Canadian Railroads > Fifty or More Years ago - CP 6542

(Redo/Repost) CP 6542 (MLW S-3) is in Toronto in May 1971. An unknown photographer took this image on Agfachrome.
Bob

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John Street roundhouse.  Worked on CPR 1201 for the NMST, they put us up at the Royal York.  It was a 5 minute walk to work!

Gerry Gaugl
Ottawa ON

Great shot and Bob and I hope some local guys will validate my fading memory.  I think we were hanging out on the Spadina St bridge late 70's early 80's.  I was a just and teenager was there with my father and uncle.   One of those S-3's came by with few cars and shoved up what I remember as a ramp to the street level to an area that is now is between Blue Jay Way going east to John St.  There was a 3 or 4 track yard there serving local customers and we were amazed at how fast the veteran crew switched.  The brakeman was running to throw switches and the engineer had no problem doing his thing in a quick way.  Looked like they were going for an early quit.  I'm just wondering if anyone remembers that small yard about 30 feet up to the north of all the tracks coming west out of Union Station?

Yes I also remember it.I believe it was called Simcoe Street yard, there were CN & CP tracks in the yard if I remember correctly  I never saw it being switched just cars parked there.  I lived in Ottawa all my life so going to Toronto there were hundreds of other things to see so I never took a photo of the yard.

Gerry Gaugl
Ottawa ON

stevelv Wrote:
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> Great shot and Bob and I hope some local guys will
> validate my fading memory.  I think we were
> hanging out on the Spadina St bridge late 70's
> early 80's.  I was a just and teenager was there
> with my father and uncle.   One of those S-3's
> came by with few cars and shoved up what I
> remember as a ramp to the street level to an area
> that is now is between Blue Jay Way going east to
> John St.  There was a 3 or 4 track yard there
> serving local customers and we were amazed at how
> fast the veteran crew switched.  The brakeman was
> running to throw switches and the engineer had no
> problem doing his thing in a quick way.  Looked
> like they were going for an early quit.  I'm just
> wondering if anyone remembers that small yard
> about 30 feet up to the north of all the tracks
> coming west out of Union Station?

I thought I knew this yard, but then you mentioned pushing up a ramp to street level. What I remember is a yard that was below the level of the main tracks west of Union Station. It was west of the yellow footbridge to the CN Tower (I was there in 1978), and east of Spadina Ave. It sat north of the main, down a grassy bank from Front St [?]. There was a concrete platform for loading/unloading, with a shelter over it. I shot from it, and also got a CN GP9 switching in the afternoon. If this is what you mean, I'll try to dig out a couple of slides and scan them in the next handful of days.
Fred

Fred, the yard was on the north side of Front Street.  The unloading platforms had canopies over them.

Gerry Gaugl
Ottawa ON

moonliter Wrote:
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> Fred, the yard was on the north side of Front
> Street.  The unloading platforms had canopies
> over them.
>
> Gerry Gaugl
> Ottawa ON

Got it.
Fred

It was called Peter St Shed, located at Peter and Wellington St.

It was an LTL shed that transhipped freight from trucks to boxcars.

I switched that shed many times out of Parkdale Yard in the early 1980's.

The lead to access it was east of Strachan Ave and ran up the north side of the CN tracks and across Front St.

It had very tight clearance for switching, not to mention the motorists on Front St that didn't always want to stop for us.

I also would have worked on the 6542 numerous times as the yard power at Parkdale yard was predominately the 6500's and 7000's.

Steve
CP Belleville Sub Hogger (Ret)
Smiths Falls, Ont.





 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/26/26 07:57 by Railroad39.

Here's a post from 16 years ago that talked about the trackage north of Front St.  Toronto location help  Sounds like Peter Street became Blue Jays Way below King St. at some point in time.

I had mentioned seeing rails in the parking lot 16 years ago.  The parking lot is still there in this Google Earth image,  https://www.google.com/maps/@43.6440135,-79.3918763,293m/data=!3m1!1e3?authuser=0&entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDMyMy4xIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D  but it seems to have been paved over.

GTD