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Caption: From its inception on October 31, 1982 until January 14, 1990 joint VIA-Amtrak train the "International" ran over CN's Oakville and Dundas subdivisions to London. Originally, Amtrak's "Blue Water" terminated in Port Huron, Michigan and after the successful introduction of the New York-Toronto "Maple Leaf" in April 1981, Amtrak and VIA came to an agreement for a jointly operated train. Re-routing over "the back route" through Guelph and Kitchener at the time of the 1990 VIA cuts added an hour to the schedule and then the discontinuance of on-board U.S. Customs inspections at Port Huron after the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks made the trip even less attractive. (Passengers had to board buses and clear customs at the Bluewater bridge for six months.) Initially, VIA and Amtrak provided equipment for one of the two train sets which evolved to a VIA locomotive and Amtrak cars both ways in the mid-1990s (single level until November 1995 and Superliner equipment--occasionally replaced by Horizon cars--thereafter). At the end, Amtrak was providing both the locomotive and cars in both directions. The last westbound "International" ran on April 23, 2004.
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The reason that the passenger equipment went all Amtrak was because the VIA LRC cars at the time were not equipped with toilet retention holding tanks and when a passenger flushed the toilet it ended up on the tracks. This was a common practice on most of VIA’s inherited fleet. The LRC cars were banned in the USA and after that time only Amtrak equipment was used.
@ngineered4u : Do Not Flush While Standing In The Station
LOL@Cdntrainphotog… When I was a brakeman on the VIA trains we used to lock the bathroom doors in Union Station to prevent the public from using the loo while the train was in the station. The car department had to do a brake test of each coach and check all the brake shoes. If the toilet was flushed the er..um…poop would end up right on top of the trucks under the coach. LOL many a time I remember the carman saying…oh $h..it