Yard Shots, NBEC 587 And VIA Ocean 15

I was going to go into Calgary on Saturday and photograph the switch derail and industries along the Mayland Heights spur that runs across the street from my place of work, but as I was checking my gear and getting ready, I noticed that one of my batteries was at 0% and the other was at 4%. It takes about two and a half hours to charge each battery. So I'm postponing my expedition until next Saturday. As a substitute, I bring you another installment from my holidays in New Brunswick this past summer. I hope you enjoy.

August 20th, 2008

It was Wednesday afternoon at around 15:30 and overcast. I wasn't really trying to catch a train that day, I was just wandering around taking pictures of the Bathurst Yard area which is on the Newcastle Subdivision. So I started off at the Golf Street crossing and the first couple I took were of the line heading towards Nepisiguit Junction.

The left track is the main line and the two right tracks are mostly used as storage sidings. Eventhough the middle track does continue on up to the other end of the yard, there is a switch on the station side of Golf Street to bypass this portion of the track back onto the main line. The crossing shown in the first photo is at Squire Green Drive. From what I have observed, the portion of the middle track west of Golf Street is mostly used for storage and temporary staging. The portion east of Golf Street is used to make up trains departing Bathurst heading east, as well as dropping off trains or blocks of cars that may be destined to go to Brunswick Mines, Belledune, Beresford or Chaleur Sawmills.

My next two shots are directed into the main yard area. From my observations, the switch in the foreground is used mostly as the entrance point into the main yard sidings and also divides the middle track in two. The switch is located just east of Golf Street. The siding in the first photo going off to the left, use to be the shop track back in the CN days. I have no idea if that shop building is still there today. The track also leads to a couple other sidings that seem to be used for storage as well. There use to be a scale on the siding between the switch and NBEC 1851, but that is no longer there apparently. In the second photo you can see two other sidings that are also used for storage.

The next photos are taken near the VIA station and show the main area of the yard. You can see in the background of the first photo, some cars on the back sidings. You can clearly see in the third photo that the main yard is four sidings deep plus the main line. The AOK hoppers are bound for Brunswick mines full of cement to back fill the stopes with a mixture of taillings. The covered gondolas are also bound for the mines and will be filled with extracted ore and sent to the smelter for final processing.

From this point on I'd like to mention that the remainder of my photos are out of chronological order when shot and may appear that I've jumped back and forth from one spot to another.

My next three shots are just east of the VIA station. The first photo shows the retaining wall where I was standing for my next few pictures. The second photo is looking west towards Golf Street. There is a NBEC office in the VIA station and it is beyond the wall where the big white Bathurst sign is. The third photo is a close up of the second. This is just speculation, but it seems that at some point in the past that there may have been a siding beside the retaining wall which was possibly used to off load some local freight.

For these next three shots I'm still on the top area of the retaining wall. In the first photo it shows the main yard extending up to the bridge over College Street where it narrows down to two tracks. You can also see a couple of sidings which only the one on the right is still in use and is used to store locomotives. The second photo shows a close up of the two of three remaining sidings. The third photo shows the now dismantled third siding. I remember this siding being used in the CN days to fill gondolas with scrap metal which was loaded from the platform you see in the foreground.

For this next series, I had walked further down towards the College Street bridge to photograph the switches leading to these sidings. The first photo shows where the bridge is and the switch on top of it. In the second photo, you can see that the frog has been removed and replaced with solid rail, but the points leading to the nearest siding have been left behind. In the third photo you can now see the remnants of the third siding. The frog and points are still in place but the rail has been removed. The last two photos are of the sidings and the yard heading back toward the station.

These next two photos are from one of my previous New Brunswick postings. and the third photo was taken 11 days after this outing. The photos were taken from the St. Anne Street bridge towards the College Street bridge. I'm using them here since they show the west end of Bathurst Yard. This part of the yard has three sidings. The one to the far right is used for storage/staging and the middle track is used for staging for outbound trains heading west. If you look closely in the second shot, you can see a switch at the far end. Shortly after that is the College Street bridge. The third shot is another angle of the sidings before the bridge. Without the view interrupted by freight cars, you can see the beginning of the third siding in the western part of the yard. You can also see part of the St. Anne Street bridge in the background.

That afternoon at around 16:45, NBEC 587 returned from it's trip to the Irvco Spur. with a load of cars. Locomotives 1868 and 1813, both RS18's in case you did not know, were the power for this train. The car you see immediately behind 1813, is one of the ore hopper destined to head to brunswick mines for a load.

After that I went home for supper, but I did end up going to Nipisiguit Junction to catch the the VIA Ocean 15. Unfortunately the light was diming due to the overcast sky and my pictures ended up blurry.

Well that's it for this one. Hopefully you enjoyed this one. I think I have one or two more posts of my New Brunswick holidays, so stay tuned.

Cheers,

From Beresford to Blue Mountain Pit

This will be my last post in New Brunswick as tomorrow morning I will be leaving for Calgary. I think I still have two more to post after this about NB and then it will be back to posting about trains in the Prairies and Rockies. Actually I should be able to do a couple of outings to chase CPR 2816 Empress. For now back to todays adventures.

The day started by waking up early around 8:00 in the morning. I had not planned for another full day of railfaning for today, but it ended up being just that. The other full was on the first of this month with a post to come. I did however miss 3 trains, NBEC 402, NBEC 587 and VIA 15. At around 8:45 I went to the station to find out if VIA Ocean 14 would arrive on time and quickly found out that it would arrive at 9:20. After snapping a few shots in town, I jumped in the truck and booted it to Nepisiguit Junction. This not so much a good place to catch the 14 anymore, as there seem to always be some bulk wood cars on the siding. The consist was VIA 6400 in the lead with new paint scheme, 6406 Spiderman, 16 cars and Evangeline Park tailgating.

At about 12:30, I heard what sound like a very large diesel engine. I jumped in the truck to go see what was at the station. It was the Bathurst yard switcher 597, NBEC unit 1849. I was sitting in front of the station with the engine off. I took a couple of pictures and headed home to eat. I also noticed that it started to make up a train for the incoming 403 later this afternoon.

At around 13:30 I headed back to the station hoping to catch 587 coming in, but instead it was 597. I later found out that it had dropped 3 bulk wood cars in Beresford on a siding by the propane dealer. At this point my sister was chasing with me, and this is where I got my new scanner setup as well, a uniden BC246T. Not a bad little piece of equipment. It was a little more fun now, as I could finally know what everyone was up to. We quickly found out that 597 was shunting and getting things ready for 586.

So we hung around for a bit more since we heard on the scanner that 403 was coming in, and it showed up around 15:20 to pick it's load. I was surprised to see that it was only the power, CFMG 6908 and NBEC 1868. So it went by to hook up to the front of the train that 597 had put out earlier. We headed for the St. Anne bridge to take a few shots.

Some shots from the bridge of 403 coupling to the train bound for Campbelton.

My sister heard on the scanner that they would be leaving in about 10 to 15 minutes, so I figured we would head out that way at a not so "speedingly" pace. When we got there there were 3 bulk wood cars on the siding there waiting to be off loaded. All CFMG cars with numbers 690107, 690154, 690174. Shortly after a wood truck showed up and started to off load the cars.

About 15 minutes later, 403 came rumbling by. The consist was 42 cars, 12 of those were wood chip cars. There were also a total of 7 center beam flats, 13 gondolas, 6 cement hoppers, 1 tank and 3 box cars. After it went by we went home for supper.

At around 18:50, we heard the diesel engines but not the scanner as the volume was way down. I figured that this was 586. We headed out again and went to meet it at Nepisiguit Junction. There were still 5 bulk wood cars of which I didn't get the numbers. The power was CFQC 3000 and NBEC 1821. The consist was 31 ore hopper, 3 covered gondolas, and 6 cement hoppers.

I jumped in the truck to meet it at the first crossing on my way to Blue Mountain Pit.

Then we went to Blue Mountain Pit. The light was getting dim and I was hoping that I would not have any motion blur. Alas, this would not be the case. You can see the blurring on the handrail at the front of 3000. This was unfortunate, but all in all it was a good day of railfaning.

See you back in Calgary!

Cheers,