A study backed by Quebec’s farm lobby proposes modernizing existing railway tracks between Quebec City and Toronto as a cheaper, slower alternative to Alto’s high-speed rail project, while reducing the need to take over farmland.

The study from Vision Transport and the Union des producteurs agricoles (UPA) estimates a basic modernization project would cost about $11 billion, including a 20 per cent contingency. Alto estimates its high-speed proposal would cost between $60 billion and $90 billion, according to reporting by Pierre Saint-Arnaud of The Canadian Press, published by Global News.

The alternative would not match Alto’s promised travel time. The authors estimate an express train could cover Quebec City to Toronto in five hours and 50 minutes, compared with four hours and 30 minutes under Alto’s proposal. A service retaining all 22 existing Via Rail stations would take six hours and 40 minutes. The current train journey takes eight hours and 40 minutes.

The study was prepared by Vincent Duguay, a research master’s student at the École nationale d’administration publique, and rail industry expert Pierre DuSablon.

Its largest proposed investment is doubling tracks throughout the corridor, requiring 407 kilometres of additional track. About 37 per cent of the corridor currently has a single track, and passenger trains regularly move onto sidings to let freight trains pass, the report says.

The authors also propose upgraded signalling to allow trains to run closer together and increase maximum speeds from 153 km/h to 177 km/h. Other measures include stronger Canadian Transportation Agency authority to prioritize passenger trains over freight, along with tilting trains and more steeply banked curves.

Unlike the high-speed proposal, the alternative would retain the corridor’s 924 level crossings, with full barriers required at 533 of them. An option to replace one-third of the crossings with overpasses would bring the estimated cost, including contingency, to about $21 billion. Electrification would require further investment.

UPA president Martin Caron said farmers fear losing land to a project that could ultimately prove too expensive to complete. The organization opposes a north-shore route involving farmland expropriations and favours using existing tracks and rights-of-way on the St. Lawrence River’s south shore.

Via Rail does not currently control all rights-of-way along the Quebec City–Toronto corridor. The study’s cost and travel-time figures are its authors’ estimates, rather than approved project commitments.

Sources