Canadian Railroads > Yellow Fields - Canola and Change on the Wainwright Sub

The title is a reference, for you jazz aficionados (any of you out there?), to an album and song by the same name by Eberhard Weber; I'm familiar with the song from a brilliant album by Gary Burton called "Passengers", with Eberhard Weber on upright electric bass and his unique sound, and Pat Metheny on guitar. Check it out. But I digress. In the late spring I saw some work on the Edson Sub, where I learned that they are making double track between Carvel and Spruce Grove. My source in Stony Plain told me that they were also doubling track on the Wainwright Sub, between Lindbrook and Tofield. This amounts to four miles, given the distance between neighbouring switches. So I went out on Monday, July 16, to document some traffic on this portion of single track before it got doubled, and it turns out I was sort of late. I was going to do this post today anyway, but then I see tomstp's earlier post today, at https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?15,4597589, with reference to CN's plan to get things more fluid, longer sidings and more double track, so this ties in nicely. There will be 18 shots in all, I think. Sorry for that. It was a good day, mostly hot and sunny, 17 trains plus a Sperry truck from 0800 to 2000, and of those 17 trains, 10 had GM leaders, and the GE leaders included a UP unit, plus an ex-CNW small-nose.
1. First up was #211 at 0808, behind UP 5759 and CN 3031, with a long, long cut of 2-bay covered hoppers, spliced by CEFX 1018, with empty bulkhead lumber flats on the tail. An early morning cloud bank had yet to clear, so I got nice, even light as it rolled up to the grade crossing near west switch Lindbrook, at Highway 630.
2. I did some driving in and out the range roads between Lindbrook and Tofield, then just past Tofield, where track orientation is favourable for morning light on WB. This is #347, a unit train of empty bulkhead lumber flats, behind 5428 and 2664, at 0949. The detector said 20 degrees, 536 axles (131 cars), and 31 mph.
3. Again at the east end of Tofield, at the grade crossing with Highway 834, MP 224.74, #312 roared through at 1022, behind 8961 and 5781, with a mixed consist. I know, no sign of yellow fields or the changes, yet. I'm getting to it.

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4. Back to Lindbrook, at Range Road 194 by the east switch, guarded by the background signals. Here the work is well along; in fact, the contractor told me that his understanding was that by day's end, the sub-bed would be complete, and next day, ballast and track-laying were due to begin. Given their proximity to the main, they had to stop work when trains were passing. In this case, 2266 and 2573 are in charge of #119 at 1139, a stack train with many singles, headed for a meet with #108, in the distance. This will soon [?] be a thing of the past, or perhaps more accurately, the location will be shifted to east switch Tofield (difficult photo access, as you'll see), or will be running meets.
5. This was going to set up nicely, but depended on a bit of luck in terms of where the bulldozer was at the moment of truth. Q108 pulled out at 1148, behind 8942 and 2424, with a mix of gons and tanks tacked on the back end. This gives you a good look at the sub-bed or whatever you'd call it, and the drainage ditch. In addition, and this is the big thing, the south embankment has been cut back and re-profiled, and really opens things up for photos. This will last until trees and weeds get established, so we should have a couple of good years, like we did at Ardrossan when they first created the long siding there.
6. At last, yellow fields, as the canola matures. I'd never really seen this photo op before, but driving out the south end of Range Road 194, back and forth to Tofield, showed me that the rail head was clear just west of east switch Lindbrook. I usually run around on the road close to the tracks. A big grain train, #867, is hauled by 8801 and 2604, along with DPU 8923. Talking to the RTC, they claimed they weighed 25,000 tons, hoping to keep moving and not get stabbed for a meet. The detector said 26 degrees, 706 axles (172 cars), and only 19 mph.

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7. From Range Road 194, this is 2531 leading #811, helped by DPU 8832, in charge of 424 axles (103 cars) at 28 degrees; time 1451. This gives a nice view of the work so far, and anyone familiar with this location will appreciate that the weeds and trees on the south (field) side are now gone, and will stay that way for a while. A bit of canola frames the right side of the shot.
8. Time to catch one's breath, change lenses, and get set for the next arrival, at 1502. One thing I'll say is that it's nice to have trains needing clearance to proceed through a foreman's block; lots of informative chatter. A trio, 8813, 2190, and 2167, head #115, with 512 axles of stack train, now up to 29 degrees. Honorary Alcos; I saw more smoke this day than I've seen in a long time, maybe due to the high air temperatures, or maybe just bad maintenance.
9. I moved over to the crossing with Range Road 193, at MP 229, to work this area. It's still single track, but doesn't look like it used to, so I missed that chance. For comic relief, and yellow against yellow, we have SRS truck 767, pinging its way WB at 1547. The truck with trailer was one of dozens that came through, having dumped their load somewhere between Tofield and Lindbrook.

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10. What I hoped for finally appeared, a WB freight. The scanner talk told me I had 2132, so I was stoked at the thought of getting a former CNW GE, skinny nose, on the point. When it arrived, on Q101 at 1613, I was a bit deflated to see its long, bare, black flank. It's not on one list I've seen of the units that wore the special "CN 15 Years" decal, so I'm wondering what that's about. Anyway, I was able to work in lots of canola, and a milepost, so that was good. 5405 is the trailer, and you can see the long stretch of new road bed. What you might not appreciate is how much they have knocked off from the south side of the tracks, which used to be a tight knoll heavy with trees and weeds, which killed photo angles. Once the project is complete, this should be good for a while.
11. At Lindbrook, Q101 met Q116, which came through my location at 1641. It ended up crawling, and eventually stopping, because there were issues with the signals at Tofield. So the RTC issued an order to allow them to proceed, but I got the rare opportunity to pull out of my location, get to Highway 14, and on to the east side of Tofield as Q101 came crawling through, at 1658. Again, a lovely canola field, and lovely motive power, CN 2881 and CREX 1515. The train is coming through the east switch Tofield, and you can see the signals, dwarf on near side, tall on the far side, of the second well car. It was moving slowly enough that I was able to hop in the car and shoot it a bit further down the line, near the next photo's location.
12. With foreman permissions being sought and granted, I knew I had another EB soon enough, so hung out on the side of Highway 14, between Highway 834 and Range Road 185, to shoot Q118 at 1723, behind 8869 and 2645. Temperature was now 31 degrees, axles were 468, and speed was 50 mph. You'll see something that pleased me a great deal. CN has actually done some weed control; from Uncas to Tofield and beyond, there was a swath of dead vegetation (surely steam and not chemical? I know, water is a chemical compound too), so the rail head was exposed like I've never seen it in summer. Some hardier plants are already recovering. This stretch forms an S-curve, with a very long straight portion in the middle; in the distance is the curve across Highway 834.

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13. Well, here was why I came out to shoot, and was too late. This is, or was, west switch Tofield, MP 226.5 on the signal. You'll see the switch is gone, and the dwarf signal turned 90 degrees. The area was swarming with people earlier in the day when I came out to check it out; this is now 1740.
14. And here's west switch Tofield, in a heap on the north side of the ROW. Funny how the trend is for switches to disappear as sidings are removed; here they're being removed as sidings are connected for double-tracking. As to what CN will gain in terms of train movement, I'm not sure it's much. The issue, it seems to me, isn't so much moving trains across the road, as having them get backed up getting in to terminals. We saw this at Jasper in June, and it's still an issue on the Wainwright. For example, the Q101 that went by at 1613 was still not in Walker by 1930, and they had two backed up on the double track Uncas to Ardrossan. What the four miles of double track between Lindbrook and Tofield will likely accomplish is give them capacity to hold two more WB pending yarding space, but still be stuck. I don't think Tofield has been a particularly useful siding for a long time, at 6,540'; I've never seen a meet there, or heard a train calling clear to stop, take siding, for example.
15. Back to Lindbrook, and what I really wanted, which was some late day WB traffic through the east switch, while it still existed. The real bonus was that things were aligned for WB to take siding; no, wait, the real bonus was that the oncoming WB did not kill any of its lights as it came through the turnouts! To my delight, 2188 and 5702 brought #889 into the siding at 1809, with grey covered hoppers, many of them FURX and TILX, I think. Not a coloured car in the lot; it looked very strange. You'll notice a lot of replaced ties, and they also replaced all the rail on the siding at Lindbrook as well, in preparation for the grand opening.

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16. The arrival of #889 allowed me to get back to Range Road 193, where I shot Q114 at 1817. Then back to Lindbrook, where signals eventually told me I had another WB, this time on the main. So I went down the parallel gravel road to Range Road 195, where new boxes and signals are being installed at MP 231.19. More grain, this time #863 at 1908, behind 8921 (the less famous one in Canada's rail history), and GECX 7354.
17. Strong clear sun continued, and the signals and alignment told me I was going to get another WB taking siding! So at 1941, 2694 and IC 1005 went through the turnouts of east switch Lindbrook, maybe the last time I'll ever shoot this. Again, a real break, as they kept the lights on; so often, even if the other train is nowhere near, they'll kill the lights in preparation for the meet, and the shot loses something.
18. The WB was told it'd be there for three, so I got to Highway 630 to set up for the first of those, with 5640 and an unrecorded GE on the head end of Q189 at 2000. The crews acknowledge each other during the PK. I decided not to stick around for the next pair of EB; no idea how long, and sun angles would only get worse.
If you wait long enough, things will change. Our Montrealer, mberry, has been documenting the changing look of things in Montreal as highway interchanges are changed. This is what change looks like in "flatlander" country; not quite so dramatic.
Fred

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Great shooting Fred! I shot that 211, which is a loaded frac sand train for Grande Prairie, just east of Spruce Grove. By that time the crew had set out the tail end bulkheads in Walker Yard.

-Trevor



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/22/18 19:55 by tsokolan.

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