Several train cars filled with grain derailed along Quayide Drive on Monday morning.
No one was injured in the derailment, which initially blocked vehicular traffic at the Begbie Street crossing to the Quay. Trains were off track in the area near the McInnes Street overpass.
“The crossing has been cleared at Begbie,” said Mike LoVecchio, director of government affairs at Canadian Pacific. “The train was across Begbie, but that was moved.”
Although vehicle access to the waterfront was restored, railway crews were on scene assessing the situation that occurred on CP tracks.
The New Westminster Fire Department attended the scene and reported there was no danger to anyone in the vicinity of the derailment.
“It is five grain cars that have come off the tracks,” said Fire Chief Tim Armstrong. “There is no immediate danger to residents. There is no evacuation required, or anything like that.”
Armstrong said a rail car carrying crude oil was at the tail end of the train, but it wasn’t involved in the derailment.
“They are making preparations to move that car,” he told The Record. “It is not impacted by this.”
Although the derailment initially affected access to the waterfront at Begbie Street, it was soon addressed.
“They separated the trains and took it back the other way to clear the crossing,” Armstrong said.
According to Armstrong, the rail companies brought in cranes to lift the train cars back onto the tracks. He said it could be midnight before the tracks are fixed.
“They are getting through on the other tracks,” he said of trains. “This is the track closest to the roadway.”
Coun. Chuck Puchmayr, chair of the city’s railway advisory panel, was downtown when the incident occurred. He immediately started getting phone calls about the derailment and went to the scene.
Although there’s little chance of rail cars rupturing along Quayside Drive because of the low speeds at which the trains travel, Puchmayr said all derailments are taken seriously by the city and the rail companies.
“Anytime there is a derailment you have to find out why and how,” he said.
