FORT-VI vice-president David Slade made a presentation to the Cowichan Valley Regional District (CVRD) board on May 14 promoting the golden opportunity that has presented itself to turn the almost dormant 220-kilometre E&N rail line on Vancouver Island into a multi-use trail network.
The CVRD was the first regional district to complete a report on the future of the E&N corridor, as required by the province. That report made clear the enormous difference in cost between building a trail on the tracks as opposed to either building the trail beside the tracks or bringing back trains.
See this article in the Cowichan Valley Citizen for more information. Note, there is an error in the article. The spur from Duncan to Lake Cowichan was converted to a trail years ago, at very low cost.