Rail-line rescue falls short for Kelowna

SATURDAY, 28 SEPTEMBER 2013 02:00 STEVE MACNAULL Kelowna Daily Courier
The freight rail line between Kelowna and Lumby is being abandoned now that it is out of bankruptcy. For the past 14 years, Kelowna Pacific Railway leased the freight line between Kelowna and Campbell Creek, which is 16 kilometres east of Kamloops, from Canadian National Railway.The main customer on the line is Tolko forest products, which railroaded lumber and wood chips out of its Kelowna, Armstrong and Lumby mills to bigger rail operations in Kamloops. However, when Kelowna Pacific ran into financial difficulties and fell into receivership on July 5, all rail activity on the line ceased between Kelowna and Kamloops. Tolko had to move quickly to start transporting lumber and chips out of Kelowna, Armstrong and Lumby by transport truck. CN has brought the line out of bankruptcy by reaching agreements with the trustee, Tolko and the Teamsters union that represents the 20 locomotive engineers, conductors and track maintenance workers. Workers will get a 15 per cent pay hike in a new five-year contract. As CN ramps up activity on the line, more workers may be hired. However, on Friday, CN announced it will resume operations on 75 per cent of the track, or 156 kilometres, from Campbell Creek to Vernon, Lumby Junction and Lumby. The portion between Lumby Junction and Kelowna is under what's called "discontinuance process" due to insufficient freight traffic. What that means is CN doesn't want to - and won't - operate it. "However, any interested party could come forward and lease that section of the line if they want to," said Emily Hamer from CN public affairs. It's unlikely a lessee will come forward. Tolko was the main user but has since moved on to an efficient truck transport system. "We've been without freight rail service since July, so that's when the biggest impact was," said Tolko communications manager Janice Lockyer. "Our sales, marketing and logistics teams in Vernon and Kelowna have done a good job in moving freight from rail to trucking." Tolko will continue to truck out of Kelowna, but will resume using rail out of Armstrong and Lumby now that that section of track will again be operational. CN hopes to have freight trains on the Lumby-to-Kamloops section as soon as the track is safe and ready. In the past, the so-called B.C. short-line railway handled about 16,000 freight cars annually.