Transport Committee on April 18th, 2016

[The Chair (Hon. Judy A. Sgro (Humber River—Black Creek, Lib.)), Liberal, Judy Sgro]

I call to order meeting number 9 of the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities.

Welcome to all our witnesses, those who are present in the room as well as those by video conference. We'll try to get some questions for all of you.

Right now on this panel we have a representative of the BNSF Railway Company, Orest Dachniwsk, associate general counsel, operations and regulatory; and as an individual, Mary-Jane Bennett, lawyer.

By video conference from the city of Surrey, we have Len Garis, fire chief, and Dan Branscher, deputy fire chief, both from the Surrey Fire Service.

The representatives by video conference of BNSF Railway Company are Glen Gaz, Johan Hellman, Jared Wootton, and Courtney Wallace.

As you all know, we are doing a brief study on railway safety, and we're getting down to our last witnesses this week. If you wouldn't mind, could you confine yourselves to 5 minutes of opening remarks, rather than 10 minutes, if possible. Make sure that you get the most important points across to give the committee members sufficient time for their questions.

We also have Jamie Bullman, manager of transportation for the city of Surrey. It's good that we have lots of representatives from Surrey.

We will start the meeting with whoever would like to go first, Mr. Dachniwsky or Ms. Bennett.

[Mary-Jane Bennett, Lawyer, As an Individual]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and members of the committee, for the opportunity to present on this very important issue of railway safety in the Surrey area of British Columbia. For those unaware of the geography of that area, Surrey and White Rock are sister cities leading into Port Metro Vancouver, with a couple of communities in-between. Those cities are located along the oceanside. It's a beautiful area of British Columbia. Some have likened it to the Amalfi coast in Italy.

In any event, the rail line hugs the shore of those areas. And it's not a case of the community coming after a railway; rather, the community was there, and then the railway line installed itself when there was enhanced access to Vancouver through the New Westminster bridge. The initial transportation of goods was benign and low volume, but since the creation of the super-port, and now with the Fraser Surrey Docks, there have been great increases in the traffic and in the commodity types. In fact, the trains are also longer. Whereas in the mid-nineties trains were 1.5 kilometres, now they're four kilometres, with increases ahead, and carrying 18,000 tonnes of goods.

There's concern in that area about landslides, bank stability, and deteriorating load-bearing infrastructure. I can describe the City of Surrey as taking a responsible and balanced approach to the matter. They have initiated a number of corporate reports from the mayor and council indicating that a railway is needed, that port activity enhances economic activity, but also warning of several safety issues.

I wanted to touch on three of them today. The first one is the UDEs, or undesired emergency brakings, that have occurred in the Crescent Beach area of that line. There were four occasions in the course of six months, and there has been little information as to the cause of the UDEs. One UDE caused a four-hour delay, another a 90-minute delay, another a 45-minute delay, and one a three-hour delay.

The concern of the city is twofold. First of all, UDEs are often described as.... When a track condition or a rail condition is unsafe, when there is undesired emergency braking, it can easily cause a derailment. Numerous reports attest to this. The second part of the problem with the UDEs is that they have the potential to cut off access to the community.

First, on the safety issue, I wanted to go into greater detail on that, but I'm feeling confined by the time. There are a number of Transportation Safety Board reports and AAR reports, and then there's the fallout from Lac-Mégantic and the position taken by the U.S. department in terms of regulating electronic brakes.

The second issue relating to this is the lack of emergency exit. The fact is that the Crescent Beach area is cut off, and the community is blocked oftentimes by the train. If there is an emergency situation, there is no other way of accessing the community, and in fact, if there is a derailment or something of that nature, there would be an inability for first responders to access the area.

The reports by the City of Surrey note that the city would like a change in the grade-crossing rules, which say that if there's alternate access within three kilometres, then access is not deemed a safety concern.

Regarding the position on advancing, I would point out that an order was recently issued to the City of Brampton under section 31 of the Railway Safety Act, just because of the delay in crossings there. The City of Surrey should be dealt with in like manner.

The last matter I want to raise is the lack of sufficient insurance. Since 9/11, insurance has contracted. BNSF has taken the lead in North America in warning that the railways are operating without sufficient insurance. I can provide greater detail on that. This is a concern to Surrey.

In the final analysis, what we're requesting is an inspection of the track to ensure that there's no safety or security of operation under the Railway Safety Act; the support of the committee for the relocation of the line under the Railway Relocation and Crossing Act; and a requirement that the cause of the UDEs be investigated. We note that at BNSF, under their air brake and train handling rules, they are required to report this to their desk as a mechanical failure, so there should be information as to the cause of that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Ms. Bennett. Hopefully in the question and answer part of the meeting, you can get to some of the other points you wanted to make.

Mr. Dachniwsky.

[Orest Dachniwsky, Associate General Counsel, Operations and Regulatory, BNSF Railway Company]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and members of the committee.

For the record, my name is Orest Dachniwsky, and I am assistant vice-president and associate general counsel for BNSF Railway Company, in office at our corporate headquarters in Fort Worth, Texas. My job duties include providing support and counsel to our operating department on issues related to regulatory compliance and safety initiatives.

I'm joined today by our technical experts who are present via video conference. I apologize for my colleagues not being here in person, but aircraft maintenance issues this morning prevented them from being able to arrive on time. We hope this inconvenience does not detract from the value we might provide to this committee. Following this meeting, I will be available to address any follow-up questions or issues that we may not be able to address in the time provided during the formal portion of this meeting.

Let me say at the beginning that we consider it a genuine honour and a privilege to appear for the first time before the parliamentary Standing Committee on Transportation, Infrastructure and Communities. We are grateful for this opportunity, and we look forward to assisting you in your study of railway safety in Canada. Furthermore, we hope this opportunity is the first of many going forward, as we mutually seek opportunities to expand our common interest in expanding safety opportunity and stewardship, not only in the communities and provinces we serve as BNSF, but all across Canada.

BNSF traces its heritage back more than 150 years, to its founder, a visionary Canadian railroader named James J. Hill. Our railroad was the second to serve Vancouver, British Columbia, commencing service in 1891. Also, a segment of line identified in paragraph B of the study in which you are engaged has continuously operated along the beach at White Rock and Semiahmoo Peninsula since 1909.

Although BNSF only operates about 37 kilometres of track in British Columbia, this segment serves as a significant strategic link in a trade route between Canada and the United States. In fact, BNSF's line in this area is the only direct rail route between British Columbia and the United States, and is therefore a vital link in the supply chain between customers and industries in Canada, the United States, and Mexico.

As competition between ports along the west coast of North America has increased dramatically in recent years, BNSF's service to Canada's Pacific gateway provides Vancouver with the unique strategic advantage of being the only port on the west coast served by three class 1 railroads.

This segment also serves an important role in passenger rail. This is a track that serves Amtrak passenger service between Seattle and Vancouver. It also serves the iconic success story in Canadian rail service known as the Rocky Mountaineer. In fact, passenger service has played a critical role historically in settling this part of the country and in establishing safe, reliable access to communities such as White Rock. It also serves an important role in the future of the region.

Speaking to the issue of rail safety generally, let me be clear that safety is the primary mission of our railroad and the cornerstone of every decision we make and every action that we engage in. Our culture of safety includes but is not limited to free railroad haz-mat response training to more than 76,000 first responders since 1996. In the last three years alone, we have trained 279 first responders in British Columbia.

Track and bridge inspections occur with greater frequency than is required by Transport Canada, with the busiest main lines inspected daily, all other sections of track inspected at least four times per week, and bridges inspected at least one time per year. In fact, the bridges in British Columbia were all inspected during the first quarter of 2016. It is important to note that as part of these inspections, we inspect for any potential signs of erosion, especially following severe weather events such as storms.

We apply rail detectors, which use ultrasonic rays, to detect internal and external flaws to rail. A track geometry car inspects every piece of BNSF track at least one time per year by measuring the track surface underload for gauge, level, alignment, and vertical separation. It then creates a computerized report of any detected flaws which is transmitted directly to field personnel, who generally address the issue within 24 hours.

We use trackside sensors, located at least every 40 miles along our line, which measure wheel heat signatures invisible to the human eye or auditory signals imperceptible to the human ear that could indicate that a wheel on a railcar is wearing inconsistently. In this way, the sensors allow railroad crews with an opportunity to move a train out at the next available siding and address potential problems before they occur.

We also participate in programs such as AskRail. In AskRail, we have more than 200 first responders currently registered in British Columbia.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

You have one minute left.

[Orest Dachniwsky]

Yes, ma'am.

As a result of our culture of safety, 99.998% of our trains carrying dangerous goods arrive at their destination without incident.

We are also happy to report that we have extremely safe conditions at each of the communities we serve. In the City of White Rock, BNSF has invested heavily in our physical plant. We’ve increased safety by replacing bolted rail with continuous welded rail and by replacing the bridges over the Little Campbell and Serpentine waterways. We have worked with the city to improve public safety by committing more of our resources to policing and are continuing to work with the city on fencing enhancement which would reduce the risk of injuries to citizens crossing areas that are not designated as authorized rail crossings.

Regarding the Semiahmoo, we work with them on a regular basis in order to improve conditions with safety.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much.

Hopefully in the questions and answers you can get in some of those other key points that relate to the issue of rail safety and fatigue.

I’d like to turn to the other representatives from BNSF railway. Who would like to speak on behalf of the group that’s there?

[Johan Hellman, Executive Director, Government Affairs, BNSF Railway Company]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

We apologize for some unforeseen travel issues that we had, but thank you, and especially the staff, for your work in bringing us in by video conference and allowing us to participate in this way. We’re happy to answer any questions in addition to the comments that you heard from Orest, and we're certainly happy to meet individually or as a group with folks as you do this important work going forward. We’re happy to answer any questions today, or at any point in the future going forward.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

That’s terrific. Thank you very much.

To the representatives of the City of Surrey, would you like to add some comments before we start with the questions and answers?

[Len Garis, Fire Chief, Surrey Fire Service, City of Surrey]

Yes, we certainly would. Thank you very much.

Just to reintroduce myself, I'm Len Garis, the fire chief, but I am also appointed as the city's emergency planner under the Emergency Program Act of the Province of British Columbia,. So there are two pieces of contacts here that are fairly important to us.

When I describe Crescent Beach, a seaside community in Surrey, it's important to know that it's about 142 acres, with about 403 properties, and home to about 1,250 people full-time. That number swells during the summer; as I said, it's a seaside resort community.

I would like to point out that Crescent Beach has two access roads from the the beach, which are intersected by the rail line at grade. The primary route runs along Beecher Street and Crescent Road. As noted, there is a map in my presentation. The secondary route is McBride Avenue.

Due to their proximity, being approximately 500 metres apart, both access points have a tendency to be blocked by passing trains. Again, the map will point that out to you. It shows two proposed emergency exit access points, from our conversations with the BNSF and the city.

The geography of Crescent Beach takes the rail tracks along the coastline of Boundary Bay and Mud Bay at about 4.5 kilometres of the portion of tracks.

For some time, Crescent Beach residents have petitioned that the rail line be moved away from the coastline, citing concerns about dangerous goods being transported too close to the community, along with the inconvenience of having eight to 10 blockages a day, which last between six and 10 minutes.

In December 2007, a mechanical failure forced BNSF to apply its emergency brake at Crescent Beach, resulting in all road access blockage of about two hours.

After this incident, the Crescent Beach Property Owners Association approached the mayor and council and requested immediate action to prevent the community from being isolated or stalled by this train. To help this access concern, Surrey Fire Services, RCMP, and ambulance services worked with BNSF to create a document called the stopped train protocol , and my understanding is that you will be receiving this shortly.

Through this protocol, when a public request for emergency services is received, the emergency provider notifies the respective rail company to either stop or delay the train. The stopped train protocol also provides a process to follow a train breakdown block at critical at-grade crossings, such as those into the community of Crescent Beach.

In October 2010, the city contracted an independent engineering consultant to investigate the matter of emergency access routes to the community of Crescent Beach, should these two access points be blocked again by the train. The study investigated a number of options, but as it turned out at the end of the day, they believe that it was proved to be too complex and costly.

In November 2012, a short time after the stopped train protocol was implemented, another BNSF train breakdown occurred, blocking access to Crescent Beach. During this incident, the stopped train protocol was not adhered to, nor were the Transport Canada regulations requiring any stopped train to be blocked longer than five minutes, to provide unimpeded access to vehicular traffic. This incident resulted in a comprehensive isolation of the community for 30 minutes. Investigation by a BNSF trainmaster later revealed that there had been a communications breakdown.

As a result of the second incident, the mayor and council, the Surrey emergency program, and the RCMP essentially felt a loss of credibility with the residents about their ability to deal with this critical safety issue. We we had put protocols in place to try to alleviate this.

Over the following years, both access roads in and out of Crescent Beach were blocked by a BNSF train on a number of occasions. On June 26, 2014, there was a failure and a blockage for 45 minutes. On August 2, 2014, at 09:35, a mechanical failure resulted in a BNSF train blocking Beecher access for more than 10 minutes, and McBride access for three hours. On January 5, 2015, a mudslide at mile post 125.7, one mile south of McBride Avenue resulted in a BNSF train blocking both access points for three hours and four minutes. On February 18, 2016, a fallen tree across tracks south of McBride resulted in a BNSF train blocking the points again for an hour and 39 minutes.

Following the January 5 incident, a complaint letter was sent to Transport Canada, which responded by saying there was not enough evidence to support the complaint or to proceed with it.

To help mitigate that, the City of Surrey installed CCTV cameras, as well as an electronic monitoring system, first at the Crescent and Beecher Street crossing, and then at the McBride Road crossing. The intent was to collect visual, time-stamped evidence in order to provide Transport Canada with documentation and proof, and to pre-empt any emergencies that were occurring in the community that we knew in real time.

The CCTV cameras monitor and record all rail traffic in contravention of the rail operations rules, specifically rule 103(d), which reads:

no part of a movement may be allowed to stand on any part of a public crossing at grade, for a longer period than 5 minutes, when vehicular or pedestrian traffic requires passage.

Following the installation of the CCTV camera, the incident on February 18 was recorded and is currently under investigation.

It is important to note that from April 1, 2011 to March 31, 2016, there have been 228 calls for emergency service in this community, and in the past few years we have seen several incidents where a stopped train protocol should have been exercised but was not.

Further, on these occasions it appears that BNSF was in violation of Transport Canada's rail operating rules. However, the city has had no indication from Transport Canada that any sanctions or consequences have been applied in order to alleviate this problem and try to encourage them to follow the rules that are in place.

It is the City of Surrey's view that BNSF and Transport Canada have failed to recognize the seriousness of the Crescent Beach community's becoming completely isolated whenever a BNSF train blocks these two access roads.

This creates an elevated life risk, should there be a request for emergency services in the community of Crescent Beach.

That is my statement. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Mr. Garis. It was very important, and I am glad you got all of those points across.

We also have a copy of the study of rail safety that was done by the City of Surrey, which certainly reiterates some very serious concerns that the community has.

We will now turn to the committee for questions. Because we have short panels, we will try to get four questioners in at six minutes each.

We will start with Ms. Watts.

[Dianne Lynn Watts, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock, BC]

I appreciate all of you being here to look at this issue and see how we can move forward.

There are a number of questions that all of us have. As the former mayor for almost a decade, I know well the issues that the community has dealt with, as well as the blockages to emergency vehicles to get to the community on numerous occasions.

Part of this is to take a lens and look at this, and see what we can do in this situation, because there may be other situations across the country that exhibit similar circumstances.

My first question would be for BNSF, to whomever wants to answer it. Given what we have just heard from the fire chief and concerns that have been expressed—and they are ongoing concerns in the community—how are you addressing this issue? It is very important that emergency vehicles have access when they need to get into a community. As I said, this has been going on continually. What do we need to do here?

[Orest Dachniwsky]

I'll start, and then I'll ask some of our operating folks to discuss the protocol that is in place.

To be clear, when we looked at the records, there have been seven stopped train events in the last nine years. When this situation does occur, it is clearly of deep concern to the community and to us, which is why we have put protocols in place to address it.

I don't know if one of our operating guys would want to respond with exactly what the protocols are.

[Dianne Lynn Watts, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock, BC]

I want to jump in there. You said seven in nine years, but our fire chief has just listed six, I think, in the past short period of time.

[Orest Dachniwsky]

We have to reconcile our records.

[Dianne Lynn Watts, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock, BC]

That leads me to a question. When you do an assessment.... Does BNSF do its own assessment? Then what do you do with that, whether it is risk assessment or whatever? Who are you filing that with, or do you keep it in house? How does that work for you?

I know that, with you being from the United States, Texas, there are different rules and regulations in the U.S. than there are in Canada. How does that square off?

[Orest Dachniwsky]

I'll let our operating folks respond.

[Johan Hellman]

Without getting too deeply into any specific event, I would start by just saying that we take these issues very seriously. As Orest said, these are relatively uncommon, and they generally occur largely as a result of an unforeseeable event, such as a downed tree across the tracks or a mechanical failure. But we recognize and appreciate the concerns of area residents.

In fact, last year BNSF met with the City of Surrey, and we offered three potential solutions to ensure continuity of emergency service in the event of a blocked crossing. Those ranged from a solution like a grade separation, which is probably the most complicated and also the most expensive.... You could potentially put in a rail underpass at that particular site. You could potentially station emergency services on either side of the track, or you could do some sort of slope stabilization, which we do proactively as well.

When we talk about issues like these, we really have to look at what the problem is that we're trying to solve and then try to fit the solution to that. For example, when people see an area like this, they think a grade separation is the obvious thing that needs to be done. That may not necessarily be the case. An average grade separation can cost $35 million or more. Maybe what you do is to put in a pedestrian overpass across that point, where you can get an emergency vehicle across in an emergency situation.

We can talk a little bit more specifically about some of the protocols, but on this general issue situations like this, this is a specific point. There's been ongoing conversation about it. I think we need to find some way we can work as private industry, as local governments, and also as a federal government to try to resolve some of these issues and move forward on that.

[Dianne Lynn Watts, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock, BC]

Let's take a look at it from the 30,000-foot level. The issue—and we'll deal with it broadly, because I'm sure that other communities face this issue as well—is the blocking of access into communities by virtue of the fact that emergency vehicles are not able to get into that area. That is number one.

The second is the stabilization of the slope and the changing weather patterns and the number of mudslides that have occurred.

As you come across the border, you're going into the Semiahmoo Indian Band, but you're also on a flood plain. Again, I'm sure this condition doesn't just occur on this side of the country. Flood plains are affected by changing weather patterns. You have mudslides and slope destabilization. How do you address that?

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

It's a very complicated question. You have about 20 seconds, so could you somehow figure out how to answer that as directly as possible and then maybe you could add to it in response to another question by another questioner.

[Johan Hellman]

We try to attack it proactively. We have geotechs who focus on this. We also have a 24-7 weather service that provides us information about high-weather events that may be oncoming.

I can tell you that we've spent $35 million in this area over the last three years, including some stabilization efforts just last month, when we put down 15 loads of rip-rap to proactively reinforce the railbed against any future events. We're inspecting the area consistently. The main line we're inspecting daily. And we're working proactively to stabilize that.

I'd be happy to talk about further issues of erosion, perhaps, later in the program.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Mr. Hellman.

The next questioner is Mr. Hardie, for six minutes, please.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Rail relocation, obviously, has been on the minds of people in South Surrey—White Rock. The people I've spoken to in the community are for it, but I don't sense a lot of enthusiasm from BNSF about it.

You're no stranger to it. You've done it in Sioux Falls, in Fort Worth, and in Denver. Why not in South Surrey—White Rock?

[Orest Dachniwsky]

It's a complicated issue. You're asking, why not? It's something we're willing to consider. It's something we're willing to look at.

I think the circumstances that you mentioned are substantially different. They're not of the same nature in terms of the distance that would have to be traversed or the geography that we would have to traverse. It would be very, very expensive.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

I understand. You built the original rail line along the foreshore because of the grades, trying to get across inland. In terms of order of magnitude, what kinds of dollars would we be looking at, if, in fact, it were just more of a straight line from there through to Brownsville, which is where the old rail bridge is?