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Passengers travelling from Quebec City to Toronto may have to take three trains to get to the final destination according to VIA Rail’s current plan to build a dedicated rail in the Windsor corridor.

The proposed $4-billion project to have dedicated tracks along the Quebec-Windsor route would allow the crown corporation to boost the number of trips in the corridor. However, VIA’s heavy rail passenger trains will probably be incompatible with the planned transformation of the Mount Royal tunnel as part of the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec’s $6-billion Réseau électrique métropolitain.

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Under that project, which has received funding from both the federal and provincial governments, the Caisse would take possession of the Mount Royal tunnel from the Réseau de transport métropolitain (RTM), which is now part of the Deux Montagnes train line. Under the terms of the deal, the pension fund is expected to be granted sole possession of the tunnel. The Caisse project calls for driverless electric trains running every six to 12 minutes on the line, 20 hours per day, and would require converting the track for light-rail trains, thus making it incompatible with the heavy rail cars VIA would use.