Fast trains are a great way to travel. But the big upside of Alto lies in the economic boon and housing affordability high speed rail could deliver.

Canada has plenty of land, relatively few people, and a housing affordability problem.

What’s this got to do with high speed rail?

The discussion around housing affordability often stalls out at the conundrum of how to protect the asset values of those who own homes today, while at the same time giving those who want to own a home a chance to buy one, in an area where they would like to live.

Cutting development charges and taxes will help. So too will driving more investment in Canada that will strengthen incomes.

But we shouldn’t lose sight of the opportunity to stimulate economic activity and new housing in parts of the country that have less population density and less costly residential land.

Canada’s High Speed Rail project, called Alto, has real potential to help with this challenge. The Toronto-Quebec City corridor is home to 18 million people. The most powerful upside of Alto might be in stimulating business development and affordable, appealing housing along more places within the corridor.

The historical evidence of how this works is undeniable.

People settle where they can move goods and themselves at reasonable cost and efficiency. When the cost geography is improved, the settlement map changes.

The Erie Canal turned Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse into boom towns. The St. Lawrence and Rideau Canal system helped develop places like Brockville, Kingston and Cornwall. The effect on Ottawa was a little different than originally intended, but the end result of a large and vibrant economy was the same.

The CPR was arguably Canada’s most obvious example of how transportation links define urban development. Route choices have had a massive impact and the same will be true of Alto’s final route choices.

In Britain, railways connected urban London with many small towns and rural areas, which have since become thriving urban communities.

Experiences in China and Japan showed that intermediate cities and towns along high speed rail routes can also experience significant upsides. In France, when the TGV connected Paris to Reims, Dijon and Strasbourg, housing demand in those towns surged. People kept working in Paris but bought larger, less expensive homes in connected cities.

Places along the potential Alto rail line stand to see economic benefits because they will be more integrated into the largest labour markets in the country.

Someone thinking about commuting to a job in downtown Toronto from Peterborough today, faces a drive, in painful traffic of at least 2 hours each way, optimistically. Most people won’t do that. The lifestyle trade off is too extreme,

But Alto could bring Peterborough from outside the plausible commuter zone to inside it, with a 35 minute comfortable train ride.

Changing distant cities and towns to “far suburbs” is where the housing affordability option really happens. It’s important to plan this out, and make sure that the land prices remain affordable while the market interest is developing, of course.

Public opinion on this project is still only lightly formed, but broadly positive. Across the country, most people (82%) support or are willing to go along with the project.

No doubt as the Alto conversation moves along, there will be questions raised about cost and route and right of way. All normal and healthy. But alongside these concerns, the proponents of the project have a great case to make, not only about comfortable and fast travel, but about helping solve a major challenge today.

Bringing plenty of focus to the impact of Alto on labour market integration, and lower cost housing for people who live along this corridor, will help broaden support, including among those who might never be in a position to use the route themselves.