50 YEARS TRACKSIDE...2000-05 THE NEW MILLENNIUM

Welcome aboard this year-long retrospective series celebrating my Fifty Years Trackside - watching trains and taking numbers. This is the Sixth of a year-long series celebrating those five decades - each month's post is a time capsule; a five-year slice of those fifty years. In the previous post, the nineties made their exit down the track. This month, it's into the new Millennium! And Y2K? That stands for Yes 2 Kids trackside! 

On May 7, 2000 the kids and I were at the VIA station for four VIA and one CN train. Andrew was not only expertly car-counting, he also relayed observations from his travels on sticky notes for me, including a notepad draft form for me to fill in:

Andrew and I put in a productive day on May 20. CN Nos 149, 590, 308, 309, 364, 301 and 306; VIA Nos 641, 653, 652/640 and 57, all between 0845 and 1400! Our Country Style donut shop was a convenient location within biing/walking distance from home. Excellent views across Bath Road to the CN mainline, air-conditioned or heated in season. And to boot, the owner was a train enthusiast. Prime morning visit times for fresh donuts!

A Sounder bilevel heads west at Kingston Mills locks above the Rideau Canal on June 30, 2000, during our Canada Day-weekend picnic. While picnicking, we netted six VIA trains, of which two were LRC-hauled evening expresses and two CN freights, between 1710 and 1920:

On a berm behind the Riocan big box centre, Erika and I watched two golden-hour Geeps switching eight Nova Chemicals covered hoppers at NORCOM on now-removed CN's Industrial Spur on Aug 9, 2000. The plant would close three years later and is now the site of a housing development with a large school, three apartment buildings, seniors' home, houses, a combined fire station/ambulance base and more to come.

Quinte 2000 was on Aug. 24, 2000. We are three generations with two different methods of documenting trackside, in the golden hour. Dad provided McDonald's supper and Andrew. From 1515-2310 there were 23 trains including 6 CP. 

September 17, 2000 was the annual Picton train show. Our whole family, Dad and Dave made the trip, catching a hog-lawed CN No 320 and a 321 setting out 31 of its 96 cars in track BY15 in Belleville yard, power 5428-5306-5285. 

Sundays were good days to catch dimensional loads. Photo by Andrew, August 2001 dimensional loads RBTs (Really Big Things!) westbound at Bayridge Drive overpass (above).

• Sep 24/00 at 1705 WECX 102.
• Oct1/00: No 317(30) at Kingston station with CN 601967.
• Jan 5/01: KWUX 10 and KRL 074.
• Jan 16/01: HEPX 200 at Queens.

References to CN's bigger trains of 120-150 cars came from an RTC, "Bigger and better? Well, bigger anyway!" and a head-end crew, "There are no cars left in Montreal - we got them all!".

The family went on a March Break vacation to Florida with another family, but without me. I couldn't get the week off work. One day I headed west to Belleville - March 10, 2001. From 1030-1600 there were CN freights No 519, 106, 364 (103 cars), 149, 301, 321 (135 cars including hi-cube boxcar GTW 378057 - below), 899 and 306; VIA Nos 642, 57, 60 and 45. Then on March 17, from 0820-1500 CN Nos 103, 149, 369, 737, 106, 309, 321, 310; VIA Nos 652/640, 641, 653, 57 and 60. CN's spring rail gang under Foreman John Casano was in the area between April 10 and 22, 2001. 

On July 18, 2001 we visited the Bath tie pile from 1830-2030 (above, below and top photo), seeing CN Nos 368, 704, 363 and 148; VIA Nos 65, 66, 47, 67, 48, 49 and 68. No 704 came out of the Bath Spur with 62 GATX empty TankTrain cars from Lennox Generating Station on the CN Bath Spur at 1955 behind CN 2506-5642.

We made a family trip to Niagara Falls between Aug.21-23, 2001. I noted tarped QOPX woodchip gons south of the Thorold Abitibi-Consolidated paper mill, and we saw an impressive 16 ships transit the Welland Canal. 

Quinte 2001 was August 30. On our way there we caught this interestingly-led CN No 308 at the Wymans Road crossing east of Belleville at 1500: CN 5628-exConrail 8667-CN 9445-unpainted FP59 GMDX 001006, the latter billed to Pointe St Charles. Between 1500-2000 there were five CN freights, two CP freights and eight VIA trains. Dad provided historical perspective, Dave was the poison-ivy detective, and Andrew picked a few apples from the nearby orchard while waiting to take more video. CN No 365 Engs 2413-5716 had a Brockville lift on the head-end at 1813 in the golden hour, heading for Toronto:

CN's public car tracing function was suspended on Wednesday, October 10, 2001 over concerned for post-9/11 security concerns, along with that of other Class 1 railroads by the AAR. From then on, I had to make educated guesses on the identity of passing CN freights, at least helped by previously-available access to learn their operating patterns!

Trips to Belleville yard still included OCS cars in the Great Lakes Region winter storage yard. On December 26, 2001 CN No 368 called out to passing 519, "Why don't you go over to Country Style, get some donuts and hoop them up to us?".

June 2, 2002 - we waited three-plus hours for the delayed but E8-powered CN business car train No 009 that finally passed westbound at 1732: IC 101-IC 100-CN Coureur des Bois-CN Gatineau (94)-CN Tawaw-CN Sandford Fleming.

During a June 26, 2002 visit to the tie pile, CN No 519 Engs 4124-4122 navigated the Bath Spur. Fifteen cement cars from Lafarge were on the siding portion of the Bath wye parallel to the mainline. The Geeps arrived from the east after switching Celanese at Millhaven and heading for Goodyear at Napanee, went down the wye, out the west end and back to Belleville:

Me and Andrew watching VIA No 67 with Eng 917 and five LRC cars at 1940 (L.C. Gagnon photo):

July 1, 2002 was our Canada Day family picnic at Kingston Mills with Mom and Dad, with four freights in one hour: CN Nos 307, 148, 363 and 366  (L.C. Gagnon photo, below).

In 2001, the British Nightstar cars were bilingually-named “Renaissance” or Ren for short, were introduced in a six-city tour. These cars entered service in spring 2002, first on the overnight Enterprise then in wider Corridor service. The Enterprise was terminated in 2005. General Electric P42DC's in the 900-series entered service, and all but one of VIA's last F-units, the 6300's, were retired. The last of the LRC locomotives were also retired, and coaches were LRC and HEP stainless-steel cars. VIA No 47 has Eng 902 at Kingston station with Erika and Andrew on June 9, 2002: 

Quinte 2002 was on August 3 with Karen only, with three CN and one CP freight between 1500-1600.

THE ENTERPRISE

The Enterprise was a revival of VIA's overnight service à la the Cavalier and operated from January 16, 2000 to September 14, 2005 first with HEP2 'commuter' cars up front/HEP1 sleepers and a Park car on the tail-end. 

VIA No 51 with stainless steel cars on July 7, 2000 at 0550 at Vista Drive:

6404-3 S/S cars -64XX-2 S/S cars -Chateau Lemoyne -Laurentide Park:

One more sighting:

Mar 9/01 0535 WB No 51:

6416-4113-4001-4115-6453-4122-Burton Manor-Evangeline Park

Ren-equipped Enterprise began in June, 2002:

Oct 1/02 0540 WB No 51:

6431-2 S/S cars-4117-6426-coaches 7204-7210, service car 7306, and sleepers 7506-7509-7514. The first Ren cars I'd seen, and the third set finished, having arrived in Toronto on the tail-end of No 2 in June.

On Aug 30, 2001 at 1910, westbound VIA No 67 with 6921-4 LRC cars would be the last LRC‐powered train I would see. CN locomotives began wearing the www dot cn dot ca logo.

October 26, 2002 I travelled by VIA to Toronto for a day-long continuing education course at the Michener Institute, riding VIA No 51 in 2&1 Ren coach 7210 Seat 11 on the north side, returning home on VIA No 648.

On January 16, 2003 Karen and I took the train to Toronto for the three-day start of the Clinical Laboratory Quality Manager course at the Michener Institute, up on No 43 car 3367, returning on VIA No 668/648 in car 3464 on January 19. The Microbiology manager heading the Con. Ed. committee got around the $1,000 annual tuition reimbursement maximum by spreading the $2,000 tuition over two consecutive years!

On Nov. 27, 2003 we went to Toronto one more time for the three-day course wrap-up for the Clinical Laboratory Quality Manager course on No 43, car 3333, returning home November 30 on VIA No 668/648. I faxed the last assignment on December 18, 2003 before receiving my certificate!

 

On August 7, 2004 two trains passed a soon-to-be-closed private crossing near Mi 179 CN Kingston Sub.  The house in the distance was set ablaze as a training exercise for city fire crews! No 309 Engs 2526-2422-5625 at 1330, then 10 minutes later No 149 Engs 2626-5615 (both - above.) Then on February 6, 2005 No 317 Eng 4809 went west with transformer for Lennox Generating Station. At Mi 179 Kingston Sub -the crossing was closed by the fall - and approaching Napanee along Old Hamburg Road. Three cars and caboose HEPX 79640.

October, 2005 westbound VIA train at under-construction Centennial Drive overpass:

Transcribing notes were lagging in 2005. I got a little behind so just taped the original notepad pages directly onto the scribbler pages. VIA LRC-equipped train consists were perhaps too boring to record. I only noted HEP-equipped trains throughout 2004. Wraps like Telus on VIA 6429 on a westbound VIA train in August, 2003:

July 30, 2005 Canada Day picnic at Kingston Mills: CN Nos 376, 148, 377, 368 from 1700-1900.

Thanks for being aboard this year-long train of thought as we retrace, remember, and yes, wallow in nostalgia these fifty years trackside. Watch for an upcoming Part 7 covering 2006-2010. 

Running extra...

Happy Independence Day to Trackside Treasure's American readers. This is a Big One - America's Semiquincentennial. I remember spending the last Big One - the Bicentennial -  watching President Ford dancing with the Queen at the Bicentennial ball on TV on July 7 while we were in Duluth, MN:

Things have really changed, though. Nothing said 'land of the free' more than Secret Service snipers riding the walkway the third of three BNSF Bicentennial units on a two-car train in North Dakota:

First past the post...

Canadians did not disappoint in their celebration of Canada Day. Ottawa's festivities at LeBreton Flats featured...the Hanson Brothers? Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen and Paralympian Man in Motion Rick Hansen, Prime Minister Mark Carney, Minister of Canadian Identity and Culture Marc Miller speaking in eight indigenous languages, and Canada's newest Governor-General Louise Arbour making her first Canada Day remarks, "Whether you’re in a remote area, a big city, with family or with friends, let’s celebrate together what unites us, not despite our differences but through them: our ability to welcome others, our solidarity, our resources and our great potential".

CANADA DAY 2026

This once-a-trip-around-the-sun post is only tangentially related to trains. Tangent track, no, a rather circuitous route around the topic of trains, yet a journey straight to the heart of why we love this country, why we should be proud of it, why we should truly be The True North Strong and Free, not to mention a land of the free and the home of the brave. (Copyright 11th Province, used without permission). 

I recently attended a concert by Kingston's own The Arrogant Worms. Some say that the Kingston's other own Tragically Hip are some sort of Phantom Power, that they Live Between Us, that they are Canada's only soundtrack, to which I reply a polite, "Road Apples!"

The US is the eagle, Russia is the bear

Australia is the kangaroo, cause they're kind of weird down there

Yeah, India is the tiger, that stands so proud and tall

But Canada is the greatest of them all

We are the beaver, we're furry and we're free

Yeah, we are the beaver, we got two big front teeth

Yeah, we are the beaver, we can chew right through small trees

We are the beaver, we are the beaver, we are the beaver

You might think a rodent is a pretty lame choice

For a national animal, but don't you listen to that voice

No, cause all them birds and predators, just take from the land

But the beaver, always gives a dam!

The concert began with the above ode to the Most Influential Canadian Animal. The only animal that can alter and engineer* its own environment. Capable of not just building a nice nest, a lovely lair, lining a cave with its own fur and excrement. NO! An ingenious system of canals, dams, AND a cozy lodge complete with large screen TV and recliner, and yes, excrement. The mighty and greasy-looking but all too ingenious indigenous Canadian beaver! How, though deemed to be our national symbol just over half a century ago, did the name become co-opted like the Gulf of America to be called the North American Beaver? Dam, that's just not right. Let's go Latin, bringing to life that dead (and buried and good riddance to ya) language. Castor canadensis it says. Not just because it's absolutely alliterative, but it puts the beaver right where it belongs...in Canada...and where it gets along just swimmingly slapping its tail at the sign of danger. Sadly hunted to near-extinction from 400 million fur one reason only, but resurgent to a current population as high as 12 million it paddles placidly and peripatetically. *The Canadian Army's Engineer branch's crest atop the Latin (again?) motto Ubique, meaning everywhere!

The second song was a sing-along ode to our Mighty Land's natural features. Of which there are three. Ride VIA's Canadian (there we go again, trains!) and you'll see exactly what the song fondly and pondly pertains to. And guess what's along the periphery of some of those lakes. No, not bald-eagle bed-and-breakfasts, beaver lodges, by golly!

The third song (and I can only remember three things, see also my Trip to the Supermarket), was an ode to a creature even more fearsome than the bitchiest beaver, the most gruff of groundhogs, the peskiest prairie dog or the surliest skink or skunk. An ode to The Hockey Mom. Forget Soccer Moms and their minivans, you don't want a puck with Hockey Mom!

After that, the rest of the concert was a blur. I do remember vague references to various songs about Canada Geese, Hawaiian Pizza and the highest level of Wormiana: I Am Cow and The Last Saskatchewan Pirate. Most were from the Worms' latest album (we forgot we had to do another one after our last one eight years ago!) entitled 'Canadian Famous' also the title of a National Film Board movie about Eric Peterson. There are not that many Erics in Canada, "Is that spelled with a C or a K?" I often hear, but there are A LOT of Daves. "Hey, you're from Canada, do you know...Dave?". 

Canadians don't stage fights on the lawns of our government buildings. That's what we have the House of Commons for! We have them inside due to inclement weather. And we don't want to make A Scene. We welcome immigrants, because aside from the indigenous peoples, that's what we all are. As Paul put it, Knowledge alone makes people arrogant, but love that unselfishly seeks the best for others builds up and encourages others to grow in wisdom. Corinthians or Canadians, it's a very meaningful ABC: Arrogance as in worms, Building as in beavers, encouraging as in Canadians?

Don't ask me why Canadians are soooo funny, but leaving the concert leaves one feeling good about being Canadian. We are so used to...

• eating our young (culturally, not cuisinally and figuratively, not foragingly)
• having to go abroad to achieve celebrity
• being so terribly sorry all the time (or as Wayne and Garth put it, "We're Not Worthy!") and
• comparing ourselves to other nations that...

...we forget the immensity of our country we neglect its potential and that of its people. Oh sure, I think I'm going a l-o-o-o-n-g way when I drive to Wal-Mart, forgetting it is ONE THOUSAND TIMES that far to reach Ellesmere Island, one of the most northerly points in Canada.

 It's where there are only have Rocks, no Trees.

We really do trump all the other countries!

Happy Canada Day to all Trackside Treasure readers!

If you're in the U.S. add HST and three days, your turn's coming...

--Eric

GEORGE McCULLOUGH'S TIME BOOK - 1944

I've had a BofLF&E enginemen's time book in my collection for over 30 years. Originally belonging to George S. McCullough, the book was given to me by his daughter, Joyce Grant. Being in the same grade in school as Joyce's son, Ross, she knew I was a train enthusiast from an early age. Even before I started recording my observations, I would go over to the family home on Hyland Court in Amherstview after school. There, Ross had a 4x8 table layout that we would work on together. I gave a good home to the train-set consist that Ross gave me some years later. Once, Ross had a box of Airfix civilians that I was asked to paint, and the painted figures I returned made Ross and his Mom really happy. Ross also had an impressive GI Joe collection. Ross' Dad Roy was quite handy as well as being a hunter, had made Ross several custom pieces for the collection. 

Joyce died in 1996, and I'm not sure in what year prior to that she gave me her Dad's time book from 1944, suffice it to say it reposed in the ol' dusty archives and just languished there. Recently, a rather unexpected turn of events finally sprung it free, enabling and expediting its exigent exposure here on Trackside Treasure. 

At the Napanee train show in mid-June I picked up five issues other than CRHA's Canadian Rail for light reading, perhaps when trackside, from taciturn Quebec dealer Michel Bellehumeur. On a sunny sunroom Sunday I flipped through one issue, shown above, that included an excellent article by well-known author the late Lorne Perry, CN public affairs official and leader of the design team at CN in 1961 when their new logo was debuted:

Describing the career progression of CN Enginemen at Montreal's Turcot Yard, the article made reference to a photocopied time book the author had in his possession, recording the trips of student fireman George S. McCullough. The George S. McCullough??, I asked myself? I remembered that name! Hastening through the rapidly-dissipating humidity in the aforementioned subterranean archives, I found my original copy of the time book Joyce had given me decades ago. Indeed, it was that George S. McCullough! Here's author Perry's description of the time book from Canadian Rail No 585 , the July-August 2018 issue:

I can only wonder how author Perry came by the photocopy of this original that he quoted from in his article. Was there a family connection between him and the Grants? Was it through a friend of the family? I guess I'll never know. It seemed to be to be a rather amazing coincidence. For some time I'd had idle thoughts of reproducing the contents of McCullough's time book in some sort of spreadsheet, then realizing the challenge of interpreting and possibly incorrectly transcribing the data contained therein, I'd decided against it. And it languished some more. Until I read and revelled in Perry's article. It was time to free it from its languishment location. Below, I have 'redneck-scanned' the pages of the time book that contain entries, in McCullough's handwriting, made over 80 years ago. 

I'll refrain from trying to draw allusions or conclusions from McCullough's entries in the time book -  I'll let them speak for themselves. It does seem, however, from an entry on the second last pages that he actually began his service on the Montreal spare board in September, 1943 and that this was a new book begun with the new year, 1944. 

Joyce died in 1996. Roy never remarried and died in 2015. Ross and his wife, whom he first met during his time at Queen's University Engineering, retired at the age of 43! I always knew Ross would go far. At Amherst View Public School, gym teacher Mr. Carson one day instructed the class to line up tallest to shortest AND in alphabetical order. Ross and I stood by and watched the ensuing nonsensical frenzied lining-up attempts - we both seemed to know it just couldn't be done! Ross' brother Bruce rose through the ranks of the Ontario Provincial Police. The McCullough family legacy lives on in the name of his great-granddaughter, Bruce's daughter McCulla.

Imagine how easy it would have been for this small but sententious snapshot of one man's service to have been consigned to oblivion over the intervening years. That it did not is nothing short of a marvellous McCullough miracle. 

A history of the proximal major yards of CN and CP - Turcot and Glen, respectively - is beyond the scope of this post. For your reading pleasure, my brother Dave, on his Rolly Martin Country blog, has helpfully published a plethoric panoply of posts concerning Turcot and nearby Glen Yards and their former importance in days of yore...

• 1942 CNR Turcot Yard and Lachine - photos by LC Gagnon, published in 2019.
• 1961 CNR Turcot Yard, CPR Westmount & Glen Yard, published in 2019.
• First Visit to Turcot Yard, Montreal, 17 July 1961, published in 2023.
• CPR Glen Yard in Archived Journals 1906-1967, published in 2026.

...and many, many more! 

CP's Glen Yard is now the site of the McGill University Health Centre (MUHC - which is not to be confused with MUMC, Hamilton's McMaster University Medical Centre). The MUHC is the result of a voluntary merger in 1997 of the Montreal General Hospital (1821), the Royal Victoria Hospital (1893), the Montreal Chest Institute (1909), the Montreal Children's Hospital (1904), and the Montreal Neurological Institute-Hospital (1934). In 2008, the Lachine Hospital (1913) and the CHSLD Camille-Lefebvre (1992) became a part of the MUHC. The Glen site project was originally budgeted at around $700 million but cost around $1.3 billion; it was meant to take only three years but took much longer - announced in 2006 and completed in 2015.

So few tracks remaining! The MUHC is at top right (H) and McCullough's home on Desnoyers Street is at bottom right (red pin). The snake-like spaghetti-bowl of highways dominates the former CN Turcot Yard site, with four CN tracks passing underneath (from centre-bottom to top-left). Turcot is now the third busiest highway interchange in Quebec, handling more than 600,000 vehicles per day.

Running extra...

SoundHoundAI has launched 'Julia', their automated voice order-taker technology at over 40 White Castle outlets in California. We knew human drive-thru order-taking was a-changin' when two-lane drive-thrus began being staffed by one person, not two as intended. (Drive-thru lines seem shorter with two lanes, more passengers naïvely pull in.) This technology 'frees up' staff to do other jobs, no, no, it's not intended to reduce employment. Sounds like you've heard that before somewhere? Would you like facts with that? Drive-thru use has increased 43% since 2020! 

Speaking of self-checkouts, can Shoppers Drug Mart train their self-checkout to apply the seniors' discount? Instead of admitting to a machine I'm incredibly old, I have to prostitute and prostrate myself (that sounded weird!) to a human to indicate my advanced age - very publicly and often loudly. The only good news is that on Thursdays, I'm surrounded by other penny-pinching, cheap, pension-spendin' seniors and the oldies are playing on the sound system! So good, so good, so good! 

Actually, what all these retail 'advancements' are really doing is just freeing up people to endlessly debate them on social media. With profanity. For hours. Unpaid hours. Really? First-world problems about who has the right-of-way in which lane, and did you know it's really all about vehicle-stacking! Hey, No Frills! While we're at it, why don't you reinstall your second cart-return shelter that you removed when you increased your store size? Not to mention destroying those excellent railman-friendly spots nearest the tracks when you added a pharmacy two decades ago.

First past the post...

It was a pleasure to meet Dave the Carpenter, fellow pensioner from my former hospital, on the weekend. Dave and Lucy, kids and grandkids are all hard workers with family roots in Portugal. Dave won the hospital staff award and not just for his carpentry skills - also for his people skills and his integrity. If he said he was going to do something, he would do it. We reminisced about his humorous 'Jump For My Love' Pointer Sisters song reference, suggested to Kit the pathologist assistant as a friendly answer to her question, "How am I going to get through there now?" after he'd professionally constructed a new bench top and which she did NOT find funny. Well, we did. He knew your name and would not shy away from flashing a toothy grin under his handlebar moustache, which I'm sure he has done many times in the presence of his EIGHT grandchildren, all by age 59! A family man and a user of a piece of fibreboard to neatly catch plaster dust when drilling a hole, Dave is also a wicked crow impersonator and helped me with my technique - I'm ravin' about it now - as we would greet each other while walking on our way to work many mornings across the Queen's University campus. (KHSC photo, 2019 - above)