The Canadian government is considering spending $6 billion to $12 billion to introduce what it calls “high-frequency trains” between Toronto and Quebec City. Though some media reports have described these as high-speed trains (which generally means trains capable of...
Randal O’Toole
Leaders on the Frontier – Why are Buses Better than Rail Transit? – With Randal O’Toole
Big Topics & Big Ideas
Building a 21st Century Transit System for Calgary
Calgary Transit is mired in the past, building an obsolete transit system designed for an archaic view of a city. Before the pandemic, transit carried 45 percent of downtown Calgary employees to work, but less than 10 percent of workers in the rest of the Calgary...
The 15-Minute City: An Extraordinarily Bad Idea
The latest urban planning fad to sweep across Canada is the 15-minute city, which proposes to redesign cities so that all urban residents live within an easy, 15-minute walk of schools, retailers, restaurants, entertainment, and other essentials of modern life. This...
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Canadian Property Rights Index 2023
A Snapshot of Property Rights Protection in Canada After 10 years
Alberta Politics and Empty Promises of Health-care Solutions
The writ has been dropped and Albertans are off to the polls on May 29. That leaves just four weeks for political leaders and voters to sort out what is arguably the most divisive, yet significant, issue for this election - health care. On Day 2, NDP leader Rachel...
Frontier Live on X – Is Our Transit System Really Serving You? – With Randal O’Toole
Big Topics & Big Ideas
Reinventing Transit for the 21st Century
Canada’s first subway line, which opened in Toronto in 1954, was 7.4 kilometers long and cost $6.8 million per kilometer—$76 million per kilometer in today’s money. That seems a bargain compared to a subway line Toronto is now constructing at a projected cost of well...
Building 21st Century Transit Systems For Canadian Cities
Policy Series 241
Revival of Rail Transit in Canada Questioned by Latest Policy Report
WINNIPEG, [March 12 2024] Canada's transit landscape is experiencing a profound transformation as eight major cities embark on the ambitious journey of developing rail transit systems. This marks a significant departure from the conventional wisdom of the 1950s when...
How to Kill a Country
Much of Seoul is a sea of high-rises. And not just Seoul: Busan and other cities in South Korea have lots of high rises. More than half of all South Korean households live in high rises, and well over 60 percent live in some kind of multifamily housing. South Korea...
Leaders on the Frontier: Debunking Myths about Urban Sprawl with Randal O’Toole
David Leis' guest here, Randal O'Toole has dedicated decades of research and analysis to policies that help citizens live and thrive rather than be held hostage to the demands of green belts and bureaucratic restrictions. In this conversation he debunks myths about...
The 15 Minute City: An Idiotic Dream
One of the arguments against single-family zoning is that separating housing from other uses forces people to drive to shops, work, and other destinations. Urban planners want to redesign cities so that people can walk to most of those destinations. They even have a...
Does ‘Peak Oil’ mean an end to the suburbs?
When fuel prices rise, people reduce other auto expenses in order to keep total costs (as a percentage of their incomes) constant. They may keep their cars a little longer, for example, or buy less luxurious cars.
Automobiles, Key to Katrina and Rita Evacuation
Autos worked partly because people who owned autos were not dependent on the effectiveness or competence of public officials.