Railroad landscape Archives - Page 10 of 11 - The Trackside Photographer

Posted on June 23, 2016January 8, 2017 by admin

Babysitting and Railroads

My daughter did not plan very well. She lives in Yuma, Arizona, in the southwest corner of the state, one of the hottest places in North America. She already had two rambunctious boys, ages three and five, and her third was going to arrive in June of 2014. Her husband would be off with his National Guard unit on the baby’s due date, so my wife and I flew down to help out.

Our days mainly followed the same pattern: get up, take the boys outside early in the morning to work off some energy before temperatures hit triple digits, back home to amuse them in the air-conditioned house, out for a little more running around after sunset, and then bed. There wasn’t much time for photography, but there was a little.

I was surprised to learn that Yuma, despite being in this harsh, hot desert (at least in June), is the center of a major agricultural district. During the winter, 80% of vegetables sold in the United States come from the Yuma area, and my daughter’s home is surrounded by citrus farms. Union Pacific has a very busy line running through Yuma, but there are a lot of other tracks around.

The reason Yuma can support all of this farming is the Colorado River, which is one of the few places one can take hot children to cool off. And one spot, a very nice little beach, also features shade cast by two bridges, one highway and one railroad.

View from the river - Yuma, Arizona — View from the Colorado River – Yuma, Arizona

I occasionally had a bit of time to poke around and see what I could find. Near one little collection of spur tracks I found a bit of discarded history.

Cut-Rail,-Yuma,-AZ-web — Cut rail – Yuma, Arizona

One of the main north/south roads through Yuma near my daughter’s house once had a railroad track running right next to it. Sand keeps trying to cover it, but wind won’t let it.

Tracks, ties, sand - Yuma, Arizona — Tracks, ties, sand – Yuma, Arizona

The two boys were scheduled to attend Vacation Bible School. My daughter wasn’t sure how she would get them there, since by then the baby had arrived. Sensing an opportunity, I volunteered to take them, since I could roam with my camera for two hours, and then go back to the church and pick them up. One evening, I visited the top of the bridge we had played underneath a few days earlier.

Eastbound off bridge - Yuma, Arizona — Eastbound off bridge – Yuma, Arizona

Another evening, I went scouting, and found a signal bridge with interesting possibilities. The next night, I took a good book and a jug of water, went back to the bridge, and waited. An eastbound train came at just the right time.

Eastbound under signals - Yuma, Arizona — Eastbound under signals – Yuma, Arizona

Rob Richardson – Photographs and text Copyright 2016
See more of Rob’s work at Where Trains Were

Posted on June 2, 2016January 8, 2017 by admin

Wheat-Filled Wonders

It was 30 years ago. Disembarking from VIA Rail Canada’s Super Continental in Saskatoon, I began a Saskatchewan scavenger hunt photographing Canadian classics – wooden-crib grain elevators. Driving off in my rented Chevy Cavalier, map in hand across the seemingly endless prairie, my plan was to visit 50 towns over three days, overnighting in Davidson and Rosetown. My subjects were very visible on the horizon every eight to twelve miles!

Most other railfans might have chosen a more elusive quarry – Canadian National and Canadian Pacific grain pickup freights still serving a sinewy spiderweb of subdivisions. But I could already see, both literally and figuratively, the massive new concrete high-throughput elevators on the horizon. In the 10 years preceding my visit, the number of Saskatchewan’s grain elevators had already been cut in half. Time was of the essence.

Among my favourite scenes from this trip were three solitary elevators: Denny, Ridpath and Leach Siding. Lettered with elevator company names or logos and not augmented by annexes or silos, these prairie sentinels stood alone in summer’s heat and winter’s icy bite, guarding their golden harvest safely inside. Characteristically, each elevator had its own unloading shed, office and elevating equipment. Each awaited the arrival of 60-ton boxcars or 100-ton covered hoppers in ones or twos, fives or tens. Each posed politely as the sun arched in the boundless sky through morning, high noon til suppertime.

Now, thirty years on, I’m sharing the results with you. These three wooden-walled, wheat-filled wonders no longer stand – all systematically toppled in the name of sheer unromanticized progress.

See more of Eric’s work at Trackside Treasure.

Posted on May 26, 2016January 8, 2017 by admin

West Virginia Signs

I love looking at maps. I can spend hours reading them just like a good book. The town names suggest so much more than just identifying a location. There is a history and a romance behind those names as well as your mind’s image of what that spot must look like. Makes me want to follow that blue line or that thin black line and see for myself.

Railroad location signs give me the same feeling. They are not very common in the eastern United States, I suppose because they are an expense and have been replaced by electronics. But when I see a location sign along the tracks, for me it is just like reading the title to a book. There is a lot more behind it and some of the stories are fascinating. It gives me the same feeling of anticipation as rounding a bend and seeing a green signal.

Scanlon.Bloomington — Bloomington, West Virginia – March, 1993

The B&O did it right with signs. I remember looking in a B&O shop window years ago and seeing a wooden mold for one of these concrete signs. This one is at Bloomington, West Virginia, where the Mountain Subdivision starts up Seventeen Mile Grade. Almost directly under this sign is an underpass where the Western Maryland Railway heads toward Elkins, West Virginia

Scanlon.Laurel Bank — Laurel Bank, West Virginia – August, 1987

Down near the far end of that Western Maryland line is the outpost of Laurel Bank. The railroad had a small yard there as well as a rest house for crews. No motels here, but there is a cozy two story wooden boarding house with your locomotives also sleeping right outside the door. Here, a Laurel Bank Switcher puts together his train for a run up to Spruce, highest point on a mainline railroad east of the Mississippi at 4060 feet.

Scanlon.Peach Creek — Peach Creek, West Virginia – October, 1990

Peach Creek Yard on the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad is just outside of Logan, West Virginia. It was the assembly point for mine runs on a multitude of branch lines fanning out of the area. I liked to stay at a very sketchy motel near the yard and get up early. The first shifter leaving the yard was the one I’d follow that day, down the Island Creek Sub to Stirrat or up the Buffalo Sub or down along the Guyandotte River to a connection with the Virginian at Gilbert.

Scanlon.Matewan — Matewan, West Virginia – May, 2004

The Norfolk and Western Pocahontas Division mainline is rich with history and has some of the best town names I’ve ever heard. Matewan was not only ground zero of the Hatfield-McCoy legend but also the site of the Matewan Massacre which was the opening battle of the West Virginia mine wars in the 1920s. The downtown area is still pretty much as it has been for 100 years. Incidentally, Devil Anse Hatfield, the patriarch of the clan, was actually an astute businessman. He speculated in lumber and real estate and sold some of his land to the N&W.

Scanlon. War Eagle — War Eagle, West Virginia – May, 2004

I have to admit, I know nothing about War Eagle except that it is a spot on the Poky mainline. You have to love the name though. Right along this same stretch on the Tug Fork River you can also visit Old Joe, Aught-One, Vulcan, Mohawk, Panther and Wyoming City. The drive is a memorable one, although not for the timid.

Wooden Station Sign in Qunnimont, WV wye. 5/17/75 — Qunnimont, West Virginia – May, 1975

The Chesapeake & Ohio had some elegant looking location signs. Painted white with angled metal supports on a wooden post. The signs were trimmed with black painted wood frames. They had dignity, as did the other structures supporting the railroad from the board and batten depots (and outhouses) to the graceful cantilever signal bridges. Quinnimont yard supported several branch lines including the Laurel Creek Branch and the Piney Creek Branch up over the mountain and down into the Winding Gulf region.

Scanlon.Thurmond — Thurmond. West Virginia – September, 1984

This sign was well deteriorated when I came across it, painted onto a wall on the main street of Thurmond. Directly across the tracks was the Chesapeake & Ohio engine-house and coal dock. Just up the tracks is the iconic Thurmond depot, now a National Park Service visitor center. Ironically, this sign was stripped off when the movie Matewan was filmed in Thurmond. It was repainted by the movie company when they pulled out. Apparently the actual town of Matewan didn’t look enough like Matewan for them.

See more of Kevin’s work at Kevin Scanlon Photography.

Posted on May 24, 2016January 8, 2017 by admin

The Victor Zolinsky Collection

BM-TR-XW-2--BELLOWS-FALLS-TO-WORCESTOR-FREIGHT-PASSING-WESTMORELAND-NH

The Trackside Photographer is pleased to present more than 150 photographs selected from the personal collection of Victor Zolinsky., a lifetime railroader whose photographs tell the story of mid-20th century railroading from an insider’s perspective.

From the end of the steam era and early generation diesels to the time of mergers and fallen flags, don’t miss these photographs.

Click here for The Vic Zolinsky Collection.

The collection may also be found on the main menu at the top of the page under "Galleries."

Posted on May 5, 2016January 8, 2017 by admin

Bad weather

February found me along the tracks on the Norfolk-Southern B-Line between Manassas, Virginia and Front Royal, Virginia. I was scouting for good spots to photograph the Norfolk &Western 4-8-4 J-class locomotive #611 which will be steaming along this line from Manassas to Front Royal and back on June 4th and 5th, 2016. The B-Line runs through Virginia’s hunt country, and there are many interesting railroad landscapes in the small towns and farmland that line the tracks.

The B-Line dates from before the Civil War, when it was established to link the Orange and Alexandria Railroad to the Shenandoah Valley. Known then as the Manassas Gap Railroad, it became part of the Southern RR system in the 1890s.

In 1988, the B-line acquired mainline status when Norfolk Southern moved its interchange for north-south traffic from Alexandria, Virginia to Hagerstown, Maryland and re-routed traffic from the former Southern mainline across the B-Line to Front Royal.

My exploration of the B-Line was hampered by rain and soon a violent thunderstorm (in February!) would end my photography for the day.

Photographers, like sea captains or steam train excursion planners, have no control over the weather, and I hope that there will be good weather in June for the N&W 611 excursion. But as I stood along the tracks in the February drizzle, I began to imagine 611 appearing out of the winter mist, its headlight shining through the fog with smoke and steam billowing in the damp air. It would be quite a sight.

Sometimes bad weather can be perfect.

For more about N&W’s 611, visit FireUp611.org

Posted on April 7, 2016January 8, 2017 by admin

Bugilbone Siding

Bugilbone-Siding

In the north-west of the Australian state of New South Wales, several branch lines were built in the 19th and early 20th centuries to open up sparsely populated regions. Built to serve rural communities they survived mostly on outward shipments of grain plus whatever else the local population consigned to the rails. The line to Walgett was opened by 1908, and its value ebbed and flowed with each successive crop. Some years were good, and some were not, but as with many such lines the world over, less and less freight went by rail and ultimately the line closed. The line to Walgett is still open though, although in this case, the only trains to run this far out on the branch are unpredictable grain trains.

I found myself in that country for the first time over Easter in 2013 and, with information a grain train was loading at Walgett wheat terminal, took the two hour drive from Narrabri to go and investigate. As it happens, there was no train on the line that morning, but I did find this remnant of the station at the oddly named Bugilbone Siding. Opened in 1905 and closed 70 years later, even in its heyday it was no more than a loop*, a simple shelter and this loading bank. By the time I drove past, the loop had been lifted so the loading bank was not only disused, but literally removed from the line it once served. From memory, there was almost nothing else to be seen at Bugilbone Siding, and why someone felt the need to paint its name on the edge of the loading bank is a mystery, but it did stand out on the otherwise flat and empty plains.

*Australian rail terminology is based on the English, with US-style terminology becoming more common in say the last 30 years or so. So we refer to a loco driver rather than engineer, sleepers rather than ties and so on. We would normally refer to a siding as a stub track (i.e. access from one end only) while a loop would have access from either end.. At Bugilbone, since it had access from either end, we call it a loop.

Alan Shaw – Photograph and text copyright 2016
See more of Alan’s work on his Flickr page