Restore Island Rail

05/06/2026

What are your thoughts about the CEO of the Greater Victoria Chamber of Commerce's article in the Business Examiner?

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Victoria’s transportation choices are no longer just about urban design or mobility preferences. They are becoming a cost‑of‑living issue, and that reality deserves more serious and more honest public discussion than we are currently having.

There is an important conversation to be had about safety, cycling, transit and the kind of city we want to build. But there is another conversation that local government must also be willing to have: the economic impact of reducing road capacity in a growing region where, according to CRD’s Transportation Plan 2026, roughly 80 percent of people rely on vehicles to get to work, deliver goods, and access services.

At the Greater Victoria Chamber of Commerce, we talk every day with business owners, employees, tradespeople, service providers and visitors. We hear concerns about affordability, staffing shortages and the struggle to attract people downtown. What we do not hear is this: “I wish there were fewer lanes and less parking coming into downtown Victoria.”

Yet that is precisely the direction current transportation decisions are taking us.

The scale of lane reductions is no longer incremental. Two major corridors make that clear.

On Cook Street, a roughly two-kilometre stretch between Haultain Street and Maplewood Road is being redesigned so that motor vehicle lanes are reduced from two in each direction to one, with protected, raised bike lanes added. This is not a pilot project or a minor adjustment. It is a significant and permanent reduction in vehicle capacity on a key north–south route.

On Blanshard Street, between Caledonia Avenue and Kings Road, vehicle lanes have been reduced from three in each direction to two, again with protected bike lanes added. Blanshard is one of the city’s primary through‑routes. This is a deliberate reallocation of roadway space on a corridor that carries commuters, deliveries, trades and service vehicles into and through the city every day.

At the same time, Victoria’s cycling network has expanded rapidly. The city has built about 36 kilometres of bike lanes, and cycling volumes are real and measurable. At a single crossing on the Galloping Goose, more than 700,000 bicycle trips were recorded in 2022.

Cycling counts. That is not the debate.

The real policy question is whether vehicle capacity is being reduced faster than the region can realistically change how people travel, particularly for those commuting from outside the downtown core, shift workers, families juggling care responsibilities and the trades and service sectors that keep the city functioning.

Here is the uncomfortable economic reality: sitting in traffic comes with a cost.

Congestion is not just a quality‑of‑life issue. It is a cost‑of‑living issue. Time lost has value, and delays get priced into everything, from the cost of goods and services to the wages employers must pay to account for lost productivity.When a commuter loses just 10 extra minutes each way because of reduced road capacity and spillover congestion, that adds up to more than 80 hours a year. Those costs do not disappear. They compound, and they show up in prices, feesand operating costs across the local economy.

The lesson here is not “don’t build bike infrastructure.” The lesson is that meaningful consultation with those who rely on road infrastructure is essential. Partnership cannot be claimed while the people most affected are sidelined.

What we are hearing consistently from the business community is concern about Blanshard Street and, more broadly, about decisions being made before impacts are fully understood.

Downtown revitalization depends on access. Making it harder to get downtown is not a strategy for revitalization; it is a barrier to it.

The Chamber’s door remains open to Mayor Alto, City Council, and staff. But consultation must be meaningful, not symbolic, and listening must happen before decisions are locked in. If the goal is a vibrant, affordable, and accessible downtown, transportation policy must support that goal, not work against it.

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Restore Island Rail
https://restoreislandrail.com

05/06/2026

We need this!

Vancouver Island will have 1 million residents by 2030. Vancouver Island's population will continue to grow because of its mild climate, natural beauty, strong communities, expanding economy, and reputation as one of the most desirable places to live in Canada.

People are choosing the Island not just as a retirement destination, but as a place to raise families, start businesses, and build careers.

We could be building complete communities along the railway corridor, reducing the cost of extending infrastructure while helping to contain the endless outward expansion of suburbia.

Railways have historically shaped communities because they create natural locations for growth. Rather than extending roads, water systems, sewer networks, electrical infrastructure, and public services ever farther into rural and agricultural areas, development can be concentrated around rail stations where transportation already exists.

Building this way lowers infrastructure costs for taxpayers because utilities can be installed more efficiently along a defined corridor, serving more people with fewer kilometres of pipe, pavement, and power lines. It also helps protect farmland, forests, and natural areas from scattered development while creating walkable communities where residents can access jobs, services, and recreation without relying on a car for every trip.

Let's not pave paradise to put up a parking lot; let's instead protect paradise from becoming one.

Restore Island Rail
https://restoreislandrail.com

04/06/2026

04/06/2026

Vancouver Island will have 1 million residents by 2030; that's only 4 years from now!

The island is more populous than New Brunswick (868,798), Newfoundland and Labrador (548,354), and Prince Edward Island (182,688). Nova Scotia only has 93,000 more, and Saskatchewan has only 269,000 more, and we're catching up.

The reality is that Vancouver Island will continue to grow because of its mild climate, natural beauty, strong communities, expanding economy, and reputation as one of the most desirable places to live in Canada. People are choosing the Island not just as a retirement destination, but as a place to raise families, start businesses, and build careers.

We could be building complete communities along the railway corridor, reducing the cost of extending infrastructure while helping to contain the endless outward expansion of suburbia.

Railways have historically shaped communities because they create natural locations for growth. Rather than extending roads, water systems, sewer networks, electrical infrastructure, and public services ever farther into rural and agricultural areas, development can be concentrated around rail stations where transportation already exists.

This approach lowers infrastructure costs for taxpayers because utilities can be installed more efficiently along a defined corridor, serving more people with fewer kilometres of pipe, pavement, and power lines. It also helps protect farmland, forests, and natural areas from scattered development while creating walkable communities where residents can access jobs, services, and recreation without relying on a car for every trip.

Restore Island Rail
https://restoreislandrail.com

03/06/2026

Budget 2027 Consultations are open.

Add the Vancouver Island Railway to your submission!

"Fund restoration of the Vancouver Island Railway as critical transportation, economic, food security, climate resilience, and emergency response infrastructure. Rehabilitating the Island Rail Corridor will reconnect communities, support freight and passenger service, reduce highway congestion, strengthen wildfire response capabilities, and unlock sustainable growth for generations of Islanders."

Go to https://consultation-portal.leg.bc.ca/consultations

Restore Island Rail
https://restoreislandrail.com/

02/06/2026

Deep down inside, even in the pessimistic ones, there's a little kid hoping and praying that trains return to Vancouver Island.

https://restoreislandrail.com

01/06/2026

BC Negotiated on the basis of railways, where's the island railway?

The problem isn't just Ferry subsidies, it's infrastructure investment across the board. Per capita, Vancouver Island is getting ripped off.

And it's not just the Federal Government, the BC Government is complicit in completely ignoring the needs of Islanders too.

Since 2011, when passenger rail service on Vancouver Island was suspended due to deteriorating track conditions, both the federal and provincial governments have largely overlooked the Island's rail infrastructure. While over a hundred billion dollars had been invested in transportation projects across Canada and in BC, Vancouver Island's railway had been left to deteriorate and burn in the case of the Cameron Lake trestles.

What makes this particularly troubling is that British Columbia joined Confederation in 1871 on the promise of railway connections; the E&N was specifically negotiated to bring Vancouver Island into BC and Canada; as written, to operate in perpetuity.

Railways were not a minor detail in the negotiations; they were a foundational commitment that helped bind communities together and support economic development across the country. Yet today, Vancouver Island, the home of nearly one million British Columbians, stands as one of the largest populated regions in Canada without active passenger rail service.

Meanwhile, the Island continues to experience rapid population growth. Highways are becoming increasingly congested, ferry capacity remains constrained, housing pressures continue to spread farther from employment centres, and concerns about climate resilience, wildfire response, emergency preparedness, and food security are growing. These are exactly the kinds of challenges that rail corridors were built to help address.

Restore Island Rail
https://restoreislandrail.com

31/05/2026

Imagine a Vancouver island where you can step onto a train in Victoria, Langford, Duncan, Parksville or Courtenay and in one smooth trip, connect to Hullo Ferry for downtown Vancouver or ride to Nanaimo Airport for flights across Canada. No gridlock, no endless ferry waits. Just clean, reliable travel that works for the way Islanders live. This isn't a pipe dream.

It's an opportunity sitting right in front of us. The Vancouver Island Railway. The tracks are already here, running through the heart of our communities. What we need now is the will and the investment to bring them back to life. A restored railway would be more than passenger service. It would be the island's infrastructure backbone alongside the rails, a modern utility corridor that carries high speed internet, water and other critical services, all while enabling transit oriented development around stations.

That means more housing, more local business space, and more walkable, connected neighborhoods. It would also take on the challenge our highways can't handle alone. Freight. With the island's population booming, more goods are moving than ever before. Freight rail could pull thousands of heavy trucks off the road each year, improving safety, cutting maintenance costs and reducing carbon emissions while keeping supply chains moving.

Even when storms or accidents. Close the highways. And let's not overlook what the world is willing to pay for rail tourism. Scenic journeys to our forests, along our coastlines and past our historic towns could become a signature island experience, bringing visitor dollars to communities up and down the corridor. Every year we delay the cost of restoration rises and so to the cost of doing nothing.

More congestion, more emissions, more missed economic opportunities. Restoring the Vancouver Island Railway is not nostalgia. It's smart, forward looking infrastructure that pays for itself in mobility, economic growth, environmental gains and resilience. The question isn't whether we can afford to do it. The question is, can we afford not to? It's time for our leaders municipal, provincial and federal, to act.

Fund the restoration. Build the connections. Give Vancouver Island the modern rail system it deserves. Because the tracks are here. The need is urgent and the future won't wait. The smartest way forward is to get back on track. Join our growing community of islanders who believe in protecting and revitalizing our rail corridor.

Join the Restore Island Rail Society.
https://restoreislandrail.com/membership

30/05/2026

‘Drop trailers’ adding to congestion, delays on BC Ferries, trucking company says

Amid a summer plagued by ferry cancellations, delays and long waits, one trucking company says a BC Ferries commercial freight policy is making things worse.

The program, known as “drop trailer service,” allows some commercial operators to drop their truck trailers at a BC Ferries terminal. BC Ferries workers then load the trailers on to a vessel for transit, where it’s picked up on the other side.

But Penta Transport argues the driverless trailers are taking up deck space, leaving its drivers and the general public waiting at congested terminals.

Penta Transport vice-president Kendra Slawson said the driverless trailers should be shipped by barge instead.

“When they started this drop trailer service they promised everyone that no live bodies would be left behind, this service was to fill the space that’s not being utilized to keep rates lower,” she said.

“Now we’re told that it’s all reservable space, so they can go into their system, reserve that space for drop trailers, and therefore the general public and the rest of us are getting left behind because we don’t have those same opportunities to manipulate the reservation system.”

BC Ferries told Global News the drop trailer service moves essential goods such as groceries.

It further insisted the space allocated for drop trailers is separate from the reservable space allocated for the travelling public.

“If there’s live bodies getting left behind, those drop trailers should not be on the ferries. We should be moving the general public,” Slawson said.

The critique came as ferry travellers faced more delays — and confusion.

Before noon, the company was already tweeting about an eight to nine sailing wait for non-reservation vehicles travelling between Victoria and Vancouver.

How accurate those figures were, however, drew some skepticism after the company’s website inaccurately displayed nine-sailing delays on Tuesday, which turned out to be an error.

Opposition BC United transportation critic Trevor Halford said the provincial government needs to step in and start treating the ferry service like part of the highway system.

“We’re talking about websites being up for an entire day with misinformation and causing people incredible angst because they’re cancelling their trips, they’re going to other ferry terminals, which is adding hours to their travel, and then a mere 24 hours later we’re seeing the same thing happen,” Halford said.

“We’re not seeing any leadership from the minister, from the premier, from the (BC Ferries board) chair and the CEO. This is all being left to the front-line workers right now.”

Global News attempted to contact BC Ferries Board Chair Joy MacPhail on Thursday, but was disconnected when a reporter identified themselves as calling from the outlet.

Within the hour, the company’s communications team sent an email saying MacPhail was “not available” to speak.

In the meantime, it appears there could be more trouble for weekend travellers on one popular southern route.

The company says it’s expecting a spike in foot passenger and vehicle travel on all sailings to Salt Spring Island and is urging people to show up early, carpool, and be ready for delays.

At the same time, the Coastal Celebration, which has been out of service for a week with mechanical trouble, is expected to return to service on Friday.

Restore Island Rail
https://restoreislandrail.com