Canadian Railroads > The X-MILW passenger cars on the Super Continental

About 1963 or so, the CN purchased six Super Domes and six Skytop lounge cars for the Super Continental. Was six of each car enough for the trains and did they run from Toronto to Vancouver? Did VIA Rail use them and what were their disposition?

Ed Burns

If you check this link you'll get some information: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skytop_Lounge. They never made it to VIA. I don't know if I'll get this done, but maybe it's a project for the next few days. I was fairly new to the railfan hobby, and on October 16, 1976, shot CN #301 on the west end of Ottawa, with at least three of the Skytop lounge cars in the mixed consist, in CN paint. I think 301 was Montreal to Calder Yard (Edmonton) in those days. Don't get excited about the prospect of the shot; it was a Tri-X grab shot as I arrived trackside on a cloudy morning, lots of poles and stuff. This suggests they were out of service by this time and headed for disposition by CN. More knowledgeable types will weigh in.
Fred

Only the Superdomes.. CN 'Sceneramics' were used on the Super Continental. The Skytops....CN 'Skyviews' went to the Maritimes on the Ocean, Scotian and Chaleur. I believe a Skyview eventually was used in the west on the Prince Rupert train and on a Rapido in the Corridor.

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And yes..the Sceneramics did make it into the VIA era on the Super Continental but not the Skyviews.

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The Skyviews spent a few years out of service sitting in the Halifax Coach Yard. The last I saw them was in Aug '76 and that makes sense with Fred's comment above seeing them passing thru Ottawa in Oct. '76.

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Also x Milw were sleepers and some went to VIA  as I was booked on one in the days when the Canadian was still on the CP.  Seem to recall it was in the blue/yellow VIA paint style.

Caught the Coffee Creek (CN 1902) in Winnipeg in June of 1979

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There's been some discussion about the Milwukee Skytop cars on TO and also some other hobby websites, this one has some dispo info:

http://www.trainweb.org/hiawatha/skytops.html

Apparently the fatal flaw was not having an emergency escape exit from the rear of the car. Great looking cars, there are some being preserved. I have a photo of one touring Northern California...somewhere in my files.

Interesting to note that both the dome car and some of the tail cars were put to work on UPrr passenger routes in UP yellow before going to CN. Very iconic car, wish I had been able to see them or ride them.

+ Important to note that there is a Lounge car and also a Sleeper/Lounge, same rear window design but used on different trains and different dispositions. Quite a bit of this info is fading into history, the TrainWeb info is very useful.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/17/21 08:58 by TCnR.

If you have access to it, Volume 18, No. 3 of CN Lines had an article by Barry Biglow entitled "The Test Trip: Working the bugs out of CN's refurbished Sceneramic dome cars in 1974." Briefly, purchased in 1964-65 along with the Skytops, and refurbished about a decade later. It's six pages, 14 illustrations.
Fred

There were also a number of ex-Milwaukee sleepers, along with other former US cars. I think CN acquired them in the early 1960's in anticipation of the boom in passenger traffic during during the 1967 Worlds Fair in Montreal. Most unusual was a twin unit diner, ex NYC I think. Not sure if CN ever used it, but it was lettered CN. Some of the ex-Milwaukee sleepers made it to Via.

feclark Wrote:
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> If you have access to it, Volume 18, No. 3 of CN
> Lines had an article by Barry Biglow entitled "The
> Test Trip: Working the bugs out of CN's
> refurbished Sceneramic dome cars in 1974."
> Briefly, purchased in 1964-65 along with the
> Skytops, and refurbished about a decade later.
> It's six pages, 14 illustrations.

A nine-page article appears in the Canadian Rail Passenger Review, Number 3, published in 2000 by Trackside Canada. Titled "CN: the Reluctant Dome Owner", it covers the Sceneramics and says those were among the first cars to be painted in VIA's blue and yellow livery. It includes a photo of one in that guise.

From the same publisher, the Canadian Rail Passenger Yearbook, 1995 edition, has a six-page article on the Skytop cars and their use in Canada, titled "North America's Most Unique Observation Cars."

feclark Wrote:
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> If you check this link you'll get some
> information:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skytop_Lounge. They
> never made it to VIA. I don't know if I'll get
> this done, but maybe it's a project for the next
> few days. I was fairly new to the railfan hobby,
> and on October 16, 1976, shot CN #301 on the west
> end of Ottawa, with at least three of the Skytop
> lounge cars in the mixed consist, in CN paint. I
> think 301 was Montreal to Calder Yard (Edmonton)
> in those days. Don't get excited about the
> prospect of the shot; it was a Tri-X grab shot as
> I arrived trackside on a cloudy morning, lots of
> poles and stuff. This suggests they were out of
> service by this time and headed for disposition by
> CN. More knowledgeable types will weigh in.
> Fred

Here's the shot; it was a good excuse for me to dig out the negs and scan some other stuff for future posting. What I can add is that the time was 0710, and I can only explain the photo location as being caused by 301 activating the crossing circuit as my bus pulled up to the north side of the crossing, and me bailing to get any shots. It's 1/60 at f1.8, wide open on the old Spotmatic. Being new to the hobby, I was not familiar with these at all, so my photo log book simply notes them as "Weird rear dome cars"; of course they're not even domes. I didn't note at the time how many of them there were; there were obviously at least 3, but I don't know if it was all six of them. I guess that'd be a project sometime, going in and revising/correcting stuff in the log books. Ya learn.
Fred



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/17/21 20:05 by feclark.

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In 1964 the Milwaukee Road sold to the CN:
       Six 8-bedroom Creek-series Skytop Lounge cars
       Six Super Domes
In 1968 the Milwaukee sold five 10-6 Lake-series sleepers to the CN
 

I recall driving from Omaha to Winnipeg in the mid-1970s with a friend, to inspect the CN ex Milwaukee Road 8 Double Bedroom Skytops put up for auction by CN.

The ex Skytop cars were parked together and all had stripped of hardware like door latches, light fixtures, mirrors.  The air brake equipment and piping had also been removed from under the car as well as AC units, etc as I recall.  John Arbuckle was the successful bidder for the "Coffee Creek", as many members are aware, and went through many challenges moving it from Canada to North Kansas City.

Thank you for all of the excellent and interesting photos in this post.

Hu

Thanks MILW 16 for your clarity including the sleepers which on one of them I was sure I had ridden from Lake Louise east!

FWIW here are three pix I have of the parlour car version, the first two from back in the day, the last one more recently in operation with the MILW 261.  I remember seeing one of the sleeper obs versions in Moncton in April 1967 on the Ocean or the Scotian, don't remember which.  There was mention of one or more of the skytops being preserved.  I know about the Cedar Rapids, wondering if any of the sleeper versions is preserved.

JBWX



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/18/21 22:07 by jbwest.

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The interior of the Skytop Parlour in jb west's photo above were similar to the Sleeper Lounges when they arrived on CN but after they were refurbished this is how they looked:

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Yes, COFFEE CREEK skytop sleeper is still with us at Alamosa, Colorado, as of October 2020.

jbwest Wrote:
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> wondering if any of the sleeper versions is
> preserved.
 

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Thanks for all the pictures!  It looks like the rear windows are of a different design on the sleeper-lounges and parlor-lounges, with more glass on the sleeper-lounges.  Were the sleeper-lounges built by Pullman and the parlor-lounges home built by the Milwaukee?

Jim



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/19/21 05:08 by Jimbo.

Here is a partia view I photographed of CN "Trinity", former Milwuakee Road 8 Double Bedroom Skytop " Gold Creek" at Winnipeg, during auction in May of 1978.

Hubert

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