What's on CN 2329 East?

Just for something a little different, let's look at some of the cars found on CN 2329 East, spotted on September 13, 2018.

CN 2329

By the name I've given the train, obviously CN 2329 was on the head end. 2329 is a GE ES44DC locomotive, built in mid 2010.

I first spotted this locomotive on train 404 on April 4, 2011 (see "404 on 4/04"), several hundred feet further east from the photo above. The second time I spotted 2329 was on October 9, 2012, pretty much at the exact same location. I might take a lot of photos in the same area... what do you think?

There was another locomotive on the train. You'll see it soon...

MGLX 625056

MGLX 625056 in Winnipeg

The first freight car I photographed was this Saskatchewan! car now owned by MobilGrain, MBLX 625056. The taggers have been all over this car, unfortunately. I always liked the green SK cars.

GTW 138205

Long live the Grand Trunk

The next car I photographed was heavily weathered GTW 138205, sporting the giant white "GT". It even has its multicolour ACI label visible to the right of the "T". I can't quite read the built date but it looks like "11-76", which is comparable to the dates on other GTW cars like this that I have photographed. 40+ years of working... too bad rail cars don't get a pension when they are retired.

CN 395299

Faded glory

Next up is highly faded CN 395299, with its Canadian Wheat Board logo and lettering barely visible. I remember it being almost pink in colour to my eye. Another car on borrowed time...

CGEX 1085

Cargill's CGEX 1085

I see a lot of Cargill grain cars. CGEX 1085 here is one of the common types, but I also see a lot of Cargill cars with external, vertical ribs. The reporting marks tend to be CGAX, CGEX or CGOX. I don't know if there is any reason for the difference in reporting marks.

You'll see another Cargill car shortly.

EFNX 160760

A truly boring car

I took a photo of EFNX 160760 not because there was anything interesting about it, but because it is a prime example of today's truly boring rail cars. This 5200 cubic foot car was built in September 2016 and is one of many cars in Element Financial's fleet of rail cars available for lease.

In "days of yore", railroads owned a lot of rolling stock. Not any more. I believe the majority of today's rail cars are owned by lessors like Element who lease them out to customers. It probably makes a lot of financial sense for the railroads to be out of the lease market, but I miss the corporate logos on rail cars. This car is truly and literally the beige among the rapidly disappearing GT blue, the UP yellow, and the rainbow Canadian grain car fleet.

OK, rant over. Incidentally, another photo of this very rail car is available on RRPictureArchives.NET.

CNA 385112

What's that in the top left corner?

CNA 385112 looks like a pretty ordinary 4740 cubic foot rail car, with external ribs, built in March 1972 and still sporting its ACI label. However... what's that in the top left of the car?

Aha! Cargill!

This was a Cargill car! Also note that it used to be NAHX 5xxx3 before CN acquired it.

These little details keep me watching the train after the locomotive(s) go by.

The FURX Cars

FURX FTW

I saw a string of these gray FURX cars on the train next. You can see they are three bay open top hopper cars, 2400 cubic feet. I can see external controls to open the doors, so they must be pneumatically controlled. I see the pistons to operate the doors and there are nozzles on the cars labelled "AIR". It's weird how the middle door is "C" and the "A" and "B" doors are on the ends.

FURX was First Union Rail, recently renamed to Wells Fargo Rail. It's another railcar and locomotive leasing company.

The 86 Foot Boxcars

PHRX 4794

The real "win" on the train for me was this pair of 86 foot boxcars, with the PHRX reporting mark. The PHRX reporting mark is owned by Premier Horticulture Ltd., a company founded in 1923 around sphagnum peat moss. Their head office is in Rivière-du-Loup (Québec).

I remember seeing 86 foot boxcars on the New Brunswick East Coast Railway in northern New Brunswick. There is a lot of peat moss on the Acadian peninsula, and in fact the former Caraquet and Gulf Shore Railway (and later CN Caraquet subdivision) hauled a lot of peat moss.

Eric Gagnon has an excellent article on 86 foot boxcars hauling peat moss.

PHLX 206036

I'm sure you noticed the locomotive...

CN 3826

CN 3826

This shiny locomotive, CN 3826, is one of the 260 new Evolution-series locomotives GE is building for CN to ease its power shortage. I imagine this was one of the first revenue runs, as the locomotive is still clean!

Shiny new loco

Note the CN Aboriginal Affairs logo that these new locomotives wear. I love how there are labels with tiny letters along the frame edge... someone is very optimistic that these will be readable! My guess is that they will become covered in grime and be unreadable within a month.

Canadian Grain Cars

A rainbow

There was a rainbow of Canadian grain cars near the tail end of the train to finish things off.

I hope you enjoyed this little rolling stock review. Let me know what you think in the comments!

Return to Snowflake

Snowflake, Manitoba

Recently someone asked me about the status of a caboose near La Rivière, Manitoba. This caboose was at the Archibald Museum, which is located northeast of the town. The museum closed in 2016 but it's not clear what happened to the collection. Time for a road trip!

I convinced my family that this was a good idea. My wife always wants some kind of destination, so we decided to have supper at GG's Drive Inn in Somerset. I read the reviews and it sounded like a good place.

Heading South

We hit the road after lunch on May 20th (a Sunday). This is the route we took.

Naturally I planned to return home by a different route. There were grain elevators to see!

I took a photo of the Pioneer grain elevator near Brunkild, because I had seen some work being done to it the last time I passed through. I think it was just track work but it's always good to document when you can!

Pioneer grain elevator near Brunkild

As we passed through Carman, I took a few photos of the yard area near Linear Grain. Linear's elevator is behind these two Cando / CEMR gondolas.

Cando gondolas in Carman, Manitoba

After we left Carman, we passed by Jordan's elevator en route to Morden and Manitou. I stopped in Manitou to take some photos of Boundary Trail's two GP9 locomotives, ex GT 4625 and ex CP 8208.

Boundary Trail locomotives in Manitou, MB

We carried on to La Rivière and immediately headed north. We headed north on route 242, which is a gravel road. The former museum is located a few kilometres outside town, basically in the middle of nowhere.

The Archibald Museum

I knew the museum was closed. My intention was to see what was left - from the grid roads around it - and see if I could spot the caboose.

I stopped by the former entrance and photographed a monument there. It documents the Wallcraft Homestead, founded in 1878.

As I finished doing that, one of the property owners drove up. I introduced myself and told her why I was there. I understand they are very concerned about vandalism and theft and I assured her I would be taking my photos from the road. We had a brief conversation and she left.

I didn't see the caboose, but I did take this long distance photo of the former La Rivière train station, which was moved here.

The former La Rivière train station

This station is fairly unique. It was built in 1898 and is the last Canadian Pacific plan #3 station remaining in Manitoba. Its mansard roof is a unique characteristic.

It's a shame it's not open to the public, but that's the choice of the owners.

There's a school marker nearby, which I wrote about in a guest post on Everybody Has To Be Somewhere. That's a blog you should read if you like abandoned places.

I mentioned that the town of Snowflake was pretty close. My wife was agreeable, so we turned south and drove there.

Snowflake

The grain elevators of Snowflake, Manitoba

Snowflake is my favourite Manitoba ghost town. It has two grain elevators and several interesting abandoned buildings. The Federal grain elevator is pretty special.

It isn't exactly a real ghost town, because there are a few houses still occupied. In fact, there was a sign on the highway directing people here for "FARM FRESH HONEY AND EGGS". I thought I heard music coming from this building.

Regardless, nobody was visible when we visited here.

The town has several old businesses along the main street, which is fairly unusual as these tend to get torn down as prairie towns decline.

A few of the buildings have prominent NO TRESPASSING signs on them.

After the CP Snowflake subdivision was abandoned in 1977, the town declined. The school closed in 1992 and the United Church closed in 1994. There is still a community centre building but I am not sure if it is still used.

There are markers for the church and school in the town, and the bell from the school is mounted on a stand. My children were happy to pose by it.

The Snowflake school bell

The stars of the town, from my point of view, are the two grain elevators.

Grain elevators in Snowflake, Manitoba

Note the spout on the silver elevator, hanging in mid-air.

I don't know what happened to the top of that bin!

The Federal elevator is looking a little worse than it did when I visited in 2014.

I never actually wrote about my trip to Snowflake on this blog. I did write about it in Ten Grain Elevator Towns on the Trackside Photographer site, and David Gagnon wrote about his visit to Snowflake in 1989.

As we drove north from Snowflake, we passed this little barn? elevator? which is located in a field near the highway.

It's looking a lot worse than it did in 2014.

Somerset

Somerset grain elevator complex

The two steel grain elevators at Somerset are looking good. These elevators are owned by Delmar Commodities, who moved one of these elevators from La Rivière to here when the CP La Rivière branch was being abandoned. At that time, Somerset was served by the Southern Manitoba Railway, but unfortunately the SMR folded and now Somerset has no rail service.

The elevator still has the La Rivière name on it.

There was a Delmar Commodities truck trailer near the elevators.

Delmar Commodities trailer

We went to GG's Drive Inn and had a great meal. I had this tasty burger and we shared some onion rings.

If you're ever in the Somerset area, drop in for a meal!

The Return Trip

CRGX 602 in Elm Creek, Manitoba

After our meal, we headed north to Rathwell, then headed east along highway 3 to Winnipeg. Along the way, I photographed the elevators in Elm Creek, Culross, Fannystelle and Starbuck in the sweet evening light.

Cargill grain elevator in Elm Creek, Manitoba

Paterson grain elevator in Culross, Manitoba

There was some work being done to the Culross elevator.

Note the small elevator to the left of the Viterra elevator, below.

Viterra grain elevator in Fannystelle, Manitoba

Pioneer grain elevator in Starbuck, Manitoba

Cargill, Paterson, Viterra and Pioneer - most of the big names in grain in Manitoba. I wrote a post about the grain elevators of the Glenboro subdivision back in 2014.

That was our trip to La Rivière and Snowflake. I like these trips... and we're taking another one in a few days to Boissevain. More grain elevator photos to come! ;)

You might want to read my marathon Southwest Manitoba Elevator Trip series to get ready! ;)

Railfanning and the Carman Fair

Rio Grande - really?

On Saturday July 15th our family traveled to Carman, Manitoba for the Carman County Fair. It was a lovely - if warm - day and we like going to these country fairs so the kids can ride on the midway rides without too much of a crowd.

The CEMR Carman Sub

We drove down on highway 3, paralleling the Central Manitoba Railway (CEMR) Carman subdivision for most of the trip. I noted cars at the Sanford grain elevator and some tank cars and a few ex Illinois Central ballast cars parked in Brunkild. At the Pioneer grain elevator outside Brunkild, there were some maintenance machines and an ex Amtrak ballast hopper working on the elevator tracks.

Carrying on down highway 3, the Sperling grain elevator was still gone (sigh) although there were tank cars stored in the village. The Homewood grain elevator is alive and well and the Carman warehouse had a lot of grain cars at it.

Stored potash cars and the fair

As we drove into Carman, I noted many potash cars stored in the town as well as a short CEMR train with two locomotives on it. I resolved to come back to that when we left.

The Fair

The fair was great - the kids had fun and my wife and I found the temperature and crowds quite tolerable. We ate supper there and the food prices were quite reasonable.

I saw one place advertising a schnitzel sandwich so I had to have that. It was greasy but tasty!

As you can see from the lead photo in this post, I couldn't help railfanning the toy train.

After we visited the petting zoo - very popular with the kids - we had ice cream and then hit the road. I decided to head back through Elm Creek / highway 2 to cover a different route.

CCGX 5202

On our way out, I stopped to photograph the CEMR train. It was not positioned for photography so I had to shoot a bit against the sun. Here's a photo I processed with HDR to get as much detail as I could.

CCGX 5202 and CEMR 5396 in Carman

The far locomotive is CEMR 5396, an ex CP SD40-2 that I have photographed many times. The near one, though, is new to me.

CCGX 5202 is an SD38AC originally built in 1971 for the Bessemer and Lake Erie Railroad as BLE 865. It was acquired by the Duluth, Missabe and Iron Range Railroad as DMIR 200 in early 1993 and retired in April 2008. It bounced around a couple of small companies and Cando Contracting acquired it in August 2015 (more info).

This loco has been painted in Cando's sharp "swoosh" scheme and looks quite nice. Note the "SD38AC" designation, the plaque "Rebuilt with pride by CEMR Winnipeg", and the Buzz Lightyear sticker.

That was nice to see. Hopefully I'll see it in better light soon.

Barnsley

On the way up highway 13 to Elm Creek, I stopped briefly to photograph the two lovely grain elevators in Barnsley. They looked very nice in the setting sun's light.

Barnsley Grain Elevators

Elm Creek Switching

As we approached Elm Creek, I could see the highway was blocked in the distance.. by grain cars! It turned out that the CPR was in town. I drove through town and found the head end at the wye.

Two of the new ECO units

The train had two of the rebuilt "ECO" units on it, CP 2238 and 2325. Again the sun was in the "wrong" spot so I did the best I could. I saw the conductor walking back to the locomotives, so I drove over the nearby crossing to avoid being trapped on the "wrong" side of the train.

The light was better on the other side..

CP in Elm Creek, Manitoba

If you squint you can see the Cargill unit about 2/3 of the way across the photo, near their grain elevator.

They started pulling, so I grabbed a photo I had been planning for a long time... the train by the giant fire hydrant.

CP 2238 and the giant fire hydrant in Elm Creek, MB

That hydrant is apparently the second largest in the world.

Homeward Bound

We headed home without waiting for the train, as it was getting late and I didn't want to push my luck with my family. We passed the lovely elevator in Culross - no cars - then Fannystelle - no cars - then Starbuck - cars - then back onto the Trans-Canada Highway and home.

This was essentially our route:

See Also

• Elevators of the Carman Subdivision
• A Grain Elevator Loop
• The CP Carman Subdivision

Finishing the Job: Part 4 - The Rivers Subdivision

This is part 4 of a series photographing grain elevators in Manitoba. (Back to the start, part 2, part 3, part 5)

After the two elevators of McConnell, I was abruptly returned to the present with the modern grain elevator at Oakner.

Oakner

Three tracks serve the Oakner elevator

The Oakner elevator is near mile 159 of the CN Rivers subdivision. This Cargill facility has a capacity of over 14,000 tonnes and has three tracks for loading grain. Unlike other Cargill elevators in Manitoba (Morris, Nesbitt/Page, Elm Creek, and Elva), Oakner doesn't have its own locomotive for switching.

Apparently Oakner and other Cargill facilities recently had PLC upgrades. A PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) is a kind of industrial computer that is used to monitor and control machinery. This is in the line of work that I do so I was interested to find this blurb from Delco Automation.

Beyond grain storage, the Oakner facility has a number of other outbuildings including fertilizer storage.

The extended Cargill facility in Oakner, MB

Sadly no trains came along.

There is not much of the town of Oakner remaining, just a few nearby buildings. I carried on.

Since the Rivers subdivision doesn't have a road running alongside it in the western part of the province, jumping from elevator to elevator meant driving L patterns across the landscape.

No direct routes..

All right, fine. Off I went to Norman.

Norman

Selfie at Norman

This elevator stands alone in the middle of nowhere, essentially. There is nothing around the elevator at all.

This is a former UGG grain elevator now operated by Canada Malting Ltd. It looks like a close relative of another Canada Malting elevator in Mariapolis. At least Norman has rail service from CN.

This is one of the newest wooden grain elevators in Manitoba. It was built in 1983 and started operating in 1984.

I parked nearby and took a few photos. As I was walking around, I heard a distant train horn. Finally - a train!

I set up the tripod with my iPhone on it, and stood by to snap pictures. It turned out to be a westbound CN intermodal train led by CN 8961 and 2230.

My Civic was photobombing

I was happy to stay a few minutes and shoot this train as it rolled past.

Shiny!

I think there was someone working on this Saturday as there was a pickup truck at the elevator and I could hear some machinery working.

This elevator has a capacity of 5,500 tonnes and has a single track with 23 car spots for loading and storage. Canada Malting's site has a page on it.

The siding at Norman

Note the Oakner grain elevator is just visible on the horizon at right.

After Norman, it was time for the namesake of the CN subdivision.

Rivers

The town of Rivers is a fairly busy place, with a population of a little over a thousand people. CN is front and centre with the namesake CN Rivers subdivision running through the town, and CN has a bunkhouse next to the former station.

In the photo below you can see the grain elevator with the train station visible at far right.

The town of Rivers, Manitoba

There are a pair of wooden grain elevators in town, labelled as Cargill and sharing a common driveway. It does not appear that Cargill still operates this elevator as it is not in Cargill's list of facilities.

It appears that one was built in 1951 by National Grain and one was built in 1957 by UGG.

I spotted a lonely CN 8918 sitting near the west end of the town. I'm not sure why it was there but it was nicely placed for a roster photo.

I checked out the train station in Rivers. It looks like it is owned by VIA but appearances are deceiving.

The train station in Rivers, Manitoba

Notice that the station is not in great shape. The Rivers Train Station Restoration Committee has not posted on their blog since June 2014; however, I see they have received a $50,000 grant to repair the roof this summer and will receive $25,000 from CN for a "loco-labyrinth" / RV park.

This is the actual VIA train station shack.

Luxury accommodations in Rivers! 

Basically it is unstaffed and the passengers are on their own. VIA's web site strongly recommends that you reserve at least 24 hours in advance, and you have to bring your own luggage to the baggage car. This kind of stop used to be called a "flag stop" but I'm pretty sure you can't flag the train down any more.

The CN bunkhouse is right beside the station.

CN bunkhouse, Rivers

There is a CN boxcar and caboose on display nearby, as part of a park. Maybe the loco-labyrinth will be near here?

CN 73664 and CN 79528 in Rivers, Manitoba

I thought about getting take-out at the local Chinese food restaurant but decided that would take too long, so I bought a sub at a convenience store. While I was there, an intermodal train rolled through town but I saw the tail end of it.

A CN engineer recognized me when I poked my head into the restaurant and messaged me on Facebook, so I went back to say hello and finally meet him in person. Hi Christopher!

I would be back on the Rivers subdivision one more time this day when I visited Quadra. The other grain elevators in Manitoba on or beside the CN Rivers subdivision are at Elie, Bloom, Gregg, Harte, Justice and Knox and I had visited all of those before.

That was it for Rivers... it was time to leave active tracks again and head for nearby Bradwardine and beyond.

Read on!