Can I be so presumptuous as to add a couple of thoughts, CB? I'm wondering if Japan is a good comparison when considering high speed rail. Japan has 4 or 5 times the population of Canada and the geography is skinny and linear, so I'm guessing if even one line was run in Japan it would be located within a very few miles of the bulk of the population. Just a couple of thoughts..........................:lol::lol:
Morning JLM...I'm moving slower than a Via Rail train this morning...must be the weather! :lol:
I brought up Japan orginally but you are right - you can't do a head-to-head comparison with Canada or anywhere else...different countries, different needs.
But, it's a handy one to look at from certain aspects, as it's been around the longest. I'm not sure what their population was in 1964 when they started the whole thing, but I think it was around 97 million, which would put it a hair under 3x our population of today. Just a rough guess there.
Indeed their population is concentrated in a long skinny country. I think most of ours is within 200 miles (or km?) of the US border...it's a bit wider that Japan is long, but strangely enough, kind of the same concentration pattern. They have a couple of really big cities - Tokyo and Osaka, and many smaller centres. We have our large cities like Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, (not sure if that's the right order of population), which gives us a proportionately different population spread, to some degree.
Our population density is among the lowest in the world, although it is growing faster than many. Our immigration policies are no doubt geared for population growth, but I have no idea what the projections are for the future numbers.
Japan has virtually no natural resources, we have lots. Another difference.
I think one of the things we already know is that Canada is a big and expensive country to run, no matter how we look at it. I am pretty sure we have quite a bit more investment in roads than Japan does, either on a per capita basis or in total. Again, a guess, but likely a pretty accurate one. In other words, we spend a pile of money on new roads and upkeep for such a small population. Another difference.
One observation that I keep making is the one about tourism. Japan doesn't seem to have a big or flourishing tourism industry (haven't bothered to look up the stats), while we have a pretty decent base in that one. It's got quite a potential for growth, and I think that deserves to be considered, as "fresh money" is always helpful. Who knows, maybe tourism could pay for a good portion of the rail construction?
Japan's bullet trains don't handle freight - passengers only. That's another possible difference when considering the two countries, I think.
Air travel is becoming a pain in the butt for many, and there are people who simply don't/won't fly...I'm wondering it that number will increase over time and if so, how it might impact the need for a train system. At least some of the traffic would come from displacement of air travel and cars too, I think.
I think this is a very interesting discussion though...lots of opinions and viewpoints. Will it ever get down to a real study of the nuts and bolts? I don't know, but I think it would be a worthwhile exercise as transportation is one of the biggest issues facing the country, due to its "bigness." I think we could (and do) spend our time and money on less productive things these days. Too many of our "national decisions" are short term, and it would be nice to have a long range look-see at how things might be say, 25 years from now. That way, we could avoid some of the boondoggles of the past by getting out in front of the changes, instead of trying to keep up to them. In any case, we shouldn't be afraid of them.
As the pretty young gate attendants used to say to me - in their best English - when I was boarding airplanes in Japan to head overseas, "Have a nice
fright!" :lol::lol::lol: