(The following article by Scott Simpson was posted on the Vancouver Sun website on December 15.)
VANCOUVER — Transport Canada eased restrictions on Canadian National Railway operations near Squamish on Wednesday, but ordered the troubled railway to provide better training for its crews.
The national transportation agency also announced that Transport Canada inspectors will monitor CN train movement as part of new safety requirements along the former BC Rail route.
The requirements were proposed by CN after Transport Minister Jean Lapierre last week restricted CN to a maximum of 80 cars for all northbound trains along the BC Rail track from Squamish to the B.C. Interior.
CN has suffered 11 main track derailments along the BC Rail route it took over last year from the provincial government — more than double the average number of such incidents along the route in recent years.
The program will extend over a 60-day trial period, during which CN “will have to abide by a strict set of safety requirements to help ensure they can operate safely in the Squamish region,” Lapierre said in a news release.
“If these requirements are not respected, Transport Canada will impose further restrictions and may take legal action pursuant to the Railway Safety Act,” Lapierre added.
Legal action would be implemented if CN refuses to comply with its new orders — but spokesmen for both Transport Canada and CN noted that the railway itself suggested the new conditions under which it will operate in the area.
In exchange, CN can now run as many as 99 cars northbound along the BCR, provided the train’s locomotive power is distributed between engines at the front and middle of the train.
Only last week, CN was ordered to restrict the length of any train to 80 cars.
The rail carrier has provided Transport Canada with a safety plan to test and demonstrate that distributed power trains can be operated safely on the Squamish route.
Based on the plan, Transport Canada has imposed several new conditions upon CN when it operates on the BC Rail line.
They include orders to conduct tests throughout the route to verify that distributed power is working properly and new procedures for dealing with starts and stops en route.
CN will also provide additional training for crews on operating distributed power trains and place a supervisor on all trains to augment crews.
“The fact is that there were a number of incidents and we had to take them very seriously and examine exactly what was going on,” CN spokesman Jim Feeny said in an interview.
It was a so-called distributed power train that derailed in the Cheakamus after locomotives located about two-thirds of the way down the train failed to engage as the train began to struggle up a two-per cent grade.
A preliminary government investigation also stated that contrary to federal regulations, the cars carrying the dangerous goods were not directly attached to a locomotive.
That derailment caused a massive fish kill when a car loaded with sodium hydroxide emptied into the Cheakamus River. That train had five locomotives and 144 cars.
Last week after two more derailments, including one into the Fraser River near Burnaby, Lapierre forbade CN from pulling any train of more than 80 cars northbound along the Squamish route.