STETTLER, Alta. – An engine pulls cars of grain slowly past Don Gillespie’s window.
A rhythmic clackety-clack and rumble hammers through the walls and fills the office.
“That’s the last train carrying grain from the south of Big Valley,” he said, not even turning to look out the window at the train about three metres from his office window.
Clackety-clack, clackety-clack.
But Gillespie hopes it isn’t an omen for his company, Alberta Prairie Steam Tours Inc. On Aug. 1, a Chicago salvage company started ripping up the metal rails from the 84-year-old rail line used by the tour company.
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With only four elevators remaining along the track, Central Western Railway Corporation, the company which owns the 176 kilometre stretch of track, said it can’t afford to keep the line.
“With the small tonnage it’s not feasible,” said Gordon Clanachan, president and chief executive officer of RaiLink, CWR’s parent company.
When CWR bought the track from CN Rail in 1986 there were about 12 elevators along the track. At the end of the year there will be only two at the south end of the line. Instead of hauling grain 145 kilometres north to Ferlow Junction, near Camrose, CWR will reroute the trains to connect with another CN line to the south and sell the rest of the rails for scrap.
Fewer elevators not only delivers a blow to the small towns in the area, but it is a powerful hit to steam train tours that are becoming popular tourist attractions.
Last year the Stettler-based company carried more than 24,000 passengers to a dozen small towns and historic sites. That’s a jump from 9,600 passengers in its first year seven years ago. Last year, train tours injected about $1.8 million into the east central Alberta economy.
A lobby effort asking the provincial government for $4 million to buy the line has not worked, said Calvin Confer, Stettler city councillor and member of the East Central Alberta Railway Heritage Society, which is working to save the line.
Two weeks ago Confer was pessimistic about the chances of saving the town’s biggest industry, but just days before the July 31 deadline the society received a $125,000 Canadian Facilities Enhancement Grant from the province.
That will cover a $100,000 down payment to buy a 32 km piece of track between Stettler to Big Valley from CWR. Now the job of fund raising to save the rest of the line begins.
“We believe this rail line and steam tour is memorabilia and not simply a treasure for Stettler and east-central Alberta, but a western Canadian treasure,” Confer said.
Unique attraction
The steam train tours are unique in the world, added Gillespie. No other steam tours go the same distance, spend as much time with passengers or have their attitude of togetherness toward small towns.
Churches, ball teams or historic associations in the small towns prepare meals for the train passengers as a fund-raiser for community events. When the train stops, the towns get a two-hour tourist bonanza as passengers eat a catered meal, tour the local historic sites, buy chips and pop from local stores, check out souvenirs, antiques or the scenery.
Support from the communities will keep the steam tours alive, Gillespie said.
“I don’t believe something as good as we have will go down the drain. It may be not all intact, but a portion will be,” he said.
The rail line will be dismantled in sections to work around the elevator closures. The area north of Donalda will be the first part of the track to go this summer. Sections south of Big Valley will be dismantled after Oct. 31 and between Meeting Creek and Big Valley by March 31, 1998.
Confer said they’ve talked to CWR about rebuilding the rail line if they raise enough funds after the track is dismantled, but it would cost about three times more to replace the track than buy it.
