November Surprise in Stratford

In November, my family made its way to Southwestern Ontario, as my wife and I were involved in a conference in Waterloo. That meant I was able to bring my daughters for a visit to Stratford, where their grandparents live. While there, I naturally made my way to the town's train station, which is always a treat for me. I haven't been to Stratford's rail yard at that time of year, so I wasn't sure what I would see. Given the seasonal nature of some of the traffic on the CN Guelph Subdivision and the GEXR Goderich Sub, the look of this rail yard likely changes with the seasons.

When I initially walked past the yard, I captured this image of a field full of rail and a blue boxcar in the background. CN maintains a fairly extensive maintenance of way facility to the east of the station, with large piles of track supplies. I thought this made a good image.

Next, I captured a clear shot of this piece of snow clearing equipment, a Jordan spreader. This car has been in the yard for quite a while, but I have never had a clear line of sight to capture it. I was happy to get a shot of it finally. Surprisingly, there were no identifying numbers on the car. I blew up the photo and saw the remnants of an old CR reporting mark and some numbers, but it was too hard to make out what they read. I can assume though that this car once belonged to Conrail, given its CR reporting marks that are still faintly visible.

For those who don't know about this part of the country, snow clearing equipment like this can sometimes be absolutely critical to keeping trains moving. Southwestern Ontario, especially areas not far from Lake Huron, are susceptible to extreme snow events and heavy snowfall, or lake effect snow, as they call it. 

In some areas, the wide expanses of open farmer's field make for dangerous drifting, which requires heavy duty equipment to clear rail lines. I often tell people that parts of the southwest are like the prairies, only with more trees. But the wide open space can still be quite forbidding in the winter. 

The Goderich Exeter Railway up to Goderich, in particular, is sometimes forced to use drastic measures just to keep its line open in the winter. I am guessing this equipment didn't get any use this past winter.

As is often the case, the yard was quiet when I walked by, with this GEXR-clad geep sitting on a stub-end track. I tried to frame it with the old Burlington Northern hoppers in the background, since they were remarkably intact and free of graffiti. Hoppers in this yard are very common, as agricultural products are a key commodity for the GEXR and CN on the Guelph Sub. Also, the Masterfeeds elevator facility is served by rail in the east end of the yard.

I also found this two-bay hopper a bit curious, as its metal sheeting was a bit angular at the ends.

Figuring that was it, as the mainline was showing nothing coming, I went downtown to enjoy some time at a coffee shop and a used record store with my father-in-law. I took one final overall shot of the yard from the platform. The little hint of sun on the old geep was a nice little surprise.

It is always a bit disappointing to capture bits and pieces, but since this trip was an impromptu visit, I figured it was a win since I managed to capture some additional interesting images to share.

Later on the same weekend, we went back to Stratford for another quick visit. This time, I was able to leave the kids with the grandparents so I could wander the town by myself, which I did. I returned to the rail yard and began to see if there was anything I had overlooked on my previous visit. It turns out, I had. As I walked around the yard on the nearby roads, I caught sight of something deep in the yard near the elevator.

Two GEXR units sat near the elevator, with a splash of sunshine illuminating the cab of the front unit. I was quite surprised to see these engines sitting there. I have only ever seen two GEXR geeps in this yard in all my visits to this yard. I figured the extra power might have been needed, as the end of the harvest in Ontario likely meant more moves to and from the elevator. 

I tried a few different approaches to capture these engines in the yard, but I like the shot above the best. I did zoom in to maybe get some more information on which engines were actually sitting back there. The lead unit is ex-Southern Ontario Railway GP38-2 2111. I was not able to get a shot that helped me identify the second unit. I did like the Grand Trunk Western coil car that was in the shot, although it made it a bit more challenging to focus on the engines. You can even see two brooms just to the left of the GTW car, for clearing off switches in the winter, I'm guessing.

Before leaving, I spotted a BC Rail lumber car, so I took a shot, given I don't have many shots of any BC Rail equipment, so I figured it was worth it. I also like that you can see a Burlington Northern hopper in the background. Two fallen flags in one shot.

Just before leaving the yard, the searchlight signals east of the yard came to life and showed that a train was on its way. I stuck around for quite a while waiting for that train, but it never showed and I had to move on. I made my way once again to a great used record store in downtown Stratford and found a cheap copy of Gordon Lightfoot's first Greatest Hits record on vinyl. I love listening to Gord at dinner time. So I missed the train, but I gained the Canadian Railroad Trilogy. Not a bad trade-off.

Mainline freight action near the station (Stratford, Part II)

In a recent post, I shared a few images of evening GO Train 3775 returning west and stopping in Stratford, en route to London. This is part of a pilot project where Metrolinx is providing weekday commuter service between London and Toronto's Union Station. For commuters along the Guelph Subdivision, the imminent discontinuation of this service will likely come as a disappointment. For me, I was grateful to catch the evening GO Train, complete with an old F59 trailing, in a rare setting. 

The bonus was that, as I waited for the GO Train, a eastbound CN mainline freight train was waiting for the GO Train to pass. This train, CN 581, was led by three idling engines, which were parked east of the Via Rail station, close to CN's yard office on Regent Street.

The parked freight was carrying mainly covered hoppers, making it quite possibly a grain or agriculture-related movement, as the Guelph Subdivision passes through some of Ontario's richest and most productive farmland. I was quite pleased to capture an image of an old Burlington Northern three-bay covered hopper, still visually intact sans graffiti. 

This car has 4,750 cu. ft. of storage space, made in 1992 by Trinity Industries for BN, all numbered in the 467XXX series. Given its fairly recent build date, that makes it positively new, in terms of the railway-branded fleets that are becoming less and less common these days. I know a lot of railway vets dislike BN's cascade green and white scheme and its ultra modern symbol, but I always liked it. It must have something to do with not growing up with BN's more well-loved predecessors, the Burlington Route, Great Northern and the Northern Pacific. I'm too young for them.

The train had quite a few of these old BN hoppers, still lettered BN, although this lettering is, of course, one of many combinations belonging to BN successor, BNSF Railway. In the late summer, this is the type of train that is quite common in this area, not to mention on the Goderich Exeter Railway, which originates in Stratford. I did catch a GEXR yard job preparing to embark for Goderich earlier in my stay in Stratford, but I'll save that series of photos for another time. That train was also very heavily weighted with covered hoppers.

Once the GO Train made its way west, I made my way east down Regent Street, which parallels the Stratford Yard. From a public vantage point, I managed to capture a shot of the head end of Train 581. There were some visual hazards, but I think they add to the scene quite nicely, as they put the image of this train in context. The head end was led by GP40-2 9449, which was given the new CN.ca scheme in recent years. The second unit, also a recent convert to the CN.ca scheme, is GP38-2 7501, although it does not have a wide safety cab hood, as 9449 does. The final unit is GP38-2 4725, still in its original sergeant stripes. 

You can also see the first car is an Ontario Northland ribbed boxcar, with the chevrons logo. Behind the parked freight were a large string of covered hoppers that were parked closer to the Masterfeeds agricultural products concrete elevator complex, which is on the east end of the yard, near the Romeo Street flyover.

Here's a closer shot of the two lead units, taken from Regent Street.

In both shots, you can see what appears to be a moveable wooden ramp, no doubt used to unload boxcars for use in carload service deliveries to local customers. I'm not sure how much business CN does like this, but it seems to me that this would be why they would keep this ramp around. Also, I'm guessing it might be used if they need to move heavy construction equipment onto a train for MoW service. These are just guesses on my part.

There was also one other cool sighting in the yard, as I explored it from all angles from the surrounding streets. On the side of the yard opposite the station, there was this electrical unit that was parked on a heavy-duty flatcar. I could only get so close on public property to get a proper shot of it. As we were leaving Stratford to head home, I saw a large contingent of local public utility vehicles carting this unit onto a truck for use somewhere in the local electrical grid.

The other rolling stock sightings were part of the GEXR move, so I will save those images for another post.

This meet between the freight train and the GO Train was one of many such sightings that dotted my weekend in Stratford. I was quite happy to catch so much action in Stratford, which can be a hit-or-miss place to railfan these days, unless you're there to catch the regularly scheduled Via service. And yes, I did get a few shots of a Via passenger train making its way to the station, since it was carrying members of my extended family into town for a family reunion. 

More material for another post. Stratford proved to be a gold mine this summer!

The traffic jam

This March, while I was visiting family in the Sarnia area, my brother and nephew took me on a tour of their favourite spots in the area, including many railside haunts. On our way home, we saw a CN train perched near Telford Road, just east of the limits of Sarnia Yard. My nephew was excited by this slow moving train, as we had not seen any freight trains at speed during our day of railfanning in the area. This was the train as it approached the crossing and then stopped. Note that the Strathroy Subdivision is double-tracked here, and there are trains on both tracks visible in the image below, taken from the Confederation Line.

Just a few minutes earlier, we had left Sarnia Yard, where another freight train, this one heading west toward the Paul Tellier Tunnel, also stopped before proceeding down the grade to the tunnel. A few railfans in the parking lot explained to us that the train was backing up and proceeding forward for a reason. At first, I'll admit that I was curious as to why this train would be doing this, unless they were assembling part of the train that I could not see. The railfans said they were "x-raying" the train. I'm not exactly sure that is the right term, but the sense I got from what they told me was the the train was being scanned before it headed into the United States. Here's a shot of the consist inching forward.

At either end of the yard, there were two enormous freight trains, one due east and one due west. Neither was moving. I joked to my nephew that it was a genuine rail traffic jam. Of course, this was not the case, as precision scheduled railways do not usually have trains with massive dwell times taking up space in congested rail yards. Sarnia Yard usually has its share of cars in the yard, but it's never what you would describe as congested or backed up. The blocks of cars appear very organized, at least to my untrained eye. Still, it was an odd sight to see two freight trains, on both tracks on the main line, apparently motionless. 

Moving back to the train due east near Telford Road. Here is a shot as it moved ahead past the end of the westbound train from the image above. I find it interesting whenever I see autoracks behind the engines. It's not something that was terribly common when I was growing up. These cars always seemed to be blocked onto the end of a train. Not the case anymore.

You can see in the image above that the fields looked to be almost ready for planning, even in mid-March. Going back to the westbound train, which we watched for awhile before giving up, here's a shot of the head end through the gantry, which governs trains movements around the tunnel. The bridge also controls the connections to the converging St. Clair River Industrial Spur (and by extension, the CSX Sarnia Subdivision) and the Point Edward Spur, both of which merge into the yard west of these signals.

 

While I was at the yard, I did spy a tank car that had an old logo on it that is not terribly common these days. I remember these CGTX tank cars when I was younger, but they have slowly disappeared over the years. It was cool to spot one. I know it might seem like a mundane image, but I think it's more important now to capture images of old rolling stock than ever.

These images we got from the yard and from Telford Road rounded out a great day or railfanning, even if the actual number of trains we saw was pretty light. You can check out our other adventure from this day in the post Next stop: Glencoe. 

One last shot of an old GP9 idling behind the old roundhouse. This engine is on the approach track that trains off the St. Clair River Industrial Spur and CSX Sarnia Subdivision use to access Sarnia Yard. Sadly, this engine didn't move either. It seemed like a gridlock kind of day when nothing was moving. My nephew wasn't thrilled. I was just happy to get a few images.

Hide and Seek, Part I

When you don't see all that many trains, you have to make the most of the chances you do get. I have mentioned this many times on this blog. Aside from the very sporadic CN freight trains in Ottawa's west end, I am 40 minutes away from the nearest main line. That's why I always make sure to bring a camera along when my family travels to Southwestern Ontario. There are a number of spots along our route where you can technically get a quick shot, if you are ready. Last summer, my family made two trips to Southwestern Ontario.

There wasn't much on the first trip down. Usually, if we are passing through Kingston around 9:30 a.m., we will catch an eastbound or westbound CN mixed freight. On our first trip, there was nothing. Between Kingston and the Greater Toronto Area, there are a few spots where you can see rails, but nothing was happening. 

On the east side of Toronto, we did see a CN freight parked on the mainline, waiting for clearance to proceed west. We were in the westbound lanes, so visibility was tight, to say the least. I was sitting in the passenger seat and attempted a few shots at the head end of the train as it waited. 

Of course, the 401 being the 401, my first shot was foiled by a car. I tried again.

This time, there were no cars in the way, but I did managed to snag a decent shot of the head end power, although it was partially obscured by the highway divider. As I've mentioned before, I earn many of these shots through quick timing and lots of editing. The full frame of this shot was not nearly as orderly as this cropped version. But, all in all, not a total waste.

I titled this post Hide and Seek for a reason. When attempting shots from the highway in a moving car, anything on the tracks can disappear behind a car, tree, safety barrier, building or bridge in an instant. It's not an easy game to play, especially when you're shooting across your car and trying not distract the driver. Thankfully, my wife knows this game and is ice cold behind the wheel.

A few weeks after this first trip, my family headed west again on a separate trip to visit the other side of our family. The second time around, my highway railway karma was much better. We did run across a freight train headed east on the CN Kingston Subdivision, but the trees obscuring the main line foiled any attempt at a shot of the head end. This time, my wife was in the passenger seat and trying her hand at railfanning. 

She did snag a tiny piece of the mid-train DPU. This shot is the essence of hide and seek.

I did pick out a few shots of the middle of the train, since there wasn't much else to focus on. I like the single TTX RailBox car in the middle of a string of tank cars. When I was younger, I loved watching the old freight trains that didn't seem to have any order to their consists. I know there is an order to this train, but it's always fun to see a car that sticks out in a line.

Here's one more shot. Boxcars and a lumber car. Nothing special, but some contrasting colours and schemes. It's all part of the game when you're on the highway.

Further along on our journey, we came across something really interesting as we left the 401 and merged onto the Highway 8 in Kitchener. Having lived in this city and thinking back to past experiences in the area, I knew there was a slight chance of catching something. I did in fact get something at long range, but I am saving those shots for the next post in the Hide and Seek series.

Our final stop was Stratford, which meant some interesting shots in the town's CN rail yard, which is shared with the Goderich Exeter Railway. There were a few posts worth of material from my time in Stratford that I just shared.

Skipping ahead to the return trip to Ottawa, I did manage to get a few shots in the east end of Toronto from the eastbound lanes, which are much closer to the GO/CN tracks. Here's one shot that you can easily get when you exit off the eastbound 407/412 ETR back onto the 401. It puts you right next to GO's east end maintenance facility and yard. I like that you can get a shot along the curve.

I wasn't able to get a shot of the GO rail yard that was usable for this post. The glare of the sun off the car's windows obscured my shots. You can't win them all.

All in all, I think my train karma was pretty good. I also managed to see a CP container train passing beneath Highway 416 near Kemptville, but there were no shots of that meet. 

As always with these posts, I am a bit hesitant to share these shots, as there are not typical of what you would find on a railway blog and they are certainly not up to the usual standards of many other blogs with far better photo quality. 

I guess there are two reasons why I share these shots. One, I think the challenge of rail photography from the passenger seat of a car on the 401 is incredibly difficult, which is itself worth exploring. Second, trips on the 401 are always an opportunity for bonus rail photos. For someone living in a railway desert, I can't pass up the chance.

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...

Lament for the boxcar

I'm not one to endlessly talk about how things were better when I was young. After all, I grew up without cellphones, the Internet, digital cameras, millions of TV channels and many of the other modern conveniences that we now take for granted.

But I will say this. When it comes to railways, I miss boxcars. They used to be one of the more common types of rolling stock on any freight train. When I was younger, I recall seeing an endless assortment of boxcars pass through my hometown on the CSX freight trains. It wouldn't be uncommon to see CP Rail, CN, Central Vermont, Grand Trunk, Port Huron & Detroit, Chessie System, Louisville & Nashville, Seaboard Coast Line or Conrail boxcars on a train. Many of the cars were your standard boxcars (think of the once ubiquitous CN brown boxcars). But some would have ribbed exteriors and some would be impossibly huge, like this one below in the CN Sarnia Yard, used for auto parts. They almost always had interesting railways graphics and were very much the standard bearer for railways alongside the locomotives. Think of all the slogans Southern Railways used on its boxcars, as an example.

I think the best thing about boxcars is how they add such a graphic element to railfanning. They still fly the flags of railways, both past and present, in a way that is somewhat lost today with the proliferation of containers and homogenous leasing company rolling stock. Here's a great example of what we have lost from an aesthetic point of view.

This is an old St. Lawrence Railroad boxcar, in CP Rail's Windsor Yard in 1991. You can also see a Bangor & Aroostook boxcar in the background. Behind that boxcar is Detroit's Renaissance Center, home to General Motors' headquarters.

I'm not saying I don't enjoy watching today's long container trains. I think, when taken as a whole, they are quite interesting to shoot, given their symmetrical dimensions and their mix of colours. This shot from the London CN Yard is a good example of the interesting visuals containers sometimes offer.

But what I think we've lost as railfans is the ability to pick out individual cars in a freight train to shoot. There's always a cool boxcar worth grabbing in a photo, in my opinion. I have more boxcar photos than any other type of rolling stock. I don't have many individual wellcar photos, by comparison.

There isn't much to cheer about if you're a railfan in Ottawa, but I will at least say that at least we do have a fair amount of boxcars still plying the rails here. I have snapped a few interesting ones over the years. This one I spotted in Walkley Yard, which made me think of the trains I watched as kid in Corunna. I like that there's a little stencil next to the door that says "A CSX Quality Car."

Here's another cool shot of a string of boxcars early one morning at Walkley Yard. It's an image that could have been taking 20 or even 30 years ago. But, it's actually 2013.

I'm always thankful when I catch an old boxcar on a passing freight. It's like watching a bit of history pass by. This one looked like it was hand painted.

Have you noticed that most museums or tourist railways have lots of boxcars, like this one on the Waterloo Central?

Railways today are great at what they do. But they are not nearly as colourful as they once were. Even though I know why boxcars are on the wane, part of me wishes they weren't.

Serving up suds?

London, Ontario Part III

As I continue to sort through my epic weekend in London and all the railfanning I was able to do, I think my CP highlight was being able to watch this local getting its consist together before making its rounds. As I mentioned in my last post, taking photos on the Quebec Street overpass does afford you a great view of the railyard, but the electrical wires are a visual hazard that you either have to work around and put up with in your shots. I was happy I stuck with it because this local featured a couple interesting aspects that were worth the hassle with the wires.

This first shot was taken in between the wires. You can see that two geeps are pulling some pretty sizeable boxcars, a few lumber cars, a string of covered hoppers and two more lumber cars. Given the back and forth that was being done, I believe there was some shuffling of the order of this train being done, although I didn't stick around for the full show. You can see the conductor in this shot.

As the train came closer, being led by CP 4426, the wires became a visual hazard that I could not overcome, but I couldn't resist sharing this shot of the two geeps kicking up a little smoke. You will recall that I got quite a smoke show from a couple of old CN GP9s in Sarnia in this post. As I mentioned then, you don't see many of these type of action shots. I'm not sure why. I love shots with lots of smoke.

Thankfully, the other side of the overpass was distraction free, so I was able to get some shots of the local (and CP 3043 with the golden rodent logo) heading out of the yard. The industrial backdrop was a bonus, although it didn't seem as though any of those businesses were rail served.

Since the train was moving slowly, I was able to get some shots of the rolling stock, including this old boxcar, which still has the old CP Rail script, although without the old logo. I was intrigued by the old script, which looked like it was somehow modified or corrected at one point, although the paint appears to be chipping away.

Here's a long shot of much of the consist. I like this shot because it illustrates something I don't often see. There were four tracks leading out of this railyard. Most railyards I have seen usually narrow to a single or double track at the end of the yard limits. This four-track expanse looks like a throwback to me. It's not necessarily the NYC Big Four mind you, but you get the idea.

You may wonder about the title of this post. Well, when I saw this line of crisp new Canada Malting Co. hoppers, it made me think of the Labatt Brewery in London. I checked out the brewery on Google and it doesn't seem as though there are any tracks serving this plant, although there is a nearby railyard. It made me wonder if any of the products for Labatt are brought by rail. Not being an expert on this city or its rail operations, I will leave it to a more informed reader to let me know.

Here's a closer shot of the company logo on another hopper, although this one is already showing the first signs of being tagged. I should mention that this was the first time I have seen this company's cars. As I have mentioned this year, it always pays to take a quick shot of the rolling stock on a train.

One last overhead shot.

I hope you're not getting too tired of the shots from Southern Ontario, because I have two more posts from London before I turn my attention back to other locales, including Ottawa. I am going back to Southern Ontario to visit family for the Thanksgiving weekend, so I might have more to share from this region in the weeks to come.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Found in the rail yard (Part II)

London, Ontario, Part II

My wanderings in London continued as I found my way to the Canadian Pacific's Quebec Street rail yard. Compared to the CN yard, which is in the middle of a very busy section of the city, the CP yard is in a much quieter spot, largely hidden away from its surrounding neighbourhood. However, the Quebec Street overpass does over off some great views of this rail yard, even though electrical wires make it extremely challenging to get unobstructed views. The mix of rolling stock in this yard is very similar to what I found in the CN yard. Both yards had their share of covered hoppers, tank cars, gondolas, some boxcars and autoracks. This is what I saw at the CP yard.

I was surprised by the mix of motive power in the yard when I arrived. Two units, which were clearly geeps (GP 38-2 3113 and 3130) were parked on a stub-end track with an ES44AC. Not your typical engine in a rail yard. I was actually really impressed with how new and clean the CP facilities looked, compared to the CN yard across town.

As I mentioned, it was incredibly difficult to get decent shots without capturing some of the electrical wires in the shot. The image above is the CP local I caught, which was just putting itself together. You can just make out the wire in the bottom left of the photo. This local was a real treat to watch, since it included some rolling stock I had never seen before as well as some older CP Rail boxcars. It also had a unit with the golden rodent on the side. This was the first time I had photographed one of these units. Stay tuned for more about this train in a future post.

After sticking around to shoot the local, I took off as there were no through freights on their way, by the looks of things. I did go back to the yard the next day and found very little happening, although two units were idling near the CP yard office, including another unit with the golden logo. I was happy to catch a glimpse of this once again. The two units were not crewed, so I didn't stick around.

However, I did manage to get a great overhead shot of CP GP38-2 4426 from the overpass, which allowed me to catch some details on the engine that I would not otherwise be able to appreciate trackside.

I made sure to get an overall image of the yard from the overpass. You can see the local train in this shot. For the most part, it was pretty quiet in the yard when I visited, but it was still worthwhile to get a view of CP's operations in this busy railway city.

Found in the rail yard (Part I)

Lambton County 2017 Part IV
London, Ontario, Part I

I've been to Sarnia Yard many times over the years and as anyone who watches trains in Sarnia knows, there really is only one decent spot to shoot pictures in that yard. The old Via Station, off Campbell Street, offers one of the few legal spots with a decent vantage point. The drawback is, given the direction where you are shooting the action, you almost always have to make do with terrible light. Cloudy days are usually best there. And now that the pedestrian portion of the Donahue Bridge is now closed off, forget about taking shots of the tunnel entrance.

When I went down to visit family in the Sarnia area, I tried to stay away from the yard so I could focus on getting some shots of trains moving on the Strathroy Sub (mission accomplished), the St. Clair River Industrial Spur (check) and the CSX Sarnia Subdivision (check).

However, I did manage to drop by the yard and spotted something I hadn't seen before.

Yes, it was track maintenance day in the area. I say this because I saw these types of MoW equipment on both the CN tracks and the CSX tracks in the area that day, although this was the only opportunity I had to get a decent shot. Other than that, all the action in the yard was taking place behind that long line (actually multiple lines) of covered hoppers.

The skies were threatening as you can see from the top image, but I did manage to see a set of GP9s and a slug idling away, no doubt in preparation for work on the St. Clair River Industrial Spur, which is where those engines are situated. It began to rain shortly after I arrived and the gantry was not suggesting that anything was imminent, so I moved on.

Shortly after my time in Sarnia, I visited London for a family wedding. It was during this week that I discovered the Highbury Road overpass, which offers a stunning view of the London East CN yard, and Egerton Street, which amazingly crosses over multiple tracks (I think it may have been seven) in the yard. I don't think there are many places where a rail yard is as open as this one, so I took full advantage of the opportunity. I was amazed at what I was able to see up close from Egerton Street and from Pine Street, which parallels the yard and allows you some great close-up shots of interesting rolling stock. Here is what I found.

The three units in the yard were idling and ready to go when I first arrived. I liked that they all represented a different CN paint scheme. Also, the yard engines seemed to parked on the track right next to a scrapper's yard, which helped add another industrial element to the shot. That's quite a pile of old cars heaped up next to the tracks.

There was nothing going on the first time I arrived, even though the yard engines seemed to be set for action, as the lead unit was lit and seemingly ready to go. The second time I visited the yard proved to be a gold mine as I was able to catch two eastbound freights in the yard, one from the Highbury overpass (stay tuned for those trains in future posts).

From Pine Street, I was able to get relatively close and take a shot of this twelve-axle heavy duty flat car. I have never seen one these in person and was happy to snap a few shots of these brutes. I was a bit surprised by the relatively small cargo attached to the car, which is clearly meant for much larger items. There were several of these cars in the yard, which were shunted around a few times in the days I was in the city.

This shot above gives you an idea of how close you are to the action while on the sidewalks of Egerton Road. Again, I am surprised that there is this type of access to a rail yard in London. You can see some large silos in the distance. I wasn't able to make my way to those elevators to see what they stored.

You can see the limits of the yard from Pine Street. I was surprised how many people ignored these signs and crossed over multiple tracks to get to where they were going. Security seems to be light here and the potential for danger seems immense, given how little people seem to care about the dangers of being around trains. Stay off private property, especially when it's something as potentially dangerous as an active rail yard. Railway officials often say anytime is train time. I can't stress this enough.

One final shot of a lonely ex-Government of Canada grain hopper, now patched for CN. I took this shot because it also gives you an idea of how large those heavy duty flatcars are.

I purposely spaced out all that I saw in this rail yard, as well as the CP London rail yard because there was simply too much to cram onto one post. Stay tuned for four more posts that will show you my meets with two massive CN freight trains, one CP local and all the rest of the miscellany I saw in the CP yard.

I can't wait to railfan in this city again.