Ode to the C-Train, a Black Invention

I’ve enjoyed the industrial sounds of a screeching train running across the tracks. The music that that makes. I’ve always had a love for mass transit, especially on rails. Whether light rail, subway, elevated line, trolly, or cross country I appreciated it. I felt this method of transportation represented the working classes, or me and my kinfolk.

I loved and rode public transit everywhere I could. I sat on ferries, electric lines, trolleys, regional rails, subways, and buses. It would only be natural that when I came to Calgary I would fall for the scarlet beauty known as the C-Train here in Calgary. I was happy there were more than buses in this city. Buses can be about as reliable as a flaky friendship, and Uber rides are just as costly.

I have not ridden the C-Train since the pandemic began. I missed it so much I decided to research its history. This was my way to connect with the screeching songs of my favorite mechanical beast. Trains, whether taken as a visitor or a resident, truly gives you a sampling of the flavours of the city. What I was unaware of, until my research-was that the C-Train also represented Black excellence.

Calgary’s C-Train was engineered by Oliver Bowen, a descendant of Willis Reese Bowen, and Obadiah Bowen, among the first Black immigrants to the Amber Valley region in Alberta. Barely a generation…