TRANSPORT ACTION ONTARIO Advocating for Integrated Public Transportation across Ontario Box 858, Station “B” Ottawa, ON K1P 5P9 http://ontario.transportaction.ca September 8th 2020 Letter Cover The Honourable Catherine McKenna, Minister of Infrastructure and Communities, 180 Kent Street, Suite 1100 Ottawa, Ontario K1P 0B6 Email:
[email protected] The Honourable Jonathan Wilkinson Minister of Environment and Climate Change Fontaine Building 12th floor 200 Sacré-Coeur Blvd Gatineau QC K1A 0H3 Email:
[email protected] The Honourable Marc Garneau Minister of Transport House of Commons Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0A6 Email:
[email protected] c.c • SCOR-EDC • Provincial transportation ministers • VIA Rail Canada 1 TRANSPORT ACTION ONTARIO Advocating for Integrated Public Transportation across Ontario Box 858, Station “B” Ottawa, ON K1P 5P9 http://ontario.transportaction.ca September 8th 2020 Dear Ministers, Preserving Canada’s rail infrastructure. Canada does not abandon roads when they are seldom used and expensive for taxpayers to maintain. We continue to subsidize them without due regard to their economic value because they are there. The C.D. Howe Institute has calculated that the public subsidy directed at Canada’s highways exceeds 30% of their construction and maintenance costs net of all tax and fee revenues. However, the same cannot be said for railways, where line abandonment continues despite the obvious benefits for freight and people movement, congestion reduction, social equity and greenhouse gas reduction. Consequently, the need for detailed consideration of modal equity in infrastructure investment has never been greater. Given that Canada’s infrastructure ranks between 17th and 22nd in terms of global efficiency, it is obvious that we need to investigate all possible methods of improvement.