Alto high-speed rail project completes first round of public consultations

Thousands of Canadians contributed feedback during the consultation process

MONTREAL, April 27, 2026 /CNW/ - On April 24, 2026, Alto successfully completed one of the most extensive public consultation initiatives ever conducted in Canada. Over the past three months, Alto hosted 26 in-person open houses, 10 virtual sessions, 32 stakeholder roundtables and spoke to more than 10,000 Canadians in rural and urban communities across Ontario and Quebec. The ideas, opinions and concerns raised over the course of the public consultation will play a key role as we move from corridor-level analysis to a more defined alignment.

"We made a deliberate choice to engage early, and we used the past hundred days to listen to communities to better understand their realities," said Martin Imbleau, President and CEO of Alto. "We value the significant number of people who took the time to share their views and suggestions with us, as well as their criticisms and concerns. All of this feedback will help us find the right balance to design a project that reduces impacts on communities while delivering lasting benefits across the entire corridor."

Since January 2026, Alto's consultation portal recorded a total of 324, 026 unique visits and 24,142 questionnaires outlining the views and perspectives of local communities were completed. In addition, the project's interactive map collected 19, 903 comments highlighting concrete local realities that will need to be taken into account as the project moves forward. Finally, exit surveys from the open houses show that 70 per cent of attendees were satisfied with the information they received about the project.

In June, Alto will publish a report detailing key findings and insights from the first phase of public consultation. A more precise corridor will be announced by fall 2026.

Although the public consultation is complete, the conversation is far from over. Alto's broader community engagement work with Indigenous communities, provinces, municipalities and special interest groups is ongoing. All that we hear will directly shape the alignment and reflect what matters most: a project built by Canadians, built for Canadians.

About Alto

Alto is a Crown corporation dedicated to building the largest public infrastructure project in Canada's recent history – the country's first ever, reliable and frequent high-speed rail network. With stations in Toronto, Peterborough, Ottawa, Montréal, Laval, Trois-Rivières and Québec City, this project will connect millions of Canadians living along the country's most densely populated corridor. Alto will bring cities and people closer together and create significant socio-economic benefits that will help generations to come. For more information, please visit our website altotrain.ca.

SOURCE Alto

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