JOURNAL OF THE C.R.H.A. PACIFIC COAST DIVISION
Vol. 45, No. 1, Issue 177

ISSN 18188-1755

Spring 2020

 Bridging the Pitt by rail — three times

In This Issue

 CN suspends WL-SQ freight operations
 New prices set for Island rail revival
Spring 2020 - Page 1

The Sandhouse is the official publication of
THE CANADIAN RAILROAD HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION

PACIFIC COAST DIVISION

P.O. Box 1006, Station A, Vancouver, B.C. V6C 2P1

Table of Contents
To Our Readers

Page 3

Dates to Remember

Page 3

Division News

Page 4

Years Ago in The Sandhouse

Page 5

Bridging the Pitt by rail:
Third time lucky

Page 6

CN suspends freight between
Williams Lake and Squamish

Page 22

New prices set for revival
of Island rail services

Page 28

Index of Sandhouse Features:
2016-2019, Issues 161-176

Page 46

Short Hauls
Canadian National
Canadian Pacific
Rail Industry
White Pass & Yukon
VIA Rail
Amtrak
Rocky Mountaineer
West Coast Express
SkyTrain
Canada Line
Port News
Overseas
Preservation
Obituary
Parting Shot

Page 33
Page 33
Page 34
Page 35
Page 36
Page 36
Page 39
Page 39
Page 40
Page 42
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Press Date — May 21, 2020
Front cover: West Coast Railway Association 2-8-2 steam locomotive No. 16 crosses the throughtruss span over Furry Creek on the PGE near Britannia Beach with a railfan trip in August 1964.
The bridge span is at its third location, having begun life as part of the CPR’s crossing of the Pitt
River in 1907. In this issue, retired civil engineer and long-time PCD member Barrie Sanford tracks
the multiple lives of the span and its sisters. (Photo by Barrie Sanford)
Back cover: The stout through-truss spans of the current Pitt River Bridge are seen in this view
looking eastward from the rear of a West Coast Express excursion train hauled by restored CPR
H1b-class Hudson 2816 on May 4, 2002. Positioning of a cab car at the east end of the special train
made this rare view possible. Author Sanford describes this 1914 structure as “by far the largest
double-track bridge of any railway in B.C.” (Photo by Ian Smith)
Page 2 - The Sandhouse

To Our Readers
When the previous issue went to press on
February 18, the term COVID-19 was mostly
associated with distant events, such as the cruise
ship marooned in Yokohama harbour with its
quarantined passengers aboard.

On that date, only five cases had been recorded
in British Columbia, all of them associated with
travel to the part of China where the novel
coronavirus had made the jump from animals to
humans.
But since then it has spread like wildfire,
dominating the lives of people around the world.
As this is written the day before publication, the
number of cases worldwide has just passed five
million. That figure is accompanied by a death
toll of some 325,000.
In Canada, the statistics amount to nearly 80,000
cases and almost 6,000 deaths, with about 2,500
and 150, respectively, of those in B.C.
Reading the contents of this issue won’t help
you to escape thinking about the virus because

its tentacles reach deep into the subject that
fascinates us – railways.
Passenger rail travel in Canada – whether urban
transit, inter-city or long-distance – has mostly
ground to a halt, and that is reflected in news
reports throughout these pages. There has been
an impact on freight operations too, as slowing
markets for lumber have proved to be the last
straw for some B.C. mills, and a slump in
foreign trade has created the spectacle of long
strings of empty container cars plugging the
sidings of mainline railways.
Please take all necessary precautions with your
health — one statistic I’d like to report in future
is that not one reader of The Sandhouse has had
to suffer the illness, or worse, brought by this
scourge.
Ian Smith, Editor

Correction
On page 11 of the previous issue, Blairmore, Alta., was incorrectly described as being “some 15 miles
west of the B. C. border.” It is, of course, east of the border.

Dates to Remember
ALL MEETING DATES MUST BE CONSIDERED TENTATIVE
September 18 — PCD Meeting, Renaissance Room, Place des Arts, Coquitlam, 19:00.
(Entertainment TBA)
October 16 — PCD Meeting, Renaissance Room, Place des Arts, Coquitlam, 19:00.
(Entertainment TBA)
Spring 2020 - Page 3

Division News
The Division’s only meeting since November was held on February 21, featuring a slide presentation
by Ken Storey on his railfanning highlights of early 2019, with scenes in B.C. and Alberta.
Since then, the COVID-19 pandemic has severely disrupted our activities, forcing the cancellation of
the Annual General Meeting on March 20 and the meetings slated for April 17 and May 15. The
Division was all set to participate in the Western Rails show on March 15, but that too was cancelled.
As social distancing protocols remain in effect and our meeting place at Place des Arts is officially
closed until June 30, the meeting scheduled for June 19 is also cancelled. Should there be any change
in the time remaining before that date, members will be advised by e-mail.
The Annual General Meeting will be rescheduled for a date in the autumn and formal notice will be
given in a future issue of The Sandhouse.

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected all forms of public transport, with VIA Rail’s
western services being cancelled. Dining car Emerald, wearing a vinyl wrap to promote
travel to Churchill, Man., is seen on May 15 in a special deadhead train departing Vancouver to transfer rolling stock to Toronto. (Photo by Corwin Doeksen)
Page 4 - The Sandhouse

YEARS AGO IN THE SANDHOUSE
40 Years Ago (April 1980 issue)
— A derailment along Seton Lake on February 29 claims the life of a BC Rail engineer.

35 Years Ago (April 1985 issue)
— 36 native bands seek court injunction against CN double-tracking projects in B.C.

30 Years Ago (March 1990 issue)
— VIA runs the Canadian on the CPR transcontinental route for the final time in January.

25 Years Ago (March 1995 issue)
— BC Rail cuts summer passenger service to Prince George to three times per week.

20 Years Ago (March 2000 issue)
— VIA’s Canadian makes its last stop at Port Coquitlam on January 17.

15 Years Ago (Spring 2005 issue)
— VIA celebrates the Canadian’s 50th anniversary on April 24.

10 Years Ago (Spring 2010 issue)
— British Columbia Railway personnel are transferred to the B.C. Ministry of Transportation.

5 Years Ago (Spring 2015 issue)
— May 27 marks 20th anniversary of Amtrak restoring Vancouver-Seattle service.
— CP closes Cranbrook yard on April 19, leaving only a siding and another track.

— Bridge damage in Ontario limits the Canadian to Vancouver-Winnipeg runs for five weeks.
— CPR locomotive 374 is featured on a $100 gold coin, which retails for $600.
— Rocky Mountaineer will cancel the North Vancouver-Whistler day trip after the 2015 season.

Spring 2020 - Page 5

Bridging the Pitt by rail:
Third time lucky
by Barrie Sanford
The author wishes to point out that records and reports on bridge dimensions and weights vary
considerably. Statistics cited in this article should be regarded as approximate.
We tend to think of bridges as being permanent
structures, but many have served in more than
one location.
Perhaps the best known railway bridge relocated
within British Columbia is the cantilever structure over Niagara Gorge on the Esquimalt &
Nanaimo, which began its life as the Canadian
Pacific Railway’s crossing of the Fraser River at
Cisco, between Lytton and North Bend. Built to
carry the locomotives of its day when it opened
in 1884, the bridge was disassembled and
moved to Vancouver Island when the CPR
wanted to use heavier locomotives on its mainline.
In its new role the bridge was quite adequate for
the smaller locomotives used on the E&N. Indeed, it still stands more than a century after its
move. Likewise, many bridges on the CPR’s
now abandoned “Southern Route” through B.C.
originally saw service on the CPR mainline and
remain in their second homes today for pedestrians and cyclists. Another bridge came all the
way to B.C. from the Maritimes.
The prime subject of this article is the CPR’s
Pitt River Bridge of 1907, which served that
railway for a surprisingly brief period, but went
on to new careers elsewhere, both road and rail.
Adequate for its time when opened, the singletrack bridge of 1907 was overtaken by a growth
in traffic not even the most optimistic forecasters of the early twentieth century had predicted,
and it was replaced by the present double-track
bridge in 1914.
Page 6 - The Sandhouse

The first railway crossing of the Pitt River was
completed in late 1883 by American contractor
Andrew Onderdonk. He had earlier entered into
an agreement with the federal government to
construct a railway from Yale, the upper limit of
navigation by steam-powered sternwheelers on
the Fraser River, to Savona, the lower limit of
navigation on the Kamloops Lake-Thompson
River system. The rail line was essentially a
portage railway paralleling the unnavigable sections of the Fraser and Thompson rivers.
When the CPR was incorporated shortly afterwards, the federal government promised to give
it the Yale-Savona trackage, when completed by
Onderdonk. This was one of several inducements the federal government offered to make
the CPR’s risky transcontinental venture more
attractive to investors.
The CPR subsequently entered into separate
contracts with Onderdonk for construction of the
line from Savona to Eagle Pass and from Yale to
Port Moody. The Pitt River Bridge was part of
the latter contract. The last spike on the YalePort Moody section was driven just west of
Deroche on January 22, 1884, almost two years
before the more famous “last spike” at Craigellachie.
The first Pitt River railway bridge was a basic
wooden structure held together with steel tierods, bolts, flanges and gusset plates. The perilous financial condition of the CPR at the time
dictated maximum economy of construction,
and few bridges anywhere on the CPR transcon-

tinental line were initially built with permanent
materials. Wood piles and sawn timber predominated. Steel trusses on concrete piers would
have to wait until operations were providing
sufficient revenue for improvements.
The bridge’s official location was Mile 109.7 of
the Cascade Subdivision, crossing the Pitt about
two miles northeast of its confluence with the
Fraser. It comprised short pile trestles at each
end, six short through-truss pony spans, six fullsize through-truss spans and a full-size throughtruss swing-span. The swing-span was required
because the Pitt River was deemed navigable.
A similar swing-span was needed in the bridge
over the Harrison River at Mile 68.2, also
deemed navigable. Swing-spans were not required across Norris Creek (Mile 79.9), Stave
River (Mile 93.5), Kanaka Creek (Mile 101.5)
and Coquitlam River (Mile 112.3), the other
major tributary streams crossed by the CPR in
the Fraser Valley, as these were considered un-

navigable.
A ferry for horse-drawn wagons and pedestrians
operated on the Pitt River from landings upstream of the bridge, sailing between the infant
municipalities of Pitt Meadows on the east and
Coquitlam on the west (the latter area was later
hived off into Port Coquitlam, incorporated in
1913). The rudimentary road approaching the
ferry ultimately became the Lougheed Highway.
Marine traffic on the Pitt River was significant,
consisting mostly of barges carrying stone and
aggregate from Pitt Lake for construction in
New Westminster and Vancouver. Thus, the
swing-span saw frequent openings. Riverboat
captains regularly complained that the channel
offered by the open swing-span was dangerously
narrow, allowing only 45 ft. of clearance. Minor
scrapes and impacts of vessels against the bridge
occurred, but none of these seriously disrupted
rail operations.

The first rail crossing of the Pitt River was this wooden pile and sawn timber structure completed
in late 1883. The view is from the east bank, slightly downstream of the bridge, looking northwest.
The swing-span is flanked by five through-truss spans on the west side and a through-truss span
and five pony-truss spans on the east end. (City of Vancouver Archives CVA 3-37)
Spring 2020 - Page 7

About the only “incident” – a railway management euphemism for a wreck – involving the
first bridge occurred on October 16, 1902, when
a freight train failed to start braking in time for a
stop signal while a short section of track on the
bridge was being removed for repair.

This was stronger than most railway bridges of
the era. The fact that three of the former CPR
spans from that second bridge still carry trains –
in other locations -- is evidence of the virtue of
their design and the quality of materials used in
their construction.

As reported in the British Columbian newspaper
the next day: “The engine plunged among the
ties, smashed through the first trestle and took a
header onto the riverbank, some 20 feet below,
followed by the three trucks. Fortunately, the
engineer and fireman escaped injury, but the
conductor and brakeman were severely shaken
and bruised.”

A newspaper report on May 6, 1905, recorded
that the CPR had called for tenders for construction of concrete piers for a new bridge. The
contract was subsequently awarded the British
Columbia General Contract Co. of Vancouver.
Reports are unclear on whether the new piers
were to be constructed between the wooden
piles of the existing bridge or on a different
alignment for an adjacent new bridge.

Untreated wooden pile structures have a lifespan
of about 15 to 20 years, and occasional news
reports reveal that by 1900 the CPR was aware
of the impending necessity of replacing the
wooden bridge. Several earlier news reports in
1891 cite work being underway on the bridge,
but it is unclear what was actually carried out at
that time. Official records from that age are
hard to find, if indeed they have been retained,
and newspaper reports are often skimpy, vague
or contradictory.

The start of construction was delayed by an appeal made by tug and steamboat operators to the
Board of Railway Commissioners, seeking wider clearance in the swing-span channel. After
considerable discussion, the federal government
agreed to contribute funds toward a 250-ft.
swing-span offering a 100-ft. wide channel on
either side of the pivot pier, thus placating the
river captains. The delay resulted in only six
piers being completed during 1905, with the
remaining piers built in 1906.

The CPR opted to replace its wooden bridge
with a steel bridge on reinforced concrete piers
consisting of: five through-truss fixed spans,
each 128 ft., 9 in. long; one through-truss swingspan, 250 ft. long; one deck-plate girder span,
length not specified; nine concrete piers including one pivot pier; and lengthy pile trestles at
each end, particularly on the west end.

Early in 1907, the CPR signed a contract with
the Canadian Bridge Co. for placement of the
steel, and installation began that spring. Falsework piles were driven to support the new spans
as they were assembled. The final piece of steel
was placed October 23, 1907, and trains started
using the new bridge the following day.

The author was unable to determine the name of
the civil engineer who designed the bridge. The
structure was rated as E55 using Theodore
Cooper’s universally recognized standards –
known as “The Bible” to railway bridge engineers – meaning safe for an eight-driver locomotive with 55,000-lb. axle loading.

The new structure was a decided improvement
over the original bridge. However, the growth
in rail traffic in western Canada at the time
quickly overtook the addition to the railway’s
infrastructure. The CPR was adding one locomotive and 25 freight cars per day to its system,
yet was struggling to accommodate the traffic
presented to it.
In 1910, the CPR announced plans to double-

Page 8 - The Sandhouse

track its entire mainline from Montreal to Vancouver. Within B.C., construction priority would
be given to helper districts in the mountains and
between Vancouver and Ruby Creek. All existing bridges between Vancouver and Ruby Creek
were to be replaced with double-track structures,
including the just-completed 1907 Pitt bridge.
(At the time, eastbound freight trains arriving at
Ruby Creek from Vancouver were consolidated
into longer double-headed trains for the undulating route through the Fraser Canyon. The plans
called for further double-tracking east of Ruby
Creek to await completion of the Kettle Valley
Railway line through Coquihalla Pass, so that
trains could be diverted over the KVR while
upgrading work on the mainline in the Fraser
Canyon progressed.)
Initial plans for the third Pitt River railway
bridge called for a bascule span to accommodate
the prospect of deep-sea freighters loading grain

at elevators planned for the riverbank above the
rail bridge. However, it was later announced that
a conventional swing-span would be used instead. The grain elevators never materialized,
and neither did a planned ship canal between the
Pitt River and Port Moody.
After an extensive program of river soundings,
the CPR opted to construct the new double-track
bridge about 200 ft. downstream of the 1907
bridge. That separation was necessary because
the existing swing-span had to remain able to
open for river traffic without fouling the new
swing-span while the two co-existed.
Moreover, the new swing-span was to be longer
than the swing-span on the existing bridge and
was to be placed closer to the middle of the
channel. This called for detailed planning and
careful co-ordination with river traffic during
construction.

This photo taken in the spring of 1913 illustrates the location of the third bridge in relationship to
the 1907 bridge. The view is looking west from a partly-built falsework trestle that will support
the steelwork of the double-track bridge as it is being assembled. The 1907 bridge is at right.
(Author’s collection)
Spring 2020 - Page 9

The double-track bridge would consist of (east
to west): eight through plate-girder spans, each
85 ft., 4 in. long; one through-truss swing-span,
273 ft., 6 in. long (clear channel 116 ft.); two
long through-truss spans, each 257 ft., 9 in. long
(curved top); one short through-truss span (flat
top); one through plate girder-span, 85 ft., 4 in.
long; 13 reinforced concrete piers; and two reinforced concrete abutments.

The abutments and some of the piers close to the
river banks were excavated with simple cofferdams. The piers in the deeper part of the river
were excavated using open caissons, basically
giant cylinders, open at the top, with clam shovels scooping out the river sediment from the
centre of the caisson as it was pushed downward. Upon reaching desired depth, the water
was pumped out and replaced with concrete.

Contractor for the substructure was the Foundation Co. of Montreal, with E.G. Matheson the
engineer in charge. Contractor for the superstructure was the Dominion Bridge Co., with J.
Findlay in charge. H. Vindal, CPR Division Engineer at Vancouver, had overall responsibility
for the entire double-track project between Vancouver and Ruby Creek.

Most piers were sunk 40 ft. into the riverbed,
with wooden piles driven an additional 30 ft. As
long as the wooden piles remained saturated,
they would last indefinitely. Falsework was built
to support the steel spans while they were assembled.

Construction of the double-track bridge began in
the autumn of 1912.

Logic would suggest that the CPR should have
simply continued assembly of the steel for the
new bridge on falsework until completed, and
then close and demolish the 1907 bridge and any
falsework. But for reasons then not apparent, the

In this view, taken at the same time in the spring of 1913 as the photo on page 9, the photographer is standing on the 1907 bridge, looking east across the river, with the falsework trestle for
the new bridge at right. Work on a temporary bypass trestle farther to the right has yet to be
started. (Author’s collection)
Page 10 - The Sandhouse

CPR built a new temporary bridge immediately
downstream of the falsework for the future double-track bridge.

tions for the road bridge ready to accept those
spans, so they were placed on temporary piles
near the riverbank on the west side.

This temporary crossing consisted of a pile trestle nearly 2,000 ft. in length and a single steel
span, the latter being the obligatory swing-span.
For this purpose the CPR delivered, in pieces, a
surplus swing-span bridge from Manitoba and
assembled it on its new trestle. It was no wonder the Daily Province, in an article on July 15,
1913 (one of the best newspaper reports on the
entire project), titled its report: “Building Pitt
River Bridge is Work of Magnitude.”

On August 21, 1913 – barely a month after the
announcement – the swing-span was floated off
the pivot pier on four barges. Other spans followed. That ended use of the 1907 bridge by
trains, at least for most of the next half-century.

On July 9, 1913, the Board of Railway Commissioners for Canada authorized the CPR to use
the temporary bridge over the Pitt River, subject
to trains being restricted to a speed of 6 mph.

Less than two weeks later, the B.C. government
confirmed what had been a poorly-kept secret
for several weeks – the Province had agreed to
purchase the CPR’s 1907 single-track bridge for
a road and tramway crossing of the same river.
Compounding the perplexity of the CPR’s decision to build a temporary crossing of the Pitt
River, the provincial government did not simply
take over the CPR’s 1907 bridge, plank the deck
and – voila – have a bridge of its own. Instead,
it decided to remove the steel spans of the 1907
bridge and set them on new piers 1,000 ft. upstream of their existing location.
A tramway, running between Mission and Vancouver via the road bridge, was proposed by the
Burrard, Westminster & Boundary Railway &
Navigation Co., a subsidiary of the Western
Canada Power Co., which in turn was constructing a hydroelectric power plant at Stave Falls,
just west of Mission.
With trains now able to use the temporary
bridge, the provincial government took action to
remove the spans of the 1907 bridge as quickly
as possible. However, there were no founda-

Assembly of the new spans on the double-track
rail bridge progressed from the east bank to the
west bank. A newspaper report on July 27,
1914, reported the swing-span on the new bridge
had been completed, as was the first of the major fixed spans.
On September 26, 1914, a test train was run over
the bridge. The test was deemed entirely satisfactory and the following day both freight and
passenger trains began using the bridge.
Completion of the bridge eliminated the last
remaining section of single-track on the mainline between Vancouver and Ruby Creek. A
news report noted the bridge was 1,749 ft. long,
contained 60,000 tons of concrete, and cost
about $1 million to build.
The bridge’s design and construction were superb, and its longevity – now approaching 106
years -- is evidence of that claim. In fact, it remains one of the largest bridges in the entire CP
system and is by far the largest double-track
bridge of any railway in B.C.
But one shortcoming has affected the bridge
since the beginning – its low vertical clearance
above high water, a mere 18 ft.
This means the swing-span has to be opened for
almost all river traffic, including slow-moving
log booms, often using two or more tugs dispersed throughout the boom. This shortcoming
was recognized by the provincial government
and the upstream road bridge was built with
substantially higher clearance, clearly visible in
Spring 2020 - Page 11

The original use of the 1907-built structure as a CPR rail bridge was shortlived. With a temporary bypass trestle for rail traffic opened in July 1913 while
the new double-track bridge was still under construction, the 1907 bridge could
be disassembled in preparation for its next life as a road bridge. First to be
removed was the swing-span, shown above on August 21, 1913, being floated
off its abutments on four barges. Below, the single deck-plate girder span was
removed soon afterward. (Author’s collection)

Page 12 - The Sandhouse

the photo below.
On May 28, 1914, the B.C. government awarded
a contract for construction of the substructure
and placement of the spans for the road bridge to
Armstrong, Morrison & Co. of Vancouver. The
work went speedily and the bridge opened for
traffic on March 3, 1915.
As the British Columbian newspaper editorialized the following day: “The completion of the
steel bridge over the Pitt River at Port Coquitlam is an event only equalled in importance by
the spanning of the Fraser River by the New

Westminster Bridge a decade ago. By this
splendid structure, erected at a cost of some
$800,000, uninterrupted highway communication has been obtained along the north shore of
the Fraser River, through fertile and well settled
districts, whose development will be greatly
promoted by a public improvement, which will
provide a crossing for a north shore electric tram
line in the future.”

One unforeseen impact of the road bridge was
on the CPR’s Fraser Valley train informally
dubbed the “Agassiz Local”. This train had
begun operation in 1907, running from Agassiz

This photo, looking west from a railcar on the east side of the river on June 18, 1914, shows the
double-track bridge starting to resemble its ultimate shape. The spans of the 1907 bridge are
now completely gone. The eight deck-plate girder spans on the east approach to the swing-span
have been completed and the swing-span is just over a month from being finished.
On the left is the temporary bypass bridge, with its own swing-span in the distance. The temporary swing-span relocated from Manitoba is peaked at its centre, unlike the nearly flat tops of
the swing-spans of the 1907 and 1914 bridges. This is evidence that the temporary bridge did
not use either the old or the new swing-spans. The curved alignment of the temporary bridge
was evidently to take advantage of shallow spots in the riverbed. (Author’s collection)
Spring 2020 - Page 13

to Vancouver in the morning and back in the late
afternoon for the benefit of Fraser Valley farmers shipping their milk and produce to market in
Vancouver.
But with a road bridge now available across the
Pitt River, farmers found shipping their produce
by truck became a viable alternative to both the
“Agassiz Local” or a long wait for the ferry that
had operated across the river up to that time.
With the start of World War II in September
1939, an 18-man detachment of the Duke of
Connaught’s Own Rifles was assigned to guard
the railway bridge against potential sabotage.
Guards were similarly assigned to New Westminster Bridge, Second Narrows Bridge, the
Ioco oil refinery, and the Ruskin power plant,
among other important facilities.

The threat was real in the early years of the conflict -- when Canada was at war but the United
States was neutral -- because potential saboteurs
in northwest Washington could prepare attacks
on nearby Canadian infrastructure with relative
impunity. Guards were removed late in the war,
when its final outcome seemed assured.
With the war over and gasoline and tire rationing ended, citizens cashed in their war bonds to
buy long-deferred goods unavailable during the
war. Chief among these were automobiles, and
the flood of personal automobiles in the postwar years strained the road infrastructure to accommodate them.
One of the principal bottlenecks in the Fraser
Valley’s road system was the Pitt River Bridge
of 1915, carrying what was now called Highway
7. The lateral clearance between trusses was a
mere 16 ft., 6 in., fine for the single-track rail-

The completed road bridge of 1915 is seen looking eastward from a point slightly downstream of
the structure. Clearly visible is the increased height of the bridge piers for its second life, which
will avoid having to open the swing-span for smaller vessels. (Photo by Stuart Thomson, City of
Vancouver Archives, CVA 99-315)
Page 14 - The Sandhouse

way the bridge had originally accommodated,
but hardly enough for two automobiles to pass,
let alone trucks. Successive politicians promised to build a replacement bridge.
Finally, in November 1955, the provincial government of Premier W.A.C. Bennett committed
to build the long-promised bridge.
But what was committed was not actually a new
bridge. Rather, a detailed engineering assessment of the existing structure suggested that it
would be quite feasible to widen and reinforce
the existing piers and replace the existing steel
spans with new spans of ample roadway width.
As a bonus, the seven spans of the existing
bridge could be salvaged relatively easily and
their sale would make a positive cash contribution to the finances of the project.

By ingenuity bordering on the brilliant, engineers developed a plan to carry out all the work
with no serious delay to road traffic. On October 21, 1957, a formal opening ceremony was
held on the bridge.
Another new swing-span road bridge on Highway 7, this one over the Harrison River, was
opened the same day. By that time, oversized
vessel movements on both rivers had become
rare and the swing-spans were seldom required
to open. In fact, the Pitt River had been closed
to oversized vessels during the entire time the
bridge rehabilitation was underway, with no
significant hardship.
The opening of the new Pitt River bridge left the
B.C. government with seven surplus bridge
spans in its possession.
Late in 1957, the swing-span and two of the
fixed spans were sold to Western Canada Steel,
which was expanding its steel plant in south
Vancouver on to Twigg Island in Richmond,
across Mitchell Channel from Vancouver.
The steel company wanted access to the North

Arm of the Fraser River on the south side of
Twigg Island for shipping finished products by
barge. Its Vancouver plant already had a rail
connection with the B.C. Electric Railway’s
Marpole to New Westminster line.
The company’s development plan seemed implausible, as the only access to Twigg Island,
other than by water, was by the Fraser Street
Bridge. This was an ancient swing-span bridge,
opened in 1905, with severe weight restrictions.
Twigg Island seemed an unlikely site to locate a
steel industry, with its heavy vehicle loads.
After Western had secured a 140-acre property
on Twigg Island at a modest price, it revealed
plans to build its own bridge linking Twigg Island with Vancouver, using the three spans from
the Pitt River Bridge it had purchased. (The
small channel between Twigg Island and Mitchell Island was filled in during the 1960s and the
combined island has since been known as
Mitchell Island.)
In March 1958, the company moved its three
spans from the Pitt River to Mitchell Channel.
The Vancouver Sun reported on the unusual
movement in its edition of April 5, 1958, as follows: “To get the bridge down the river, crews
had to wait for the right combination of wind
and tide. ‘We finally got rolling early in a Sunday morning. It took just four hours to make the
voyage,’ an official said. At the Twigg Island
end, piling and supporting piers were prepared
in advance and now crews are working to get the
spans permanently located.”
To make the journey from the Pitt to Mitchell,
the spans had to pass through five other swingspan bridges – the 1914 Pitt River Bridge, New
Westminster Bridge, BCER’s Lulu Island
Bridge, CNR’s Lulu Island Bridge and Fraser
Street Bridge.
The swing-span was set on a new pivot pier in
the middle of Mitchell Channel, and the two
Spring 2020 - Page 15

fixed spans were set flanking the swing-span.
All three spans had rails installed to carry locomotives and freight cars. They were also decked
with planks to allow trucks to cross, thereby
avoiding the weight restrictions on the Fraser
Street Bridge.
Western Canada Steel did not reveal the purchase price of the spans, but reported the total
cost of the bridge project at just under $500,000.

For the next 16 years, the bridge spans served
well in their new location. Western Canada Steel
even had its own locomotive for switching cars
around its plant or interchanging with the BCER
(and its successor, the BC Hydro Rail division
of the British Columbia Hydro & Power Authority) on the Vancouver side. BC Hydro attached
towers for its high-voltage transmission lines to
the fixed spans.
Railway historian Roger Burrows, whose father
was a Western Canada Steel employee, learned
to drive by going back and forth across the
planked bridge in dad’s car while the latter was
at work.
In April 1968, Premier Bennett announced that
the provincial government was planning to build
a new bridge connecting Mitchell Island with
Vancouver and Richmond. Closure and removal
of the 1905 Fraser Street Bridge was part of the
plan. An alignment with Vancouver’s Knight
Street was ultimately chosen, and on January 15,
1974, the Knight Street Bridge was opened, with
intermediate ramps to and from Mitchell Island.
The new bridge had no weight restrictions, so
Western Canada Steel opted to close its combined rail-truck bridge, thereby eliminating the
need to maintain the structure or to pay for a
small crew of bridge tenders to operate the
swing-span. A retired Western Canada Steel
employee informed the author that the swingspan was scrapped following its removal. The
pivot pier in the centre of the channel was also
removed, but the two fixed spans flanking the
swing-span were left in place.
Page 16 - The Sandhouse

They have since become the focal point of a
small public park called Mitchell Island Pier
Park. The City of Richmond website promotes
the park as offering “a fishing pier and scenic
view point with excellent views of the North
Arm of the Fraser River and related river activities.”
However, a recent visit by the author revealed
access to the span on the south side has been
blocked by a fence. The picnic benches formerly
installed on the span have been shifted on to the
grass approach. Access to the span on the north
side of the channel is totally blocked.
The two remaining spans have been in their present location for 62 years. After their 50-year
service for both rail and road over the Pitt River,
more than half of their lifetime has been spent
on the banks of the Fraser River’s Mitchell
Channel. Likely they will continue to “reside”
there for many more years.
The three remaining through-truss spans from
rail and road service on the Pitt River were sold
to the Pacific Great Eastern Railway directly
after the second road bridge was opened in
1957. All three remain in service on former PGE
trackage, now leased to CN.
As illustrated on this issue’s cover, one was installed over Furry Creek (Mile 27.92, Squamish
Subdivision), just south of Britannia Beach,
where a temporary bridge had been built in time
for the opening of the PGE line between North
Vancouver and Squamish the previous year.
The span might have been disassembled for the
move to its new “home” or it may have been
simply winched intact up the slope from the
shore of Howe Sound.
The second span became Pine River Bridge 2 at
Mile 613.60, Chetwynd Subdivision, in time for
Premier Bennett to make a triumphant trip over
the line and drive the last spike at Dawson Creek
on October 2, 1958. This span most certainly

was partly disassembled prior to transport in
order to clear the many tunnels and bridges encountered on its lengthy journey.
The third span was stored at Squamish until
1962 when it was installed over the Mamquam
River at Mile 41.4, Squamish Subdivision, following numerous mishaps to previous crossings
of the river at that point.

A seventh span from the 1907 CPR bridge -- a
short plate-girder span -- had been incorporated
into the 1915 road bridge (see the bottom photo
on page 12). However, the author was unable to

determine its fate after it was salvaged from the
road bridge in 1957.
As with most industrial infrastructure, the 106year-old double-track bridge rarely makes the
news. Probably most passengers on West Coast
Express trains don’t even pay attention to the
river crossing, despite the noticeable clank as
the wheels pass over the gap in the rails between
the swing-span and the adjacent fixed span.
Likely no one recognizes that the clank is louder
in winter, when the rails on the swing-span
shrink, than on hot summer days, when the gap
in the rails is negligible.
Perhaps some glance to the north as they cross,

The central swing-span has been scrapped and its pivot pier removed, but two fixed
spans from the 1907 Pitt River Bridge remain in place on either side of Mitchell Channel, their location since 1958 when they were put into service there by Western Canada
Steel Co. The scene has changed little since this photo was taken in 2003, looking north
from the south shore. (Photo by Barrie Sanford)
Spring 2020 - Page 17

where today they would see a prominent cablestayed bridge that opened in 2009 to replace the
second and third road bridges that had opened in
1957 and 1978, respectively. Traffic had grown
in the two decades since the second bridge had
been opened, to the point that a parallel bridge
had been built on its north side, opening in 1978
to accommodate the westbound traffic.
The 1914 railway bridge those commuters are
crossing is essential to the smooth operation of
their train. Indeed, marine traffic is prohibited
from requesting to have the swing-span opened
during the hours that West Coast Express operates, a departure from the normal practice that
gives water-borne traffic priority over rail movements pursuant to the federal Navigable Waters
Protection Act.

The operating contract between CPR and WCE
even notes that, if the federal authorities ever
revoke the special permission to keep the bridge
closed to give priority to WCE trains, either
party can give 10 days’ notice to terminate the
commuter rail service if it then interferes with
CPR’s freight operations.
One thing those commuters don’t have to worry
about is the prospect of the third Pitt River railway bridge following its predecessor to a new
location. As an essential element of CPR’s infrastructure, its future seems well assured.
With all the twists and turns in the story of the
Pitt River’s many bridges, there may be yet another to come, albeit well into the future.

On May 31, 1957, soon after their 42-year life as part of a road bridge had ended, two
truss spans of the 1907 Pitt River railway bridge sit on barges tied up at the Arrow
Transfer Company dock on Vancouver’s False Creek, awaiting yet another relocation,
this time to the Pacific Great Eastern Railway. One of these spans went to Furry Creek
near Britannia Beach and the other to the Pine River crossing in the Peace River
District. (Photo by Bob Harris)
Page 18 - The Sandhouse

The 380-metre-long cable-stayed bridge that
opened in 2009 is currently configured with
seven road lanes -- four eastbound and three
westbound – plus a bicycle and pedestrian lane
on the north side.
But as the government’s news release stated
when the structure opened: “the bridge is engineered to accept light rail transit at a later date.”
Perhaps there will be yet another metamorphosis
in the Pitt’s crossings, with rails coming to the
road bridge this time.

Another truss span from the 1907 Pitt River railway bridge found a new home on the
PGE after its days as part of the 1915 road bridge were over. After five years in storage
at Squamish, it was installed over the nearby Mamquam River in 1962. Following flood
damage in 1976, the truss span was flanked by eight pre-stressed concrete box girders,
as seen here on September 2, 2006, with a CN hi-rail pickup truck making a northbound
track patrol ahead of a train. (Photo by Ian Smith)
Spring 2020 - Page 19

REFERENCE

SOURCES

“Steel Bridge”, British Columbian, April 29, 1907, p. 1
“Pitt River Bridge Contract Awarded”, Daily Province, September 7, 1912, p. 34
“Bridge Plans are Changed”, British Columbian, September 28, 1912, p. 1.
“Plans Ready for Pitt River Bridge”, Daily Province, October 1, 1912, p. 20.
“Two Million for Perfect Pitt Navigation”, Daily Province, January 27, 1913, p. 1.
“Rapid Progress on Double Track Bridge”, British Columbian, February 21, 1913, p. 2.
“Start on Bridge over Pitt River”, Daily Province, February 28, 1913, p. 1.
“Pitt River Bridge Work”, British Columbian, July 10, 1913, p. 1.
“Building Pitt River Bridge is Work of Magnitude”, Daily Province, July 15, 1913, p. 14.
“Government Will Use Superstructure”, British Columbian July 19, 1913, p. 7.
“First Step in Bridge Project”, British Columbian, August 23,1913, p. 2.
“Moving Spans of Old Bridge”, British Columbian, April 20, 1914, p. 8.
“Tenders Called on $700,000 Bridge over Pitt”, Daily Province, May 5,1914, p. 1.
“Old Pitt Bridge is a Thing of the Past”, British Columbian, May 7, 1914, p. 2.
“Vancouver Firm to Build Bridge”, Daily Province, May 28, 1914, p. 1.
“Pitt Bridge Contract Let”, British Columbian, May 29, 1914, p. 1.
“Big Bridge is Nearly Ready”, British Columbian, September 21, 1914, p. 7.
“New Bridge now in Use”, British Columbian, September 28, 1914, p. 8.
“Swing Span is put in Place”, British Columbian, February 13,1915, p. 1.
“New Bridge Completed”, Daily Province, March 5, 1915, p. 5.
“Contract Let for New Pitt River Bridge”, The Columbian, November 30, 1955, p. 1.
“New Pitt River Bridge to End Traffic Bottleneck”, The Province, February 21,1956, p. 19.
“Two Lanes Opened on Pitt Bridge”, The Columbian, October 10, 1957, p. 1.

Page 20 - The Sandhouse

The low vertical clearance of the 1914 double-track bridge means the swing-span has to open for
river vessels that could clear the upstream highway bridges. Above, on September 28, 1974, the
span has opened for a tug and oil barge bound for Pitt Lake. (Photo by Barrie Sanford)
In its first four decades of existence, the 1914 bridge would have been traversed by steam
locomotives tens of thousands of times. Below, in a scene reminiscent of that era, restored Class
H1b Hudson 2816 leads an excursion train for employees eastward across the bridge on July 10,
2005, emerging from the swing-span in fine sunlight. (Photo by Ian Smith)

Spring 2020 - Page 21

CN suspends freight between
Williams Lake and Squamish
Canadian National has suspended through
freight service between Williams Lake and
Squamish service on the former BC Rail
mainline, bringing an end to the daily Trains
L570/L571 between Prince George and
Squamish.
The last train, southbound L570, reached
Squamish on April 7. The last northbound Train
L571 had departed a day earlier.
Since then there has been no through freight
service in the 273 miles between Williams Lake
(Mile 312.9) and Squamish (Mile 40.4), a
distance that represents most of the 345 miles of
the early Pacific Great Eastern Railway, which
had stretched from Squamish to the northern
terminus at Quesnel from 1921 until 1952.
CN cited the continued closure of industries
along the route as the reason for its decision.
In a statement sent to the mayor of Williams
Lake on March 31, a CN spokesman wrote:
"At times of diminished customer demand, as is
the case in the Williams Lake to Squamish
corridor, it is normal for CN to make changes to
our service. Over the last few years of global
market uncertainties, this corridor has been
impacted by curtailments and closures at our
customers’ facilities.
“Many of our customers’ employees have been
impacted, some to the point of job losses. On
the heels of another round of customer
curtailments and closures, it is no longer feasible
for CN to maintain the current service profile in
the area.

Page 22 - The Sandhouse

"Effective April 3-8, 2020, and in conjunction
with our employees’ change of card process, CN
will suspend train service between Williams
Lake and Squamish. The remaining customers
on this corridor will now see their traffic routed
via the Prince George-Kamloops-Vancouver
corridor. We advised all the affected customers
of this change in advance.
"This is not a decision we have taken lightly.
While we are sympathetic to the disruption of
this change on the lives of our employees,
particularly in the current environment, these
employees may have an opportunity to remain
with CN in other locations. Based on collective
bargaining agreements and depending on
employee seniority, they may elect to work at
other CN locations such as Quesnel, Williams
Lake, Prince George, and other locations in
Northern BC.”
Prior to the CN take-over in 2004, BC Rail ran
three trains daily between Prince George and
Squamish or North Vancouver. CN shifted the
traffic pattern to a single daily train as of
January 14, 2005, routing other traffic via
McBride and Kamloops. Although the
Kamloops route is some 150 miles longer and
involves an extra crew change, it has minimal
gradients, making train operation more fuelefficient than on the undulating BC Rail route,
which has grades as steep as 2.2% in various
places.
Interior sawmill operations – the main source of
freight traffic along the route -- have been
severely hit in recent years by factors such as
pine beetle devastation of the forests and
extensive wildfires, both of which reduce the
timber supply, while lumber prices in the major
U.S. market have been declining since 2018.

Impacts have ranged from reduced operations
with fewer shifts to outright closures.
The COVID-19 pandemic has been the last
straw for some, as the effects of the public
health crisis have dramatically slashed demand
for lumber in the U.S. housing construction
sector. Bloomberg News reported on April 20
that 25% of Canadian sawmill capacity had been
idled, citing West Fraser Timber and Canfor
among B.C. firms that had curtailed operations.
Interestingly, CN’s statement did not refer
specifically to the COVID-19 impact on its
lumber shippers, instead addressing the “last few
years of global market uncertainties.” This
could be interpreted to mean that CN has for
some time prepared for this suspension.

Certainly, there is little business left along the
line south of Exeter (100 Mile House), itself
some 53 miles south of Williams Lake at Mile
259.5.
Last September, West Fraser Timber
permanently closed its lumber mill at Chasm
(about Mile 213), owing to the dwindling local
timber supply.
Farther south, the Graymont lime plant, which
had once shipped product from a loading spur at
Pavilion (Mile 177.9), closed in 2017 after 43
years in operation. One factor was CN’s
decision not to handle this product on the BC
Rail line, requiring it to be trucked to Ashcroft
for transloading.

Three ES44AC units with CN 3847 leading powered the last run of Train L571 from
Squamish to Prince George on April 6, seen here crossing Haylmore Creek at MP 122.3
just south of D'Arcy. (Photo by Chris Wasney)

Spring 2020 - Page 23

The large Ainsworth Lumber mill at Lillooet
(Mile 157.6) once shipped product south by rail
to U.S. markets, but was closed and sold in
2009. Two years later it was re-opened by the
company that owns Savona Specialty Plywood,
and its entire output now consists of veneer that
is trucked 78 miles to Savona for use in making
concrete forms.

South of Lillooet, the line runs for more than 30
miles along Seton and Anderson lakes, without
any sources of freight traffic, and then passes its
next customer at Mount Currie (Mile 99.7).
Continental Pole ships utility poles by rail, but
its traffic is minimal, described as “one or two
cars every couple of months.” This is the only

remaining customer on the line in the 220 miles
between Exeter and Squamish.
Two locomotives ran north from Squamish on
April 30 with a train of just two empty bulkhead
flatcars to be spotted at Continental Pole.
From Mt. Currie it is nearly 60 miles to
Squamish, where the major customer is
Squamish Terminals, served by rail from North
Vancouver.
This, then, is the state of freight business for
well more than 200 miles of mainline.
Traffic from Exeter and points north will be
routed via Prince George (Mile 462.4), one
example being the copper concentrate shipped
by Taseko Mines Ltd. from Gibraltar (Mile

IC 2458/CN 8939 led the last Train L570 running all the way through from Prince
George to Squamish, passing Creekside siding on April 7 with a short train consisting
mainly of copper concentrate loads from Gibraltar Mine north of Williams Lake. This
location still sees regular train activity as the siding is being used for storing empty
cars. (Photo by Corwin Doeksen)
Page 24 - The Sandhouse

344.3) to Vancouver for overseas export. A
mine spokesman said there would be no change
in freight rates and noted the routing via
Kamloops was used during the wildfires of
2017.
Ironically, the very south end of the BC Rail line
has seen ramped up activity since the end of
through freight service from Prince George.

The daily North Vancouver-Squamish turn,
Train L546, has emerged from the shadows of
nocturnal operation to make its run in daytime,
departing North Van sometime after 14:00. And
on occasion trains have run several times per
day, as CN is now using the sidings along the
line for car storage.

All five sidings in the 65 miles north of
Squamish – Cheakamus, Garibaldi, McGuire,
Mons and Creekside – have been used to store
cars, along with Porteau and Brunswick to the
south. A 133-car train with a midtrain slave
locomotive ran from North Van on April 29.
Some trains have included long strings of
“baretable” empty container wellcars, a type not
ordinarily seen on the ex-BC Rail lines.

This does not appear to be long-term storage, as
sidings are filled and emptied regularly.
There was also a southbound move from Prince
George on May 18 to store baretable cars at
Lillooet, so most of the rails are still getting
polished occasionally. The train had originated
at Prince Rupert.

Container wellcars are a most unusual sight on the former BC Rail lines, but are now
being stored at various sidings north of Squamish following the suspension of through
freights. On April 26, this string of “baretables” is crossing Mamquam River Bridge at
Mile 41.4 southbound after being retrieved from Cheakamus siding. (Photo by Chris
Wasney)
Spring 2020 - Page 25

CN’s suspension comes at a time when Rocky
Mountaineer is not operating its weekly luxury
tourist trains between North Vancouver and
Jasper, owing to the pandemic.
The Kaoham Shuttle serving the native
community at Seton Portage with a daily roundtrip to Lillooet operated on a six-days-on, sixdays-off schedule in March owing to a staff
shortage, but it’s not known whether this has
since been curtailed in light of the pandemic.
But whether it’s Rocky Mountaineer or the
humble shuttle, CN does have contractual
obligations to provide access for these services.
CN’s public statements on the suspension do not
point to a firm conclusion about its long-range
intentions, particularly in light of these

passenger service obligations, which are
embedded in the “Revitalization Agreement”
between CN and the province that underpin the
take-over of BC Rail in 2004.
Under that agreement, now that five years have
passed since the take-over date, CN may
discontinue or sublet its operations on all or a
portion of the ex-BC Rail system, or assign the
lease to a third party. In no case will it receive a
refund of any part of the $150 million it paid for
the 90-year lease.
If it intends to discontinue (the official term for
“abandon”), it must follow the discontinuance
procedures set out in the Canada Transportation
Act, after first advising its landlord, the British
Columbia Railway Co. It has done exactly that
in the case of the northernmost 193 miles of the

Two empty bulkhead flatcars are the sole business of this train heading north near
McGuire on April 30, en route to a shipper at Mount Currie, the last freight customer
between Squamish and Exeter. (Photo by Sean Zwagerman)
Page 26 - The Sandhouse

Takla Subdivision, as reported in the Summer
2019 issue (p. 43).

Sean Zwagerman for observations and other
information.)

Such an intention would become public when
CN updates its Three-Year Rail Network Plan,
which federally-chartered railways are required
to publish, stating which sections of their
networks they intend to keep active or
discontinue. But that does not set a deadline –
Canadian Pacific listed the Arbutus Corridor
section of the Marpole Spur for discontinuance
in its three-year plans from 1999 through 2014,
suspending service in 2001, but did not dispose
of the line until 2016, when it was sold to the
City of Vancouver.
As the BC Rail rights-of-way are still owned by
the province, the matter of ownership would be
academic in this case. So, unlike CP in the
Arbutus case, CN has no opportunity to realize
money from selling the land, but could benefit
financially if it were relieved of the obligation to
maintain 200-plus miles of track.
That assumes, however, that CN would be able
to sidestep its obligations to offer access to
passenger train operators and to operate the
Kaoham Shuttle, both of which are clearly
spelled out in the Revitalization Agreement.
And official discontinuance would deprive CN
of a key diversionary route for freight traffic,
which was used as recently as February when
landslides blocked its Fraser Canyon line in late
January (see previous issue, pp. 33-34). A more
extreme example came in 1979-80 when the
Second Narrows Bridge was knocked out of
commission by a ship, and as many as five
trains to the North Shore terminals were diverted
via the BC Rail mainline every 48 hours (see
Autumn 2019 issue, p. 22).

The availability of such a diversionary route
might well be the deciding factor in CN’s plans
for the line’s future.
(Thanks to Corwin Doeksen, Brian Kelly,
Trevor Mills, Ken Storey, Chris Wasney and

Is this a prophetic sign on the backtrack at
D’Arcy? The second-to-last through running of
Train L571 passes on May 4. (Photo by Corwin
Doeksen)

Spring 2020 - Page 27

New prices set for revival
of Island rail services
New price-tags have been applied to reinstating
service on Vancouver Island’s Esquimalt &
Nanaimo Railway corridor, with the release on
April 28 of a consultant’s study commissioned
last year (see Spring 2019 issue, p. 45).
The study updates a similar investigation
conducted in 2009/10 and a specialized analysis
in 2012 that examined the condition of the
bridges on the Victoria Subdivision (see
Summer 2010 issue, pp. 29-30, and Summer
2012 issue, p. 41).
Since 2006, the E&N lines have been owned by
the Island Corridor Foundation, a non-profit
society whose members are the five regional
districts and 14 First Nations groups with
territories along the routes. ICF contracts with
Southern Railway of Vancouver Island to
operate the freight service.
Carried out by the consulting firm WSP Canada
Group Ltd. on behalf of the B.C. Ministry of
Transportation and Infrastructure (MoTI), the
research project assessed the condition of the
railway’s track, grade crossings, bridges and
rockfall activity, and estimated the costs of
upgrading the infrastructure to resume normal
rail freight and passenger service, and starting a
commuter service between Victoria and
Langford.
Summarizing their ratings on a scale of Good,
Fair and Poor, the consultants appraised the
condition of the 140-mile Victoria Subdivision
mainline between Victoria and Courtenay as
follows: roadbed and track, poor to fair; bridges,
poor to good; and grade crossings, fair. Their
overall rating of the line is poor to fair.
Condition of the 39-mile branch from Parksville
Page 28 - The Sandhouse

to Port Alberni was rated as poor.
The main track deficiencies are: uncontrolled
vegetation; an excessive number of decayed ties
(45% of total); and outdated rail hardware in the
form of single-shoulder tie plates (60% of total)
and angle joint bars, both of which impair
performance.
The consultants outlined three levels of track
rehabilitation that could be carried out in
separate stages to meet actual traffic
requirements as the need arises, calling these
Initial, Intermediate and Ultimate.
The Initial level involves restoring the track to
railway industry Class 2 standard, with
maximum track speeds of 25 mph for freight
and 30 mph for passenger trains.
Track upgrades would consist of replacing 55%
to 70% of defective ties, replacing shoulder
plates and anchors, adding ballast, and removing
vegetation. Other work would include turnout
upgrades, bridge rehabilitation, grade crossing
upgrades, and rockfall remediation.
On the Victoria Subdivision, this level of
rehabilitation would permit two to four
passenger trains per day and two to four 10-to20-car freight trains. It would not allow for
sustained use of freight cars loaded to a gross
weight of 286,000 lb., the current industry
standard.
With the line restored to Class 2 standard, a
passenger train could run from Victoria to
Courtenay in 5 hr., 11 min., which is 26 minutes
slower than the scheduled journey time when
VIA Rail service using Budd RDC trains was
suspended in 2011.

The cost of restoration to Class 2 standard is
estimated at up to $227 million (all figures
rounded and in 2020 dollars), including $126
million for construction, $14 million for
engineering, and a contingency of $58 million.
Other costs within the estimate are for project
management and First Nations consultation.
Cost to rehabilitate the Port Alberni Subdivision
to Class 2 standard is estimated at up to $99
million. That line last saw revenue traffic in
January 2002, with the final shipment from the
Port Alberni paper mill.
The Intermediate level of upgrading would bring
the line up to Class 3 standard, with track speeds
of 40 mph for freight and 60 mph for passenger
trains, and allow sustained use of freight cars
weighing 286,000 lb.

Work would include new and heavier rail (most
current rail is 85 lb./yd.), vegetation

maintenance, tie replacement, new rail joints,
additional ballast, and new turnouts.
At this level, the line could handle from four to
eight passenger trains daily and four 10-to-20car freight trains daily, carrying up to four
million tonnes per year (current freight loads
total just 110,000 tonnes per year).
Class 3 track would permit the VictoriaCourtenay passenger run to be made in 3 hr., 8
min., compared with the 4 hr., 45 min. in the
2011 timetable.
Upgrading to this level would add as much as
$178 million to the estimated maximum cost for
the initial level, including a $45-million
construction contingency.
For the Port Alberni Subdivision, the estimate of
additional spending for an upgrade to Class 3
ranges up to $47 million.

Island sees 1,200 freight cars annually
The state of rail freight traffic on Vancouver Island is summarized in WSP Canada Group’s recently
published report for MoTI.
About 1,200 railcars are shipped between the mainland and Island annually, landing at the barge slip
directly adjacent to the railway’s Wellcox Yard in Nanaimo. Commodities include animal feed, forest
products, aggregates, fertilizer and propane. But aside from propane, the cargoes are transloaded to or
from trucks at Wellcox.
Tank cars containing propane are hauled by Southern Railway of Vancouver Island (SVI) to Superior
Propane’s facility in the north end of Nanaimo, typically making two or three runs per week to deliver,
reposition or lift cars. Annual volume ranges from 250 to 300 cars.
SVI’s parent, Southern Railway of British Columbia, keeps two GP9 locomotives at Wellcox for
switching operations.
To put today’s freight volume into context, at the time of the 2009/10 consulting study, Southern
Railway estimated it would take 20,000 carloads a year to support a sustainable stand-alone freight
operation on the Island, and 30,000 carloads to recover the costs of rehabilitating the line to freightonly standards. CP hauled 7,900 carloads in 1997, when the Port Alberni paper mill still used rail.

Spring 2020 - Page 29

The Ultimate level of rehabilitation involves full
reballasting of the line, with new ballast and in
greater amounts than before. It assumes the two
earlier levels of upgrading have already been
carried out. The consultants recommend this be
considered when passenger traffic reaches or
exceeds eight trains daily or freight loads top
four million tonnes per year.
Estimates of additional cost beyond the
Intermediate upgrade range up to $143 million
for the Victoria Subdivision and $34 million for
the Port Alberni Subdivision.
Viewed in conjunction, then, the estimated cost
of upgrading the lines through all three stages
could be as much as $548 million for the
Victoria-Courtenay mainline and $180 million
for the Parksville-Port Alberni branch.

The most expensive option in the 2009/10 study
was to rehabilitate both subdivisions to allow for
more freight, three VIA trains daily and the
Victoria-Langford commuter service, at a cost of
$216 million (including upgrades of passenger
cars), plus up to $120 million on bridge repairs
and upgrades.
The E&N line is known for its numerous and
sometimes spectacular bridges, and these
received considerable attention from the
consultants.
The 48 bridges on the Victoria Subdivision
would require $4 million in immediate repairs to
restart passenger service. That figure balloons to
$19 million if the aim was to institute freight
service with 286,000-lb. cars, since the bridges
at Mile 39.3 (Cowichan River), 47.9
(Chemainus River) and 125.5 (Tsable River)

This view looking south at Nanaimo’s Wellcox Yard on May 6 captures much of the Island’s active rail scene. Both of SVI’s GP9 locomotives, Nos. SRY 110 and 128, are on
hand, as is caboose A5 and various maintenance-of-way equipment. At left is privatelyowned ex-VIA/CN cafe-lounge car 754. (Both photos by Robert D. Turner)
Page 30 - The Sandhouse

would require replacement.
The tall steel viaducts at Mile 14.0 (Niagara
Canyon) and 14.9 (Arbutus Canyon) would need
$118,000 and $98,000, respectively, in
immediate work to restart passenger service, and
the Niagara bridge would need another $300,000
immediately for freight service. In the long run,
full replacement costs for each would be $22
million and $13.75 million, respectively, at
current dollar values.
The consultants put the likelihood of having to
replace those bridges within 50 years at 70% for
Niagara and 40% for Arbutus.
As well as estimating costs to rehabilitate the
lines, the consultants also looked at passenger
train operations in the various scenarios.

With the basic Class 2 upgrade, they suggest
that the single daily VIA service be re-oriented
to start from Courtenay rather than the
traditional northbound run from Victoria, which
was criticized for not offering any form of
commuter service into the Island’s largest city.
This suggestion comes with the trade-off that the
Courtenay departure time would be 03:00, so as
to allow for commuting from Nanaimo and
Duncan into Victoria, with an arrival time of
08:28, allowing for a 15-minute contingency
stop at Duncan. The northbound departure from
Victoria would be at 17:00.
The upgrade to Class 3 track standard would
shave some two hours off that journey time,
allowing for a later start from Courtenay and an
earlier evening arrival there.

Animal feed is transloaded from railcars to a truck hopper-trailer at Wellcox Yard on
May 6. The shipment is en route to Top Shelf Feeds at Koksilah near Duncan, which
received such cargoes by rail until service was suspended in late 2014 owing to unsafe
track conditions.
Spring 2020 - Page 31

There would be six intermediate stations, at
Qualicum
Beach,
Parksville,
Nanaimo,
Ladysmith, Duncan and Shawnigan Lake.
Drawing from two data sources, the consultants
forecast that the passenger service on Class 2
track would attract 497 riders per train, with 574
using the faster service on Class 3 track. That
compares with an average of 110 per train
(40,000 per year) at the time of the 2009/10
study.
A key aspect of the consulting firm’s
commission was to analyze the requirements to
rehabilitate the line for commuter rail service
between Victoria and Westhills in the
Goldstream area of suburban Langford.
The result was a recommendation to rebuild that
section to the “ultimate” level and add four local
stations, at Westhills (10.06 miles from
Victoria), Langford (7.9), Six Mile (5.5) and
Admirals (2.6).
A new Victoria station could be located about
120 metres west of the replacement Johnson
Street Bridge, which was opened in 2018
without provision for a railway connection into
the city’s downtown business district. (The line
across the old bridge reached a VIA Rail station
on the downtown side, which has since been
dismantled and relocated).
Total journey time would be 28 minutes. In the
morning, three commuter-only trains would run
ahead of the train from Courtenay, which would
also serve the commuter stops. In the afternoon,
the process would be reversed, with the 17:00
departure for Courtenay providing the first
commuter service, followed by three commuteronly trains.
At start-up, an average of 119 commuter
passengers per train in the morning is forecast.

Page 32 - The Sandhouse

The consultants put the cost of the commuter
option at $595 million, net of any spending to
upgrade that section of the line as part of a
mainline rehabilitation project. Some of the
major expenses would be for stations ($27
million), a maintenance depot ($60 million),
property acquisition ($44 million), signalling
($26 million), and rolling stock ($38 million).
The estimate includes a substantial contingency
amount of $255 million.
The findings of the consultant’s report will be
considered
in
MoTI’s
South
Island
Transportation Strategy, looking at all modes of
transportation across southern Vancouver Island.
The strategy is expected to be released in June.

SHORT HAULS
The Events of Today are the History of Tomorrow
In the past decade, the structure had been used
for storage, including flammable materials.
(National Post/northernview.com)

Two Union Pacific locomotives powered a
train on the Squamish Subdivision on May 1.

CN has returned 25 leased ES44AC units
to their owner, CitiCorp. These were numbered
CREX 1501-1525. (Branchline)

UP 3885-7910 (SD70M and ES44AC) left
North Vancouver with 81 cars, mostly
centrebeam flatcars, and set out 74 at Brunswick
siding for storage, before continuing to
Squamish, and then taking 80 cars north to
Garibaldi. (Chris Wasney/Trevor Mills)

Eight ex-BC Rail locomotives have been
retired by CN.

C40-8Mu units BCOL 4606/10/13/14/15/16/
21/24 are the first to leave the roster, out of the
26 acquired by CN in the take-over of BC Rail
in 2004. Built in 1990 or 1994 as follow-ons to
CN orders, they were later upgraded to Dash 9
specifications, including boosting the output of
their diesel engines to 4,400 hp from 4,000.
CN has also retired some of its own original 55
locomotives of this type, but these were never
upgraded. Class leader CN 2400 and 18 others
have left the roster.
With these retirements, CN has 32 ex-BC Rail
units on its roster. It acquired 109 locomotives
and 10 slugs in the 2004 take-over, at a cost of
$105 million. (Branchline/Editor)

Prince Rupert’s CN enginehouse was

destroyed by fire on March 1, in a blaze that
took 18 hours to extinguish. Police arrested a
juvenile male for arson on the day of the fire.

UP 3885-7910 are seen from the 26th Street
footbridge in West Vancouver at Mile 5.2 of the
Squamish Subdivision, working north with Train
L546 to Squamish on May 1. (Photo by Chris
Wasney)
Spring 2020 - Page 33

on the Westminster Subdivision in Coquitlam.
This will add capacity for staging 8,500-ft. trains
destined for the North Shore via transfer to CN
at Sapperton.

CP’s newly rebuilt SD70ACU units have

been restricted from operating west of Calgary,
while various electrical issues are sorted out.
Concentrating them at operating bases at
Winnipeg and St. Paul, Minn., will enable the
remanufacturer’s engineering staff to keep a
close watch for problems.
The first such unit, CP 7000, made its first
appearance in the Vancouver area on August 26
last year, and the last to be seen was CP 7011
departing for Calgary in mixed freight Train 400
on May 13.

CP 7011 is one of 10 locomotives painted in a
maroon-and-grey heritage livery (7010-7019)
and CP 7020-7024 and 6644 are painted in
military tribute designs (see Autumn 2019 issue,
pp. 6-15).
As of the press date, CP had received 51 of the
60 locomotives being rebuilt to SD70ACU
specifications by Progress Rail Services at
Mayfield, Kentucky.

CP has bought six SD80MAC units from
Norfolk Southern to serve as parts sources for
the remanufactured SD70ACU locomotives in
its fleet.

Numbered NS 7206, 7215, 7218, 7225, 7226
and 7227, these 5,000-hp locomotives are a
unique type acquired only by Conrail in 199596. When Conrail was split up and sold to NS
and CSX in 1999, the 30 units of this type (CR
4100-4129) were allocated between the two
railways, with NS getting 18. (Conrail
Cyclopedia)

A third yard track is being added in the

interchange yard between Booth and Sapperton
Page 34 - The Sandhouse

The current layout consists of a mainline track
and two yard tracks on its north side, plus the
Fraser Mills Passing Track on the south side,
which once provided access to several locations
within the former Fraser Mills complex.
The new track is being built on the alignment of
the passing track.
The northernmost yard track, designated Track
2, was extended in 2012 by some 3,000 ft. to
match the 8,000-ft. length of Track 1 on its
south side. That extension was made possible
by the replacement of the King Edward Avenue
grade crossing with an overpass (see Autumn
2012 issue, pp. 24-25). (Dan Brewster/Editor)

CP set an all-time monthly record for

grain hauling in April, moving 2.8 million
tonnes, topping its previous high-mark set in
November 2019 by more than 100,000 tonnes.
That came after a record first quarter, in which
CP hauled 6.35 million tonnes of Canadian
grain. (CP)

An ex-CN/VIA diner has joined CP’s
business car fleet.

Now numbered CP 89, the car was purchased
from the National Railway Historical Society,
BC Chapter, which disposed of its large
collection of heritage passenger cars last year
(see Spring 2019 issue, pp. 52-53, and Autumn
2019 issue, p. 48).
It was built by Pullman-Standard in 1954 as CN
1347, and carried that number during its life
with VIA from 1978 to 1995, when it was
acquired by NRHS-BC. (Branchline)

Fire-damaged locomotive CP 5014

returned to service in April, some two years

after it was heavily damaged in a blaze at Port
Coquitlam Yard on January 22, 2018.
The SD30C-ECO unit collided with a tanker
truck full of ethanol at a crossing in the yard,
with its nose stuck between the two trailers
hauled by the truck (see Winter 2017/18 issue,
pp. 40-41).
Three months after the incident, CP 5014 was
sent to Progress Rail in Tacoma for repairs, after
being shipped to Calgary for an assessment of
its damage.

CP said it would acquire up to 5,900 new highcapacity hoppers over four years, and to date has
added more than 2,500. CN said it would purchase 1,000 hoppers of the same type, built by
National Steel Car of Hamilton.
In both cases, the railways squeaked barely under the wire to stay within their MREs for 20182019.

CN earned $933,357,710 from hauling Canadian
grain, just $371,116 below its MRE. CP brought
in $862,734,965, which was $764,101 below its
MRE.
Under the Canada Transportation Act, the agency sets an MRE for each railway for a specific
crop year (August 1-July 31), and at the end of
the year it determines whether the maximum has
been exceeded. This functions as a form of rate
protection for western farmers.

Rail Industry
CN and CP did not exceed their “maximum
revenue entitlements” for western grain shipments during the 2018-2019 crop year, according to a ruling by the Canadian Transportation
Agency.

This marks the first time in a decade that neither
railway exceeded the MRE cap, even though
they hauled 13.4% more grain than in the previous crop year, amounting to 46,060,737 tonnes.
That is the result of a change in the MRE calculation formula as of the 2018-2019 year that
gave the railways an incentive to make capital
investments that boost their grain-hauling capacity. The change was introduced in the overhaul
of the Canada Transportation Act that took effect in 2018.
The railways responded quickly with a pledge to
upgrade and expand their grain-hauling fleets.

The railways are required to pay the amounts
above the maximum, plus a 5% or 15% penalty,
to the Western Grains Research Foundation,
which funds research that benefits Prairie farmers.
For example, in the 2017-2018 crop year, CN
exceeded its MRE by $1,047,285 and therefore
paid $1,099,649 to the foundation, while CP was
$1,500,513 over the MRE limit and paid
$1,575,539.
In total, the railways have paid $106 million to
the foundation since 2000, when the MRE process was established.
The agency describes the MRE “as a limit to the
average revenue per tonne, for a given length of
haul that CN and CP can earn, adjusted for the
level of inflation of railway input prices.” It
replaced a system of maximum freight rates
dating back to 1983 when the Western Grain
Transportation Act superseded the 1897 Crows
Nest Pass Agreement. (CTA)

Spring 2020 - Page 35

from March 13 onward owing to the risk of infection by the virus. By that date, 176 people in
Canada had been infected, 53 of them in B.C.,
and there had been one death.

White Pass & Yukon Route
Four MLW diesel locomotives have been
sold by White Pass & Yukon Route to the
Durango & Silverton tourist railway in
Colorado.

Two of the WPYR’s unique RSD-35
locomotives were loaded in to a barge at
Skagway on April 11 for their voyage
southward. Numbered 101 and 107, they were
built in Montreal in 1969 and later were among
a group of five units of this type sold to a
Colombian railway in 1992, then reacquired in
1999. No. 101 received a Cummins QSK45L
diesel engine in 2015, but No. 107 retains its
Alco 6-251D engine.
A further two locomotives will be selected later
by Durango & Silverton and shipped to
Colorado in 2021.
Prior to the sale, WP&YR had eight MLW units
of this type, plus a single wide-cab version built
by Bombardier in 1982. (Trains NewsWire/
Canadian Trackside Guide)

Of those cases, 75% involved travellers and another 10% were close contacts of travellers.
The initial suspension of the Toronto-Vancouver
Canadian and Montreal-Halifax Ocean was for
two weeks through March 27, but within days
that was extended to May 1 inclusive. On April
6, that was further extended to June 1, and on
May 6 VIA announced that suspension of both
services would continue through November 1.
By then, there had been 63,367 confirmed cases
across Canada and 4,223 people had died.
When the suspensions began, the Canadian had
only just returned to service after three weeks of
cancellations owing to blockades by natives (see
item pp. 38-39). Only two eastbound and three
westbound trains ran during the nine days between the two prolonged closures. The last arrival at Vancouver was on March 15.
Two days after the initial long-distance suspensions, VIA announced it was cutting service by
50% in the Quebec City-Windsor corridor for
the same period and reducing meal and snack
service on the remaining trains.
As of March 31, corridor service was reduced
further to one train daily in each direction between Toronto-Montreal, Toronto-Ottawa, Quebec-Ottawa-Fallowfield, and Toronto-Windsor.
That is set to continue until June 18. (VIA)

VIA’s stainless-steel fleet is undergoing rig-

VIA has cancelled the Canadian “at least”

through November 1, as the COVID-19 pandemic continues. The discovery of structural
problems in the car fleet is also a factor in the
lengthy and indefinite suspension (see next
item).
Long-distance services were initially suspended
Page 36 - The Sandhouse

orous inspections after “new structural issues”
were uncovered during a program to modernize
42 coaches.
In a message to employees on May 6, VIA’s
chief executive, Cynthia Garneau, said:

“Regrettably, in recent weeks, rigorous inspections have revealed new structural issues in
some of these cars, which have travelled many
kilometres since they were built. These unfortunate setbacks mean that we need to scale up the
inspection program and quickly carry out structural repairs on a greater number of cars than
originally planned.”
Garneau noted that, as a result of the COVIDrelated service suspensions, “a reduced number
of HEP cars are currently in service. This will
allow our maintenance centre teams in Montréal,
Toronto, Winnipeg and Vancouver to focus and
complete the required inspection and repair
work . . . so that the upgraded cars can be reintegrated into the network as soon as possible and
so that we can be ready in time for the 2021
peak season.”

While the May 6 public news release on the
structural and COVID issues cited the service
suspension lasting until November 1, the employee memo is more explicit, with Garneau
saying: “ . . . we are extending the suspension of
the Canadian and Ocean operations at least
until next November. Until then, and depending
on the results of our inspections, we will evaluate our options to offer a reduced service starting in November 2020.” [emphasis added]
The $100-million modernization program that
began in 2018 involves 17 coaches originally
used by U.S. railways, which are being rebuilt to
provide full accessibility for disabled passengers, and 25 coaches from the 1954-55 build for
CP (see Spring 2018 issue, pp. 42-43). Both
types are classed as HEP-I, having been converted to head-end power in 1990-94.

However, Garneau’s statement implies that the

Observation-dome car Glacier Park brings up the rear of VIA Train 12 at the west portal of Yale Tunnel No. 4 on the CP Cascade Subdivision, on May 15. That’s right, Train
12, not the Canadian. It’s a transfer of stainless-steel cars from Vancouver to Toronto
for inspection work. (Photo by Corwin Doeksen)
Spring 2020 - Page 37

inspections could involve the entire HEP-I stainless-steel fleet, which includes 69 sleeping cars,
13 dining cars, 15 Skyline dome cars, 14 Parkclass observation-dome cars, and 18 baggage
cars, as well as the coaches undergoing modernization. Altogether, the HEP-I fleet comprises
171 cars.

gam that included five dining cars, three regular
Manor-series sleepers, three Prestige-class Chateau sleepers, one coach and a baggage car, all
intermingled (photos, p. 4 and 37).

VIA owns another 10 club-galley cars and 23
coaches in the HEP-II category, all purchased
from U.S. operators and converted to head-end
power in 1995-96. It is not clear whether these
cars are implicated in the announcement of
structural issues. (VIA/Canadian Trackside
Guide 2020)

The move might have been made to distribute
the equipment among VIA’s maintenance centres for inspections related to the structural issues with these cars, as noted above. (Corwin
Doeksen/Tim Stevens)

VIA Trains 5/6 have been cancelled until

July, owing to the COVID-19 outbreak and what
VIA describes as “continued infrastructure issues” as CN makes track upgrades.
As the Jasper-Prince Rupert service was also
affected by native blockades along the route (see
item below), it appears that the last westward
run was made from Jasper to Prince George on
February 12, with the train turning around at that
midpoint and returning to Jasper the next day.
There were no VIA trains between Prince
George and Prince Rupert on those days, with
the last train from Prince Rupert having departed
on February 7. (Tom Box/Tim Stevens)

With the western trains sidelined, VIA ran
a 20-car deadhead train across the country to its
Toronto Maintenance Centre in mid-May.
F40PH-2D locomotives 6453-6456 departed
Vancouver on May 15 with 14 stainless-steel
cars from the Canadian’s fleet, and picked up
locomotive 6459 and six more cars at Jasper the
next day, the latter representing two three-car
consists from Trains 5/6.
With a Park-series observation-dome car at the
rear when leaving Vancouver, the train looked
like a proper Canadian at first glance, but on
closer inspection was formed of an odd amalPage 38 - The Sandhouse

The deadhead train ran as VIA Train 12, but was
numbered P01251 15 in CN’s system.

Disruptions from native blockades in various parts of the country saw the Canadian and
other VIA services cancelled from February 13
into early March.
As reported in the previous edition, the eastbound Canadian was annulled at Portage la
Prairie, Man., on February 12, after leaving
Vancouver on February 10 (not on the 11th, as
incorrectly reported).
The westbound Canadian that had departed Toronto on February 12 only made it as far as Winnipeg.
Following that, six eastbound departures from
Vancouver were cancelled from February 14
through March 2. Five westbound departures
from Toronto were cancelled from February 16
through March 1.
Service on the Canadian resumed with Train
No. 1 leaving Toronto on March 4 and No. 2
departing Vancouver on March 6.
The latter was the annual Moonlighters’ train,
heavily booked by current and retired American
and Canadian railway managers making the pilgrimage during a full moon (see Spring 2019
issue, p. 46). Once again accorded priority treatment, the 20-car train reached Toronto 47
minutes ahead of schedule on March 10.
Those Moonlighters making the turnaround

westbound trip from Toronto on March 11 weren’t as lucky with that train’s performance, as it
departed some three hours late and arrived at
Vancouver almost 12 hours late on March 15,
owing mainly to equipment failure (its defective
baggage car had to be switched out and marshalled behind the Park observation car).
They were lucky in one sense through – their
train was the last to leave Toronto before VIA
cancelled all of its services effective March 13
owing to the growing risks posed by the COVID
-19 virus.
Altogether, the blockades across the country by
militant natives and their supporters played havoc with VIA services. VIA reported on February
28 that 940 trains had been cancelled, affecting
164,000 intended passengers. Services gradually
resumed starting March 3.
At one point, some 1,000 VIA employees had
been laid off.
The only routes not affected were the SudburyWhite River train in northern Ontario and the
service between The Pas and Churchill in northern Manitoba. Neither of those services run on
CN tracks, which were the target of most protests. (VIA)

Amtrak suspended service to Vancouver
on March 16, citing the closure of Pacific Central Station owing to the threat of COVID-19
infection.

A statement on Amtrak’s website, posted at
15:00 that day, said: “Pacific Central Station in
Vancouver, BC is closed. As a result, Amtrak
Cascades service north of Seattle is suspended
until further notice. Daily thruway bus service
between Seattle, Everett, Mt. Vernon and Bellingham will still operate."
In fact, Pacific Central was not closed at that
point. Although service on VIA’s Canadian was
suspended as of March 13 (the last arrival was
on March 15), bus services from the station were
still operating, run by Wilson’s Transportation
and Ebus; both were later suspended.
Amtrak service remains suspended.

Trains through July 31 were cancelled
owing to the COVID-19 pandemic that had
broken out before the season began.

Rocky Mountaineer announced the cancellation
of April trains on March 17, acknowledging that
the delay to opening the season could
“potentially be longer.” But on March 30,
cancellation to the end of June took effect, and
on May 14 that was extended to July 31.
The season was to have opened with trains from
Vancouver to Banff/Lake Louise and Jasper on
April 13 and 14, respectively, and from North
Vancouver to Jasper via Quesnel on April 25.
Spring 2020 - Page 39

Those whose departures were cancelled will
receive a credit valued at 110% of the original
booking price to be used for travel by the end of
2022 season, but cash refunds were not offered.

WCE said the sharp drop in ridership would be
balanced with the need to maintain “social distancing”, so all other trains would remain on
their regular schedules for the time being.

In early April, the company said it had laid off
or reduced hours for half of its 300 year-round
staff, the majority in Vancouver, but about 60 in
Kamloops as well. Hiring of about 450 seasonal
staff had been postponed. (Rocky Mountaineer/
Vancouver Sun)

With the first frequency reduction, a 10-car consist was removed from service. The four remaining trains had consists of four, eight, nine and 10
cars, respectively, for a total of 31, with a seating capacity of about 4,550.

The last of 10 German-built bilevel cars

for Gold Leaf service was delivered in
December, completing an order placed in 2015.
The first car was delivered in June 2018 (see
Summer 2018 issue, pp. 46-48). The 10 cars are
odd-numbered RMRX 9541 through 9559.

Rocky Mountaineer has 16 older bilevel cars
built by other manufacturers from 1995 through
2007. (Rocky Mountaineer/Canadian Trackside
Guide 2019)

The reduced ridership amounted to about 1,100
passengers in each direction, allowing for about
25% occupancy of the cars to provide for social
distancing. Trains were also being disinfected
during their cleaning every evening.
Then, as of April 8, the fourth morning departure (at 06:55) and fourth afternoon departure (at
17:30) were also cancelled. As a result, there
would be a one-hour interval between each of
the three remaining morning trains. In the afternoon, the gap would be one hour between the
first two departures and then 90 minutes until
the final train.
This reduction saw the 10-car consist of Trains
W4/E4 withdrawn, reducing the active fleet to
21 cars in three sets, with a seating capacity of
about 3,100. These were formed into consists of
eight, seven and six cars, working the 15:50
(E1), 16:50 (E3) and 18:20 (E5) homeward runs,
respectively.

COVID-19’s impact on ridership resulted in
service being reduced in several stages.
Capacity was cut to four trains in each direction
as of March 26 and then three trains as of April
8, which were then shortened on April 22, with
only eight cars operating in total.
Starting March 26, the second morning departure from Mission City (at 05:55) and the second
afternoon departure from Waterfront (at 16:20)
were cancelled, as ridership had plunged by
80% from normal levels.

Page 40 - The Sandhouse

The consist rebalancing had taken place on April
7, with the nine-car set used for E3 giving up
two of its cars, which were added to the four-car
set used for train E5. An eight-car consist remained in service.
April 22 saw those three consists reduced to a
mere eight cars altogether, as TransLink embarked on a wide range of service cuts to all
modes of transit, as ridership and revenues
plunged (see item in SkyTrain section).

That day, Train E1 ran with just two cars (down
from eight), E3 had three cars (cut from seven),
and E5 also had three cars (rather than six). On
the following day, the two-car consist was
switched to trains E5 and W5, with E1 getting a
three-car set.
The three trains had a combined capacity of
about 1,160 seats. Assuming the same ratio of
four seats to one passenger that was applied earlier, this implies that fewer than 300 people were
riding the trains. Under normal circumstances,
about 5,000 ride WCE trains daily.
The use of a two-car train has only one precedent in WCE’s history, dating back to 1999. On
January 14 that year, westbound train W1 consisting of three cars leased from Miami Tri-Rail
hit a small mudslide along Burrard Inlet and
derailed. The truck of the leading cab car was

damaged, resulting in that train running with just
two cars for the ensuing two weeks, as the Miami and WCE cars were not compatible to be
operated together. (TransLink/Editor)

A native protest blockade at Haney on

February 24 caused the cancellation of the afternoon’s homeward runs.
Protestors with awnings and camping chairs set
up a blockade at about 16:00 on a private crossing at Mile 102.5, just east of Port Haney Station, which brought freight traffic to a halt. All
five WCE trains were annulled at Waterfront.
By 18:45, police had dispersed the protestors
and trains began running, with four eastbound
freights passing in the next 75 minutes. Then, all
five WCE trains ran eastbound in a fleet to Mission City, deadheading empty in the correct sequence of their usual departures.

F59PHI locomotive WCE 902 hustles homeward with a two-car Train E5 at MP 100.4
of the CP Cascade Subdivision at Albion on April 23, the second day of shortened
consists owing to the COVID-19 ridership drop. (Photo by Ian Smith)
Spring 2020 - Page 41

The five trains passed Albion east of Haney in a
35-minute window from about 20:25 to 21:00,
averaging nine minutes apart.
That afternoon’s passengers had been advised to
take SkyTrain to Coquitlam Central. A bus
bridge had been organized to take them to stations from Port Coquitlam to Mission City.
Later that day, CP obtained an injunction from
the B.C. Supreme Court against any similar future action anywhere in B.C. Among other
things, the injunction forbids any protest action
within 50 ft. of either side of CP tracks.
(TransLink/Editor/Maple Ridge News)

VIA 6426 was pressed into service on West
Coast Express for several days in early March,
presumably because WCE was unable to provide its own spare locomotive.

The F40PH-2D unit was assigned to the four-car
consist that normally forms the first morning
and last afternoon train, and was seen on those
trains from the March 3 afternoon run to the
March 5 morning trip. (Editor)

As of April 22, Expo Line capacity was reduced
by a further 20% during peak hours and the Millennium Line saw an extra 15% cut in that period. On both lines, capacity was cut by 20% to
40% during middays, early evenings, and weekends.
In both cases, those cuts were in addition to a
17% drop during peak hours and a 20% reduction on Friday and Saturday evenings that had
been instituted in March.
Announcing the later cuts on April 20,
TransLink said that with current passenger
loads, it should be possible for riders to maintain
the “social distancing” required by the public
health authorities, but advised them to wait for
another train if they felt such distance could not
be achieved.

In that announcement, TransLink said it was
losing $75 million per month, with ridership
down by 83%, while still providing transit services for essential workers.
Bus fares had been eliminated in March to avoid
close contact between riders and drivers, with
only the rear doors used for boarding and alighting. By way of signs placed on seats, seating
capacity was reduced to provide added space
between passengers.
As of April 24, service on 12 bus routes and six
night bus routes was suspended, to be followed
by another 47 routes in May, along with frequency reductions on many other routes. But
when the time came, 41 route suspensions slated
for May 18 did not take place, as the first easing
of COVID restrictions took effect.

SkyTrain service was reduced in stages as
the impact of the COVID-19 virus greatly
changed commuting and social travel patterns,
and severely cut into TransLink’s revenue
sources.
Page 42 - The Sandhouse

TransLink was also losing money as gasoline
and parking tax revenues had dropped, as car
use plunged with many people staying home
from work indefinitely.
In conjunction with the service cuts, TransLink
said it was laying off 1,492 employees in
SkyTrain, SeaBus and bus operations, and head-

quarters functions, and senior executive staff
was taking a 10% salary cut. But with the cancellation of the May 18 reductions, the layoff
notices were withdrawn.
Starting May 14, more full-length trains were
gradually added on the Expo Line. On May 19,
service was restored to 90% of pre-pandemic
levels by increasing frequency during peak periods, middays, and early evenings.
TransLink said Expo and Millennium Line service would be operating at 100% of prepandemic levels by May 25. (TransLink)

Port News
Roberts Bank Superport has reached the halfcentury mark.
The first test train of coal hauled by CP Rail
from southeastern B.C. reached the new port on
April 30, 1970, an event soon followed by the
departure of the first ship, MV Snow White,
sailing for Japan with a load of 24,289 tonnes.
The grand opening took place on June 15,
attended by both Prime Minister Pierre E.
Trudeau and B.C. Premier W.A.C. Bennett,
representing the governments that had poured
large sums of money into the project.
Deltaport container terminal was added in 1997,
as the “pod” of land at the end of the 2.5-mile
causeway had been expanded to four times its
original size in a 1983-84 project in anticipation
of the port’s future growth.

peak hours in March, as the Canada Line’s operator adjusted to lower ridership resulting from
the COVID-19 impact on both commuting to
work and trips to and from the airport.

A brief story of Roberts Bank’s growth was told
in the Spring 2010 issue (pp. 22-23) on the
occasion of the 40th anniversary. A feature in
the next issue will look at the multiple
expansions of the railway layout at the “Bank”
over the past 50 years.

The cut was not intensified when SkyTrain service on the Expo and Millennium Lines was
further reduced as of April 22.

Neptune Terminals will not ship coal for a

Service capacity was cut by 18% during

As of press time, service was operating at 92%
of normal levels, with 18 trips per hour during
peak periods. (TransLink)

five-month period starting in May, while work
to complete the capacity expansion is
accelerated.

Teck Resources, a co-owner of Neptune, needs
that expansion to be completed by March 31,
2021, the expiry date of its 10-year shipping
contract with Westshore Terminals at Roberts
Bank (see previous issue, pp. 6-13). Teck
slowed its coal production in the run-up to the
temporary shutdown of Neptune. (Teck
Resources)

Spring 2020 - Page 43

British Rail diesel multiple unit 142049 takes a rest at Abbotsford on July 30, 1986,
after a run from New Westminster over BC Hydro Rail tracks. (Photo by Ron Keillor)
Below, near 21 years to the day later on July 28, 2007, the unit was spotted at
Manchester Piccadilly station, now in a yellow-and-white livery and operated by
private company Northern Rail. It wore no commemorative sign or plaque to
recognize its stint in Canada. (Photo by Ian Smith)

Page 44 - The Sandhouse

Overseas
The British Pacer “railbus” that visited Expo
86 was scrapped in January, as that type of vehicle nears its end of service owing to lack of facilities for disabled passengers, which are now
required by regulation.
Fresh from the factory, the two-car unit numbered 142049 spent several months in Canada in
1986, which included a test run between North
Vancouver and Squamish on BC Rail.
That railway’s shops added some equipment
essential for operation in Canada, including air
horns, a bell (in the form of a fire alarm) and
two-way radios in each cab.
Its main purpose was to provide a non-stop
demonstration service between New Westminster and Abbotsford on BC Hydro Rail tracks,
which operated from June 25 to August 10,
making three round-trips daily (see Summer
2006 issue, pp. 23-28).
For the record, 142049 met its demise on January 28 at the EMR (European Metal Recycling)
scrapyard at Kingsbury in the West Midlands.
(Editor)

Preservation
Ex-CP wide-vision caboose 434371 will be
returning to Vancouver Island after donation to
the CHRA’s E&N Division.

This means the caboose has come full circle in
the past 20 years, as it had been restored and
painted by the Division in 1999 while in the
ownership of RailAmerica, which operated the
Esquimalt & Nanaimo lines from 1999 through
2006.
RailAmerica had sent it off-Island in 2002 for

service on one of its Alberta shortlines, the Mackenzie Northern Railway, and it eventually ended up on the Alberta Prairie Railway tourist operation at Stettler.
The APR decided last year to donate the caboose to the E&N Division, which will once
again restore and repaint it. At press-time, the
caboose had yet to be shipped from Alberta
(photo, p. 50). (Canadian Rail/Jim Sturgill, Jr.)

Obituary
Harry Home, the driving force behind the

restoration of CNR locomotive 6060, passed
away on March 30 at the age of 86, in Jasper,
Alta.
A CN engineer by trade, Home was instrumental
in seeing the U-1-f class 4-8-4 locomotive restored at Jasper in time to play a starring role at
SteamExpo in Vancouver in 1986, running under its own power to reach the event on the second-to-last day.
After further work at BC Rail’s North Vancouver steam shop over the next two years, and two
guest doubleheader trips on the Royal Hudson
excursion in May 1988, No. 6060 made a triumphant return to Jasper in October that year on a
multi-day mainline special, doubleheading with
ex-CPR 2860.
After a 49-year career with CN that started at
Boston Bar, Home retired in 1998 but remained
active in railway preservation as a co-founder of
the Rocky Mountain Rail Society, which took
ownership of No. 6060 from the Alberta government in 1992. He was inducted into the Canadian Railway Hall of Fame in 2002. (Phil Mason/
The Jasper Fitzhugh)

Spring 2020 - Page 45

Index of SANDHOUSE features:
2016-2019 (Issues 161-176)
The following index lists all the feature content in Issues 161 (Spring 2016) to 176 (Winter 2019/20).
Not included are the usual sections at the front and the Short Hauls current news items. In most cases
the listings are the article headlines, sometimes with additional wording for clarity of reference.

Previous indices can be found in the Spring 2007 issue (covering issues 101-124, March 2001 to
Winter 2006/07); the Summer 2013 issue (covering issues 125-148, Spring 2007 to Winter 2012/13)
and the Spring 2016 issue (covering issues 149-160, Spring 2013 to Winter 2015/16). Copies of most
issues are still available — please contact the Editor for information.
Spring 2016
B.C. Budd – the Rail Diesel Car on CPR’s Southern Mainline, pp. 14-26
Railway heritage circle tour makes a nice short break, pp. 27-35
Evergreen Line testing reaches Coquitlam terminus, pp. 36-38
The Sandhouse marks 40 years of publication, pp. 7-13
Summer 2016
B.C. Budd – the RDC on Canadian National, pp. 6-13
B.C. Budd – an All-Time Roster, pp. 14-16
B.C. Budd – RDCs in non-revenue work, pp. 17-21

Arbutus line gone in 40 days, pp. 22-35
Evergreen Line update, pp. 36-39
Autumn 2016
Evergreen Line opens, pp. 6-19
Sailing on the PGE’s Point Ellice, pp. 20-25
A visit to Gerry Wellburn’s private line, pp. 26-31

SkyTrain launches Mark III cars, pp. 32-36
Clay slopes above CN line constantly shifting, pp. 37-39
Winter 2016/17

Page 46 - The Sandhouse

How sand is housed: evolving practice at CP, pp. 6-13
Evergreen Extension stations continue bold design trend, pp. 14-33
TrainBus expanded West Coast Express service, pp. 34-44
Spring 2017
The evolving appearance of CPR No. 374, pp. 7-13
Crossing Canada by CPR to Expo 67, pp. 14-15
How sand is housed: evolving practice at CP – Part 2, pp. 16-31
Revisiting BCER’s Fraser Mills line, pp. 32-35
The Moonlighters ride a closely watched train [VIA’s Canadian], pp. 36-37
Summer 2017
Confederation Train brochure, pp. 8-9

Confederation Train started with long tour of B.C., pp. 10-17
My special preview of the O Canada whistle, pp. 18-19
CP celebrates sesquicentennial with Canada 150 train, pp. 20-27
How sand is housed: evolving practice at CP – Part 3, pp. 28-40
Autumn 2017
GN’s passenger diesels were a Vancouver first, pp. 6-13

The spectacular special train of a short-lived CPR president [William Neal], pp. 14-30
Siemens Charger locomotives begin revenue service to Vancouver, pp. 31-33
New SkyTrain footbridge straddles Broadway, pp. 34-35
Canyon chaos as slides block CN and CP lines, pp. 36-39
Winter 2017/18
Pole position: how a CP wayfreight serves an on-line customer [Huntingdon Turn], pp. 6-17
Little Honda 90 jump-started my railway photography, pp. 18-25
My life in Canada began with a cross-country train ride, pp. 26-31
Two new ferries displace Seaspan rail veteran, pp. 32-35

Spring 2020 - Page 47

Spring 2018
A “Daylight” for VIA: the launch of a new train [Rockies by Daylight, 1988], pp. 6-13
BC Rail’s luxury cruise train: gone with the [Whistler] Northwind, pp. 14-27
SkyTrain takes the right way on Evergreen Extension, pp. 28-30
A sign of the times, as SkyTrain adopts new standard look, pp. 31-34
Summer 2018
Riding the Canadian: a British visitor’s view, pp. 7-20
Late-running Canadian lucky for some, pp. 21-27
Canadian’s schedule gets remake in bid to run on time, pp. 28-30
Grandview Viaduct going strong after 80 years, pp. 31-39
Autumn 2018
Views [of SkyTrain] from the viaducts: will they vanish?, pp. 6-16
Another Porter tank is being rebuilt to the “Gould” standard, pp. 17-21
A last look at North Bend’s CPR houses, pp. 22-25
Surrey derails approved LRT line, opts for SkyTrain extension, pp. 26-29
New CP maintenance train makes bright appearance, pp. 30-33
Canadian’s schedule revised yet again, starting in Spring, pp. 34-37
Winter 2018/19
By Budd car to Cranbrook via the Kettle Valley Route (1963), pp. 6-15
Railfanning from a business car makes for a pleasant afternoon, pp. 16-20
Remnant of old BCER line hides in Burnaby forest, pp. 21-24
All-door boarding launched at busy Commercial-Broadway, pp. 25-28
Proposed SkyTrain extensions advance through political process, pp. 29-32
CTA launches inquiry into Vancouver freight congestion, pp. 33-34
Spring 2019
Longest-ever Canadian made for a memorable journey, pp. 9-25
Page 48 - The Sandhouse

Has LRT used up its nine lives in the Vancouver region?, pp. 26-35
Rare veteran locomotives add variety to local CP scene, pp. 36-37
New track expands capacity at Roberts Bank, pp. 38-39
Summer 2019
Second Narrows Bridge essential to western economy, pp. 6-29

2015 WCE-CP contract revealed through FOI process, pp. 30-36
Canada Line marks 10 years with delivery of new cars, pp. 37-40
Autumn 2019
CP brings back 1950s look for 10 fresh locomotives, pp. 6-9
CP honours military service with five distinctive liveries, pp. 10-15
Impact of Second Narrows collision topped $100 million, pp. 16-23
How CN handled the PR crisis of the Second Narrows closure, pp. 24-31
CNoPR remnant on Lulu Island still serves packaging plant, pp. 32-37
New White Pass loop and sidings make big gain in train capacity, pp. 38-39
Winter 2019/20
CP’s loss is CN’s gain as Teck shifts coal traffic, pp. 6-13
Vancouver’s 2010 rail services rose to the Olympic occasion, pp. 14-26
Remote North Bend had room at the inn, pp. 27-29
Burnaby third-track project starts to take shape, pp. 30-32

Spring 2020 - Page 49

Opinions expressed in The Sandhouse are those of the author concerned and are not necessarily those of the
PCD or CRHA. Brief excerpts of articles and news items may be used in other publications, provided The
Sandhouse and author are credited. Photographs may not be reproduced, in any form, without permission.
The Sandhouse is normally published once each quarter, in Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter, and mailed
to paid-up members. Copies can also be purchased from the following retail outlets:
Central Hobbies, 2825 Grandview Hwy., Vancouver, BC (604) 431-0771
Kelly’s Kaboose, 6648 Savona Access Rd., Savona, BC (250) 377-8510
All contributions are gratefully received, but are subject to editing. Please send all news items, photos and
articles to the Editor, care of the Division address (see page 2).

Ian Smith — Editor

Parting Shot

Then owned by RailAmerica, this ex-CP Rail caboose was in transit to an Alberta
shortline from service on Vancouver Island when it was caught on camera at CP’s Coquitlam Yard on March 9, 2002, wearing a special livery applied by members of
CRHA’s E&N Division. Now, after 18 years in Alberta, it will soon be coming home,
after being donated to that division (see p. 45). (Photo by Ian Smith)
Page 50 - The Sandhouse

Canadian Railroad Historical Association, Pacific Coast Division
P.O. Box 1006, Station A Vancouver, B.C. V6C 2P1

WE INVITE YOU TO JOIN US
Get together with fellow railway enthusiasts and take part in the varied activities of
the CRHA's Pacific Coast Division.
We meet nine times a year on the 3rd Friday of the month (see below)
 Meetings feature slide shows, video programs, talks by railway officials and writers on railway
subjects, and the opportunity to socialize with other railway enthusiasts.

 We publish The Sandhouse, a quarterly journal on B.C. railway matters. Membership dues
include a subscription.

We hope you'll join us. Please send your address details (name, full address, phone number, e-mail),
together with your payment, to our postal address or bring it to one of our regular meetings.
Annual dues are: $32 for Canadian residents; $30 U.S. for U.S. residents and $40 Overseas
Visit our webpage at http://www.exporail.org/en/crha/divisions/

Pacific Coast Division’s regular meetings
are held on the third Friday of each
month (except July, August and
December) at
Renaissance Room, Place Des Arts
Heritage Square
1120 Brunette Avenue
Coquitlam, B.C.
Presentations begin at 7:00 p.m.

Spring 2020 - Page 51

Bridgework

Page 52 - The Sandhouse