Burnside Manitoba Pool Elevator

The Manitoba Pool Elevators (MPE) $1.6 million grain elevator at Burnside, MB was one of the last wooden grain elevators built, opening on July 24, 1984. Surprisingly, its lifespan was a short 25 years. Continuous-pour elevators were already on the horizon, literally, at Tucker and later at Rosser on CP's Carberry Sub east of Portage. Located seven miles west of Portage la Prairie on CP's Carberry Subdivision, just off the Trans-Canada Highway, the Burnside shipping point was intended to replace Portage's 'A' elevator which was lost to fire in 1982. I was able to visit the elevator twice - once in 1984 (top photo and below) during construction and again in 1986 (all other photos below).

At 80 feet high, the double-composite design comprised 47 bins with a 5,680 tonne, 208,000-bushel capacity. Twenty tons of nails hammered into 750,000 board-feet of lumber. The acccess road featured a former CP tank car body in use as a culvert! The elevator track had room for 30 covered hoppers.

Built by Manitoba Pool Elevators between August 1983 and July 1984, and opened officially on 24 July 1984. It was later closed and demolished in 2008. Fern Legault, a friend of my aunt and uncle, was manager until 1989. Based on that connection, I drove out to the new elevator during my four days in Portage on June 5, 1986 for a visit. I was allowed to wander around, camera-in-hand.

The amount of lumber that goes into an elevator is just plain staggering.

The unloading shed (above) and signage (below):

Ubiquitous tools at the car-loading doors, including two car-movers:

No 1 and No 2 Legs. Hand lettered on both: MAKE SURE TO CHECK SWING FLOW.

Stencilling - GARNER GATE, HOPPER GATE:

An aerial view from the 1993 MPE calendar:

Under-construction photo from the Portage Daily Graphic dated March 9, 1984. Hoping it was warmer up there than it looks:

Two more Portage Daily Graphic photos - Grand opening July 26, 1984:

Not warm nor fuzzy: trackside view January 8, 1987:

There's more on Burnside in this earlier post CP Carberry Sub west of Portage.

Lots o' links:

• Two photos in my brother's 1993 post on the area.
• Three photos in my brother's 1985 post as well.
• Manitoba Historical Society & Archives page.
• in 2017 pre-demolition with logos removed.
• Grain Elevators of Canada.
  
• Mike Stobbs photo page showing Burnside in 2006.

Running extra...

If I'd had access to any of the following at this YouTuber's age: video camera, camera, internet, Youtube, any technology above a notepad and a pencil, I probably would have done this:

There are a lot of young, enthusiastic railfans out there. I used to write down with my pencil and paper: 'LOCOHO, LOCOWA OR CBWA' to indicate honk from the locomotive, waves from locomotive and caboose. That was a big deal at the time. As we age, we may look at this and think it's a bit much. I think that says more about 'us' than it does about 'them'.

In many pursuits, I tend to place a high value on enthusiasm. I place a low value on stodginess and know-it-allness. Sometimes enthusiasm is viewed as a virtue of someone less serious instead of a virtue of someone who is just more fervent. In this, my third post on my 1986 visit to Portage, I had already been visiting there for ten years, and my enthusiasm was still at a high level.

One More Day at Portage, 1986

From May 21 to June 7, 1986 I travelled aboard VIA Rail from Kingston to Vancouver return. My trip east is profiled in this post. My goal had been Expo86, the World Exposition in Vancouver, and its SteamExpo. My first two days in Portage are profiled in this first post of this two-post series. 

I had the use of my Aunt Rosemary and Uncle Wilf's car, so mid-morning on June 5 I drove to Burnside, where agent Fernand Legault, one of their dental patients, showed me the new Manitoba Pool elevator. I was down at the station from 0830-1040, caught two CP trains at Burnside, then spent the afternoon back at the station. 

Between switching moves, CP 6014-5776-3120 pause at the Portage station with its manifest train and van CP 434142, as the head-end trainman returns to the head-end at 0850 on June 5 (top photo and below):

Pulled by CP 5615-552x, a short 47-car eastbound with van CP 434620 passes grain cars at 0928:

VIA 6512-6621 bring train No 2 into Portage behind the UGG elevator at 8th St N.W at 0945. The train’s two engines can manage the 8-car consist, but help is on the way. New VIA F40PH-2D’s will arrive beginning in December, 1986. 

On the wide-open, west-of-Portage prairie, I’m visiting MPE’s new elevator at Burnside. There's more about my visit in this post on this then-new, now-gone grain elevator. 

Three CP freights went past, maybe more while I was inside! CP 5989-5924-5407 led this eastbound intermodal at 1042. CP 5407 was originally Quebec, North Shore & Labrador 211. Caboose 434712:

New CP 3121-3122 lead 5529 plus ballast and grain empties wend their way west at 1125. Cylindricals forever! Or so it seems as these iconic grain-handlers seem to head to the horizon on CP at Burnside (below).

Back in Portage, CP 6010 crosses 3rd St N.E. with its solo serving-up of 110 grain empties at 1145:

CPWX 601073’s were the reporting marks chosen for Model Power’s  HO-scale cylindrical (too short, friction-bearing, under-detailed but it’s all we had until Intermountain and other model manufacturers cottoned on to the Canadian market).

Unphotographed:

1320 W CN 5244-5032 79718.

1320 E CN 5314-5185-5036 bathtub gondolas 79392.

1400 W CN 9511-5273 36 ballast cars 79860.

It was very difficult to find a CN SD40 not wearing stripes by this time. CN 5195 with two-shy-of-a-hundred grain empties westbound at the CN station at 1420:

CP stabs CN! CP 5780-5917-6020-6013 hammer the West Tower diamonds with 109 eastbound coal loads behind them at 1435.

CN 5141-5221 wait to go west on the Rivers Sub as coal loads continue to continually clank over the CN.

Minnedosa messenger! CP 6034 toots its own horn, making its eastbound arrival apparent at 8th St N.W. Its grain loads ahead of Angus van 434626 pass the Coke can loads at the UGG elevator at 1450:

CN 5141 and 5221 are now free to go west with 95 grain empties and caboose 79201, after pawing patiently for the CP coal loads to conclude at 1453.

Westbound CP 5782-3064 drag potash empties past the Engro spur, with its own fertilizer load spotted at the fertilizer shed at 1600:

CN stabs CP! CN 9499’s manifest has the light at West Tower, as CP 5782’s train waits at 8th St N.W. at 1610:

After a home-cooked steak supper, my aunt and I drove the yards in the evening, catching more CP and CN freights. 

2031 E CN 5175-4314-1051 grain loads 79213

2130 E CN 5229-5226 79657

Aunt Rosemary and I were at the Portage station at 0830 on June 6, though my train didn’t arrive until 1015. Wilf arrived just before train time. I was in seat 30 of ex-CP coach 110, where I enjoyed their care package lunch at Winnipeg. I arrived in Toronto on June 7.

Running extra...

It's been a week. IYKYK:

Nora O'Donnell's changing role at CBS includes a relaunch of the CBS Evening News this coming Monday, with co-anchors Maurice duBois and John Dickerson and state-of-the-art technology 'walls'. A through-line to the greats: Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather, forgettable Harry Smith/Jeff Glor and the sterling Nora.

Two Days at Portage, 1986

From May 21 to June 7, 1986 I travelled aboard VIA Rail from Kingston to Vancouver return. My trip west is profiled in this post. My destination was Expo86, the World Exposition in Vancouver, and its SteamExpo. I spent six days in Vancouver before heading east aboard VIA No 4 to Portage la Prairie, MB where I spent four days with my Aunt Rosemary and Uncle Wilf. In this post, I'll profile my prolific Portage passages preserved for posterity on June 3 and 4, with June 5's trains in part two of this two-post series. 

I'm missing some of my original notes for these first two days of Portage train watching, June 3 and 4, so bear with me. I had major life changes on my mind during this trip, about to start a full-time job, propose marriage to the medical stenographer who worked across the hall, and marry her a year later! My usual fastidious note-taking fell by the wayside!

Aunt Rosemary met me at the station on June 3 at 0910, and we met Wilf at the office before heading to their house to drop off my duffle bag (and poster tube of VIA posters from their station display at Expo86). Then it was off to our usual lunch rendezvous, the Co-Op Restaurant adjacent to CP's Carberry Sub for lunch. In the evening, after a turkey supper, we drove around to see Tucker, Oakland, Burnside and MacGregor elevators. I also caught seven CN and CP freights around Portage in the afternoon. I found this interesting westbound crossing 3rd St N.E. CN 5519-4243-4xxx-4xxx are in charge, with a cut of military equipment, likely heading for CFB Shilo, behind the power:

M109 self-propelled and M101 towed artillery

M113 armoured personnel carriers 

M548 tracked cargo (ammunition) carriers and an M578 recovery vehicle (below)

CN 5082 and a mate bring potash empties down the yard lead heading west:

This eastbound grain train is pulled by CP 6041-5965. Fewer elevators still standing in Portage meant less road and rail activity, but improved sightlines! Just managed a photo of this GRAD '85 GLADSTONE graffiti:

An interesting-looking two-unit manifest churns westward behind CP 3082-5012:

A going-away zoom shot of CP 3082-5012. With scads of SD40-2’s, CP still had a little bit of locomotive latitude left! 

At East Tower, CN 9546 brings this manifest west under a sunlit sky. A John Deere pull-type combine is near the head-end, likely for setout at a still-to-be-reached town. 

Lumber empties are led west by CN 9627-5135. The switch in foreground leads to the spur along Fisher Avenue. On the spur, the large number of covered hoppers could not possibly be accommodated by the UGG elevator. Perhaps an over-supply of stored cars, or spotted for producer-loading. 

On June 4, I was back at the station from 1015-1200 before we headed into Winnipeg to visit CN's Symington Yard followed by a supper at Don Cherry's Grapes restaurant. Plowing west past the CP station, 6000-5559 have a boxy stowaway behind the power! 

Robot 32, a.k.a. CPHX 1032 was built in 1977 and owned by Ontario Hydro. Typically used in the mountains, not the Prairies, this unit was originally CP boxcar 204200 and contains Locotrol equipment used to control mid-train helper units. 

Switching near the CN station, striped 5226-5229 have a Pacific Fruit Express mechanical refrigerator car in tow. 

The chase is on! CN 5009-5017 head for the U.S. border with lumber and other resource products in this pacing shot south of Winnipeg on CN’s Sprague Sub. 

Ahead by a nose! At a crossing near the distinctively boxy Mile 142.4 Manitoba Pool Elevators installation along the Trans-Canada Highway, we got ahead of 5009’s train. 

Ex-CN hogger Mark Perry says this photo was taken at Deacon's Corner - where Manitoba Road 207 intersects the Trans-Canada Highway; out of Symington Yard we'd just visited - beyond the Red River Floodway. I think my uncle was driving pretty fast to get us ahead of the train and on the sunny side! The elevator and elevator track are long-gone, now a self-storage location:

An aerial view of the intersection from the 1993 Manitoba Pool Elevators calendar:

The snail-like synchronicity of posting photos taken trackside 38 years ago continues. Hey, better late than never. In the fullness of time, I plan to finally feature all my Portage photos. It's part of the balance of then and now, passenger and freight, CN and CP, pop-up and for-posterity posts here on Trackside Treasure. Thanks for being along for the ride!

Running extra...

Watching the US Cabinet nomination hearings in front of the Senate has been an exercise in watching UNderwhelmingly UNderqualified candidates in front of UNimpressed Democratic senators and UNinquisitive Republican senators. Is this the UN or the US? The SecDef candidate has never managed more than 200 people and is set to take on a workforce of 3 million. Oorah! (Perhaps indicative of the Unimpressive nature of this process, when I typed Oorah, the spellcheck feature changed it to Oprah!)

I'm tempted to change Trackside Treasure to a current world affairs blog. With new governments in the US and Canada, a potential mid-East peace deal, worldwide political intrigue, and enough conflict and strife to fill several conference rooms at the UN, I tried out an online blog name generator for some blog name ideas. Here's the portmanteaux the AI gave me: WorldLens, GeoPulse, EcoSphere and WorldReflections. I'm going to go my own way and call it The World is Going to Peaces.

Here are two book-end viral moments to encapsulate the now-ending Trudeau-Biden era. 

Oh wait, wrong Trudeau.