Travel bloggers’ view from the E&N train
Travel Bloggers Ralph Mills and Lenore Ogilvy ride our E&N railway and describe the journey on their Two at Large blog.
– Wayne Schulstad
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Posts and Comments on Nanaimo Governance 
Is it time to remove the E&N train from service on the island and pull up the tracks in Nanaimo? I say it is, for the obvious reason that it no longer serves any purpose for industry or business,and is certainly not a viable commuter option.As far as the Nanaimo station,now a burned eyesore,I say bulldoze it down and save the cost of re-building for other more worthier causes.Do you agree?
Where to start? There’s so much complicated background to go over before I could even begin to challenge your short sighted solution to rail on Vancouver Island: tear it up and bulldoze it down!
You may want to wait for the release of the provincial governments $500,000 feasibility study weighing the costs and viability of the rail line compared to cost of ongoing upgrade and maintenance of the only other artery from Victoria up island including the treacherous Malahat.
You may be aware that the rail line itself was a constitutional prerequisite of British Columbia joining the Canadian federation in 1871.
The current ownership of the rail bed and the stations along it is also relevant. The CPR washed its hands of it and donated the assets to the Island Corridor Foundation(www.islandcorridorfoundation.ca) which is made up of First Nations, municipalities and regional districts along the line. The bed itself extends west to Port Alberni and right into downtown Victoria through it’s northern suburbs (making light rail commuter transit an economic possibility for Victoria and inter-city commuter rail transit up Island.
The Nanaimo station (www.nanaimotrainstation.org)is scheduled for a complete restoration — most of the funds are in place from the insurance claim related to the fire a couple of years ago, fundraising and Downtown Nanaimo Partnership (now the Downtown BIAs).
Elsewhere on the planet huge investments are being made in rail transport and transit. Alternatives to the massively expensive asphalt and concrete infrastructure that subsidizes the internal combustion engine are urgently needed in Canada.