Updated: The smell of diesel in the morning

In mid-July, after my family visited the Sarnia area, we paid a visit to Stratford to spend some time with my in-laws and catch a play at the Stratford Festival. My family ended up seeing Anne of Green Gables, which was an interesting, modern take on the classic story that I have read to both of my daughters numerous times.

While in Stratford, I was able to make it to the CN yard a number of times, but I was also in luck since our AirBnB was close to the Goderich Subdivision; in essence the main line of what it left of the Goderich Exeter Railway. 

Our place was near the Birmingham Street level crossing. Also, we were lucky that St. David Street also parallels the GEXR tracks for a long stretch, which means you are able to both hear the trains coming, when they come, and have the opportunity to scout out a spot to capture them. I was lucky enough to have run into a train twice. Once was on purpose, as I knew the train was outbound for Goderich so I waited. The second time was a fluke, as my daughter and I were stretching our legs during a walk when she heard the rumble to two GP38-2s coming toward us long before I did (my hearing is awful).

I had my iPhone with me so I ventured into the green space beside the tracks and found a small window to capture this shot. As always, with an iPhone, I never use the zoom function as it instantly pixelates your image. Always get as close as you can, safely and legally. Leave the rest of the work to your photo software.

I like this shot more than most of the images I captured this summer, because there's the human element. I was a a little hesitant about sharing it, because I didn't want to identify the crew capturing a bit of fresh air, but it was too good of an image to keep to myself. You can see the GEXR still has an old Southern Ontario Railway unit permanently assigned to Stratford, along with a GEXR unit as its mate. Update: Upon reflection, I blocked out the person's face in this version of the photo just because I didn't feel comfortable identifying him, even if his face is largely unidentifiable to begin with 

 

It was a blazing hot morning when I got this shot, so I'm not surprised the crew wanted a moment for some fresh air as the short train made its way northwest toward Goderich. I'm sure he was wondering who I was and why I was taking shots of the train. How to explain that I'm a train-starved railfan from Ottawa? I didn't come across any railfans around the Stratford CN yard, so possibly they're a rare breed in that area. I don't know for sure.

 

 

The train was clearly a run to the railway's agricultural customers between Stratford and Goderich, as there are many farm clients along this stretch of railway. This Potash Corp. hopper car added a bit of colour to a largely grey consists. Modern rolling stock has become very bland, sadly. 

 

 

The train ended up with a few tank cars on the rear as it made its way out of town. I was happy to catch this train by surprise, as it just added another set of photos among the many I took in Stratford during the week that I was there. I have a number of other photographs to share from around the town during my time there. 

 

My New Book 

 

Those who have followed this blog from the beginning know that I am also an independent author of (now) four books. I don't really have any expectations for these books. I put them out there because someone once told me, "Until you release them, they will never be art. They're just files cluttering up your hard drive." I appreciate the sentiment, but I know these books are not art. Even if they were, it would not be for me to say. 

 

 

My latest book is titled 1999. It's a story of that final lousy summer job you have before you graduate and join the real world. That was the genesis of this story, anyway. I had way too many surreal experiences in my summer of landscaping and working for a property management company for it not to fuel a story. 

 

Truthfully, my story about the real Trailer Park Boys (that's what I called them, for good reason) ended up being about much more.  

 

I am very proud of this book, which has been twenty years in the making. I originally began writing it in 2005 and have worked on it periodically since then. It never seemed like the right moment to release it, until my daughter convinced me to take up my writing again. So there it is. If you are interested in it, you can find all my novels listed on this page of my author's website. There are links to all my books, except for the first one, which was legitimately published by a real publisher, but is now out of print. 

Or you can skip right to the Amazon.ca page to find out about this book.  

Dive right into 2024 (Stratford Part IV)

Happy New Year, fellow friends of the iron horse. I was considering how to start the new year and what to write about when it hit me. Just start with some cool train photos. That was what I decided. There is lots of material left over from last year's adventures, which will be shared over the weeks and months to come. Sadly, I wasn't able to make it trackside over the Christmas holidays, but that's okay. There was very little snow after Dec. 25 and I was still working my regular hours at home, so the opportunities for something seasonal didn't materialize.

So let's start with some shortline summer action shots, shall we? On July 30 while in Stratford for a family reunion, I had a chance to stop by the Stratford station to see if there was anything going on in the yard. Luckily, there was. The GEXR crew had two geeps idling in the yard and ready for some work. Later on, CN 568 came passing through, which you can check out in this post. In the harsh early morning sunlight, I wandered around the yard from publicly accessible vantage points, as the crew assembled a string of hoppers that seemed to be destined for Goderich or other points along the GEXR Goderich Subdivision. Here's a shot from the crossing. The morning sun was washing out the sky, but I still like this shot.

I have a friend who takes shots from this vantage point, so I decided to follow his lead and get an overall shot of the yard action. This is in keeping with what I started last year, in the Year of Different. the goal is to get some railway images that aren't dominated only by the train. In this case, I wanted to get the grain elevator and the overall yard in the image. I didn't get all that I wanted, but I think this shot conveys the overall size of this railway operation.

Here's another example of a shot that is different. I wouldn't have taken this shot even a few years ago. The crew in this shot is getting ready to couple its two hoppers with a few more cars, some that are hidden behind the boxcar. It's the human element that I like in this shot, even though the morning sun did not do me any favours.

The engines went back and forth getting the cars the crew needed to take up the Goderich Sub, which allowed me to think about different shots and elements to capture. There's nothing like a good smoke shot! In fact, I dedicated a previous post to smoke.

As everyone knows, GEXR is a shortline owned by the Genesee & Wyoming Inc. shortline company, so it's not uncommon to see orange units in the yard that aren't technically GEXR units. In this case, the power was supplied by a Southern Ontario Railway GP38-2 2111 and Huron Eastern GP38-2 3510. Here's a closer look at the Huron Eastern logo, which is a small departure from the G&W logo.

While SOR has been absorbed back into the CN empire, HESR continues to operate close to 400 miles of track in Michigan's thumb area and into Flint and Saginaw in the lower peninsula of the state. Here's something that I thought was odd, though. Since I have been taking shots in this yard in Stratford, I have spotted more G&W units that are not GEXR than I have actual GEXR units. I would imagine the reason for this is that things are likely quite fluid between the various operations that G&W oversees across North America.

One more observation from this shot. The aftermarket horn on the SOR unit, as it was moving across the crossing, was more like a car horn than a train horn. It was quite pathetic, to be honest! I often see people on train forums that can rhyme off the actual make of horns on engines. In all honesty, that is a level of detail I just don't have room for in my brain.

Here's shot that required some editing, as the morning sun was playing havoc with my shots. I decided I would accept some form of distortion and shadow for the chance of getting a shot of the engines in action against the backdrop of the grain elevator. I liked how this turned out, despite the obvious imperfections. It screams early morning or late evening. 

Here's one final shot with a blue sky in it, as the sun was throwing me a bone. The shadows were harsh still, but the colours came through pretty well in this shot as the crew stretched out its consist before backing it up again to pick up more cars. I didn't stick around for it to depart, as my daughters were getting a little impatient, so I decided to wrap up my wanderings shortly after taking this shot and a few more.

Looking through my photos from Stratford this summer, I can see I have a lot more to share. This early morning bit of shunting was fun to see but there were a few more surprises the yard still had to offer me. However, it wasn't until I returned to Stratford in November that these surprises were fully revealed. All in all, it was a fun bit of railfanning on a pleasant July morning. And that wasn't counting the mainline freight that came through later on.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas break. Here's to more rail musings and conversation in the year to come.

Something a little different

As I mentioned in recent posts, I was lucky enough to spend some time in Stratford recently, which gave me the opportunity to take some shots of the Goderich Exeter Railway staging yard in the city, although it was quite empty for the most part.

You can read Part I of my series from Stratford here or Part II here. 

For the final portion of my Stratford pictures, I thought I would showcase one last shot I have attempted over the years, with varying degrees of success. I'm not sure what to call it, but it's kind of like a railway family photo where different railways get together in the same frame. But it's not quite a meet photo, as most have captured from time to time. This type of shot is a little different. The shot I have attempted a few times is a much more focused shot of the lead engines.

But before we get ahead of ourselves, I'd like to show off another few shots of a westbound Via corridor train bound for Sarnia. This train does one run to Toronto and back to Sarnia each day, so catching it is pretty simple. I was certainly not out to capture more Via Rail shots, but with no freight trains imminent, I figured I should capture what I could. 

Here's the first shot of the same consist I caught the previous day (see Part II link above). This time around, it was F40 6413 leading the way. Hard to believe these old warhorses will soon be gone when Via takes delivery of its new Siemens Chargers. I will miss the F40s. I've always liked them. 

The cut of hoppers in the GEXR yard was still there, possibly awaiting delivery the following day, which was a Monday. I hope the old Southern Ontario Railway geep tied up in the yard started okay. Two young railfans pointed out that someone had left the engine's trailing lights on. I had to strain to see the lights, but they were indeed left on. Oops.

 I figured I should also catch trailing P42 906 in the Via wrap design while I still can. It's not easy catching these engines in a single frame from the side, especially on a station platform. They are long units. I will say this. Via's wraps really do improve the look of these beasts, in my opinion. I know a lot of railfans don't like this scheme, but I like it. It's something different and it really does make the Via logo and the passenger train stand out. Both good things.

So with that business out of the way, this is the latest attempt at a family shot. I attempted to capture it as my one last frame before I packed it in for the evening. I have tried this type of shot before. This time around, I was reasonably pleased with the outcome. Unfortunately, my shot was a little off balance so I had to adjust the photo a bit, which trimmed a tiny bit off the top of the F40. Still, I love seeing two railways represented in the same shot. Both of these units are getting on in years and I'm sure one day this will be a shot I will appreciate more.

I will group together a few similar family shots in a future post, simply for the sake of exploring the idea of a different type of railfan photo. I hope this shot also explains that I am not anti-wedge or dramatic close-up, as some might have guessed, based on what I have written in this blog in the last little while.

As the light was fading fast, I didn't push my luck and headed back to the hotel where I was staying. It was a fun weekend in Stratford, which also included a quick trip to St. Marys to see the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame and snag a few shots of the town's beautiful Via Rail station. Sadly, there were no trains coming through on the day I was there. Also, the pouring rain made it very difficult to get any shot at all, but here's a quick shot from the platform. You can see the town's water tower in the mist behind the station. You can also see the raindrops in the shot. Unavoidable, sadly.

That was the extent of my railfanning in Southern Ontario this summer. Now that my children are back at school, I do intend to try and catch up with the Wednesday Arnprior Turn here in Ottawa. Anyone who knows when it passes by in the morning these days, feel free to leave a message. I get the impression it has run later in recent weeks (around 10 a.m. or so). Any info is welcome.

Making the most of it

I don't need to tell any of you that 2020 has been a write-off in many respects. For me, it's been a challenge at times, particularly with this blog. Last week, I shared some photos of a nearly empty, quiet railyard in Stratford, since there was nothing happening when I arrived. Later the same day, I made a return visit, just in case. This is what I saw when I returned.

Nothing special right? Well, no quite. First of all, that string of hoppers was not there earlier in the day when I surveyed the yard, so it was obvious to me that a local spotted the cars at some point during the day, when I wasn't around. So that was disappointing. Those cars might have been headed for the salt mine in Goderich or an agricultural spur somewhere on the GEXR Goderich Sub. I'm not sure of the customer base on the CN Guelph Sub. I am just guessing it was headed for Goderich since I was at the same place last year and saw two orange GEXR geeps towing a string of covered hoppers toward the Goderich Sub.

Anyway, you will see that the two signals are showing red. What made that significant was that the signal on the left is a searchlight signal, which is dark unless something is imminent. That was my clue that something was coming. Exciting right? Well, not exciting exactly, since it was clear to me by the people on the station platform that the train that was coming was a Via Rail corridor train heading west for Sarnia. Not exactly was I came to see, but I decided to make the most of this grain elevator backdrop.

This shot, above, was my favourite. I have a few others where P42 906 is closer, but I much prefer this shot, since is incorporates more of the hopper cars and grain elevator. You will notice on the extreme right that I did purposely try to keep the flatcar in the shot as well. I figured, if I couldn't catch a freight train, I might as well keep as many of the freight cars in my shot as possible. I also like what the weeds add to the scene. To me, it screams secondary route, small town. That's the type of image I love to catch.

Here's a shot of the corridor train from a closer vantage point. I included it just for comparison's sake. I've noticed on a lot of railfan sites that these type of shots are usually the preferred image. I have been moving away from these images for quite a while. This is not to say that my way is any better. It's just a personal preference. I find I am much more interested in the overall scene, rather than how much of my frame is filled with the actual train. Still, I like how this shot at least keeps the grain elevator in the shot.

Here's one more shot of the train at the station, with an idle F40 on the tail end. This father and son were checking out the railway action along with me. At one point, they walked off the platform to check the signals, which were just beyond the end of the asphalt. This is a big difference I notice in smaller cities and towns. There is a much more liberal attitude toward railway property. I don't agree with this. I also saw another local resident cutting across a large piece of CN property that was clearly being used as a storage area for various pieces of construction and MoW equipment. I suppose if the railway has no active presence in the town, people don't worry so much about being caught. I still think it is always a bad idea to trespass on railway property. 

The worst example I ever saw of this attitude was when I saw multiple people crossing through CN's Dundas Subdivision yard in London, Ont. to take a shortcut. Given the railway's active staff in the yard and the frequency of trains on this busy route, I can't think of many things that are as reckless as this.

Anyway, before I left Stratford and headed home to Ottawa, I did manage to sneak in one last trip to this rail yard the next evening to catch the same Via Rail corridor train en route to Sarnia. I managed to try something a little different and was pleased with the end result. That will have to wait for another post.

Catching up with GEXR in Stratford

Stratford was my destination of choice. I knew it was the headquarters of the Goderich Exeter Railway. This railway has always been a source of fascination for me, which made this opportunity to possibly see it in action as a priority. I was dismayed to learn recently that GEXR no longer has control of the Guelph Subdivision, after CN resumed control of the right-of-way after the GEXR lease was not renewed. These are my thoughts about that from last week. So, as I was visiting family in the countryside about half an hour west of Stratford, I knew that my prospects for seeing something would likely be best in Stratford, since I didn’t want to venture too far afield.

When I arrived, I made sure to stake out a good spot near the historic train station, which was built in 1913 by the Grand Trunk Railway. Interestingly, the two-storey station was built in the prairie style, according to the historic plaque. I’m not sure I’ve seen many stations like this in Ontario.

It was a beautiful summer morning, with a few clouds obscuring the rising sun, which turned out to be quite a blessing, as a real, honest-to-goodness GEXR train was readying itself alongside this grain and feed elevator complex. When I first arrived, the train was backing up toward the elevators with a short consist of grain hoppers in tow. I waited for the crew to get its clearance and watched the nearby signal before the short train eased forward.

I was thrilled with some of these shots, which have a few picturesque elements to them, not the least of which is the grain elevator. I often marvel at the grain elevator images on other blogs (hello, Trackside Treasure and Train Geek!) and wonder if I could ever capture something like that here in Ontario. Well, this one below is not quite as majestic, but it’s one of my favourite shots I have taken in years. If there was a better vantage point, I might have moved back a bit but I had to stay on publicly accessible land.

I was still quite happy with these images.

And, unlike a few years ago when I caught some GEXR action in Kitchener, this time I actually caught a fully painted GEXR geep in its Genesee & Wyoming colours. The GEXR unit is the second.

The first unit in the consist was notable too, since it was painted for the Southern Ontario Railway, a Hamilton-Nanticoke area shortline that was also swallowed up into the CN empire once again. So, a good catch all around.

I took a few more shots of the short train as it made its way to the Goderich Sub and northwest toward Lake Huron.

I stuck around to see if possibly a CN freight was going to make its way by the station, but signals at the station remained stubbornly solid red, which meant nothing was imminent, sadly. I have heard different stories as to just how much CN is using this subdivision again, as it doesn’t appear to be a huge priority for the railway.

I did look for some rolling stock in the yard worth shooting and saw this car, which was hard to capture properly due to the angle I had to capture it. It reminded me of a similar yellow hopper I spotted recently in Smiths Falls, but this one did not have the same paint scheme. NMIX 465119 is a Scoular grain hopper, with a grain image on the side. Here's another shot of the car here. The car is owned by NSC Minerals Inc. Anyone know more about these cars? This is the first time I've ever seen one. (Quick update - NSC Minerals is Saskatchewan's biggest provider of rock salt, according to its website. That would make sense for this car to be on a GEXR train headed to Goderich. The car will likely be used to service the salt mine at the end of the GEXR line at Goderich Harbour. Still no info on Scoular)

All in all, it was a brief, but exciting, morning for me in Stratford. I can now cross GEXR off my list officially, as I have captured a GEXR train at the east end of the Goderich Subdivision.