ViaFast

During the transition to Paul Martin's leadership, members of both the sitting Liberals and their opposition in the Canadian Alliance expressed concerns about the plan and it was quietly abandoned.

Even with full upgrades to the existing lines, scheduling issues would limit the maximum possible performance along the Corridor, as Via services ran behind freight.

The first of these was CN's introduction of the UAC TurboTrain in the late 1960s, which featured a passive tilt system adapted from the Spanish Talgo designs.

Via inherited the Turbo, but soon after replaced them with the LRC of similar performance, featuring a locally designed active tilt system.

[10] These studies supported the construction of entirely new high-speed lines that would provide services up to 400 km/h in the case of maglev, although they suggested this technology was not yet mature and primarily looked at 300 km/h electric sets.

Announced in 2002 by Federal Transport Minister David Collenette, ViaFast would improve service times primarily through the combination of new signaling and portions of new line that would avoid bottlenecks in the existing network, especially around Kingston.

[1] Details of the ViaFast plan did not become publicly available until a "strictly confidential" Via Rail internal report was leaked to the Canwest news service in 2009.

[14] Initial funding for ViaFast was provided on 24 October 2003 when Collenette announced the new $700 million "Renaissance II" infrastructure program, stating that Renaissance II "will provide for faster, more frequent and more reliable passenger service across Canada and will preserve the option for higher speed rail, such as the Via Fast proposal, at a later date.

Even before the announcement, liberal member Stan Keyes complained that Collenette hasn't provided enough information on ViaFast; talking to the CBC he asked "What is higher-speed rail system?

Shortly after the announcement, Joe Comuzzi, chair of the House of Commons Transportation Committee, stated that Prime Minister Jean Chrétien should not be committing to large funding expenditures as he neared retirement.

[15] Renaissance II was announced during the height of animosity between Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin, who frequently clashed in private and often spilled over into the public eye.

Martin, a fiscal conservative who was named to the World Economic Forum's "dream cabinet" in 2001,[17] cancelled many capital spending projects, Renaissance II among them.

[1] With the fall of Martin's government after a motion of no confidence and their loss in the subsequent 2006 federal election, Via's fate was passed to Stephen Harper's Conservatives.

[19] Part of the federal January 2009 budget included $407 million for rail upgrades, some of which was earmarked for a new track expansion in the Kingston area to allow trains to overtake each other and eliminate bottlenecks.