CBC News

CN has made a commitment to improve safety procedures on its line from Prince George to Vancouver, following two recent derailments in the Cheakamus Canyon north of Squamish.

Senior railway officials made the promise at a meeting with two B.C. cabinet ministers in Victoria on Tuesday – a meeting called by Transportation Minister Kevin Falcon.

* FROM OCT. 25, 2005: Latest CN derailment raises concerns

First CN derailment – in August – that killed thousands of fish. One of the accidents resulted in a spill of caustic soda that killed thousands of salmon and trout.

"This is unacceptable, in the sense that the minister of the environment was very concerned about what the environmental impact of the Cheakamus River spill was in August," says Falcon. And we're very concerned about the fact that we want public confidence to be maintained."

Falcon says while no railway can eliminate derailments, the risk should be minimized.

"I think we made it abundantly clear it's not going to be business as usual, and we wanted some evidence that CN takes this issue seriously."

CN is promising to improve patrols along the railway lines and increase employee training. It will also put locomotives in the middle of trains on its Vancouver to Prince George run to better distribute power.

"We learn from these incidences as we go forward." says CN's senior vice president for western Canada, Peter Marshall.

But while it's promising to do better in the future, CN is not admitting its safety procedures were at fault. Marshall says CN has had about seven derailments in B.C. this year, which he says is "quite an improvement" from previous years.

© CBC.ca 2005