Mayors from across southwestern Ontario were in London on Thursday asking the head of VIA Rail about service cuts to their communities.

Despite the pressure, CEO Marc Laliberte made it clear he wasn’t there to talk about the cuts, but rather about improving service in the future.

The group, which included Kitchener Mayor Carl Zehr, Region of Waterloo Chair Ken Seiling, Stratford Mayor Dan Mathieson and others, says the meeting was productive nonetheless.

“I think we gave [VIA Rail] the message and they heard it loud and clear, in fact they apologized for not consulting beforehand,” says London Mayor Joe Fontana.

Attendees agreed to establish a working committee that will look at how to boost ridership.

They will also do more consultations to come up with ways to deal with the looming cuts, which includes the loss of routes 86 and 89 along the Toronto to London corridor.

Laliberte says “I think we need to think a little bit more about how we can share with the other modes of transport, how we can harmonize our schedules better.”

Zehr believes the meeting was a positive step, but says both the public and all levels of government need to jump on board, not just municipalities.

“What we don’t have is a national transportation strategy and without that they will continue to do things on a business case basis.”

And the situation is at a breaking point for communities like Strathroy and Stratford.

Strathroy-Caradoc Mayor Joanne Vanderheyden says “We don’t have busses, we’ve been cut off with that. We’re going to be cut off with the train. We’re a little oasis out there doing what? Driving our cars again.”

Mathieson adds “There’s no viable option for public transit using passenger rail and with the recent cuts to transportation and bus service, it makes it next to impossible for people to come to that theatre with public transit.”

In an interesting twist, while Laliberte says London is one of the best-served cities, he had to return to Toronto by car, since there wasn’t a train available to meet his schedule.

“I have an important meeting in Toronto, so I’m sorry, but I really wanted to be here today, I took the train this morning.”