Canadian Railroads > Looking Back at the Alberta Railnet

Here's some of my shots of the plucky Alberta Railnet. ARN purchased the line from Swan Landing AB to Grande Prairie, along with some trackage north of GP from the CN in the late 1990's. Using an all GE Dash 7 fleet of C30-7, B23/30-7 (plus a couple SF30C's they tried to make a living in the north country. Later, the dash 7 fleet was supplemented by some ex Conrail/NS C39-8's as well as a change of ownership and re naming to the Savage Alberta Railnet. Finally, they threw in the towel and CN took back the track and operations. At the time I started rail fanning the ARN, GE locomotives were unfamiliar, since I had not yet begun to travel southward into the USA. These worn out dash 7's really put on a show, at least when they weren't dead in consist! I still remember the words of an ARN engineer when I asked if he enjoyed working for the shortine "The power's junk, the track sucks, but its still better than working for CN!"
1. Southbound into the Swan landing AB yard (and interchange with CN) A mix of 6 GE's will have their work cut out for them on the return trip north. May 30 2003
2. Same train cropped since I neglected to pack my "pole filter" in the camera bag
3. C30-7 #1013 leads a northbound at Mile 39 September 14 2005

-Trevor

---

---

---

4. C30-7 #1013 and a leased Southern Railway of BC SD38-2 head south of Grande Prairie with a local to switch the pulp mill outside of town. June 2 2005
5. Same train, different location
6. 1012 and 3 sisters prepare to depart Grande Prairie and head north. The trackage north of GP was 4 axle locomotive territory September 12 2005

---

---

---

7. 1006 in the shop at Grande Prairie September 13 2005
8. "New" power! C39-8 7488 in the shop at GP .September 13 2005
9. SF30C 9556 in the CN yard at Jasper AB awaiting forwarding to a new owner after the ARN purchased the C39-8's. November 11 2005



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/19/12 10:04 by tsokolan.

---

---

---

More C39-8's at the Grande Prairie shop, September 13 2005

---

---

---

And the last Alberta Railnet/ Savage Alberta Railnet train I shot, a southbound shown here pulling into the Swan Landing yard, September 28 2006.

-Trevor

---

---

Fantastic. I never heard of this railroad but I did see some of the units in Calgary once when I was home for a visit. I didn't know much about them but IIRC the ex-ATSF units were sitting on that compound in Alyth where the old intermodal container yard was.

I think they were in transit up there.

Rick

Trevor,

Did you ever see the WC SD45's, RMR GP40-2L's, or CN SD40-2W's on lease to these guys? A buddy of mine, who later went to CN, shot those various units, as well as the SRY SD38's up there. This was just as the C39's were being phased in.

Locotrol2

I did catch the CN SD40-2W's on lease to the Savage, apparently the C39's weren't working out too well for the railway. I didn't know about the leased WC SD45's, but I could see it happening as there were a bunch of them running on CN at the time. Here's a couple shots of 2 of the SD's on lease, I was a little upset not to have a GE leading, and the weather sucked, but sometimes you just have to take the shot anyway, looking back I'm glad I did. The 2nd shot shows the train leaving Swan Landing, the 2 SD's and 2 GE's were in the company notch trying to lift the train upgrade.
-Trevor

---

---