Early Morning Snowfall Over Southern B.C. Shuts Schools, Snarls Traffic

By THE CANADIAN PRESS

VANCOUVER – When snow falls on the West Coast, commuter chaos is never far behind – and snow is blanketing Metro Vancouver Tuesday.

School districts in Mission, Maple Ridge, North and West Vancouver have cancelled classes, Simon Fraser University, the B-C Institute of Technology and several colleges are also shut down.

But it’s the roads that are the real issue as drivers face closures, delays, lineups and dozens of accidents. The situation has been complicated by the derailment of a CP Rail grain train on tracks in Burnaby along Burrard Inlet just east of the Ironworkers Memorial Bridge.

CP spokeswoman Breanne Feigel says no one was hurt in the 2 a.m. incident and the two-car derailment has caused no environmental damage, but has blocked tracks shared by the West Coast Express commuter rail service.

Translink spokesman Drew Snider says that means passengers heading to Vancouver from the Fraser Valley must get off in Coquitlam and transfer to buses for a trip to the nearest Skytrain station in New Westminster.

From there, the roughly one-thousand passengers from each of the five trains must squeeze onto Skytrain cars already filled to capacity by commuters who have left their vehicles at home in favour of transit.

“We’ve been reminding people that they need to dress warmly, expect delays, be patient and expect there is going to be a lot of company on those transit systems,” says Snider.

And he says things may not be better by the start of the afternoon rush.

“When you are dealing with a derailment you take your time, so with the track blocked, it is going to be hard to say if the West Coast Express will be able to make it all the way into Vancouver, or if we will have to pull it out from Coquitlam and get people out there, somehow.”

Snowfall warnings remain in effect for the Queen Charlotte Islands and most of Vancouver Island as well as the Sunshine Coast, Metro Vancouver, Fraser Valley and Central Okanagan.

As much as 15 centimetres of snow is expected to fall in some areas before the system turns to rain later today.