TRACK RECORD

Tracing the routes of a historic railway

- Mike Lane

They say that if you put your ear to the railway track, you’ll hear the sounds of the trains: the whistles, the hissing of the locomotives, and the clickety clack of the rail cars, past and present. My buddy Gar and I were walking along the E & N (Esquimalt and Nanaimo) railway track, on a long iron trestle that spans the Niagara Creek Canyon, just north of Victoria. I didn’t hear any trains coming, as the last train had passed over these rails in early 2011. The rail line was abandoned, and the grasses and blackberries have taken over. I kept looking over my shoulder, just out of caution, as the trestle we were on had no walking platform, no guard rails, and no place to escape if a train should come through.

The trestle we were on, a cantilever suspension bridge, has an interesting history. It was built in 1883 in England and shipped to Canada, where it was initially used as a crossing on the Fraser River. Later, in 1910, it was moved to Vancouver Island and reassembled in its current location. Today, it is still a majestic sight, but it sits silent, gently rusting in the spring rains as it waits for whatever is in store for this railway line.