There was a major VIA Rail announcement this afternoon at 3:30 PM Atlantic time. "Canada's New Government" announced they will be investing $691.9 million in VIA Rail over the next five years. $175.9 million will go toward "transitional operational costs" and $516 million will go toward capital projects.
If this sounds very familiar, then-Transport Minister David Collenette announced the same package back on October 24, 2003. His announcement was a five year investment package valued at $692.5 million. Transport 2000 article.
Today's funding is new funding, not included in the federal budget.
The announcement was very short on details but upgrading of the existing locomotives was mentioned, presumably to refit the entire fleet of F40PH-2 locomotives in the same way 6400 was upgraded.
I don't know how much this will affect Atlantic Canada, if at all. If this is anything like the 2003 proposal, it will benefit the Montreal-Toronto Corridor most of all.
All in all, good news, long overdue.
UPDATE: Official announcement
No comments:
Post a Comment