Quick Photo Im starting to like the town side of the layout

While shooting some photos of the mech reefers to show off on the Railwire Weathering Forum, I decided to take this grabber of 7883 posed on the team track on the town side of my current layout.
I was alway very nervous about getting this side of the layout right, but shots like this are starting to make me feel like I'm at least headed in the right direction.

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That Photo of No 26 I Promised

I finally got the older photo of Erie no.26 scanned (the previous one had merger Erie-Lackawanna herald).

I like the detail of the steel tanks on the walkway. Also note the cloth flap at the front grill - I assume to keep the engine warm on bitter Northeastern nights. There also appears to be a cloth awning to provide some shade to the engineer when he hangs his head out the window. Got some detail projects now.

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Wordless Wednesday Erie № 520 Photo

Erie № 520 unknown location unknown date. In collection of author.

So there aren't supposed to be any words, and I don't really have any words that need to be added, so here is a Wordless Wednesday photo post... with a bunch of needless words.

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Hoboken Photo Surprise

I got a great surprise in an email this week! Paul Tupaczewski most generously shared the following photos with me to share with you. All photos taken by Randy Brown. Thanks to them both!

I'll have to pore over these for details that might be applicable to 1959. For instance, the photo of the HBS engine house shows a rusted railroad crossing sign with a private property addendum - not to mention the engine house itself.

HBS 701 (entering 14th St - Hoboken, NJ - 10-72 - Randy Brown)

HBS 701 (Hoboken, NJ - 11-72 - Randy Brown)

HBS 701 (near engine house - Hoboken, NJ - 10-72 - Randy Brown)

HBS 701 (Hoboken, NJ - 11-72 - Randy Brown)

HBS engine house (Hoboken, NJ - 11-72 - Randy Brown)

HBS Hidden Lake (ex-Erie #4 - Hoboken, NJ - 10-72 - Randy Brown)

HBS interchange (Hoboken, NJ - 2-74 - Randy Brown)

HBS yard (14th St - Hoboken, NJ - 12-72 - Randy Brown)

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Whats Wrong With This Photo Wednesday

A little worse for wear, GACX 2718 sits all by itself at Kitchener, ON on 3/15/2015. Photo by my dad Keith.

Instead of the usual Wordless Wednesday today I thought I’d write about something a bit more interesting. Every now and then when railfanning, you may stumble across something you don’t see very often – maybe an old freight car in original paint, a locomotive from a fallen flag, or even a derailment. 

Today’s photo almost qualifies for the latter, but fortunately a sharp-eyed railroader caught the offending car and stopped it before it had the opportunity to derail. Observe car GACX 2718 at Kitchener, ON on 3/15/2015: on the surface (beneath all the rust!), the car appears to be a standard National Steel Car-built 3220-CF 2-bay hopper. The ends of the car have decals stating that it is leased to Eka Chemicals and a trace reveals it is hauling a load of salt from the Sifto Salt mine at Goderich, ON to the Eka plant at Magog, PQ. However a closer look reveals that this car will be delayed a bit – have a look at the B-end truck. It would appear that the car has received a heavy impact on that end which has caused the B-end centerplate to jump out of the bolster bowl. Note that the springs are unevenly compressed under the bolster, and that the truck has rolled inboard slightly of the centerplate (compare to A-end truck, or note that body bolster doesn't line up with center of truck sideframe). Interestingly, the car is loaded, so either it was impacted when empty and managed to travel this far before being noticed, or the car received an impact great enough to jolt it upwards despite being loaded. Either way, looks like the RIP track crew has their work cut out for them. Despite the delay in transit, it is indeed fortunate that the car didn't derail.

Cheers,

Peter.

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Photo of No 19 at New Harlem Freight Station

I recently found a copy of Erie Railfan (vol 1, no. 3, pp 8-9, Summer 1973) that has the second part of an excellent Larry DeYoung article on first generation diesels. Included is this photo (Ed Kelsey) of no.19 at the Harlem Station (149th Street). The building behind it is the office and freight house located on the Exterior Street side of the yard looking E-SE. No.19 was actually the fourth boxcab Erie acquired in 1928 (no.20 was the first in 1926 and nos. 21-22 in 1927).

The photo and article provide some interesting and relevant data for my layout. I now know that no.19 was at Harlem on June 12th, 1949, and that it had its end tiger striping. Cross referencing another photo from the Railroads of New York Harbor 2010 Calendar by George J. Abere, Jr. in April of 1955 shows that the striping is still there, and since it is a color photo, I know the striping is yellow as is the lettering and herald on the sides.

I also have a good reference for the building windows, awning and configuration in '49. I haven't researched this fully, yet, but the building changed over the years, so this adds a piece for nailing down what it looked like if I want to choose a specific year to model it (or perhaps multiple models for different years?)

1954

Also of note is that it looks like the ground is paved with concrete, which is previously unknown information to me. So, I go to historicaerials.com and search for "Exterior St and 149th, New York", and I find aerials from 1954 (above) showing the concrete paving. The tracks are also uncovered at this point, and I know from a 1957 photo that the two tracks, along with others) are enclosed by a building. There is also a neat feature that allows you to compare photos side by side with a slider to reveal one or the other photo. I choose 1966 and 1954 to compare (the oldest available), and notice not only the new building, but also maybe some new tracks by the centrally located crane and an elevated I-87 over Exterior St. (below)

1966

So a really good find leads me through a slew of resources to have a better idea of the evolution of the yard. I think I prefer the smaller building without the covered tracks, which means pre-'57 at some point. I may go to 1959 and simply construct the walls of the building with a removable roof for operation, or, better yet, just say it is '59 and not have the building. (Don't tell anyone if I end up doing that.)

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HBS 701 Photo

A new old photo of HBS No.701 in front of the General Foods building on the left and the Standard Brands smokestack on the right. The image is from a 616 black and white negative taken on 17 September 1968. The 44 tonner is a couple of decades old by this point and looking pretty good. I wonder if they ever repainted any of their locomotives...

*Edit clarification: The HBS changed the paint scheme on the 44s between 1947 and 1954 (see page 11 of Bernhart's Hoboken Shore Railroad book for original paint scheme). What I am wondering if they did any maintenance on the paint over the ensuing last years of the railroad.

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