Via set to return to the rails

VIA Rail will be back in business in the Northwest starting on Wednesday when the Prince Rupert to Prince George train heads out from the Prince Rupert station.

However, passengers on the first train out are advised to pack a snack as, there will be limited selections available on that train.

It will mark the first passenger train to depart the city since service was suspended on June the 8th, the first train in to Prince Rupert will arrive on Thursday evening.


The full story on the shutdown of rail service and its impact on the northwest was posted to the Vancouver Sun's website today.


Via Rail to resume service as water subsides (12:05 pm)
Vancouver Sun
Tuesday, June 12, 2007

VIA Rail announced today it will begin resuming passenger train service today between Prince George and Prince Rupert because river levels are returning to normal.

The passenger service on the CN rail line - much of which follows the still-swollen Skeena and Bulkley rivers - has been curtailed because of mudslides and flooding since June 6.

VIA Rail spokesperson Catherine Kaloutsky said in an interview today that VIA Rail contacted customers who had booked trips to inform them that passenger train service had been suspended, but could not make an alternative overland service available because the main highway was cut off by a major mudslide too.

Kaloutsky had no estimate of the number of customers affected.

Regular train service begins resuming this Wednesday, when the first train leaves Prince Rupert for Prince George. On Thursday, the first train leaves Prince George for Prince Rupert.

VIA Rail advised travellers there will be limited food items available for purchase on the first few runs because of transportation and food delivery problems, but regular meal services are to resume June 15.

Meanwhile, river levels on the Lower Fraser River have now dropped below the six-metre mark, sparing B.C.'s Fraser Valley from serious flooding.

The Lower Fraser is running at 5.9-metres, and falling, at the Mission gauge, 71 kilometres east of Vancouver.However, several hundred homes in Maple Ridge, Langley, Abbotsford, Chilliwack and Hope remain on evacuation alert.In northwestern B.C., 568 homes in the Francois Lake area south of Burns Lake are the latest to be affected by evacuation alerts.

Overall, 1,665 homes remain on alert but evacuation orders have dropped to 13 from more than 60 over the past several days.A boil-water advisory has been issued by the Northern Health Authority affecting residents from Houston west to Prince Rupert and the Queen Charlotte Islands, due to concerns that ground water may have contaminated drinking water in private wells.

With files from Canadian Press