Will Via Rail ever allow bikes on their new Venture trains?
Via rail has never offered much in the way of bicycle carriage on their Quebec City - Windsor corridor routes. However, before the pandemic there were a few trains that were equipped with baggage cars and bicycle racks. With careful planning. it was possible to arrange intercity corridor bicycle trips using these trains.
All this came to a sudden end when the pandemic started and Via removed the corridor baggage cars .
Not to worry, the new Venture trains are coming into service and they are equipped with bike racks.
Via began putting new Venture train sets into service in Nov 2022, however they do not allow passengers to reserve the bike racks for bicycles. The official line is that there are not yet enough trains using them to provide clients with a reliable return-trip bike transport service.
By May 2024, this is certainly no longer true on Ottawa - Montreal - Quebec City routes as Via now offers many possible return trip possibilities with new Venture trains.
The Montreal Bicycle Club decided to try the simplest possible bicycle carriage on a Venture train:
One way ticket from Montreal's Central Station to Drummondville. A one way ticket removes Via's excuse of needing to provide an available return. Instead, we would return by bicycle, staying overnight in Granby.
Book a Venture train ticket, show up at the train station and ask to put a bike on to the bike racks. If Via does not allow this, take the REM and ride on a loop to Granby from the South Shore.
We decided to test this new Fixture 13 May 2024.
A.T. Lane and G.T Bishop stood in the lineup with their bikes. At the gate they were told that they could not board the train. When asked why not,as the train is equipped with bicycle racks and has bike symbols at the entrances, an employee went on to the train to check if the bike racks already had baggage placed on them. He found that no racks were available. Via refunded their tickets and they took the REM to the South Shore.
Afterwards, they thought about how this trip might be possible in the future. The only excuse Via has to not permit this one way to Drummondville trip has is the lack of available racks. To be certain of an available rack, we need to only to arrive early and be first in line. The Drummondville - Granby route is a good one to try again and the REM offers a quick alternative if Via does not co-operate.
The weather forecast was for rain the next day so we did not ride to to Granby from the REM station as planned but rather rode to Chambly then returned to Montreal via the Jacques Cartier Bridge.
.jpg)
It looks like the picture attached of a Via Employee putting a bike on the rack has the bike sticking out into the alleyway where there is the Sortie sign. That appears to me to be a design flaw and Via is probably not allowed to have an emergency exit partially blocked by the bike. Rather than admit that the designed is flawed and try to fix it, Via is just not letting bikes on their new trains and probably never will.
ReplyDelete