{"id":896787,"date":"2026-09-15T15:28:24","date_gmt":"2026-09-15T15:28:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/896787\/"},"modified":"2026-09-15T15:28:24","modified_gmt":"2026-09-15T15:28:24","slug":"quebecs-farmers-union-is-calling-on-ottawa-to-suspend-alto-high-speed-rail-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/896787\/","title":{"rendered":"Quebec’s farmers union is calling on Ottawa to suspend Alto high-speed rail project"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a> People rally in opposition to the Alto high-speed rail project as they gather on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Wednesday, June 10, 2026. THE CANADIAN PRESS\/Sean Kilpatrick – The Canadian Press <\/p>\n

LONGUEUIL \u2014 An association representing Quebec farmers is calling on the federal government to suspend its plans for a high-speed rail project between Quebec City and Toronto. <\/p>\n

Last Friday, the Union des producteurs agricoles wrote to federal Transport Minister Steven MacKinnon to ask him to put the brakes on the project. <\/p>\n

In the letter, the union president, Martin Caron, questioned the benefits of a Quebec City\u2014Toronto high-speed rail line. <\/p>\n

Caron says that a high-frequency train would also provide gains in travel time and reliability at lower costs. <\/p>\n

The union is asking the federal government to suspend the project. <\/p>\n

It is also asking the government to launch an independent review comparing options for a high-speed and a high-frequency train. <\/p>\n

Alto currently estimates the high-speed rail project would cost between $60 billion and $90 billion, but some experts say the final cost may be higher. <\/p>\n

Construction on the first segment, between Montreal and Ottawa, could begin as early as 2029. <\/p>\n

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 15, 2026. <\/p>\n

The Canadian Press <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"People rally in opposition to the Alto high-speed rail project as they gather on Parliament Hill in Ottawa…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":896788,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194295],"tags":[49,48,310449,20739,157535,24738,944],"class_list":["post-896787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ottawa","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-martin-caron","tag-ottawa","tag-parliament-hill","tag-quebec-city","tag-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/896787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=896787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/896787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/896788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=896787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=896787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=896787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}