High Speed Rail vs. Air vs. Car: Canada Edition! Toronto to Montreal on Canada High Speed Railway

Рет қаралды 51,969

2 жыл бұрын

What are the prospects of a Canada High Speed Railway? High Speed Rail in North America has so far been limited to the Acela corridor in the northeastern United States, which some would argue still doesn't meet the standard of true high speed rail. In previous videos we walked through an example trip on California High Speed Rail, and ran a race from Dallas to Houston on the proposed Texas Central railway. In this video we take a fresh look at the potential for high speed rail between Canada's two largest cities, Toronto and Montreal, comparing it to existing rail service as well as the recently proposed High Frequency Rail plan. And, of course, we pit three travelers against one another in a race by train, car, and airplane.
This video drills down into the details of an example trip between Toronto and Montreal, following the journeys of three hypothetical travelers on their way from Greater Toronto (including Hamilton and Oshawa, by the way!) to Bell Centre in downtown Montreal. Along the way, and we compare their journeys step by step, and look more broadly at the argument for high speed rail in Canada by comparing to other successful HSR city pairs like Milan-Rome, Madrid-Barcelona, and Paris-Bordeaux, and praising Canada's ahead-of-the-curve (well, for North America) transit connections.
Our video includes overviews of:
- Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport (YTZ)
- Toronto Pearson International Airport (YYZ)
- Montreal-Trudeau International Airport (YUL)
- Toronto Union Station (likely stop on any future high speed rail connection)
- Montreal Centrale Station (likely stop on any future high speed rail connection)
And, of course, we finish by crowning a winner!
Other videos referenced in this video:
- Best US City Pairs for HSR: • Top 10 Places to Build...
- International city pair twins for the most promising US city pairs: • U.S. High Speed Rail v...
- California HSR vs. Air: • High Speed Rail vs. Ai...
- Texas HSR vs. Car vs. Air: • High Speed Rail vs. Ai...
- North America's Best Airport/Transit Connections: • North America's Best A...
- Best North America NHL/NBA Arenas Urban Form: • 10 Arenas That Fit The...
It might be a stretch to say high speed rail is coming to Canada, but here's more on Canada's High Frequency Rail plan"
- "New mostly electric rail line will get you from Toronto to Montreal 25 per cent faster - at speeds of up to 200 kilometres per hour" from the Toronto Star: www.thestar.com/business/2021...
- "Liberals announce plans for new 'high frequency' rail lines from Toronto to Quebec City" from CBC: www.cbc.ca/news/politics/high...
Ontario Ministry of Transportation Traffic Data: www.library.mto.gov.on.ca/Syd...
SNCF (ticketing for TGV / OuiGO): en.oui.sncf/en/help-en/boardi...
Photo Credits:
New title roll: Video by IRVING AGUILAR from Pixabay
Republic of Korea train video: Video by Train_Video from Pixabay
Leafs home ice: Image by Tom Glod from Pixabay
Symphony: Image by TravelCoffeeBook from Pixabay
Milwaukee Art Museum: Image by David Mark from Pixabay
Charlotte Convention Center: Image by Bruce Emmerling from Pixabay
Chicago Theater: Image by David Mark from Pixabay
Downtown Philadephia: Image by magnumlifestylemedia from Pixabay
Air Canada: Image by Nel Botha from Pixabay
Toronto skyline: Image by jplenio from Pixabay
Music:
CityNerd background: Caipirinha in Hawaii by Carmen María and Edu Espinal (KZfaq music library)
Video topic based on a suggestion from viewer Simon Eh. Thank you!
Twitter: @nerd4cities
Contact: nerd4cities@gmail.com

Пікірлер: 411

@NotJustBikes 2 жыл бұрын

NJB fans incoming... The Québec City - Windsor corridor has about 50% of Canada's population, a similar population density to France, and it's organized in a straight line, including two of Canada's largest cities (Toronto and Montréal). It's really insane that there isn't high-speed rail in this corridor, at the very least, between these two cities you talk about here, especially when both cities have good public transit. Driving the 401 is so painful, and real HSR would improve this area massively. In the last week I've travelled via HSR between Verona and Naples, and Amsterdam and Paris. It really is the best way to travel. Canadians are missing out.

@416to613 2 жыл бұрын

Why does everyone forget about Ottawa? VIA has as much demand to Ottawa as it does to Montreal from Toronto. Not in the least because federal public servants are incentivized to use rail. Ottawa also has strong ties to Montreal. And the train station in Ottawa has much better transit and road connections to the core than the airport ever will. I wish people would talk about this as the Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal (TOM) Corridor, than just referring to Toronto and Montreal.

@NotJustBikes 2 жыл бұрын

@@416to613 this video assumes that alignment (through Ottawa). But also, I used to live in Ottawa and I'd be very happy to forget it. 😂

@joshmorcombe4907 2 жыл бұрын

As someone north of Toronto who had to drive to Montreal and back just last week, I couldn't agree more

@Nik-ny9ue 2 жыл бұрын

Not for long! (on the missing out bits)

@416to613 2 жыл бұрын

@@NotJustBikes LOL. Not gonna say Ottawa is a paragon of urbanity. But as far as intercity rail goes, it is simply nonsensical to exclude it. Ottawa has nearly as much air and rail departures to Toronto, as Montreal. And any Ottawa-Montreal HSR would attract a decent commuter market.

@stevenparkison7780 2 жыл бұрын

You don't even have to walk outside to go between Gare Centrale and Centre Bell, they're both connected to the city's underground walkway network.

@coastaku1954 2 жыл бұрын

So is the Scotiabank Arena and Union Station in Toronto, in fact they are actually closer

@terryomalley1974 2 жыл бұрын

You mean Central Station and the Bell Centre? Lol

@theexcaliburone5933 Жыл бұрын

@@terryomalley1974 they speak french there

@1practicaljoker Жыл бұрын

There is no underground link between Gare Centrale and the Centre Bell. The link is between Gare Lucien Lallier and Centre Bell

@Mystro256 Жыл бұрын

@@1practicaljokerthey really ought to connect all three

@mattmarshall8639 2 жыл бұрын

The most unbelievable part about this is the leafs making it out of the first round 😭

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

That drought is terrible. Especially for a city the size of Toronto, I mean really?

@tristanridley1601 2 жыл бұрын

@@CityNerd It's also been the most profitable team in the league for ages. It's like if the Yankees made just as much money but also lost badly every year.

@pex3 2 жыл бұрын

@@tristanridley1601 so basically, the Knicks

@kevinlove4356 2 жыл бұрын

The Leafs have quite often made it out of the first round. But they always choke at some point later on.

@coolioso808 Жыл бұрын

The Cubs had the curse, but they finally beat it, just hope Toronto doesn't have to wait as many years as Cubs fans did. At least for Toronto sports team fans, they have won the NBA Championship with the Raps, the MLS title with their FC, the World Series with their Blue Jays, and for the Canadian Football League, the Argo team has been pretty successful over the years (probably helps that there aren't many teams in the league =p).

@AlRoderick 2 жыл бұрын

Canadian HSR connecting to Windsor is something that I would love for a purely selfish reason, it would create a stronger justification for connecting Detroit on the other side of the river to Chicago with a high-speed link.

@TheStargazer4000 2 жыл бұрын

Big like for Canada/Toronto content

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

I'd get bored only making videos about the US -- there's a lot to learn from what Canada is doing right. (And honestly, Mexico, too.) I didn't even really get to talk about land use!

@coolioso808 Жыл бұрын

@@CityNerd I'm Canadian and loved this video, been enjoying quite a bit of your content as of late. New subscriber! Would really like it if you took a look at a Trans-Canada High Speed Rail Line. Like, even from Toronto all the up Northern Ontario (with a few stops), through Manitoba (with stops at Winnipeg and Brandon), through Saskatchewan (with stops at Regina and Moose Jaw), through Alberta (with stops at Medicine Hat, Calgary), through BC (with stops at Kelowna and Vancouver). You can also take a sports-related approach because Winnipeg, Calgary and Vancouver NHL teams as well as, soon as you get to Manitoba from Winnipeg to Vancouver are a series of WHL junior team locations along the Trans-Canada. Those boys travel LONG hours on buses to get to their games. People travelling cross country just for vacation use the main Trans-Canada quite a bit but it is a lot of wide open space. I think that it would still be a lot safer and more efficient for passenger high speed rail, rather than a bunch of people in their own vehicles going a lot of the times to the same main cities and back.

@simoneh4732 2 жыл бұрын

Thank you!!! - Yes, you absolutely can arrive 1 hour before departure time at YTZ. It's the big selling point of service from that airport (dominated by Porter Airlines). You can cut it even closer especially if you're walking - Bravo sir on the Rush YYZ reference - True high speed rail is the dream, so happy you focused on that - A bit sad you didn't pronounce "Eh!" in my name. That was tee'd up so perfectly!

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

Ha, glad you enjoyed. I feel slightly bad I downplayed the current High Frequency proposal -- it's going to be a huge improvement in the rail service, and for people who value the "productive time" (or whatever you want to call it) that the train offers, a really big benefit. I'm just afraid it doesn't make for a super interesting video! Thanks for confirming my assumption about travel out of YTZ. Every airport is different, but it does seem the smaller ones in cities that have multiple (National, Midway, Burbank, Oakland, Love Field, Hobby, etc.) avoid a lot of the unpredictability that bedevils air travel.

@sblack53 2 жыл бұрын

Air Canada advertises bag drop cutoff at YTZ only 20 minutes before. Security lines are never long, and the gate is just down the escalator.

@adammillar6775 2 жыл бұрын

@@CityNerd The only true caveat of the YTZ 1-hour-pre-departure theory is that by my experience and rough estimates, 99.9% of flights out of YTZ get delayed for at least 30-60 minutes. So could you make it there for the schedule departure time? Yes. Will the plane depart then? Usually not.

@jason38321 2 жыл бұрын

Seconded. Last time I used YTZ it took 20 minutes from getting out of the car to sitting down outside the gate.

@adorabell4253 Жыл бұрын

@@adammillar6775 pre Covid no. Most flights went out on time or within 5 mins of scheduled departure, at least for AC. The problem, of course, is weather. The runway is the absolute minimum required, it’s in the middle of a lake, and there are condos and old smokestacks in the way or in the flight path. So we get things like fog and lighting and wind affecting operations lot more than other airports. Post Covid is a different beast and in addition to all that we have staffing shortages and increased weight restrictions. AC is also having an issue where YTZ is operated by Jazz and AC Mainline took a bunch of the Jazz pilots, a lot of whom did the YTZ/YUL run and did this 5 days before November hit. December should be better up till the snows hit.

@RMTransit 2 жыл бұрын

Haha, the 401 is wildly busy that's for sure!

@simoneh4732 2 жыл бұрын

When I watching this I was thinking "Hey I wonder if Reece knows about this channel?", and then I see you beat me to a comment! #first

@Theincredibledrummer 2 жыл бұрын

@@simoneh4732 haha i was literally about to send him this on twitter, but nope he must have a sixth sense for Toronto based transit content

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

It's pretty...amazing. But also Toronto doesn't have THAT many freeways (relative to North America). I mean, would you rather have one super-wide, super-busy freeway, or like 3-4 "normal" freeways?

@simoneh4732 2 жыл бұрын

The irony is the 401 was originally called the Toronto bypass and was only 8 lanes. The city quickly sprawled past it, and because they had originally given it such a massive ROW, traffic engineers thought the answer to solving the traffic problem was to build more lanes. They were confident that their new 12-16 lane collector/express system would permanently solve congestion.

@neil.simmons 2 жыл бұрын

@@CityNerd one wide super-busy, cause highways suck so the less of them the better imo

@robertpaterson3229 2 жыл бұрын

I’ve shown up 25 mins before a flight at YTZ and still got on and made the flight.

@johnsheldon8098 2 жыл бұрын

You did very well. If anything, you may have underestimated the travel time from Montreal airport to downtown. The traffic is often brutal on that route Your pronunciation of Oshawa is kind of cute. Phonetically, it's Aw-sha-wa. Again, I live in Toronto and you did a good job.

@klobiforpresident2254 2 жыл бұрын

Isn't traffic usually much lesser during a big sportsball (sportsdisc?) event because everyone's at home watching the game?

@johnsheldon8098 2 жыл бұрын

@@klobiforpresident2254 I live in Toronto, and even though there is good subway and GO Train service to Leafs, Raptors, Blue Jays, Toronto FC and Argos games, the traffic going to the games and afterwards is always brutal because of this contingent of folks that won't stoop to using transit

@klobiforpresident2254 2 жыл бұрын

@@johnsheldon8098 Oh, yeah. Before and after games traffic in U.S. cities can be horrendous. I learned this when living in Lansing, MI, and being taken to handegg games (MSU in East Lansing). I am sure Toronto has issues with traffic *around* games. My local, non-American transit system also gets swamped whenever football occurs because transporting thousands upon thousands ain't easy. I can understand not wanting to be caught up in that mess of loud, occasionally drunk, rarely but sometimes violent sea of people. My question was more about *during* the game. A lot of people like the local sports club, so most of them won't drive (and instead be glued to the television), no?

@topphatt1312 8 ай бұрын

correction: you live in tronno not Toh-ron-toh lol

@agilemind6241 6 ай бұрын

@@klobiforpresident2254 The games start pretty late in the evening (after rush hour is over anyway) so it doesn't make a huge difference. And as a city of immigrants there are plenty of people in TO who don't care about the Leafs.

@MrTaxiRob 2 жыл бұрын

I love that you're using sporting events as a good reason for a day trip besides regular commuting for work. I usually use this as an example when talking about HSR, along with major league sports realigning their division and conference structures to encourage travel to adjacent cities. That would help both the leagues and the trains to sell more tickets during non-peak travel times.

@edwardlepine 2 жыл бұрын

That’s why I’m looking forward to a resolution of the Tampa Bay Rays stadium situation. The AL East would be much more fun with Montréal.

@coolioso808 Жыл бұрын

@@edwardlepine Bring back the Expos, right? And Quebec City really needs the Nordiques back in the NHL.

@SyrusDarkhunter 2 жыл бұрын

Love the YYZ Rush reference.

@terryomalley1974 2 жыл бұрын

I really do appreciate that you usually include Canadian cities in your videos. So often, I'll hear Americans and Europeans refer only to "American and Europe" when speaking about issues affecting the entire Western World. I resent this oversigh5, because it makes it seem like Canada and Australia, for instance, are irrelevant afterthoughts. While not as populated nor militarily powerful as the US and the UK or France, these are still two highly developed Westrn democracies that share many characteristics with the US, UK, etc..., but at the same time, have their own unique problems/strengths that are worth noting.

@belnick 2 жыл бұрын

Amazing channel, just have taken existing slow train Toronto Montreal this weekend. Kinda amazing timing vid. Even this experience rocks. Especially with 1 year old daughter, we sure had more freedom to comfort and entertain her comparing to crammed plane or even more car. Cutting time in half and having them run every half an hour, I would take this trip once a month. Montreal is amazing!

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

Yeah, what goes kind of unsaid in these videos is how great an experience a train can be even if it IS slower than a plane.

@avneet06 2 жыл бұрын

Yes, you can walk to YTZ 15 minutes before a flight and travel as you’d like to. Feels like a bud station! I’ve done it before when I lived downtown Toronto.

@ramzanninety-five3639 2 жыл бұрын

Hello, to a new urbanist channel. I have an explanation for infamous 401 congestion. It is the only limited access expressway spanning all of southern Ontario. In GTHA (Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area) there are only two other highways that parallel it. There is a tolled 407 (the province was stupid enough to build on the edge of the greenbelt, but we were lucky that they also privatized it so in the end 407 did not foster more suburbanization north of the city). There is also QEW, the world's first super-highway, which runs along the lakeshore. I think it is important to contextualize Toronto and its highways. All of the mentioned highways never entered Toronto proper (the City of Toronto prior to 1998 amalgamation). Gardiner was built in the 1960s over a rail yard and DVP was cut through a ravine. As a result, all expressways ever built in Toronto have been constructed in areas with almost no residents. Outer boroughs of modern Toronto were independent suburban municipalities prior to amalgamation. It was their shortsightedness that allowed construction of 401, 404, 427 and 400 in their current form (401 was designed as a two-lane Toronto bypass though farmland back in the 1940s). Since the 1950s, the City's power has been diluted within the Metro Toronto and it is continuously undermined in the modern Toronto City Council. However, a much more urban and human-scale pre-amalgamation Toronto managed to successfully oppose all highways projects that required evicting people (most famously the truncated Spadina Expressway (today's Allen Road), but also unbuilt Crosstown and Scarborough Expressways). It successfully advocated for subway construction and retained the core of its streetcar network though the most turbulent decades. I would go even further to argue that due to its opposition to massive 1960s modernist projects, the City of Toronto did not experience the population shift towards suburbs to the same degree as other North American cities did. It also should be mentioned that opposition to construction of highways in favour of subways became a political consensus abound the 1970s when the political landscape in both province and the city was dominated by Progressive-Conservative Party of Ontario. To a substantial degree, highways construction in today's Ontario is not a partisan issue, it is regional issue (suburbs want them, no one else does). As a result, the most politically beneficial approach over the last 40 years or so was to expand existing highway which resulted in the statistics you see today.

@andrepoiy1199 3 ай бұрын

It didn't have the move to the suburbs because there wasn't the same kind of racist policies like redlining. What is interesting is that Toronto suburbs are often more diverse than parts of Toronto proper because new immigrants tended to move there. If you look at a racial map of Toronto, central Toronto (a large area north of Downtown but south of the 401), is predonminantly white, while other places in the GTA are quite diverse (with certain ethnic enclaves still existing, like Chinese in Markham).

@TheKenContinuum 2 жыл бұрын

I love your channel! The Toronto-Hamilton-Oshawa area is more like an American MSA (based on commuting patterns) than a CSA. The Greater Golden Horseshoe would be the closest analogue for the area to a CSA, and the GGH has about 10 million people now!

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

Yeah, I kinda wondered about that. I think a lot of people in the US don't realize how big of a metro Toronto is.

@petermacfarlane4388 2 жыл бұрын

I live in the Central Valley of Calif. near Merced. My friend and I have been closely following the progress being made. I hope to live long enough to ride it.

@Quand9 2 жыл бұрын

Billy bishop airport really does work like that. It's pretty awesome!

@Sanginius23 2 жыл бұрын

it is funny somehow, having the busiest Highway means grid lock, air polution and bloody accidents. nobody is happy about it havinng the busiest HSR is the pride of a Nation

@coolioso808 Жыл бұрын

City design, including transit in North America is really so ass-backwards when you look at it. And it is SUPER crazy to me, especially in Canada, where 50% of people live in that corridor from Quebec City to Windsor that includes the two most populous cities of Toronto and Montreal and they have NOTHING for high speed rail, but they do have 1st place for an infamously busy highway.

@S14N9LS Жыл бұрын

Late to the party but smooth Rush reference. The kitchen implements did an adequate job recreating the intro.

@saideepakb 2 жыл бұрын

Yeah, YTZ is a very chill airport. For reference, we used to go there to get coffee and look at planes taking off before the pandemic.

@Immortalcheese 2 жыл бұрын

I'm from Toronto. If you left at 4 PM from downtown via car, you'd get to Oshawa by 7:00 PM Between 4:00 and 6:00 PM, the Highway 401 is just inching traffic. Scoot up a few inches, then stop. Scoot a few inches, then stop. I like to joke that at rush hour, Toronto becomes a walkable city because it literally is faster to walk across the city than to drive.

@pauldevey8628 2 жыл бұрын

I live in Ottawa and just found your channel. Your analysis is spot on. Love how many details you have found and factored in.

@GuillermoLG552 Жыл бұрын

I have been on HSR in three countries and I have loved it everytime, furthermore I have never met anyone who has been on HSR who hasn't loved it.

@peterblake8318 2 жыл бұрын

Oshawa: AWWshawa in Canada and the eh is pronounced AY….just kidding. Great video, you’ve done a tremendous amount of work here.

@cigarette.butts.666 2 жыл бұрын

How about a video on potential rail transit in western Canada? The west almost always get left out of these conversations

@dragon32210 2 жыл бұрын

I flew Porter once out of YTZ going to EWR. What a delight and beautiful views of the skyline

@damienpilon9785 2 жыл бұрын

Being from Québec, the approximate pronunciations of Joliette and St-Hyacinthe was compensated by the fact that you said "ToronTo" the french way. Also, from the airport to downtown MTL, there is currently only a slow express bus that goes from YUL to Laurent-Groulx and Berri-UQAM metro stations, but they are building a new metro line to the airport which will take only 20 minutes, to be opened in 2024

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

Yeah, I'm excited about that metro line -- I'll have to update my airports video once that's open. (There are a couple other airport services being upgraded, and I'm also hoping we get back to pre-COVID operations too?)

@hdufort 2 жыл бұрын

You mean Lionel-Groulx

@kingstonsean Жыл бұрын

Commissioning of the REM to YUL is now delayed until 2027. :( And I think they made a big mistake by not extending it to Dorval's Via Rail train station.

@kingstonsean Жыл бұрын

I'm also from Quebec and thought he did he did a much job with Saint-Hyacinthe and Joliette than he did with Oshawa! CityNerd: "Oshawa" is pronounced much like "Ottawa", but I think you noted that in another video)

@jamiehackl1231 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks for the Canadian content!

@Bencentre 2 жыл бұрын

Very entertaining way of presenting this comparison!

@scottcampbell2707 2 жыл бұрын

Going back to the past would be an improvement. In the 90s, when Air Ontario flew out of YTZ, more than once I made it from downtown Toronto to downtown Ottawa in two and a half hours office to office (including the cabs at both ends). You didn't need to be at the airport an hour before back then, just before the doors on the plane closed. The key was to time your arrival at YTZ for the ferry departure time (before the tunnel). The old ferry took less than a minute to cross the channel, but there were 15 minutes between crossings. In the 70s, the VIA Rail Turbo train took 3 hours and 59 minutes from downtown Toronto to downtown Montreal. It could go up to 140mph but was limited to 95mph due to all the level crossings. For a couple of years in the 70s, there was also apparently Twin Otter DHC-6 service (Air Transit) from YTZ to an airport on Montreal Island in an Expo 67 parking lot near the Victoria Bridge. The service also went to Rockcliffe Airport in Ottawa.

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

Yeah, the calculus of air travel has changed a bit in the last 20 years. Thanks for the great historical background on some of these travel options. I was aware of the ferry, but couldn't imagine it would be a better connection than just walking through the tunnel (I've never actually been to YTZ). How new is the tunnel? Is the ferry still useful, and for what kind of trip? Lots of luggage maybe?

@scottcampbell2707 2 жыл бұрын

@@CityNerd The tunnel opened in 2015. The ferry runs every 15 minutes, so if you plan to get to the airport on the hour, half hour, or :15/:45, then the ferry is pretty convenient -- it only takes a minute to cross (the total journey is 400 feet). If you drive to the airport, you can take your car on the ferry to park on the island. The primary advantage of the tunnel is that it spreads the incoming travellers out, so that you don't get 300 people arriving at security at once, 4 times an hour. The tunnel is pedestrian-only, so vehicles have to take the ferry. Before they built the mainland-side terminal, the shuttle bus from downtown took the ferry and dropped you off on the island.

@agntdrake 2 жыл бұрын

Love it. I won't correct the French Canadian names, but Oshawa is pronounced more like "Ah-sha-wa", but I'm totally going to let it slide because you nailed pronouncing "quay". One thing I would say about taking Porter Airlines is that while being pretty convenient, their on-time performance isn't super great (66%), so a high speed train would almost certainly beat it every time. Who are we kidding though? HSR would probably kill Porter because they can't legally fly jets out of City Airport (they only fly Dash-8s), and right now they charge about $450 CDN for a last minute ticket to YUL. HSR would likely be less than half the price, so they'd lose their most lucrative route.

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

Good insight on Porter -- I honestly didn't think about price for this one, because the way I set up the rules it was last minute for the buyer, and I didn't want to people to dwell on either (a) ruinous prices or (b) whether there would be seats available at all. I've been to Vancouver enough times that I already learned by my lesson about Quay!

@thetrainmon Жыл бұрын

The Madrid-Barcelona pair was a good foreshadowing! This just retroactively popped into my feed today while Ray is currently in Spain, enjoying, among other things, their vast high-speed rail network!

@stevensullivan5945 2 жыл бұрын

I love the Canadian content... thanks for this video! The demand for high speed rail up here is a quite low, but university/college students are among the most frequent passengers. It would be hard to imagine a rail service between Toronto and Montreal that wouldn't include Kingston. Kingston is a cultural and historical hub and is a tourist destination for Ontarians. It is also home to the Royal Military College and Queens University. I could imagine the service running through Toronto - Kingston - Ottawa - Montreal, even though it would increase the total distance and time.

@frnkndad 2 жыл бұрын

Best time through YTZ myself was - 30 minutes from entering the tunnel to wheels up on a flight to Baltimore. As long as you don't mind flying a dash-8 (jets are prohibited at that airport), YTZ is always the best choice.

@KdM_BigRingBubba 2 жыл бұрын

The main knock that rail travel will always have in Toronto (so long as it uses Union Station) is that Union is on the lakeshore, so there a total absence of population density to the south of the station. For a lot of people who live in the periphery of the city, it can take a very, very long time to get downtown in order to catch a train, and non-peak hour access on regional transit isn't quite there yet (promised to be coming soon with all day 2-way service).

@Neville60001 2 жыл бұрын

This is why there should be a new station in the middle of the city, with the platforms on the third floor.

@kb_100 2 жыл бұрын

@@Neville60001 Berlin Hautbanhoff style. That place feels more like a space station with trains coming in at different elevations.

@TheRandCrews Жыл бұрын

@@Neville60001 like at Spadina with their station for Fastracks and the Barrie Line but not serving any another line

@Neville60001 Жыл бұрын

@@TheRandCrews, when I mentioned a third level, I meant a third _underground_ level, such as in Berlin Main Station or Pennsylvania Station/Monihan Train Hall in New York (yes, I know that's going into the city like a rat, but a lot of train stations are like that around the planet.) The only problem with building said new station is that all of downtown Toronto's already developed with condos, so finding any space to build said train station in downtown or midtown Toronto will be hard thanks to the building of said condos.

@jrausseo1 Жыл бұрын

i loved this video

@hk33michigan 2 жыл бұрын

I’d love to see you talk about a hypothetical Detroit-Chicago-Milwaukee-Minneapolis HSR in addition to the potential Windsor-Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal-Quebec alignment. There are a lot of Midwest alignments, but it seems that this four city alignment makes the most sense given the city pairs within it.

@bl4542 2 жыл бұрын

I really liked the video !!!

@Dan-qv9xy 2 жыл бұрын

Great video! There are so many great reasons to better connect cities

@tyleralberico9340 2 жыл бұрын

6:25 OMG I NEVER KNEW THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THAT RHYTHM MIND BLOWN

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

It was pretty wild when I finally figured it out

@martinvanoene7192 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks so much!

@ShellShocks14 Жыл бұрын

I live in Toronto and it still blows my mind how busy the 401 is. Other highways look worse in pictures and videos but statistically the 401 is hell

@jeanbolduc5818 8 ай бұрын

Toronto has a USA car culture ... plus Toronto is not a dense city .. in order to get the title of the largest city in Canada, Toronto includes cities as far as 130 km ... does not make sense .. soon Toronto will include Ottawa.... there is no sense of community in Toronto and nothing in commun between these cities

@AncientMiracle 2 жыл бұрын

Great RUSH reference!!

@joshuaeisen4271 Жыл бұрын

Yes, I have flown out of that small island airport in Toronto. I flew Porter home to Ottawa, we showed up 45min before, walked from my hotel downtown!

@chaughten 2 жыл бұрын

You can definitely walk right into ytz! Love this video! More Canadian stuff pls! Esp. Yul 😉

@alk61695 2 жыл бұрын

YYZ! I was ready to start air drumming! Ha ha ha. I'd say in current times the easiest way to get there would be a flight from Downtown airport. Though if I was in Toronto and someone said they had tickets to a hockey game in Montreal for a 7pm game, I'd just say forget it. I am the one who usually gets to the arena around 4pm for a 7pm game. Great video!

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

I may not make more Canada-specific content for awhile, so I gotta get the Rush reference in while I can!

@scottcampbell2707 2 жыл бұрын

To get there in evening, both flying and the train are good options. If you want to get there first thing in the morning (such as for an 8:30am or 9am meeting), though, you pretty much have to fly.

@tristanridley1601 2 жыл бұрын

You'd forget it? But... this is the Conference finals... Got to catch the Leafs choke in person!

@Jack-fw4mw 2 жыл бұрын

11:56 I don't know if you intended that to be visual irony, but it was definitely worth it.

@patspadd8243 2 жыл бұрын

Hi good video thanks regarding transportation between Toronto and Montreal and cheerio

@lw1391 4 ай бұрын

As a Canadian, the scenario you engineered not only raised my interest level, but created actual tension thinking about trying to get to that game before puck drop. Well done. Bonus marks for remembering the old conference names (no longer named that, but they should be dammit!! 😉) Also, as someone who used to live downtown Toronto, a 10 min walk from Billy Bishop airport (YTZ), that timeline was very realistic.

@ramsesmedina3159 2 жыл бұрын

Great vid Bruv

@seanrodgers1839 2 жыл бұрын

Nice to see one relevant to me. I really appreciate the more analytical approach with premises and facts. You're good on the facts and other interesting information. I do think that the driving time from Oshawa (rhymes with Ottawa) to Montreal is overestimated. I used to go Ottawa - Burlington regularly, door to door was exactly 501 km, in 4 hours 45 minutes. So that route is more likely 4:30 instead of 5:30 I have done the train, in that short period when they could travel 160 km/h all the way to Ottawa. It was nice, but not convenient for most of my travel purposes. It's stunning to think that a real high speed train could get me from Ottawa to Toronto as fast as the GO Train could get me from Toronto to Burlington.

@andrewmason9137 2 жыл бұрын

I can attest to the YTZ airport. I have walked through the front door and onto a plane in less than 20min, I was 2.5hrs ahead of my scheduled flight and asked if I could take the earlier flight. That being said, I really hope Canada makes a smart decision and makes this a true grade seperated HSR, Toronto is now linked with regional trains to Barrie, Niagara Falls, and Kitchener/Waterloo/Cambridge too which is pretty awesome.

@Steven-hs3db 2 жыл бұрын

Well put together analogy, I can vouch for it's accuracy as someone that has made that same trip each way described many, many times. To concur with some other commentary, you could literally be showing up at YTZ without a ticket a mere 20 minutes before the flight and still make it. Getting off at YUL, they are purposely gated right next to the exit and taxi stands, a mere 10 minutes from touchdown and you're in vehicle. Important note is the inherent delays by car or plane due to inclement weather.

@mr51406 2 жыл бұрын

Excellent video! ⭐️ I “Canada goosed” the algorithm. 🇨🇦

@lucasapacker 4 ай бұрын

If you know anything about Torontonians is thst we love imaginary hypothetical content on a dream transit system. It just gives us hope.

@bruhski5469 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks for the warning on the two T’s 😂

@haweater1555 2 жыл бұрын

One of the contributor to accidents on 401 is attempting to drive the entire distance Toronto to Montreal without making a "pit stop" . Most all mishaps occur at the final stage of the trip.

@sagefirman1391 2 жыл бұрын

I live in Bathurst Quay. I've made a flight in 20 mins from my door.

@coastaku1954 2 жыл бұрын

I've been to Calypso and IT IS AWESOME!!!!

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

I didn't even know they had water parks in Canada. I was slackjawed.

@coastaku1954 2 жыл бұрын

@@CityNerd You know we have a summer right? It can get as hot as 40C here, we have many water parks

@aidanmcgregor8789 2 жыл бұрын

Yep it’s true, the 401 is the busiest freeway in North America. I live in ottawa and I take it occasionally to head to Toronto, it can be a nightmare.

@oerrukhsfgkh1612 2 жыл бұрын

Wow your channel is blowing up!

@Pamani_ 2 жыл бұрын

5:20 For your question about max AADT. I found in the caltrans database that the Highway 60 at Fairway Drive in Industry peaked at 461k AADT in 2016. Not the most obvious highway in LA (you'd thing 405, 5, 10...)

@Arkiasis 2 жыл бұрын

1:10 the term for that area is the "Golden Horseshoe" that includes all of Oshawa (you pronounce like Aw-shaw-aw) to Niagara Falls.

@Coltoid 2 жыл бұрын

I only take the Billy Bishop airport in Toronto, there is a constant free shuttlebus from Union Station so its probably easier for most people in the city to get to than to Pearson as the train from Pearson is an express train and there are only 3 places it stops. I fly home to Ottawa often, you can show up 15-30 mins before your flight, its 30mins in the air, and then I get picked up at The Ottawa airport just 1 hour and 30mins after I left. It's usually 4-5 hours driving or 5-8 hours by Via Rail train. This airport makes living here pretty wonderful, flights to almost any city in North America, I live walking distance to the airport (20mins).

@kingstonsean Жыл бұрын

One of my biggest travel blunders was flying from CDG to LHR. :( My ultimate destination in London was Canary Wharf, so I should have taken the chunnel train. But one of my best decisions was three days earlier when I took the train from Geneva to Paris. :)

@stopmotiontacos 2 жыл бұрын

Video idea: good trains to take to go overnight camping, i.e., backpacking. Video idea 2: comparison of freight trains and trucking throughput and time tradeoffs. I think freight goes slower in USA. Thanks for doing these fun explorations!

@canadagood Жыл бұрын

I am interested in the differences between shipping by rail versus by truck. If you had something big and bulky weighing about a thousand pounds and you called for quick shipment to New York or Los Angeles what would be the difference between railway and highway transport? How does that compare with passenger overland transport times?

@polo_d_g 2 жыл бұрын

Agreed with other comments about YTZ. Flew in and out of there once. At departure seems like you can arrive quite late, and it's essentially in downtown.

@seanrodgers1839 2 жыл бұрын

This is truly a fantasy scenario. Toronto in a conference, I forget too, finale. That will never happen.

@ernestoalvarez2706 2 жыл бұрын

Great video! I’m from Calgary and there have been talks about building a high speed train between Calgary and Edmonton. I’d be interested to hear your thoughts on how feasible that line would be.

@WhiteWulfe 2 жыл бұрын

I'm also curious about the feasibility of it, but hasn't it been something talked about for over twenty years now. Sure would be nice to have such though, because driving the QE2 by yourself is... Well, there's a reason Gasoline Alley exists in Red Deer, and it isn't just to stretch your legs and get a milkshake at A&W and doughnuts at the Donut Mill...

@aidan8473 Жыл бұрын

that's a big ask honestly, even as a fan of rail. two smaller cities, regionally important as they are, probably aren't worth it.

@coolioso808 Жыл бұрын

@@aidan8473 As someone who has travelled through that area a fair bit, mostly as a visitor to see family out there, I can say that nothing would make more technical sense than high-speed rail connecting Calgary to Edmonton. With the potential go fast and safely between Calgary and Edmonton on a high-speed rail where every passenger can read, write, listen to music, watch a show or podcast or just chat with each other without the concern of 'focusing on the road' and this trip could be in under 1 hour - it would be a fantastic investment for future sustainability of travel.

@jeanbolduc5818 8 ай бұрын

A fossil fuel train for sure ... CO2 is the best friend of Alberta

@peterelliott3776 2 жыл бұрын

I just watched this video. I'm in Toronto. It was great. I live 15 minutes from Toronto Pearson airport. I'm retired so no leaving work early issues. if I was invited at 4pm, then I am pretty confident that I could get a 5pm flight that lands at Montreal Trudeau at 616pm. $394US / $500CDN. (Ka-Ching!) Lets say I'm 20 minutes getting out of the airport. I'd get a seat as close to the front of the plane as possible and take an overnight bag in the overhead compartment. A taxi to the Bell Centre is around 22 minutes. If the flight is on time, then I'd arrive at 658. I'd be in my seat before the start of the first period. Hmmm... What would a decent ticket to a Game 7 between the Leafs and Canadiens cost? $1000CDN, maybe?

@DanTheCaptain 2 жыл бұрын

Torontonian here. Couple points. Highway 401 is the busiest in the world because not only is the centre part that goes through Toronto extremely busy, but because the 401 stretches from Windsor’s all the way to the Ontario-Quebec border. Thus the data is slightly skewed when looking at stats for the 401 as a whole. On the topic of YTZ, which is the island airport in Toronto. YTZ is tiny and you can easily show up to your flight with 15-30 mins to spare and board your flight, if you go off-peak, which at 4pm is not happening. Pre-Covid rush hour at that airport can be a madhouse.

@grandfelixo 2 жыл бұрын

I live in Berlin and regularly travel to Hamburg which is roughly a 300km drive and i complain everytime the train doesn't make its 1:45hr time schedule. But seeing these videos makes me wonder how i could even live in America. I can sleep, relax or eat in a train and still need only half the time the car would take me.

@Newspeak. 2 жыл бұрын

Rail connections between cities outside of the NE of the US are few and far between and not very good so you almost certainly would need a car.

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

It's amazing that the US and Canada are so technologically advanced but are so far behind on intercity transportation.

@kingstonsean Жыл бұрын

I realize this is all hypothetical but it's speculated that even the High Frequency Rail won't use Central Station but will use a new station on the other side of Mount Royal. From there it can more easily continue on to Trois-Rivieres along the north shore of the St. Lawrence River. Via Rail trains heading to Montreal move very slowly after Dorval Station. They even travel at street level through the Saint-Henri district.

@TheRandCrews Жыл бұрын

I proposed they use Gare Parc cause it’s on the CP Rail line that eventually connects to Quebec Gatineau railway to Trois Rivières and has a blue line connection on the Metro. Either that or they connect to Lucien A’llier probably awkward to get off there

@VikramKrishnan404 2 жыл бұрын

I do really like the Toronto city airport that dumps you 20 (public transit) min from the downtown core. Pretty landings too. You can find flights from Windsor to YTZ for under $200 USD round trip fairly easily. By contrast, VIArail takes 4.5-5 hours with little frequency. The flexibility of last minute travel by car makes it win hands down though. Maybe if we had trains/flights leaving every hour the equation would change

@fosahistorica2537 2 жыл бұрын

cool video

@definitelynotacrab7651 6 ай бұрын

This needs to be built ASAP

@dustinwilliston6428 2 жыл бұрын

Great video! i just have one thing to say, you made that conclusion rather decidedly for someone who has never taken via rail haha. It's not efficient and boarding via takes 15-25 mins in Toronto Union I live in Windsor and study in Ottawa so i take this route a lotl. There of often delays and issues, not to mention there were only 2 trains running/day for a while from windsor to union. And when taking via rail you MUST deboard in toronto and wait for another train to montreal adding to the wait time. its not the same for GO transit though, the provincially run rail service serving the GTA.

@Chris4942Chris 2 жыл бұрын

It would be cool to see a video about Brightline West that would provide service between Las Vegas and Las Angeles

@spencergraham-thille9896 2 жыл бұрын

* Los Vegas.

@johngaleazza3652 2 жыл бұрын

Regarding Oshawa. VIA rail (the National rail carrier, who would most likely be operating the high speed rail network) also stops at Oshawa. And given that Oshawa is kind of the Eastern Gateway to the GTA I don't think it would be unreasonable to assume that there would be high speed rail service here (or at least a conventional rail service that connects to a near by HSR station)

@1practicaljoker Жыл бұрын

I have driven from Oshawa to Montréal in 3 1/2 hours. So that would be the only viable way to get there today. Of course, that’s not counting the 30 minutes or so it would take to find parking!

@kateofthings 10 ай бұрын

Would like to see a vid on the value of high speed rail between Edmonton and Calgary, which seems perfect.

@mrgeorgejetson Жыл бұрын

Your pronunciation of Joliette is perfectly fine. It's the way you say "Oshawa" that I find kind of surprising. How do you say Ottawa? And as for the pronunciation of Montreal... well, it's a shibboleth that you can use to instantly detect outsiders like you, and I'm quite happy to leave it that way. :) On a less jokey note, you're actually giving Alex more time than he needs. As an Alex who loves to shave it close with air travel, and who ... "lived" in Toronto and occasionally traveled back to my beloved hometown using this very airport, I can tell you that he'd easily have ten or fifteen minutes to spare. However, I'm a self-aware enough Montrealer to say that the ride from Dorval to downtown is pretty brutal, not to mention pretty brutally expensive, and for that reason I think I took the train more often than I flew, despite the brutally slow real-life train ride of several years ago. If Montreal would just build a quick rail system from the airport to the downtown train station there would be no contest for me and I'd say fly for sure, but obviously a European or Asian-style high-speed rail system would be the best of all worlds.

@slavkovalsky1671 2 жыл бұрын

Yes, you can walk that tunnel - has got accessible elevators and everything at both ends... or, if you have a bit more time and are feeling extra fancy, you can take the 240 ft-long ferry ride...

@n.b.3521 2 жыл бұрын

Sure hope we can get high speed rail between Toronto & Montreal!

@Grantonioful 2 жыл бұрын

It's Pronounced [Awshawa]. Thank you for your time.

@patton3rd1 2 жыл бұрын

Hahah, I love your 'warning' about pronouncing both 't's in Toronto

@sexygeek8996 6 ай бұрын

If someone tells me to pronounce it with one "t" then I'll call it Hogtown.

@Boffin55 2 жыл бұрын

If the Ottawa - Montreal segment were to run north of the Ottawa River, and enter Montreal from the NW, it could run past the vastly underutilitized Montreal Mirabel Airport

@stevenhuntrods3911 2 жыл бұрын

Yes you can walk to YTZ. You can go through security and check your bags within 15-20 minutes at Billy Bishop.

@henrivanbemmel 2 жыл бұрын

We took this in 2013. The train swayed so much at 160 km/h that the water was slopping out of the toilet. The problem for all of this is the dated trackage. To go for high speed rail, you have a lot of open space between say Toronto and Montreal. Even Trenton and Kingston are not that big. So, a lot of track with not much in between. For high speed the track has to be straight as an arrow (at least parallel as one) and with gentle curves. You cannot go too far north without encountering the Canadian Shield, filled with granite, a much harder place to build a train right of way. I would love high speed rail and I think that in France they have begun to ban short distance flights because the trains give comparable service and have a much smaller environmental footprint. However, then you get into the spectre of a Gov't corporation (VIA) displacing free-enterprise (airlines). Now maybe Canada is more open minded about such things, it is not a given. We also have a population that for the most part would drive to Montreal rather than to fly or take the train. Why? because they can leave when they want, stop when they want and take what they want. Such things matter to a lot of people.

@stratamember4637 Жыл бұрын

Been there done that (at least the part from T.O. to Cornwall.) There was so much side to side motion it was tiring to read.

@gregvassilakos 2 жыл бұрын

I'm enjoying thees intercity transportation mode race videos. Perhaps you should consider doing intracity transportation mode races - car vs. transit vs. bike.

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

Oh....that is a REALLY good idea. It's something I think about a lot in my actual daily life (I live at a commute distance where it NEVER makes sense to drive, it only makes sense to take the bus if the weather is terrible, and I bike 80% of the time)...but haven't thought about at all for this channel for some reason. I will definitely use this idea at some point, but will have to let it percolate a bit. Thanks!

@gpan62 2 жыл бұрын

You got the Montreal suburbs right, but not Oshawa ("O" = "Awe") 😉

@208467 11 ай бұрын

The fastest drive Toronto to Montreal I've ever experienced was 3:35 Uptown to Downtown and that was at insanely fast speeds that will get your car and licence taken away on the spot.

@zacharylegaspi7594 2 жыл бұрын

LA to Vegas next maybe? or Miami to Orlando would be cool too given that the railway is actually under construction.

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

Those are both definitely on the list. Jeez, do you work for Brightline or something??

@OurToronto 11 ай бұрын

Hi Ray. So it is possible in theory walk to Toronto Island Airport an hour before a flight and just get on one. But for reasons unknown Porter Airlines does not allow same day flight purchases, so for red tape reasons unfortunately no.

@tomkelly8827 2 жыл бұрын

Very interesting! I liked that race. I think that the one thing that you missed was cost. I don't know how much high speed rail costs but surely it is less then a flight.

@saveddijon Жыл бұрын

Depends. In the mid 90s Air Canada had a seat sale around the time I needed to travel, and I was able to book YOWYTZ for $150 all in.

@sking2173 2 жыл бұрын

Interesting, but the only time such a comparison is even valid is if you compete between two metro areas that would have the chance of getting HSR service. I live in Asia, and flying to the US, I can always catch a commuter out of my gateway airport and be flown to a point reasonably close to my destination, even if it’s a small town. For me, the US air network works well. Their trains and buses ? It seems disuse has taken a heavy toll on those conveyances.

@RobertDerusha 8 ай бұрын

Although the posted limit for the 401 is 100km/h, you'll definitely be in the flow of traffic going 120-125, 130 at some points. Which would have Chris arriving at 8 or so. (And any leafs fan would probably approach light speed if given this scenario)

@maumgz8327 2 жыл бұрын

0:34 I'm from MX and i've also thought "why not get to Guadalajara through Toluca and Morelia but I think it has to do with the fact that querétaro and león are more "important" economically and industrially than morelia (not necessarily than toluca) That's my opinion about why are the things like that

@CityNerd 2 жыл бұрын

Interesting. I don't have an opinion on which route makes more sense...but if I could get from QRO to CDMX without sitting on a bus in traffic for 4 hours that would be pretty great.

@maumgz8327 2 жыл бұрын

@@CityNerdthe idea of get to qro and cdmx by train in less than an hour has some years in discuss for the very congested highway between both cities but none of them is becoming true, even a hyperloop route was planned (cdmx-qro-leon-gdl) the "mexloop" but the NAIM was cancelled and there was the place for mexloop to arrive and then the high speed train "mexico-queretaro" but had a problem of concession and finally with a simple train but it's stay just in a plan

@maumgz8327 2 жыл бұрын

I had to use the translate for writte all of that because i'm still practicing my english 👉🏽👈🏽