THE LATEST VIA RAIL UPDATE IN RESPONSE TO COVID-19

AS OF TODAY, VIA RAIL CANADA WILL BE PUBLISHING REGULAR MEDIA UPDATES TO KEEP ITS CUSTOMERS AS WELL AS THE GENERAL PUBLIC INFORMED ABOUT ITS RESPONSE TO THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC. PLEASE VISIT OUR MEDIA CENTRE TO GET THE LATEST INFORMATION.

 

MONTRÉAL, March 15, 2020 – To support the ongoing efforts deployed by the public health authorities across the country to limit the COVID-19 propagation, including recommendations for social distancing and in order to further reduce health risks to our passengers and employees, VIA Rail Canada (VIA Rail) announces a reduction of some of its services as well as additional preventive measures.

As a result of significant reductions in passenger volumes experienced in the last week, combined with the need to deploy our resources to more effectively deal with the pandemic, as of Tuesday, March 17, services will be reduced by 50% in the Québec City-Windsor corridor.

Regional services (Sudbury-White River, Winnipeg-Churchill, Senneterre-Jonquière) will continue to operate according to their respective schedules with no change.

As well as the schedule changes, VIA Rail will be introducing a modified meal service aboard its trains. In line with the health authorities social distancing guidelines, we will limit the amount of staff and passenger interaction to a minimum, including our meal service. Passengers in economy class will receive a complimentary snack and water. In business class, the regular meal service will be replaced by a light meal and water. In both classes, no other food or beverage service will be offered and passengers with food restrictions are being asked to plan accordingly.

Additional on-board employees will be deployed on all of our trains in order to sanitize our coach cars while in operation. This is in addition to the previously announced enhanced cleaning protocol in effect at terminal stations. Via Rail continues to deploy additional strict cleanliness and hygiene protocols for its other trains in operation as long as they are in use.

Passengers showing symptoms similar to a cold or flu (fever, cough, breathing difficulties) are asked not to travel aboard VIA Rail. If those symptoms develop on board, they are asked to immediately report it to one of our employees.

"As a public passenger rail service to all Canadians, we remain committed to provide as much services as possible under the circumstances, as well as a safe travel environment for our customers and our employees. As we are already seeing an important reduction of ridership, these additional measures will help to allow us to maintain the service”, said Cynthia Garneau, President and CEO.

“We are deploying these additional precautions knowing that they will have an impact on our capacity to run our trains on time. We thank our passengers for their patience and understanding during this challenging period for all Canadians and want them to know that all of us at VIA Rail remain dedicated to offer the best possible service and travel condition, especially on board our trains, in our stations and our call centres", continued Cynthia Garneau. "Until the situation returns to normal, I invite all our passengers to consult our website to get the latest updates about our operations".

VIA Rail continues to closely monitor the development of COVID-19 and we remain in close contact with public health agencies and the federal and provincial governments.

 

Overview of services* 

Routes	Services
Montréal-Toronto	Reduced services until March 27 inclusively
Toronto-Ottawa
Québec City-Montréal-Ottawa
Toronto-London-Windsor
Toronto-Sarnia	Regular services
Winnipeg-Churchill-The Pas
Senneterre-Jonquière
Sudbury-White River
The Ocean (Montréal-Halifax)	Cancelled until March 27 inclusively
The Canadian (Toronto-Vancouver)
Prince Rupert-Prince George-Jasper

*This information is subject to change without notice.

 

Flexibility for clients

Passengers who choose to change their travel plan will be accommodated. For maximum flexibility, passengers can cancel or modify their reservation at any time prior to departure during the month of March and April and receive a full refund in addition to not incurring any service charges, regardless of when they purchased their ticket. This includes all travel up to and including April 30, 2020, as well as any travel after April 30, 2020, if their outbound train is on or before April 30, 2020. 

Since March 13, these changes to our services results in the cancellation of 388 trains and affects over 20 000 passengers. 

The most recent updates are available on our website.  

About VIA Rail

As Canada’s national rail passenger service, VIA Rail (viarail.ca) and all its employees are mandated to provide safe, efficient and economical passenger transportation service, in both official languages of our country. VIA Rail operates intercity, regional and transcontinental trains linking over 400 communities across Canada, and about 180 more communities through intermodal partnerships, and safely transported over 5 million passengers in 2019. The Corporation has been awarded five Safety Awards and three Environment Awards by the Railway Association of Canada since 2007. Visit the “About VIA Rail” section at https://www.viarail.ca/en/about-via-rail.