CANADA: Funding has been announced for infrastructure life extension works to support Huron Central Railway in sustaining a viable freight service on the 280 km line between Sault Ste Marie and Sudbury.
The federal and Ontario governments are each to provide up to C$10·5m, with the Huron Central Railway Inc subsidiary of Genesee & Wyoming which operates the line providing the remaining funding for the C$31·5m project.
The line has been threatened with closure at various times, most recently in 2020, but government support has enabled operations to continue.
The latest collaboration ‘is a positive example of how we can come together to build fluid and reliable internal trade corridors’, said federal Minister of Transport Omar Alghabra when the funding agreement was announced on January 10.
Ontario’s Minister of Northern Development Greg Rickford said the provincial government recognises the value of the rail corridor to the regional economy, and the investment ‘demonstrates how, together, we are building a competitive, strong and vibrant northern Ontario’.
