• Eiri@lemmy.ca
    0·
    2 days ago

    Ugh. Why did we ever privatize rail. People would riot if we privatized the highway network, and yet…

    • ikidd@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      2 days ago

      When were the railways ever not private in Canada? One barely solvent passenger service that’s a crown corp hardly constituted nationalized rail.

      • Eiri@lemmy.ca
        0·
        2 days ago

        Wasn’t it originally a huge public undertaking? It was my understanding that the rails and CN began their lives in public ownership before being privatized.

        Did I misunderstand things?

        • ikidd@lemmy.worldEnglish
          0·
          2 days ago

          No, it was typical land grants and bond guarantees like the US did, where there were massive bailouts of private firms that lost their shirts putting in rail across Canada. But it was all done privately, with land along the right of ways granted to the companies being sold off to partially pay for the railways, along with bond guarantees that they typically reneged on. The Canadian government never owned any of the freight lines, and started up Via as a heavily subsidized crown corp for passenger rail out east when the rail lines gave up trying to make that profitable.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_Canada#History

  • masterofn001@lemmy.ca
    0·
    3 days ago

    I’m gonna take a guess without watching and say:

    Because freight company CP owns the lines people use riding Via.

    And the various governments for decades have done nothing about anything to make rail better.

    • humanspiral@lemmy.ca
      0·
      2 days ago

      The way to get the highest score in railroad tycoon (classic game) is to prioritize the mail and passenger trains. Government could pay CN to let VIA prioritize traffic.

    • kent_eh@lemmy.caEnglish
      0·
      2 days ago

      VIA operates on CN tracks in the west, but that doesn’t negate the overall correctness of your statement.

      They’re always late because they don’t own the infrastructure and have to take a back seat to their "landlord’s " schedule.

      • FireRetardant@lemmy.world
        0·
        2 days ago

        I may be wrong but I recall learning somewhere that the recent rail project used the UK and Australia as a study for it. Neither of these countries are known for amazing high speed rail. Why didn’t we look at Japan, France, Spain, or other countries that have world renowned high speed rail, high ridership rates, and good frequency?

        The the time to build this rail was decades ago, lets use some of the most successful examples to study so we can catch up and build a modern system instead of building something that is already outdated.