the broken typewriter

A coincidental text message from a Fort St. John resident led to a discussion about blocked railway crossings during a Canadian National Railway representative’s Rail Safety Week presentation and proclamation request.

CN Railway’s Transportation Manager, Shawn Lussier, asked Council to proclaim September 15 – 21 as Rail Safety Week in Fort St. John, which aims to draw attention to the need for public caution on and around tracks and crossings to prevent avoidable injuries and deaths.

In 2024, there were 261 railway crossing and trespassing incidents in Canada, which led to 68 avoidable fatalities and 58 avoidable serious injuries, according to a presentation given to Fort St. John City Council at its September 8 regular meeting.

For two decades, CN has partnered with Operation Lifesaver Canada (OL) to raise public awareness about the dangers surrounding railway crossing and trespassing on railway property, Lussier told Council.

“Through collaborative efforts and community engagement, we strive to foster a culture of rail safety and prevent accidents across our network,” he said. “By looking out for each other and working together, we can help keep our communities safe and prevent injuries and fatalities on and near the railway property.”

Councillor Gord Klassen relayed a concern from a resident about the blocking of 100 Avenue at the railway crossing with a parked train, a concern he had coincidentally just received via text message.

The resident complained that it was blocked when school was letting out for the day, and to pick up their child from school, they had to go all the way around via Swanson Lumber Road after waiting for 10 minutes for the crossing to be cleared. When they returned that way as they headed home, the train was still blocking the road approximately 30 minutes after first arriving at the blocked crossing.

“Their question, their frustration, is how long are the trains able to block traffic, and there are times of day when it’s maybe not ideal for trains to be blocking the road,” Klassen said.

The problem, Lussier explained, is that is a longer train and unfortunately the Fort St. John rail yard is not big enough for such a long train, of up to 120 cars.

“We’re trying to get longer tracks so we don’t have to do those double overs,” he said.

“What happens is we’ll take two tracks and double them together – so the first one will pull up and they’ll block the crossing, then they’ll back up, hook it all up and put air to it, so it does take a little time.”

There is a rule that they can’t be stopped longer than five minutes, but as long as they’re moving, Transport Canada does allow them to block a crossing.

“We can cut the crossing if there’s an emergency vehicle or something, but for just the general traffic, it’s unfortunately something that has to be done. We don’t have yard tracks that are long enough to support 120-car trains.”

In response to further questions from Council, Lussier said that among CN’s proactive safety measures, the company has installed more cameras at certain crossings that are more dangerous, as well as more cameras overall. With the tracks in Taylor near the Motorcross Track, Lussier says they’ve had concerns about kids crossing the tracks and “playing chicken” with the trains. CN Police will come up from Prince George to monitor situations like that.

CN Police, along with OL representatives have talked to schools about why playing on or around train tracks is a dangerous practice.

“They’ll go to certain schools; they’ll talk to the students at the school and have information sessions to explain why it’s not an ideal thing to do.”