Nickel Belt MP Marc Serré has been in regular contact with Ministry of Transport staff, City of Greater Sudbury Councillor Mike Jakubo and CN representatives regarding a CN Rail crossing in Capreol.
Capreol residents who attended a town hall hosted by Serré this past Oct. 13 raised concerns about the unusually long delays causing public safety concerns at the Young St. rail crossing.
“At the Town Hall in Capreol, I was presented with a petition from the Capreol Community Action Network calling on the federal government to create new rules to limit rail crossing wait times to 15 minutes. I intend to submit this petition to the House of Commons for an official government response later this week,” said Serré.
Last week Coun. Mike Jakubo introduced a motion to the Council of the City of Greater Sudbury which passed unanimously.
The motion is calling on the federal government to establish a maximum limit for the amount of time that trains may occupy public railway crossings at grade.
Serré issued the following statement:
“I would like to thank The Council of the City of Greater Sudbury for their ongoing dedication to listening to the concerns of residents and reaching out to work collaboratively with other levels of government. During last October’s Town Hall with residents of Capreol it was made immensely clear how much the community is impacted by long railway crossing delays, and this is exactly the kind of action our residents called for and deserve.”
“This issue is not confined to just the Greater Sudbury/Nickel Belt area—in June, the Town Council of Hornepayne, Ontario passed a resolution similar to the motion of Greater Sudbury, and as recently as Nov. 10, the Saskatoon Regional Economic Development Agency stated that Saskatoon loses an estimated $2.5 million dollars of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per year due to unnecessarily long rail crossing wait times. This is a very real public safety issue which poses a serious impact on local economies as well.”
