{"id":10756,"date":"2018-02-28T16:30:27","date_gmt":"2018-02-28T21:30:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/?p=10756"},"modified":"2018-02-28T14:33:11","modified_gmt":"2018-02-28T19:33:11","slug":"more-smoke-mirrors-and-studies-for-canadian-rail-passengers-in-budget-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/2018\/02\/28\/more-smoke-mirrors-and-studies-for-canadian-rail-passengers-in-budget-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"More smoke, mirrors and studies for Canadian rail passengers in Budget 2018"},"content":{"rendered":"

Feb 28, 2018 @ 16:30<\/b><\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/a>For the third straight year, the federal Liberals have produced nothing but unsubstantiated promises and $5 million more for studies while VIA Rail Canada continues to disintegrate.<\/p>\n

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\u201cUnfortunately, the VIA tidbits in Budget 2018 are exactly what we\u2019ve come to expect from this government,\u201d says Robert Wightman, president of the citizens\u2019 advocacy group, All Aboard Ontario.\u00a0 \u201cAll we see is enough money to provide life support for VIA\u2019s deteriorating service, a vague, dollar-less promise of new equipment for the Quebec-Windsor Corridor and yet more public bucks thrown at studies of the ridiculous high-frequency rail plan that VIA keeps waving in front of us without ever producing an actual plan.\u00a0 This is supposed to reassure us.\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Budget 2018 calls for the funding of more studies of the Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal HFR scheme through to 2020-2021, on top of a previous $3 million.\u00a0 It also proposes an unspecified amount to buy new corridor equipment to replace the life-expired fleet VIA is now operating.\u00a0 But it weasels out of putting a dollar figure or a delivery date on the equipment by saying those details can\u2019t be released \u201cdue to an upcoming procurement.\u201d<\/p>\n

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All Aboard St. Marys co-founder Chris West says, \u201cThis just demonstrates the Trudeau government is playing Russian roulette with VIA\u2019s future.\u00a0 We had proof of that this past weekend here in St. Marys, when passengers were turned away because of a lack of space.\u00a0 That\u2019s due to the rapid deterioration of VIA\u2019s ancient fleet, which even its own corporate plans say will lead to service cuts within two years.\u00a0 One of our two trains runs with a maximum of four 35-year-old cars, while the other two-car train gets one that was built in 1946 and the other in 1955.\u00a0 Even the locomotive is a 30-year old relic.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The situation is no better on VIA\u2019s trains outside the Quebec-Windsor Corridor, where equipment problems, freight-inflicted delays and mounting costs are not being addressed by Ottawa.\u00a0 This is most apparent on VIA\u2019s flagship train, the Canadian<\/em>, which has become an object of shame from Toronto to Vancouver.<\/p>\n

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The founder of All Aboard Northern Ontario, Eric Boutilier, says, \u201cIt\u2019s doubtful there is a less reliable rail service in the industrialized world than the Canadian<\/em>, which used to be one of the world\u2019s finest trains.\u00a0 It has been as much as 48 hours late in recent weeks and it hasn\u2019t been on time once since before Christmas.\u00a0 Imagine what that does to the travel plans of isolated travellers, who often have no other public transportation options.\u00a0 So much for the inclusivity and fairness this government constantly claims as its guiding principles.\u00a0 This sends a bad message to Northern Ontarians, who are being made to feel they just don\u2019t count.\u201d<\/p>\n

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All three branches of the All Aboard Network have repeatedly pointed out what\u2019s needed to provide a modern, reliable and efficient rail service.\u00a0 It requires immediate investment in proven, off-the-shelf equipment, the replacement of the government-appointed political hacks on the VIA board with seasoned professionals and legislation to compel the railways upon which VIA operates to treat passengers as well as they treat freight.<\/p>\n

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Says Wightman, \u201cEven if Ottawa does come through with the equipment funding, we have extreme reservations about VIA\u2019s ability to make the right choice.\u00a0 Their selection of the unreliable Bombardier LRC trains in the late 1970s and the problem-plagued, second-hand Renaissance cars from England in 2001 doesn\u2019t fill us with confidence.\u00a0 We remain to be convinced VIA\u2019s up to it or that this government is sincere when they mouth platitudes about their support for environmentally-sustainable rail passenger service.\u201d<\/p>\n

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In the opinion of all three All Aboard groups, today\u2019s budget release is further proof that Canadian rail passengers are being set up for the obliteration of their already inadequate rail service at a time when our global competitors are investing wisely in theirs.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe\u2019ll believe the Trudeau government is serious about fixing VIA when we see the plan, the funding and the right equipment on the tracks,\u201d adds West.\u00a0 \u201cEven if they eventually do it, it\u2019s still far off and VIA\u2019s downward spiral continues to accelerate.\u00a0 These \u2018sunny ways, sunny days\u2019 promises really just amount to Ottawa once again shafting Canadian rail passengers.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Feb 28, 2018 @ 16:30 For the third straight year, the federal Liberals have produced nothing but unsubstantiated promises and $5 million more for studies while VIA Rail Canada continues to disintegrate.   \u201cUnfortunately, the VIA tidbits in Budget 2018 are exactly what we\u2019ve come to expect from this government,\u201d says Robert Wightman, president of …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":10758,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[1285,1284],"class_list":["post-10756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-provincial","tag-all-aboard-ontario","tag-ontario-budget-2018"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-18 08:23:36","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10756"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10756\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10759,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10756\/revisions\/10759"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10758"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}