Sept. 2011 Local Action

Photos by Dave Ingles

September local action begins on the 2nd with a routine shot of CN local L504 returning from Burlington, into Waukesha at Grand Avenue, junction with the Wisconsin & Southern, with engine IC 9562 (an ex-GM&O GP38-2) and 6 cars at 3:50 p.m.

On Sept. 4th we drive to visit Illinois Railway Museum (see separate file), and from Sept. 8 thru Sept. 13, we are in Illinois (see separate file). The next day, needing a break from unpacking/reorganizing, etc., at home, I take a short spin out in mid-afternoon. North of Duplainville, a CN train is in the siding and soon begins creeping south, so I do a U-turn and glimpse his power nearing the diamond. For once it's worth shooting, so I speed down to Joseph Road, a dead-end street just south of Duplainville, for this nice sequence of what I guess is train #446, behind CN 8932/BCOL 4621/IC 1001, at 4:36 pm.

This is CN #446, which begins a short saga on Sept. 15th. In town on errands, I see CN is lined up for a southbound, so I go south to the Amron siding switch in the south end of Waukesha and wait . . . and wait . . . and wait, for more than 45 minutes. Nothing. As soon as I start for home, the RTC (Rail Traffic Controller, i.e., dispatcher) comes on the radio and I learn this guy is in town and coming at me, and will meet 3 freights plus the local at the next two sidings south. This is 8944/2324 with 141 cars at 2:46 p.m.

With the light better on CN up to the north, and Amtrak #8, the eastbound Empire Builder, running about 90 minutes late (a big improvement for him over recent times!) and thus expected thru Duplainville about 3:15, I head up there. After checking the signal north of Dupy to make sure no other southbound CN's are coming, I head west to get #8 and wind up in the office park at MP 103 for this "different angle." I am tipped off by the MP 108 detector that extra cars are on #8, and they turn out to be an Iowa Pacific full-length dome and PV Gritty Palace, which has been around for decades. Engines 175/161 with 14 cars at 3:17 p.m. I believe the initials on Gritty Palace are GNW&B, which stand for Going Nowhere & Back.

Meanwhile, the first of the CN northbounds, stack train #193, is at hand, so here he is at Weyer Road, about MP 104.5, with 2604/2593, at 3:33. I do not hear the axle count from CN's MP 108 detector.

Here's where the saga sours a bit. The second northbound CN is local L504, which I don't need to shoot, but a necessary pit stop away from the tracks keeps me from doing so anyway, and his light engine is returning south from this spot by the time I'm back to trackside. Knowing this WPSX coal load is coming north as the third train on CN, I wait at Weyer Road for a good shot, but with a mental cutoff time of 4:10 because that would mean he was being held for Amtrak #7 to go thru Duplainville on the CP first, as #7 was on-time, which meant "Dupy" at 4:15. At 4:10 I go, but I get less than a half mile down the road when I see the headlight of the coal train anyway (drat!) so I make a U-turn and speed back to MP 105 for this half-baked shot (and no slide). It's UP 5846/6377 SP Patch up front on probably 135 cars, tho I do not confirm a count. Then it's off toward Dupy, noting the DPU on this train as UP 5713 as I fly by. I hadn't seen one of these trains in months. But sure enough, I see Amtrak #7 go across the road about a city block in front of me at 4:15. Fortunately his consist is normal, nothing to worry about. But on top of that, CN #341 has gotten closer to me than I know about and he and I pass each other unseen (but soon heard on the scanner) on the outskirts of Waukesha. So I slink on home -- it's not often I bat around .500 on local things in one session, shooting 4, one not ideally, and missing 3.

Saturday, Sept. 17th began sunny but deteriorated, so here's the only shot of the day, Amtrak #8 at Pewaukee about an hour and a quarter late, engines 12/116 at 3:03 p.m.

Two days later, Monday. Sept 19th, was nice so after leaving the office I wound up with a flurry of 4 trains in less than 90 minutes, beginning with this late Amtrak #8, at Milepost 100 in Brookfield, east of Duplainville, at 4:10 p.m., engines 194/119 with 14 cars, including 3 PV's on the end, and friend Craig Willett at the throttle.

The PV's are MKT business car 103, Caritas, and Iowa Pacific's ex-Santa Fe dome, the Nenana, which will be renamed and sent to a tourist line later in the  year.

A CP coke train, symboled #857, is next, at Duplainville at 4:22, engine 9592.

Amtrak #7 is next, running about 40 minutes late behind units 192/125 with 2 DOT cars at the rear, 4:55 p.m. He's on track 2 to go by the empty coke train, which has stopped at the end of two main tracks in Pewaukee.

The slide was better, weeds are bad this time of year for this angle.

A half hour later, a CN southbound shows up, units 5617/2604 with 111 cars, crossing Spring Creek along Duplainville siding at 5:25 p.m.

This shot of #8 on Sept. 29 finishes local action for this month, coming by the Pewaukee Lakefront in the village of Pewaukee, 3:09 p.m. (1:30 late or so), engines 5/131. The depot-like building on the lakefront, at left, was built to look like the old Milwaukee Road passenger station, which stood just behind (to the east of) my vantage point here, and of course the main line was double track in those days. It came down in the early 1970's. The lakefront building houses public restrooms and a small to-go cafe which operates in the summer when the beach is crowded.

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