Frustration in Dentville, Amblepath, the North Yards and several other neighbourhoods in Squamish is escalating due to train shunting, whistle blowing and general noise pollution at all hours of the night.
Wolfgang Wittenburg lives on Buckley Avenue and said he and surrounding neighbours are plagued nightly by "the repeated loud hum of shunting, the thunder of rail cars banging into each other, the screeching of brakes with the sound of bells and whistles have become a source of intolerable noise pollution."
He wrote a letter and appeared before council on July 20 with petition in hand listing 130 names from Dentville, the North Yards and the north end of downtown who echo his dismay.
CN Rail spokesperson Warren Chandler said they haven't received the letter, petitions or a request to meet yet but are more than willing to oblige.
"We have met with the District of Squamish council in the past and we're definitely willing to meet with them again," said Chandler.
Glenn Ashenden lives on Willow Crescent near the train crossing west of Government Road connecting to Amblepath and Spiral Mobile Park. He sent council a letter outlining his correspondence with the District of Squamish and Transport Canada's policies on train whistling.
He said before new crossing barriers, which include overhead bells and lights, the blaring was necessary, but now that the crossing has all these features, it meets Transport Canada's requirements for "public grade crossing within an area without train whistling."
"It's such a cut and dry case that I don't even see why it's necessary," said Ashenden.
"Transport Canada told me that if a crossing has all the bells and whistles and barriers, it doesn't need to honk anymore."
He said all his neighbours are rallying to stop the noise.
"Everyone I talk to in this neighbourhood is upset about this. It's an annoyance in the day time but whatever, at night time it's just crazy," he said. "It must be even worse for the guys in Amblepath, at least I have a row of houses in between me and the damn train."
Transport Canada doesn't appear to have such a cut and dried policy for train shunting, although Wittenburg did suggest that's what train yards are generally supposed to be used for.
Chandler said shunting, which is the process of building a train by combining all the cars and putting them in a certain order, is a necessary process as it basically brings the parts together to compile a full train.
"There have been some minor switches to our switching services to our rail yard and Squamish terminals and we do operate during the night in order to service our customers," he said, "but that's just standard operating procedure.
"That's always been happening for the past five years switching at night has always been standard procedure for us out there."
He said they try to confine switching to the rail yards and Squamish terminals but "if a train is of longer length than the actual rail yard than it would have to occur outside of the yard."
"I can't speculate on how often this happens," said Chandler. "It just depends on the number of cars that are there and need to be shipped."
Wittenburg said most residents who live along the railway corridor are well disposed towards the railway, or they wouldn't have decided to live there.
"What we are objecting to is train shunting and idling of engines in residential areas. That is an operation what railway shunting and switching yards are meant to be for," said Wittenburg.
"Of course, CN elected to vastly reduce the Squamish yards after acquiring BC Rail and has lately begun to carry out such activities with abandon outside of them."
He said that if train shunting must encroach on residential communities due to occasional extra long trains being assembled or other reasons, then "CN could at least be considerate enough to do it during the day when the line is free of traffic anyway."
Steven Hill lives in Viking Ridge complex directly across Government Road from the crossing and has been speaking to his neighbours about either circulating a petition or writing letters to council as well.
He said trains go by several times a night and the whistling has become intolerable in recent weeks.
"We've been living here for seven or eight years and I've never had a problem with the trains until now," he said. "It wakes up the baby and the drivers don't seem to be very respectful.
"They used to go by and just do a couple quick toots to alert people because it's the middle of the night and who the heck is crossing?" he said. "But now it's almost like they relish sitting on that horn and just letting it go for a while."
Wittenburg also mentioned potential development issues in railway areas if this continued.
"This could potentially hinder the district's ability to generate developer interest for new residential projects in the affected areas and possibly even the Ocean Front lands, if developers sense negative market perception in regard to industrial noise," said Wittenburg.
In response to the residents' concerns, District of Squamish council made a motion to send CN Rail a letter and also request a meeting to with representatives to discuss their role as a responsible corporate citizen in dealings.
However not all resident are unified in their disdain for train-related clamour. Amblepath resident Amanda Kearns said this noise was an obvious part of living next to the railway.
"If you decide to live next to a train track, you're going to hear trains," she said.
