Canada’s GMD1 diesel locomotive was the first to be completely designed by General Motors Diesel Ltd., Electro-Motive’s subsidiary at London, Ontario. GMD built 101 copies in two variants between 1958 and 1960. The locomotive was powered by a 12-cylinder, non-turbocharged 567 prime mover producing 1,200 hp. A news brief in Trains’ July 1959 issue called […]
Canadian National 4-6-4T No. 46 couples to a string of commuter coaches at Dorval, Que., in September 1955. The tank engine brought the cars out from Montreal and now will head back with a load of morning commuters. Philip R. Hastings photo […]
MONTREAL — The Teamsters Canada Rail Conference, representing approximately 6,000 Canadian National locomotive engineers, conductors, and yard workers, has ratified its new contract with the railroad, CN announced Friday. Some 70.7% of those voting were in favor of the contract, the union said. “I want to graciously thank the members who took the time to […]
MONTREAL — Canadian National envisions the day when its main line to the Port of Prince Rupert, British Columbia, will host 50 trains per day. “Our capacity right now on that line is about 25 trains a day,” CN CEO Tracy Robinson told an investor conference on Wednesday. “We’re running a little bit below that […]
EVANSBURG, Alberta — A 10-mile stretch of Canadian National’s transcontinental main line about 65 miles west of Edmonton, Alta., continues to be surrounded by what has become the Yellowhead County wildfire, but trains are getting through the area in part because of CN firefighting equipment known as “Poseidon.” The compact fire train was fashioned out […]
KINGSTON, Ontario — Six cars of a Canadian National train carrying hazardous materials derailed Friday in Kingston, Ontario, leading to a small chemical leak and collapsing a portion of a bridge, the CBC reports. No members of the train’s three-person crew were injured. Two tanks cars of the 12-car train ended up in Little Cataraqui […]
CHICAGO — Canadian National, which led the big Class I railroads in volume growth over the past decade, expects to keep it up over the next three years. CN believes it will add as many as 900,000 annual new carloads and intermodal containers to its system by 2026, which translates into 5% volume growth per […]
CHICAGO — Canadian National executives on Wednesday dissected the long-train strategy that the railway has cast aside in favor of an operating plan where sticking to schedule is gospel. “The plan is sacred” was a phrase CN officials used multiple times during the railway’s investor day presentations. “You have this phrase around here … ‘the […]
A westbound Canadian National train crosses the Thompson River on the CN main at Lytton, British Columbia, in May 2015. CN will continue to add capacity west of Edmonton, Alberta, to support traffic growth. Alex Mayes CHICAGO — During an investor day presentation today, Canadian National touted its operational improvements over the past year […]
CHICAGO — Starting today, Amtrak’s Lincoln Service trains will begin operating at 110-mph maximum speeds over Union Pacific’s former Gulf, Mobile & Ohio speedway between Laraway Road, south of Joliet, Ill., and the Alton, Ill., Amtrak station. Shortened schedules will be established at a later time “to ensure everything on the system is running properly […]
MONTREAL — Canadian National, Union Pacific, and Ferromex have significantly tightened the schedules for the new intermodal service they will launch on May 15 to link Canada and Detroit with Mexico. The changes to the Falcon Premium service, announced in customer advisories on Monday, take 40 hours out of the Detroit-Monterrey transit time and trim […]
MONTREAL — Members of the Canadian union Unifor have ratified a two-year contract with Canadian National Railway, the union announced Friday. The union and railway had announced an agreement March 20. The deal covers more than 3,000 mechanical, intermodal, facility management, and clerical positions represented by Unifor’s Local 100 and Council 4000 [see “Canadian National, […]
