Hopefully this link works, it's a Facebook video but I was able to watch it without being logged in.
https://www.facebook.com/zartok35/videos/372317181147341
This is the privately owned former Okanagan Wine Train equipment and several other cars being moved between two Saskatchewan shortlines, from the Wheatland Railway to the Great Western Railway.
The cars are all privately owned by a farmer from the North Battleford, SK area who has amassed quite the collection of antique rail equipment over the past decade. I'm told that he has plans to partner with the GWR to operate an excursion train down there.
He also owns a pair of rebuilt ex-VIA/CN F-units, which were also recently moved to the GWR from the former storage location at the Alberta Railway Museum. 6304 and 6311 were both rebuilt to FP9RM specs and given Detroit 6v92T HEP gensets during the 1980s and 90s.
http://www.railpictures.ca/?attachment_id=34316
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
16 cars - quite a train for a single farmer.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
I didn't know farming paid that well. He obviously wasn't a sharecropper like the Joads.
His is the type of modern large scale industrial farm which operates over many square miles (or 'sections' as they are known out here) and has multiple large, new combines and other heavy machines, each of which is probably worth as much as your house.
I also recall hearing a story about how his family had settled out here early enough that they were able to keep the mineral rights for their land.
54light15 I didn't know farming paid that well. He obviously wasn't a sharecropper like the Joads.
Your average "40 acres and a mule" farmer probably isn't driving a Caddy. Now, 4,000 acres (6.25 square miles) and a handful of $500K combines...
We have dairy farmers here milking 200-300 head. That would be small in some areas.
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...
54light15I didn't know farming paid that well. He obviously wasn't a sharecropper like the Joads.
Even 'family' farms, depending on the location, can encompass thousands of acres.
I follow the videos of two operations - 'Laura Farms' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsyrXeoxBnk and Welker Farms https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwYWbSw8iRc
One grows corn and raises livestock. The other grows mostly wheat and some other grains. What each of them have tied up in equipment in total is well into seven figures. When it comes time to plant crops they need more seed than just a package of Burpee Seeds.
I didn't know there were that many passenger cars in all of Canadaland
Farming is a big-money occupation nowadays. You would not get rich with a 500-acre farm, and I'm not sure you could support a family on one. Unless you inherit land, it's very difficult to get started in farming. You have to have a lot of expensive equipment, some of which is only used a few months a year. Twenty years ago, my mother's cousin's were still using a cotton picker built around 1950, because it was only used about 4 months a year, and not that much for a number of years in the '60's when they didn't plant much if any cotton. You have to love farming to do it, because it is hard physical work.
Then how did Oliver Wendell Douglas do so well? The guy wore a suit every day and drove a Lincoln convertible. His wife wore fur coats so farming must have paid him pretty well. Oh wait, that wasn't real.
Can abybody guess on what a move like that would cost the consumer?
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
I was told well over $100k for the passenger cars.
Moving the pair of F-units from Edmonton to the GWR cost approximately $40k.
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