Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. As someone who grew up taking the metro in Montreal and has ridden trains across Europe, the gap between what North America has and what it could have is staggering.
The Current State
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- Japan's Shinkansen has been running since 1964. Zero fatal derailments.
- France's TGV connects Paris to Lyon in under 2 hours at 320 km/h.
- Amtrak's Acela tops out at 240 km/h but averages far less due to shared freight track.
The problem isn't speed — it's infrastructure. You can't run high-speed trains on 100-year-old freight corridors.
Why It Matters
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- Climate — rail emits 80% less CO2 per passenger-km than flying
- Urban development — stations drive density, highways drive sprawl
- Equity — not everyone can drive or fly
- Reliability — trains run in weather that grounds planes
The Montreal-Toronto Corridor
This is the most promising route in Canada:
- Distance: 540 km (similar to Paris–Lyon)
- Current train time: 5+ hours
- Potential HSR time: ~2.5 hours
- Air shuttle time: ~1 hour (plus 2+ hours of airport overhead)
At 2.5 hours city-center to city-center, the train wins. That's the magic threshold where rail beats air for total journey time.
What Needs to Happen
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- Dedicated right-of-way — separated from freight, no sharing
- Political will — infrastructure projects span election cycles
- Funding model — public investment with operating cost recovery
- Phased delivery — start with one corridor, prove the model, expand
My Hope
Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident. I believe we'll see high-speed rail between Montreal and Toronto in my lifetime. The economics make sense. The climate demands it. The only question is whether we'll build it before or after the next generation gives up on trains entirely.