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Caption: A cut of seven brand new Government of Alberta cylindrical covered hopper cars, fresh from the National Steel Car plant in Hamilton, sit in TH&B's Kinnear Yard awaiting forwarding out west to their new owner. Car numbers visible here are ALPX 628138, 628139 and 628140, part of a series of CP-assigned cars. All sport the original Alberta "Heritage Fund" livery that they wore as-built, before repainting into the more well-known Alberta "Take a Break" livery in the early 90's.
Starting in the 1970's and progressing through the 80's, a handful of government bodies would invest in fleets of new covered hoppers to move grain in Canada (often nicknamed the "Trudeau Hopper" fleet). CN and CP had been reluctant to invest in new cars for prairie grain service as the Crow Rate had kept grain transportation rates down at 1897 levels, so the vast majority of grain was still being transported in old 40' boxcars, and often on light-rail branchlines that couldn't take heavier cars (the railways were reluctant to upgrade those too, seeing them as unprofitable).
This all eventually lead to the Government of Canada, as well as the governments of Alberta and Saskatchewan, purchasing their own covered hoppers and assigning them to CN or CP for grain hauling (cars with an N in the reporting mark would be CN-assigned, cars with a P would be CP like these ALPX cars). Three Canadian builders would be chosen: Marine Industries Ltd, National Steel Car, and Hawker Siddeley Canada, and all would build variants of the same basic 4550cuft cylindrical covered hopper design. Over time, the hundreds of new covered hoppers being build would reduce the number of aging 40' grain boxcars in active service. A branchline rehabilitation program was also started to upgrade some of those old light-rail lines (including funding for new CN & CP ballast hoppers).
The provincial government of Manitoba took a slightly different approach, as instead of purchasing, they had leased covered hoppers for grain service for a brief time (more info on those at Trackside Treasure). The governments of Canada and Manitoba also provided money to CN and CP to upgrade and repair some of their old 40' boxcars for continued service on some light rail lines that couldn't take the heavier covered hoppers, including the famed CN "Buffalo Boxcar" fleet for the line to Churchill MB.
Reg Button photo, Dan Dell'Unto collection slide.
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An era is ending, the cylindrical government grain hoppers of all kinds are now on their way to retirement, as they are getting close to the 50 year age limitation on cars in interchange service. CN and CP are both replacing their fleets, and while some shortlines and elevators have bought some I don’t know how long they will last.
As an operator, I have to say I won’t miss them, both their air and handbrakes perform very poorly compared to other cars.
Also, they are now officially old enough to be a museum piece, the Alberta Railway Museum acquired one this fall, ALBX 628006 “take an Alberta break, visit Edmonton” (re-initialed for use on the Battle River Railway).
The CPR yard at Bassano, Alberta, is full of Government of Canada grain hoppers. I guess they are either for sale or on hold for scrapping.
Nice write up Dan! I’ll miss those cars, none of the new cars have the more exotic CANADA or Alberta government paint jobs. Interesting note, the rate freeze you mentioned was amended in 2018 with bill C-49. Allowed to Canadian class 1′s to modernize the grain fleet. Hence the large order from CN and CP during/after 2018.
https://www.railwayage.com/mechanical/freight-cars/cp-replacing-grain-hopper-fleet/?RAchannel=home
It wasn’t long after the bill was passed you saw the older cars getting scrapped. Not too surprising as I believe they were maintenance headaches (as evidence by the side sill doubler plates on many of these cars).
http://www.railpictures.ca/upload/heading-away-from-the-camera-on-the-cp-hamilton-sub-is-cn-l562-with-a-solo-cn-5615-and-50-cars-headed-for-interchange-with-trillium-at-feeder-of-note-are-the-40-or-so-hoppers-bringing-up-the-rear
Mark, you are correct that many of the cylindrical government grain cars are now being scrapped, but those in the photo you linked are not grain cars (you can tell by the colour and round roof hatches).
Those cars were built for mineral service, not grain. Their final regular assignment was in phosphate rock service between Neptune terminals in Vancouver and Agrium’s massive Redwater, AB fertilizer plant, previously they hauled phosphate from the Kapuskasing, ON mine until it closed. Many similar cars also spent decades in potash service.
Their death knell came when Agrium/Nutrien decided to end phosphate production at the Redwater plant, and the cars were scrapped soon after.
If round roof hatches are not a grain car then what is this? http://www.railpictures.ca/?attachment_id=41686