Today the Financial Post reported that members of the railway industry, regulators, lobbyists and local first responders met and discussed phasing out older model tank cars.
The industry forum followed a derailment in northwestern New Brunswick last week and last summer’s deadly derailment and fire in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, which have renewed calls for enhanced safety.
At the day-long workshop, the head of the
Canadian National Railway Co. (
TSX: T.CNR,
Stock Forum) safety division said the railway industry wants to “aggressively phase out” older tank cars as they have been tied to problems in recent accidents.
According to the
article retrofitting older cars can cost more than $70,000 each, while new tank cars cost well over $100,000.
Currently 78,000 older DOT-111s remain the workhorse of the oil-by-rail boom.
On Tuesday, CN Rail lost 0.7% and was trading at $58.43 a share. The company had a market cap of $48.5 billion, based on 830.5 million shares outstanding.