Evening News Update for April 28, 2020
NANAIMO—Two more people have died from COVID-19 in BC, one from the interior and one from the Fraser Valley, bringing the death count to 105. The province saw another spike in new cases, with 55 reported over the past 24 hours. Four of those are in the Island Health region. The majority of new cases, more than half, are the result of the outbreaks at two lower mainland poultry plants. However, the Provincial Health Officer says those large outbreaks will not influence her plan to ease some restrictions. Dr. Bonnie Henry says she still expects to do so by the end of May. Henry says large outbreaks are more easily tracked than small, random cases in communities. It's that random group that has to stay low in order to relax restrictions.
📷 Education Minister Rob Fleming and BC School Trustees Association President Stephanie Higginson / Photo via Province of British Columbia (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0).
The Minister of Education says there is no plan yet to reopen BC schools before the end of this school year. However, Rob Flemming says officials are planning to open more classrooms, as more workers return to their jobs. Currently, there are close to 8,000, mostly elementary school students who are in classrooms in BC. They are the young children of health care workers, who cannot be left alone all day. Flemming expects those numbers will grow in the coming weeks. Flemming downplayed a full return to classrooms before the summer. He says that won't happen until a balance can be struck between what's effective and meaningful learning and what is healthy and safe to do.
A just-released series of reports estimate it will cost close to a billion dollars to reopen the Vancouver Island Railway Corridor to maximum capacity from Victoria to Courtenay. The E and N passenger train service shut down in 2011 because many of the tracks and bridges did not meet transportation standards. Currently, only a small freight service exists around Nanaimo. The new engineering studies found the existing roadbed and track structure of the corridor is in a poor to fair condition. Bridges along with the corridor range between poor to good, while at-grade crossings are in fair condition. The reports outline a three-phased approach to upgrades The first phase, allowing for 2 freight trains and one round trip passenger train per day would cost $326 million. Phase two, a doubling of those services would cost $522 million and a third phase would cost $728 million. It would include much higher freight volumes along with four round trips between Victoria and Courtenay and a full commuter service between Victoria and Langford. The Ministry of Transportation says it will consider the findings as part of its South Island Transportation Strategy. It expects to release that strategy report in June.
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