Very good.
First of all, I'd like to thank you very much for having Mr. Gilbert speak first. He brought up a tremendous amount of points and made me very much aware of how much more I have to learn about railway and about high-speed rail.
My background is the resource industry, mining and geology and petroleum, and I've had a lifelong interest in railway. Like Mr. Gilbert, I've gone over the report for high-speed rail and its impact, and the suggestion on how it would help transportation in the corridor between Calgary and Edmonton.
I'm looking at his points on the price of oil. There were some discussions even earlier today that the efficient use of oil and electricity has a tremendous bearing on the cost of those two resources. I tend to agree, to a certain point, that the cost of fuel is really what's driving all the changes that we're concerned about in the economy and in transportation. By the same token, it becomes very much a dispute and a discussion--not an argument, but a discussion--in terms of what would be the cause of the present recession.
I have to turn around and defer to Mr. Gilbert there; he certainly has an awful lot more experience and has made a lot more effort in terms of study. I look forward to reading his books and his notes on where the premise comes from in terms of what the existing economic situation is.
For my part, my concern and interest comes from the point of view of the resource and the impact on the environment. I know from the previous notes that there were presentations by leading manufacturers on what works in Europe and how it's going to work here in Canada.
Like Mr. Gilbert, I have covered the country. I was born in Toronto. The only area in Canada that I have not worked in is the Maritimes. I've covered the whole of the Arctic and I've covered all of western Canada from both a mining and a petroleum side. As recently as the past year and a half, I was working on a project in Sudbury that was very much focused on the mining industry. When the whole commodities market collapsed, I ended up back in Calgary.
At this point in time, I'm very much on a learning curve. I don't want to tie up the committee while I try to explain where my interest is coming from, but it's very much focused on the interface of any of the methods that we are speaking of with what is already established infrastructure.
As early as this morning, we had another fatality outside of Calgary when a local train hit a car that was trying to go through the crossing. Our LRT, which we spoke of earlier, is solely powered by wind; it would be debatable as to what the source of the wind is. By the same token, it's being redesigned right now, because the major interfacing with the infrastructure is causing major problems. Locally we're developing a very sophisticated +15 level, but the focus is to turn around and put that same very efficient LRT system below the ground.
So I'm more concerned, from an engineering point of view, when we look at the system we are talking about, which is going to have an impact all across Canada, that it becomes very much something that is designed and fit for a purpose rather than an adaptation afterwards. The group I am working with is very experienced in rapid trains and rapid rail, and they also have concerns in being able to take systems that we are adapting to Canada as opposed to designing a system that would really enable everybody across the country to use it. The ideal situation we're faced with locally is still the amount of traffic that goes between Calgary and Edmonton. I agree that there is a very good situation for it, but whether or not a grounded system is part of what would fit for it, we're not quite sure.
Right now we're trying to make sure that the whole concept of what is the most efficient people mover is what we're working on. There are very many concerns about the efficiency of energy. There are a lot more experienced people than me who know that we lose a tremendous amount of energy in how we transport electricity and there is a huge consumption of energy when we produce oil. Just the way we use the oil lends itself to a great inefficiency. Those are the things that initially my comments would want to address: from an environmental side, we would give a lot of thought, not just a cursory thought but a lot of thought, to how any new system of any size is going to interface with the existing infrastructure.
I agree very much that the connection with the city centres is the most important part of any new system. When you look at the heavily populated areas of eastern Canada, there doesn't seem to be the same concern for the amount of land. I believe there were previous notes that suggested there would be a third corridor—you'd have a free corridor and a high-speed rail corridor and a traffic corridor. You are basically creating a third corridor to have a high-speed rail system. In western Canada, the use of land is very critical and, for lack of a description, it becomes very protected. So just how much land would be taken up by any one particular new system is part of the big concern. How it gets incorporated visually into the landscape is the other part of that issue.
As far as my comments would go, putting those on record right now would probably be my biggest concern. There is a tremendous amount of information that Mr. Gilbert went over that our group recognizes to a certain extent, and there are some other points we would probably have a varying opinion on. But as far as that goes, I think that would be sufficient for the time being.
I appreciate very much the invitation. Thank you for allowing me to have this opportunity to chat with you and join in with the group.