Eastern Railroad Discussion > Maine road tour request information

Have an opportunity to visit Maine. Enjoy regionals and shortlines, old depot's. Any highways follow rail lines closely where chances of seeing trains might be good? Bugs bad in August? Thank you in advance. Aaron 24

I grew up on the MA/NH state line, and I'd have to day that the area is notoriously lousy for roads paralleling tracks for any appreciable distance.

Bugs are bad in Maine in the summer. Bring lots of Off! spray.

Finding trains underway is tough, there aren't a lot of active lines in Maine any more.

Plenty of good food, especially lobster and cod, though.

Your best bet at seeing train action in Maine is around Waterville. The south (west) end of the yard is easily visible from public property, and you can watch the Pan Am yard switchers and hopefully catch a road train or two. Wouldn't hurt to swing by Rigby Yard in S. Portland if you are headed through there. Further north, you'll find as much of a "hot spot" as possible in northern Maine at Brownville Junction. Be there first light and you have a chance of seeing the MMA road train from Montreal come in, plus the Eastern Maine (New Brunswick Southern) train getting ready to head for Saint John, NB. This spot tends to be busiest from sunup to about 9am, then you may wonder if anything ever moves there. MMA local to Northern Maine Jct. can run pretty much any time. From what I've seen, they are down to about a dozen T&ES employees, and all jobs are one man operations. Most moves are made in daylight hours with the exception of the Job 1/2 trains from Brownville Jct to Montreal and back. I suspect those are still a two-man crew.

Good luck! Maine can be very rewarding, and good thing you like shortlines and regionals, because there is not a Class 1 in the state! You may possibly see some CSX run through power in Portland, but that's about it. You do, however, have to cover a lot of miles to find much action, as others allude...

Mike Derrick
http://www.shortlinesusa.com

RRmemories Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Have an opportunity to visit Maine. Enjoy
> regionals and shortlines, old depot's. Any
> highways follow rail lines closely where chances
> of seeing trains might be good? Bugs bad in
> August? Thank you in advance. Aaron 24

There's lots to do in Maine besides railfanning. You'll find lots of track, but little activity, as others have noted above.

Whenever I've passed the paper mill on the north side of Bucksport there have been a couple of Guilford locomotives parked there. The tracks are right beside the road, so you can get close while still on public property. The line from there up to Bangor crosses ME 15 several times, but it doesn't really "parallel the road" in a way that would allow pacing a train, if you could find one.

As others have said, there's lots of good food. Lobsters, steamed clams, other seafood. The seacoast area from the state line up to about Belfast is very touristy, and crowded in the summertime, as is Mount Desert Island (Acadia National Park, Bar Harbor). Go down east or inland, though, and you're in the Real Maine, the part without the sailboats.

I was born and raised in the Bangor area. I've put together a tour guide for my friends and acquaintances who would like to go back and visit. It's light on rail stuff (most of them are not railfans) but has lots of sights to see and food to eat. Drop me a PM with your e-mail address and I'll send you a copy.

Edit: As noted above, the bugs can be merciless. Blackfly season will be over in August (except that around the Penobscot River there seems to be a second season late in the summer) but there will be lots of mosquitos, and no-see-ums that can come through window screens. Good insect repellent is a must. My dad was a forester, and would wear Old Time Woodsman's Fly Dope, that had pine tar and oil of citronella in it, and would not only keep away the insects, other people would keep their distance too. Some people, including me, have allergic skin reactions to it, though.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/10/11 07:03 by ddkid.