VIA Rail

[crs1026]

Today, for the first time, VIA is trying to meet CN's imposed minimum train-length requirement for its new Siemens Venture trainsets by augmenting a test set with the addition of two cars. Total transit length is eight: VIA train No 631 is operating today from Montreal-Ottawa with one each Economy Class* and Business Class** cars from Set 7 added to Set 12. Consist: Cab car 2311-Economy Class cars 2811-2911-2906*- Business Class cars 2706**-2711-2611- locomotive 2211.

It will be interesting to see the cycling plan for longer sets once we know how many of these VIA is assembling.

This is a better interim solution than the slow orders, especially with the busy summer season approaching. I bet VIA will be able to fill enough of these seats to make this less painful.

I just hope it does not signify either that TC is unsympathetic to VIA or that VIA's legal advice has concluded that the court decision is unlikely to favour VIA.

- Paul

 

[nfitz]

I just hope it does not signify either that TC is unsympathetic to VIA or that VIA's legal advice has concluded that the court decision is unlikely to favour VIA.

Even if VIA is 100% correct, I'd think getting a court of laypeople to override an easy-to-explain safety rule is going to be a challenge.

Those making the decision aren't going to understand the technical aspects, and if CN rolls out an expert that says that doing what VIA wants, creates a higher chance that even a single person will be injured (or worse), then the court is going to be too scared to impose something other than financial damages to VIA for not communicating this much, much, earlier.

 

[dowlingm]

While I actually think this is great that VIA might be forced to run larger trains, it really will only make sense on the corridor from Windsor to Quebec City along the CN mainline.

Running an 8 car train on the Sarnia train will be a huge waste of resources, currently they barely fill a 3 car train.

They will definitely have to find an alternative solution there.

Apparently today's Sarnia has been shifted from Venture to LRC, per groups.io list.

 

[robmausser]

Apparently today's Sarnia has been shifted from Venture to LRC, per groups.io list.

I wrote something but changed my mind.

The Sarnia line goes through Kitchener on GEXR. Which partially is owned by Metrolinx (no slow order) and the part West of Kitchener is so slow already, the slow order by CN doesn't even have an effect. The trains already limp along at 40mph.

So the only issue really is the section from London to Sarnia.

I think that in that case using a short Venture is fine, as there will be minimal impacts on going slow. What's an extra 15 minutes on an already abysmally slow line?

The end solution is for VIA to purchase the GEXR from CN West of Kitchener in order to increase speeds on it, and then they will not be at the behest of crossing speed restrictions from CN anyways and can run shorter Ventures on it as fast as they please.

 

[Bordercollie]

It will be interesting to see the cycling plan for longer sets once we know how many of these VIA is assembling.

This is a better interim solution than the slow orders, especially with the busy summer season approaching. I bet VIA will be able to fill enough of these seats to make this less painful.

I just hope it does not signify either that TC is unsympathetic to VIA or that VIA's legal advice has concluded that the court decision is unlikely to favour VIA.

- Paul

This what they should have done in the first place. Half the fleet is out of service anyways. Might as well make use of what is available.

 

[Trackside_Treasure]

This what they should have done in the first place. Half the fleet is out of service anyways. Might as well make use of what is available.

There is a lot of misinformation about the Venture fleet, assuming that's what you're referring to. To say half of it is out of service is not quite true. At any one time, only half the fleet is operational. I published this post to try using citizen-science to find some facts that are otherwise unavailable re: OTP and serviceability of Ventures.

"What is Happening with VIA's New Venture Trains?" Seven Months after CN Imposed its Crossing Speed Reductions

It's been seven months but it feels like seven years. To say it's become somewhat of a Trackside Treasurobsession covering the implementatio...

tracksidetreasure.blogspot.com

I did so because VIA is a convenient whipping-boy for statements like, "The Ventures are crap" and "they never should have been bought", stuff like that. It may be true, but I don't think the folks making such statements have any better access to facts than I do! Only three sets are completely unavailable since late last year, that is clear. The rest rotate in and out of service per the table in the linked post. I can't say whether this is planned or unplanned maintenance, or some other reason.

I did suggest on my blog back in October that lengthening consists to placate CN until a more objective outcome could be reached by an external body, ideally a regulatory one i.e. Transport Canada, and become effective. I have no way of knowing if lengthened consists are to 'sell more seats' or to placate CN. A lot of folks seem to think the former. Time will tell if all the space in the lengthened trains is made available for passengers or they're just treated as deadhead cars. Certainly, over the past nearly three-four years VIA has never yet tried this option. So we have to wonder, why else now but to placate CN?

Half the fleet is unimplemented. The implementation is stalled. There's no indication there is a shortage of trained crews. We have to consider strain on crews and crews booking off as a result of CN's 'watch the crossings' rules. VIA has plateaued at its current number of trainsets and that may be the case for the foreseeable future. But I do agree with you - they should make use of what is available.

 

[smallspy]

Even if VIA is 100% correct, I'd think getting a court of laypeople to override an easy-to-explain safety rule is going to be a challenge.

It'll be pretty easy when so many of CN's "facts" are so easily shown to be lies.

Dan

 

[nfitz]

It'll be pretty easy when so many of CN's "facts" are so easily shown to be lies.

If CN gets a qualified expert to "lie", the court will have little choice.

I'd expect multiple levels of appeals lasting until the 2030s by CN if they lose - up to the Supreme Court.

Transport Canada needs to grow, and order CN to upgrade every level crossing quickly. Even if VIA wins the first round, I don't see an end to this.

 

[dowlingm]

I wrote something but changed my mind.

The Sarnia line goes through Kitchener on GEXR. Which partially is owned by Metrolinx (no slow order) and the part West of Kitchener is so slow already, the slow order by CN doesn't even have an effect. The trains already limp along at 40mph.

So the only issue really is the section from London to Sarnia.

I think that in that case using a short Venture is fine, as there will be minimal impacts on going slow. What's an extra 15 minutes on an already abysmally slow line? .

If you are only going from Sarnia to London to work or make an connection, and could be doing 80mph in a short LRC consist, I daresay an unnecessary 15 mins delay is annoying indeed.

 

[crs1026]

If CN gets a qualified expert to "lie", the court will have little choice.

I'd expect multiple levels of appeals lasting until the 2030s by CN if they lose - up to the Supreme Court.

Transport Canada needs to grow, and order CN to upgrade every level crossing quickly. Even if VIA wins the first round, I don't see an end to this.

Litigation is such a convoluted and illogical process - if a witness claims they can’t fly, the lawyers will ask if they ever jumped off a bridge to see if they actually could.
Call me perverse, but it wouldn’t surprise me if some legal mind decided that VIA’s case would be stronger if they actually ran the longer trains, so the loss of revenue due to empty seats and the inability to cover the rotation due to a less flexible deployment of Ventures becomes a provable fact backed up by experience and numbers, and not just a hypothetical but unproven postulation by an expert witness.

- Paul

 

[Trackside_Treasure]

If CN gets a qualified expert to "lie", the court will have little choice.

I'd expect multiple levels of appeals lasting until the 2030s by CN if they lose - up to the Supreme Court.

Transport Canada needs to grow, and order CN to upgrade every level crossing quickly. Even if VIA wins the first round, I don't see an end to this.

CN doesn't have to get someone to lie. The numbers, huge buckets full of numbers of machine readable data, apparently, for all the affected crossings were submitted to Transport Canada literally months ago. CN has already had its experts submit affidavits, though not testify in Ontario because the case never made it to court there. The Quebec case is plodding along and I've heard nothing about it.

Don't expect too much from CN. As Dan says, they have nothing. If nothing equals lies, then they have lies. Their qualified expert's best line? That he had no idea, around the day when Ventures began operating in Southwest Ontario, that Ventures had really been operating outside the MOQ triangle - until that day! But the longer Transport Canada dithers, the better CN's case looks and the longer the reductions stay in place. VIA is not spotless in this, their insistence at 45 mph from the whistle post is not always necessary and needlessly accedes to CN's goals of making VIA trains' OTP worse!

 

[Bordercollie]

CN doesn't have to get someone to lie. The numbers, huge buckets full of numbers of machine readable data, apparently, for all the affected crossings were submitted to Transport Canada literally months ago. CN has already had its experts submit affidavits, though not testify in Ontario because the case never made it to court there. The Quebec case is plodding along and I've heard nothing about it.

Don't expect too much from CN. As Dan says, they have nothing. If nothing equals lies, then they have lies. Their qualified expert's best line? That he had no idea, around the day when Ventures began operating in Southwest Ontario, that Ventures had really been operating outside the MOQ triangle - until that day! But the longer Transport Canada dithers, the better CN's case looks and the longer the reductions stay in place. VIA is not spotless in this, their insistence at 45 mph from the whistle post is not always necessary and needlessly accedes to CN's goals of making VIA trains' OTP worse!

If it's so clear then why does the court not throw it out? That would end the whole thing.

 

[nfitz]

CN doesn't have to get someone to lie. The numbers, huge buckets full of numbers of machine readable data, apparently, for all the affected crossings were submitted to Transport Canada literally months ago. CN has already had its experts submit affidavits, though not testify in Ontario because the case never made it to court there. The Quebec case is plodding along and I've heard nothing about it.

Don't expect too much from CN. As Dan says, they have nothing. If nothing equals lies, then they have lies. Their qualified expert's best line? That he had no idea, around the day when Ventures began operating in Southwest Ontario, that Ventures had really been operating outside the MOQ triangle - until that day! But the longer Transport Canada dithers, the better CN's case looks and the longer the reductions stay in place. VIA is not spotless in this, their insistence at 45 mph from the whistle post is not always necessary and needlessly accedes to CN's goals of making VIA trains' OTP worse!

Why would it matter if an expert knew about whether they were operating Ventures or not. Normally expert witnesses are retained after a court case starts - unless perhaps you are a tobacco company.

 

[Trackside_Treasure]

If it's so clear then why does the court not throw it out? That would end the whole thing.

Well, it did get 'thrown out' of Ontario court. VIA and CN hadbeen before Federal Court since last November. In February, 2025 the court concluded that it did not have the jurisdiction to rule on the issue. This prompted VIA Rail to turn to the Quebec Superior Court, which has not yet ruled on the dispute. VIA and CN have been battling this issue in Federal Court since last November. Stay tuned. I don't know if Ontario or Quebec court judges would be qualified to go through machine readable data to grant VIA's request to rescind the reductions.

 

[Trackside_Treasure]

Why would it matter if an expert knew about whether they were operating Ventures or not. Normally expert witnesses are retained after a court case starts - unless perhaps you are a tobacco company.

'Qualified expert' was your term. It was actually Hoang Tran, CN Senior Director, Regulatory, System Safety and Passenger Operations, and he ought to have known. Hey, if in doubt Mr Tran, contact Mr Luce, CN Manager of Passenger Operations. Neither seemed to know.

ought to have known.