Cessation signs will be installed in Maple Ridge this coming week. (Contributed)

Routine train horn soundings could soon cease through Maple Ridge.

Cessation signs will be installed this coming week, Maple Ridge Mayor Mike Morden wrote on his Facebook page.

“Once installed, the bulletin to crews will be sent, and whistles will stop sounding,” he says.

“It’s important to note that residents will still hear whistles once cessation is implemented, from the Fort Langley side of the river and whenever the crew on the train need to announce their presence or warm someone off the tracks,” Morden adds.

“Only the routine soundings through Maple Ridge will cease.”

Maple Ridge council voted in September to stop train whistles after signing on to the Transport Canada cessation program.

First, though. 1.8-metre-high security fences, at both Port Haney and Maple Meadows Way stations, had to be built to keep people from crossing the tracks in the area.

Installation of those was completed in February, said Darrell Denton, the city’s acting director of economic development.

He added that CP Rail is waiting for signs to be put up at the railway crossings in Maple Ridge telling train engineers that horns will no longer be sounded.

But he’s still waiting for a firm date for that. Then the city expects to get final notification that the horns will stop sounding by a certain date.

Minor improvements at the rail crossings in Maple Ridge were required under the train whistle-cessation process, costing about $30,000. The security fencing cost about $40,000.

Other railway crossings where horns no longer will be sounded include 113B Avenue, Lorne Avenue, Ditton Street, River Road and Tamarack Lane, 240th Street and 287th Street.

The cessation decision also applies to the West Coast Express commuter system, which runs on weekdays.

READ ALSO: End in sight for stopping train horns in Maple Ridge.



editor@mapleridgenews.com

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