The Liberal government is weighing a significant routing change for the Alto high-speed rail project that would move the line’s corridor south toward the shore of Lake Ontario.
“I have directed Alto to develop a southern route option that includes a potential stop in Kingston, subject to technical feasibility and project requirements,” Transport Minister Steven MacKinnon said in a statement sent to CBC News.
“This is an important next step toward building a faster, cleaner and more connected rail network for Canadians.”
The proposed line from Quebec City to Toronto — which Prime Minister Mark Carney wants to start building in four years — was announced late last year with planned stops in Trois-Rivières, Laval, Montreal, Ottawa and Peterborough.
MacKinnon told reporters in Kingston on Monday that the decision to consider another route was informed by Alto’s What We Heard Report, which summarizes feedback gathered during a 100-day public consultation process.
It was also informed by consultations with Indigenous people that took place from October 2025 through June 2026 across the Toronto-Quebec City corridor.
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While there has been some opposition to the project from people living along the proposed route of Canada’s first high-speed rail line, the mayors for Kingston and the Township of South Frontenac have taken a different position.
The two mayors met in March to voice support for a scenario that would see the track for the Alto rail line run along the Highway 401 corridor, stop in Kingston, and then continue on to Quebec City.
“There’s a lot of opposition to both the northern and southern corridor, so we’re urging Alto, rather than just pushing through that opposition … [to] listen to the feedback [and] listen to the voices that they’re hearing,” Kington Mayor Bryan Paterson said.
“In this case,” Paterson added, “you’re getting a very strong ‘yes’ with a couple of key conditions that are technically feasible and make a lot of sense from a business and economics perspective.”
MacKinnon says Kingston is the fourth-busiest Via Rail station in the country, and services in and out of the city can complement the high-speed rail network Alto will provide.
“You would want to have a combined service and a real hub such that Via Rail … becomes then a feeder, part of the Alto network if you will,” he said.
MacKinnon, who went to Queen’s University in Kingston, said that beyond connecting to communities around the city, university students will widely use high-speed rail to travel to and from their homes.
For those reasons, the minister promised his office is “going to take a very, very, long, strong and positive look at” the possibility of including Kingston in Alto’s future.
“This is a project for, literally, the common good. This is a project for people,” he said. “Designed for people, to help people, to help communities to allow people to more freely live, work, play across the corridor and also attract visitors.”
Alto has proposed two routes. One is an essentially straight line between Peterborough and Ottawa. The second is a southern track that dips to within a half-hour’s drive of downtown Kingston.
Paterson and South Frontenac Mayor Ron Vandewal are backing an alternative third route: one that dips even further than the proposed southern corridor.
Councillors for both Kingston and South Frontenac had already voted, in separate motions, in support of telling Alto and federal officials they oppose the route unless it goes all the way to Kingston and stops there.
Speaking with reporters in Brockville, Ont., in March, Ontario Premier Doug Ford provided early backing for a southern route.
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“Maybe make a stop in Kingston, because it’s a little too weighted on the other side of the border,” he said, referring to the current plans that calls for four stops in Quebec, but only three in the province he leads.
The 1,000-kilometre rail line is set to connect Toronto and Quebec City, with all-electric trains reaching speeds of 300 km/h. Overall, it’s expected to cost between $60 billion and $90 billion.
Since the project was first announced it has faced opposition from people who own land along the route and could have that land expropriated for construction.
The Budget 2025 Implementation Act, which enacts measures proposed in the budget, also contained changes to the Expropriation Act and other laws that make it quicker and easier for the federal government to acquire land for the new railway.
MacKinnon referenced coming from a farming family, saying he understood the attachment to the land that people along the route feel.
As the exact route starts to take shape, he said his preference would be to see a federal right-of-way to pass through the land but admitted in some cases that land will have to be expropriated.
“I have directed Alto to proceed with extreme sensitivity, to respectfully deal with landowners who will end up along this route, this 60-metre-wide corridor, that has to in most cases travel in a straight line,” he said.
The minister said he will ensure the project makes the smallest possible impact on properties and the environment along the route.
“We will not cut corners when it comes to respect; we will not cut corners when it comes to sensitivity.”
Immigration lawyer Shane Rayman has previously told CBC News that both provincial and federal laws on land expropriation for major projects, and the way those laws have been treated in court, demonstrate their intent is to ensure landowners are made financially whole for the losses they may suffer in an expropriation.
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MacKinnon said that while routing Alto’s high-speed train through Kingston means the journey between Quebec City and Toronto will take a little longer than it otherwise would.
“Yes it is a longer route but it does not add enough time such that it would dissuade people from … taking a short airplane ride, or getting in their car or using some other mode,” he said.
Speaking in Vancouver, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre dismissed that suggestion. He said said high-speed rail might convince people to choose trains over planes, but it won’t get them out of their cars.
The Conservative leader has called for the government to cancel the project entirely.
