HAY RIVER, Northwest Territories — Canadian National Railway has begun the process of ending service to Hay River, which currently holds the distinction of being the northernmost point connected to the North American rail network.
Cabin Radio reports the railroad filed in May to discontinue service on its Meander River Subdivision between mileposts 354 and 376, most of the route between Hay River and Enterprise, NWT, some 40 kilometers (25 miles) to the southwest. Much of the track between the two communities was damaged in a wildfire last year.
A CN representative said in an email to Cabin Radio that the decision came after “thoughtful engagement with local stakeholders and customers.” The email also said that after last year’s fires, the railroad had reallocated resources to restore service to Enterprise “to meet customer commitments” and that its engagement with customers and a cost analysis “revealed that the costs of repair for the lines were not proportional to the volume commitments of customers in the region.”
But the decision raises concerns about supply-chain issues for the remote communities of the Northwest Territories, the territories’ infrastructure minister, Caroline Wawzonek, told the CBC.
“It has a tremendous effect on really some of the most vulnerable Indigenous communities in the North,” Loss of the rail line will require trucking cargo from Enterprise to fill a link in the current rail-and-barge chain, and will lead to higher supply costs. A six-hour trip by truck from Hay River will become an 80-hour trip from Enterprise, she said.
Abandoning the line will require a three-year process. After a year, CN can attempt to sell the segment, but Wawzonek said a territorial government purchase “isn’t an appropriate use of tax dollars.” Similarly, the government said it is not willing to provide the $15 million needed for repairs. (Cabin Radio notes that the territorial government has an annual revenue of about C$2.5 billion compared to the railroad’s C$17 billion.)
A former Hay River mayor who owns a rail yard in Enterprise that is a transloading hub, and will gain even greater significance, says the move may simply reflect changes that have already begun and will accelerate if the proposed Mackenzie Valley Highway, an all-weather road in the region, is built.
The former mayor, Brad Mapes, told Cabin Radio, “The logistics of the North has changed, and it’s only going to change. … As the Mackenzie Valley Highway goes, the less and less barging is going to happen.” Historically, fuel and other cargo were delivered by train to Hay River, then moved by truck to Yellowknife or by barge on the Great Slave Lake to other communities.
The highway, however, does not have yet have funding or a timeline for construction. And this summer, the normal barge service has been disrupted by low water levels on the Mackenzie River, meaning much of the usual cargo traffic is being brought in by air, a far more costly operation.
Hay River is, by straight-line distance, some 510 miles north of Edmonton, Alberta. It is some 193 miles from the southern end of the Meander River Sub, in High Level, Alta.
Paragraph five reads,
She said, A six-hour trip by truck from Hay River will become an 80-hour trip from Enterprise.
A couple of sentences must be missing, not sure how losing train service can equate to a 74hr. difference in travel time.
It seems that this Hay River line could be a link to Alaska with the Alberta-Alaska Railway Development Corp., (A2A), project. That should make this CN branch cost effective.