Farmers from Neepawa, Man. are sending out an S.O.S. from their little island of rail tracks.
It’s a call of distress over the poor service they say their two grain elevators are getting from CN Rail.
The elevators are on a half-kilometre of track owned by CN. But for CN to get to the island, it has to travel about 40 km up a CP Rail mainline.
While the elevators have been plugged since mid-September, the farmers watch trains zip past them on the nearby CP track with envy.
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Bert Lowry, chair of the local United Grain Growers board, said farmers wanted to make their community aware of the possible consequences of the lack of service.
“We’re not wanting to use scare tactics, but if the situation continues, the ultimate conclusion is we’ll probably lose the elevators,” he said.
Blow to town
He said losing the elevators would be a blow to the heart of the town of 3,500, which is home to four bulk fuel dealers, five large fertilizer dealers and a half-dozen farm machinery dealers.
“It’s a thriving little agricultural town.”
The Neepawa track used to be part of a branch line that was abandoned last summer. But even when the track was longer, Lowry said the service wasn’t much better.
The branch line was light steel, but the Neepawa portion was upgraded 10 years ago. Together, the two elevators handle about 45,000 tonnes per year.
Lowry thinks the elevators could fill a train every week. But last winter, they got only 51 cars in five months.
Jim Feeny, spokesperson for CN, said the railway will send a train to Neepawa when it gets enough orders from grain companies.
“We don’t decide which elevators get cars,” he said, adding CN would need an order for at least 30 cars to go to Neepawa.
Feeny said CN hadn’t missed or delayed orders to Neepawa from the fall to mid-January.
But the president of Manitoba Pool Elevators, which owns one of the elevators, sees it differently.
At the end of January, the pool elevator had only 74 tonnes of available space, with 10,000 tonnes of outstanding contract calls.
“People are becoming very discouraged and are delivering their grain elsewhere by truck,” said Charlie Swanson.
His company has had 14 cars for Neepawa on order since the beginning of January, and was sitting at 17 orders last week.
“I think between the two companies, we certainly could have given them a good reason, a minimum of 20 to 30 cars that they could have come in with to service those elevators on a fairly regular basis,” Swanson said.
Want track under CP
Lowry said farmers understand why CN wouldn’t want to make the special trip to get their grain, but they want the company to find a way to transfer the track to CP.
Feeny said CN is talking to CP about some options. Steve Morris of CP wouldn’t comment on whether the company would be interested in serving the point.
