Talk:BC Rail

Notice

Recently I found two unsigned comments with no lead as to who it came from. I ask that all users sign their name with four tides (~). Thank you. Allan kuan1992 (talk) 06:51, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

General Talk

Actually the old peer review request was under another name; it can be found at Wikipedia:Peer review/British Columbia Railway. JYolkowski // talk 01:10, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

PGE = Pigs Going East; Prince George, Eventually. The subject of a lot of Len Norris cartoons in the Vancouver Sun during the controversial times when the old railway right of way was reclaimed through North Vancouver. Many people had encroached on it, and Norris cartoons usually showed a living room with holes in opposite walls and railway tracks running through the middle. The PGE ran up the Cheakamus River valley past Brackendale and Cheekeye (the end of the auto road in the late 1950's, where I spent some summers). Now there is a highway from Horseshoe Bay past there to what is now the Whistler ski resort, which you had to hike into in those days, if you were crazy enough. There was no skiing there then. There was a gold rush trail (the Pemberton Trail) that ran past Cheekeye along the rock talus slopes. Some of the trail is still there. It was dangerous to use it in the 50's because the bears also used it for a highway; you could smell them.

1912-1949

Shouldn't there be a history section to cover the period from 1912 to 1949? If the railroad ran from "nowhere to nowhere" at that time, where exactly was that? --Metropolitan90 14:12, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

The article was vandalised a fair bit earlier in the day, and the removal of that section may have slipped through the cracks. I've since put it back. JYolkowski // talk 21:09, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Nary a mention of the Council of Trade Unions in the entire entry? That's a bit shameful. If I wasn't too busy I'd make the addition myself. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 64.180.184.128 (talk • contribs).

Can't help with the union history of the railway, but as far as the 1912-1949 period goes that, to me, is glaringly absent. I can add to some of the text but as if's a featured article I'm hesitant to plunge in; I'll start a section here with suggested improvements/information. One reason for a separate section - and I'd venture a separate article for the pre-nationalization PGE - is that I've got all kinds of pictures of the Gas Car, Budd Car etc. and may be able to get historical photos of its early years and also some of the special cars - the dining, baggage etc. cars as well as the club car, named Bridge River, which was on permanent lease to one of the promoters of the Pioneer Mine to host VIPs visiting the mines. Pictures of the railhead-port at Shalalth, which was the only entry to the mining district, are already on Shalalth, British Columbia, and I have some of the railway hotel that was at what is now the South Shalalth station (then known as Bridge River).Skookum1 08:55, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

map

Can I suggest moving the map up the page? My first question was "wonder where this railway went?" and I think that question should be answered visually pretty much right away! :-) Othereise, great work!

Paulc1001 21:36, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Citations

I left a note here. Sandy 17:33, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

separate article for pre-Crowncorp PGE?

Just wondering if the pre-WAC/pre-nationalization PGE shouldn't be its own article; that's a whole era and different history; or is it standard in Wiki that things get absorbed by successor companies of the same name? Because this is CNR now, so technically this should be on the CNR page; so I'm suggesting that the "old PGE" be its own article - Skookum1 01:00, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Disagree. I think that it should stay, because it makes up good chunk of the history section. Besides, if it was split up, we may end up with two smaller pages, and with the limited public info of each, we will have a hard time trying to fill up both articles with additional details. Allan kuan1992 (talk) 06:42, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

NPOV concern

Does this section raise NPOV concerns with anyone else?

"The success story that continues to get lost however, is that BC Rail centralized its operating department during 2000/2001. This did lead to some growing pains during early implementation which may have helped build the case for the sale to CN, but by March 2002, BC Rail was on the verge of a significant recovery. The synergies related to the entire operation being run on one floor lead to huge gains in productivity. For example, empty online cycle times for lumber equipment improved over 40 percent between 2001 and 2003 and continued to improve in 2004 prior to the sale. Profitability at BC Rail made huge gains even with the loss of coal traffic and the business sense of the sale was debated furiously. It has been speculated that what should have been THE success story in North American railroading for 2003 and 2004 had to be hidden from the press in order to complete the sale. Some have said that BC Rail's centralized yard operations strategy could have been a model for North American railroads plagued with inefficiencies and congested yards. Others have speculated that BC Rail needed to be sold before they proved again that a government owned business could in fact turn a significant profit."

That part is entirely unsourced, and has been for some time. Unless someone is willing to provide sources confirming that BC Rail made profits, it should be removed, as it for sure will not meet FAR criteria. That is not to say that I supported the BC Rail move either; however, I'm too young to change the laws at the moment (being only 15). Allan kuan1992 (talk) 06:24, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I wrote the piece above that has since been deleted from the main article. I worked in the work order centre of BC Rail in North Vancouver and have first hand knowledge of the operational improvements made during that time.

The following quote can be found here: http://thetyee.ca/News/2003/11/14/Why_Are_We_Selling_Our_Railway/ "Last year the railway posted an operating profit of more than $75 million, and were able to pay down some of their debt. By the end of the third quarter of 2003, BC Rail's operating profit was already at $70.5 million."

Page 6 of the 2003 BC Rail annual report (http://www.bcrco.com/2003report.pdf) shows that revenues did increase slightly between 2002 and 2003 even though coal revenue decreased by $13.7 million. Page 16 of the 2003 Annual report shows an operating profit for both 2002 and 2003. Net Income is in the black for 2003, but not 2002 - I don't have time to study the specifics of the write downs (Tumbler Ridge Line etc.) that show BC Rail losing money for a few years in the early 2000's, but funnily enough, the Tumbler Ridge line was re-opened, so perhaps the write-downs were unwarranted (but I'm no accountant).

Not sure if my little paragraph can be considered "fact", but at least you all know where it came from now (should anyone care...)

Evan Symons, Vancouver Esymons (talk) 03:12, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

The difficulty is avoiding WP:Synth and in your personal case WP:OR (you can be excused WP:COI for various reasons, partly because you don't work there anymore). Taking data and analyzing it - on your own - is SYNTH and OR, and it's hard not to, granted...similar information to what you're talking about is in some of the court evidence, and various aspects of it were in fact part of Brian Kenning's testimony - and uncomfortable cross-examination, and also in CIBC World Markets' examinations of teh financial state of the railway, which were prepared as pitch/background for the bidders; some of that is public evidence, the actual testimony I don't think exists in transcript form (why is yet another hanging question to do with that case) though there was fairly good reporting of it "even in the mainstream press" during that week; Kenning at least had a memory, the Preem's Deputy Chief of Staff Martyn Brown had this strange amnesiac affliction and, well, just couldn't remember anything at all, of anything to do with the largest privatization in BC history, over which he partly presided....anyway yes, my god, it's hard to keep from sounding POV, but as elsehwere, this is just a recitation of facts. Point is that there's material out there much the same as what you are saying, and there's similar from Ben Meisner's news service out of Prince George, which as been tracking CN operations since all this began.....it's all out there; and t he cites you've provided are useful; but any of the analysis given that's not citable in another source/verifiable/reliable source, can't be there....and to the original poster in this section, no, that's not POV at all....its' rather moderate in tone, and strictly factual; but needs "refimprove" and stripping of OR and SYNTH.Skookum1 (talk) 05:09, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

route map

here is a chart, all we need to do is fill in details for PGE

Pacific Great Eastern Railway
mi alt. (feet) 0 North Van (Pemberton Ave.) 2 2 Ambleside 1 5 Caufeild 50 Horseshoe Bay Tunnel 2 mi. 11 Horseshoe Bay 100 26 Porteau Cove 2 31 Britannia Beach 2 39 Squamish 2 44 Brackendale 40 46 Cheekeye 200 59 Garibaldi 1,000 74 Alta Lake (Whistler) 2,100 79 Parkhurst 2,200 94 Pemberton 800 99 Mount Currie 800 104 Spetch 1,000 116 Birken 800 120 Devine 800 123 Darcy 800 130 Marne 800 138 Seton Portage 800 142 Shalath 800 154 Craig 800 157 Lillooet 800 173 Glen Fraser 1,200 176 Pavilion 1,500 196 Kelly Lake 3,200 203 Clinton 1,452 214 Chasm 1,262 236 Flying U 3,600 246 Lone Butte 3,500 252 Canim 3,000 273 Lac La Hache 2,000 314 Williams Lake 1,500 358 Alexandria 2,000 363 Australian 1,452 384 Quesnel 1,400 409 Abhau 2,300 225 Strathnaver 1,862 466 Prince George 1,400

Other than the remaining Mexican stations in the list, there's also a tunnel at Fountain, or between Fountain and Glen Fraser, rather, neither of which are listed here yet. About a year ago I threw away a lot of old stuff, including a bunch of standard BC Rail passnger tickets-=slips before they discontinued ordinary passenger service.

"Port Pemberton" seems very obsolete, I don't remember it on the tickets; it would ahve said Mount Currie at that spot. "Parkhurst" I'm not sure where it was, have to check - oh yeah, it' teh old "ghost town" at the north end of Green Lake, opposite Emerald Estates, called "Soo Valley" by the hippie squatters in teh old days (many of whom are now Whistler establishment...."Soo Valley" was a separate stop-name though, at teh highway crossing north of Wedgmont - another name missing from the list. McGuire's and Brandywine should be on there between Garibaldi and Alta Lake, and between Alta Lake and Green Lake there shoudl be Mons.

From Pemberton northwards the station list goes

• Pemberton
• Mount Currie
• Gramson's (No. 10 Downing)
• Poole Creek
• Spetch
• Birken
• Whispering Falls
• Devine
• D'Arcy
• Ponderosa
• McGillivray Falls
• Marne
• Buntain's
• Seton Portage
• South Shalalth ("Bridge River")
• Shalalth
• McNeil's
• Craig Lodge
• Lillooet
• Polley's ("Hop Farm" in real-world speak)
• Fountain
• Glen Fraser
• Pavilion
• Moran
• Arden Forest
• Kelly Lake
• Clinton
• Chasm
• Flying 'U' (before or after Lone Butte, can't remember)

A lot of those are just whistle-stops, where you'd hang the metal sign to get the train to stop; some never get stopped at, e.g. Craig Lodge was a historic stop but the lodge has been gone since the '40s....the Birken-Spetch area ones I may not have in the right order, and I dno't think are complete. I think in the final days there was a Function Junction "station", which would have been between McGuire's and Whistler (Nita Lake/Jordan Lodge), the main Whistler station in the final days - Alta Lake was a different station, and Rainbow Lodge used to be a different stop too. Also there was Green lake, which wasn't tehs ame as Green River, and WEdgemont, and Soo Valley.....

Basically every time the highway crossed the tracks there was a station-name; this is all Spetch and Poole Creek were, although they train did stop there because residents used it.....Skookum1 (talk) 16:00, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Moran was just a siding, ther's nob ody lived there although I think a trail from leon Creek, on the other side of the Fraser, led there. Nobody's lived at McNeil's for years but the stop was still ont h ticket; the old lodge at Marne is gone but it' was still used by local residents, same with Buntain's even though that's a part of Seton Portage....."Bridge River" used to appear on the ticket instead of South Shalalth, which is a new-name and is actually west of Shalalth, not south of it ("south" on the line, but not in compass terms); as you may know the original route did not have Lillooet, but "East Lillooet", and also Polley's wasn't there (I don't recall teh train ever stopping there, but it's a flagstop jsut berfore the new brdige - teh area is "hop Farm"); both Lillooet and Polley's resulted from the post-wartime rerouting of the tracks through town; before that Craig Lodge had been the effective main Lillooet station....Skookum1 (talk) 16:00, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

The property on which the ghost town of Parkhurst stands was, at one time, owned by the Soo Valley Lumber Company (based in North Vancouver). This property included the whole north end of Green Lake and the spot where the cook shack stood - the scene of the infamous group nude photo. Hence the misnomer "Soo Valley" which is actually not in this place at all. The hippies were paying rent, by the way - some nominal fee of $10 a month or such - and not squatting - at least not then.Ttoesen (talk) 05:02, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the waystations Skook I was trying to do it by memory, and never having ridden the Cariboo car past Mt Currie, it was tough. Sounds as if you spent your youth on the "bud weiser'. Now I have to find mileages and elevations. sfs —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.81.76.183 (talk) 18:43, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm older than that, though I did take the Budd Weiser in '96 or sometime since (note spelling, pun on Budd car....and kinda unsuitable for what is mostly a school bus-on-rails from a valley afflicted with acute alcoholism....does it run from D'Arcy now? Only ran from Seton or Shalalth when I was there...I guess there's more western-side people bought in at Seton now, would make sense for a rail ferry from D'Arcy...). Too bad I threw out the old ticket/s/borchures when I left Burnaby...probably on file in a library or museum somewhere; Spetch etc I'm not sure were on the ticket....but they were on the road/rail-crossings signs and "stations" (a post with the green/white metal flag hanging out somehwere, some of them had shelters but that was usually only for "main' stations like Shalalth and Birken....long after Shalalth's old station house was torn down, whenever that was). Oh, anyway, no, the Budd Weiser's basically after my time; in my time it was the Gas Car, the old auto-"ferry" from Shalalth to Lillooet....Skookum1 (talk) 18:54, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Skook, now I have to figure, do I do the Ft Nelson, Disease Lake lines too. they did not run so much. also the PGE did not run thru the Horseshoe Bay tunnel. Oh, to have more books... sfs —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.81.76.183 (talk) 21:29, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't think either of those ever had passenger trains, which is the point of the "stations"; otherwise the relevant items i.e. for freight services, would be major industrial installations along the line....there's the Tumbler Ridge extension too, but again no passenger service....Skookum1 (talk) 21:36, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Seton Portage and McGillivray should not be left off, likewise Craig should be Craig Lodge; and South Shalalth/Bridge River is too historically important to omit; also the Alta Lake station was not the Whistler station, that was at Nita Lake and not sure what the original station there, if there was one, was called; on the last tickets it was just Whistler Southside and Alta Lake remained a separate statino/stop, as also was the case with Mons. What were your criteria for deciding which stations to display?Skookum1 (talk) 17:39, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Messy one, criteria? where I had mention of and mileage for... there are 75 stations or so, most weedy and windblown waysides. this was a start to make it less like the cliffs of chile. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.81.76.183 (talk) 20:33, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

It's just that it shouldn't have gone on the main page until it was finished; there's stations that should be on it simply because ther'es wiki articles on them, e.g. Seton Portage for one but also others; you have no other line-data measurements? i.e. how farup the line any other stations are?The old 1965-era highway map showed a lot of them as you may remember. Stop names don't always conicde with place name, sorme are ticket-shorthand like "Craig" which has always been on regular maps, when it appears, as Craig Lodge or even Craig's Lodge (the Banff Springs of the BCR, despite Rainbow's hype re Alta Lake/Whistler being "the most famous"...with stagehands and tapdancers, yes, but not with the blue palte crowd like Craig Lodge). Unfortunately their guest register and other records were destroyed in teh fire which destroyed the place in the late '40s; not sure what happened ot the records for the Bridge River Hotel, but those and also those from the Bridge River hotels up at hte mines would all be very interesting reading.....Flying U and Green Lake likewise are major "stops"/destinations; Chasm there's an article for, and so on....the old ticket I had didn't have the mile-numbers anyway....there might be old schedules in teh archives or some other online history resource somewhere, Il'l keep an eye openl...Skookum1 (talk) 21:38, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

thanks for the cleanup. I was trying to put logo in the whitespace,nice and big and purdy like. speeking of which, the photos here are piss poor. Next time I go up I'll take some of route and mabye post. Perhaps I'm jaded but for a FA this article is very thin. Never herd of Craigs... Elevations are in feet, railroads are archaic and always use Imperial. Ambleside clicks to Cumbria btw. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.81.76.183 (talk) 22:32, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Big and purdy won't last, someone will always bring it in-line with WP:MOS. Ambleside and Caulfield (-feild?) I wans't certain of, there's an Ambleside, West Vancouver article for sure, not sure ablout Caulfeidl. I agree that for FA the article is thin, particularly re history and engineering notes (Deep Creek Trestle, Gibbs Creek Trestle, Seton Lake complications. Evelations are still wrong in imperial; Lillooet's elevation is only 810' or so, Seton Lake something like 810' or 800' and Anderson's only 50' high (hence Marne and D'Arcy/Devine would be in teh same range).Skookum1 (talk) 22:59, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Give me purdy or give me death. I fixed the elevs. guestimating when I put em in. the thing is adequate for now and can be polished as need be. There is much missing from the history as you say with the engineering. Much politics, grief, overspending, etc etc. Ramsey spells it out as does Garden. cheers sfs —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.81.76.183 (talk) 05:24, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

The elevations may be correct but, unfortunately, elevations are sometimes in metres, sometimes in feet, and not specified. Just note there is nowhere on the line where the tracks climb to 3,500m Ttoesen (talk) 05:02, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

SFS, can you find the elevevation/distance for Moran, and for Arden Forest? Once you add them (they're in between Pavilion and Kelly Lake) I'll do little articles on them, though I don't know enough about ARden Forest; but it['s liek anywhyere through there; notable because of who owned it and named it. Moran's different;m ajor siding and ongoing reapir site on the railway, site of that one crash a eyar or two ago, also the top of the Leon Creek trail, from some unknown crossing of the Fraser far below (Leon Creek's on the other side; this was its only access to the outside world oteh than over the mountains...or the Pavilion or Big Bar Ferries I guess...point was that even though there's nothing at Moran, and no one'se ever lived there, it's notable; especially because of hte unbuilgt Moran Dam proposal, which I've been too shy of the topic to want to get into writing (like Hat Creek...).Skookum1 (talk) 01:36, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Messy 1, I do not have the numbers at my fingers. I do not have Garden's book, wish I did. though I'll see about getting them. Surely you mean Ardenne, WW! battles and Guderian's victory —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.81.76.183 (talk) 02:28, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Never occured to me that Arden Forest might be "Ardennes"....I'll see if that's in BCGNIS; Arden Forest is how folks I knew in Pavilion referred to it, and the PGE conductor too....Skookum1 (talk) 16:11, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

there is no two mile tunnels! and the PGE ended at NEWPORT which is what Squamish was called... HA —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.80.121.10 (talk) 00:05, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes, and no. An attempt was made to name it Newport, but it didn't stick as the long-established name was Squamish; see here.Skookum1 (talk) 02:23, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

distance from Lillooet to Moran

The spill happened north of Pavilion, not at Pavilion. I'm unsure of the track distance between Pavilion station and the Moran "station" (flagstop, with nothing there but a side-track for speeders), and maybe a trail to/from somewhere..... Moran has no benchland, either; the benchland in that cses is the ranchland much higher up ;the bank is sand and gravel; I was going to say "talus" but it's not really a talus as not formed that way; scree definitely......maybe that's the better term.....also, though probably not much different, the usual mileage cited from Lillooet to Pavilion varies between highway and railway, would be better to have track-milage specifics if available; used to be on timetables but none are evident in the refs so far....Skookum1 (talk) 16:11, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Gibbx Creek Trestle and derailment

I'm not sure of the year anymore, and will come back with pics; this should be mentioned in the article not just because of the derailment but because at the time it was the largest trestle on the line (alter surpassed, I think, by the Deep Creek Trestle, which also needs an article).Skookum1 (talk) 16:11, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Railway lodges

Though Rainbow Lodge gets all the press/hype, there were many of these along the line, starting at Cheekeye (where the lodge buildings still, I think, stand) then at Garibaldi. I'll come up with a list; I don't have a copy of the book about the Murrays but I know George Murray undertook to promote these lodges, even getting some of them built, though many were started earlier than his tenure as local MLA; Craig Lodge it's a pity there's little material on as it was a "blue plate" type resort....north of Lillooet there was only the Flying U. I think, but I'm not sure, that the old Bridge River Hotel at Shalalth may have been owned by the railway, or by one of its major shareholders. Also notable in the tourism/passenger history is the old club car named "Bridge River", which was owned/chartered by Ben....Ben something...who was one of the main promoters of the Bralorne mine; a luxury club car with pool table, bar etc it was used to shuttle VIPs to/from Shalalth to get to the Bridge River Mines....also the old observation cars should be mentioned, as well as the use of the route today by the Rocky MountaineerSkookum1 (talk) 16:11, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Re Passenger service controversy

there should be more here on the discontinuation of passenger service and the controversy and economic crisis it caused for the towns and communities along the route; as with other crown-era operations, there are allegations that it was let to deliberately deterioriate in order to justify privatization, and in the same week the government refused to cover the $30 million that would keep paseenger service to towns along the route, $600 million was announced to build the RAV line to Richmond.....when this article is missing this kind of history, it can never properly be ready for FA (admittedly the RAV comparison it a bit of synthesis, but it's also to be found in op-ed coverage of the controversy).Skookum1 (talk) 16:11, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Dease Lake Extension

Both WAC and Davey Barrett considered this the first leg in a railway to Alaska, and Barrett was all over the idea of building it to bypass Alaskan North Slope oil overland instead of shipping it down the BC Coast. Somewhere else, also, I saw referencx to Minaret being the end of the track, this in relation to the North American Supercorridor revival of the railway-to-Alaska idea (as well as a Fort Nelson-Watson Lake/Whitehorse line).Skookum1 (talk) 16:11, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

railway blockades

The most infamous of these was the blockade at Seton Portage during the Oka Crisis (see Seton Portage), but there were others farther up-line and at least once at Mt Currie.Skookum1 (talk) 16:11, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

"Seton Lake eats locomotives" and other stuff

I have some pics in an email box somewhere that show crews fishing locomotives up out of Seton Lake in the area of the McNeil's bluffs ,the cliff-side stretch near the Lillooet end of Seton Lake. There have bee numerous into-the-drink episodes here, and some locomotives remain at the bottom of the lake, as it's so deep (some were never found). Also along this stretch, above the rail line, are vestiages of teh old Lillooet Cattle Trail. Also mentioned should be the point that in the Garibaldi-Pemberton stretch, or even Cheekeye-Garibaldi, the trackbed was laid down on portions of the route of the Lillooet Cattle Trail, aka the Pemberton Trail....some portions of which remain off-track in the McGuire's area....Skookum1 (talk) 16:11, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Lillooet bridges

there should be some account of the re-routing of the track at Lillooet; until WWII it had crossed the river south of town and the station at East Lillooet was a few km of dusty, hot wagon road via the old suspension bridge; with post-war rebuilding the line was rerouted through town, eradicating what was left of Chinatown and also leading to the expansion of the town's residential/commercial area southwards to the location of the new station; there are good BC Archives and VPL pictures of the building of the new rail bridge that can be used (PD). Prior to that re-routing, most Lillooet-bound passengers got off at Craig Lodge and took a wagon into town from there on the last leg of teh Douglas Road.Skookum1 (talk) 16:11, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Lede is incorrect

, was a railway that operated in the Canadian province of British Columbia between 1912 and 2004. I

This needs rewriting; BC Rail still exists, still has a board of directors, and still has 40km of track, though no rolling stock; this article needs a major overhaul anyway, but this railway should be written about in hte present tense, not the past tense. Technically the railbed itself is also only leased to CN, or so the government claims (a 990 year lease is only theoretical, as no legal system on the planet is that old - the Magna Carta is in fact younger).Skookum1 (talk) 16:33, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

Lede revised - time for the truth

Some will complain, maybe, that all of this addition is POV, but it's the straight goods; cites forthcoming for each item, and more than one cite, too. Further information also forthcoming on the value of the deal, due to the $400-750 million tax indemnity built into the sale, the $1 transfer of real estate assets possible, and otehr matters which raise the question of what the value of the deal to the taxpayer is. The current Minister of Transportation's lying in the legislature this week (see [http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2010/03/29/GordonBCRail/ this Tyee summary of the railway's profitability prior to sale, which the Minister was explicitly lying about) is an example of why government sources, even ministry sources, can't be trusted and are inherently POV; so the former sentence that said the railway was politically controversial because of its debts was just too soft-toned to stand any further, given the technical details of that debt as outlined in that article. Also the wording taht said the railway was sold; no, no, no, as is widely known it's a lease, adn a highly questionable one of unknown value; though CIBC world markets was explicit about the value of the assets, including profitability, the government, which had promised not to sell the railway, has since told untruth after untruth after untruth, and when confronted about them, said "the matter is before the courts". Actually only the OmniTRAX/Roberts Bank deal is before the courts, though the defence in the Basi-Virk-Basi case has said over and over that the charges their clients face were due to actions undertaken at the direction of their political bosses, i.e. the Premier, the Finance Minister, the Transportation Minister (different ministers than today) and that the entire "sale" of BC Rail was rigged from the start (something that, as I put in the article, Canadian Pacific and also Burlington Northern have said) and they were only doing as they were told. I can't comment much further about that for now because I'm on Canadian soil and the judge in the BAsi-Virk-Basi case has placed a publication ban on evidence and any account of defence pleadings; even though I"m in Nova Scotia I could be jailed for giving details of the case, and actually in the previous few sentences I've done exactly that. However, editors in other countries who familiarize themselves with the story can still add to this page or the Legislature Raids page, or even create a HMTQ v. Basi, Virk, Basi article (which is needed) Matters presented before the jury, once it's chosen and called, can be reported here by Canadians, however. The involvement of an illegal lobbyist working for both sides in the transaction is also of issue, but due to the power and stature of that psuedo-lobbyist he was able to claim "third party" status and prevent certain information from being presented as evidence; a secret witness has also been called in the case, which only Crown and the judge (and not defence, and maybe not even the jury) will be able to hear. There is sufficient material for a separate Sale of BC Rail Scandal article to be compiled, but all Wikipedians currently aware of these matters (including me) feel more than a bit daunted by the complexity and scale, and the legal risks, of writing much about it. I'vee done the best I can in the just-now changes to correct the misinformation that was provided in as NPOV fashion as possible. But this party ain't over, not by a long shot....there are also items in the Tyee article which can be added to other-decades sections, such as the forgiveness of debts by WAC and Bill Bennett and othe matters of financing history.....Skookum1 (talk) 02:25, 30 March 2010 (UTC)

But that's way to long for a lead. eg "Notably, as example, the Social Credit governments of WAC Bennett and his son Bill Bennett forgave the railways..." is article content not lead. Needs shortening into concise form.Shortfatlad (talk) 21:13, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

It also gives way too much emphasis to "the scandal" compared to other aspects of the railways history, operations, workforce, etc etc. Please keep the info. but slim the lead/Shortfatlad (talk) 21:38, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

The lead is a bit too long, but don't cut it down more than by a third. I agree, the lead should probably only have a sentence or two on the sale, and not more than one on the scandal; in the whole (being Canada's third-largest railway etc) the scandal is only a small aspect of the article, the railway and the company's history. In the body, perhaps a one- or two-paragraph section would be about right, at most. If you feel like writing a lot about the scandal, feel free to start a separate article on it; it is surely an important and encyclopedic issue (as long as you avoid POV). Arsenikk ^(talk) 21:50, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

[post-editconflit]That particular passage was inserted, after the rest of the ramble was largely written, to address the previous oversimplification that the railway's debts had often been the subject of political debate; it's more like the bookkeeping was often the subject of debate, mostly in the House; keeping the railway running was more the public concern that the House debates were a symptom of, as public ownership of the railway was a deliberate subsidy of development and economic sustainability for the Northern and Central Interior towns/livelihoods; this is the essence, also, of the debate over what's wrong with CN ownership as well as what's wrong with how CN got control of it. I'd welcoming a shortening into something more concise; but less evasive than what would be found on the railway's own website (which is technically a COI site, but also a heavily spin-doctored source); I note on an earlier set of edits I expanded later content sections with some of the same points, where also some of hte citations are needed; I'll see if I can revise/condense what I've done in the lede; I was in a fit of pique, admittedly, when I wrote it; and I'm known for being prolix. Would you care to suggest a replacement passage and we can work on it here?Skookum1 (talk) 22:03, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with the situation and it would take me a while to get up to speed - it seems that the actual company has become a bit of a 'political pawn' or political arguing point - maybe the lead should say just that. I would recommend moving the long text to a section (with whatever improvments) within the article, and working from there. And just state that there is/was a court case ongoing about corruption surrounding the sale.

It would help if the article could explain very briefly in the lead how the company is generally viewed from a canadian point of view (with a view to a non-canadian or non-expert audience).

I really can't get a grasp on what the situation is as it stands - the lead "throws me in at the deep end".Shortfatlad (talk) 22:22, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Re "it seems that the actual company has become a bit of a 'political pawn' or political arguing point" - It always has been (even before nationalization in 1917); it is, in fact, the nature of a crown corporation (others that are/were political pawns are ICBC, BC Hydro, BC Ferries, to name the largest). And re the Canadian/non-Canadian dichotomy/perspective I agree and sorry for the deep end of the pool like that; the paradigm is really British Columbian/non-British Columbian as there really is no other equivalent in other Canadian political environments, alhtough there are other Crown-owned railways (CN, ironically, used to be the largest, but it was federal-owned); but its political and economic significance in BC, which is also partly symbolic, does need to be addressed for the benefit of "outsiders" (meaning anyone from Alberta eastwards as well as outside of Canada....). Maybe better in the lede would be a description of its geographic/economic reach and a short statement of it having been very politically important as well as economically crucial (most towns in northern BC would have been ghost towns decades ago if not for the railway's continued operation by dint of government support, and some would not have come into existence at all). Let me see what I can come up with, and of what I've added what I can add into later sections.....Skookum1 (talk) 22:47, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

And please note, it was not a SALE, not technically anyway, and (for now) the actual corporation continues to exist, though it consists mostly of only bloated executive salaries....Skookum1 (talk) 22:49, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

Yes (the fog clears a little) as a rough plan for the intro I'd suggest

• Say what it is - ie a canadian rail company
  • Note it's size, date of birth, and geographical extent, - try to give some "tonnage or mile" figure that allows comparison with other NA rail companys.
• Next paragraph. State key dates after inception - eg major mergers, acquisitions, changes of ownership, famous trains, any other specials such as monumental stations etc. If it is historical notable in the creation of the nation (as other NA railroads were) also say that here.
• Next paragraph. state that it is a politically/economically important company. Here is a good place to mention profitability/subsidies over key periods.
  • (also any other workforce/enviromental good or bad points if notable and relevant)
  • (also any key innovations - possibly the date of transistion from steam to diesel also mentioned somewhere before here?)
• Then this leads to the corruption issue. As this appears to be ongoing I would state that there is an ongoing issue with this topic, and not attempt to cover it further in the lead, but, give a full description in this (and/or other) articles(s).
  • But note the key points. Comment if it is a real political scandal then this is not the place to even attempt to cover it.. at the very least there is BC Legislature Raids to link to from the intro: which should give a reader an idea that there is a deeper issue - even if it is not covered very well (the bigger picture) in the article.
    • Once the corruption etc 'thing' has been settled (if ever) then it will be a lot easier to write. ie if the issue is ongoing then note that and don't attempt closure in the lead - it's impossible!

BNSF seems a fairly good example of an intro - I would recommend using that as a template - except where BNSF mentions Warren Buffet - this article will have a paragraph about the political issues. Shortfatlad (talk) 23:07, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

I don't quite get what you mean about Warren Buffet - that there is no clear primary owner to mention? Well, one side of that is the stat that a majority percentage of the railway, though it's registered as a Canadian company, is owned by American shareholders, the bulk of them in Texas; and Bill Gates has had around something like 23% of it since buying in after "privatization" (the 990-year lease). A name that certainly should be there, though, is CEO (pres?) David McLean, also the owner of Vancouver Film Studios and lots else....and, er, close to the Premier and also the Liberal Party....like other names relating to this scandal/sale, it's dicey to say much more without being POV/BLP etc....McLean is from an old VAncouver family, I'm not certain if there's a connection to the first Vancouver Mayor McLean, or perhaps more likely to that of Premier McLean (two different families, as I've found out so far, though obviously distant cousins/clansmen).Skookum1 (talk) 04:58, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

lede follow-up

I'm sorry I haven't had a chance to pare down that lede, perhaps someone else has by now (?), or move it to a lower section of the article....and yes, it could well be just as brief a paragraph as is possible, given the manifold complications of the situation; as there is now a very strong need for an article called BC Rail Scandal, which is now even found in the mainstream press though, like so much else about this, originating in blogspace. It's not just the BC Rail corruption trial, which is only part of it (HMTQ vs. Basi, Virk, Basi (that's the formal name, but there could/would also be a redirect for a common usage would be the Basi-Virk Trial). This is because the scandal is much, much wider than just the trial and its circumstances alone; currently what's out there is BC Legislature Raids but the Basi-Virk proceedings, and their unfolding in the years of preliminary hearings prior to the start of the actual trial, are really a different topic thn the raids article should be about; lots to do with the preliminaries to the trial would need to be there, the warrants, the series of special prosecutor appointments that led to the raid, the background to the drug investigation, launched by two murders, one in LA, the other in front of Gotham Restaurant on Seymour in downtown Vancouver (in broad daylight); a related trial is HMTQ vs. Bains, Mr. Bains being the "Mr. Big" on Vancouver Island who rose to power in the wake of those murders, and was the principal subject of the investigation that led to Dave Basi's offices; there's also HTMQ vs. Basin, Young, which is the ALR scandal in Sooke, which was in camera while the BVB (Basi, Virk Basi) proceedings were underway. Point about the ledge raids article, to underscore it, is that the raids themselves are a different topic from the preliminary hearings and trial (HMTQ v BVB), and the larger scandal - so difficult to summarize and I've shied away from the work myself because of the complexity/difficulty and also, for a long time, a court ban on publication of any kind (even though Wikipedia's servers are in the US, a Canadian could have been charged with contempt for expanding the article in various ways and on certain bits of evidence and/or news). Clearly all that doesn't belong here; a short paragraph would never fully suffice....see next section(s).Skookum1 (talk) 04:58, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Problem in lede with dates

This has been in need of fixing for a while, and relates to the above matters, though it's a technical wording issue:

BC Rail (reporting mark BCOL), known as the British Columbia Railway between 1972 and 1984 and as the Pacific Great Eastern Railway (PGE) before 1972, was a railway that operated in the Canadian province of British Columbia between 1912 and 2004.

2004 was when the lease/transfer to CN of the main line happened; BCR did not cease to exist and still had 40km of track leading to the Roberts Bank Superport; this was the line that OmniTRAX was set up to get when the police informed the solicitor-general (Rich Colmena) that the sale was tainted by the bribery, money laundering and influence peddling charges on Basi and Virk, based on informations given to the police by Erik Bornmann in the course of his confession/amnesty deal; as a result of that information, Coleman cancelled the sale (illegal contracts are null and void, which is also the principle behind the mounting calls for a public inquiry into the entire BC Rail situation). So the BCR stayed in operation, with a sizeable executive budget but no other employees, just track, no rolling stock. On that board was, I believe, Brian Kenning, who also was on the Campbell-appointed committee which recommended the railway be sold and was teh second witness in the Basi-Virk trial before its sudden denouement; he was the one that was away at a birthday party in Ontario, resulting in (yet another) adjournment when the trial was supposed to resume; in that breathing space the deal was cut etc. Now, I'm really really trying just to give a rundown on events and not be POV here; my point for the moment is that the opening lede dates should account for 2004-2010 for the continued operation of the company - it did not cease to exist, and continued operating and with CEOs etc, until 2010, when the management of that line has been subsumed into a department of a branch of the Ministry of Transportation (they can't sell it, as they, um, promised not to sell BC Rail....the CN thing is a "lease"). So given my customary wordiness I'm hoping someone else can coin a short phrase about the continuation fo the railway, which "was a railway in British Columbia until 2010", not until 2004, with the company's actual official extirpation into a department of a branch of a ministry in 2010; I don't have the date handy, but in the course of the last several months BC Rail, as a company, was finally extinguished. Not in 2004. Deterioration of northern lines is an issue, somewhat related to the BC Rail Scandal and also to the following section; CN is largely ignoring the Tumbler Ridge and Mackenzie-Pine Pass lines and traffic on the old mainline has greatly dwindled as the CNR uses its network to mostly funnel lumber, for example, via McBridge-Blue River instead of from PG to North Vancouver directly; that doesn't have to be in the lede, but should be noted (it's very citable; a certain independent news services in northern BC - not a blog - by Ben Meisner, has been tracking CN since it took over. It's not stuff you'll find in the Sun or Province or Globe though....Anyway could somebody please fix that opening more simply than I am capable of doing succinctly; it's incorrect at the moment.Skookum1 (talk) 04:58, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Northern lines and Port of Prince Rupert

This, like so much else, is a complicated situation and I've only just briefly read about it, partly via the aforementioned Ben Meisner; I've mentioned the Tumbler Ridge and old Peace River mainline (Mackenzie-Pine Pass) but the Dease Lake Extension, on the other hand, is being revived, partly to serve the new mineral developments in teh Spatsizi Plateau area/Skeena Headwaters, but also with an eye to its originally-intended extension all the way to Alaska (rail lines can carry more oil than pipelines and tankers can....), and it's pretty widely perceived that this will be the Canadian leg of the Alaska Railroad, though others have talked about Whitehorse-Fort Nelson-Fort St. John; I think it's the Mosque railway point where operations or improvements have resumed as far as (at the Mosque River's confluence with the Skeena); that's a lot closer to Alaska than Fort Nelson is, and that route also has latitude for access by spurs or connecting roads to the Alaska Panhandle cities (though with bizarre geotechnical difficulties and environtal-protection obstacles in all three cases of Ketchikan, Wrangell and Juneau). Essentially CN's management and known future plans for the northern lines, and its treatment of the original mainline and the Tumbler Ridge spur, are all citeable material; I'm not a WP:Trains person and clearly ahve different reasons to know about all this than someone in WP:Companies or, say, WP:Environment, though for those interessted I can point you at various sources, a few come to mind but I won't list them just now, I know this has been long; but I hope food for thought; point is now, also, that BC Rail has ceased to existed, but CN operations in BC are a signficant topic, a subarticle covering that is needed CN in British Columbia is a little vague (they're not "Canadian National" anymore, the official name SFAIK is CN, and not even CNR); an equivalent articles is Canadian Pacific Railway in British Columbia, though that's much-underwritten as of yet, and will be more old-historical in context for the most part; this is the opposite; it's changes in railway service/infrastructure in northern British Columbia since 2004.Skookum1 (talk) 04:58, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

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