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British Columbia RailwayThe British Columbia Railway (BCR; AAR reporting marks BCOL, BCIT), called BC Rail since 1984, was a railway that operated in the Canadian province of British Columbia. Formerly owned by the government of British Columbia, it was sold to Canadian National Railway in 2004. Prior to its sale, the railway was the third largest in Canada, operating 1,441 miles (2,320 kilometres) of mainline track. Chartered in 1912 as the Pacific Great Eastern Railway (PGE; AAR reporting marks PGE, PGER), the name that it used until 1972, the railway was acquired by the provincial government in 1918 after running into financial difficulties. A railway that ran from "nowhere to nowhere" for much of its existence, neither passing through any major city nor interchanging with any other railway, it expanded significantly between 1949 and 1984. The railway's operations have not always been profitable, and its debts have made it the centre of political controversy on multiple occasions. History 1912-1948 The Pacific Great Eastern Railway was incorporated on February 27, 1912 to build a line from Vancouver north to a connection with the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway at Prince George. Although independent from the GTP, the PGE had agreed that the GTP, whose western terminus was at the remote northern port of Prince Rupert, could use their line to gain access to Vancouver. The railway was given its name due to a loose association with England's Great Eastern Railway. Its financial backers were Timothy Foley, Patrick Welch and John Stewart. Upon incorporation, the PGE took over the Howe Sound and Northern Railway, which at that point had built nine miles (15 kilometres) of track north of Squamish. The British Columbia government gave the railway a guarantee of principal and 4% interest (later increased to 4.5% to make the bonds saleable) on the construction bonds of the railway. The railway soon started to run out of money, however. In 1915 it failed to make an interest payment on its bonds, obliging the provincial government to make good on its bond guarantee. In the 1916 provincial election campaign, the Liberal Party alleged that some of the money advanced to the railway for bond guarantee payments had instead gone into Conservative Party campaign funds. In the election, the Conservatives, who had won every seat in the legislature in 1912 election, lost to the Liberals. The Liberals then took Foley, Welch, and Stewart to court to recover $5 million of allegedly unaccounted funds. In early 1918, the railway's backers agreed to pay the government $1.1 million and turn the railway over to the government. When the government took over the railway, two separate sections of trackage had been completed: A small section between North Vancouver and Horseshoe Bay, and one between Squamish and Clinton. By 1921, the provincial government extended the railway to a point 15 miles (25 kilometres) north of Quesnel, still 20 miles (35 kilometres) south of a connection to Prince George, but was not extended further. The track north of Quesnel was later removed. Construction of the line between Horseshoe Bay and Squamish was given a low priority because there was already a barge in operation between Squamish and Vancouver, and the railway wanted to discontinue operations on the North Vancouver-Horseshoe Bay line. However, the railway had an agreement with the city of Vancouver to provide passenger service that it was unable to get out of until 1928, when they paid the city $140,000 in support of its road-building programme. The last trains on the line ran on November 29, 1928 and the line fell into disuse, but was never formally abandoned. For the next twenty years the railway would run from "nowhere to nowhere". It did not connect with any other railway, and there were no large urban centres on its route. It existed mainly to connect logging and mining operations in the British Columbia interior with the coastal town of Squamish, where resources could then be transported by sea. The government still intended for the railway to reach Prince George, but the resources to do so were not available, especially during the Great Depression and World War II. The unfortunate state of the railway caused it to be given nicknames such as "Province's Great Expense", "Prince George Eventually", "Past God's Endurance", and "Please Go Easy". 1949-1971 Starting in 1949, the Pacific Great Eastern began to expand. Track was laid north of Quesnel to a junction with the Canadian National Railways at Prince George. That line opened on November 1, 1952. Between 1953 and 1956 the railway constructed a line between Squamish and North Vancouver, which opened on August 27, 1956. By 1958 the railway had reached north from Prince George to Fort St. John and Dawson Creek. In 1958, British Columbia Premier W.A.C. Bennett boasted that he would extend the railway to the Yukon and Alaska, and further extension of the railway was undertaken in the 1960s. A 37 kilometre spur was constructed to Mackenzie. A third line was extended west from the mainline (somewhat north of Prince George) to Fort St. James. It was completed on August 1, 1968. The largest construction undertaken in the 1960s was to extend the mainline from Fort St. John 250 miles (400 kilometres) north to Fort Nelson, less then 100 miles (160 kilometres) away from the Yukon. The Fort Nelson Subdivision was opened by Premier Bennett on September 10, 1971. Unfortunately, the opening of the line was overshadowed by the inaugural train derailing south of Williams Lake, south of Prince George. 1972-1989 The railway underwent two changes of name during this time period. In 1972, the railway's name was changed to the British Columbia Railway. In 1984 the railway started calling itself BC Rail. In 1973, the British Columbia government acquired and restored an ex-Canadian Pacific Railway 4-6-4 steam locomotive of the type known as "Royal Hudsons", which were given that name by King George VI after one led the royal train westward on a transcontinental journey in 1939. The locomotive that the government acquired, numbered 2860, was built in 1940 and was the first one built as a Royal Hudson. The government then leased it to the British Columbia Railway, which started excursion service with the locomotive between North Vancouver and Squamish on June 20 1974. The train ran between June and September on Wednesdays through Sundays. In the 1960s, a new line had been projected to run northwest from Fort St. James to Dease Lake, 412 miles (623 kilometres) away. On October 15, 1973, the first 125 miles (200 kilometres) of the extension to Lovell were opened. The cost of the line was significantly greater than what was estimated, however. Contractors working on the remainder of the line alleged that the railway had misled them regarding the amount of work required so that it could obtain low bids, and took the railway to court. The Dease Lake line was starting to appear increasingly uneconomical. There was a world decline in the demand for asbestos and copper, two main commodities that would be hauled over the line. As well, the Stewart-Cassiar Highway that already served Dease Lake had recently been upgraded. Combined with the increasing construction costs, the Dease Lake line could no longer be justified. Construction stopped on April 5, 1977. Track had been laid to Jackson, 263 miles (423 kilometres) past Fort St. James, and clearing and grading were in progress on the rest of the extension. It had cost $168 million to that point, well over twice the initial estimate. The management and operation of the railway had been called into question, and on February 7, 1977, the provincial government appointed a Royal Commission, the McKenzie Royal Commission, to investigate the railway. Its recommendations were released on August 25, 1978. It recommended that construction not continue on the 149 miles (239 kilometres) of roadbed between Dease Lake and the current end of track, and that trains be terminated at Driftwood, 20 miles (33 kilometres) past Lovell. The rest of the track would be left in place but not used. In 1983, the Dease Lake line was closed after logging operations ceased at Driftwood and traffic declined sharply. However, it was later reopened and currently extends to a point called Chipmunk, still over 175 miles (280 kilometres) south of Dease Lake. Many of the Commission's other recommendations, including the abandonment of the Fort Nelson line, and discontinuation of uneconomic operations such as passenger services, were not followed. The Tumbler Ridge Subdivision, a 82 mile (132 mile) electrified branch line, opened in 1983 to the Quintette and Wolverine mines, two coal mines northeast of Prince George that produced coal for Japan. It has the lowest crossing of the Rocky Mountains by a railway, at 3815 feet. There are two large tunnels under the mountains: The Table Tunnel, 5.6 miles long, and the Wolverine Tunnel, 3.7 miles long. Electrified due to the long tunnels, it was one of the few electrified freight lines in North America. Although initially profitable, the traffic on the line was never as high as initially predicted, and by the 1990s was under one train per day. The railway had incurred much debt building the branch line, and the expensive, unprofitable operations on the branch line could not help to repay that debt. 1990-2003 In the early 1990s, the provincial government reduced subsidies to BC Rail. As a result, the railway, burdened with several money-losing services that it was required to operate, saw its debtload grow more than sixfold between 1991 and 2001. In the 1990s, the railway branched out into shipping operations, acquiring terminal operator Vancouver Wharves in 1993 and Canadian Stevedoring and its subsidiary, Casco Terminals, in 1998. In 1999 these operations became the three operating divisions of a new entity, BCR Marine. BCR Group became the parent company of both BCR Marine and BC Rail. In early 2003, attempting to reduce the railway's large debt, BCR Group sold its BC Marine assets except for Vancouver Wharves (which was also not included in the subsequent sale of BC Rail to Canadian National, and remains a provincial Crown corporation). On August 19 2000, the Quintette mine closed, and the portion of the Tumbler Ridge Subdivision between Teck and Quintette, British Columbia was abandoned. The last electric locomotives ran along the line on September 29, 2000, after which the line was worked by diesels. The Wolverine mine closed on April 10, 2003, after which the remaining 69.6 kilometres (43 miles) of the Tumbler Ridge Subdivision between Teck and Wakely was abandoned, although the track is still in place. Several other services were discontinued around this time as well. The Royal Hudson steam train excursion was discontinued at the end of the 2001 excursion season. The 2860 was out of service in 2000, needing extensive repairs. The backup steam locomotive, a 2-8-0 locomotive built in 1912, broke down in May 2001, and for the rest of the season BC Rail used a former Canadian Pacific FP7A diesel locomotive that it had leased. Passenger train service ended October 31, 2002. The service was unprofitable, and the railway's Budd Rail Diesel Cars that it used were ageing and becoming increasingly expensive to keep in service. Service between Seton Portage and Lillooet was replaced by a railbus. As well, around this time the railway also ended its intermodal service. The sale of BC Rail Looking to retire BC Rail's debt, on May 13, 2003, British Columbia Premier Gordon Campbell announced that the government would privatise BC Rail, while retaining ownership of the right-of-way. On November 25, 2003 it was announced that Canadian National's bid of $1 billion would be accepted over those of several other companies. The transaction was closed on July 15, 2004. Many opponents, including Canadian Pacific Railway, accused the government and CN of rigging the bidding process, though this has been denied by the government. It has also recently surfaced that Dave Basi and other upper-echelon aides were possibly bribed by OmniTRAX in exchange for skewing the process in that company's favour, albeit unsuccessfully. Freight services Forest products are one of the main products transported by the railway. Prior to its sale to CN, the railway transported over 120,000 carloads of lumber, pulp, woodchips, and other forest products per year. The railway served several lumber and pulp mills in the province. Between 1983 and 2003, the railway hauled coal in unit trains from the Teck and Quintette mines near Tumbler Ridge to to Prince George, from where CN would haul the trains to Prince Rupert for shipment to Japan. The Quintette mine, the larger-producing of the two, closed in 2000 and the Teck mine closed in 2003. Starting in the 1960s, the PGE operated an intermodal service that transported truck trailers between North Vancouver and Prince George, and to places further north. Unlike most of the railway's other traffic, most of the intermodal traffic was northbound. In April 1982, the railway combined its piggyback and LCL services to form a new Intermodal Services Department. BC Rail halted its intermodal services in 2002. Starting in 1958, the railway started to haul grain from the Peace River District, serving grain elevators at Dawson Creek, Buick, Fort St. John, and Taylor. With an amendment to the Western Grain Transportation Act in 1985 that included the railway in the Act, it became economical for the railway to transport grain, and it also carried grain from Northern Alberta bound for Prince Rupert, interchanging with CN at Dawson Creek and Prince George. Interchanges Between 1928 and 1952 the PGE did not interchange with any other railway. Once its extensions to Prince George and North Vancouver were completed in 1952 and 1956 respectively, the railway was able to interchange with CN at these locations. Its two major yards are also located in these cities. Starting in 1958, the PGE also interchanged with Northern Alberta Railway at Dawson Creek. CN bought the NAR in 1981. CN's line between Hythe, Alberta and Dawson Creek fell into disuse in 1998, but CN agreed to reopen it as a condition of purchasing BC Rail. As well, some interchange occurs with the Union Pacific Railway through the Seaspan railbarge link between North Vancouver and Seattle, Washington. Reporting marks Reporting marks are a system intended to help keep track of rolling stock and financial transactions between railways. The Pacific Great Eastern Railway used the reporting mark PGE. It later adopted the reporting mark PGER in 1971 for freight cars in international service. When the railway was renamed to the British Columbia Railway, it adopted the reporting mark BCOL, as well as the BCIT reporting mark for freight cars in international service. Locomotives Until the late 1940s, most motive power on the PGE was provided by steam locomotives. The majority of the railway's locomotives were of the 2-6-2, 2-8-0 and 2-8-2 wheel configurations. In addition, the railway also used a handful of gasoline cars. The railway received its first diesel locomotive in June 1948, a General Electric 65-ton locomotive. Over the next two years the railway acquired six GE 70-ton locomotives. In the 1950s, the railway bought RS-3, RS-10, and RS-18 locomotives from Montreal Locomotive Works (MLW). The railway had fully dieselized by 1956, and by the end of the decade had nearly 40 diesel locomotives. The railway would purchase new locomotives exclusively from MLW until 1980. During the 1970s, the railway also purchased several used locomotives, mostly American Locomotive Company (ALCO) models from American railways. In the 1980s, the railway acquired new SD-40-2 locomotives made by General Motors Diesel (GMD), as well as used SD-40-2's originally made by GM's Electro-Motive Division (EMD). More recently, the railway purchased several locomotives from General Electric. In 1970, the railway started using remote controlled mid-train locomotives, allowing longer and heavier trains to be operated through the steep grades of the Coast Mountains. It initially used separate remote control cars to control the mid-train locomotives, but in 1975 it received eight M420B locomotives from MLW. These locomotives were specially designed for mid-train operation. They contained remote control stations, and were cabless. The railway also leased seven G6FC electric locomotives made by GMD for use on the electrified Tumbler Ridge Subdivision between 1983 and 2000, when the electrification was removed. In 2004, one was sold to the British Columbia Railway & Forest Industry Museum in Prince George, and the rest were scrapped. References -
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- Schmidt, Paul (May, 2003). British Columbia seeks new BC Rail operator, retains right-of-way. Trains, p.11.
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