an aircraft and a train for green credits, tail pipe emissions alone are considered. This method is flawed as trains require laying of tracks and maintenance activities performed on them, whereas aircraft need only the runway and the aircraft to be maintained. This becomes more significant when the plane is making a trans atlamtic flight. So applying the same to a bus/train comparison, a bus needs a road to run efficiently whereas a metro train usually runs underground with reinforced concrete floors and steel columns. Since green credits and energy efficiency are dependent on these too, I have included these as well for fair comparison.

Carbon foot print of the vehicle:
Carbon foot print is considered because the vehicles use different types of fuel. Motorcycles and cars use gasoline, whereas a bus uses diesel. Trains and electric cars use electricity. So the carbon emitted due to the use of the vehicle can be used to compare all these different transportation modes. Electricity comes from different sources with different carbon footprints, so for every 1Watt consumed at the socket, the power comes from different sources. The world wide distribution of these sources are:


Considering these parameters and the miles to a gallon, the carbon emission per passenger (lower is better) for these different modes over a 100KM stretch is:


Few surprises here - Prius is the most economical personal vehicle, whereas trains and buses are close in terms of mass transport. Trains however have a edge of 250 grams of CO2 for every 100 KM.

Infrastructure related Carbon Footprint:
Infrastructure carbon footprint includes CO2 generated in the manufacture of the raw materials, construction of the infrastructure, transport of materials to the construction site etc. In several studies, this crucial and large contributor to efficiency is not included. Roads, bridges and every structure in the road use concrete. CO2 per ton of Concrete is in a ratio of 0.9:1 in many cases, and concrete manufacturing contributes to about 7% of world CO2 emissions. By this criteria, roads win hands down by a factor of 1300% initially. Trains catch up with the 250 grams of CO2 per 100 KM I had mentioned earlier for every passenger transported. After transporting a million passengers a day for 2 years in the case of overhead tracks or 10 million passengers a day for 3 years in the case of underground metro (by my estimates) they start being carbon footprint negative compared to buses. Consider the cross section of a underground metro system:


For an over head metro system, the cross section is as below:


Considering these three cases, the carbon footprint for these infrastructures (lower is better) are as below:

When including the infrastructure, Buses are the most efficient transportation medium.

[normtwofinger]

The wife and I were recently back in Canada during the summer. We flew from Calgary to Abbotsford to see the wife's family. When a round-trip flight from Calgary to Abbotsford is the same price as round-trip Costa Rica to Calgary, there is a problem. Airfare is way too expensive in Canada.

[guzzy]

There is a group that already owns the land in downtown Edmonton and downtown Calgary. They already have leases on the right of way through the corridor. I know Stantec did a feasibility study over 5 years ago that showed it feasible at $50 return - Edmonton to Calgary.

I designed a pipeline for Pengrowth a few years back in the Olds areaand one of the right of way crossing was the HSR company. Nothing was shown on the survey except the HSR ROW. I don't recall the name of the company though.

The back up plan if they don't install a HSR is to turn it into a trucking corridor and eliminating heavy haulers on QE2.