The Fraser and Thompson River Canyons: One of the Heaviest Corridors in North America

[SD70Dude]

A few additional comments:

CN's coal trains in the area are normally at least 152 cars (8000+ feet), although shorter trains are occasionally run.  Currently only Teck's Cardinal River mine at Luscar, AB (of recent runaway train fame) ships coal on CN to Vancouver, and this is a minor amount of their total production, most of it goes to Prince Rupert.  The other mines CN serves have either closed or switched entirely to Prince Rupert.  CP also interchanges some coal trains to CN at Kamloops, and some of those go to Prince Rupert. 

I believe the 150ish car coal train size is due to the track layout at one of the Vancouver ports, but am not sure.  Same goes for the potash trains.  CN runs much longer coal trains (170 to 220 cars) from the two Alberta Coal Branch mines to Prince Rupert, and the Saskatchewan-Saint John, NB potash trains regularly exceed 200 cars.

The traffic handled by the Prince George-Vancouver mixed freights is what formerly ran on BC Rail before the CN takeover.

Among other things CN uses the Kamloops yard to pre-block traffic for the various Vancouver terminals, including entire trains that will be interchanged to CP at Coquitlam. 

[ADRIAN BALLAM]

 

Hello railfan geniuses,

A discussion that I have never seen (and would like to) in Trains Magazine is the high tonnage of traffic through the Fraser and Thompson River Canyons in British Columbia. A background on the corridor includes the following:

• The corridor stretches from Kamloops to Mission, BC, around 350 kilometres (200 miles), along the Thompson River to Lytton and then the Fraser River to Mission.
• The two railroads that traverse the canyons are the Canadian National Railway (CN) and Canadian Pacific Railway (CP).
• CN's subdivisions are Ashcroft from Kamloops to Boston Bar; and Yale from Boston Bar to Surrey.
• CP's subdivisions are Thompson from Kamloops to North Bend; and Cascade from North Bend to Vancouver.
• There are upwards of 60 daily trains, evenly split between the railroads, and consisting of intermodal, merchandise, grain, coal, potash, sulphur, and oil.
• VIA Rail and Rocky Mountaineer are the passenger services through the canyons.
• Both railroads have significant classification yards in Kamloops, where some trains are reclassified; CN's yard is the bigger of the two.
• It is an integral corridor that connects the Port of Metro Vancouver with the rest of Canada along with the Midwestern USA.
• It is directional run for around 250 kilometres (150 miles), from Basque (west of the town of Ashcroft) to Mission. CN is used for westbound trains and CP is used for eastbound trains.

 

In watching trains in this corridor for many years, I believe that it could be a contender for being the heaviest in terms of tonnage of any corridor in North America. Despite other corridors seeing more than the 60 freights daily, the trains here are long and heavy. The reasons broken down are:

1. CN’s trains are exceptionally long, with the majority now exceeding 10,000 feet in length and some being as long as 15,000 feet. These long trains include intermodal, manifest, and grain. In recent years, grain trains have exceeded 12,000 feet (or 200 cars), with two units at the front and one or two mid-train DPU’s. Intermodal trains can been extremely long, upwards of 270 cars. Some mixed freights consist of huge hauls of lumber coming from northern BC, and can be as long as 12,000 feet with support of a DPU. Potash trains are uniformly 170 cars (or 8,500 feet) and coal trains, while rare, usually an average of 7,600 feet.
2. CP’s trains tend to be heavy on bulk commodities. CP runs numerous coal trains a day that are uniformly 152 cars with DPU setup of either 1x1x1 or 2x1x1. The railroad also runs many grain and potash trains (the latter the same length of CN), along with intermodal and sulphur. Though CP trains may not be as long as CN, they are quite frequent.

 

When looking at other corridors in North America that consist of at least two railroads, the ones that come to mind are:

• The Columbia Gorge (Oregon/Washington): though there are upwards of 60 trains daily (25-35 for BNSF and around 25 for UP), this corridor does not have the same amount of tonnage as the Fraser/Thompson Canyons. The trains are much, much shorter and less heavy. I have never seen a train that was 12,000 feet (in person or on video) through the Columbia Gorge, most likely due to siding constraints. There are no sulphur trains, and not as many coal trains (very few, if any, on UP).
• Cajon Pass (California): While it certainly exceeds the Fraser/Thompson Canyon’s train count at around 90 daily trains, there are very few (if any) coal trains, and no potash or sulphur trains. BNSF and UP are primarily intermodal, with some mixed, grain, autorack, and ethanol trains. Trains of 12,000 feet are nowhere near as predominant as they are through the Canyon’s.
• BNSF Transcon (Anywhere): While portions of this mainline see upwards of 90 daily trains, the vast majority are intermodal, with nowhere near as much in terms of bulk commodities as what goes through the Fraser/Thompson Canyons.
• Berea (Ohio): This one might match in terms of tonnage as there are around 110 trains daily. However, while there are incredibly long trains, there are also incredibly short trains and high amount of intermodal trains. Bulk commodities do include a wide range of commodities, including coal, grain, and oil, but these trains are not as long as what goes through the Canyon’s.

There are two corridors that could be ahead of the Fraser/Thompson Canyons:

• UP’s Overland Route: While busy in general between Salt Lake City and Chicago, the busiest portion is from Bailey Junction to Gibbon Junction in Nebraska. There are around 110 trains a day, which includes nearly 50 that are coal. A number of these coal trains are comparable in size to CP’s coal trains in the Fraser/Thompson River Canyons. There are some exceptionally long trains for manifest and soda ash. Intermodal lengths vary but few exceed 12,000 feet.
• The Powder River Basin (Wyoming): The BNSF/UP Joint Line in Wyoming sees 80 to 100 coal trains per day. While there is very little variety in terms of traffic, coal is a very heavy commodity and with this level of frequency, this may exceed the tonnage volumes that travel through the Canyon’s.

In presenting this analysis to you railfans, I would like to hear your comments on busy corridors, especially those from the Midwestern and Eastern USA. Please let me know your thoughts.

ADRIAN C. BALLAM