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Caption: It was indeed a surprise when, waiting for NS #328 autoparts train at Merritton, to witness them stop and the switch thrown at mile 9.49 and the train lined for the Thorold sub. What the???? Emergency work of some description was to be performed on the CN Canal bridge 6 and that #328 was to detour down the Thorold Sub and across brige 10 to CN Allanburg and onto the Stamford at Port Robinson. With two ships in the Twin Flight Locks, it made for a unique opportunity to catch trains and boats in the same photo. Power was nice as well, CP 5521, GATX 7371 and NS 6215. I was to witness moves like this a couple more times in the next few weeks. The Thorold bridge 10 was dismantled in 1997 and thus the east side of the line is now CN Thorold Spur and the west side (pictured) is the PCHR (Trillium) Canal Line.
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I love this Arnold – NS 328 on rare mileage -I would never have thought big trains ran on this line this late in the game considering how CN had essentially left the line for discontinuance/transfer.
Makes you wonder also what CN will do when Bridge 6 needs work again – Detour on CP? There are few alternatives now..
Looking forward to the rest of your shots of these re-routes
Thanks, Mr. H.T.Grep, Sir!! I only have a handful of images…..you’d think perhaps this detour would be running not much more than a crawl; but, consider the roadways….no place to park, then he crosses the bridge and where do I cross??? Down to Hwy 20. It was a mess of confusion being caught off guard like that. To make matters worse, only the odd #328 went on this detour, and I never knew which one it would be. Will try and locate other images.
What was the speed of the line (Thorold Sub) back then? The grade at where you shot is close to 2% is it not? That would have been quite the show even for a 20 car NS 328..
Thorold Sub. between M 9.49 Grimsby sub and connection with Stamford Sub at Port Rob was mostly 20 MPH grades/curves of which mostly all of what that stretch was. The TT has a posted 40 MPH but there really isn’t anywhere to “open ‘er up”. Once the train crossed the Br. 10 it meandered by the Hayes/Dana company property and crossed Hwy 20 and almost already at CN Allanburg and the Jct with CN Stamford. A run all of 7.9 miles.
Great shot Arnold! You got a ship in each of the Twin Flight Locks and a train on that rickety piece of track. WOW!!
Mr. Mooney, do you remember when there were two sets of tracks running – for a distance – parallel to the Welland Canal? If you do a search of Google Images of “lock 7 at Thorold,” you’ll find a terrific old postcard photo of Lock 7, showing the Welland Canal at Lock 7, with the two sets of tracks just to the west of the canal, and the vehicle bridge which once crossed the canal there. The only thing which would have improved that shot would have been a train.
Such an amazing shot. Anything more than 5 cars is now rare though along these tracks..
A tidbit of information I finally located regarding the Thorold Sub: Other than these detours trains I have posted to RP; the last mainline train that ran this sub was CN #431, eastbound behind CN 9535 and a couple of MLWs in September 1987. This was due to a Clifton Wye work project. Other than locals, I have not heard of any scheduled trains along here in the past 35 yrs.
This photo still blows my mind today…