For 10 years, a group of people in southwestern Manitoba have talked about one day owning the rail that connects Waskada and Goodlands to the main line at Deloraine.
And now Turtle West Rail is inching its way through the red tape at the finish line.
The short line is named after the nearby Turtle Mountains, not for the fable, although the tale of how the group worked to get the line comes close to Aesopian proportions.
Bill Morningstar, who farms near Goodlands, said he can’t tell the whole story because of strict confidentiality agreements with CP Rail, which is selling the track after abandoning it last summer.
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What he can say is 73 people put together money to buy the 28.5 kilometres of track in hopes they can save their communities. Three grain elevators sit on the line and the towns want to hold on to the jobs and the tax dollars.
The group compared the cost of the line to how much their mill rate would rise if thin-skinned roads were upgraded to handle heavy truck traffic. Rail won out.
A Brandon-based company will operate and maintain Turtle West. It’s the first local project for Cando Contracting, which switches cars and runs locomotives for industrial customers in other provinces. It’s also the first short line for Manitoba.
President Gord Peters said the company will have its own locomotive or high-rail trucks pick up hopper cars from the main line, distribute them to elevators on the track and haul them back.
Community involvement
Cando also put up some money to help buy the track. Peters thinks the short line will work because local people have done the same.
“They want to keep their local track there and they want to put their money where their mouth is,” he said.
Morningstar said the line has handled up to 70,000 tonnes of grain in the past. Turtle West is hoping for at least 55,000 tonnes.
Peters said Manitoba Pool Elevators and N.M. Paterson and Sons Ltd., which own the elevators on the line, will continue to buy grain on the line.
Although CP wanted to get rid of it, Peters said a smaller rail operator can find profits in the line.
“We don’t have an Air Canada or Canadian Airlines servicing Brandon, but we do have a commuter aircraft that takes you into Winnipeg or Regina,” compared Peters.
Morningstar said the group is also working on getting a couple of passenger cars for the line to attract tourists.
Peters said he sees similar opportunities arising in other parts of the province. But he said a challenge to short line railways will be the trend toward large, inland terminals on main lines.
Similar facility
Saskatchewan Wheat Pool is planning one such facility for Boissevain, a little more than 60 km by road from Waskada.
“I think it’s going to be an interesting exercise over the next three or four years to see how it all works,” he said.
