Let's talk about the weather, shall we?

It sucks.

So my winter was doing reno stuff, running when I could, which wasn't very much or often, working (thankfully) and grabbing the rare vid.  Since I do my railfanning on foot, this winter hasn't been particularly cordial towards my hobby, thus the lack of postings this last few months.  It's been hard enough just finding the time to run.

The mid-December ice storm kicked the year off on the wrong foot, and made the underfooting for a lot my running a lost less stable.  Last year and the year before I ran trail nearly the whole winter.  This year, maybe twice, and only when we had good snows down to get some traction going.  Actually one of the runs had superb conditions, even better than some summer runs, with hard packed snow nicely levelled by off-road cyclists.  Too much ice and thaw/freeze cycles to keep it in shape for long.

On the railfanning side and with the ice storm having set the tone for the year, my running stayed pretty local and sticking to the Lakeshore commuter runs.  But it gave a chance to visit a couple of locales I've not ventured to, such as the Birchmount Road bridge over the CP Belleville Sub.  This gives a nice view of the long sweeping curve from west to east:

From the same location, face east and you get the long corridor through the Kennedy GO Station:

Standing around outside waiting for trains isn't much fun.  At least commuter traffic has schedules so I canto time my run to arrive just-in-time and catch what I can.  Like this one, where I catch VIA's luxurious Glenfraser lounge car tacked onto the end of a Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal run, VIA combo 62/52:

Glenfraser is a pretty interesting car.  One-of-a-kind, it's a Canadian Car & Foundry unit built to the same dimensions basically as the stainless Budd cars.  VIAs fleet site has a whole page dedicated to this unit.  Since it's only one car, I do wonder how VIA decides which train gets to pick it up, it would be a nice bonus for a train trip.  However, VIA often rents it out for special functions so seeing it on the train you're about to board may not turn out as promising as hoped.

Cars like this is what made riding the rails such a thrill when I was a kid.  As a young-un, we did take a family trip once from my home in Sydney to Toronto and then back and all those images of getting set up in the sleeper bunks, eating in the dining car, hanging out the lounge, still there in my head.  When my wife and I were dating we did a trip from Toronto to Sydney while the railliners (more commonly known as the RDC cars) still ran from Halifax to Sydney.  The Atlantic ran from Montreal to Halifax for our overnighter and we took a nice big cozy bedroom for the trip.  The Atlantic was one of the last steam-heated trains in service.  When you sat on the toilet, the water was all steamy and warm, so you got this gush of nice warm air when you sat on it.  Wasn't a lot of money those days, a couple of hundred for the unit each way.  She wasn't quite as enthused with the railliners from Truro to Sydney thoguth, with their built-in diesel engines.  I always liked them, having spent many a ride from the Annapolis valley, sitting at the bar in the back.  Nothing quite like drinking a beer or two and watching the country side slide by out the window.

So, only a handful of vids this winter.  My yootoob page has a couple more.  When I get more time I'll be able to dedicate a bit more to the task.  Right now any extra time I have is spent getting in the miles to avoid becoming a non-runner.

How many trains can you catch in 30 minutes?

The nice thing about commuter traffic is that it's both predictable and constant.  Living close enough to the Lakeshore east line that I can listen to the engines throttle up from my back porch gives me a venue to catch a lot of commuter traffic.

Early mornings reflect a sequence of trains that have to cover a mix of long and short haul commuter traffic in a variety of services.  The nice thing about the mix of GO and VIA is the power options and the mix of express and local trains together on the same lines and makes for some interesting management.

Between 6:45 and 7:15 AM, you have 7 different trains in 6 distinct consists prioritizing themselves over the Kingston sub east of Union Station.  5 of those pass through in the first 15 minutes, often parallel to each other and can have as many as 3 consists over the stretch below Danforth Avenue at the same time.  On October 10th I decided I would capture all of this action into a single vid, which ended up being 5 minutes in length.

2 of the trains are on a single consist, being the VIA 50/52 trains that are tied together until Belleville, then split their respective ways to Montreal and Ottawa.  This is the first of the bunch that passes through and can often be in a drag race with a westbound GO express that departs roughly 1 minute later than the VIA depending on lateness of the VIA units.  With the GO units, the convention is to have express units use the same center track as VIA while the westbound GOs share the north track with local units.  Some track switches manage the overlap of westbound local and express trains.  All of this is within close tolerances as the units are often within short minutes of each other.

A couple of unique hits on this video.  One of the GO trains had dual MP40 units up front, an express EB train probably moving an extra power unit to Oshawa.  I also got a good throttle up for an F59PH leading WB with an MP40 pusher.  For the final sequence I managed to catch a head-to-head meet of the EB and WB units on the short bridge over Woodbine Avenue.  This was a good sequence of trains to catch in such a short period.

Recording under a bridge

Yesterday morning I ran over to the Danforth GO station to catch the morning commuter runs.  On weekdays it's a mix of services, VIA, GO regular service, GO express runs.  The regular services stop at each/most of the stations and the express units sail right on through.

The bridge grants a nice straight view along the westward tracks and you get a head-on type of shot of the oncoming eastbound units.  I usually shoot from Main Street on the bridge over the station but thought I'd shoot at track level for this one.

VIA 50 / 52 is a connected pair of trains that head to Montreal and Ottawa.  They depart together from Toronto and then separate in Belleville.  It makes a few stops along the way but not at this station so it has time to pick up speed before blowing through on it's way toward it's first stop at Guildwood station.

On this morning 50 / 52 was a few minutes late.  Waiting on a bench I caught sight of it's lights far down the track and positioned myself against a post, using it to help steady the camera.  The train was on the center track of three and my view is straight down the middle, it's a quite warm morning and the heat is eminating from the surfaces as it approaches.  Since I'm staying focused on the viewfinder and pointed westward, and it's noisy, I'm unaware of a GO express from Oshawa bearing down from the east on the track immediately to my left.

Trains, being rather large, displace a fair amount of air.  One train moving in open air pushes it out and up and draws some along with it as it goes.  Two trains in opposite directions and both moving quickly gives some additional dynamics to the whole process.  Have it occur under a bridge adds jan extra element.  Thus as I'm anchored to this post, VIA zips by on center track and at the same moment the express GO blows past me from behind.  A brief but violent swirl of air throws the viewfinder of the camera shut, immediately terminating my recording.  I quickly reopen the panel and feverishly hit 'record' until it started up again.  It would have been a good clip had it all been a single shot.  Unfortunately I ended up with two scenes and had to blend them together in editing, making the GO passing seem oddly brief.

Anyway, here's the outcome.  All part of the fun.

Railfanning without a scanner

In radio-free land, catches are luck and observation.  Well, really just luck.  And schedules.  Commuter trains run on schedules you can usually look up.  This works great near the source end but the destination end is considerably less reliable.  Such is true of catching the Canadian as it rolls through the Don Valley on it's four day trip from the west coast.  I've caught it by pure luck as late as 26 hours after it's scheduled arrival time.

I'm not big on long waits at crossings and locations, I give maybe 15-20 minutes if I have time, less if my run is more critical than catching some video.  The Canadian is a frequent target since it's in my running territory and usually the only train rumbling through lower Bala on a Saturday morning.  Since I don't know when it might arrive, I generally stop at a level trail crossing and look for signs that a train may have passed through, usually a clean path along the top of the rails free of the mud and dirt left behind by cyclists and foot traffic.  The line signals help but only one is in a convenient spot, and it's for the south section so won't tell me if the north section is occupied by traffic.

Last Saturday I ran over to the valley and stopped at the bailey bridge crossing near Don Mills Road to check.  The signal south was full green, unusual as it's normally yellow since it's not far before it feeds into the Union Station corridor.  I decided to check the north signal which meant following some trail near the rails that offers a peak at one point.  The signal glowed red, indicating a closed line north.  Southbound train?  Maybe, or maintenance work or something else.  I ran a few hundred metres further to an open viewing point and prepped the camera just in case.

Within a minute came a heavy rumble form the north, and the sound of a ringing bell, definitely the Canadian.  Passenger services through here always ring the warning bell.  The Northlander when it would pass through had a quite loud and distinctive bell that could be heard well before it arrived.  Sure enough, seconds later the Canadian pops into view, and on this morning had a decidedly sprite pace, unusual along this winding and aged section of Bala.  6435 lead, 6446 second, 19 Budds.  The location granted a slightly lowered view and from the bright sunlit side.  With the camera held well overhead to clear the ROW fencing, I grabbed my minute of video, another successful catch VIA's train #2 from Vancouver to Toronto.

After packing up the camera and heading back along the trail I rechecked the north signal...still red.  I'm not sure how long the interval is before it switches status, or maybe there was something up line still holding it closed.  Hard to tell.  Maybe I just got lucky.

Ottawa

A brief trip to Ottawa gave me a small bit of time to scout around the local trackage and see what was happening.  Our hotel was a couple of kliks aways from the main VIA Rail station near Vanier Parkway of Tremblant Road.  I had been down that area last year scoping out viewing locations.  A local trail near the transit road offers good sitelines and for westbound traffic out of the station.

I timed it on Sunday morning to catch train #643 on exit.  I had little time for neither running nor fanning so I had to keep my wait period down to a minimum.  I arrived about 5 minutes before departure and had enough time to pick an angle and focus points.  The trail pathway is however on the northerly side of the tracks which means you don't get a direct sunlit view on departure.  Trains will get full sun once they round the bend and turn southward so the morning sun catches them full side, as seen in the Youtube thumbprint.

For this morning, 643 was lead by F40PH unit #6455.  I believe the parked unit on the right is #6415 but hard to tell in the shot hear, the original 1080 vid reveals the numbers a bit better but I'm still not positive if it's 6415 or not.

The departure is quite slow.  The train doesn't start to throttle up until it rounds the bend so it's a fairly quiet pass.  Next time I'm in the area I'll venture down line a bit, there are some level crossings further south that should offer good views and units at higher power output. 

Bright mornings, fast trains and some poking around

I haven't had much time to be out taking images of trains lately.  There is a bridge under repair that connects my local area of Taylor Creek with Sunnybrook and it's throughly fenced in until the workers have completed their tasks.  If you're familiar with the area, it's the bailey bridge that crosses the CN Bala tracks near Don Mills Road.  The area has been undergoing renovations to replace the aging footbridge under Don Mills.  That work is completed and now they are doing the decking on the bailey bridge.  Before the bridge closure you could still navigate across Don Mills but a deckless bridge isn't very useful.  Most people are just going around the fencing and cross the tracks but I have this inate refusal to tresspass on the Metrolinx right of way so I'm staying away from the area until the work is done.

Bala below Doncaster sees not a lot of CN action these days.  VIA's Canadian #2 still uses it and Richmond Hill GO service on weekdays, but I haven't seen freight action there in months.  CP's Belleville and North Toronto subs are my freight train sources these days.  The bridge work at Don Mills makes this less accessible for the time being.  I can still get around through the area near Cottonwood Flats if I have time for longer runs.  The level CP crossing at Wicksteed needs only 25 minutes for me to get there with the bridge open, but over an hour with the bridge out.  Summerhill is more accessible right now and Summerhill has better viewing, albeit not at track level.  I did try a few longer shots of the Leaside yard area from Cottonwood Flats but there are just too many trees in the way.

The reliable Kingston sub is always nearby.  6:30AM and on that is one busy line.  Mutliple GO trains an hour, plenty of VIA trains coming in and going out.  Being wakey wakey with the ever earlier sun shining in through the window and the window opened a crack for air, the Lakeshore line gets mighty noisy.  This morning I headed down Woodbine Avenue to the crossing north of Gerard Street just in time to catch VIA combo 50/52 heading to Ottawa and Montreal with it's unique two train tandem.

Blink and you'll miss it:

They don't have the high-speed train warning signs posted everywhere on that line for nothing.

While scoping out some other locations on the streets nearby I'm glad I had the camera rolling here for this GO eastbound unit:

Not the best location, it was over a fence at the base of Westlake Avenue just south of the Danforth, but it was a unique catch.  This double-ender had two of GOs refurbished F59PH units, #564 up front and #563 tacked onto the rear.  These 59s have to double up to meet the performance demands of 10 car passenger service as they lack the oomph of the MP40PH 4000HP powerhouses on most of GOs trains.

Winter blahs - in spring

It's starting to brighten up out there.  However, I will have to have a talk with those gophers that predicted an early spring because it's been anything but for the last several weeks.

I managed to turn an ankle while running frozen trail a couple of weeks ago on some ruts and sidelined myself for a week.  I could have run as it doesn't really affect straightline running but I wanted to play it safe, and the less than desireable weather meant I didn't feel too bad about sitting around for a few days.

The trail system is peppered with signs informing users to stay off the trails in muddy conditions as this damages the slopes and really messes up the surface.  I've been running them all winter and conditions have been good but it looks like plenty of people ignored the signs when the temps crawled over freezing and the trail was heavily rutted from walkers and a small handful of cyclists.  After it froze over, which is when I ran it, it's like cobblestones turned on their edge and I managed to misjudge on a downhill, rolled my ankle and hobbled home.  The swelling a couple of days later let me know it needed some rest.

Nonetheless, back at it this weekend and inspected the trails on Sunday.  They seemed fine until I got to some messy muddy sections near Bayview Avenue and had to run off-trail.  While high in the section near Bayview I heard a consist trundling it's way southbound on Bala near the trial crossing at the 5 mile mark.  I had my camcorder with me and was a bit out of position for a clear shot which left me finding a reasonable opening through the trees.  Much to my surprise, being a Sunday, it was VIA train #2, the Canadian, running more than a day late after being held up by snowstorms in Saskachewan.

Related news article:

http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/via-train-moving-again-after-spring-storm-leads-to-major-delay-in-prairies-1.1207173

Quite the catch as there isn't much activity on south Bala outside of the Canadian and the weekday GO commutes.  I used to see a lot more freight action along this line.  For freight action these days I hang out around the level CP crossing at Wicksteed when time allows:

Happy Spring!

VIA Canadian doesn't quite fit - Google maps

Check this out, it's a location link in Google maps.  Zoom a notch and pan after you open it.

https://maps.google.ca/maps?hl=en&ll=43.644515,-79.380346&spn=0.002935,0.004823&t=h&z=17

This is Union Station in Toronto.  The train that juts out the east and west ends of the platform appears to be the VIA Canadian, the giveaway being the observation dome on the tapered end car on the east (right) side.  A pair of engines, the first car and part of the second car protrude the west side while the trailing 3 cars and part of the 4th protrude the east side.  Obviously too long for the platform, I guess to board and de-board, either shunt the cars to position in stages or everyone passes through to the platform adjacent cars.

I'd never noticed it before in the maps.  Neat.

Snowy morning at Danforth GO station

Having been sidelined with a cold for the last while, rail vids had to take a back seat.  Oh, I've done plenty of running.  I just can't be standing around in the cold waiting for something to show up.  The closest I've gotten is a couple of visits to the pedestrian bridge over the CP tracks at Summerhill to see if I could get a lucky strike.  The one time I was there and had a chance, I managed to double pump the rec button on the Sony and came up blank as a beauty of a mixed CP consist trundled by.

So with this biggest storm of the last 4 1/2 years upon us, I thought a quick jaunt over the Main Avenue timed for a couple of scheduled passes would be in order and chance to get some footage in nasty conditions.  It's not far away, less than 15 minutes.  I had my trail shoes outfitted with hex screws for traction and my full winter wear on.  Camera in a carry bag, in a plastic bag and all wrapped up nice and tight.

Made it with a minute to spare as the eastbound VIA tandem of 52 and 50 headed for Montreal/Ottawa came peeking through the blizzard like conditions at speed.  6442 was in lead for Montreal bound #52 up front but the unit leading #50 in tow lacked number lighting and I didn't catch what was on the side as it passed.

An Oshawa bound GO train would be next.  It would normally arrive just before the VIA but I'm guessing was a bit late on it's Union Station arrival and took a few more minutes to reach Main Ave.  In the meantime I taped a TTC streetcar climbing the hill on Main on it's way to the station.  No slipping here, the tracks were clear from plenty of traffic.  I think the vehicles with tires fared a bit worse in the city today.  This is tacked onto the end of the clip.  After that, the GO unit finally arrived.  Autofocus took a bit to kick in with the snow flying about, and again I couldn't catch the lead unit number in the poor lighting.

Sunshine promised for tomorrow.  Down into the valley for me, camera in hand, and see what I can come up with.

A warm midwinter weekend

Too nice to hang about this weekend.  It's not often we get temps in the teens in January. Getting them for a full weekend makes you wonder what you did to deserve it.  Shorts on, a couple of t shirts and out the door to catch some Kingston sub action.

Saturday was dropping by nearby Danforth GO station, enjoying the sunshine and catch what I could.  I headed out to try and catch VIA 60 as it passed through Danforth and got there just in time to miss it.  I did get a few seconds of it's rear end disappearing to the east.  Some bits of a couple of scheduled GO units had to suffice.

I did grab a couple more segments at a section on Eastwood Avenue thats pretty close to to rails but hard to get good position.  The southern track is so close to the ROW fencing that eastbound units seem like they're going to roll right over you.  The houses nearby must have their dishes glued down just in case.

I returned to Danforth a little after noon to see what else may come by.  I noticed the signals on the north and centre tracks switched from yellow to red while standing on the bridge.  The north track would be the scheduled westbound GO.  The centre track would be VIA, but I wasn't sure which one.  Later checking it was VIA 643 Kingston/Toronto.  The GO had already passed, the VIA came by 10 minutes later.

On Sunday I headed out to an area just off St. Clair Avenue E and Midland Avenue, a little N/E of Scarborough GO station and see if it offered a decent viewing location.  It rained all night but by morning had moved off to the east leaving just a hazy day behind so no problems taking the new Sony along.

I scoped some sections along a street adjacent to the tracks called National Street.  The hillside leaves the ROW fencing well below the viewing angle, although a bit steep and hard to get a good footing.  Also, lots of trees planted to offer some separation from the tracks for the nearby new housing development making some spots more obscured than others.  At the north end of the street the view of Kingston sub to the north east is nice and unubstructed although the property beyond the roadway is CN owned.  No need to step into the field though, the view simply standing at the end of the street is as good as it gets.

First came VIA train #60 out of the southwest.  The heavy haze carried the unmistakable roar of a locomotive from well down the tracks.  The haze also gave it neat effect of the lights piercing through as the train powered it's way through Scarborough GO station and along the long straightaway until it bends to Brimley.  Lead loco was P42DC VIA 919.  I shot it from the embankment in a slightly flattened area with decent footing an no tree or fencing in the way of the shot.

Next up, I headed to the north end of the street to catch an eastbound GO unit reversing it's way toward Union Station, nothing particularly interesting and I failed to have the Sony on as it appeared around the corner so we'll leave that vid in the archives.

For the last I waited for the eastbound GO which would be a few minutes after the w/bound unit.  Staying in position at the north end of National, I picked up the lead loco as it passes on the southern track and appearing through the trees of the embankment.  As it passed and I switched to the N/E view I noticed the lead loco was not alone, with an older EMD slotted in second place.  The second unit was 558, an F59PH.  A quick lookup in google and youtube shows a few other hits for this locomotive for the past couple of years.  Not sure if it has been in continuous service or temporarily retired but it was a surprising catch nonetheless!

Trails were too messy to run this weekend with the snow melt and the rain.  Kingston sub is never far away for a street run, always manages to deliver and even the occasional surprise can be had.

Morning Commuter Action at Danforth GO Station

I'm not a fan of running in the fog.  I suspect that inhaling all that particulate, especially here in the city, isn't a particularly healthy endeavour over the long term.  During heavy fog I stay in until it clears.  And, it's been foggy these days with warm daytime conditions, no wind and mornings at the freezing mark so I've had to skip morning runs.

Today was an exception, with fog limited to low laying areas like valleys, swamps and recessed rail corridors only.  And with the sky lightly illuminated to the south east it seemed a bit of fun to grab the Sony and jog down to the Danforth Subway station.

Lots of commuting action on weekday mornings here.  The trains start early and go straight through to nighttime.  Heavily run by GO and VIA, these trains move fast as well so keep your feet back of the yellow line when you're standing on the platform when a through unit passes because they do not slow down even a smidgen.

Here we start the morning with VIA tandem of 50 (Ottawa/Montreal) and 52 (Montreal direct) 10 minutes after it's 6:41 departure time from Union Station.  It will make a stop further down the line at Guildwood, but not here.  At the same time is an eastbound GO unit on it's way to Oshawa but lags a bit behind the VIA units.  I do wonder if these two trains drag it out on this section since they have identical departure times from Union Station.  Maybe I'll venture down to Union one morning just to see, good for a longer morning venture.

After departing Danforth the GO unit meets a sibling through unit making it's way to Union Station and no stop here, just a fast pass.  Watch the lights as they meet.

Unusual Sightings on a Saturday Bala Subdivision

Glad I took along the video today.  I dropped off the car for service and hopped down into Crother's Woods, seeing it was a picture perfect sunny day for running some trail and maybe catch a unit going along Bala.

I was checking out an open area a bit north of Pottery Road, it's about 11 or so.  After grabbing a couple of shots of a bridge, I was in between open sections and could hear a horn blast further north, followed shortly by activating signals at a foot trail crossing.  I had to sprint back to an open area and luckily caught VIA Canadian #2 passing through.  Odd setup with 4 power units up front lead by 6442, 6410, 6456 and 6441 in that order.  Then the shorter winter consist of 10 cars.

After poking around the trails for a while, I wound my way back near the line and found the north signal showing red, and the south signal green.  Nothing had gone north so either something was heading southward or track maintenance was happening further up the line.

I got a call that my car was ready for pickup and headed back up the trails to the dealership.  Just before passing the waste treatment facility below the Redway Loblaws, a diesel sounds on the line.  This is about 12:30.  I'm a fair bit away but open the camera expecting a CN freight unit.

Surprise!  It's another VIA!  A more modern unit with light cars making it's way southbound.  Not what I was expecting at all.  I know of no other VIA units using Bala on a regular basis outside of the Canadian.  I was too far away to see any numbers.

So two interesting catches.  A 4 power unit short consist Canadian and a light modern Via unit.

Update:  Apparently there is some problems with a building near Union Station in danger of collapsing onto the tracks.  The Canadian was delayed and some other trains rerouted, notably VIA 84 out of Sarnia.  This is most likely #84 as the timing fits.

http://www.680news.com/news/local/article/422855--dozens-of-via-customers-affected-as-trains-re-routed-over-fears-of-unsafe-building-near-the-track

Another VIA Canadian vid

I was heading over to Bayview Avenue to check out the area around the CP overpass after reading a bit of this web page on rudy.ca about Old Pottery Road.  I wanted to see if the area had any good viewing locations for the CP Belleville sub section that crosses this location.  After crossing along Pottery Road and heading up Bayview Avenue, I heard the crossing signals at Pottery go off.  I turned to catch the VIA Canadian train #2, but too far up the hill to make it back down in time to get a closer view.  It's still an interesting viewpoint, higher up the hill, and you can watch it wind it's away beside lower Bayview on it's way to Union Station.

As for Old Pottery Road, the area is under construction by Hydro One as they have been working on the new towers just south of the CP Rails, and views shown in Rudy's page above are not accessible at this point.  I suspect that once completed, any good viewing access that existed to the CP line will no longer be there.