Niles Canyon Railway “Train of Lights” 2009

Of all the fun things to do during the holidays, from parties to shopping, to visiting family, the one thing I look the most forward to is a train ride on a Santa Train of some kind.  Normally we would go to Old Town Sacramento and ride the from the old depot there.  However, this year, being already in the Bay Area for Thanksgiving, we decided to try something different.

We pulled up to the Niles Depot of the Niles Canyon Railway operated by the Pacific Locomotive Association on Friday evening in time to get our tickets and board the 2009 “Train of Lights”.  The railway runs two trains, one departing either end of the line and meeting at about the half way mark of the beautiful scenic rail line that was once part of the transcontinental route.

The train pulled into the station about fifteen minues prior to departure.  Each end of our train boasted it’s own locomitve, allowing for the train to be push/pulled along the route from Niles to Sunol and back.  At the East end of our train was an open topped car.  Then a passenger coach, followed by a combine where hot coco, soup, and other treats were avaliable, another coach, and a dome car finished the consist.  Everything was decked out in holiday lights and decorations, inside and out.

The ride was fantastic.  We rode from Niles to Sunol in one of the coaches.  Then after a short stop, we rode back to Niles on the open car.

If you have the opportunity to ride the Niles Canyon Railway on one of the operating weekends, you’re in for a treat as you pass the yard where the vintage locmotives and rolling stock are kept and worked on.  We could only really see the equipment that was close to the mainline as we passed.

Part of the train ride is a visit from Santa!  He visited our train first, and then crossed to the Sunol, Niles, Sunol train as it passed us.

Family train rides are a great way to introduce kids to the joys of trains of any size.  We intend to make riding the “Train of Lights” part of our holiday tradition in years to come.  If you get a chance to ride it, or another train in your area, make it part of your holiday traditions as well.

-Jeremy

Model What Used to Be: Abandoned Trackage.

Since the beginning of the railroads not every commercial venture between two steel rails has always worked out for the better. There are over 10,000 miles of abandoned right of way in the US alone, probably much more if you count yards, sidings and industrial spurs.

Often, abandoned right of ways tell almost, if not more of a story then the active lines you’d model on your railroad. Most times bridges were left in place, signals still standing (some still operating years after the track has been abandoned!) Of course embankments, ballast and the right of way itself will remain until redevelopment or nature destroys it.

Railroads merge and traffic dries up, creating duplicate routes and usually the one that’s costlier to maintain is abandoned. Case and point would be the Southern Pacific’s Altamont Pass line. It was steeper in grade and featured sharper curves to the rival Western Pacific mainline just across Alameda Creek. Rails were removed in the 1980’s when much of the traffic along the line had disappeared, and what was left was easily served by the WP mainline (namely the Kaiser Gravel Plant at Radum, between Livermore & Pleasanton, Calif.)

The mess of industrial trackage that can still be found in most American cities that experienced industrial growth before 1940 is another interesting example. Really tight curves, crossovers, diamonds, double slip switches and small yards would be utilized to efficiently serve the major industries of the day. Often the buildings were built with the curvature of the railroad tracks in mind, as were fence and property lines. One can trace former industrial trackage without great difficulty as long as it hasn’t been completely redeveloped. Many older industries simply left the trackage in place and removed their mainline connection (usually a switch) sometimes they would have a few obsolete railroad cars delivered before this would happen to be turned into storage.

When railroads fail completely, due to lack of traffic or commercial business reasons, the right of way is either left to rust or ripped up. All infrastructure except for ballast is sold off and the grade is left to nature. Most often when this happens, especially if it’s in a scenic location near affluent residencies, a “rails to trails” program is started, which usually paves the right of way with a bike path. The Southern Pacific’s San Ramon Branch is an excellent example of this, as is the Northwestern Pacific’s line to Tiburon. It would be interesting to model a little paved pathway with bikers and joggers with evidence that tracks once existed there.

Disasters can also cause a line to be abandoned. The Eel river plagued operations on the NorthWestern Pacific railroad up in Norther California’s Redwood Empire. The river would rise more than 40 feet, washing out bridges, flooding tunnels, destroying buildings and eroding embankments. Eventually the line was so unprofitable that it was abandoned. Plenty of other hard-to-maintain railroad lines have had their rails pulled up.

Here’s some excellent examples of abandoned trackage:

Blueprints: Gas-Electric Doodlebug for the CWR&N

Here’s a set of blueprints I recently purchased of California Western Railway & Navigation Company’s M-100 motorcar, dated 1935. If you’d like to have a paper copy of these blueprints, e-mail me and we’ll work out a way to send them to you. If you want to purchase the original copy I have here, make me an offer.

Here’s the original blueprint below, the top photo was inverted into white-on-black line drawing in Photoshop.

It’s a neat piece of history at any rate and it’s interesting to see such unusual artifacts still floating around, I’m just glad that I was able to find them.

Look Beyond the Docksider: 0-4-0’s.

The following is quoted verbatim from a Baldwin Sales Catalogue:

Four couplerd locomotives have all the weight on the driving wheels, and are suitable for contractor’s’ or industrial service, and also for light switching work on railroad yards and terminals. These engines have short wheel bases, and they can be safely operated on sharp curves and switches. The smaller classes can easily traverse curves of fifty feet radius. For short runs, or for switching service eherre a large fuel and water supply are not required, saddle or side tanks can be used and the fuel carried in the cab or on a rear extention of the engine frames. For longer runs, a seperate tender should be employed. If desired, the tender tank is made with a slopin back, this giving the engineman a better view when backing up. A seperate tender is also an advantage on exceptionally narrow track, as it admist of a lower center of gravity than if the tank were placed on the boiler.
In tank-frame locomotives, as illustrated (below) the frames consist of steel plates, between which the water tank is place. This construction lowers the center of gravity; an important featur where the gauge is unusually narrow. These engines are fitted with a simple design of Marshall Valve gear, having all it’s parts outside the wheels where they are easily accessible. This style had a through trial on light industrial locomotives operating under the most severe conditions.

Here’s a pretty extensive gallery of what these little locomotives looked like. Most modelers know of the dozens of (usually crude) models in various scales that have been produced with the 0-4-0 wheel arrangement. This gallery will hopefully give you some different and fun ideas for kitbashing a more unique looking locomotive.

It’s the perfect power for a really modest shortline operation, like the Indiana Northern.

If you don’t want it operable, it makes excellent shop clutter in a detailed interior scene.

Some were used by larger industries to handle cars around their plants.

Mines used them to switch cars around the loading tipples.

They’re a very down-and-dirty workaday locomotive, this small scale railroad operation would be easy to model and fun too.

They were the “trackmobile” of many industries from the 1860’s through the 1960’s.

Not all of them looked good, here’s a locomotive nothing short of hideous.

Looks like this one worked on some noticeable grades…look at the size of that sand dome!

This unusual side-bunker 0-4-0T would be an interesting thing to model, presumably coal or wood was loaded in through the sides of the cab, rather than the rear.

Most operations kept them running on bubble gum and bailing wire, here’s a good example, note the odd oil tank cobbled together from scrap parts.

Working large industries like quarries helped these little locos earn their keep….

…until trucks took over the jobs that the venerable 0-4-0T used to handle. Caterpillar, Euclid and other off-road trucks took over duties at the construction contractors, mines and quarries in the 1950’s and 1960’s, while other industries purchased tractor-trailer trucks to handle their freight or bought a small diesel switcher or trackmobile to handle their rail traffic. The 1960’s was the last decade to see these little locomotives in north america, they were either saved to operate in a tourist railroad, or stuffed and mounted in a park, but thousands of these workaday locomotives met the scrapper’s tourch, perhaps to be turned into truck parts!

The Economic Bailout that Never Came- PennCentral

For many hardworking people of the Northeastern US, it was the economic bailout that never came. The Penn Central was - until very recently – the largest corporate bankruptcy in history. To fully appreciate the story and it’s staggering effect on railroad and corporate history, listen from the perspective of the average worker. This average worker doesn’t work behind a desk (and if he does, it’s in a caboose) he works in the crumbling infrastructure that was the deadly hallmark of differed maintenance. The PC had to deal with more than 200 derailments a month, more than 3,000 miles of very poorly maintained track, 300 MILES of damaged freight cars, and more than two dozen derelict maintenance facilities that are inefficient and dangerous. Every attempt to modernize their operations to at the very least make them save to work around were halted due to massive debt. Unlike Lehman brothers and all the modern “paper pushing” companies today, you can see, hear and appreciate the consequences of differed maintenance.

 

This isn’t the way to run a railroad. Watch the 1974 film (featuring non-stop Railroad action) that was a helpless plea to congress for funding.

 

In 1976, congress formed the Consolidated Rail Corporation or CONRail, which went public in the 1980’s and was run so well that it was merged into the NS & CSX, roughly split in half.

Gems from the Archives – The Alameda Belt Line Story

I took a long trip out to the Archives on this namesake Island to look through their archives for any suitable information on the Alameda Belt Line, a tiny shortline loaded with character.. what I found is chronicled in the following post.

Credit is given to all those brave journalists who took photos and wrote articles chronicling this great shortline. I thank them for their will to preserve the past.
 

When the refrence locomotive #2144, they mean this ex-Santa Fe GP7u that they purchased when their ALCo’s went kaput.

 

(Note: I didn’t take these photos or write these articles, obviously, and cannot claim ownership to a scrap of paper here. If anybody has a problem with me posting half-century old newspaper articles, I’ll remove the articles from this site permanently, ASAP.)

Modelgenic Buildings 3: Union Machine Works

This neat building featuring unusual rooflines and multiple additions is located HERE today and still stands, empty, but strong. It’s a remarkable structure only being a block away from the Western Pacific depot on third street, to be featured in a future article. The other interesting feature is that at some time in it’s life it was rail-served via an overhead crane and a siding embedded in the street (since removed with the rest of the WP line down thrid street)

Here’s a historical photo found in the room of the N scale layout I featured in the NMRA tour I mentioned a couple of months ago.

Number 77, a beautiful 4-6-0, guides her train into the street trackage outside the Depot on third Street. This scene hasn’t changed too much since this photo, the locomotives and rolling stock are probably scrap, the tracks gone and the box company is now the back of a jazz club, but the rest of the scene remains, including the neat building on the right, Parker Electric (now also empty) which will certianly be featured in a future article.

about 150 feet down the street and over 60 years in the future, the Union Machine works still stands. The distinctive painted signs would make an awesome modeling detail for any brick model structure. Here’s a closeup of the sign.

Around the Front, the main structure is visible from second street, looking SE. Note the adjacent office made from a different type of (yellow) brick, this is also part of this unique structure.

Here’s a closeup of the office, note the ornate brickwork and the still functional, but hopelessly obsolete oil-bath electric transformers on the pole in front, this is indicative of the number of huge power-hungry electric tools that once filled this interior:

An interesting building that may find a place in your industrial-age heart or at least on your layout, it’ll make a challenging, but worthy scratchbuilding project.

Splashdown! SP Geeps take a bath at Brazos River Bridge

Read this incredible story and take a look at these incredible series of photographs! (5 in all, showing the entire incident)
 

It happened on the NWP back in 1983. (Northwestern Pacific, a subsidiary of the Southern Pacific that conncected Vallejo to Eureka in the vast redwood empire.)

Start Researching Railroads Today!

IF you’re new to the hobby or just getting back into the fascinating world of locomotives, railroads and history, be sure to check out these awesome websites. They are indispensable to the beginner and advanced modeler or historian alike.

To learn all about steam locomotive and find surviving locomotives all ’round the world, look here:
http://www.steamlocomotive.com/

Love geared logging locomotives like the Shay, Heisler and Climax, or want to know what a geared steam locomotive is? Check out http://www.gearedsteam.com/index.html  

Switching Locomotives
http://yardlimit.railfan.net/ They have some of the most obscure and famous (practically all North American Switchers) listed with photos.

With excellent photos of nearly every type of rolling stock or locomotive pictured somewhere on this extensive site, you can’t help but spend hours looking through all these photos!

http://www.northeast.railfan.net/

Want to learn about the big four locomotive builders? (Baldwin, Lima, ALCo, EMD) or some of the most obscure American and world locomotive companies?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Locomotive_manufacturers

For mainline Diesels, check out the locomotive manufactures listings on Wikipedia (It’s actually a pretty reliable source nowadays)
For GM EMD products, like the SW9, look at the bottom of the page for the manufactured locomotive listing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electro-Motive_Diesel
http://www.sdrm.org/roster/diesel/emd/history/

If you like those smoky Alco’s check this out!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ALCO_diesel_locomotives
http://alcoworld.railfan.net/specindx.htm
Or if you’re a Baldwin Fan, check this out.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baldwin_Locomotive_Works
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Baldwin_locomotives
http://baldwindiesels.railfan.net/contents.html

To research a specific railroad, find the Yahoo! group that corresponds to your favorite railroad and join that. For example the “Espee” group os the better of the two Southern Pacific RR groups, and the ATSF group is the Santa Fe oriented ones.

You can even join a group that talks about modeling a specific industry, like the “Citrus Modelers” yahoo group.

If you want to know accurate information about freight cars, visit these two sites:

Steam Era Freight Car Group: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/STMFC/

Modern Freight Car Group: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MFCL/

Return of the CB&Q 24′ Shipping Containers!

Due to extremely popular demand, I went back to the containers today, and after having the very kind employees open the gate for me, I took a couple dozen photos, from all angles, including the roof!

These unusual CB&Q(Z) COFC containers were purchased by a poltury exporting company to store their records, papers and extra office supplies back in the early 1970’s. They have sat in that location ever since.

Any now, I present to you some extremely comphrehensive photos of these Pacific fleet 24′ Aluminium shipping containers!

 

 

Here’s a shot of the front of the container.

Right Rear door closeup showing the hardware.

 

It’s a DORSEY!

This shot is of the roof, it’s skewed because I had to jump at just the right moment to capture this photo. Pretty simple construction.

I hope this helps.  PLEASE leave a comment here if you found these photos helpful.

For all my effort, Athearn had better come up with a model of this in HO scale!