"New England Clipper Service"? Boston - Halifax

I'm curious if anyone knows about a train called the "New England Clipper Service"

From what I gathered, it was handled by CN, NBSR, and Guildford in a joint effort starting in 1997. I believe it may have run from the port of Halifax to Worcester. Did this ever actually take off? Does it still exist?

The latest edition of this has been called The Bluenose see the Pan Am Clipper Newsletter thread and go back one edition or two for more information directly from the company.

Is The Bluenose service a dedicated one? That is, would it be on a certain Pan Am train such as WAAY to pick an example.

Rockingham Racer wrote:Is The Bluenose service a dedicated one? That is, would it be on a certain Pan Am train such as WAAY to pick an example.

From the Pan Am newsletter,

The twice weekly train service is designed to bypass several rail yards, thus halting the delays and extra
handling that rail cars heretofore experienced. The freight now traverses the NBSR and PAR rail systems
in less than four days from Saint John to connect with the CSXT at Worcester, Massachusetts, and in
less than five days to the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPRS) or Norfolk Southern (NS) at Mechanicville,
New York.
The NBSR pre-blocks those cars destined to Ayer, Massachusetts and CSXT for delivery to PAR at
Mattawamkeag, Maine on a train designated as SJWA (Saint John to Waterville). Roughly twenty-four
hours after leaving Saint John, these pre-blocked cars are added to PAR Train NMSE (Northern Maine
Junction to Selkirk) at Waterville, Maine. Dedicated exclusively to Ayer and CSXT traffic, NMSE makes
one stop at Rigby yard in South Portland, Maine to pick up additional CSXT traffic before going directly
to Ayer. At Ayer it sets off the traffic destined for the Ayer vicinity, picks up any additional CSXT traffic
available, and then runs the last twenty-five miles to Worcester for delivery to CSXT.
Traffic to other PAR, CPRS or NS destinations travels in this same service run to Waterville where it
is classified and added to a NMED (Northern Maine Junction to East Deerfield) train which follows
a similar routing as far as Ayer, but then continues west to East Deerfield, Massachusetts where it is
switched into a EDMO (East Deerfield to Mohawk, NY) train for delivery to Mechanicville.

Thanks. Interesting that it's two different train symbols to get to Mechanicville, as opposed to a single NMMO designation.

All other things being equal, there would seem to be a distinct advantage to routing CSX. Once onto CSX, the cars will move. For PAS routing, there is Waterville dwell time, and once onto PAS, the progress will be even less certain because of recrews and ED dwell time.

And more expensive in most scenarios on the PAS due to them getting their cut. While not ideal for them, I think NS assumed that something this would happen... If they were that worried about the diversion of traffic to begin with they would have insisted that the Worcester line be part of the deal.

Still, it sucks to not see any of the paper going to Rotterdam anymore...

To speculate on my personal feelings a bit, it would have been impossible for NS to takeover anything east of Ayer. Considering once you get past Ayer there is only one single line that carries traffic into Northern New England. Essentially, competition must be maintained between NS and CSX thus making it challenging/impossible to takeover east of Ayer. And yes, I know the PAS goes to Willows, but PAR has trackage rights in order to maintain competition and make the connection with CSX. NS knew this was part of the game and if CSX was offering a better deal to PAR, then they would side with CSX. Now the hard scenario plays out. How does a Class 1 (Such as NS or CSX) take over PAR without disrupting competition? Trucks? Shortline feeders? The only way into Maine via the United States is PAR. Perhaps SLR/MMA/NBSR could be considered competition (Direct connections with CP/CN). Also keep in mind the PAS transaction was considered to be a "minor" transaction after the definition of the term was re-evaluated (And created as a new precedence). So what happens now?

Oh and to the topic of the New England Clipper Service, this ran as a Halifax to Ayer service many years back. The containers were added to trains EDNM/NMED and at times could span 40+ containers. The idea was that if they could get 50 a week, they would run a dedicated train. I will not speculate as to why this service failed but I do know the possibility exists for it again.

So to summarize: the Bluenose runs from Saint John, change of hands at Waterville, and then runs to Worcester where it is put on trucks or handed over to CSX?

So is Halifax out of the picture, or does CN bring containers from Halifax to Saint John where it is put onto the Bluenose?

The Bluenose service doesn't carry any containers as of yet,athough there is rumors of a new container service from Halifax to Ayer starting soon.