Venture Serviceability - draft

For the last year, I've been doing some 'citizen science' to find out what VIA couldn't or wouldn't share - Siemens Venture serviceability data. Why? Because the constant complaining and perceived problems with the Ventures, expressed by rail enthusiasts and passengers alike, may not always have been fact-based. An earlier post published in May, 2025 includes serviceability data and On-Time-Performance data from the previous seven months. I'm still waiting for a complete response from VIA's Access To Information Co-Ordinator and have been since March, 2025. So, here goes...

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY BASED ON DATA FROM THE LAST 11 MONTHS

• Venture Sets have a wide variation in serviceability, from 0-100%. 
• As of today, each Venture Set has an average serviceability rate of 73%.
• As of today, the Venture fleet has a median serviceability rate of 80%.
• As the number of Sets increased, the percentage of sets in service increased, as did the total number of sets in service.

WHY AM I DOING THIS?

While train watching at Kingston's VIA station last winter, I decided to start recording the serviceability of the Venture sets from various sources I could cross-reference: 

• personal observations,
• credible trackside reports from others,
• video and still photos,

while maintaining a high bar for veracity so as not to over-report or sensationalize the challenges VIA staff and operating crews have faced with this implementation, as well as the aforementioned acrimony of VIA's passengers as they switch to Ubers, planes and GO trains to their destinations, while slagging VIA on social media. 

In the table, 'VIA Ventures Not Operating November 18/24-November 8/25' (below) I used to compile serviceability, the trainset number (Sets 1-32) is shown on the vertical axis at left. The weeks of each month are shown on the horizontal axis at top. The table uses the following colour-coding to show serviceability:

• Red - not observed in operation for two or more weeks. (I allowed up to two-week intervals for which I'd garnered no observations anywhere in the Corridor, allowing perhaps for routine service, or just missed by trackside observers, although since the trainsets operate across multiple Corridor lanes, that seemed unlikely!)
• Yellow - undergoing [1,000-mile] break-in testing.
• Green - train set received but not yet undergoing break-in testing.
• White - observed in service.

Now that a year has elapsed since that chilly sittin'-in-my-van session at the station, I've decided to tabulate the data from the table. Here's how I compiled the data:

• I first added red cells for each Set vertically to get a total of Sets 'not observed in operation'.
• I then used the number of Sets as a numerator, using 'total number of Sets in revenue service' that week as a denominator, i.e. not including then-undelivered Sets or those undergoing break-in testing.
• I calculated the percentage of number of Sets in revenue service that week.
• I averaged each month's weeks together to get a number of Sets in revenue service that month.

Notes:

• each 'week' is not necessarily Sunday-to-Saturday, nor completely in one month. Months shown may therefore include a few days of previous or subsequent month.
• a 'week' shown in red may be based on only one observation or many, i.e. the set may have been used for one day or seven days to be shown as white/in service.
• percentages have been rounded up.
• Set 25 "became" Set 7 after remnants of both sets were combined in August.
• Set 32 entered service during the second week of November, just beyond the scope of this table.
• I did not include the last two weeks' of November 2024's data, nor any data beyond the first week of November 2025 because the number of observations was decreasing below what I believed was a statistically-significant level. That's why I can't claim a full year of data, but 48 weeks' data reveals an emerging, credible trend.

I've summarized the compiled data in three ways:

SERVICEABILITY OF VENTURE SETS BY MONTH - SINCE DECEMBER 2024

Here are the monthly Venture fleet serviceability rates as a result: (mean = 73%)

• December, 2024: 68%
• January, 2025: 60%
• February: 62%
• March: 67%
• April: 67%
• May: 73%
• June:75%
• July:81%
• August: 87%
• September: 85%
• October: 79%

SERVICEABILITY OF VENTURE SETS BY INDIVIDUAL TRAINSET:

Here are the number of weeks in service for each Set over the past 48 weeks:

• Set 1: 0% (shop queen, not officially accepted by VIA)
• Set 2: 52%
• Set 3: 32%
• Set 4: 50%
• Set 5: 48%
• Set 6: 81%
• Set 7: 67%
• Set 8: 94%
• Set 9: 62%
• Set 10: 85%
• Set 11: 75% (damaged near Mont St Hilaire on September 24, 2025 and still out of service)
• Set 12: 66%
• Set 13: 87%
• Set 14: 81%
• Set 15: 62%
• Set 16: 62%
• Set 17: 100%
• Set 18: 79%
• Set 19: 62%
• Set 20: 75%
• Set 21: 79%
• Set 22: 88%
• Set 23: 100%
• Set 24: 100%
• Set 25: 100%
• Set 26: 100%
• Set 27: 93%
• Set 28: 100%
• Set 29: 100%
• Set 30: 87%
• Set 31: 60%
• Set 32: 100%

SERVICEABILITY OF SETS BY PERCENTANGE (RANGES OF 10%)

Or to put it another way, and not to single out a particular set for circumstances beyond its control, here is a grouping of Sets by serviceability: (median = 80%)

• 100% serviceable: Sets 17, 23, 24, 25, 26, 28, 29, 32.
• 90-99% serviceable: Sets 8, 27.
• 80-89% serviceable: Sets 6, 10, 13, 14, 22, 30.
• 70-79% serviceable: Sets 11, 18, 20, 21.
• 60-69% serviceable: Sets 7, 9, 12, 15, 16, 19, 31.
• 50-59% serviceable: Sets 2, 4.
• <50% serviceable: Sets 1, 3, 5.

Trends:

• It's clear from the compiled data that the number of in-service Sets has trended positively. More white, less red!
• It's also clear that VIA has got a handle on maintaining the Ventures as newer sets are delivered, they seem to spend more time in-service.
• It could be argued that showing percentages for each Set, with earlier-delivered sets understandably having more weeks in service to have something 'go wrong' would make it easier for newer sets to have higher percentages in-service. But note that the final ten Sets delivered (23 to 32 inclusive) have been in revenue service for up to 42 weeks, with one set entering service about every 7 weeks.
• It's important to remember that as the number of sets increased until all were delivered, that a percentage represented an absolute higher number of sets, i.e. 81% in the first week of December, 2024 represented 17 sets in service (out of a total of 21), while a similar percentage in the first week of October, 2025 represented 26 sets in service (out of a total of 31).

Running extra...

First past the post...

CN Carlton Sub

First, some links:

proposed for disposition in 1964 page 267

says rails removed in 1992

May 20, 1977 partial article on Carlton Sub:

1977 Saskatoon Star-Phoenix article:

July 19, 1980 hearing to abandon:

February 6, 1980 elevator article:

May 7, 1982 removal of track Laird to Carlton:

August 1, 1984 Saskatoon Star-Phoenix article: 

January 27, 1992 final abandonment:

It's Over, Son.

A Sentimental Journey? In tonight's episode of M*A*S*H, to boost morale, Radar hits the airwaves, and at Col. Potter's request, plays Sentimental Journey 23 times during a marathon session! But Radar isn't self-aware enough to know when short-lived career is over. Sherm has to come in and tell him. It truly is a blessing to know, for oneself, when it's over.

Alan Alda Lifetime Achievement!

Alan Alda received the Life Achievement Award from SAG-AFTRA tonight. Richly deserved. Alan WAS M*A*S*H! The depth and breadth of his acting, not to mention writing and directing simply made the show that millions watched. Watched longer than the war it was intended to depict.

Alan is 83 but the baton has already been passed. Watch Dr. Max Goodwin on NBC's New Amsterdam, played by Ryan Eggold. He embodies the same range of emotions, versatility, believability and credibility that Alan brought to the role of Captain Benjamin Franklin Pierce, M.D.

Oh, Tokyo

Catching some M*A*S*H reruns on CHCH-TV, including the Loudon Wainwright III troubadour episode "The Bridge".

Oh, Tokyo...

One Man's Garbage...

In one of his whimpering appeals on the show, Frank pleads, "I ask for so little, and I give so much."  Ever feel the same way, though you don't plead it as only Liver Lips could? 

Recently, a colleague made a co-operative gesture on my behalf.  I immediately thought of the episode in which Frank uses the above rationalizing phrase.

Twofer:

I inevitably end up taking out the garbage.  Each Monday night, I'm reminded of that Season Four episode in which Frank is proud to be given the odiously odiferous task of dealing with the 4077's garbage.  Proud to have been given the title 'garbage officer', he even organizes a garbage auction for the business-minded indigenous people.  Hawkeye buys the garbage and dumps it on the Jeep of a detestable officer, using a helicopter sling.

Super-Limo and a Terrible View

I was very impressed by each Super-Limo.  No doubt a Russian prototype.  Certainly not a General Motors product.  The Portraitmobile was particularly impressive.  The hearse was so long it had two sets of rear-view mirrors.  I slept in and got there late and so my standing spot (each one geometrically measured and marked with a small masking-tape 'X') was awful and I couldn't see much:

Doesn't have much to do with M*A*S*H* but both happened on the Korean Peninsula.