Canadian Railroads > Back when fuel trains were booming out east

A couple of years ago quite a large number of crude oil trains were running through and to Montreal (on CN and CP) as well as ethanol trains through Montreal (CP only). Today only a fraction of these same trains still run (only ethanol train CP 650 runs at this point). The increase in traffic was nice, but even nicer was the motiver power variety. Here is an example, with a CN and then a CP fuel train passing through Dorval in under 20 minutes, on a grey afternoon in April 2014.

1&2-First up was CN 710 (oil loads for Valero near Quebec City) blazing through with an ex-Oakway SD60 and 2 BNSF units, including the Microsoft Train Simulator unit (CN 5482, BNSF 4723 and BNSF 9905). As the first shot shows, a CP train is stopped on the parallel CP Vaudreuil Sub.

3-After being held about 90 minutes due to trackwork, CP 642 (ethanol loads for Albany) is able to head east with a nice lashup comprised of CP 5920, DME 6201 ("City Of Pierre") and BNSF 5709 (a somewhat rare by BNSF standards AC400CW).

Michael Berry

---

---

---

Is the Irving refinery in St. John getting its crude via ship now?

CPR_4000 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Is the Irving refinery in St. John getting its
> crude via ship now?

It  always has received oil by ship, even when crude trains were booming.

​When I drove through Saint John Tuesday on the way home to Halifax, there were two tankers off shore, presumably unloading.  (Partly because of the very high tides in Saint John, tankers don't dock, they unload at a buoy a mile or more offshore.)

​There is still crude arriving by rail however, just not enough of it to justify unit trains.  Two weeks earlier on my trip west, there were plenty of cars on 406 (the daily Moncton-Saint John turn) placarded "1267" (crude oil).

​GTD

I believe there hasn't been a CP oil train on the London Division since at least July.

Bill Miller
Galt, ON

Nice to see these photos. After a recent 2 week railfan trip around Ontario, I never saw a single oil train of any descriptioin. Chris uk.