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    Alberta, Ottawa to explore high-speed rail between Calgary and Edmonton
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    Alberta, Ottawa to explore high-speed rail between Calgary and Edmonton

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    19 Comments

    2. bubblewhip on

      Guess its election season.

      Don’t worry, you will get a high speed rail **plan** before the next election.

    3. EatBaconDaily on

      Hey what a coincidence we’re about to elect a government who wants to ban high speed rail for no reason in Quebec

    5. tdfast on

      High speed rail efficiency really goes down hill if you don’t have effective rail systems in the two cities. You’ll need a car rental place at both ends of the train so you can actually get somewhere in the city, once you get there. LRG is coming but the rail link only makes sense when you have lots of local transit options.

    7. bcl15005 on

      High-speed rail aside, it’s nuts that at present there aren’t even conventional speed trains between Calgary, Red Deer, and Edmonton.

      Like if you had to list the big regional corridors in Canada where train travel stands out as an obvious practical solution, it’d be:

      1. **Quebec <-> Windsor**
      2. **Edmonton <-> Calgary**

      … and really that’s about it.

      Plus, Calgary <-> Edmonton is basically the simplest and cheapest terrain you could ask for when it comes to any kind of linear infrastructure.

    8. No-Wonder1139 on

      This is a good idea. Much like it’s been a good idea for the past 60 years, but we never lay any track and the price just keeps going up.

    9. LemmingPractice on

      For all the problems with the Toronto to Quebec City system, the Alberta proposal should be an absolute slam dunk.

      The distance between Calgary and Edmonton is perfect for high speed rail (close enough that it would outperform flights between the two locations, when taking into account security time), it would run across flat prairie land (instead of the rugged Canadian Shield land of the Ontario/Quebec one) allowing for lower costs and higher speeds, and the fact that the Calgary and Edmonton airports are right on the line means it would give airport to downtown connections for both cities. There also is currently zero passenger rail service between Calgary and Edmonton, while the Ontario-Quebec one would be orphaning billions in existing rail infrastruture.

      For some perspective, the estimated cost of the Toronto to Quebec City line is $90B, due to the rugged land it goes through and the sheer distance in the Toronto-Ottawa and Montreal-Quebec City sections. The estimated cost of the Alberta Prairie Link proposal is $9B.

      It’s just an absolute slam dunk project, and if Prairie Link were an Ontario-Quebec project, the feds would have built it ages ago.

    10. polloyumyum on

      This again? The Alberta government will look into the possibility of doing, have some sort of report put together, then do nothing. Then, in a few years when they fuck something up, they’ll pull this off the shelf, dust it off, and get people talking about it again. The only difference is that construction costs have gone up 20% so it becomes even less feasible.

    11. ToxinFoxen on

      So apparently the reward for treason is high speed rail?
      Maybe the conservative party doesn’t look so bad after all…

    14. HowlingWolven on

      YES PLEASE.

      And the Green Line. If we align the projects right, we can benefit from Alto experience and tack onto the fleet buy.

    15. CipherWeaver on

      This route should be a no brainer. Fast, over flat land, and it would take in both airports and also Alberta’s 3rd largest city.