Save the Vancouver Island Rail Corridor with a continuous
Multi-Use Trail

This is your chance to help create the most amazing trail
project on Vancouver Island. We need your “vote” to help
convert old E+N rail corridor to a multi-use trail.

Your support for this petition will help accelerate Federal,
Provincial and Regional government commitment and action to
preserve the corridor by converting the Vancouver Island Rail
Corridor to an Active Transportation Trail.

The Federal
Government’s Active Transportation Fund has $400 million to fund
projects like this with up to $50 million for a single project.
An Active Transportation Trail, together with rapid bus electric
intercity transit service, would provide cost-effective, and
environmentally sustainable transportation and commuter service
on Vancouver Island. Please sign and share this petition today.
In March of 2013 the Canadian Federal and the British Columbia
Provincial Governments decided not to provide funding to restart
rail service on the corridor and announced an 18 month
consideration of possible future uses for the corridor.

Many people thought rail service was needed to keep the corridor
intact as a unique and irreplaceable transportation asset. All over
the world though, unused rail corridors like the E+N are being
saved for public use by converting them to highly successful
active transportation routes as multi-use trails.

The Friends of Rails to Trails Vancouver Island believe that the
conversion of the 290 km Island Corridor would be a world class
tourist attraction. It would also be, like the Galloping Goose in
the Capital Region, an environmentally friendly and safe local
walking and cycling alternative to driving.

A study for FORT-VI funded by a Federal Government Active
Transportation Grant showed that the Island Corridor Trail could
be built for the same cost per km as the North Okanagan
Armstrong to Sicamous Trail now under construction.
The study also showed that the trail would stimulate much
needed employment and economic activity, about $98 million
dollars annually, from increased tourism and business in the
many small towns on the corridor. The study also noted the
many increased health and wellness benefits for those who used
the trail.

For more information or to become of Member of FORT-VI please
visit our website at https://fortvi.ca/

*Active transportation is human powered transportation such as
walking, cycling and skiing, and includes mobility aids, electric
bikes (e-bikes) and electric kick scooters (e-scooters)

Background:
The Island Rail Corridor (formerly known as the E&N Rail
Corridor) is approximately 289 km running between Victoria and
Courtenay (225 km) with connection between Parksville and
Port Alberni (64 km). There are 48 bridges and trestles on the
Island Corridor, and it is intermittently flanked by rock cuts,
canyons, and wetlands.
The corridor runs in close proximity to 13 First Nations and 37
communities (more than 80% of all Island residents) and is an
irreplaceable asset. The railway, built to carry coal in the 1800s,
also carried passengers. As passenger and freight demands
decreased so did rail service. Passenger service was found to be
unprofitable by the Canadian Transportation Commission as far
back as 1984
The condition of the railway deteriorated due to a lack of
investment and maintenance over many years and the passenger
and freight services on the rail corridor were terminated in 2011
for safety reasons.
Conversion of the Island Rail Corridor to an Active Transportation
Trail supports the National and Provincial Active Transportation
Strategies; the BC government!s CleanBC Plan; the Province!s
Economic Recovery Plan; along with many regional, municipal
and First Nations’ planning documents, such as Official
Community Plans, Sustainability Plans, and Transportation Plans.
The federal government has established an Active Transportation
Fund to target active transportation. It is making $400 million in
federal funding available over five years to support a modal shift
away from cars and toward active transportation, in support of
Canada!s National Active Transportation Strategy.
*Active transportation is human powered transportation such as
walking, cycling and skiing, and includes mobility aids, electric
bikes (e-bikes) and electric kick scooters (e-scooters)
For more information or to become of Member of FORT-VI please
visit our website at https://fortvi.ca/