The good, bad and awful of the Alto high speed rail project, and how to fix the flaws and concerns surrounding it

I’ll start off by saying that even with all the criticism and foul language I’m about to hurl at Alto, I am actually in favour of moving forward with high speed rail. However, the recent string of urban rapid transit failures in Canada (Ottawa LRT being the worst, and Finch LRT being the most recent) should be a lesson to transit people, and the public at large, to speak up early and aggressively when something “seems a bit off”. Many of those projects could have been radically improved if people had been more critical when they were first proposed over a decade ago rather than adopting the attitude of “well it’s not perfect but it’s better than nothing”. With Alto, there is still a chance not to make that mistake again.

I would also add that even though I think the process behind Alto getting to where it is today was likely corrupt, I kind of don’t care about that. And even though it might sound like I am resigned to the core vision of Alto being unchangeable, I actually think that’s okay and not worth dwelling on. Overall the direction they have taken with Alto is fine enough. Many elements of the project itself can be changed and, through the use of supporting infrastructure, Alto can be improved and become good value for money. And yes the price tag matters a lot. At CDN60-90 billion Alto should nail every detail and be fucking exceptional.

Lastly, and perhaps most important, after a decade of the public having had zero ability to offer any input on Alto and its original VIA HFR iteration, it’s time to let them have it. Speak up. Be loud. Put the boots to them. This is finally a public project and we need to make sure they dont put it behind closed doors again. And with that, let’s dive in...

What do we know about the Alto project?

For the past 60 years there have basically been two approaches to high speed rail across the world. The first is the Shinkansen model. Launched in 1964, it was the original modern high speed rail service. This involved building fully dedicated, high speed, infrastructure from end to end. High speed lines weren’t just built in the long, empty sections through rural or mountainous landscapes. Even in the highly urban and dense parts of the network high speed trains had their own tracks, their own stations (sometimes next to an existing station, sometimes independent of one), right down to their own platforms. It is the most expensive way to build a high speed line, but it does have some critical benefits, particularly when it comes to travel times, reliability and on-time performance. This is the same approach that China would also take for much of its high speed train lines.

A photo taken near Tokyo Oji Shinkansen station. You can clearly see the separation between the original passenger rail tracks on the ground, and the high speed line, which in this case has been elevated several stories in order to weave its way through the dense Tokyo neighbourhoods.

The second approach is the European model, popularized by France and the TGV in the early 1980’s, which was then adopted by other European countries in the subsequent decades. With this method anywhere from 70-90% of a route would be on dedicated high speed tracks. But in the urban areas high speed trains would use existing “classic” tracks that are also used by regular intercity and regional services. Sometimes they have dedicated platforms within existing stations, though sometimes they would share them with every other train using the station. The biggest advantage with this method is cost, since you can reuse existing stations and the expensive to build urban sections of the existing rail network.

Alto seems to be adopting the Shinkansen model. I say seems to be because it isn’t explicitly spelled out. But the way they describe the network, their aims, goals, and the stations, all seem to indicate that they want a 100% end to end dedicated high speed network.

When it comes to the route the *exact* location of the line has not been officially decided on yet. However a clearly defined corridor has been identified. This largely follows the original VIA HFR route, though there are two major differences. Between Ottawa and Montreal they have a much different corridor in mind that would completely avoid the existing VIA route, going further north and coming into Montreal from the top via Laval. And between Peterborough and Smiths Falls there is now a southern route option which goes south of Highway 7 and the old Canadian Pacific rail corridor, and north of the 401. The corridor being investigated would be well north of most (possibly even all) of the existing VIA stations in between the 4 major cities of Toronto, Montreal, Quebec and Ottawa.

An official Alto map showing the corridors they are considering building the high speed line in.

When it comes to stations it seems that they are aiming for 7 in total, across the nearly 1000km line. This is how they advertise the line in a video on their website. While they are hosting open houses in communities located within the corridors they are considering there has been no indication they will, or even want to, build stations in smaller centres, or even in the suburban fringes of most major metro areas. This has been a consistent theme with the project since roughly 2018 when the original VIA HFR proposal removed references to stations in smaller communities like Kaladar or Perth and avoided talking about them like they were the plague (and then a literal plague hit and made it super easy for them to avoid addressing the issue since people were preoccupied with things like not dying).

The exact locations of *all* 7 stations is up in the air. In previous iterations of the proposal it was basically a given that they would use Toronto Union or Montreal Central because they were already clearly established hubs. Access to them would have been over existing lines, or at least within existing corridors. That is no longer the case. Because the intent seems to be building dedicated HSR stations, or at the very least having dedicated platforms and a dedicated line in and out, there is a chance that Alto will not serve any of the existing VIA stations (the odds of that would be small, but it is a possibility).

When it comes to stops outside the major metro areas the intent seems to be greenfield stations. For Peterborough they mention a station outside the city with “good bus connections” indicating a station in the middle of a field, something that interactive maps on the Alto website confirm. Trois-Rivieres is much the same, with Laval perhaps being located in an area currently hosting a business park, light industry or big box stores.

We also know they are aiming for the Ottawa to Montreal section to be the first one they start construction on. No specifics are given on their website, but according to an Alto representative at an open house held in Ottawa that was filmed by Rail Fans Ottawa, construction on that section would begin in 2029 and take approximately 7-8 years. Timelines for the other segments have not been publicly discussed yet.

As you will see, or have already deduced from above, there are still *a lot* of unknowns about the project. And I have reached out the Alto team to get there response to many of the concerns and questions I have, but as of this writing I have not received any statements back. But this is what the public currently has to work with.

And with that, let’s breakdown the good, bad, and awful of the project.

The Good

1. For the route and project they have developed the Shinkansen model is probably the right approach.

Yes you could take the high speed rail discussion back to square one and make a case that the European model with a different route is better, etc etc (a camp I fall into but also a stance I am conceding and forgetting about going forward). But the reality is that even after 60 years of global high speed rail competition, the Shinkansen probably remains the best overall in terms of reliability, on-time performance, safety and speed, despite being the first out of the gate.

While Canadians often lust over European high speed trains, like the TGV, the 4 1/2 decade long build out of that high speed network hasn’t always been great. Germanys ICE network has pretty severe on time issues and is often derided by the public that uses them regularly. The Dutch foray into the field was an equally mixed bag with problems that are still being sorted out 20 years after its only high speed line opened. Going back to the OG high speed network is the most expensive choice, and also probably the correct one.

Top left: One of the approaches into Amsterdam Central which shows not only many different trains and services all using it, but a complex string of tracks and junctions that also slow trains down. Top right: A map of the Dutch HSL Zuid line (in black). You can clearly see the line end and restart in Rotterdam, as it does for Amsterdam and Antwerp as well,. Bottom: The graffiti tag“Theyre food might be good but... Dont buy trains from Italy” refers to the fact that the trains purchased for the launch of domestic high speed service in The Netherlands were so bad they barely entered service and enraged a lot of the public. It left NS running 160km/h service instead of 250km/h for almost two decades (even then domestic service only started running at 200km/h a few years ago.

2. Alto may not use any of the VIA owned corridors.

Leaving the existing VIA owned lines alone, from Brockville to Ottawa, and then onward to Coteau, would create a really good opportunity to still enhance and upgrade services for all the cities and towns that are going to be far away from the Alto line. I say could because there has been no confirmation yet as to whether they intend to keep existing VIA services, or even the lines themselves. But at least 70% of the VIA owned corridors are guaranteed to remain untouched by the Alto project so there is a reasonable chance that lines could survive and be put to better use.

3. The Montreal to Quebec section is largely fine.

The Alto line to Quebec City will run on the North Shore of the St Lawrence, which hasn’t had passenger rail service since 1990. There is VIA service on the South Shore via Drummondville but the presence of the mighty river effectively makes them two distinct regions as there are limited crossings over it. It seems unlikely Alto will threaten the existence of that service. There are specific issues with the station in Trois-Rivieres, where a Quebec station might be, and a lack of smaller stations. But those are issues that can be easily addressed. Overall the North Shore plan was fine in the VIA HFR days, and it remains fine in its Alto form.

4. Alto should be able to avoid being the disaster that is California high speed rail.

This is both in terms of construction and how badly the California project will probably function once its up and running. Researching and writing about that project makes my brain bleed so I all I will say is that we can only hope that lessons are in fact being learned from that horrendous shit show.

5. It’s high speed rail. And fast trains are cool.

We can pretend otherwise but the “gee-whiz train go fast” factor of it all appeals to our silly, dumb brains. The social, cultural and political realities of Canada often mean that the public transit projects that get the go ahead are typically smaller in scale, and more pragmatic than visionary (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing). But the fact that this is a “super fast futuristic bullet train”that sparks imaginations will be critical if the public is going to get on board with spending CDN60-90billion on it.

The Bad and Awful

1. There is no guarantee that Alto trains will use Toronto Union Station, Montreal Central Station. or Gare du Palais in Quebec.

While I’ve lumped all these stations into the bad category, it’s kind of a mixed bag and not so straight forward. I already mentioned that the Shinkansen model is a wise one to adopt. But that does come with a caveat when talking about its approach to urban stations. One aspect of the Shinkansen is that many stations are not next to longstanding existing “classic service” stations. For Japan this isn’t really a big deal. Their cities have far more decentralised density patterns, and more robust rapid transit networks. That isn’t the case in Canada. Cities here have highly centralized density, almost always centred around major passenger rail hubs, such as Toronto Union or Montreal Central. It’s how cities grew starting in the mid-1800s and it has remained that way for over 150 years.

The most extreme example of this style of growth is Toronto. Everything centres around Union Station. Every GO train heads there. It’s served by two major subway lines. It has an intercity bus terminal and even a few tram lines. And because the city, region and province have made Union *the* transportation hub it also has a massive amount of development centred around it (and it will continue to get denser ). While bringing an Alto HSR station to, or next to, Union won’t be cheap, there really isn’t any other sensible option given the reality of Toronto.

For Montreal this might not be the worst outcome. Its rail network is a total disaster owing to many historical reasons I won’t get into here. Even Central Station is not exactly a ‘centre’ of the regions transportation network in the same way that Toronto Union is. So there are opportunities to give Montreal’s intercity (and commuter) rail strategy the total rethink it has needed for the past 2 or 3 decades. An Alto HSR station should still be central, and probably close to or part of the existing VIA/EXO station. But its choices are different and more complicated than Toronto.

There is actually recognition by the Alto project of the importance of urban stations. They explicitly talk about building tunnels or viaducts to get into the central areas of Toronto and Montreal, and as much as 18% of the projects budget could go towards making that happen. So they are part of the way there. However two cities are not marked for that treatment. Quebec gets vague references amounting to “we will see were we can end up”. Though getting to the existing, centrally located Gare du Palais shouldn’t be too bad and seems likely (though not guaranteed).

And then there is Ottawa, which we will get to eventually.

2. The Alto network does not serve Pearson or Dorval airports.

So, for decades one of the biggest selling points high speed rail advocates would use to sell it was the ability to kill, or at least radically reduce, air traffic in the Quebec-Windsor corridor. This was also wrapped into their environmental arguments for the project, which oddly enough rarely cared that much about reducing car traffic (there was a lot of hypocrisy and classism in their arguments as there is in many modern day ones). And for people who are only going between Ottawa and Toronto or Quebec and Montreal the Alto proposal would probably take a huge chunk out of those flights (it would absolutely hurt Porter something I suspect few people would feel sad about).

But what if you are going from Montreal to Saskatoon via Pearson or Ottawa to Frankfurt via Dorval? The reality is a lot of the travel between cities in the corridor are people who are on the first/last leg of a longer trip. In order to really crush airline traffic within the corridor you need stations at Dorval and Pearson so that those initial/final connections can be done seamlessly on a high speed train. This means Schipol (or at the very least Frankfurt) style stations that do not involve janky, obnoxious connections via shuttles, people movers, or a metro trip.

One of the various proposals for a transportation hub at Pearson Airport. It isn’t as ideal as Schipol, where the tracks and stations are directly underneath the main terminal entrance and blends seamlessly into the airport. And you wouldnt want an HSR station located any further away than the one above as it would make walking times less than ideal. But this would provide a “terminal” that connecting passengers could transfer to and not find too annoying.

In addition Pearson is also well positioned to serve as a western GTA HSR station providing a convenient place for people in Brampton, parts of Mississauga, and northern Toronto to catch a train at. This is a function Dorval currently serves for VIA service on the West Island of Montreal.

With the routing options they’ve chosen Dorval is completely off the table. That is problematic but it is also difficult to solve without totally rethinking how the high speed line enters and leaves Montreal, so an Alto station at Dorval seems highly unlikely. Pearson could still be served if they extend the line beyond a ‘central’ Toronto station, (in combination with bringing in separate lines for GO or other regional rail services) and it’s rather surprising this isn’t even mentioned in the slightest.

3. It doesn’t address or fix any of the problems facing cities and towns on existing VIA routes and may lead to many of them losing rail service all together

With the original VIA HFR proposal there were many places that wouldn’t really see any benefit from it, such as Belleville, Kingston or Drummondville. But that was largely okay. HFR wasn’t going to be a nearly CDN100 billion project. It was meant to increase and improve service on very specific routes, such as Toronto to Ottawa (but not Toronto to Montreal). It was a first step in addressing the need to modernize all of the VIA routes in the Quebec-Windsor corridor. And it was meant to do so at a reasonable price, with estimates settling around the CDN10-12 billion range for the first phase.

But a few years after it was announced it began to evolve into something much different. There hasn’t been any mention of improved VIA service in Southwest Ontario since 2021. And the few mentions they gave to bettering service in Lakeshore cities like Kingston, even if they were kind of bullshit ideas, disappeared even earlier than that.

The current route possibilities add even more concern as to what might happen with existing services. For the Ottawa to Montreal corridor Alto would be an entirely new route that would leave existing communities like Alexandria and Casselman 30-60km away from the Alto high speed line. Then there is the recently added “southern route” option between Toronto and Ottawa.

Prior to the recent release of information the plan had been for the Peterborough to Ottawa route to roughly follow Highway 7. However, the new “southern route” which they say is an option because its construction costs would be less due to going through more agricultural land versus the rockier granite terrain of the shield, is roughly half way in between the Highway 7 routing and the 401. It doesn’t get super close the existing VIA line (it would be 20-35 km further north of Belleville and 40-55km further north of Kingston). But it isn’t hard to see the feds selling stations on a southern route as “close enough” to Lakeshore cities so they could justify reducing, or flat out cancelling, VIA service on that line.

Does this does sound slightly sinister and conspiratorial? Yes. And there is good reason for not trusting the feds and the Alto consortium.

It took Alto, and its earlier VIA HFR variant, 11 years before it finally decided to get the public at large involved (there were admittedly some small consultations along the way, but this was only for a select few people or communities). And for the past 5 years basically everything about the project was locked away in secrecy. It was known that private companies and transit consultants were doing... some stuff. It was known that by 2025 close to CDN5 billion had been allocated into doing... stuff related to the project. But the public didn’t see a single report or map. There was no accountability for how that money was spent. The few announcements that were made amounted to “we are going to make the train go faster” and that was it. We just had to trust that the transit consultant overloads and feds weren’t setting the money on fire.

In a fairer world the whole lot of them involved would be investigated for corruption. It is genuinely crazy that so much money has been spent and there has been zero transparency and oversight for it. But, unfortunately, that isn’t going to happen. It sucks. A lot. But with everything there is to fight for (and against) these days you have to pick your battles and where to put your energy and that fight probably isn’t worth it.

However, the public at large isn’t stupid. People can use common sense and tell when a group of people have been acting dodgy and suspicious. And now that the public is involved in the Alto project the assumption has to be that they are going to keep acting this way because why wouldn’t they if they’ve gotten away with it for so long.

Given all that, it is totally justified to think they might just have shady intentions of shutting down the existing VIA Lakeshore line if the southern route is picked. And to be clear that would be totally unacceptable as a “goal” and would be one of the few reasons to completely torch Alto and force it to reset. That said early feedback from people living along or near the proposed southern route has been quite negative (for a number of reasons, some ridiculous but most valid) so we will see if that option makes it very far.

4. Greenfield stations.

While the inclusion of Peterborough and Trois-Rivieres is good, these are also not high priority stations for Alto. In reality the line is being designed so that trains can hit 300km/h as fast as possible after they leave Toronto, Ottawa, Laval and Quebec, and have the ability to stay at that speed the entire way between those 4 stations. It is highly unlikely that they are going to add billions to the price tag for the tunnels and viaducts that would be needed to create downtown stops for Peterborough and Trois-Rivières. Greenfield stations at the edge of the cities, on empty or near empty land, are (unfortunately) the most cost effective way to achieve the overall goal that Alto seems to be working towards.

The problem is it becomes very easy for them to adopt the laziest option, which would be surrounding the station with parking lots, implementing the lowest cost transit access to them, and making them a weird pariah to the city. This would be counter to the last few decades of urban and transportation planning and be a massive step backwards. That said, they aren’t a lost cause and there are ways to mitigate having a greenfield station that I will cover later (though Im sure you can guess what it is already).

5. Smaller communities in between the 6 *chosen* cities are left out to dry

I already mentioned this briefly, but as of right now there is zero indication that smaller locations along the line, like Tweed/Madoc or Vankleek Hill/Hawkesbury would see any service whatsoever. Just trains blasting straight through community after community. It is genuinely unacceptable to have 200km+ long sections were trains fly by at 300km/h without anyone in between being served. Its not as though every little community needs a station, and most trains could drive by with just a handful of them making the smaller stops. When highways are built no one blinks an eye at peppering them with CDN50 million interchanges. It should be no different here.

6. The lack of suburban stations

Canadian cities are suburban cities. And even though the central part of major Canadian metros do see growth, the suburbs by and large still outpace them. On the current VIA network suburban stations have proved to be very valuable. 18 years after Ottawa added a station in the southwest suburban satellite of Barrhaven it was 16% of all of Ottawas boardings and growing (until the pandemic and VIAs general decline began to happen). In Quebec, Ste Foy station captured 38% of that cities riders in 2019.

Top: A graph showing boardings at both Ottawas Tremblay and Fallowfield station from 2001 (when Fallowfield opened) to 2019. The suburban station had consistent growth since it opened, even in years when overall ridership declined. Bottom left: Pie chart showing the share of riders Ottawa Tremblay and Fallowfield received in 2019. Bottom right: Pie chart showing the share of riders that Quebecs Gare du Palais and Ste Foy stations received in 2019 (Ste Foy had increased its share from 32% in 2009)

Under the current Alto plan Toronto, Ottawa and Quebec have zero suburban stations. Not just Toronto in fact, but the entire Greater Toronto Area. Just like adding smaller community stations they don’t need to be big and grand, and not every train has to stop at them. It makes total sense that Laval has one, but it shouldn’t be the only suburban station on the network and failing to recognize the importance that these riders and communities would have on Alto would be negligent.

Other issues and concerns that need to be addressed

Those are far from the only issues. There are other serious concerns that need to be addressed as well (in reality the list is much longer but this gives an idea of some of the more critical ones).

1. How much will tickets on Alto be?

High speed rail is a premium service that more often than not commands premium prices. Right now it is often borderline whether VIA works out to be a cheaper option than driving. If you are a single person and buy your ticket many months in advance, you might end up being okay. But if you are travelling with two or more people, or driving an EV, or willing to take a bus, VIA is almost always the most expensive way to travel (outside of flying and even then it sometimes isn’t). Price matters a lot when it comes to how popular a rail service will be (GO train expansion to K-W and Niagara Falls have been clear demonstrations of this). But as it stands there is zero indication of what the average person is going to end up paying for a ticket, something the public should know. It matters a lot whether it makes sense to dump all that public money into what may amount to a luxury service.

2. What will happen to the existing VIA lines?

I’m repeating this a bit because because not only is it important that the existing VIA lines are not scrapped, but it has to be absolutely, very clearly, explicitly spelled out, with the network designed in a way that they cannot be sabotaged. It would be very easy for the Alto consortium to engage in ratfucking that would hinder the viability of the existing lines and that option needs to be shut down immediately

3. Ensuring there will be no non-compete clauses so that regional rail alternatives can still move forward

One aspect of the REM rapid transit line in the Montreal region that is not widely discussed enough is that it is in fact private transit and that part of the contract that the CDPQ has with the Government of Quebec includes non-compete clauses in it. For example Reseau de Transport Longeuil (RTL) who used to operate buses from the South Shore across the Champlain Bridge to downtown Montreal is no longer able to do so on a scheduled basis because it would cut into the REMs ability to make money (they only do it if the REM has a shutdown and buses are needed for replacement shuttle service). There are also questions about whether there are clauses that limit the ability to modernize EXO rail services if it could compete with REM (something I have been looking into but don’t have a definitive answer on yet).

Is the current intent for Alto to have similar provisions that would prevent the creation of regional rail lines that roughly parallel the Alto route (such as using the VIA line from Ottawa to Montreal for a regional service)? Even if the existing lines remain untouched ensuring there are no clauses to prevent their modernization is absolutely critical.

Let’s talk about Ottawa....

You might be wondering why there is a section dedicated to Ottawa-Gatineau. At the end of the day the city represents everything good and bad about the Alto project. It highlights the flawed process that got Alto and high speed rail in general to where it is today and how that has created some difficult “pick the least worst option”choices. But it also highlights the huge impact this project will have on the future of cities, especially a rapidly growing one like Ottawa-Gatineau that is on the cusp of becoming a proper, metropolitan city and region.

I won’t go through the entire history of passenger rail in Ottawa. Sean Marshall recently wrote a great article which gives a good overview of that history if you want to dive into it a bit more. But the very brief rundown of the current Ottawa situation is this. In 1967 passenger rail service moved from a centrally located Union Terminal on Rideau Street (temporarily home to the Senate because *those* people are not allowed to be unhoused) to a site 5 km south that is surrounded by a freeway, light industry, some parking lots, and now big box stores. Basically it was proto-Amtrak bullshit, though at least Ottawa ended up with one of the most beautiful train stations in all of North America. The whole “rail rationalization” program also made access for anyone living in Gatineau much more inconvenient, especially if you were a poor who had to take transit.

This is the current state of intercity (VIA) rail going in and out of Ottawa. It is easy to see how not just the VIA station itself, but also the lines heading to it, are located away from the most dense parts of the city.

The ‘67 move is often viewed as a mistake and for years people have wanted to see train service brought back to the old Union terminal. Many people in Ottawa (more often than a certain type of older person that uses Facebook a lot) are now fantasizing that Alto is the opportunity to do just that. But it isn’t as simple as just running tracks back to the station and in reality, it’s kind of a bad idea that also doesn’t work for the Alto plan the public has been presented with.

Ottawa-Gatineau faces a big problem when it comes to its place in the Alto network. Despite it being a growing region, so to are Toronto and Montreal, which also happen to be the two largest cities in Canada, and are almost certainly going to remain that way for a long time. And at the end of the day the *real* holy grail of high speed rail has always been seen as the Toronto to Montreal route. This is why many previous high speed rail proposals had it roughly paralleling the Lakeshore and skipping everything in between. These “gee whiz bullet train go fast” mega-proposals have always been about connecting those two cities with the fastest trains and lowest possible travel times with everything else being secondary.

Routing the line through Ottawa was in part a holdover from the HFR proposal and that has a couple critical consequences. First, it makes it longer than if it was roughly paralleling the existing VIA line by 45-60km (depending on the exact routes chosen). At 300km/h that only amounts to 9-12 minutes. But at CDN60-90 billion you really dont want to lose any minutes of travel time. Sometimes trade offs are going to happen, and a slightly longer route and travel time is the trade off for putting Ottawa on a single line between Toronto and Montreal instead of multiple, probably more expensive, branching lines (an option the public never had a chance to explore or evaluate).

However it also means the line goes through another urban area and that means unless trains are in a tunnel or perfectly isolated from its urban surroundings and on a fast alignment they will have to slow down to get through it. This wouldn’t be a big deal if all trains were starting or stopping in Ottawa. But that won’t be the reality. In fact very few trains are likely to start or stop their trips there. Most are going to be Toronto to Montreal bound trips that also make a stop in Ottawa, or Toronto to Montreal trips that are running super express and driving straight through the city.

This photo of a Shinkansen line shows just how sweeping the curves need to be in order for the trains to still be able to travel at 300km/h. This is about as tight a curve as you can get before trains would have to slow down from their top speed.

The reality of Alto being a single line through Ottawa is that trains will have to be able to get through Ottawa as quickly as possibly so that Toronto to Montreal trains don’t bleed too much time (on top of what they’ve already lost from using a slightly longer route). This means the “cheap and simple” option of running trains into a revived Union terminal is out because its going to add way too much time to the Toronto to Montreal trips that are making a stop in Ottawa (on top of other factors).

The cheapest way (though still not actually cheap) to bring service back to the old Union Terminal is to replicate how it used to be done, though a tunnel and underground station would be required today since there is no above ground land for tracks and station platforms (unless you demolish parts of the Rideau Centre and DND headquarters). This single section would instantly add 5-8 minutes to every Toronto to Montreal train that was also stopping in Ottawa in addition to the time lost on the approach in and out of the city.

Having a central station, like Toronto and Montreal, would necessitate tunnels and viaducts so that trains can get in and out quickly. But because of the geology and topography of Ottawa-Gatineau that won’t be cheap, or easy, and would probably also dictate a station very deep underground (like the downtown O-Train stations are). This is easily the most expensive option for a station.

If you wanted an Alto alignment that supported full speed travel through Ottawa (for Toronto to Montreal express trains) and have it serve it a more central station, whether it was at the old Union on Rideau or one near Parliament or Lyon O-Train stations, the red line shows what it would have to look like. It would require a broad, sweeping curve and 20-25km of tunnels in order to get through the city without demolishing parts of it. Even an alignment that had tighter curves and slower through speeds would still require 15-20km of tunnels.

So what about the current VIA station then? It’s better than resurrecting the Union Terminal idea in some ways since trains can drive straight through. However if you simply used the existing western approach as is the last 10km wouldn’t be particularly speedy and there is an insanely tight corner that slows trains down to a crawl before entering the station. You would have to tunnel at least some of the western approach so that you didn’t put the VIA tracks in jeopardy of being taken over by Alto, and to maintain reasonably high speeds coming in and out of the station. You could create a higher speed alignment through the station, but that would require far more tunnelling and escalate the cost of it all.

Here you can see two possible Alto routings. The first, in red wouldnt allow full speed travel through Ottawa. But it would greatly increase how fast trains could enter versus the existing VIA route, and would reduce the amount of tunnelling needed versus other options. The section in pink shows an alignment which would allow full, or nearly full, speeds, but would require roughly 6km of additional tunnelling in order to make it happen.

And of course its general location, and surroundings, and access from Gatineau are still shit. If this location were chosen there would have to be a very serious and conscious effort to integrate it into the rest of the city, which would need to consider options such as burying part of the Queensway to help stitch together nearby, disconnected neighbourhoods, better transit connections to Gatineau, and dense development around Tremblay station.

The area in orange shows where the Queensway, and its interchanges, create a barrier between neighbourhoods. It actually has a massive impact on most central part of the city and burying even just highlighted section would make a radical difference to the city. In fact you could easily argue that burying that portion of the Queensway would do far more for Ottawa than a central station for Alto ever could.

There is technically a third option which has been thrown around before (both in the 1950s/60s and recently in the VIA HFR era) that is “apparently”not being considered, though I am skeptical about that. This would involve using a freight and hydro right of way about 10km south of the city centre. It would easily be the cheapest way to provide the fastest possible travel times through Ottawa. But it would place the station even further from the city centre and as of right now would have no direct rapid transit connections to downtown. There are technically ways you could develop the rapid transit network to directly serve the station from many part of the region, including Gatineau, but that would basically require rethinking the entire Ottawa rapid transit network and likely require tens of billions to do the work necessary to integrate the station in a meaningful way. In short, this is a bad option.

This southern alignment occasionally came up in conversations about the VIA HFR plan. It is easy to see why this would be considered, because it is clearly the cheapest way to get trains through Ottawa at full speed. So far Alto doesn’t seem to be considering this option, and it is critical that they never do.

As you can see there isn’t a stand out option for Ottawa. The cheapest ones, and the ones that would technically be best for the goals of Alto and its holy grail Toronto to Montreal service wouldn’t really make the most of the opportunity when it comes to what it could do for Ottawa-Gatineau. The “dream” option of a central station would easily be the most expensive when the overall needs of Alto are considered. It would also be the most complex and difficult, would likely leave VIA disconnected from Alto, and would almost certainly require a new central station location instead of trying to make the obsolete Union terminal one work in a modern context.

Ottawa is actually in a rough spot, partly owing to historical reasons, and partly due to Alto having been designed the way it is. It really needs to get this right to set itself up for the next 50 years of growth. And even after all the time I’ve spent putting this article together and considering the various options, I don’t know if I am any closer at picking one above the rest. That said there is a starting point that I will cover shortly.

Ottawa also isn’t alone in facing these kinds of difficult choices. Whether it’s Kingston or Peterborough or Laval all these cities have to decide what exactly is going to be worth fighting for. And in many cases there isn’t a “great” option, but rather “okay” ones you have to find ways to make the best of. These are the places where the most contentious battles and debates will take place (and they will be very ugly and nasty at times).

Can Alto be salvaged and go from a dud to a stud?

Yes. There are ways that Alto can be drastically improved. Most of these options aren’t free with some requiring multi-billion dollar investments. And they will require a lot of public pushback, advocacy, and outright fighting to get because they aren’t concessions that will be made easily. But they should be done.

0. Solidarity

I am labelling this as zero because to be honest without solidarity, there is little chance of getting the kind of public pressure needed to fix Alto. Even if you live in Toronto and only really care about being able to get to Montreal fast, don’t throw everyone else in between under the bus. Be a champion for the smaller communities, or at the very least suburban parts of the GTA, who actually want to see some benefit from the project instead of trains speeding by them. The inverse is true of smaller communities, especially those on the Lakeshore who won’t even be close to the line. It’s going to be a lot easier to address the problems you face if people in Peterborough or Trois-Rivière don’t view you as a villain trying to sabotage the project.

Basically, don’t be an asshole who is only concerned with getting yours. The enemy isn’t someone in Belleville trying to make sure they also get better service, it’s the feds and the private companies who created a project behind closed doors that failed to address these concerns in the first place.

1. There should be more than 7 stations

As of right now the average distance between stations is roughly 160km, with some stations being seperated by as much as 250km. There should be at least a North Toronto/Southern Markham station for suburban, eastern GTA, passengers, and consideration for suburban stations in Ottawa and Quebec. And there are several small communities along the way, such as Tweed, Hawkesbury/Vankleek Hill, or Terrebonne where a simple station with even a few trips a day would provide a huge amount of benefit and ensure they get onboard with supporting Alto. Again, they don’t need to be awe-inspiring structures. And in some instances greenfield stations would probably be an okay trade off. But there should be more stations.

2. High density development around the already planned greenfield stations

For Peterborough, Laval and Trois-Rivieres the stations should also be primary hubs for new high density development. They shouldn’t be allowed to sit in an empty field for decades on end. Planning for these HSOD’s (high speed oriented development) should be taking place alongside the planning and design of the high speed line and the stations. Not only that, development should be well underway before the line even opens. In the case of Ottawa if the current VIA station is chosen or if (god forbid) a southernAlto HSR station is what is settled on, the area around those stations should become HSOD too. In addition, it shouldn’t be the feds or the NCC leading the development plans since that is a guarantee it will sit empty for decades, like Lebreton Flats.

3. The Toronto and Montreal HSR stations should be part of the existing rail stations.

You could maybe, kind of, sort of, make a case for the HSR stations in Ottawa and Quebec being in a different or less central location (its a thin case, but there is one). For Toronto and Montreal there is no excuse. Yes, there is already a lot going on at Toronto Union, and expanding it for an Alto only station area wouldn’t be cheap. And getting into the Montreal Central area will require tunnelling (something they have already acknowledged and are willing to do). But with the density and development patterns of Canadian cities, especially the two largest ones, that is where the stations need to be. The Alto team need to figure out how to make it happen.

And for Toronto, its okay to disassemble the old train shed, use it elsewhere, and not artificially constrain yourself. In general heritage preservation is fine but this is a case where it’s really not helping anyone.

4. At least start planning for the line to reach Pearson Airport

There are some good reasons why extending the high speed line to Pearson should be undertaken separately from the rest of the current Alto project. It’s been understood for the better part of a decade that Pearson needs more than just a boutique train connecting it to downtown Toronto. It needs an onsite, seamlessly connected, transit hub that includes urban rapid transit lines, buses, GO, intercity trains, and now Alto. It won’t be a small project and it will require coordination between Metrolinx, Alto, and the Greater Toronto Airport Authority, to name just a few of the agencies that would have to be involved. With all the needs and coordination required, it makes sense to do it separately.

However, at a bare minimum, there has to be enough of a plan so that a western exit from a central Toronto Alto station is accounted for. And ultimately the early stages of a Pearson to Downtown GO/Alto connector project should begin moving forward within a year.

5. Ottawa needs to be properly addressed

I’ve already said a lot about Ottawa-Gatineau so this should be pretty clear. The region is facing a tough choice when it comes to how it wants to proceed with Alto. The regions rate of growth means it will likely hit 2 million people within the next 15 years, and could easily rise to 3 million in the next 40-45 years. Decisions made today will set the regions growing rail transit and urban agenda for the next 50 years.

The best option is probably to use the existing station, which would likely cost 1/2, or maybe even 1/3, of what a sufficient central station would. From there you can focus on other game changing projects, such as connecting the Tremblay station to Gatineau with a regional line with proper, more commuter oriented central stations, and burying a portion of the Queensway to stitch together several disconnected central neighbourhoods. The map below isn’t meant to be *the* ideal plan, but it does illustrate how you can use the existing VIA station for HSR, have it meet most of Altos needs, and create a much better integration of into a regional rail network.

The above map shows the existing VIA lines, two possible alignments for Alto to use going in and out of the existing VIA station, a section of the Queensway that could be buried, and a new line that connects with the existing VIA lines that could bring regional service to a downtown, commuter oriented station for Ottawa, as well as direct connections for Gatineau. It isnt meant to be a definitive plan. But it does show how many aspects of the regions transportation and urban failings can be fixed even if Alto chooses the existing VIA station instead of a new, more central one.

Whatever the outcome Alto doesn’t get to simply shoot its shot in Ottawa then fuck off. The project is going to have a massive impact on the cities future (probably more so than any other city) and the choices Alto makes cannot be made in isolation of that.

6. Turn the VIA routes into regional rail (including building dedicated tracks aka VIA HFR 2.0)

Another reality that has to be faced is that there is only going to be one gee-whiz high speed line in the corridor. If you live along the Lakeshore or in Casselman on the VIA owned lines, you are not “next on the list” for a high speed line. In fact as I mentioned above, there is reason to be concerned you might lose your service altogether. But, even if those lines aren’t shuttered, the status quo of those VIA services being unreliable trash also has to change or else its still going to die, just slowly due to continually degrading service.

The answer is to go back in time 11 years to the very original VIA HFR plan. That proposal was actually very simple and clear in its purpose. It just wanted to have dedicated tracks so that VIA trains didn’t have to mix with freight allowing them to bump up the frequency of trains on those routes and operate them more reliably. The original plan wasnt even that concerned with electrification as it would start off with VIA’s upcoming (now current) diesel Siemens trains.

If you look at the current Toronto to Ottawa VIA line, of the 446km length, 110 are on VIA owned track, and 60 are on Metrolinx track, or 38% of the route. Between Montreal and Ottawa 140km of the 203km route, or 69% (nice) are owned by VIA. Its not as though converting the 339km that are on CN owned track to a dedicated route would be super simple, especially in Montreal proper were urban conditions and a tangled web of legacy freight rail lines would make it kind of messy. And it would likely require additional work to the Metrolinx corridor between Oshawa and Toronto Union. But it’s also not impossible. And if the focus is simply on getting a dedicated route where trains can do 160km/h (or 200km/h if a chunk of it happened to be grade separated), that creates far fewer constraints and difficulties than a line that needs to support 300km/h or more.

The map above shows a rough possible alignment for Alto in red, existing VIA owned lines in yellow, Metrolinx owned lines in Green, and CN owned ones in purple. Having parallel regional services isnt going to hurt Alto. The existing routes are longer and wouldn’t support the same speeds the high speed lines would. But turning the two routes into fully dedicated lines would not only save and improve the service for the communities currently served, additional small and growing communities could be added further enhancing the value of the modernized lines.

Some of the work could even begin within a year or two. On the sections of VIA owned corridor where its absolutely certain the Alto HSL won’t be coming near they could start adding a second track (which would also help the existing VIA service that will be operating for at least the next 12-15 years before Alto starts to open). It’s also recently been shown that, even if it is difficult, it is possible to make a deal with CN to build dedicated tracks in their corridor. It isn’t as though all of a modernized Lakeshore line would simply run next to the existing CN tracks. But for the parts that would there is now a precedent for making it happen.

This is a typical view of the VIA owned lines leading in and out of Ottawa. Most have little to no development around them and adding a second track into these corridors is not a difficult task. Upgrading the line isnt free, but in terms of a situation where you upgrade intercity or regional rail capacity for the lowest cost possible, you dont get much more ideal than this.

The biggest barrier with this plan isn’t technical or financial. It’s community. This isn’t something the feds are going to propose or simply offer up out of the kindness of their hearts. It will be up to all the municipalities and communities on the lines, alongside the support of agencies like Metrolinx, to be the leaders and push for this (they already have a head start with the growing anger towards VIA that has emerged in the past year and brought people together). Not only does it benefit the people living on the line, but it also helps address some of the other big concerns, like offering a lower cost rail travel alternative to Alto who can’t, or wouldn’t want to, pay for tickets that could be close to the cost of flying. And it’s worth noting that even in countries with robust high speed networks, somewhat slower, but more affordable, regional services are still the backbone of ridership and that fact shouldn’t be ignored here in Canada.

There is a lot more to say about this. But I will save the rest for a separate article that focuses specifically on what Lakeshore cities could propose, and fight for, that would alleviate the problems Alto isn’t solving for them.

Be loud and vocal and makes sure they don’t get away with mediocrity

Right now if you are someone who is only ever going to go from Toronto to Montreal, or Montreal to Quebec, or you dont mind driving to a park and ride in a field 5km outside of Peterborough, this project would probably be okay for you (though even then it does depend on where the stations end up being). But for everyone else, this misses the mark.

The reality is that no one is ever going to be 100% happy with whatever the final Alto plans are (especially if you are a train person). And that’s fine. It isn’t about having something that is perfect. It’s about getting relatively close to it for as many people as possible. And getting there means speaking out loudly so that the feds and private companies behind Alto are not simply allowed to run roughshot over public opinion and design the HSR network as they see fit. If they are going to dump nearly CDN100 billion into this HSR project, it should be fucking brilliant with every last detail carefully considered.

Right now open houses have started, and will run over the course of the next few months. There is also a form on the Alto public consultation website that you can fill out to leave your feedback, and an interactive map you can leave location specific comments on (though it’s already so popular you might have to check in a few times as it has been breaking). You can also email your local MP, send off letters to the editor of your local newspaper, and put this topic out into the mainstream public discourse as much as you can.

It is time to learn from the two decades of public transport mistakes we have made in Canada and call out bullshit before shovels hit the ground. The mid-2010’s attitude of “well it’s far from perfect but it’s better than nothing so we should just support it” lead to some abysmal failures that are proving to be a nightmare to fix after the fact. If that attitude is adopted for Alto, then the end result is not just going to be mediocre, but insanely expensive and difficult to fix once it’s open and the obvious faults and problems emerge.

It is clear that Alto is flawed. And even though they haven’t released every detail, there is enough that we can see what they are aiming for and what the future of the project is. Now is the time to speak up, put the boots to them, and turn Alto into a worthwhile and transformational project for as many people, communities, and cities as possible.

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If you want to find me on social media you can do so @Johnnyrenton.bsky.social on Bluesky. If you have any thoughts or feedback let me know in the comments.