High-speed rail in Canada is not up for debate, or is it?

In far less time than it will take to build Alto, we will have electric aircraft capable of travelling between Toronto and Montreal in just over an hour. In fact, Heart Aviation’s ES-30 electronic passenger plane, with a hybrid range of 800 kilometres, has already had its first fully electric test flight in New York state. Suddenly, a three-hour train trip seems less appealing.

The Toronto-Quebec City corridor comprises 42 per cent of the national population and 43 per cent of the labour force. Political support for high-speed rail extends across both federal Liberal and Conservative parties as evidenced in their recent election platforms, writes William Morrison.Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Opinion

BY WILLIAM MORRISON

June 19, 2025

Recently at the 60th annual conference of the Canadian Transportation Research Forum in Ottawa, I was honoured to take part in a long-standing conference tradition:

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