Tens of thousands of travellers are scrambling for alternative transportation today after VIA Rail Canada halted all train departures when its engineers officially walked off the job at noon.

Negotiations between VIA and its 340 engineeers hit an impasse early this morning. But VIA started cancelling service in anticipation of a strike earlier this week.

"It's now the mediator's role to work with the parties," said VIA spokeswoman Ashley Doyle.

Travellers like Vita Little were able to board VIA-chartered buses to their destinations yesterday.

The Toronto woman was at Union Station heading to Montreal for a birthday party. But without a train, she didn't know how she would be coming home Sunday.

"It's very disappointing.The train is just a nice way to travel," said Little.

Meantime, about 2,000 other VIA employees, members of the CAW, are expecting to be out of work within days, according to an official from their union.

About 80 per cent of those ticket agents, maintenance and on-board service workers will be out of work "imminently" with 20 per cent remaining to handle passenger refunds and put equipment away, he said.

According to Teamsters Canada Rail Conference, the union representing Via locomotive engineers and yardmasters, their members have been without a contract since Dec. 31, 2006.

Following a 21-day "cooling-off" period, its members voted 91.2 per cent in favour of a strike.

Some of the outstanding issues include job security.

In a written statement released last week, the union claimed that Via has been demanding the implementation of an antiquated crew utilization procedure which, they say, creates uncertainty about when a locomotive engineer would be scheduled to work.

Wage and benefits are also a major request.

Intense negotiations have been under way for the past four days with the assistance of a federally appointed mediator.

Talks continued overnight but ended around 1 a.m., when Via Rail said that both parties had reached deadlock.

Trains on the Sudbury-White River and Victoria-Courtenay routes will remain in service, as they are operated by third parties on Via's behalf.

For more information, call Via at 1-888-VIA-RAIL (842-7245).

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About 12,000 passengers travel routes across Canada each day.

With a file from Precious Yutangco