Two Days at Portage, 1985

On Monday, September 16, 1985 I left Montreal aboard VIA No 1, arriving at Winnipeg on the evening of September 17. During servicing, I was out wandering around East Yard and up at track level, under the Winnipeg depot train shed was No 93 to Churchill, No 7 from Capreol and my No 1, and mosquitoes:

Arriving after dark, over an hour late at Portage's CN station, there was an RCMP cruiser in the parking lot! We made their leisurely drive around Portage seeing some nighttime combining, then I enjoyed a nightcap Coke and sandwich at their house. I spent until Friday night with my aunt and uncle who lent me their car during the day. I saw many trains, out to Poplar Point and High Bluff to photograph elevators, also the new continuous-pour elevator east of Portage at Tucker. I had a [reduced from other years] three days' train watching in Portage.

My whole 1985 trip is told in a three-post series, starting with this post - a travelogue before and after Portage. I'm finally getting around to publishing these Portage train-watching photos - it's been 40 years since these photos were taken! In my defence, I've already blogged every other aspect of this trip in the panoply of previously-published posts. (Though I hate to publish the same photos twice, a few in this post appeared in posts on grain cars, for instance.) The first of these plethoric 1985 posts were shared way back in the first month of Trackside Treasure's ever-lengthening 16-year lifespan! Here's my entire 1985 trip, in date order of publication:

• Thunder Bay and Sudbury on the way home
• CN's Lewvan Subdivision
  
• Vestibule View heading west to Winnipeg
  
• CP's Loose Caboose 
• CP ballast train on the Minnedosa Subdivision
  
• Railfanning Regina
  
• CP's Carberry Subdivision east of Portage
  
• Across Canada by Train Order - Westward
  
• Across Canada by Train Order - Eastward
  
• Riding Montreal to North Bay
  
• Postscript - Sudbury
  
• Dome View of Alberta and Saskatchewan
  
• CN's Glenavon Subdivision
  
• CP's Tyvan Subdivision 
• CP's Portal Subdivision (Part 1 of 2)
  

That's a lot of Trackside Treasure posts spawned by one trip! But let's get back to the heart of the trip and my time trackside during those Three Days in Portage. Trains are shown by time, direction, railway, locomotive numbers and remarks.

September 18, 1985

I was allowed to use my aunt and uncle's car and spent the cloudy morning at the tracks from 0930-1200. Then we were off to the Portage Co-op restaurant for my signature club sandwich before returning to the stations for an hour after lunch. 

0930 W CP 5923-5742 45 cars of ballast and Jordan spreader CP 402892 to Minnedosa Sub 434526 (top photo, linked post above). Then I headed to East Tower - a lot faster driving Trenton Avenue than it had been on foot in previous years!

1045 W CN 1067-1012 with 15 grain cars likely lifted from the elevators east of Portage (more on CN 1012-1067 in this post on GMD-1's).

1035 E CP 5591-5787-6003-8813 434581. A westbound freight is departing at left:

The eastbound approaches the yard lead switch, the trainman lines the high-target switch for the units and cars to head into the yard as a Canadian Forces Kiowa flies overhead from nearby CFB Portage/Southport.

The power backs down the north side of the train into the yard.

After picking up 3 MPA and one CP boxcar and a tank car, the units return to the head end, with the train broken at the Stephens Avenue crossing:

The trainman makes the joint and connects the air hoses.

1103 E CN 5216-5091 with caboose 79222 past East Tower:

Before lunch, 1012-1067 return from the Oakland line. 

The units pull the boxcars into the yard, then attached the covered hoppers brought into Portage before heading east:

1330 W CP 5996-8701 30 ballast, 90 grain empties to Carberry Sub at West Tower with van 434448:

My aunt and uncle and I spent the rest of the day in Winnipeg, enjoying a hotel restaurant supper and getting home by 2200.

September 19, 1985

A rainy day; I photographed elevators on CP east of Portage. We enjoyed lunch at the May May Restaurant, and I headed back to the tracks in the rain until supper time.

0900 W CP 5923-5742 ballast cars 434526 (unphotographed)

1111 E CN 9585-9625-9528 hotshot with caboose 79328, east of Portage:

More on intermodal traffic in this post.

1448 W CN 4243-4324 grain empties with caboose 79414 crossing Eighth St. N.W. to the Gladstone Sub:

1615 W CP 5852-8657 (second photo below).
1628 E CP 5928-5904 100 grain loads and van 434341:

CP 5852-8657 in the yard visible just above my aunt and uncle's car, seen in line with the semaphore mast.

After setting out a car of rail in the yard, 5852-8657 pause beside the ballast train at left. It has backed into Portage yard. The westbound added the ballast train's power, 5923 and 5742, to their power consist before continuing westward. 

1635 W CN 5293-5067 lumber empties and caboose 79751:

In the evening, we watched the [now] Patrick Swayze 1984 cult-classic Red Dawn on VCR.

In Part 2, I'll profile another prolific Portage day trackside.

Running extra...

Wolverines! Charlie Sheen played Patrick Swayze's younger brother though his name is strangely absent from the film's credits?! Anyway, nothing livens up a high school history class like Russians landing just outside the window and watching your teacher go out to inquire of the heavily-armed and Spetsnazzy-camouflage jumpsuited Russian paratroops, "What's going on here, my friend?", before he himself becomes history. Forty years later, 'Colorado school shooting' has another grisly meaning, but in 1984 it was all fur caps 'n' Golden Arches! "Would you like fries with that....comrade?"

TV celebrity buys house to get model railway in basement! The original news story courtesy of The Montgomery News, the very professional Pacific Southern webpage including the layout's history and coming soon to the house the celebrity's wife's candle business, sounding suspiciously like a locomotive number: No. 95 Candles. An amazing story all around!

It's weird when your trip to RONA includes a NOVA. As in this Novabus charging itself at Gardiners Road Canadian Tire store (above). Toronto Transit Commission 6600-6735 are Nova Bus LFSe+ buses built in 2024. They are the first battery-electric buses ordered from Nova Bus by the TTC.

First past the post...

Thanks to Associated Railroaders of Kingston executive members Andrew Chisholm, Dave Cook and Michael Pasch who served up Pizza Pizza pizza and light refreshments at last night's May ARK meeting. ARK member Kurt Vollenwyder gave us a glimpse into mountain railroading in Switzerland with the remarkable Gotthard Tunnels. Imagine 260 freight trains daily through a mountain!

"What is Happening with VIA's New Venture Trains?" Seven Months after CN Imposed its Crossing Speed Reductions

It's been seven months but it feels like seven years.

To say it's become somewhat of a Trackside Treasurobsession covering the implementation of VIA's Ventures here on the CN Kingston Subdivision, if not earlier in the MOQ (Montreal, Ottawa, Quebec) triangle is an understatement within a minimization of an archetype wrapped in a microcosm. And the imposition by CN of crossing speed reductions on VIA's new Venture trains at around 300 crossings within the Windsor-Quebec City Corridor has been the big story of the implementation...

...not the newness of the trains, or their accessibility, their speed, their comfort, not even their flexibility due to bidirectionality. For your humble blogger, the delays faced by VIA passengers and only minimally acknowledged by VIA management have been as disturbing and disingenuous as they have been borderline-deceitful, but moreover, unnecessary and unproven by CN therefore unwarranted and unbelievable! Witness this westbound Venture on April 30, 2025 at Mi 179 Kingston Sub, accelerating from one such crossing (all photos in this post).

My initial Ventures in Service post grew to three, including all the links to all my other posts on the topic. I even published a rare opinion post. I tracked the serpentine sequence of contemporaneously non-conclusive court cases launched by VIA, and I've also heard that these posts have been read in VIA Rail Canada's C-suite and within the Teamsters hierarchy. But what are the facts of the implementation?

In this post, I'm presenting independently-garnered facts gathered seven months on, showing how the Venture implementation has downgraded and downwardly-denigrated On-Time Performance over the past seven months, and how many of the tragically troubled trainsets have been serviceable over the past six months.

VENTURE TRAINS ON-TIME PERFORMANCE

The "VIA Venture Trains On-Time Performance October, 2024+" table (below) covers the imposition of the CN crossing speed reductions from Day One. Column headings explained: 

• Week - Almost always the Monday of each week.  I chose Monday to monitor Venture OTP because it's usually the day of the week with the highest number of Venture-equipped trains. 

• Daily # of Venture Trains - The total number of Venture-equipped trains on each Monday that I monitor OTP, even if the trains deviate from the planned Corridor rotation. So, if a normally-HEP train is Venture-equipped for one day, I include it.

• All Ottawa/Montreal/Toronto trains OTP - Until February, I lumped both service lanes' Venture-equipped trains together. I split this total into two destination-specific columns once the 'Doublavay' J-trained Ventures began operating on VIA Nos 60/50 and 62/52 in early February...

• ...Ottawa/Toronto trains OTP - Reflecting the OTP on the Brockville-Ottawa VIA trackage, though subject to delay due to CP switching at Smiths Falls. Venture trains can make up time here.

• ...and Montreal/Toronto trains OTP - 28 crossings with speed reductions in 100+ miles of CN trackage from Brockville-Coteau. Venture trains only get later here.

• Late Departure Train #'s - Significantly late (15 minutes +) departures, often caused by the late arrival of a previous run-through Venture-equipped train or mechanical issues.

• Doublavay OTP at Kingston - Doublavays Nos 60/50 and 62/52 at Kingston should arrive here On-Time due to exceeding CN's 32-axle limit with a Doublavay totalling 48 axles and not having to slow for the 58 crossings with speed reductions from Toronto to Brockville.

• Doublavay OTP to Ottawa - after splitting at Brockville, No 50 and 52 arrival OTP at Ottawa.

• Doublavay OTP to Montreal - after splitting at Brockville, No 60 and 62 arrival OTP at Montreal.

VIA VENTURES NOT OPERATING NOV 18/24-MAY 17/25

While train watching at Kingston's VIA station in February, I started recording the serviceability of the Venture sets from various sources I could cross-reference: personal observations, credible trackside reports from others, video and still photos, with a high bar for veracity so as not to over-report or sensationalize the challenges VIA staff and operating crews have faced with this implementation, as well as the aforementioned acrimony of VIA's passengers as they switch to Ubers, planes and GO trains to their destinations, while slagging VIA on social media. 

Colour-coding in the 'VIA Ventures not Operating Nov 18/24-May 17/25' table (below) comprises the following colours over the last six months:

Red - not observed in operation for two or more weeks. (I allowed up to two-week intervals for which I'd garnered no observations anywhere in the Corridor, allowing perhaps for routine service, or just missed by trackside observers, although since the trainsets operate across multiple Corridor lanes, that seemed unlikely!)

Yellow - undergoing [1,000-mile] break-in testing.

Green - train set received but not yet undergoing break-in testing.

White - observed in service:

WHAT IS HAPPENING...NEXT?

VIA's Corridor change-of-card is on May 26. VIA is maintaining the disposition of 14 Venture sets in daily Corridor service. Look for more experiments with Doublavays. One several-day recent experiment saw a Doublavay travel across the Corridor with space in most of the 10 cars being sold - those in the centre of the cab-car-coupled double consist necessitating only one stop at each station. 

I'll continue monitoring and augmenting both tables on an ongoing basis. Until the CN-imposed crossing speed reductions are lifted, VIA will not be enlarging the number of sets in service. This seems to be a self-limiting implementation block. There are an average of 13 Venture sets in use weekly since February when the number of Venture-equipped trains in the Corridor rotation was reduced to 12 (after being increased from 12 to 13 sets in early November). On May 7, VIA introduced a new 14-set rotation, increasing the number of Corridor sets by two, both of which are now serving Southwest Ontario daily.

As previously described on Trackside Treasure, the constant slow-down, speed-up for CN's selected (and unmarked) crossings takes a toll on crew alertness, causes fatigue, negatively affects morale, and can therefore limit crews available for service. Who will initiate the lifting of the reductions? Not CN, unless forced to. Not VIA, unless supported by Quebec court action. Not Transport Canada apparently, though their pivotal regulatory role in promoting public safety is undisputed.

VIA cancelled some trains in February, and has signalled that it will preferentially and slowly replace HEP consists with Ventures before attempting to reinstate the cancelled trains, at least until September. That may make only one HEP set left, down from the current three.

With 29 sets delivered and only 14 in service, and based on the tables above, the implementation will continue to founder.

Running extra...

Sometimes the spammers are lazy. Recently, some have actually done creative writing to get their desired link buried in this blog. Here's one from the previous Kool-Aid contest post, "This is such a fun and unique piece of history from VIA! A Kool-Aid contest train promotion is definitely something you don't see every day – pure nostalgia! It's great to reflect on those creative marketing campaigns from the past, and how different travel experiences can be. Speaking of getting around, I was just thinking about the convenience of a dubai car rental for exploring a big, modern city. Anyway, thanks for digging up this cool "tracksidetreasure"!

Also eminently emanating from the emirates is a lot of 'wingspam' about the new Boeing 747-8 Air Force One. With 1,000 nmi. additional range, the currently-attainable Washington to Tokyo extends to Washington to 'Jina'. Perfect for that next face-to-face he-said-Xi-said summit on tariffs! With 29 feet greater wingspan and 19 feet increased length the new version is the longest commercial jet available in the world. Perfect for your next fighter escort over Gulf nations. What the F-15??

First past the post...

Arriving on Track 1 from Montreal, a mystery visitor with sistery history pulled into town aboard an LRC consist this week. The weather was not much to write home about, though Timbits, coffee, rhubarb-strawberry muffins and pizza sweetened the day. Blood may be thicker than water, but successfully crossing that artificially-drawn line (that looks like it was drawn by a pencil and a ruler) trumps everything!

VIA's Kool-Aid Contest, Summer 2000

A Kool-Aid contest in March 2000 led to 6404, 6405, 6406, 6411, 6424, 6432, 6433, 6439, 6453 and 6454 wearing a colourful livery, for a few months, April to August 2000. This Kool-Aid wrap appeared on more locomotives than any other wrap, pre-rebuilding, and was arguably the most colourful and eye-catching of the plethora of wraps VIA applied to its F40 fleet. Spiderman wraps were numerically second with six in May 2004, though for much longer, with 6408 staying wrapped from 2004-2011! VIA 6433 at Kingston (below at Kingston - Tim Reid photo):

It took me 25 years, but I recently (thanks, Jason Paul!) acquired this brochure that was distributed to kids during the consist. The brochure explains the contest, as well as featuringsome puzzles to challenge young minds:

Kool-Aid-wrapped 6432 leads No 65 at Kingston on May 12, 2000 as the engineer greets our kids during the station stop. Our kids rarely if ever drank Kool-Aid. So sugary. (Though I hope they drank the Kool-Aid when it came to our parenting style!) Now they have grown and moved on to more 'adult' beverages. Nor have they been 'drinking the Kool-Aid' when it comes to watching trains, although they do occasionally send a message when something interesting and/or colourful rolls by!

The contest even made the newspaper wire service:

Combine kids, trains and a healthy dose of Kool-Aid and what do you get? An award-winning campaign that brings to life Kool-Aid's fun and wacky branding and embodies its brand essence of "Kool-Aid takes the Ordinary and makes it WILD!" And it also delivers bottomline results for the client. The Kool-Aid Kool-Train program was an unprecedented success, partnering Kool-Aid, VIA Rail Canada, YTV, Kidsworld Magazine and TV Guide to create a synergistic and integrated media campaign to reach both the kid and Mom target. (It won the Best of Show at Marketing Magazine's inaugural Media Innovation Awards last November. And this June, it made the short list in the Media Lions competition at the International Advertising Festival in Cannes.) - From Marketing magazine, Jul 30/01 Vol 106:30

UberVIAphile Tim Hayman contributed this photo (below) to my fourth book on VIA Rail, one of several featuring Tim's fine modelling of VIA's comparatively small yet diverse fleet. The locomotive is a Rapido F40PH-2D that he painted with a variety of Tamiya paints (custom mixed to match), and decalled with Highball Graphics (formerly SGS) decals. Weathering was done with airbrushed acrylics. The model represents 6404 as it appeared in late summer of 2000, when Tim rode behind it on a trip from Ottawa to Brockville. Unique among the other Kool-Aid units, 6404 was the only locomotive in that scheme that did not have a small Canada flag between the numberboards. It also had a cab sunshade on only one side, and had an early version of the air-conditioner that would soon become standard on the 6400's. Unlike the later yellow air-conditioner units, it was white, with "Genesis" lettering on the sides, for which Tim custom-printed decals.

For those who prefer RTR models, Rapido Trains released this attractive paint scheme on their F40PH-2D model in 2018. 

Lots o' links:

• VIA 6411 rail pictures photo
• on video thanks to the prolific late David Othen
• HO scale decals by Highball Graphics
• brass model Pacific Fast Mail

Is a Kool-Aid unit still out there? Looks suspiciously so, based on these clandestine photos taken in North Bay...turns out it's a former Roberval-Saguenay unit:

Running extra...

From inside the lines at VIA, I received a message this week: "...when your blog is being used as reference during the Teamsters Union call to give employees information...", it makes blogging feel even more worthwhile. Trackside Treasure does not represent a particular side in the protracted CN-VIA Venture/crossing speed-reduction polemic: management, union or passenger, but attempts to represent all and moreover, the truth.

The trade war continues...albeit in volleys of comments following the recently-published Globe & Mail article on Rapido Trains Inc. There are some commenters who hit the nail on the head but are woefully unaware of what the company actually does. Then there are counter-commenters who know the company's talking points all too well:

First past the post...

Thanks to the unnamed grey-top who kindly handed over two of her Tim Hortons napkins to us on our napkin-less sit-down at the mall food court with our granddaughter this week. The octogenarian may have seemed grandmotherly in her demeanour, but she then whipped out her tablet and it like a boss immediately afterwards!

Pop-up Post: Two Days in March 2025, Freight Cars

For the second time in two months, an online crafting event for my wife meant an anticipated three days trackside: March 21-23, 2025. My goals were to visit some Kingston railfanning locations I hadn't been in awhile, and to catch some doublavay Venture eastbounds. Each train was listed by time, direction, train number if known and notes in Part 1, Day One.  In Part 2, it's Day Two and in this third pop-up post it's freight cars I photographed on those two day's trains! 

Day One - Irving lumber aboard AOK 29813 on No 305

Day One - CNPX 160193 on CN No 731

CITX 151566

NKLX 201887

More Irving lumber on CN No 305

Day One - CR TTGX 981037 on CN No 271

Day Two - GACX 54158-54163 on CN No 372

Wheel flatcar AOKX 44125 on CN No 372

Day Two - Lebel lumber on CN No 305

W&W AEX 23898

GAEX 100293 blue pole flatcar

Day Two - PHLX 107 on CN No 306

PHLX 183

PHLX 200

WC 85061

Running extra...

On May 1, I was pleased to present my Paralysis Analysis PowerPoint presentation to the 75 Zoom attendees participating in the Virtual Prologue of the Railway Modellers Meet of British Columbia (RMMBC). Thanks to blog partner Marc Simpson for the invitation and fellow presenters blog partner Matthieu Lachance and Chris van Der Heide for their presentations on weathering and 3D car printing and prototypes, respectively. I had to have a nap, as my time slot began at 2245h, three hours later than Pacific Time! I'm looking forward to taking in the second evening Prologue on May 15. Feedback:

On May 7, I was pleased to be a volunteer Heritage Fair judge at my grandsons' school. Neither of them were participating, being too young for the Grades involved: 5-7-8. Feedback for this one was in the form of a nice hug from my older grandson who was touring the displays, a signed Thank You card from all the participating students and juice and cookies from the teachers co-ordinating the Heritage Fair. One lad's display on the Canada-Denmark "Whiskey War" did not include free samples, and I don't think the two displays on Maple Syrup did either!

Today is VE-Day. Eighty years ago, the Germans finally gave up. The CBC coverage of the Liberation of Holland largely by Canadians has been excellent. Major-General Richard Rohmer at 101 years of age valiantly made the trip with a small group of centenarian veterans to honour the 7,600 Canadians who gave their lives in the pursuit of peace in that then-devastated country.

First past the post...

It was good to chat with former fellow Whig editorial board member (and renowned local historian and author) Peter Gower at the Heritage Fair. Not only has Peter devoted his time in the past to preserving Kingstonians' contributions to World War I and historic Kingston objects in book form, but in the present he inquisitively wondered why on a recent train trip CN freight traffic had been non-existent!