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Profile Page for Bill Linley

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About Bill Linley

I am a lifelong railfan having been introduced to trains by my father, Leslie, in the early 1950s during trips to Front Street overlooking the approach to Toronto Union Station. I took my first colour slide of the CPR's Ottawa West station in April 1962 and have been shooting since. After retirement, I have authored four books for Morning sun, my latest Trackside Newfoundland will be released in April 2019. Please contact me if you are interested in my books and prints. bill.linley@gmail.com

Bill Linley's Railpictures.ca photo upload statistics

Number of images: 57
Total gold: 1025
Number of comments recieved : 124
Number of comments posted : 30
Total views: 122514

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Bill Linley's 57 photos on Railpictures.ca:

CN Dash8-40CM 2432 (GE 11-1992 #47129)was the third of 25 units in a follow-up order to 30 units received in early 1990. These units were the first GE's added to the CN roster since the last of the 44 Ton units in 1956. GE lobbied hard to secure an order from CN but was not successful until after the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement was finalized in September 1988. Some of the units rode on the Dofasco 3 axle trucks that had been original equipment on the 2000 series MLW built C-630Ms dating from 1967. These MLW's were notorious for their hard ride and this trait carried over to the GE's. The GE's largely bumped the MLW's into retirement from their predominance on freights to Atlantic Canada. The trailing units are EF-640a 2424 and SD50F 5458. The 5458, a 3600hp unit equipped with the last version of GM's 16-cylinder 645F engine was built in London, Ontario in 1987 and was retired by 2008. The 2400s are now being sidelined as newer units join the CN's roster. <br> <br> Since January 2000, Basque has marked the starting point for directional running by the railways for 160 miles west to Mission/Matsqui with westbound trains on the CN line and eastbounds on the CP.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Canadian National
Date:	09/1997
Location:	Basque
Province:	British Columbia

1 Comments | 19 Favourites

On a frigid Wednesday morning in March 1992, a business trip to Saskatoon gave me an opportunity to sample the photographic opportunities at the VIA station. I was able to take transit to a stop near the station on the outer reaches of the city from the warmth of my downtown hotel, formerly CN's Bessborough, on the banks of the Saskatchewan River. At the time, VIA Train 1 was scheduled to arrive at 3.05 a.m. for a twenty minute stop. VIA FP40-2H 6455 (GMDL 1989) leads the Vancouver bound train. The cold was mind-numbing but fortunately, the air was quite still so I was able to get my time exposures and retreat to the hotel without lasting damage.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	VIA Rail
Date:	03/1992
Location:	Saskatoon
Province:	Saskatchewan

4 Comments | 21 Favourites

F Unit Friday: VIA FP9 6304 waits in the background while workers loaded piggyback flats at Thompson, Manitoba, in October 1991. Train 93, the tri-weekly Hudson Bay from Winnipeg, some 700 miles to the southeast, would lift three flats during its 90-minute supper-time layover in Thompson. The Ford tractor is loading the first of three Gardewine trailers that VIA will deliver to Churchill some 347 miles and 13 hours away. The railway is the only year-round access to the Hudson Bay port of Churchill. VIA 6304 began life as CN 6509 (GPA-17a, GMDL 1956 #A639). Via had the unit rebuilt at CN's Pointe St-Charles shops in Montreal in 1984 with a 16-645 prime mover, classed as a GPA-418a. It was the last of five similar units that had their steam generators removed for service on the Churchill line. In 1967 it was renumbered 1967 and was the trailing unit to CPR FP9A 1411 on Canada's Centennial Train. As VIA retired its steam-heated cars, it received a 275kW head-end power unit in 1997 and was subsequently withdrawn in 2002 and sold to IFE Leasing of Saugus, California. Edmonton, Alberta, is presently the storage site for VIA 6304.The year 1910 marked the first planning for a railway to Churchill, and initial construction was begun in 1912 by the Canadian Northern. Bankruptcy intervened, and the CNR finally completed by the line in 1929. CN sold the route to Colorado-based OmniTRAX in 1997. Operation of their Hudson Bay Railway line continued until major washouts in 2017. Some two years later, operations resumed under new ownership: Fairfax Financial Holdings & AGT Limited Partnership and Missinippi Rail Limited Partnership, representing First Nations members and residents. Gardewine is a multi-purpose transportation company headquartered in Winnipeg and is now a subsidiary of the Mullen Group Ltd. of Okotoks, Alberta.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	VIA Rail
Date:	10/1991
Location:	Thompson
Province:	Manitoba

3 Comments | 25 Favourites

CPR 5000, Canada's first, of two, was built in London, Ontario, in March 1963. It was delivered as 8200 and renumbered in April 1965. The 8200 was GM's first sale of a turbo-charged, second-generation unit in Canada. Trade-in for the two units was provided by F9B 1902 and F7B 1910. A runoff of Train 8, the Dominion, near St-Eugene, Ontario, on Sunday, January 7, 1962, had wrecked the B units. The lead unit in the wreck, RS-10 8474, provided trade-in credit for the first-ever C-424, CP 8300.

The view shows the 5000 leading RS-3 8451 (MLW 11-1954) on Train 903. It is about to cross the Station Road at Elmsley, Mileage 5.7 on the Belleville Sub just west of a crew change at Smiths Falls, Ontario. The date is Tuesday, July 11, 1967.

After many years in mainline service, it was based in Coquitlam, British Columbia and spent many years in local service, for example, on the freight to the BN connection at Sumas, Washington.

Having served for more than thirty-five years, the GP30 was retired in June 1998. Today, the Alberta Railway Museum in Edmonton preserves this historic unit.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Canadian Pacific
Date:	07/11/1967
Location:	Elmsley
Province:	Ontario

1 Comments | 33 Favourites

With GO Transit's 1967 debut of service to Oakville, they also replaced CN's two traditional commuter trains on the 39.3-mile route between Toronto and Hamilton, Ontario. 1957-built FPA-4, 6766 pauses with the second last run of Train 989 at Burlington, Mileage 32.2 of the Oakville Sub, at 6.25 p.m. on Friday, May 19, 1967.

Barely six months later, on Wednesday, November 15, the MPA-18a was wrecked at Drummondville, Quebec and would become the first FPA-4 to be retired. The 6766 caught fire after it's Train 21, a one-stop Rapido en route from Quebec City to Montreal, met Train 424 head-on. Trailing FPB-2 6854 survived while RS-18s 3854 and 3882 were also retired on December 31, 1967. Fortunately, there were no fatalities.

In the foreground, the double-tracked Halton Sub veered off to the north to CN's Toronto [now MacMillan] Yard.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Canadian National
Date:	05/19/1967
Location:	Burlington
Province:	Ontario

5 Comments | 18 Favourites

CN Train 60, The Rapido, on a 5-hour, two-stop schedule from Toronto to Montreal speeds past a detouring D&H freight in Belleville, Ontario, on Monday, June 26, 1972. FPA-4 6771 was one 27 built by MLW for the CNR in the spring of 1959. Retired by VIA in 1989, it was sold stateside in 1990 and, ironically, was painted in D&H colours in 1993 while operating out of Cumberland, Maryland. In 2003 it entered service on the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic RR in Independence, Ohio, near Cleveland. D&H 705 and 706 are changing CN crews and will soon depart for Toronto and Buffalo. They were part of a parade of detours running over CN and CP following the devastating impact of Hurricane Agnes on the Erie Lackawanna mainline. The two GE U30Cs were part of an order for a dozen units delivered in 1967-68 that were sold to the National of Mexico a decade later.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Canadian National
Date:	06/22/1972
Location:	Belleville
Province:	Ontario

5 Comments | 21 Favourites

The 3628 is westbound with an 18 car midday extra trailed by van 79022. The MLW RS-18 was built as a group of 54, 3617 - 3670, in the second half of 1957 as class MR-18b following the successful demonstration of the 3615 and 3616 that began in December 1956. Built-in August 1957 with MLW serial 82139, the unit was geared for 75 mph and equipped with dynamic brakes. It was assigned to Gordon Yard's diesel shop in Moncton, NB in August 1979 and likely remained there through its retirement on Wednesday, November 21, 1990. It was sold for scrap to Sidbec Feruni.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Canadian National
Date:	06/01/1965
Location:	Dorval
Province:	Quebec

8 Comments | 23 Favourites

Today, January 14, 2020, marks the 30th anniversary of the Conservative federal government's drastic cuts to passenger service across Canada. On that day every regional service in Atlantic Canada was summarily shut down. Beginning on Monday, January 15, only a single train ran from Halifax to Montreal. Here on January 13, we see the last run of Yarmouth - Halifax Train 152 about to depart Kentville at 10.40 a.m. RDC's 6119 and 6143 were in charge. Notice the new VIA station that had opened in May 1988 and the old DAR station in the background. A truly shameful day for public transportation in Canada! Not a single scheduled service has been introduced east of Quebec City in the intervening thirty years save for a short, tourist-oriented venture with the Province of Nova Scotia. This was the Halifax-Sydney Bras d'Or.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	VIA Rail
Date:	01/13/1990
Location:	Kentville
Province:	Nova Scotia

3 Comments | 14 Favourites

A few days ago, I posted an image of CN 2020 with an RS-18 lurking in the background. Here's that unit, the 3888 switching in Ottawa, Ontario on the morning of Tuesday, July 5, 1966. It was working the switcher from CN's Walkley Yard to the CP interchange at Ottawa West while serving other CN customers in the Chaudiere Flats area. Later, at the Moncton Shops, the unit was equipped with A1A trucks from a retired MLW RSC-13 and its V12 re-rated to 1,400 horsepower because of the lighter-duty traction motors. It was renumbered 1783 and assigned to Halifax for a time. That's CP's Prince of Wales bridge from Ottawa West to Hull West barely visible above the unit.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Canadian National
Date:	07/05/1966
Location:	Ottawa
Province:	Ontario

Comments | 14 Favourites

As the year 2020 opens, I thought it would be interesting to see if I had an image of a Canadian National locomotive with the same number. Sure enough, I found this shot of the C-630M at Spadina engine house that I took in June 1968. That summer I was working with the Ontario Government as a summer student based in Toronto. I boarded with my grandparents, Robert and Ruby Yates at 113 Benson Avenue. I recall that it was a great summer as I travelled for work in a new '68 Rambler during the week and with friends on weekends. We visited Detroit, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Vermont and many locations in between that summer. In September my friend Doug Campbell and I drove to Victoria in his '68 Volvo 142 photographing all along the way. From Calgary west, we were in the capable hands of Bob Loat. In October, Terry Thompson drove Ted Wickson and me to St. John's in his new 'VW. It was the first year that I would photograph trains in all ten provinces.

Thanks to Pierre Fournier for the fun idea.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Canadian National
Date:	06/15/1968
Location:	Toronto
Province:	Ontario

6 Comments | 14 Favourites

Train 120 is approaching the John Bell Road just to the north of Brookfield, Mileage 56.0 The power includes SD70M-2 8022 (GMDD 2007), 5706 2996 and DPU 8928. At Brookfield, the stive active 2.8-mile Canada Cement Spur diverges to the west.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Canadian National
Date:	10/20/2019
Location:	Brookfield
Province:	Nova Scotia

4 Comments | 10 Favourites

Last Look. July 2, 1969, marked the last eastbound departure of the fabled Caribou, aka the "Newfie Bullet." A living legend became one of dreams and memories the next day as Train 102 arrived in St. John's. My last encounter with the Caribou was here, emerging from an overpass on the Trans-Canada Highway just west of Deer Lake on a dreary afternoon, Wednesday, October 9, 1968. Fellow railfans Terry Thompson and Ted Wickson and I travelled from Ontario in Terry's new VW bug to sample the delicacies of railroading on Canada's East Coast. We paid particular attention during our week to PEI and Newfoundland as their passenger trains were under intense threat of termination. Sporting the markers that afternoon was Inspection Car 3 which had been built for the Read Newfoundland Railway in 1903. It, too, would end its days on the Island. It was burned at the informal reclamation yard in Whitbourne in 1975.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Canadian National
Date:	10/09/1968
Location:	Deer Lake
Province:	Newfoundland and …

1 Comments | 18 Favourites

An A Train of semi-trailers bearing two 20' Terra Transport containers is seen in Johnstown, Ontario in April 1984. The containers were new within the last five years with the advent of Terra Transport in September 1979. Many of these containers lasted well beyond the end of the former Newfoundland Railway in September 1988. A Ford tractor is in command at the Johnstown grain elevators. For decades these elevators were the site of grain transshipments between 'Lakers' and 'Canallers.' Prior to the opening of the Seaway in 1959, the small size of the locks between Cardinal, Ontario and Montreal precluded the use of 'Lakers' due to their larger size. Winter storage continues to be a long-time feature of the elevators. As well, boats were often wintered here when the lakes and Seaway were closed to shipping. In the background, the M/V Cartiercliffe Hall is in winter layup. The M/V Cartiercliffe Hall was built in Hamburg, Germany, in 1960 for service as an ocean ore carrier. In 1976 it was converted for use as a dry bulk carrier for Great Lakes service. In June 1979 downbound to Port Cartier from Lake Superior, it was involved in a fire in the crew quarters that killed seven of 23 crewmembers. More details of the tragedy may be found here: http://continuouswave.com/misc/cartiercliffehall.html. Sold and renamed AlgoOntario, the boat was sold for scrap in 2009.

The covered hoppers are on National Harbours Board tracks which were served by CN off the Kingston Sub and CP Rail off their Prescott Sub prior to its abandonment in 1997. It was an interchange point between the railways and the switches were interlocked to prevent collisions.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Terra Transport
Date:	04/1984
Location:	Johnstown
Province:	Ontario

1 Comments | 14 Favourites

CN 800 is passing Goose Cove south of Trinity, Newfoundland on its return from Bonavista on the 80-mile trip to Clarenville with mixed Train 206. It is about 3 p.m. on a June day in 1973, and engineer Bill Mornell widens on the throttle to begin the ascent of Heartbreak Hill to the famous Trinity Loop. Trailing unit 801 leads three boxcars and combine 6016. At this time, Trains 205 and 206 ran tri-weekly on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. G8a 800 had a long history on the former Newfoundland Railway. It was built by GMDL in London in June 1956, retired in December 1986 and scrapped at Whitbourne in 1988. For more images from this and other chases on the Bonavista branch and throughout Newfoundland, please contact me at bill.linley@gmail.com to obtain a copy of my just-released book “Trackside Newfoundland.”

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Canadian National
Date:	06/1973
Location:	Goose Cove, Trinit…
Province:	Newfoundland and …

1 Comments | 19 Favourites

GR12-x 946 (GMDL 1-1960 #A1842,) the newest locomotive on CN's Newfoundland roster, bears down on Dannys Road as it approaches the scheduled stop in St. Georges, Mileage 459.7. It's near the scheduled 1.23 p.m. on October 8, 1968, the Sunday of the Canadian Thanksgiving Weekend. With friends Ted Wickson and Terry Thompson, I had driven overnight from Ontario in Terry's new Volkswagen to catch the ferry to Port Aux Basques and begin several days of chasing the Caribou and other trains. Our successful chase was delayed without apparent reason that afternoon. Thirty years later, I learned during a slide show in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, with the train's engineer, Kevin Bourne, in attendance that they had paused to conduct a runpast for a visiting vice-president of General Motors Canada. Only in Newfoundland! Also on board that day was a large railfan tour group organized by the Scotian Railroad Society of Halifax. Train 102, the Caribou, would pass this way until Wednesday, July 2, 1969. Locomotive 946 was trailed this day by the 931, heater car 2951 and 13 cars, including the business car Avalon. Terra Transport sold the 946 sold to the Ferrocarril de Nicaragua as their 907 "Diriangen" in June 1989, becoming the "Cocafer" in 1991 and moving to the Ferrocarril de Antofagasta a Bolivia in Chile as their 1426 in May 1994. <br> <br> Barely visible in the background is the overhead tramway of the Atlantic Gypsum Company, which from 1952 to 1990, transported gypsum from the mine near Flat Bay to the trans-loading point on St. George's Bay. For more views of this train and others throughout Newfoundland during the years 1967 through 1988, please contact me at bill.linley@gmail.com about my Morning Sun book: Trackside Newfoundland. As St. George's is home to many pleasant train watching memories and the grandparents of renowned author Ken Pieroway (Rails Across and Around the Rock,) this one's for you, Ken.

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Newfoundland Railw…
Date:	10/06/1968
Location:	St. Georges
Province:	Newfoundland and …

3 Comments | 22 Favourites

Canadian National 1200 hp NF210s 924 and 928 pull by the station in Lewisporte, Newfoundland on Friday, August 27, 1982. The units had left Bishops Falls that morning as Extra 928 with a train of empty pulpwood cards and a handful of boxcars for Lewisporte. At Notre Dame Jct., Mileage 244.5, they set off the pulpwood empties which they would deliver to the loading grounds at Glenwood some nine miles to the east on the Clarenville Subdivision. In the meantime, the units traversed the 9.4-mile Lewisporte Subdivision. Upon arrival they wyed their train and proceeded to switch the docks where CN Marine's PETITE FORTE, the KLOSTER and the MARINE TRADER were loading for various outports. The Lewisporte Sub boomed from the late 1930s through the 1960s as the inbound port for materials and aviation fuel that was shipped to the nearby Gander airport. Previously Lewisporte had served as a staging area for the construction of the paper mill in Windsor from 1906 through 1909. Light, 50 lb rail required the used of 2-8-0s until the CNR relaid the line with 70 lb rail after 1949. As traffic dwindled in the late 1970s the line was downgraded to a spur with intermittent traffic until it was abandoned in 1987. Formerly the line hosted weekday Trains 909 and 910 from Bishops Falls. Unit 924 became the last unit to run in Newfoundland with engineer Brendan Dicks at the throttle when it was placed on display in Bishops Falls on Wednesday, November 21, 1990. NF 928 went to Nicaragua and later Chile for further operation. NF110 902 is displayed in Lewisporte. For further views of Lewisporte and throughout "The Rock" please contact me at bill.linley@gmail.com about my forthcoming MOrning Sun book: "Trackside Newfoundland,"

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Canadian National
Date:	08/27/1982
Location:	Lewisporte
Province:	Newfoundland and …

6 Comments | 28 Favourites

CN Mixed Train 205 pulls to a halt at Lethbridge, Mileage 18 of the Bonavista Branch in central Newfoundland. At this time in June 1973 the train was scheduled to leave Clarenville at 8 a.m. on Monday, Wednesday and Friday for the four hour and twenty-minute, 80-mile run to Bonavista. It was scheduled to return later the same day at Train 206. My wife, Judy and I chased this train as part of our Honeymoon Trip to Newfoundland and Labrador. Kindly engineer Bill Mornell told me how to access the Trinity Loop and paused while I clambered up and down the hillsides to get the best angles. Later while we chatted in Bonavista, he learned that Judy had never been in an engine and so paused some miles south of town on the return trip. He then made sure that she had a good long ride on the way back to Clarenville. G8a 800 had a long history on the former Newfoundland Railway. It was built by GMDL in London in June 1956 and traveled by rail to Halifax where it sailed aboard the SS Random for Agentia. It was placed in service by August. The six G8s were double-headed with CNR steamers on the CARIBOU for a period prior to the arrival of the six steam generator units later that year. The G8s settled on the branchlines to Bonavista, Argentia and Carbonear where they ran in pairs and trios. The 800 was retied in December 1986 and scrapped at Whitbourne in 1988. For more images from this and other chases on the Bonavista branch and throughout Newfoundland may I suggest that you contact me at bill.linley@gmail.com to obtain a copy of my upcoming book “Trackside Newfoundland.”

Name:	Bill Linley
Railway:	Newfoundland Railw…
Date:	06//1973
Location:	Lethbridge
Province:	Newfoundland and …

1 Comments | 30 Favourites

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