Along with other locations, I was shooting pix at Northern Maine Junction last week. If you want to see an odd yard, check out this place on Google Maps.
Still in training.
Oh won't you take me to, Funky Yard ...
You know, it might make an interesting N, HO, or O Gauge layout!
Even G Gauge if you've got a big enough back yard!
Interesting street/road names - Diesel Shop Road, Starch Plant Road, Cleanout Road...
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
Neat that the roundhouse is still standing, though it isn't being used for railroad purposes anymore and the turntable is gone.
Definitely a weird junction. I'll bet it wasn't built that way originally, and various parts were added at different times over the years.
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
Somebody has a sense of humor. There's a Sunset Strip there, and several of the homes along the street have in-ground swimming pools. In Bangor, Maine!
They probably get double use out of them as skating rinks in winter
SD70DudeI'll bet it wasn't built that way originally, and various parts were added at different times over the years.
The topo maps on historicaerials.com show nothing but the east-west Maine Central track there in 1942, with the north-south Bangor & Aroostook (and all the loopty loop tracks) added by 1946.
tree68 The topo maps on historicaerials.com show nothing but the east-west Maine Central track there in 1942, with the north-south Bangor & Aroostook (and all the loopty loop tracks) added by 1946.
Thanks, Larry. You've cleared up something for me. I saw a diagragm of the junction from '43; and it is configured like today. But that must have been the future plan only. The earliest photo I've seen of the yard like that is indeed from 1946.
Thanks for straightening me out on this.
Lithonia OperatorThanks, Larry. You've cleared up something for me. I saw a diagragm of the junction from '43; and it is configured like today. But that must have been the future plan only. The earliest photo I've seen of the yard like that is indeed from 1946.
Topo maps were not always completely current - they would have been compiled by hand, leading to a certain amount of lag between research of a given area and the final product. MC would be able to shed light on that.
The facility might have been in place at the time of the 1942 map, or at least under construction. Barring other documentation, I wouldn't discount the possibility of it being there in 1942.
The earliest aerial photo of the area is 1973, so that's no help.
Sometimes the maps on there even revert back to an earlier or less detailed and accurate portrayal of an area when looking at a more recent map. Especially if it's from a different source than the earlier map.
For a random illustration that I've fabricated to illustrate what I mean, let's say a 1946 map accurately shows the layout of my fictional area. But a 1948 map from a different source may instead reflect the layout from the 1930's that disappeared at the beginning of WWII when major work was done to the area. But then there might be a 1951 map that again is accurate.
Makes it quite difficult with the absence of corresponding aerial photography to fully trust the available topographical maps for determining approximately when something changed. You don't know if the earlier map was already out of date when it was published, if the newer map is portraying an older configuration that no longer exists, etc.
Further complicating matters are some maps are simply less detailed. An older map may show a roundhouse at a yard while a slightly newer map may show no roundhouse, leading one to falsely think it may have been demolished in the time since the older map was created. Yet an even newer map may again accurately show the roundhouse as extant.
rdamon Oh won't you take me to, Funky Yard ...
When you zoom in on the Google Maps image of the wye connected to the "balloon track", it appears even more like a model train layout. I see two places where the ends of the track haven't be been connected yet
If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?
Yeah, that really is a wild track arrangement. If I had seen that on somebody's model railroad I would have brushed it off as unrealistic.
It is sad that the tracks are gone from the roundhouse and even the diesel house or car shop to the south. But there still looks to be a fair amount of on-line carload business in the immediate vicinity.
A.D. MacYeah, that really is a wild track arrangement. If I had seen that on somebody's model railroad I would have brushed it off as unrealistic. It is sad that the tracks are gone from the roundhouse and even the diesel house or car shop to the south. But there still looks to be a fair amount of on-line carload business in the immediate vicinity.
Railroading is the home of - do what you have to do with what you have to do it with as railroading does not exist in the perfect world of desirable geography and unlimited funds.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
After tracing the various paths around the trackage, it begins to look to me like a highway cloverleaf.
If you zoom out, you'll see that the two tracks from the north are two branches of one. Using historicall names, that is the BAR line from Brownville Junction (jct. w/ CP). The land is significantly higher north of Rte. 2. The western one of the two branches comes off the high ground, crosses Rte. 2 and the MEC, then has a significant slope down into the loopy part of the yard, which is all BAR. The eastern branch curves east and feeds into the MEC; this slope is quite steep to my eye. When I was there, someone had left a cut of tank cars there, assumedly for interchange one way or the other. I have to figure every tank had the handbrake on tight!
Here is a CP engine consist. Note that the second unit is still in its CMQ livery. They are on the embankment heading up from the loopy yard.
Here they are heading north over the Pan Am main; then it will cross Rte 2 and wind up on the high ground.
I kinda hated to see CMQ get gobbled up, because they had a very sweet livery, IMO.
A.D. Mac Yeah, that really is a wild track arrangement. If I had seen that on somebody's model railroad I would have brushed it off as unrealistic. It is sad that the tracks are gone from the roundhouse and even the diesel house or car shop to the south. But there still looks to be a fair amount of on-line carload business in the immediate vicinity.
For it to be the prototype to someone's model train layout, the switches would need to be lined for a Baldwin S12 switch engine to be going 160 MPH around that loop.
At The NW corner of the Facility there is a roundhouse.
Now shown as Main Scrap Metals
Steve
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