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Caption: This was one of my first real attempts to railfan in Kitchener, and it was a bit of a disaster to say the least. 568 began working the yard around noon with 4790 and BCOL 4612, and switched for quite some time. The potash hoppers sitting at right are on the main, and this ended up tying up the crossings at Lancaster Street and St Leger Street for a good two hours before a maintainer arrived to manually open and close the gates while 568 worked. I think they worked until about 1700 or so, at which point they finally departed for Stratford. Not long after, they stalled before they even got out of town, and had to set off some cars and try again. From what I have heard and seen elsewhere, I believe they finally made it to Stratford some time after 1900.
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Nice James.
Yes they finally did make it ahead of 87 that night. Both units were on 568 again today with 7025.
Thanks Jason. Hoping for a bit of better luck next time but at least I was able to start to form some sense of things there, so not entirely unproductive. Still don’t know up from down with respect to getting around town though haha
Kitchener is a horrible place to chase trains.. word of advice… you don’t… go to one spot, get your shot, and move on.. you have to go out of town for the next shot or just go elsewhere (Galt, Paris, etc, all close by) Of course, you can shoot the yard first (as your photo is above) before finding the next spot.
Yeah that was the plan but I never got to put it into practice because switched for an eternity. Oh well.. as a first timer I figured I could get away with a cheapie yard shot this time at least
@James: you can try the crossing at Petersburg and Baden next. Nafzinger Rd between Baden and New Hamburg isn’t bad. I’m not really familiar with spots west of New Hamburg. I usually don’t have time to venture too far.
568 is always a roll of the dice and always has been. They can depart after 85, they can switch for HOURS. And it’s becoming less predictable.. some for the better (more six axle motive power)
heck sometimes these trains go down the huron park spur instead
(both 568 and 540). It’s a lot like a shortline (because it is! Internal to CN!)
I know 568 has been getting more unpredictable by the day. Usually the 6-axle power comes and goes based on what happens with 431 but the BC Rail unit has been around for a couple of days now and used on 568. And last week 568 ran with an SD75 leader. So anything goes now.
Yeah I scoped some potential sites west of the City in the afternoon, for future reference.
I was hoping for both a Huron Park run, and run to Stratford. Such is life – can’t win them all.