Executive Summary

This report examines the issues that currently threaten large segments of New Brunswick’s rail sector. In particular, three critical challenges arose in swift succession during 2012. They are:

• CN’s announcement of the pending abandonment of 139 miles of the Newcastle Subdivision, the route of VIA’s Ocean, between Moncton and Belledune;
• VIA Rail Canada’s reduction in the frequency of the Montreal-Moncton-Halifax Ocean from six times weekly to three, effective October 2012; and
• The bankruptcy of the Moncton rail equipment remanufacturing firm, Industrial Rail Services, Inc., as a result of the cancellation of three VIA contracts totalling $117.3 million.