Caption: CN SW1200 7023 sits in the east end of Bathurst Street Yard in downtown Toronto, south of Front Street and east of Spadina Avenue, between switching duties in March of 1963. The team tracks and platforms in the background are full with 40' boxcars (the standard freight car of the day for freight, express and LCL shipments) unloading and loading cargo. One can spot a foreign Delaware, Lackawanna & Western (DL&W) "Route of the Phoebe Snow" car amid all the CN wafer-logo boxcars, and a new noodle-logo 40' repaint (it and the next car sporting yellow doors, initially meant to signify high-class merchandise service before being more commonly associated with CN boxcars in newsprint service).

According to timetables and track diagrams, this part of the yard was the K-200 series of team tracks, often noted as "Lower Yard" (see Robert Farkas' shot here). Hendrie Cartage (a CN affiliated transportation company) operated out of this yard and handled freight and LCL shipments for CN and a variety of customers. Cargo such as food products, newsprint and papers, furniture, textiles (for Toronto's old downtown textile manufacturing industry) was often unloaded from 40' boxcars at the team tracks here, and transloaded onto trucks for local delivery in town, and vice-versa for outbound shipments.

Further east were the K-100 series of express and team tracks next to the CN Express building, that handled express shipments, customs and bonded cargo. Track K-101 was noted as the siding into the Express Building / Bond Shed. K-104 was the "Paper Platform" (outbound express newspaper shipments?), noted customers here include the Globe & Mail, Toronto Daily Star, Toronto Telegram, the Ryerson Press. Hendrie Cartage handled their own print and paper customers at Lower Yard's paper platform (Track K-201).

Auto and truck loads for Car-Go-Rail, auto brokers, select auto dealers, rental companies and manufacturers were noted as handled at the Auto Ramp tracks in the Parkdale area (see here).

The CN Tower parking lot displaced a lot of the K-100 & K-200 team tracks here in the mid-70's, and eventually succumbed to commercial redevelopment (the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, and Royal Bank data centre). The main Bathurst Street yard tracks (K-300 series) were reconfigured in the 1980's for GO Transit train storage, and today are know as GO's Bathurst North Yard. The old CN Express building west of Union Station was renovated into the Skywalk in the 1980's.

The track in the foreground lead up grade to CN's Simcoe Street yard and freight sheds at Front & Simcoe (south of the CP/Dominion Express freight sheds). Both CN and CP had freight sheds here, but CN's were demolished around 1967-68. CP's survived until the late 1970's before being demolished, but some facilities at King St. continued to exist for paper deliveries and team tracks into the 80's.

Background items of interest: CN's prominent Spadina Roundhouse with passenger power such as FPA4 and RS18's visible outside. Further in the background to the left was CP John Street Roundhouse and coach shop, with 40' ice reefers spotted nearby. TTR's Central Heating Plant is just visible off in the distance on the far left. The two smoke stacks in the middle of the photo (between the roundhouses) were for the City of Toronto's water filtration plant at Rees St. The silos on the waterfront at far right were for Maple Leaf Milling (demolished early 80's).

CN 7023: The CN 7000 series were made up of GMD SW9 and SW1200 units, 1200 horsepower "GS-12" switchers not equipped with roadswitcher features such as flexicoil trucks, larger fuel tanks, MU, and full end numberboards like the more common CN 1200- and 1300-series SW1200RS units were. Nevertheless, they along with the lower horsepower SW8 and SW900 units were common across the CN system at various terminals for local and yard switching duties well into the 1980's. Built in September 1956, 7023 later became 7723 (due to the 7000-series GP9RM rebuilds in the 80's that saw larger replacement local and switching power like the GP9's replace smaller, older, lower horsepower units like the SW8/900/9/1200 fleet) and eventually retired and disposed of.

Original photographer unknown, Dan Dell'Unto collection negative (large-format scanned with a DSLR, with some restoration work done).