The Silver Bullet

Our Rail line, better known as the Silver Bullet, transports people and products from Pukatawagan to The Pas year round. Efforts are being made to upgrade the track in order to shorten the time it takes to travel or transport goods to Puk.

In 2009, we established Power to Mile 99, which eliminated the need to the generator station. This has been an environmental concern for the leadership for many years and we thought that in this day and age, a cleaner source of power should be used to power the train station and the bunk house for the employees. We have had our share of diesel spills and we want to make sure that these generators were replaced.

A new Ramp is also being built and the new train station is almost complete. The majority of this work was funded by the Keewatin Stimulus Package worth 5.2 million dollars. During a ceremony on the tracks in front of our new locomotive, I accepted the funding from the Honorable Terry Stratton. Of the 5.2 million in funding, 1.1 is from the Federal Capital funding and 4.1 million was made available under the Economic Action Plan and was applied for and negotiated by the dedicated employees at Keewatin Rail Company (KRC).

The projects funded under this new monies will include track rehabilitation, a new locomotive and other rail equipment, the construction of a new repair facility in The Pas as well as a new Waiting Station in Pukatawagan. All remaining monies will go to replace railway ties and culverts.

All of this activity means increased employment, improved efficiency and higher levels of comfort and service for the people of Pukatawagan and the businesses at MCCN.

In the past, the railway has been seen as a vehicle for bringing in goods and services into our community. In the future, under my leadership, the railway will be seen as a vehicle to transports goods and products out of our community and to the rest of the world.