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From: chapman@fornax.uucp
Newsgroups: can.politics
Subject: Re: definitions of culture
Message-ID: <200@fornax.uucp>
Date: Tue, 24-Feb-87 22:03:19 EST
Article-I.D.: fornax.200
Posted: Tue Feb 24 22:03:19 1987
Date-Received: Wed, 25-Feb-87 04:35:23 EST
Distribution: can
Organization: School of Computing Science, SFU, Burnaby, B.C. Canada
Lines: 43

.
. 
> I have taken 1 (one) train trip from Moncton to Montreal on a VIA
> train.  It took 3 days (rather than the scheduled 14 hours),  standing
> on the tracks in the middle of the Quebec wilderness for 24 of those

I have made the same trip and we had to stop for quite a while but it
was because (I am told) the route actually gos through the US and there
are required inspections entering and leaving. 24 hrs seems too long for
that though. I had been going from Toronto to New Brunswick and my favourite
part was in Montreal where I had to haul ass carrying all my luggage on
foot to go between the od CN station where the Toronto train stopped
adn the old CP station where the outgoing train left - the travel
agent forgot to mention this part of the trip.

> hours with the temperature outside at -40 (I kid you not), with the
> steam heat in the train frozen solid, making the inside of the train
> not much warmer than the outside.  I arrived in Montreal 2 days
> *after* my flight to Vancouver had departed, rather than 10 hours 
> before.  My airline ticket was worthless, and VIA pointed to the
> disclaimer on the back of my VIA ticket stub which stated that they
> they were hardly liable for delivering my *body* at the destination.
> 
> Canada's wonderfull train system cost me $350 to buy a new ticket
> to Vancouver, endless frustration, and hypothermia.
> 
> Now my question:  Why do you think it odd that someone who thinks
> that VIA's service is lousy should also consider that they are
> not worth the money we spend on them?
> 
> ---
> Marc Majka

I don't know what VIA's problem is but I've been making cross country
trips by train for about 20 years and it's always been pretty bad
(particularily if you make the mistake of riding coach) although it
is definitely better than the bus (>$$ too).  As far as I can coud
tell CN and CP just didn't want to run a passenger service - but they
had to under the terms of their original agreements which got them the
massive amounts of land in Canada they own.

john
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