Canadian Railroads > not quite out of service

Although CN stopped running through trains between Williams Lake and Squamish a few months ago, there have been periodic trips to move cars in and out of storage. All the cars have now been cleared, so unless and until the Rocky Mountaineer resumes operations in 2021, the weed sprayer that ran through here last week might really be the last train--at least for a while. Here are some photos from the last six weeks:
1. CN 5460 in Whistler, pulling a string of cars from the siding at Mons at about 10pm.
2. Train 546 southbound with another string of cars near Brunswick. This part of the line is still in use.
3. Light engines head north at Garibaldi to retrieve stored well cars from Lillooet.

Loleta Fernbridge

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4. Light engines northbound at Rutherford Creek.
5. Passing Nairn Falls.
6. Flattening some weeds at Birken.

- L.F.

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7. Train 571 runs northbound near Garibaldi to retrieve more empty well cars from Lillooet.
8, 9. Two days later the train returns south with a long string of empties and two loads of poles from Mt. Currie (the last customer between Squamish and Exeter). No empties were spotted at Mt. Currie, so these may be the last cars from that customer. The first photo is near Cheakamus, the second south of Squamish.

- L.F.

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10, 11. Two more photos of the same train, south of Squamish.
12. Train 546 on the Mamquam River bridge in Squamish on July 26 with the last of the stored cars, pulled from the siding at Cheakamus.

- L.F.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/03/20 11:18 by loleta.

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13, 14. On July 27 CN ran a weed sprayer, running as train 905, to Lillooet and beyond. Here it is at Brackendale and Garibaldi. I suspect this line will now be quiet for a while . . .

- L.F.

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Thanks for the pics...

Seems odd to run a weed sprayer train if the line is going into mothball, especially considering how weed over grown many CN main lines are.

The optimist inside me thinks that maybe they are going to resume service.  Unfortunately, that guy is usually wrong, so I mostly listen to the pessimist inside...

loleta Wrote:
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> 7. Train 571 runs northbound near Garibaldi to
> retrieve more empty well cars from Lillooet.
> 8, 9. Two days later the train returns south with
> a long string of empties and two loads of poles
> from Mt. Currie (the last customer between
> Squamish and Exeter). No empties were spotted at
> Mt. Currie, so these may be the last cars from
> that customer.

What was the date of the lift of pole loads from Mt. Currie?

Thanks for all the pics!  It is great that someone is there to document what could be the final days of service on one of Canada's most scenic rail lines (if not the most scenic).  Hopefully there will be some sort of reprieve.

Magellan

The empty well cars make photo 11 a really imaginative effort; that's some eye to see the possibility and execute it.
Fred

railsmith Wrote:
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> What was the date of the lift of pole loads from
> Mt. Currie?


July 1, I believe.

- L.F.

Since this is a "suspension" and not an abandonment I guess they still have to inspect the track, right?

Could you remove some rail at each end of the "suspension" to be free of regulations to inspect and maintain track, signal system, and crossing protection? 

nm2320 Wrote:
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> Could you remove some rail at each end of the
> "suspension" to be free of regulations to inspect
> and maintain track, signal system, and crossing
> protection? 

No.