I’ve completed my second eBook, “Passing a Half Century”! This details the trip my wife and I took through Alberta and British Columbia to celebrate turning 50.

Buy the book (link to Gumroad.com for purchase)

This book is a compilation of the blog post series I wrote, plus reviews of the three railway museums I visited, plus additional content just for the book. It’s all in one convenient 143 page PDF, with over 200 photographs!

 

Thanks for your interest!

PS – New readers may not remember that I wrote another eBook, “Diesels on Prince Edward Island“, a few years ago.

I had a tip that Canadian Pacific was running its business train east through Winnipeg. The story was that it was headed to Montreal, where it would then head into the US to tour one of CP’s subsidiaries, the Delaware and Hudson.

A “business train”, often called an “officer’s special”, is a passenger train owned by a railway and used for the railway’s business. You can’t buy a ticket to ride it and it’s not open to the public unless they are invited. These trains are often used to court investors or shippers, to honour veterans or active duty military personnel, or to host employees on special occasions.

I knew it was due into Winnipeg around 1 PM. I had an errand to run mid-morning, so I packed up my camera and laptop so I could sit near the track and work while waiting for the train.

First, CN

As I approached the CN Rivers subdivision on my way north, I spotted an eastbound CN train. I took a few minutes to photograph faded CN 5772 and CN 5720 leading a container train.

I used to see those SD75I units all the time in Saint John, New Brunswick. It’s nice to see them still out earning their keep.

On to CP

Again I saw a train as I approached the tracks. This time it was an eastbound CP train on the CP Carberry subdivision. A little driving found me in position to grab CP 8144 East. This might have been train CP 100.

That train had CP 8745 mid-train, and blue leased unit CEFX 1049 was bringing up the rear.

I parked off the highway on a side road – often called a “grid road” because prairie roads are laid out on a 1-mile wide grid – near “CP Makwa”, just west of the Perimeter Highway. Every now and then I would take a look at the signals facing west to see if they were A) lit or B) showing green.

The Portage Rocket

I did notice red-lit signals, and it turned out to be a westbound train. CP 2297 was rocketing along toward Portage la Prairie with its train of refrigerated cars for McCain and Simplot and hoppers for Richardson Pioneer. CP used to keep a locomotive in Portage for these local customers, but in the past few years they just run the train out to Portage to serve them, and then it comes back to Winnipeg.

There is double track from this point east to the CP yard in Winnipeg. They were on the south track, coming onto single track for the run west.

That was exciting, but unfortunately it meant there would be no business train for a while, as 2297 would be occupying the single track west of me!

It took 50 minutes. They must have met at Meadows or Marquette.

Making an Entrance

There was a glimmer of light as the sun struggled to shine through the overcast skies. I took my tripod over to the “sun” side of the tracks and leveled it, then I locked my Canon T1i on and confirmed the horizon was more or less level. I know my tripod has a level indicator on it but it is never really that accurate.

While I waited for the train to get “in range”, a pickup truck pulled up to the crossing. The driver turned out to be Felix Lesiuk, a local railfan and occasional contributor of train photos to the Winnipeg Model Railroad Club blog. Here an example of his work.

He happened to be driving by and saw I was waiting for a train. Felix has a bit of “railfan luck” as he happened to drive by the recent CP derailment in Rosser not long after it happened, and captured some great photos, which he graciously gave permission for me to show.

Anyway, we worked out where we were going to stand so we didn’t get in each other’s shots, and went to work as the train passed by. Here’s the video, with a lot of clicking noises as we both fired off some frames.

Those three “F” units looked pretty sweet.

The train had refurbished “F” unit CP 1401 followed by CP 4106 and CP 4107. The irony of these “CP” units is that they were all originally CN units.

All too quickly, they were past us and taking the south track into Winnipeg. I believe the train was empty, and the dark observation car seemed to confirm that.

Felix and I stood and chatted for a few minutes after the train went by, then he went west and I went east (and south) toward home.

One More Train

On my way down, I noted an eastbound CN train, so I had to exit and grab it – since it was there, you know.

The train had boxy CP 8016 leading, and “black widow” IC 1020 trailing.

It was a good few hours of trackside time!

Related Posts

• The Canada 150 Train Comes to Winnipeg
• Not the Rocky

Just One More Thing

I just finished reading the book “Ancillary Sword” by Ann Leckie. It’s the second book in her Imperial Radch trilogy. Good book, not as good as “Ancillary Justice” but still well worth reading. I’ve downloaded the third, “Ancillary Mercy“, and will be reading it digitally… a new experience for me. These are military science fiction books, leaning toward the social / interpersonal “soft” science. Think C.J. Cherryh more than David Drake. Recommended.

(these links are affiliate links, meaning I earn a small commission if you purchase something by following them, at no extra cost to you)

Octobers in Winnipeg can be pretty cold. Season temperatures are a high of 10C (50F) and low of -2C (30F). So when it’s warm, everyone gets out and enjoys it while it lasts, before the cold winter sets in.

On October 18, it reached a high of 23.6C (74.5F). Time to get out of the house!

As the sun was setting, I drove up to Wilkes Avenue. The sunset was gorgeous and I was concerned that I had missed the light. As I approached the track, I saw an eastbound train rolling along. I got ahead of it and photographed it approaching Carman Junction.

I always find it interesting how the light changes so much between facing the sunset and facing away from the sunset. Check out this “going away” photo, taken from the exact same spot but pointing the other way.

It’s like the two photos were taken on different days, instead of just 33 seconds apart.

Here’s the video I took.

I was pretty pleased with the photos – and the video.

For those who are interested, my camera settings were: shutter speed 1/500s, aperture f/4.0, ISO 800. I was using my 70-200mm (f/4.0) lens. I wanted to use a relatively high shutter speed to freeze the action, so I had to bump the ISO up to get the right exposure.

After the train went by, there was no evidence that another train was coming, so I headed home. On the way home, I decided to stop into La Salle to take a few photos of the grain elevator there.

It had been a while since I was in La Salle, so it was time to take an up to date photo… or two.

I’m crossing my fingers for a continued warm fall. Let’s hope!

The Arctic Gateway group and its subcontractors have been very hard at work fixing washouts and repairing track along the rail line between Gillam and Churchill, Manitoba. It has been a tale of triumph and tragedy so far.

They have made tremendous progress since the line was purchased by Arctic Gateway in early September. The clock was ticking, as the construction season is short in northern Manitoba and the possibility of an early freeze made it imperative that crews work as fast as possible to repair the line before winter came.

Paradox Access Solutions was engaged to provide ground stabilization services using their Tough Cell technology. Cando Rail Services has been doing the rail repair once the surface was prepared.

A major milestone was reached when high rail vehicles reached Churchill on October 10. Churchill’s mayor, Michael Spence, greeted the pickup trucks as they rolled into the town. The trucks were followed by a Holland rail test vehicle, looking for defects.

Tragedy Strikes

The good news was overshadowed by a freight train derailment on September 15, near Ponton, Manitoba (south of Thompson). Both train crew members were seriously injured by the derailment, and the 38-year-old conductor died on the scene. The train had three locomotives and 25 cars; all three locomotives and four cars derailed.

The derailment occurred in a remote location, and it was spotted by a passing helicopter who alerted authorities. It took a significant amount of time for aid to get to the site and for the crew to be extracted.

The Arctic Gateway Group issued a statement, which in part said, “Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of those involved in the accident, and with our employees. We thank all of the first responders and emergency services workers that have assisted in the initial response to this incident, and we remain committed to cooperating with these emergency services teams and all other stakeholders to provide information and support in the wake of this tragic incident.”

Canada’s Transportation Safety Board (TSB) is investigating, and their initial assessment is that two culverts were washed out. Jerry Berriault, the TSB’s senior investigator for Manitoba, told the Winnipeg Free Press that “it looks like there was an upstream release of water somewhere, possibly related to beaver activity.”

This section of line is traversed by VIA Rail’s trains as well as the Hudson Bay Railway freight trains. The line was last inspected two days before the derailment. VIA suspended passenger service between The Pas and Gillam until the track was repaired.

Next Steps

Now that the washouts have been repaired, the focus turns to repairing the rails themselves and ensuring they are in good shape to support freight and passenger rail traffic.

There is a lot of work ahead for the crews, but they can feel proud of what they have accomplished to date.

 

It’s amazing how much progress has been made. One wonders why Omnitrax never did any repairs to the line – although the $117 million investment that Ottawa has made in the repairs and future operations probably has a lot to do with that.

Good progress has been made so far. Let’s hope the weather stays good so they can finish the repairs and get trains moving on the line before freeze-up.

Thanks to Arctic Gateway for giving their permission for me to use their photos in this article. Follow them on Facebook for updates!

 

On August 7, I heard that the VIA Rail “Churchill” * train headed to Winnipeg had a 40th anniversary unit leading the train. With the current schedule, it would have come into Winnipeg at 13:45, during my working hours. After checking its forecast arrival time using the VIA Rail tracker site, I found it was significantly late. I decided to try to catch it coming into town, after a quick supper. I ended up catching it in a three way meet with two CN trains.

The Setup

I headed up to the CN Rivers subdivision. As I arrived trackside, an eastbound train was heading into the city. I quickly grabbed a photo at 17:54 as it passed under the Perimeter Highway overpass.

It had CN 5489 and CN 2677 leading.

I continued west to Diamond to wait for VIA. I saw that there was another east-facing train in the distance on the north track, but it was not moving. I elected to leave it for now and get VIA framed by the east-facing signals at Diamond.

While I waited, a westbound train came creeping up toward Diamond on the south track. It stopped short, setting up a three-way meet.

 

The Meet

At 18:10, VIA 692 came rolling along, threading between the two waiting CN trains.

It passed the first train on the south track, then crossed over to the north track to pass the second train.

The CN crew was on the ground for the quick rollby inspection. VIA 692 had Kokanee Park on the tail end, a relatively rare occurrence for this train.

 

Aftermath

Once VIA passed, the westbound train started moving and rolled past me, with a nice wave from the conductor.

Here’s the meet between the two CN trains. The east-facing train was just getting underway.

The eastbound train (CN 2199 East) passed Diamond at 18:20. The photograph below shows them about to cross the CP Glenboro subdivision.

I waited around for a bit, and after about 20 minutes, another train came rolling along at 18:42, with CN 5700 and CN 8862 in the lead.

That was enough for me, so I packed up and headed home. I chalked that up as a success – I got the VIA train I wanted, plus 4 CN trains!

* I know it’s not actually the “Churchill” train at the moment, as the line between Gillam and Churchill is still closed at the time of writing. You’re lucky I don’t still call the VIA Winnipeg-Churchill train the “Hudson Bay”.

I took video of the VIA train, and it’s the first train in this video.

P.S. I just finished reading The Fall of Gondolin by J.R.R. Tolkien. It’s a worthy prequel to The Hobbit and to the Rings trilogy. Fans of minute details will like the extensive notes that Christopher Tolkien included along with the story. Personally, I am a more casual fan and, although I enjoyed the story itself, I skimmed a lot of the pages after the story as they were really “meta” information. It was interesting to read the first mentions of Legolas and Elrond, though!