(The following story by Bruce Constantineau appeared on the Vancouver Sun website on November 11.)
VANCOUVER — The owners of the popular Rocky Mountaineer rail service have announced a proposal to operate two new tourism rail services along the BC Rail route — from Vancouver to Whistler and from Whistler to Prince George, connecting to Jasper.
The plan would require Vancouver-based Great Canadian Railtour Company to negotiate a successful track access agreement with the winning bidder for BC Rail’s assets.
Great Canadian Railtour president Peter Armstrong said his company was close to a track access deal with BC Rail before the province decided to sell the railway’s freight operations and it has already talked with the potential buyers about a new tourism rail service along the Vancouver-Whistler-Prince George corridor.
Three potential buyers remain in the bidding for BC Rail in a process that’s expected to last several more weeks. They include Canadian National, Canadian Pacific and a partnership between OmniTRAX and Burlington Northern.
“We are very fortunate because we operate over CN and CP tracks so we have had a long relationship with both those railways,” Armstrong said in an interview. “We have also met with Burlington Northern/OmniTRAX so whoever the government chooses, we hope to conclude something with the successful proponent.”
He envisions a high-end service between Vancouver and Whistler — to be called the Whistler Mountaineer — and a service from Whistler to Prince George that would use BC Rail and CN lines to connect to Jasper.
Armstrong said that if the necessary approvals are obtained before the end of this year, he could start the new services by the spring of 2005.
“This is part of a much bigger plan and we think there is a lot of potential in moving people through Prince George, Jasper and maybe intermediary points along the route,” he said. “We have already started a shore-excursion program for cruise ships in Prince Rupert and in time, we’d like to see if we could connect Prince George with Prince Rupert.”
BC Rail shut down its tourism and passenger rail services last year because the operations lost money. The closures involved the Pacific Starlight Dinner Train and Whistler Northwind tourism operations and the Cariboo Prospector, a passenger rail service that lost an estimated $5 million in its last year.
Armstrong said there are not enough passengers along the route to make a passenger service viable.
“It’s what has happened with rail and tourism all over the world,” he said. “Over long distances, you’re not going to get enough locals using the service on a regular basis. They might use it once in a while but that won’t be enough to pay the freight.”
Armstrong said his company would invest millions of dollars on new equipment for the proposed rail services as it is anxious to expand its operations throughout B.C. He noted Great Canadian Railtour will conduct a trial run next spring to test the feasibility of a Kootenay service linking Golden, Cranbrook, Creston, Trail, Castlegar and Nelson.
“We think rail tourism has a real potential in this province and we’d like to see how far we can take it,” he said.
A new Vancouver-to-Whistler rail service has also been proposed by Vancouver-based Whistler Rail Tours and Via Rail. Whistler Rail would provide the rail cars while Via would operate and maintain the service.