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The first stretch of Canada’s proposed high-speed rail network, from Montreal to Ottawa, is expected to cross approximately 1,700 properties, including at least 500 agricultural lands, the Crown corporation behind the project has told Radio-Canada. <\/p>\n
That will require what Martin Imbleau, the president and CEO of Alto, described to Radio-Canada Qu\u00e9bec’s Premi\u00e8re Heure as partial acquisition of lands. <\/p>\n
“In there, there are about 30 to 40 per cent farmers \u2014 that\u2019s roughly 500 farmers, something like that,” Imbleau said in French last week.<\/p>\n
The day after Imbleau’s comments, Alto spokesperson Philippe Archambault said those figures are an estimate and that the targeted properties “could be” located within the network\u2019s future 60-metre right-of-way.<\/p>\n
Public consultations on the high-speed rail network<\/a> wrapped up late in April. Alto plans to unveil its final, more precise corridor between Ottawa and Montreal by this autumn.<\/p>\n When asked whether Alto had a preferred route already in mind regardless of the public consultations, a spokesperson told CBC News that Alto “deliberately asked for feedback early.” <\/p>\n “We are now analyzing the feedback collected in order to narrow the corridor down to a preferred alignment,” according to the statement to CBC. <\/p>\n ‘If it turns out to be true, it\u2019s a lot’<\/p>\n Michel Dignard, the vice-president of the Union des cultivateurs franco-ontariens (UCFO), said he was surprised by the figures cited by Imbleau, especially since he had the opportunity to speak with Alto early last week.<\/p>\n “This is the first time I\u2019ve heard this. We talked at the beginning of the week and he didn’t mention this at all,” Dignard said in French. <\/p>\n “If it turns out to be true, it\u2019s a lot.”<\/p>\n Dignard, a farmer, is worried for himself and his colleagues who have just begun the seeding season under a cloud of uncertainty. <\/p>\n “This is not the time to be stressing farmers about this,” he said. <\/p>\n Alto announced at the end of March that it would request access to private land<\/a> to conduct environmental tests. The Crown corporation clarified that this does not necessarily mean the tracks will pass through the visited lands. <\/p>\n UCFO members are nevertheless anxious, according to Dignard.<\/p>\n “The calls are coming in pretty steady.\u2026 One [person] had four requests for different plots of land he owned. It\u2019s scary.”<\/p>\n Another meeting scheduled<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1778013196_410_default.jpg\")
Michel Dignard is the vice-president of the Union des cultivateurs franco-ontariens (UCFO), a union of Franco-Ontarian farmers. (Anne-Louise Michel\/Radio-Canada)<\/p>\n