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September 2001 West Vancouver Historical Society Page 7 TRAIN WRECK AT WEST BAY! By: Peter Hall H'esi Vancouver has ecperienced two notable tram wrecks. This one occured in the early days of the Pacific Great Eastern's North Shore Subdivision. Labor Day in 1916 fell on Monday, September 4th. The weekend had been sunny and warni, and the weather for the holiday boded to be Uie same. City dwellers flocked to die parks and beaches, and several hundred set out for Wliytecliffe (as it was Uien spelled), and Horseshoe Bay attracted by the railway's special fare of 50 cents and die program of band concerts, picnicking, races, etc., which die railway had phuined. Traffic had been heavy all day, widi the P.G.E.’s tliree gas powered cjus towing standard coaches running consuuitly between die Nordi Vancouver depot at die foot of Lonsdale to die end of die line at Wliytecliffe. The station was actually at the top of die hill before the drop down into Horseslioe Bay, about across from where Gleneagles scliool is today. So great was die demand that day, that steam engine #2, normally just used for freight and yard transfer duties, was pressed into service. As train # 19 and pulling three cars loaded widi 250 excursionists it departed from die P.G.E. station with orders to proceed as far as Dundarave, where it was to wait on die mainline until eastbound train # 22 arrived and took the adjacent siding. While # 19 did stop at Dundarave to pick up passengers, it failed to await the arrival of the odier train - a gas car towing a standard coach. ... "the two trains met and, as the North Shore Press described it. ...were badly crashed in.". . So die stage was set for die inevitable. As die westbound train neared the curve just before West Bay, the eastbound gas car appeared around die bend. Although both trains applied emergency brakes, it was too late. At mile 6.5, just behind today's 3300 block of Marine Drive, the two trains met and, as the North Shore Press described it,"... were badly crashed in". The Vancouver Province next day had this to say: "Twenty persons were injured when two Pacific Great Eastern trains met in a head-on collision near West Bay yesterday afternoon at 12:55p.m. Seven passengers were removed to the Harbour View Sanitarium at NorthVancouver. All will survive. The other injured were removed to their respective homes." Among the injuries were broken noses, fractured ribs, scalp and face wounds, and bruises.These injuries mainly arose from passengers being thrown from their seats. As the North Shore Press of September 8th put it: "People were thrown from their seats, and when the trains met head-on passengers and seats were piled in a heap at the end of the cars closest to the engines. The passengers in the first car behind the locomotive received the worst shock." Doctors rushed to the scene and transported the more seriously injured to hospital in their own cars. Odier drivers were commissioned to bring in the rest, which diey did at what was described as "breakneck" speed. But by the dme of the accident there were huge crowds west of the wreck. The single track line was blocked, and would remain so for several hours. The railway responded by chartering the Terminal Steam Navigadon's steamer "Bowena" with a capacity of 500 to call at Horseshoe Bay and other docks along the way to pick up the stranded holidayers. Later trains stranded west of the wreck shutded passengers to the scene, where a path had been cleared around the wreck, to meet anodier shutte train bound for North Vancouver. And so, something on the order of 1,500 to 2,000 excursionists were brought home. Only the seven more seriously injured remained in hospital. The gas car was damaged beyond repair and was scrapped. Engine # 2, the steam engine, was repaired and returned to service and, after some years as a logging locomotive on Vancouver Island, was presented to the town of Squamish and was placed on display there as the last extant P.G.E. steam engine. It subsequenUy was gifted to the West Coast Railway Heritage Park in Squamish where it has been beautifully restored and is on di^lay. Operations on the line through West Vancouver terminated in 1928 as an expanding road system drew commuter traffic away, only to be resumed in 1956. There was another notable wreck in 1972, but that is another story. PHOTO: Peter Hall P.G.E. Engine # 2