Western Railroad Discussion > Question About BNSF Line to Vancouver, BC

Good Morning:

How many trains per day does BNSF run between Seattle, WA and Vancouver, BC? Does the BNSF still dispatch the Canadian portion of this route, or was this also turned over to the CN a couple years ago?

Thank you in advance.

About 2-3 each way. CN dispatches.

BNSF dispatches the line up to the Fraser River bridge at New Westminter, BC. It's OCS (similar to track warrants) from the USA/Canada border to Colebrook and CTC North of that. There are about two to three manifests a day that go North of Colebrook plus both loaded and empty coal trains going to and from Roberts Bank that use the BC Rail trackage from Colebrook. Amtrak also runs one train North and one train South each day.

Any word or rumor when the second Amtrak Cascades will be added to the route?

It depends. It's been a year or so since I've lived there, but here's the rundown as I remember it (subject to much error):
Typically north of Bellingham you'd see each way at least:

1 Cascades
1 Cherry Point Turn
1 Ferndale Turn
New Westminster-Everett way freight
At least two maybe three through freights
Occasional coal train
Occasional Potash

Moving south you'd add another Amtrak Cascades and lose the "turns".

I liked the way freight becuase it usually had three or four geeps.

South of Burlington you'd add at least:

Sumas-Everett freight
Anacortes Turn

There are probably others but these are the trains I observed.

South of Everett is much, much busier with commuter trains, Empire Builder and intermodal.


Hope that helps.

Casey

CyberFoamer Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> South of Everett is much, much busier with
> commuter trains, Empire Builder and intermodal.

Plus garbage trains and the Boeing switcher (is trash considered IM traffic snice it's in a container?)


TCS - rawk on

Garbage is part of the VBC, 15-22 cars a day. If Vancouver City starts shipping it will be a dedicated train. But overall the BNSF scene in Vancouver is to get smaller. Word is the Barge job is goin to SRY then they will move its to Annacis Island. In fact lots of local BNSF traffic is going away. Canadian Govt still fighting over secomd Amtrak. But BNSF coal had doubled and is 2 trains a day now