CN Rail set for another summer of large investment into Northern rail infrastructure

They'll be working on the railway for much of the summer of 2020, with CN Rail announcing an expansive infrastructure investment into its Northern corridor line between Prince Rupert to Prince George and beyond.

In an information update from the railway on Monday, CN provided a glimpse at some of the projects that have the green light for this summer from their 445 million dollar investment into British Columbia.

“We take our essential role in the North American economy seriously and these investments in British Columbia are a key part of our strategy to support growth. The Company remains committed to help enable supply chains that fuel British Columbia’s growth as we are a critical part of getting everyday goods to markets and consumers. Safety is a core value at CN and by investing in the maintenance and expansion of our track and capacity, we are providing customers with a safe and reliable solution at a time when fluid supply chains are more critical than ever.” - James Thompson, Vice-President, Western Region at CN

Much of the work for this summer is designed to increase access to the two major ports of the West Coast at Prince Rupert and Vancouver.

The work will feature a number of expansion projects that will add track in yards to handle growing traffic, new sidings as well as continued investments in multi-year initiatives to increase capacity at the Port of Vancouver and at the Port of Prince Rupert in collaboration with the Government of Canada, the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority, and the Prince Rupert Port Authority.

The investment program also includes:

Building new sidings on the Edmonton to Prince Rupert corridor to increase capacity for growing demand.
Replacement of more than 100 miles of rail Installation of over 209,000 new railroad ties Installation of over 46,000 concrete ties
Rebuilds of 22 road crossing surfaces
Maintenance work on bridges, culverts, signal systems, and other track infrastructure

You can review the full scope of the announcement from the CN announcement here.

Earlier this month, as part of their Annual Public Meeting,  the Port of Prince Rupert put some focus on the work of their partners at CN and the local projects that are set to get underway, including the railway's plans for the Zanardi bridge and other port related infrastructure.

For more notes on CN Rail in the Northwest see our archive page here.