Basi, Virk and now some cabinet ministers - maybe?
I will confess I have not got a clue what is going on. I am depressed by the sub at the Tyee who decided to use the word “Railgate” in the headline. But Bill Tieleman is hanging in there and letting us know what’s happening.
I have the distinct impression - which may just reflect lack of diligence on my part - that the rest of the media just think this whole thing is a big yawn. It certainly doesn’t do much to build one’s faith in the Canadian justice system.
Transport regulator slaps conditions on CN
This brief story is a follow up to the train on fire citation I provided at the end of last week. It imposes more stringent conditions on the remote control switching operation. CN says it is already meeting all of the requirements, but clealrly wasn’t at the time of the incident.
Alaska Canada Rail Link
A rail connection through Canada would improve the economic security of Alaska and the lower 48 United States by providing both essential supply route redundancy, as well as West Coast container congestion relief with a new Alaska sea/rail port gateway on U.S. soil.
That page also has a link to a map in pdf format, which I found interesting.
It may or may not be significant that BC is not part of the study. Fortune Minerals could be the key player here
Fortune’s Mount Klappan anthracite coal project covers more than 15,000 hectares of contiguous coal licenses straddling the BC Rail right-of-way and roadbed, 150 kilometres northeast of the Port of Stewart and 330 kilometres northeast of the Port of Prince Rupert. The railway right-of-way currently provides road access to the site from Highway 37. Fortune is currently proposing to construct a short-cut truck haulage route in order to transport coal to the Port of Stewart. Currently, the Company is proceeding with the permitting of a 1.5 million tonnes of clean coal per year export metallurgical coal mine producing pulverized coal injection (PCI) coal for the overseas steel industry that was assessed in a positive full feasibility study in 2005
by Marston Canada Ltd.
Here are some pictures of the BC Rail right of way and the wikipedia article has some of the background. I am currently reading “The British Columbia Railway - A Railway Derailed” by Karl M Ruppenthal and Thomas Keast published by UBC in 1979 ISBN 0-919804-14-1
And no doubt the ongoing story of the sale of BC Rail will itself be the subject of a book - and probably quite a racy one judging by Bill Tieleman’s articles so far
BC Rail - curiouser and curiouser
The story that it beginning to emerge in the BC Supreme Court, as two low level political aides are being thrown to the wolves, gets more and more intriguing. And I am not going to pretend to understand it. I am just going to remind you to keep reading Bill Tieleman
Did the B.C. Liberal Party pay large amounts of money to manipulate talk radio shows?
Did Campbell’s press secretary Mike Morton tell Premier Gordon Campbell about a paid “team” in place to make positive calls to a CKNW radio talk show?
Was Campbell tipped off by B.C. Liberal Party Executive Director Kelly Reichert about an RCMP investigation into that media manipulation?
Those are just some of the highly controversial defence allegations made in the B.C. Legislature raid case last week and yesterday.
So while former provincial government ministerial aides David Basi and Bob Virk may be the ones on trial, Campbell and his party could face a tough political reckoning as a result.
The allegations made in B.C. Supreme Court are unproven and the Crown has not yet responded. But those defence allegations were detailed and disturbing.
