The Budd cars return to Windsor after dark

This is part II of my Windsor history series. You can read the first entry by clicking here.

In August 2022, when I was taking photos of the interesting pieces of rolling stock at the Waterloo Central Railway's St. Jacobs yard, I spotted an RDC unit tucked away in the yard, far enough away from my vantage point on a nearby street that I couldn't get a clean photograph of it. But I got a reasonable shot. I give the volunteers running this operation credit. They painted the unit in the Canadian Pacific maroon and gold scheme, albeit lettered for the Waterloo Central. This maroon scheme predated the ubiquitous CP multimark scheme that was adopted in 1968. It got me to thinking.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, it was clear that highways had supplanted passenger rail services as the dominant form of short-distance travel in much of Canada. Despite various attempts to modernize their service or innovate after the Second World War, both CP and CN were hemorrhaging money on their passenger services. In CN's case, it was a government owned corporation, which tended to soften the blow, but also force its hand to stick with its passenger services. CP was a different story, as it was not a government owned entity, although it was still subject to the same regulation that mandated passenger service standards at the time. So, in a sense, CP had the worst of all worlds.

That said, CP and CN were going in different directions as the 1970s approached. One was investing and another was actively bailing out.

At this time, my Dad had moved with his family to Windsor, Ont., as my grandfather was transferred from CP's facilities in Chapleau, in Northern Ontario, to the Windsor shops. In my Dad's case, this meant, as a teenager, he found himself with his first job at the CP yards in Windsor alongside my grandfather, who was a rolling stock mechanic.

My grandfather usually worked the RIP track, which is short for the repair-in-place track. He sometimes would work in the shed near the roundtable as well. There were times that he would be dispatched to wrecks around southern Ontario to ensure that the main line would be clear as quickly and safely as possible following an accident. In short, my grandfather did a little bit of everything. By contrast, my Italian grandfather (Nonno in Italian) was also living in Windsor at this time, but he had long since moved on from his work as a general track labourer with CP, which he did in the Crowsnest Pass district of B.C.

My Dad often worked nights at the CP yard alongside my grandpa. At the time, CP was still maintaining a national passenger network. A peak at the CP schedule from 1968 shows that there were two daily trains between Toronto and Windsor in both directions. This image below was taken from Steve Boyko's collection. Steve is the author of the traingeek.ca blog. He graciously allowed me to use this image for this post. 

The timetable gives you clues as to CP's state of mind regarding regional passenger rail at the time. The four trips were all made with Dayliners, which is a fancy term for RDCs. The schedule shows two RDCs made morning runs, one from Toronto heading west at 8:30 a.m. and one from Windsor heading east at 7:15 a.m. The eastbound to Toronto arrived at 11:20 while the westbound to Windsor arrived at 12:40 p.m. That means a four-hour trip. A bit slow, but not bad considering the stops made en route. 

The evening trains followed similar schedules. The evening train out of Toronto heading west left Union Station at 6:30 p.m. and arrived in Windsor at 10:40 p.m. The eastbound out of Windsor left at 5:05 p.m. and arrived in Toronto at 9:15 p.m. 

So what are the clues that CP was not prioritizing the passenger service, other than the fact that the Budds were doing the hauling? Look closely at the left of the image and you see that the schedule advises that there are "Meal Stations" en route where food can be purchased at city prices. In other words, there appears to be no service on the train. It's also worth noting that CP has a bus service to Kitchener from its Galt passenger station, since Galt (part of Cambridge now) is quite a way from Kitchener and Waterloo.

The final clue as to what CP was thinking at the time can be found on the notation at the bottom of the schedule which lists Windsor's passenger terminal as "Tecumseh Road and Crawford Avenue." This is what my Windsor rail friend and blog contributor Kevin O'Neil said of the CP passenger terminal.

"CP’s Budd Cars stopped at Tecumseh W and Crawford. The whole intersection was realigned a few years ago so the two distinct wings of Tecumseh were connected with a sweeping curve, covering part of the Crawford right-of-way. The building that held the CP Express transfer docks is still there, although it hasn’t belonged to CP in the years of my conscious memory. It belonged to a private cartage company for many years, and now it’s a warehouse for a restaurant equipment supplier. I’ve never been able to pinpoint the location of the Budd waiting room."

 

So, in other words, CP had some sort of makeshift waiting room for passengers in a freight facility. Not uncommon in the days where railways were actively trying to discourage passenger travel. Now compare that image in your head to the Canadian Pacific's terminal near the Detroit River, which served from 1880 into the 1930s. I don't know that I have ever seen anything like this.

 

Image and the one that follows beneath are from the Southwestern Ontario Digital Archives at the University of Windsor and are used for informational purposes only, as per the disclaimer stated on the SWODA website. 

 

After this station was demolished, CP moved its passenger operations into the Michigan Central station on Pelletier Street until it improvised a waiting room at the former corner of Tecumseh and Crawford in the 1960s. The MCR station was used by the New York Central's Canadian operations (legally the Canada Southern Railway, a subsidiary of MCR, which was owned by NYC) before its operations were merged into Penn Central and eventually Conrail. At this point, there were no passenger services offered by this successor railway, as Conrail's birth came after the establishment of Amtrak.

 

Sadly, this station is no longer around, as it was a victim of arson some years back. I do recall reading about this, but my thanks to Kevin for reminding me. 

 

So back to my Dad. I do recall him telling me about his two most vivid memories of working in CP's yard during his early years. He told me he recalled walking alongside freight trains that had just arrived and filling the journal boxes with oil. This was, of course, at a time when there was still rolling stock around that used journals instead of roller bearings. Essentially, the axles were kept in running condition by fabric that was coated in oil. When these boxes containing this fabric and oil leaked and the oil spilled out, the axles would get hot. This is the origin of the term "hot box" I am told. 

 

My Dad's other memory? He told me one of his jobs was to clean out the Budd cars that had arrived from Toronto. This is where his job got interesting. He often found that the cars were quite a mess when they arrived in the yard for servicing. He said it was quite common to find beer and liquor bottles on the cars, as well as a surprising amount of money. His suggestion was that there was usually an unsavoury element that rode these trains into Windsor at night. 

 

Luckily for my Dad, Ontario Hydro offered him a better job with benefits and hours at the J. Clark Keith thermal generating station in Windsor (long since closed). His life on the railway and cleaning out the Budd cars was mercifully short.

The Ghosts of Bedell, Part II

As I mentioned in my last post, Bedell is an interesting spot on the Canadian Pacific Winchester Sub. It's an area that has rich history. Now, as much of its old infrastructure has been removed, it's also a testament to how railways have evolved. Small towns are rarely much more than a passing landmark to freight trains these days and Bedell is no exception. There are no diamonds here, the interlocking is long gone, the station is only visible in old photos and much of the former Prescott Sub connection has been removed.

So what is there to see in Bedell these days? Well, in the last few years at least, there was a fair amount to see, to be honest. The Canadian Pacific has been very busy reshaping the Winchester Sub, which connects Montreal with Smiths Falls. The double tracks have been slowly merged into a single track governed by modern signalization. Bedell retains some extra trackage, as the railway still makes use of passing sidings, but most of the old remnants of the Bedell rail yard have disappeared. 

The image above is a shot I took in February last year as maintenance of way crews continued their work in the area. Much of the consist was parked on the South Prescott Spur. The caboose, which had the modern CPR letting on it, seemed to be the crew breakroom, where they could escape to a warm place and get out of the howling winter winds. You can see the smoke rising the smokestack, indicating that there is something cooking or running inside the old car. The earliest photo of this caboose I could find was from 2004, meaning it's been assigned to engineering services for nearly two decades.

This shot above shows you a hint of the gondolas on the South Prescott Spur. The entire consist was being marshalled around by a flatbed truck equipped with flanged wheels for use on the rails. I was disappointed to see this. It would have been cool to see one of CP's old MoW locomotives on point, possibly with some old multimarks on the long hood, but it was not to be.

What's also striking about this image is the fact that so many old ties were piled up in the area. In the several times I have been to Bedell in 2020 and 2021, the amount of rail ties was pretty impressive. It seemed like this was the spot where many of the old ties were dumped. The shot below was taken in July 2020. This pile was just the tip of the iceberg.

I haven't been to Bedell in more than a year to see what it's like these days, but seeing those cabooses when I did was incredibly gratifying, especially for someone who is old enough to remember when trains still had cabooses. I remember the debate when railways unions pressed their cases about the issue. I still have a pin somewhere that says "Trains are safer with a caboose." It was given to me by a Teamsters union representative that was pleading its case at a Sarnia mall in the 1980s.

When you drive through Kemptville these days, you wouldn't know you were in a railway town. The last remnants of the old Prescott Sub were lifted shortly after I took this photo in 2014. In fact, you won't find that old industrial building anymore either. It's all been razed. Nothing but a flat expanse of development land for sale. 

Despite the removal of much of the infrastructure at Bedell, it still remains one of my favourite spots to sit trackside. Go there in the summer and listen to the sound of the wind swishing through the trees. It's a very peaceful spot. Catching a train there is tough, given the decreased frequency of traffic, but the newly installed modern signals will give you some clues. You can see these signals safely from the Bedell Road crossing, which might be able to let you know if you will be waiting an entire afternoon or whether you might be in luck. 

You see? Progess isn't so bad.

The Ghosts of Bedell, Part I

This post was supposed to be the first stop on my blog's reunion tour, as I called it when I restarted things in August 2021. Since then, I have accumulated much more material, which has pushed back this post for months and now more than a year. It's not a bad problem to have.

Bedell, Ontario, a spot along the Canadian Pacific Railway's Winchester Subdivision. Bedell once housed a station and an active rail yard. Over the course of my extended hiatus from blogging, I did manage to visit this spot a few times. Truthfully, I wouldn't have been able to visit this spot were it not for the fact that I had surgery on my knee at the Kemptville District Hospital and subsequent follow-ups with my surgeon a few times. That meant a few free passes to railfan at a time when I would usually not be able to get away from Ottawa.

Those who know their history know that Bedell once boasted a station, a tower, an interlocking crossing between the Canadian Pacific and the St. Lawrence and Ottawa Railway and later a diamond that connected the CP Winchester Sub to the railway's Prescott Sub. Read about the history of Bedell's rail operations here.

The Prescott Sub lasted until the late 1990s, when it was finally deactivated and the rail removed south of Ottawa. The rail in Ottawa was spared, some of which became part of the O-Train Trillium Line while the remainder was used by Ottawa Central and then CN in its local operations. A small portion of the Prescott Sub still ventured into Kemptville as the North Prescott Spur. That spur was lifted several years ago. The South Prescott Spur is still hanging on, as a turnout for eastbound locals on the Winchester Sub. That spur serves CP customers in Oxford Station.

So, what's left in Bedell these days? Not much but memories and a few ghosts no doubt. I've been here a number of times and detailed the ongoing process of rails being lifted and area being cleared of anything resembling a rail yard. 

This shot above was the scene on November 30, 2020 when I was in Kemptville for an appointment, which led me to Bedell, of course. Throughout 2020, CP maintenance of way crews were quite active in Bedell as the Winchester Sub was single tracked in many places, due to modern signalization improvements that do not require two tracks. For my purposes, I was interested to see the two old yard tracks removed on the north side of the area (left on the photo). One of the tracks was once clearly labelled as a bad order track. You could see the sign from the side of Bedell Road. The south track with gondolas marked the first time I have ever seen cars parked in this area.

The North Prescott Spur was being used that day as a staging ground for this maintenance of way consist, including a genuine caboose. I was quite surprised to see the last vestiges of the CP multimark on this car. The white scheme with no identifying marks or numbers was quite odd, although it might have been a case of a car being repainted after being heavily marked by graffiti. 

Here's a closer look at the caboose. You can see from the ends that its original yellow paint scheme is clearly visible. As if a caboose on a main line wasn't odd enough, this one had two paint schemes. I was disappointed that I didn't see any freight trains pass by, but this was a great consolation prize, to be sure. 

Still, I couldn't help but feel a little sad for the ghosts of Bedell. At one point, this was a real community gathering spot, where families embarked on long journeys or reunited. It once saw upwards up 30 trains a day. By most counts, it now sees anywhere from five to seven, based on what I hear from various railfans. Occasionally, there will be a seasonal extra, such as a semi-regular ethanol unit train, but the frequency is not really conducive to regular railfanning.

This Soo Line gondola has definitely seen better days.

 

Progress or is this the end of an era? Depends on your perspective.

 

Despite the fact that very little is left in Bedell from the area's heyday, it's important to understand today's reality. Canadian Pacific is definitely a railway in growth mode, even if it isn't evident in this area. The railway's purchase of the Central Maine & Quebec Railway (formerly Montreal Maine & Atlantic) gave CP its transcontinental connection to the East Coast once again. The railway has been promoting its new eastern terminus as a competitive advantage for shippers (read: intermodal and containers). The railway also clearly sought to establish a link to Mexico with its prolonged struggled to acquire Kansas City Southern.

 

So what does this have to do with Bedell? Well, if the minds running CP have their way, the railway is clearly going to be busier as a true transcontinental transportation concern once again. That could mean a few more trains passing through Bedell. They might not stop there anymore, but the ghosts would likely notice the increase and smile.

Hide and Seek, Part II

Ah, to go back in time and right past wrongs. I often think of my time in Kitchener and kick myself for not using that time to capture the then-Goderich Exeter Railway Guelph Subdivision action. I lived in KW from 2007-2009. The only train photograph I came away with was a shot of the trestle over Kolb Park on the city's eastern boundary. You can check that photo out in this post. Since living in the city, I have had very few opportunities to return. I did go back in 2018 and managed to catch a few really cool things, which are even more meaningful now that GEXR is but a memory on the Guelph Sub. You can check that post out here.

This is all a very long-winded way of introducing the second part of my Hide and Seek posts. Hide and seek is really just a fancy way of putting a name to my maddening pursuit of railway pictures from the passenger seat of my car when my family is driving on Highway 401. This summer, my family made two trips to Southwestern Ontario and saw a few things on the way. The second trip was much more fruitful, but I want to focus on one area where I never expected to see anything, but I did.

When you are travelling westbound on the 401 through Kitchener, you don't have to wait long once you exit the 401 and drive onto Highway 8 before you might see some trains. You have to look to the right of your car as you head into Kitchener (west). If you strain your eyes and you are lucky, you will see the Canadian Pacific switching, mainly autoracks.

You will notice that this is not much of a photo. I had to blow it up, sharpen the blurred lines and crop out the extraneous highway dividers. But it feels so good to earn a bonus shot, especially for me, since I so rarely see freight trains and CP freight trains especially. You can even see a hint of some golden farm fields in the background.

I almost came away with a brilliant shot, but then this happened. The shot is pretty sharp and there would have been nothing blocking my view of these distant engines, but then the dump truck ruined my shot. Taking shots from a moving car is the definition of crap shoot. You never know what you are going to end up getting or just narrowly missing. Hence, hide and seek. Sometimes, you get something and sometimes, it all disappears in a flash.

But I was happy to get anything, to be honest. When I lived in Kitchener, CP was a busy railway in and around Cambridge, which is on Kitchener's southern border. CP switches for Toyota in Cambridge, along with a number of smaller light industries in the area. But, the automotive production plants are its big business here. The railway built Wolverton Yard specifically for its flourishing autorack business at a time when it was not really in the habit of such capital expenditures. The yard handles Kia and Hyundai distribution, as well. I do remember when I was covering stories for the Record newspaper in Cambridge, I would sometimes happen across CP's switching moves and my eyes would linger for a moment. There are some great spots in Cambridge to watch local switching. Alas, I never took any photographs.

I knew I had to be aware when we pulled into Kitchener on Highway 8 this time around, since I first noticed the CP switching moves last year when we travelled the same stretch of road. This year, I was ready and I was lucky enough to see a train once again. Great train karma for once!

The shot above is not bad, all things considered. You can see that the head unit, GP38-2 3118, is in need of new paint. You can barely see the Canadian script or what's left of the golden rodent. I wasn't able to get a clear shot of the second unit, which looked like it had newer paint. Considering how few CN geeps I have seen (excluding the GP20ECO rebuilds), I was happy to see this old warhorse.

This shot below is the one image that was clear enough to allow me to identify the one unit. As you can see, much of the train is obscured, but that's how this game is played.

It's not much, but when you see as little as I do, every small victory counts.

Something Old, Something New in Smiths Falls

You better believe that when I took my family to the Railway Museum of Eastern Ontario in Smiths Falls in August, a trip to the Canadian Pacific rail yard was on the agenda as well. I told my wife that this would be a stopover before we hit the local Tim Hortons. She seemed fine with this and stayed in the car. My oldest daughter decided to come with me and walk along the old platform in front of the original Canadian Pacific (later Via Rail) passenger station. 

As is the case in Smiths Falls these days, timing is everything. This is not a terribly busy rail yard at times. It's such a different place compared to the CN rail yard in Sarnia, which is one of only a few other points of reference for me. However, there is one thing you can almost always count on seeing in the Falls. CP always has two units assigned to the yard and they are usually idling a few tracks out from the main line. And by this, I mean the middle of the yard.

I checked the old searchlight signals and it was clear there was nothing coming on the main line, which was no surprise, so I decided to see if there was any interesting rolling stock in the yard. I did find this tank car, still painted in the Omya scheme. Of course, these cars are quite common in these parts, as CP serves the Omya plant in Perth, delivering what it needs to make its calcium carbonate-derived products (think of toothpaste and many other consumer and building products).

This may not be all that exciting to some, but I was happy to find one of these cars that still had the Omya logo on it. I have a lot of shots of these cars from years past, but almost all of them now have no logo on them. I've mentioned it many times on this blog, but I'll mention it again. What seems mundane today might just be a gem a few years from now. 

I also love taking overall shots of this yard, which is one of the few I have seen that was designed on such a pronounced curve on the main line. It allows you to see lines of cars stretching quite far into the distance. Again, for someone who never sees trains these days, any shot is worth taking.

If you study shot carefully, you'll notice three different styles of tank car (grey, black and white), some more of the white tank cars bound for Perth and a long string of autoracks, including one painted for the Grand Trunk at the end. 

But all of this is secondary to the idling engines in the yard, which is about all there is to see in Smiths Falls for much of the day. Some mornings, you might get to see crews get a consist together for a run to Perth (I've caught this type of action two times. You can read about it here and here.). This time around, nothing was happening. The two units in the yard were idling and the air brakes were making some serious hissing noises. My daughter found it unsettling.

Here was the shot I took. Here are a few things I found odd about the lash-up. First, I don't know that I've seen units lashed up like this. They are usually connected on the long hood ends. The next thing I noticed was that there were two very different units together. Unit 2304 is obviously a rebuilt GP20ECO unit that are the go-to choice for yards and local runs on the CP, judging by my past experiences in this yard and at a few other CP spots I've visited. But engine 3037 is a GP38-2, obviously in need of some new paint, judging by the look of the red on the long hood.

Okay, so it's maybe not as surprising as a regular to this yard would expect, but it was the first time I've seen this type of old and new together in this yard. For someone who so rarely gets to the rail yard these days, anything out of the ordinary is worth mentioning.

Railway stories: The reporter along the tracks

With the options for railfanning limited these days, I have been searching for some ideas to use for this blog. I have been cycling through photos and thinking of stories not yet told. Then it hit me. I have a number of life stories that somehow connect to the railways. I'm sure lots of people have similar railway stories, whether they know it or not. For me, I tend to remember more details of major life events when there is some sort of railway connection.

So, here's my first story. When I was in my early 20s, I lived for two years in Peterborough, Ontario. I worked for the local newspaper, the Examiner. It's a daily that is famous for once having employed Robertson Davies as its publisher. While Davies is certainly not my favourite author, I can appreciate his work and the cachet his name still carries.

In 2003-04, when I worked there, the Examiner was located in an industrial office building on an industrial road dubbed The Queensway. The building included a printing press in the back and the property backed up onto the Kawartha Lakes Railway line, a CP Rail shortline. This was the same line that once went through to Ottawa. The line now ends in Havelock. It is once again being looked at as a possibility for better, faster train service to Ottawa and Montreal (pipe dream).

This is not a shot from Peterborough. In fact, I have no rail photos from my time there in 2003-04, but I thought I needed to show something. So here's a shot of a yard switcher in London, Ontario. It's a good example of CP's secondary power that was and is the primary power on the Kawartha Lakes Railways through Peterborough.

When I worked in Peterborough, the Kawartha Lakes Railway was a forgettable secondary rail line that saw limited, albeit somewhat regular, action. But it was never terribly busy. I do recall being at my desk in the evening and looking out the back window of our newsroom, which faced west. The setting sun was always a soothing site, but that window also offered a view of the rail line and it would always make me pause when a train came roaring by.

I also remember being held up mid-jog by a train that was hurtling by Lansdowne Street, being led by two old SW1200s that were pulling a surprisingly long load. That was the type of scene you could expect to see on this line at the time. Two yard switchers pulling a long freight train, working as primary road power. 

I remember one night, a call came in on the police scanner, which was asking for officers to try and find two yokels in a pickup truck who had steered their truck onto the rail line in search of a deer they were apparently hunting. This was the type of local flavour that often coloured our police coverage.

To this day, I'm not exactly sure what to make out of this city. It was always an enigma to me.

But I think the clearest memory I have of those railway tracks was when the city was hit by what is known in weather circles as a cold low. It was a torrential rain storm that stalled over the city and dumped more than 100 mm of rain on the city in less than 12 hours. The result was that the city was flooded almost in its entirety. The flood only lasted a day, but its damage was immense. The story made national headlines in the summer of 2003.

The only way I could make it to work was by bike, since the roads were mostly flooded between my house and the newspaper offices.

This was my street. A neighbour was trying to fish something out of the crater that had been created near the hydro box.

The day of the flood turned out to be one of the longest of my career. It was exhilarating and humbling at the same time. I remember biking down one of my local streets with the water over the front tires of my bike. I had no raincoat, so I had to wear a garbage bag over my clothes, just to keep dry.

My railway memory of that day happened when I was in the back parking lot of our newspaper offices and looking down the tracks, much of which were washed out and unpassable. In that quiet moment amid the chaos of that day, a young reporter came walking up to me, a recorder and microphone in hand. She introduced herself as a reporter from CBC Radio and wanted to know if I could comment a bit on what was happening in the city.

The whole time as I am answering her questions, I wondered, how did this reporter, most likely from Toronto, find her way into the city? The main routes into Peterborough were flooded. I also wondered, why was she walking along the railway tracks? I never asked her how she made it into town and I never did figure out why she was walking along the tracks.

It was a surreal moment in my career and one that I will never forget. Much of that has to do with the fact that it happened near railway tracks.

Three shots, lots of history

I am always aware that many readers of this blog come across it accidentally and read these postings long after I posted them. So rather than expounding on the state of the world as it stands on March 29th, 2020, as I write this, let's just enjoy what we came here for. Let's explore our passion for railways together for a few minutes and consider ourselves lucky to be able to do so.

With that in mind, I recently came across some images I captured this past summer in Southwestern Ontario when I was visiting family in the Sarnia area. Those who are regular visitors here know I post a lot from this area, since it is where I grew up and it remains a spot I visit semi-regularly.

One day near the end of my last visit, I took my nephew and my daughters to the Sarnia CN rail yard on our way home from a visit to a museum in the downtown. We were treated to the sight of a tunnel train marshalling its load together in front of the Sarnia Via rail station. You can read all about that train here.

But as I was looking for other items of interest in the yard, I turned my attention to the old Sarnia roundhouse, where Lambton Diesel operates as a repair and refurbishment facility for many railways. That means you are often treated to the sight of rare or odd units in the yard, depending on the day you visit.

Take this image below. You can clearly see the long hood of an old CP geep in its action scheme It's most likely an old GP9, which was one of the last of the railway's GP series that was rostered on the railway in recent years. My guess is this hood was from a geep that was sold off to a shortline or industrial operation before it reached the end of its lifespan and was sold for scrap or parts.

You can also see the old Novacor SW series switcher, which appeared to be in for servicing. I have shot that unit at the Nova Corunna plant a few times in recent years, where it still operates alongside what appears to be a genset. And old CN warhorse GP9 is peaking out from behind the shell of the old CP geep hood.

Here's another shot with no shortage of interesting material. You can the see the exposed engine of an old CN SW1200 switcher in the centre of the frame. To its left, the old Esso SW switcher, which likely was in for servicing. As Imperial Oil still has a very large presence in the Chemical Valley, I'm sure that switcher is kept busy

Look to the left of the Esso unit and you can see a grey shell of another geep unit. The grey could be primer or possibly it's an old CSX livery. I am guessing it's been taken down to primer. Just a hunch. Looking to the right of the frame, you can see another grew SW unit behind the old CN unit. To the right of the frame, CSX has one of its GP38s in for servicing as well.

I almost missed this unit, but saw it at the last second, sandwiched in between a tank car and an NCIX covered hopper. I don't know how many of this GATX units are still in use on the CN system, but I'm guessing few, if any, especially given the dearth of business right now.

So there's a brief distraction for you. Lots of 1960s-1970s heritage units, all in a few shots. I always make sure to get a shot of these old locomotives when I see them in Sarnia because you never know which ones are destined to become parts for another engine.

Catch the history while you can.

A matter of perspective

As I've mentioned recently, I'm not as big a fan of railyard shots as I once was, simply because there is so little action at times. The Smiths Falls CP yard is a great example. Although the yard has some interesting curves, which allow you to get some great angles in your shots, the yard is unfortunately but a shadow of what it once was. Those are not my words but the words of a couple of Smiths Falls railfans that I bumped into earlier this spring when I was at the yard.

However, when you have so few options in and around Ottawa, you take what you can get. So, on the day when I took my daughters to the Railway Museum of Eastern Ontario, I made sure to stop by the CP yard on our way home, just to see what was happening there.

This shot below is what greeted me when I turned the corner of the old passenger station and looked out to the north end of the yard. Two ECO units sat, one of which appeared to be idling and readying to take a string of gondolas somewhere west on the Belleville Subdivison.

Now compare the top image, with the two units merged, with the image below, which was taken much closer to the actual units. A few paces and the perspective totally changes. I'm not sure which image I like better. The one above tricks your eye at first sight as it creates the illusion of a super long freight locomotive. The image below, of course, is a bit more conventional as you begin to see how these two units really sit on adjacent tracks. I also like that one of the units has a hatch open on the side, which is where you start the engine, correct? Someone out there can correct me if I'm wrong.

Here's a shot of some of the cars in the consist of the idling train. What was unfortunate with this shot is that I would really like to have a photograph of whatever was behind this gondola. Does anyone know what that is? I have a few ideas but I'm not sure. It looks like a piece of maintenance of way equipment. If I had stayed long enough, I might have caught the departure of the gondola train and gotten a better look at that hidden equipment. However, my girls were eager to get home to Ottawa, so I had to call it a day.

A little further down the yard, there was a long string of covered hoppers sitting a few tracks away from the gondola train. I love Potash cars, since they are among the few colourful cars out there right now. I also like the Agrium car alongside the Potash car. Anything is better than the grey-sided blank hoppers that are owned by the leasing companies.

So, all in all, it was worth taking a few minutes of my day with my daughters to get a few bonus shots at the Smiths Falls yard. Despite the fact that the yard doesn't have a lot to offer in the way of freight action these days, I still like going there because the perspectives that you get here are worth it. Those two shots of the engines at the top of the post are great examples of how you can play around with the curves in Smiths Falls and get some very different shots, even in a quiet rail yard.

Some interesting rolling stock in Smiths Falls

As I wrote about last week, a recent trip to the Canadian Pacific yard in Smiths Falls yielded some interesting finds, even if I was unable to catch a mainline freight making its way through town. I did however, catch the Perth Turn, just as it was about to take off for the Omya plant at Glen Tay. When the train, headed by an ECO unit, took off, it happily uncovered an interesting assortment of rolling stock in the yard, some of which I had never seen before. Given how little activity there is in this yard these days, you have to take what you can get, so I decided to focus on the rolling stock in plain view before calling it a day.

Here's the first car that caught my eye. It was patched for a leasing company but it was the centre logo, long since covered over, which had me intrigued. The AEX mark belongs to a leasing company listed as the Andersons. I have not been able to find any other photos of this car but I did find another car in this number series. Apparently, they were once ENDX (GATX) and NACX (GE Leasing) cars. Given its colour, which was once likely red, I'm hoping someone out there might find something recognizable about this car. I couldn't find much.

Here's another I have never seen before. This is the French side of the car, obviously, which prominently announces that the car handles chemical products. A close examination of this car shows that there was once an Alcan logo on the right side of the car. You can still make some of it out if you look really closely. The car is now patched RS, which means it belongs to the Roberval and Saguenay Railway, which would make sense, since that line is a resources (ore) carrier owned by Rio Tinto Alcan. This was one of my better finds in recent years.

You may have noticed this car bringing up the rear of the Perth Turn in last week's post but I thought I'd share another shot of it in profile. I wonder if it might be a buffer car for this train's return trip. Although I can't imagine a train with calcium carbonate would require a buffer. Either way, it's an outlier on this consist. It's patched for CAAX, which is listed as a subsidiary of ConAgra.

This is just a shot of a Norfolk Southern boxcar mostly hidden behind a line of tank cars. I was trying to find anything at this point, as there was not much else to capture.

One final shot. I had to strain my camera's zoom to get this shot. A few fellow railfans thought this might be the end of a train whose crew had its time run out, but it stayed there throughout the morning that I was trackside. A subsequent visit to this yard the following week showed that this consist was still in the yard for whatever reason. I guess car dwell time wasn't a big deal in the case of these cars.

As I mentioned, I was at this yard a week after this visit, as I brought my daughters to the Railway Museum of Eastern Ontario nearby. While trackside at the yard for a brief moment, I managed to once gain catch the Perth Turn and few other items of interest. I also have a few thoughts and tidbits to share about the railway museum. Stay tuned for more dispatches from Smiths Falls. I didn't intend for this summer to be a Smiths Falls extravaganza, but I'm hoping it's a breath of fresh air for those who might be tiring of endless Ottawa photos and non-news items (read: O-Train). I know I'm enjoying putting these posts together.

Speaking of news, the RTG Group has told the city that the first phase of the Confederation Line is ready to hand over. More than a year past their deadline, they are done, apparently. We'll see...

The Perth Turn

As I mentioned last week, I recently had enough time that I was able to drop by the rail yard in Smiths Falls. Although the trip was a bust in that I was not able to see any mainline freights passing through, I did get to see a fascinating Via Rail meet in front of the old Smiths Falls station. But the highlight for me was seeing the Perth Turn take off from the yard.

For those who might remember, I managed to catch a few shots of this train a few years ago, with two units. This time, the line of cars was being pulled by a single ECO unit, 2304.

CP serves the OMYA plant just west of Perth, where calcium carbonate is produced. Calcium carbonate is used for a variety of consumer products including toothpaste, antacids, calcium supplements, vitamins, building materials, cement, limestone aggregate and more.

This train usually features a number of tank cars that you don’t often get to see on the rails. I have seen these cars sparingly elsewhere, but mostly in this yard.

Given my position between the old Via Rail station and the CP office building, there was only a series of going away shots to be had, which is okay. I have really forced myself to break free of the mold of the wedge shot whenever possible.

When the train pulled away, I noticed a number of the old OMYA logos on the cars had been painted over, since the cars are now repatched for SHPX (ACF Industries or American Car and Foundry). It’s too bad that the logo is gone, because it is extremely rare to see a company logo on cars these days. Companies have been moving away from owning or controlling fleets of cars. There are still a few branded cars out there, like the Potash hoppers, for example, but not a whole lot more.  I think back to some of the Sclair and DuPont hoppers I used to see in and around Sarnia when I was younger and how, even then, there weren’t all that many of these types of cars to see.

The run west to Perth is a fairly short one, as the train follows CP’s Belleville Subdivision through Perth itself before ending its run at Glen Tay, where the plant is situated next to Highway 7.

Sadly, this was the only freight train I saw this day as the Saint-Jean-Baptiste holiday in Quebec might have shut down some of CP’s operations there, thus lightening the traffic to and from Montreal, where CP’s operations end.

Still, a small local is better than nothing and I should add that this local is at least 10 times as long as the Arnprior Turn.

Also, there was an unexpected bonus to this train leaving when it did. It revealed another string of cars, some of which were intriguing enough for me to take some photos. I'll share those next week.

Meet me at the station

I had an interesting experience in Smiths Falls recently, which saved what was otherwise a disappointing day trackside. I found myself with some free time recently and decided I would either head to Prescott or Smiths Falls to catch some trains. Prescott promised many more trains on the busy CN Kingston Subdivision, but there were no really solid spots to set up and get the shots I wanted. And Prescott was farther away. Smiths Falls was indeed closer but promised far fewer trains on the somewhat light Winchester Subdivision. I made my decision that I would try my luck in Smiths Falls since there were great sightlines on either end of the CP yard, not to mention a safe, shaded railfanning bench to sit on and read while waiting.

What I hadn’t thought of was that the yard and the mainline would be quieter than usual, due to the Saint-Jean-Baptiste holiday in Quebec, which shut down just about everything in the province and likely whatever was happening at the end of the CP line. That meant I saw no mainline freights coming through the yard, which was really disappointing.

However, I did manage to see the Perth turn head out of the yard with ECO unit 4301 pulling a sizeable string of tank cars and covered hoppers for the OMYA plant in Glen Tay. I have caught this train before, so it was a decent consolation prize to see it again. I will share photos of this train next week.

There were two interesting factors that made the day unlike other trackside experiences I have had in the past. One was there were other railfans at the old station, waiting to see something like me. They had a scanner, which was a bonus for me, since I usually don’t use one. I generally really on watching signals. I don’t usually encounter other railfans when I am out there trackside. In fact, I think this might be the third time I have ever run across fellow photographers since 2009, when I rediscovered my trackside pastime.

After a while, it was obvious that all we were going to see were Via Rail corridor trains, which was not worth the drive for me. But then something interesting happened. A westbound Via stopped on the outside track in front of the old station, as it waited for an eastbound train to clear the switch from the Via Brockville Subdivision, just past the station.

This was the first real meet I have caught in several years (not counting shots of multiple trains at Via’s Central Station). Two for the price of one is always fun. The other railfans sitting near me didn’t even bother to get up and take shots of two earlier Via consists that came by, each pulled by a F40 with typical LRC coaches. I don’t blame them. I took a few shots, but neither had anything worth sharing. The angles, track curvature and trackside buildings offered some new elements, but I didn’t have anything I was thrilled with.

But then at the back of the stopped train, I spotted something that I had never seen. This consist had some stainless steel streamliners, which is always a bonus. But one of the stainless steel cars was adorned with Via’s unfortunate renaissance colour scheme. I was the first to catch this and point it out, which had the other railfans up and taking photos.

The eastbound train came soon enough, which allowed me to get a few cool shots of the meet between two wrapped P42s. It’s not what I was hoping to come away from my free morning trackside, but it was something new, which is always a good thing.

And that stainless steel car with the new colour scheme? Not impressed at all. I am glad Via got rid of the faded Canada flag decals. I was disappointed that they have retained the bureaucratic Government of Canada wordmark. But that gaudy colour scheme on a stainless steel car?

Why, Via, why?

Eastbound and down in Bedell

Last week, I shared a few observations about Bedell, Ontario, a great spot to see passing freight trains on the CP Winchester Sub. This might be my favourite spot, simply because it is so quiet and the views along the line are quite impressive (when you can find a spot clear of weeds).

Those who have been here know there is a small hill next to the tracks, close to where Bedell Road crosses the tracks. Sadly, the weeds on the hill are making photos tough. But, closer to the crossing, there is a clear section next to the bad order track that offers a fairly decent vantage point where you can capture an eastbound train.

I should mention that I had initially set up on the hill and was planning to try and get in front of the weeds on the edge of the hill, in order to capture a westbound freight. But, for the first time, I heard the sound of an engine horn coming from the east, which forced me to scramble to the clearing near the tracks. The only disadvantage to this spot is that is in not elevated.

Anyway, I set up and could hear the eastbound freight charging toward the crossing at quite a clip. I’m not sure what the speed limit would be on this stretch of the tracks, but I am assuming this train was travelling at about 70-80 km/h. Some experts tell me the limit is 65 mph which seems about right.

 

I was a little disappointed that the train was an intermodal, but there were a few points of interest. The head end was led by the usual two six-axle hulks.

But what I found interesting was that, while there was a double stack container behind the power, there was a short string of autoracks, which gave way to a long string of containers. I don’t pretend to know why trains are made up the way they are, but I did find these outliers interesting in an otherwise all-intermodal train.

In this shot, I think I might have caught a refrigerated container unit (UASC marks on the side). At least that was what it looked like. This was the only container on the train that had what seemed like an air conditioning unit. Someone who is more knowledgeable can correct me, if I'm off the mark.

I know most railfans don’t like shooting intermodal consists, but I always like getting a shot of a string of colourful containers in a long line. This train had no Canadian Tire containers to shoot, so I contented myself with a few of these multicoloured images.

Another thing I found interesting was that this train had barely a spot of graffiti on it. I know that well cars are usually not the canvass of choice, but they do often bear frequent tags of the “artists” who deface trains. This consist had almost none. I think it might have been because much of this train was made up of brand new well cars. Mostly, they were these shiny yellow TTX wells.

Here’s a question for the experts out there. I occasionally see these tanks in well cars. This train had a number of them. What do these tanks usually carry? I wonder why a liquid cargo would be carried in these tanks on well cars and not in a dedicated tank car. It might be because the liquid is from overseas, which would necessitate being handled in an international shipping container. Just a guess. Does any out there know?

This was a long train. I had to work around a lot of bushes to get a decent going away shot of the end of the train. Here it is. A great meet for me at my favourite spot.