(And of course some within VIA would probably not be too sad at abandonment either, given how much would be saved in operating costs)
You are underestimating what importance the Churchill line has to VIA: there has been a close cooperation with the tourism industry in Northern Manitoba which has allowed to significantly grow the tourism markets during the
seasons for watching polar bears (July to November), Whales (June to August) and the Northern lights (January to March and August/September). This has helped to significantly improve the performance of the Winnipeg-Churchill train, yielding a higher cost-recovery and lower per-passenger-mile-subsidy figure in the last two years than the Toronto-Niagara service:
In fact, the timing of the washout could not have come any worse, as polar bear season is
just about to take off and would have brought in many tourists, many of which are prepared to pay Sleeper class fares. Even worse, hundreds of
Canada 150 Youth Pass holders were already
getting excited about discovering the northernmost city of this country, which can still be realistically reached without expensive plane tickets, and would have probably shared their adventures with many thousands of young Canadians via Social Media, spreading the word about this hidden gem (ask anyone who's been up their) and thus creating more tourist interest in this remote area over the next years.
Instead, the passholders had to rebook on the other VIA trains, thus putting additional stress onto the capacity on the Canadian and the Ocean (just go on viarail.ca and try to book any seat in Economy on any departure in July on either service) and we have one trainset stuck in Churchill while we are anticipating 4,000 travel-hungry youngsters and countless tourists from all over the world for this country's sesquicentennial anniversary this July, which is already one of the busiest months in a normal year...
Churchill isn't anywhere that is critical for defense or for heavy goods delivery. There are so many other towns and cities in the far north that get by without rail access, it's hard to make the case for this one town to have it, especially if the money to fix the line could be better spent.
VIA has had a good run on this route, but there will be very little impact if the line is abandoned.
- Paul
Rail and port access in Churchill does not only play a crucial role for Churchill itself, but
also for all the Arctic communities even further north, who depend on transport channels for basically everything and now face a
severe crisis. I have no idea what providing or subsidising services to the north costs every year (except for VIA's Churchill service, which was apparently $17,565,000 or $0.49 per Canadian last year), but I'm from a country where richer
Bundesländer (Germany's equivalent for provinces) pay billions every year through the
Länderfinanzausgleich to fund their poorer peers. The same happens in the European Union and in both cases with the explicit goal of helping achieve a convergence of living standards and prosperity across the respective territories and populations, as exemplified by the EU's
Economic and Social Cohersion strategy.
If there is one thing I admire about this country, it's its demographic, geographic, climatic and environmental diversity and as someone who has travelled this country from-coast-to-coast (and itches to explore the real North), I believe that even if it sometimes comes at a price for us taxpayers, the cost pales against all benefits...
