“Short-line railways play a vital role in moving agricultural products in our province,” said Beck.
“Focusing on the future means investing in trade enabling infrastructure like short line rail. We need to support investments in our short-line rail system to ensure it’s running at full capacity.”
Beck called for the province to increase the provincial grants provided to short-line railways in Saskatchewan and develop a long-term strategy for building out short-line rail capacity.
She also called on the federal and provincial governments to work together to support expanding short-line rail as vital trade-enabling infrastructure.
“We need to make sure we can get our world-class products to markets, and that means we need to support major investments in pipelines, rail lines, and power lines,” said Shadow Minister for Highways and Infrastructure Hugh Gordon.
“Supporting short-line rail means supporting good jobs and strong rural communities.”
"The short-line industry has many challenges – infrastructure growth, maintenance costs, property taxation – but it’s becoming more important to the network within the network, to provide an option to complement our class 1 partners on first and last mile service,” said Glenn Pohl, Senior Railway Specialist with Xpert Railway Consulting.
“Our supply chain will flourish with the growth of short lines, interprovincial utilization, and industrial partners. Our supply chain needs us more than ever and we are here ready to grow and serve those needs.”
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