Two Escape Injury After Vehicle Collides With Train in Banff

A vehicle carrying two people collided with an eastbound freight train at the Norquay Road railway crossing in Banff on Saturday (Aug. 29), temporarily blocking one of the town’s main entrances.

Neither occupant required transportation to hospital, according to the Town of Banff.

The vehicle had been travelling north on Norquay Road and stopped beneath the crossing arm as the Canadian Pacific Kansas City train approached, Town of Banff Communications Director Jason Darrah said in a statement.

The circumstances that left the vehicle beneath the arm, including whether it had entered the crossing before the warning system activated, remain unclear.

Banff Fire Department was notified at approximately 11:40 a.m. Emergency crews assessed both occupants at the scene, but neither was taken to hospital.

The train came to a stop approximately 200 metres east of the Banff train station and remained across Norquay Road while emergency crews responded.

Banff firefighters cleared the scene at about 12:50 p.m., and RCMP reopened the road at approximately 1:05 p.m.

The closure temporarily disrupted access along Norquay Road, which connects the Trans-Canada Highway with downtown Banff.

Bow Valley Insider contacted CPKC seeking information about the sequence of events, whether the crossing warning system was operating correctly and whether the train sustained significant damage.

A representative of the CPKC Police Service said its police reports contain confidential information and are not publicly released. The inquiry was forwarded to CPKC’s media team, but the company did not respond by publication deadline.

Public occurrence data from the Transportation Safety Board of Canada shows relatively few vehicle-related railway crossing incidents recorded in Banff over the past four decades.

Among 30 Banff-area railway occurrence records dating to 1983, only one earlier event was formally classified as a crossing occurrence. In 2002, a light truck at the automated Bow Avenue crossing struck a pole protruding from the back of a railway maintenance vehicle. No one was injured.

The federal data includes only occurrences reported to the Transportation Safety Board and should not be treated as a complete record of every close call or minor incident at Banff railway crossings.