A friend sent this around the other day, taken in 1985 looking west from the top of the CN Tower in Edmonton. The crossovers west of the platforms are now centre ice at Rogers Place, new home of the Oilers:
http://static.panoramio.com/photos/large/112551166.jpg
Rogers Place:
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/QX_QQu44dwk/maxresdefault.jpg
Near the bottom of the first photo there is a GM New Look (Brown-Boveri electrics) trolleybus heading north, about to pass under the platforms. Edmonton once had 100 of them, built in the early 1980s they turned out to be our last new trolleys, as the wires came down in 2009.
Farther west the old 105 St. overpass can be seen, once a favourite spot of railfans it was demolished soon after the railyard was abandoned in 1990. From it one had views like this:
http://www.railpictures.ca/upload/in-may-1989-the-via-supercontinental-departs-edmonton-behind-fp9as-6303-and-6301-attached-to-the-rear-is-the-skeena-behind-via-6310-this-scene-can-never-be-repeated-as-these-tracks-orig
Beyond that was the grandly-named 109 St. Subway, but no one ever called it that. To Edmontonians the narrow, curved(!) two-lane nightmare was simply known as "the Rathole". It lasted over a decade after the yards closed, and was finally dug up in 2001, a real cause for celebration:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DS5YH0Hngi0
Time lapse of destruction. Look how black that dirt is!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ywYFln3BUWU
Farther west there was once a roundhouse, demolished around 1960. But the turntable pit was simply filled in, and the foundation was rediscovered a few years ago:
https://www.macewan.ca/wcm/MacEwanNews/PREPARATION_REVEALS_CN_TURNTAB
Amazing how new development makes an area unrecognizable, so much has been lost. VIA doesn't even come downtown anymore, instead they have a Amshack-inspired building over by CN's main freight yard, in a sketchy area with no transit connections.
Time marches on.
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
There was also support for keeping the streetcars from the then-mayor, and there were two local university professors, one a woman, who had successfully opposed the downtown elevated automobile expressway and who turned their attention to preseving the streetcar network. Someone can provide the names.
I wonder if the LRT grade crossing problems are the result of contract designers without rail experience who are "re-inventing the wheel". You can expect a few tweaks and minor debugging after a new installation, which should get quickly resolved in the commissioning phase. Ongoing problems like those suggest incompetence.
Toronto kept its streetcar system mostly because they were slower at abandoning it. By the early 1970s the final push to convert to rubber was imminent and routes were still being cut back. But rail had started to become trendy again.
Denver has had similar grade crossing signal problems with its more recent line extensions. mudchicken has posted on other threads here about those, and is far more familiar with the details than I am.
- PDN.
Miningman Waiting to hear from Overmod on how things are progressing in Memphis, last we heard the signals work!
Waiting to hear from Overmod on how things are progressing in Memphis, last we heard the signals work!
I still can't believe how much trouble Edmonton is having. The North LRT may as well go back to running at restricted speed, at least then the crossing gates will activate in time.
Now some people are proposing that Edmonton build a Bus Rapid Transit system instead of more LRT lines.
Good analysis SD70Dude. Toronto has done an outstanding job protecting their streetcars despite all the carping from motorists, politicians and the bicycle crowd. It is an extensive system. They still have regular police patrols on horseback too! The red Tunic Mounties at City Hall and the airport are for the tourists however.
Our own Dave Klepper has written letters to the various Mayors in Toronto over the years showing his gratitude and support.
New light rail into Pearson International from Union Station Up and running well.
Other cities following and making comebacks.
Amazing what has been lost.
And yet at the other end of the Kingston Sub the opposite happened, as Toronto abandoned abandonment plans and ordered new CLRV & ALRV cars in the late 1970s, as their PCCs aged. Now aging themselves, the CLRV/ALRV fleet is facing the same fate as the PCCs before them:
http://www.railwayage.com/index.php/passenger/light-rail/the-car-that-saved-torontos-streetcars.html
Today the Toronto Streetcar System is the busiest in North America.
To think that Montreal could be the same, if only those in charge had a greater vision way back when.
Thank You.
Yes the difference between the end of 1959 and the end of 1960 was stark and sobering. Those are great scenes in Montreal, but don't feel like the Lone Ranger ...it was the same thing from Saskatoon to New Brunswick. Ottawa, Toronto, Winnipeg, London, Niagara Falls, my home town of Burlington, there was steam everywhere, roundhouses were full. Sure the ranks had been thinned but many were just outshopped, resplendent in new paint. Then one day the whistles just stopped. It was system wide, sudden and lethal.
A new decade started and there was a new feel to it all. The roundhouses were a shadow of themselves, fell into disrepair and came down. The water and coaling towers sat unused and then came down. Passenger trains disappeared in droves, en masse, heavyweights were disappearing all over. New bold paint schemes, not in a traditional railroad sense appeared announcing that what was is gone for good and there was more to come yet. Soon the towerman and communications, the wire and telegraph.
No...things were never ever the same. The sights, the sounds, the aromas, the permanence, the importance, all faded into a vanishing vapour and then disappeared. I really do miss it and think we lost too much.
I am grateful to have known, to have been there, to grow up with it all, but still it's the knowing part that reaches out and tries to regain......something.
BaltACDHullet operators certanily had a up and down life!
Kinda fascinating to think that the operator sat where he did and controlled that massive machine.
And probably rather boring - I'd love to know how many scoops it took to empty the hold of one of those ore boats.
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...
SD70DudeAmazing! You don't see clamshells like that around anymore, and all the Hullets are gone too. A few places like Lambert's Point still have little electric locomotives or Barney Cars, but they are rare now too.
A few places like Lambert's Point still have little electric locomotives or Barney Cars, but they are rare now too.
Hullet operators certanily had a up and down life!
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Amazing! You don't see clamshells like that around anymore, and all the Hullets are gone too.
From my distant youth, I can remember the heat waves coming off of loaded bottle cars when the Interlake bottle train would be waiting for clearance onto the SC&S Bernice line from the Calumet River Secondary. At that time, the bottle train originated form Interlake's blast furnace plant at 108th Street and the Calumet River and followed an all-PC routing down to Lansing and back up the Pan Handle to Interlake's Riverdale facility.
Paul_D_North_JrIn cold weather such as this, the bottle cars might not be too uncomfortable to be around. When we were working on the tracks at the US Steel Fairless Works (about 30 mi. NE of Philadelphia) in this kind of bitter cold weather, they'd park a red-hot ingot or two on a flatcar a couple tracks away. A great demonstration of radiant heat - cold air in between, but definitely warmer facing that way. Not balmy, but it could take the edge off, and help warm the extremities, especially hands (even gloved ones) that had to handle cold steel tools and track materials. - PDN.
When we were working on the tracks at the US Steel Fairless Works (about 30 mi. NE of Philadelphia) in this kind of bitter cold weather, they'd park a red-hot ingot or two on a flatcar a couple tracks away. A great demonstration of radiant heat - cold air in between, but definitely warmer facing that way. Not balmy, but it could take the edge off, and help warm the extremities, especially hands (even gloved ones) that had to handle cold steel tools and track materials.
There is a signifigant difference in heat between 'hot ingots', which are solid and cherry red when loaded and molten metal that is contained within the bottle cars. Even with the insulation of the bottle cars, being near them made on uncomfortably warm.
In cold weather such as this, the bottle cars might not be too uncomfortable to be around.
tree68 BaltACD Einstein was not on the property - just vetern railroad carmen from the EL who had been dealing with bottle cars for decades. I would imagine that time would be of the essence. I don't think they want that metal to cool too much in the car...
BaltACD Einstein was not on the property - just vetern railroad carmen from the EL who had been dealing with bottle cars for decades.
I would imagine that time would be of the essence. I don't think they want that metal to cool too much in the car...
Bottle cars are well insulated and metal, in 100 ton volumes, doesn't cool all that quickly anyway.
BaltACDEinstein was not on the property - just vetern railroad carmen from the EL who had been dealing with bottle cars for decades.
MiningmanBaltACD--- That would be a pretty hairy situation...tricky, heavy, very dangerous, very hazardous,....I would want Einstein there doing mathematical computations every minute and directing the whole thing.
Einstein was not on the property - just vetern railroad carmen from the EL who had been dealing with bottle cars for decades.
BaltACD--- That would be a pretty hairy situation...tricky, heavy, very dangerous, very hazardous,....I would want Einstein there doing mathematical computations every minute and directing the whole thing.
Paul D. North Jr.---Thank you for the information. That is a difficult book to find. Hope all is well for you.
NDG Miningman Here's one for NDG. When scenes and service like this were important. The diesel tug Okanagan (launched February 1947) with barges at Kelowna. Nicholas Morant/CPCA She made her last run on ending service on Okanagan Lake May 31, 1972. Sure went to Heck after 1960, everywhere. Most of the cars on the barges are Reefers. S S Naramata was on the job until 1967. http://sssicamous.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/PMA0366-SS-Naramata-and-Rail-Cars.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Naramata Along with CP 414325, the last Steam on CPR. https://i.pinimg.com/736x/03/22/0b/03220b68fb584dd88ff915427232ab24.jpg Thank You, Sir! Love the INCO Pix!! Mining and Railways are inextricably intertwined.
Miningman Here's one for NDG. When scenes and service like this were important. The diesel tug Okanagan (launched February 1947) with barges at Kelowna. Nicholas Morant/CPCA She made her last run on ending service on Okanagan Lake May 31, 1972.
Here's one for NDG. When scenes and service like this were important.
The diesel tug Okanagan (launched February 1947) with barges at Kelowna. Nicholas Morant/CPCA She made her last run on ending service on Okanagan Lake May 31, 1972.
Mining and Railways are inextricably intertwined.
Re: Kettle Valley &etc:
While perusing an old model railroad track planning book ("The BEST of MODEL RAILROADING Magazine's TRACK PLANS", edited by Robert Schleicher, Eastwood Publishing Co., 1983), the section on pages 58 - 59 is entitled "Kettle Valley, A Possible Prototype". In it is mentioned and the cover shown of a book I'd not seen referenced before, The Kettle Valley and Its Railways, by Hal Riegger, published by PFM (Pacific Fast Mail, mainly a company that imported brass model locomotives), 1981? or 1983? Since I've not seen it myself, other details summarized from that article: then $24.95; 284 pages; color photos from 1950 to 1980; several hundred B&W photos and dozens of route plans from the 1880 - 1980 period; includes several other valleys, such that a better title would be "Kettle Valley Railroads", as the true subjects are the GN and several other railroads which became part of the CP, nearly 500 miles of line. As to the latter, GN had branches that crossed the border in 3 places plus the Spokane Intl. (now UP) crossed it once.
https://www.abebooks.com/book-search/title/the-kettle-valley-and-its-railways/author/hal-riegger/used/ - prices from $47 to $115.
https://www.amazon.com/Kettle-Valley-Its-Railways/dp/0915713047 - prices from $30 to $100.
https://books.google.com/books/about/The_Kettle_Valley_and_Its_Railways.html?id=k01nuQAACAAJ - has references to a couple other books about the Kettle Valley, i.e., McCulloch's Wonder: The Story of the Kettle Valley Railway, by Barrie Sanford and Andrew McCulloch, 288 pgs., 2002; and Railroaders: Recollections of the Steam Era in British Columbia by Robert D. Turner, 1981, 91 pgs.; there appear to be other similar books, if you search for them.
As to what we've lost, I saw that over on the T-1 thread Miningman posted something like:
"Don't cry because it's gone - smile because it happened!"
That philosophical attitude has been of value and solace to me several times over the past couple of weeks. Thanks for sharing it.
Miningman Inco 3 hot metal car being shoved by 109. Collection of Dave ShawNo doubt the neighbour whose wash is out appreciates the electric locomotive!
Inco 3 hot metal car being shoved by 109. Collection of Dave ShawNo doubt the neighbour whose wash is out appreciates the electric locomotive!
Rerailing derailed loaded bottle cars was loads of fun. Got to observe the operation when EL derailed one adjacent to the B&O's Haselton Tower in Youngstown. Two wreck cranes - loads of fun!
NDGAlong with CP 414325, the last Steam on CPR.
What is that arrangement at the end of the boom in the picture? I thought at first it was a clamshell bucket of some kind, but that makes little sense, and what is there appears much more complicated.
Beautiful! I am glad to see the Naramata is still around, and in good hands.
A $90,000 restoration grant eh, if only all steam preservation projects were deemed so worthy by the powers that be.
The details are fuzzy after 50 some years, but seems like I remember Inco Nickle sponsoring something on WJR radio in Detroit.
It was a regular thing - not a one-time deal.
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