It's not over by any stretch

Restore the Vancouver Island Rail Corridor to its former glory!” is sometimes shouted, but it’s not the reality of what would come.

A restored railway will not only be better, stronger, and faster, it will be modernized, accessible, comfortable, reliable, WiFi enabled, and will better support micro transit options like bicycles.

With a refurbished track bed, the ties replaced, and brand-new upgraded tracks it would be a smooth ride! With additional sidings so more trains can pass (yes, many already exist), and seismic and safety upgrades to the trestles and bridges, people will feel safe and secure while they travel the island. With the anticipated $3-$9 million in revenue predicted by the Freight assessment completed by the B.C. Government and released in Dec 2022, the railway will be able to generate income to pay for its own maintenance going forward.

On a fundamental level, the corridor’s value is widely known and is sorely needed to compensate for rapidly increasing populations and industries all over the island. In particular, Nanaimo, Victoria and Langford are growing at a record pace compared to other cities across the country. It’s not hard to imagine why, after all Vancouver Island is a mild-climate paradise compared to most other places in the world, and our industries and economy are booming! MOTI and others are predicting another 100,000 people on Vancouver Island in just 7 years, that averages to about 39-40 people per day. Could you imagine the commutes in 2030 when 1 million people are living here!

The steady persistence to solve every transportation problem by involving roads runs counter to just about every goal that every level of government has, especially considering we already have a pre-established right-of-way, the rail corridor. On a restored railway, the trains would run adjacent to the Malahat and touch every major city from Courtenay and Port Alberni all the way through Parksville, Ladysmith, Duncan, Shawnigan, and Langford, to the start of Victoria’s walkable cycling network.

Car ownership is expensive with payments and maintenance, and of course, the fuel prices that are set to grow in perpetuity to reduce pollution from combustion engines. The magic of owning a car quickly fades when it’s grocery money that has to fill the tank. Many people do love their cars, but the facts are that they pollute with tire particles, oil leaks, windshield washer fluid, and of course exhaust fumes that were proven to alter your brain chemistry by B.C. Universities. There are long-term health effects on us from those gases, we should not be accepting longer commutes as the norm. We should be using our existing railway in addition to the roads to provide alternatives to those that would use passenger rail services, an estimated 20-40% of the population.

There are no straight lines on Vancouver Island, the land is way to mountainous and full of a vast number of sensitive eco-systems to create an alternate route or to put in a “bullet train.” “Slow and easy wins the race” they say, and on a right-of-way going up to 80km hour in the straight stretches and slower in other areas, that makes perfect sense. Trains would only stop at Terminals, cars get the lights, bells, and gates.

The recent announcements by government and the $18 Million distributed through Regional Districts and First Nations for the purposes of engagements is set to start soon. That means it’s not over by any stretch of the imagination. Cases of reconciliation through indigenous partnerships have been successful all over B.C. and in Canada, there is no reason to think we could not see the same here.

All the Regional Districts and all the First Nations could put the Vancouver Island Railway back together again.

Restore Island Rail

Warren Skaalrud - A private unfunded citizen advocating for the restoration of the Vancouver Island Rail Corridor for all the right reasons.

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