Video of Swiss Stadler’s EC250,Low-Floor High-Speed Train

From Global Rail News - Stadler’s EC250, believed to be the world’s first mass produced low-floor high-speed train, has been presented at InnoTrans 2016.

From the end of 2019, the EC250 will begin operating between Basel/Zürich and Milan, and has been designed to meet the challenges of operating through the world’s longest rail tunnel, the Gotthard Base Tunnel.

Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) placed an initial order for 29 11-car trains in 2014. The order includes options for up to 92 additional units.

Stadler’s chief executive Peter Spuhler and the chief executive of SBB, Andreas Meyer, have presented a five-car version in the outside demonstration area at InnoTrans.

Eventually the EC250s will also run to Frankfurt and will therefore also need to be certified to run on Germany’s national network as well as in Switzerland, Austria and Italy.

Each 202-metre trains has four motorised bogies with a power output of 6,000 kW, providing a maximum operational speed of 250 km/h.

Seattle to Vancouver in 57 minutes? Political leaders push for cross-border high-speed rail

GEEKWIRE - Nate Levy - VANCOUVER, B.C. — Plenty of barriers have kept Seattle and Vancouver from becoming a single, connected region. Chief among them, the international border and the numerous traffic jams that travelers inevitably encounter one a journey between the two cities.

One solution to that: high-speed rail. As part of the Emerging Cascadia Innovation Corridor Conference in Vancouver B.C. Tuesday, political leaders from both sides of the border pitched an idea to build trains that would travel between Seattle and Vancouver in less than an hour.

http://www.geekwire.com/2016/seattle-vancouver-57-minutes-political-leaders-push-cross-border-high-speed-rail/

Video of France’s newest high speed train Océane” TGV

Take a look inside France’s newest high-speed train :Forty new high-speed trains are soon to hit the tracks in France, and they look pretty impressive indeed.

The new “Océane” TGV trains have been revealed by rail operator SNCF, built with thanks to a €1.2 billion project from Alstom.
http://www.raillynews.com/2016/take-look-inside-frances-newest-high-speed-train/

Transport Minister Marc Garneau appears lukewarm on high speed train through Southwestern Ontario

LONDON FREE PRESS - Federal Transport Minister Marc Garneau appeared to lean toward Via Rail’s dedicated rail plan over a provincially-backed high-speed train corridor through Southwestern Ontario when he attended an event in London Wednesday.

Speaking to the London Chamber of Commerce, Garneau said improvements to passenger rail service could come with a Via Rail plan to create a dedicated passenger rail track corridor in southern Ontario. Under the plan, Via would take over lines now used for freight traffic.

In an interview, Garneau said Via’s plan would allow for more frequent service, no interference from freight traffic and higher speeds than conventional trains, though well below the 200- to 300-km/h clip of high-speed rail.

“That’s the essence of the Via proposal and that’s what we are looking at seriously and if that is a workable solution, that will address the issue,” said Garneau.

Cloutier s'engage à construire un train rapide entre Montréal et Québec

MARTIN CROTEAU- La Presse

S'il devient premier ministre, Alexandre Cloutier s'engage à lancer dans un premier mandat la construction d'un train rapide qui reliera Montréal et Québec en moins de deux heures. C'est le projet phare de la plateforme de l'aspirant-chef du Parti québécois (PQ) en développement durable, qu'il a dévoilée à La Presse hier.

« Ça fait 40 ans qu'on en entend parler, il est grand temps maintenant de passer à l'action », a résumé en entrevue le député de Lac-Saint-Jean.

Si le PQ remporte les élections de 2018, dit le candidat, le gouvernement annoncera dans son premier mandat un projet de train électrique rapide entre les deux plus grandes villes du Québec. L'infrastructure serait construite sur la rive nord du fleuve Saint-Laurent, ce qui lui permettrait de desservir Trois-Rivières.

Le projet répond à un « besoin économique évident », résume M. Cloutier. Il permettrait de désengorger les autoroutes et principaux axes routiers. Ce faisant, il faciliterait le transport des marchandises par camion.

http://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/politique/politique-quebecoise/201609/02/01-5016903-cloutier-sengage-a-construire-un-train-rapide-entre-montreal-et-quebec.php

VIA RAIL Dreams! Peterborough to Ottawa

PERTH COURIER -  Desmond Devoy - A new, electric VIA Rail corridor starting in Peterborough could connect Perth and Smiths Falls.

Perth Mayor John Fenik revealed at the very end of the Tuesday, Aug. 30 council meeting that he had been in talks that morning with Lt. Cmdr. (retired) Jacques Fauteux, director of government and community relations with the office of Yves Desjardins-Siciliano, the president and CEO of VIA Rail Canada.

“It’s not at the federal level yet for approval,” said Fenik during the media questions section of the agenda. “They want to establish a link.”

VIA Rail Canada, according to Fenik, has been canvassing politicians all along the proposed corridor, and Fenik said he intends to establish a mayors' coalition to make this proposal happen. He promised to meet with Smiths Falls Mayor Shawn Pankow on Wednesday, Aug. 31.

“I see it as being good for Perth and Smiths Falls,” said Fenik.

Fenik said that in his preliminary discussions with the company, “high speed trains were taken off of the table,” since they require costly infrastructure to accommodate trains travelling more than 200 kilometres per hour. “High speed would be too expensive to put in.”

The Windsor-Toronto-Montreal-Quebec City corridor, which includes Ottawa rail links to Kingston and Montreal, is a heavily travelled band of steel.

“They have to invest in other lines,” said Fenik. He envisioned that there could be as many as four trains daily between Perth and Smiths Falls, which would then make onward rail travel to Ottawa possible, which could facilitate students going to university or college in Ontario’s second largest city, or workers on their way there, too.

“From Perth to Smiths Falls, you can get anywhere,” said Fenik. The plan is for VIA to increase ridership…they keep pushing the frequency.”

The mayor will be seeing support for a resolution in principle from his council at the next committee of the whole meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 13.

During the meeting with Fauteux, Fenik told council that “this community would unequivocally embrace a railway,” while adding that “we would love to be a hub for servicing (trains).”

The issue of train whistles has long been a gnawing issue among Perth residents, and Fenik admitted that while the issue was not at the top of the agenda, it was discussed, and he discovered that VIA Rail trains may be exempt from the whistle rule.

Fenik said he could see this becoming a reality “within a short period,” starting with seeking federal approval within the next two quarters (by early spring of 2017), with a possible build within the next three to five years.

Fenik floated the idea of even building a train station out of limestone, made to look like the old 18th century train station the town used to have.

“I will do whatever I can to make this happen,” said Fenik, promising he would be calling in political favours. “(I will) go to the ends of the earth to make this happen.”