A Cobourg man who got an unexpected surprise when tons of rocks and wooden ties was dumped onto his property received an apology from CN Rail on Thursday, July 23, 2020.
In the latest battle, Brian Milner said CN Rail dumped tons of rocks and railway ties on his property.
Milner has owned 13 acres of property on the north side of railway tracks, just east of Victoria Street for many years.
But lately CN Rail seems to be taking advantage of the good neighbour policy by using Milner’s property as a dumping ground.
On Wednesday, July 22, 2020, Milner noticed upwards of 20,000 tons of rocks and old railway ties that reaches about seven metres (20 feet) high that has partially been dumped on his property.
Milner said the rocks and ties were dumped within the last week.
But Milner says this wasn’t the first time CN Rail has used his property as a dumping ground.
“CN are continually infringing on it. We’ve had them move steel rails off, we’ve had them move a whole bunch of garbage that they had stored on it over the years.”
Milner had a survey done of his property and there are numerous posts/stakes along the perimetre of the property, but during the course of dumping the gravel at least one was removed.
“I’ve asked CN to put a fence up and they just ignore me.”
Over the course of several years, Milner said there has been rails, wooden debris, railway ties and gravel dumped on his property.
At one point, Milner said CN Rail called Cobourg Police and CN Police because they thought he was trespassing on their property. Milner left before police arrived, but he was working on his own property clearing it.
“They seem to think they own all this property. Just because they border on it, they think they can do what they want with it.”
Traditionally, Milner said it has been very hard to get in contact with any representatives from CN Rail, but on Thursday, his luck seemed to have changed and he got hold of the right person.
Today’s Northumberland reached out for comment from CN Rail. Manager, Public Affairs for CN Rail in Ontario Daniel Salvatore stated in a e-mail to Today’s Northumberland, “CN would like to apologize for the inconvenience and impact caused to Mr. Milner as a result of materials spilling onto his property. CN crews spoke with Mr. Milner earlier today (July 23rd) with respect to the gravel that straddles CN and his property and informed him that beginning tomorrow morning CN will begin to remove said materials. In addition to removing the material, CN will be placing barriers to demark the property boundary to avoid further events of this type happening again.”
Author: Pete Fisher
Has been a photojournalist for over 30-years and have been honoured to win numerous awards for photography and writing over the years. Best selling author for the book Highway of Heroes - True Patriot Love
