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A new, two-car Canada Line train set sail for Vancouver from Korea late last week.

It’s the first in a 12-train order that is meant to bolster the Canada Line fleet and address overcrowding on the rail line that runs between Vancouver and Richmond.

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The first train is expected to arrive in the next few weeks. The other 11 trains will arrive over the course of the year. They are being built by Hyundai Rotem.

Following testing and commissioning, TransLink anticipates the trains will go into service in early 2020, coinciding with a planned increase in service during rush hours, evenings and weekends.

The total cost of the cars is $88 million, with 50 per cent of the funding coming from the federal government, 33 per cent from the province and the rest from TransLink. The funding was allocated in the first phase of the 10-year regional transportation plan. The line also saw service increased during high-demand times, beginning in January 2017, and escalator upgrades are underway at some stations.

According to TransLink’s data, there was an average of 147,700 weekday boardings on the Canada Line in 2018, a 5.3-per-cent increase over the previous year. In 2018, there was a total of more than 48 million boardings on the line.

jensaltman@postmedia.com

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