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Caption: Us lads trackside certainly did a lot of whining over ugly, grubby CP locomotives on the lead of many trains this past couple of years, their very presence often ruining the overall classy photo we hoped to capture. Now, suddenly, I notice they have vanished. Apparently most all the 9500 series (AC4400CW)units have gone into storage due to a downturn of traffic. So the opportunity to dig up a photo of back when these were new out of Erie PA, a scant 21 years ago, presents itself. Here is train #521 (USA to Toronto) as seen from beside the High Level bridge in Hamilton. For viewers out of province, that is Hwy 403 in background, very quiet looking compared to todays' crush of traffic; and beyond that, Cootes Paradise, a quiet mostly severed (from Hamilton Harbour) protected body of water. Locos that can be seen: CP 6408, 9536, 9531, 9539, 9529, 9528, 9538, 9544, 9545, 9547, 9542 and 9541. The units looked nice when new..but that didn't last. I'm glad CP has since gone back to a better quality of paint.
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Excellent shot! And from a preservation standpoint, it was only a bit of time before that the City of Hamilton and in conjunction with GO Transit announced expanded train service from downtown out of the then abandoned (yet under renovation)art deco THB station. This explains the work on the track(s) beside the train….and ended GO’s service out of CN’s James Street station. And as you said, here we are, a scant 21 years later…and GO built the new West Harbour station. Begs he question from me why didn’t they just stay in the old CN station?
I find it hard to swallow; but I was told a long time back that TH&B station won out because the “People In The Know” claimed that all that activity would bring more business to the surrounding area, making it a better financial opportunity than having passengers use John St. (as if everyone wants to go shopping after work!) Now that to me was a real crock of (bleep), but thats what I was told. The end result in my mind was citizens of Hambone Mt finding it much better just to drive the 403 to Aldershot and take the GO from there. And everyone knew expansion of GO would NOT be going up the hill thru Vinemount to Welland, but right by John St to Niagara Falls. Wonder how much they all got in “bonuses” for coming up with that plan? Perhaps the reality was that CN was making things difficult for the idea of commuters on their lines. I’d love to hear some comments on this subject, as no doubt would you.
Beauty shot
The dual flag scheme would never look that clean again.
Nice catch. Now lets hope they never re-emerge from storage and get cut up instead.
Amazing shot to see, if not for the lineup of power but for the angle as well. This is one I have thought of trying before but haven’t made it happen (aside from a back lit shot in my earlier days). from what i remember though i don’t think this is quite possible anymore anyways.. with all of the growth now i think you can pretty much only shoot them coming head on. anyways, very cool to see this – i quite enjoy the “best images” links at the top of the page as they bring me to things like this that i may otherwise have never seen.
Still possible, see some of the shots I posted a couple months ago (one shot)… from 2014.
have to wade in the sumac but it’s doable..
Thanks, James. I agree with you about the images across the top of the page. I have been part of this site for a few years now but I constantly see photos I either have forgotten or never some reason saw in the first place. It isn’t fair to anyone that photos posted become part of the dark vault after a couple of weeks. Old is refreshing.
Arnold, you are right about the vault part, which is why I have the top of the page as it is. It’s a way to spread the love.
But the proof is in the pudding, right? For some reason, some guys view counts just grow grow grow – Doug Page’s view count is up to 75,000 and when I last spoke to him he had 50,000 – and very little was posted by his group in that timeframe. Some profiles have juice. Views grow – images are linked here and there and become part of the Internet fabric.
I welcome suggestions on how to push the archive some more