VIA Rail Station Codes

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PRR 60

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Like Amtrak, VIA uses station codes for identifying stops. However, if anyone has used the VIA on-line booking and tried to enter TWO for Toronto or VAC for Vancouver, you find out that VIA does not know what you're talking about. That is because VIA does not use Amtrak codes. Amtrak codes are internal for Amtrak only. VIA took the action to have its stations assigned official IATA airport codes - codes that are registered, unique, and compatible with travel reservation systems. The result is that VIA codes have little or no relationship with the city name.

The fact is that, as a casual traveler, it is not really necessary to know the VIA codes. Like Amtrak's on-line system, VIA's booking engine does just fine if you start entering the name of the city. But you can also enter the code, and as travel geeks, isn't that really what we want to do? Why yes, it is.

So, without further ado, here are the official IATA codes for the major VIA stops (except Edmonton - the web listed code does not work). Go to the VIA site, enter "XEA" and watch Vancouver BC come up. It is really quite magical. For the couple of AU members who took advantage of the recent VIA half price sale, I hope you enjoy your trip from YMY to XDG on 2R.

Code:
City                         Code

Churchill, MB                XAD
Gaspe, QC                    XDD
Halifax, NS                  XDG
Jasper, AB                   XDH
Jonquiere, QC                XJQ
Kingston, ON                 XEG
London, ON                   XDQ
Moncton, NB                  XDP
Montreal, QC                 YMY
Niagara Falls, ON            XLV
Ottawa, ON                   XDS
Prince George, BC            XDV
Prince Rupert, BC            XDW
Quebec, QC                   XFZ
Sarnia, ON                   XDX
Saskatoon, SK                YXE
Senneterre, QC               XFK
Sudbury, ON                  XDY
Toronto, ON                  YBZ
Vancouver, BC                XEA
Victoria, BC                 YYJ
White River, ON              YWR
Windsor, ON                  XEC
Winnipeg, MB                 XEF
 
Last edited by a moderator:
VIA Rail used to use four-letter codes for their stations (TRTO, VCVR, etc.). Do they still have those?
 
VIA Rail used to use four-letter codes for their stations (TRTO, VCVR, etc.). Do they still have those?
Yes, they do ("MTRL" for Montreal, as another example). Those are even harder to find than the IATA codes.
What codes do you want to know?
I would love to know the four letter codes for the list posted above. I don't have any real reason that I have to know the codes, but that doesn't mean I don't want to anyway. It's who I am. :)
 
For the couple of AU members who took advantage of the recent VIA half price sale, I hope you enjoy your trip from YMY to XDG on 2R.
I actually take CO from EWR to YUL, then a taxi from there to YMY and then 2R from there to XDG, and eventually take CO from YHZ back to EWR :) Unfortunately due to time limitations no 2V involved.
 
Someone posted a file of all the VIA 4 letter station codes on Github. They're pulled directly from VIA's website, so they should all be right.
They can be verified with these links (also in the github repository): https://reservia.viarail.ca/GetStations.aspx?q=<enter code>.
The link to a webpage with more complete info for each station is here: http://www.viarail.ca/en/embedded/station/detail/<enter code>.

Github repository URL:
https://github.com/pndurette/viastations

Edit: I attached a text file of the codes with each station on a separate line so it's a bit easier to go through.
 

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