Transport committee  Yes, so they would have to continue investing in that. This high-speed rail system would get the passengers off those tracks, in fact.

Transport committee  For freight.

Transport committee  It may or may not. Railways haven't done expansions in a long time.

Transport committee  I take note of your comment. We are trying to understand what the impact is on the traffic, on congestion, as I mentioned, the impact on VIA Rail, because we do have a current passenger rail operator. What's the impact on VIA? What's the impact on the bus carriers? What's the i

Transport committee  Yes. That's part of what I was commenting on to Mr. Laframboise, the environmental, social, and economic impacts of doing something like this. Does it open up new possibilities in terms of economic development opportunities for places in between, let's say places like Kingston? I

Transport committee  That's no problem. We agree with you that the conclusion of the 1992-1995 study is probably dated—we think; we don't know. As I said before, probably the most essential piece of the study we're going to be doing is to understand how ridership has evolved and how the modal behav

Transport committee  It's going to depend on the segment. In terms of outcome or the trip-time benefit, VIA is planning to introduce a couple of express trains that would have fewer stops. They would reduce the total trip time between Montreal and Toronto by half an hour.

Transport committee  No, it's quite difficult when you're sharing the same infrastructure and you don't have a grade-separated right-of-way. It limits what you can travel at.

Transport committee  Yes. In fact, the 1992-1995 looked at the impact of the traffic on the other passenger modes, right? Are you referring to the infrastructure costs of the other modes, or is it funding levels?

Transport committee  Right. It will look at that. I'll say that it'll look at the impact. Task 12 of the study will look at the impact of reducing road congestion by reducing automobile trips. So that deals with the highway mode. How many cars...?

Transport committee  It would be difficult to do that until we know.... For example, take the highway system. On the highway system, people aren't paying for its use; it's paid for through general revenues. The highway will still have to be there. It's shared by cars and trucks. It isn't necessarily

Transport committee  No. And we are looking at the impact on the passengers who would no longer be using those modes. But as I say, that does not necessarily translate into direct capital cost avoidance, because a system of this nature is serving very targeted markets.

Transport committee  Right, except that the airport will still be serving other regional flights--it's a hub-and-spoke type of system--plus international flights. Right?

Transport committee  As I say, part of the study is looking at the potential for diversion of traffic. Once you have that, then, yes, we could look at those impacts. Some of them are probably going to be really difficult to calculate, extremely difficult to calculate, in particular road. On the frei

Transport committee  Yes.