Travelling by train is an increasingly popular form of tourism. In the case of Canada it’s a great way to enjoy the varied landscape of this vast country. One person who knows a lot about this is Zachariah Wells. Zachariah, or ‘Zach’, is a writer and poet, but he also works as a ‘Dome Car host and guide’ for Via Rail, the national railroad company. As he explains, trains played a vital role in Canada’s development:
Zachariah Wells (Canadian accent): Without the railroad there would be no such thing as the Canadian nation. It’s a country of quite distinct regions and those regions, prior to the construction of the railroad, were quite isolated regions: it was easier to get from Winnipeg to Chicago than it was to get from Winnipeg to Toronto.
And the railroad was the condition on which several of the provinces agreed to join Confederation. Without it, it literally would not have happened. As a historical
link between the different geographies and ethnicities and different groups in Canada, you can’t, I don’t think, overstate its importance.
FAMOUS FOR 15 MINUTES...
Zachariah Wells accompanies rail travellers on the long journey between Halifax in Nova Scotia and Montreal in Quebec. His favourite part is the Tantramar Marshes. These are near the Bay of Fundy on the Isthmus of Chignecto, which connects the provinces of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick:
Zachariah Wells: It’s a beautiful place. It has ecological significance too because it’s a flyway for migrating birds and you see the Bay of Fundy tidewaters there, the highest tides in the world, so it’s just... it’s this really rich 15 minutes of travel through this landscape.
ECONOMICS
And Zachariah Wells admits that, in many ways, it is tourism that is keeping Canada’s railroad alive:
Zachariah Wells: It’s impossible for a railroad service in such a sparsely populated, expansive country as Canada to make money. It just can’t be done. The lines between the major cities, and Toronto, Montreal, etc., do fairly well, short-haul services, between dense populations, but the long-haul service couldn’t ever hope to make a profit, but it serves a very important role almost as a cultural ambassador for people to be able to come from another country, and see Canada on the rails is, I think, an experience that you can’t put a price tag on. You can’t look at it in terms of profit and say, “Well, it’s losing money, so we’d better cut it” because you lose an awful lot more by doing that than just dollars and cents.
Para saber más: Canada by Train: All Aboard!
