TRURO – VIA Rail passenger service, which runs through Truro, will be cut to three days per week each way after Thanksgiving.
VIA officials made the announcement this morning in Halifax
The service currently runs six days per week between Halifax and Montreal.
“It will be quite serious in Nova Scotia,” said John Pearce of Dartmouth, a spokesman the public transportation users and advocacy group Transport Action Atlantic.
“And it will be year round.”
Pearce said the cuts in service will also expected to lead to a reduction in service at the Truro train station.
“That impacts the station, of course,” he said, adding the facility will obviously have to be open for fewer hours. “Maybe some days it won’t be open at all.”
After Thanksgiving, Pearce said VIA’s Ocean run will only depart from Halifax for Montreal on Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays and will be running from the opposite direction on Wednesdays, Saturdays and Mondays.
The Ocean currently runs both ways each day exectp for Tuesdays when it does not run from Montreal to Halifax and on Wednesdays it does not run from Halifax to Montreal.
Pearce said approximately 200 people are currently being handled at the Halifax station each day. Information was not immediately available for the Truro station but Pearce said people from Pictou County, Cape Breton and areas in between come to Truro to access the Montreal service.
Group president Harold Nicholson said today’s announcement to Canada’s nationwide rail passenger service is wrong and inexplicable given the federal government’s recent investment of $923 million in a renewal of VIA Rail Canada’s trains, stations and other assets.
More information to follow.
hahaha,yes! the train was always an adventure going home or to visit friends at other schools.