Canadian Railroads > Question about VIA Rail's Edmonton station

VIA's moving maps is currently showing trains 1 and 2 arriving into Edmonton within a few minutes of each other.  Since the station is located on the stub end of a wye just south of the mainline, and trains have to either back in or back out, what happens when two trains arrive at the same time?  The last time I was on the Canadian was two years ago, and from what I remember the station looks like it can only handle one train at a time.  So what happens if both trains arrive at the same time - does one just sit and wait until the other one departs?

Dwayne

Has Edmonton seen any upgrading with track work and what not, because seems to me there’s at least two tracks at the station now - one that could store passenger cars, particularly the ultra-dome(s) that were switched in/out of the consist? 

And train 3 / 4 need to be housed there too. 

And then same question as above - only one train at a time because only one track has access to the station at a given time? Or has this been altered a bit?

Same issue applies to Jasper. On my mid February trip on #2 we were late and met a very late #1 at Jasper. Again the second train has to wait until the first has departed

WP17 Wrote:
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> Same issue applies to Jasper. On my mid February
> trip on #2 we were late and met a very late #1 at
> Jasper. Again the second train has to wait until
> the first has departed

This has also happened many times in Winnipeg. Despite the extra tracks in the station, only one track can be used for servicing the Canadian.

There are two tracks but the second has no platform access to the VIA shack. It is used to store the Panorama car which is switched on to and off the Canadian at Edmonton during peak season. The VIA station at Edmonton is a disgrace. It is also the bus station and has no where near enough room at train time to accommodate everyone and nothing resembling a first class waiting area. And it's also far from the downtown area where the former station was located resulting in a pricey taxi ride. Then with the train in sight of the station, you sit there for ours waiting for CN to allow the train to cross their tracks into the station. But with only for trains a week in Winter, I guess the business doesn't warrant a decent facility. 

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Edmonton/@53.5774911,-113.5283292,530m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x53a02392545beb49:0xa8573bb83d39b496!8m2!3d53.5788686!4d-113.5307153

Panorama and 4 other cars are sitting on the siding. 

Here's a question for Edmonton historians. CN's downtown station was originally the Canadian Northern station.

The present CN main line through Edmonton is of Grand Trunk Pacific heritage. Both railway were constructed into Edmonton just before WW1.

While the CNor and GTP were still independant railways, did the GTP have its own station in Edmonton? 

Also, after CP built the High Level Bridge into Edmonton from the south, did they ever use the CN former CNor station?

The image shows the CN station in Edmonton, the passenger station was in the ground floor of the office tower. Buildings around the tower are remnants of a 1950's station building and beyond the tower, portions of a 1920's or 30's structure.

The Via train is the Winnipeg-Edmonton replacement train after the "Super Continental" was discontinued in 1981



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/15/19 13:39 by eminence_grise.

e_g wrote: "While the CNor and GTP were still independant railways, did the GTP have its own station in Edmonton?"

According to C. Bohi's "Candian National's Western Depots" page 76-77... "An arrangement was therefore worked out for GTP to share Candian Northern facilities in downtown Edmonton for passenger operations."

A casual perusal of the City of Edmonton Archives website shows this.

https://cityarchives.edmonton.ca/c-n-r-g-t-p-station

andersonb109 Wrote:
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> There are two tracks but the second has no
> platform access to the VIA shack. It is used to
> store the Panorama car which is switched on to and
> off the Canadian at Edmonton during peak season.
> The VIA station at Edmonton is a disgrace. It is
> also the bus station and has no where near enough
> room at train time to accommodate everyone and
> nothing resembling a first class waiting area. And
> it's also far from the downtown area where the
> former station was located resulting in a pricey
> taxi ride. Then with the train in sight of the
> station, you sit there for ours waiting for CN to
> allow the train to cross their tracks into the
> station. But with only for trains a week in
> Winter, I guess the business doesn't warrant a
> decent facility. 

It's just a train station ow, with Greyhound Bus service ending in Canada. When the downtown CN yards were removed, the site of the current VIA station was the only logical location at the time, and even today there's really no other area that a station could be built. 

-Trevor

https://business.financialpost.com/pmn/business-pmn/greyhound-replacements-find-tough-road-to-prosperity-in-western-canada

If the "Canadian" were halfway reliable, these replacement bus companies could do better as feeders from the train and get additional network business. These isolated mom & pop companies are not very discoverable, too transient, and trip itineraries are too fragmented. If you plan a journey, the route or company may not exist in several months. You really cannot make plans.  



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/17/19 12:08 by joemvcnj.

I always thought a good location for the VIA Station would have been adjacent to Edmonton Transit’s Belvedere LRT Station…..providing easy connections throughout the city. There’s a CN secondary track adjacent that has a wye connection to the CN east/west Main just east of Walker Yard.

https://goo.gl/maps/sdx9WzuyfwRLz9dk6

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I remember riding into Edmonton on Via 1 westbound using the "downtown loop" and paralleling the LRT tracks. At departure time, Via 1 backed up along the same route.

In those days, a friend in Edmonton published a railfan newsletter, and I remember the western part of the loop had been removed for a college campus. The current Via station is adjacent to Edmonton Industrial Airport, one of Canada's pioneer airports and a "gateway to the north". The city grew around the airport so that it couldn't expand and today there are no commercial flights.

I had assumed the eastern part of the loop had also been removed, but the Google images show at least some of it remains..

In 1976, I spent some time at North Edmonton , and watched a couple of CN RDC's arrive heading to the station. From what I recall, North Edmonton was at the junction of the GTP and the loop track.

The station appears to be a CNor design. As the GTP arrived at an arrangement with the CNor to use their Edmonton station, was the loop opened the same time as the rest of CNor?

eminence_grise Wrote:
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> Also, after CP built the High Level Bridge into
> Edmonton from the south, did they ever use the CN
> former CNor station?
>
As nobody else has addressed this part of your question, I will respond with what little I can offer: A 1957 Official Guide shows Canadian National and Canadian Pacific occupying separate stations in Edmonton, about 1/2 mile apart. CPR timetables in the same Guide show the distance between Edmonton and South Edmonton as 2.2 miles. Which makes it unlikely, though not impossible, that they ever shared the same station.

joemvcnj Wrote:

>
> If the "Canadian" were halfway reliable, these
> replacement bus companies could do better as
> feeders from the train and get additional network
> business. These isolated mom & pop companies are
> not very discoverable, too transient, and trip
> itineraries are too fragmented. If you plan a
> journey, the route or company may not exist in
> several months. You really cannot make plans. 

Oddly enough, Alberta has another intercity carrier, Pacific Western Transport, long established and operating under a variety of names.

For decades, PWT and Greyhound competed head to head for the lucrative Calgary-Edmonton business along Highway 2. PWT operates Red Arrow buses on this route.
Red Arrow has its own terminals. PWT operates a variety of their own intercity bus services in Alberta, under the name Prairie.

Like First Group, the corporation that owns Greyhound, PWT operates a wide variety of other bus services on contract, school buses, and oilfield transprt under the name "Diversified".

All PWT operations carry the markings "Safely Home".