In case anyone cares, “L’Orignal” translates to 'The Moose."
Balt-- Sudbury has a great deal of outcrop naturally . Glaciers scroured them to a polish and left numerous striations . Multiple times. There was a thin layer of Laurentide drift left as overburden from the waters of melting glaciers.
Sudbury’s incredible massive sulphide deposits were exposed and revealed when the CPR blasted thru outcrop as they built their main lines.
Prospectors came in swarms and blasted all the outcrop in the basin with giant water monitors , removing the thin overburden and the brush that struggled to grow there. This was a common method of removing overbuden and exposing rock. Still is .
The early years of smelting were pretty bad but that that did not last long. Very large and high smokestacks dispersed the emissions high in the atmosphere. Although built later in 1970 the superstack at 1250 feet was the tallest of them all.
In the centre of the basin is rich farmland located in a bowl, no outcrops, and is a major source of mixed crops, potatoes, dairy and horse breeding farms.
It is a common misconception that the barren nature of Sudbury was due to environmental problems caused by thoughtless men. This fact is reported ad nauseum.
There is a problem with heavy metals such as lead contamination despite the stacks. Modern day scrubbers and curtailed production have reached a point where the super stack is no longer needed.
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Remember - my pass through the area was in 1959 - long before climate and pollution had come into the common vocabulary. I lived in Akron through much of the 1960’s - the ‘perfume’ of the rubber companies let you know you were in Akron. Lived in Pittsburgh in the middle 50’s - the light show one got to see as the B&O trains we traveled on for family visits back Baltimore were better than any of todays ‘laser shows’; of course those shows created more pollution than lasers.
Back in the ‘olden days’ we thought the Earth could withstand any indignity we throw at it - and the Earth can; however, humankind is much more fragile than the Earth - will we create our own ‘mass extinction’?
What I don’t understand is why CN hasn’t pulled out of Ottawa yet. They have given adequate notice, so why continue running 589? CN is pulling the trigger on the Cayuga sub, giving the customers their notice and moving quickly to abandon the track. Why not do it here?
Also, just want to point this out, but CN really is a trucker’s best friend with all this business they are handing over.
Just speculating here, it may be that the Ottawa-area lines are still considered safe to run on, and have a bit of life left before extensive track maintenance is required.
The portion of the Cayuga Sub in question has multiple large bridges which have likely suffered from deferred maintenance for years.
CN now owns TransX and H&R Transport, in addition to their own internal trucking division (CNTL), whose big rigs are painted just like the locomotives.
You recall correctly, Ottawa Union Station was located on the east bank of the Rideau Canal, in view of the Parliament buildings. Tracks ran underneath the Chateau Laurier, on their way to CP’s north shore lines via the Alexandra Bridge. The coach yards and mail/express/LCL handling facilities and team tracks were just south of Union Station.
Multiple large pulp/paper/lumber mills were clustered around Chaudiere Falls, just upstream of the Parliament buildings. One mill was immediately across the river.
All of this is gone now. The Union Station building is still there, but has not seen a train since 1966, when passenger operations were relocated to the current station, and all tracks in downtown Ottawa were removed.
This is what I was referring to in my earlier post about Ottawa not having much rail-suited freight anymore.
There has been minimal, if any freight activity west of the Thurso area since 2010, when Resolute Forest Products closed their large Gatineau plant. It later reopened, but at much reduced capacity.
The last train to use the Prince of Wales Bridge was in 2007, when Domtar closed their Gatineau mill. This was also the last operating mill at the Chaudiere Falls.
The bridge is now owned by the City of Ottawa, which has reversed course and now intends to turn it into a cycling/multi-use trail, instead of using it for a future LRT/Commuter rail line.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ottawa-gatineau-prince-of-wales-bridge-1.5296186
Ottawa Left Again.
There was another line into Ottawa from the South which was lifted c. 1937, it’s Right of Way plainly visible from then Route 17.
It was abandoned in chunks, and it was once possible to travel from Ottawa to Quebec City by rail, as here.
http://www.trha.ca/trha/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/GNRMap1901.jpg
Bridge over Ottawa River.
http://images.ourontario.ca/PrescottRussell/2302148/data
Station Hawkesbury.
http://www.trha.ca/trha/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/HawkesburyCNoR1900sjpg-768x470.jpg
http://www.trha.ca/trha/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/HawkesburyBridgeGNRoC1905-768x483.jpg
The bridge was removed c 1962 when constructing the Carillon Dam.
Carillon Dam.
https://www.google.ca/maps/@45.5627178,-74.3896878,8740m/data=!3m1!1e3
MUCH more, here.
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Less than 5 years ago, CN invested almost a million dollars to rehab the Cayuga sub. It is in decent shape. The question is, if they are losing money on daily operations in Ottawa, why not leave? They could fulfill their service obligations by paying for trucking for the customers. The only explanation I can think of would be that CN wants to operate in Ottawa, but is looking to transfer ownership of the tracks to other parties to save on maintenance.
What is troubling though is that Ottawa still handles at least somewhere in the region of 1000 carloads per year. To just walk away from that business is troubling and shows that rail in Canada just isn’t doing well.
1000 carloads a year is less than three carloads per day, hardly a major source of traffic.
1000 carloads is a very low end estimate, there is almost certainly more than that. Either way, 1000 carloads isn’t nothing, and it shouldn’t be walked away from. The Ivaco mill is a rather large operation, and so is Rideau Bulk. They should be able to make a profit on this, especially since they don’t have to maintain much track, and the track that they do own, is rather cheap to maintain as it is flat, with few crossing and no bridges.
A couple million is about the amount you would spend to replace the worst, and only the worst ties on a line of that length, and maybe buy some ballast and fund a few urgent repairs.
If the bridges require significant work at least one zero, maybe two, needs to be added to the maintenance budget.
The deferred maintenance probably would have started when CN still owned the Cayuga Sub, and would have continued under Trillium.
I was going to comment on this earlier, but forgot.
These lines have something in common: They all once hosted large amounts of through traffic, which has since disappeared for a variety of reasons. And the remaining local traffic has declined to the point where they are no longer profitable.
The Cayuga Sub and Ottawa Valley lines can be discussed together, since they have both suffered greatly from the decline of manufacturing in North America over the past 50 years. The Cayuga Sub also formerly hosted Wabash (later N&W, then NS) through freights between Detroit and Buffalo. When Wabash became part of N&W along with the Nickel Plate, most of this through traffic moved south of the border, which also avoided the costly and time-consuming Detroit River ferries.
What is now the Huron Central Railway was once part of a CP-Soo through route from Montreal to the Twin Cities, and ultimately to the CP transcontinental mainline in western Saskatchewan. The key industries along this route were mining, forestry, and the massive steel mill at Sault Ste Marie, all of which have declined in recent years. And the through traffic disappeared many years ago.
The section of the former BC Rail in question, between Exeter and Squamish, is Canada’s Tennessee Pass. It is a tough piece of railroad, traversing rugged territory that is prone to rockslides while also having 2%+ grades in both directions, including the torturous Kelly Lake Hill north of Lillooet, which I believe is the longest sustained grade over 2% in North America, at over 30 miles if I recall correctly. It is no wonder that CN diverted most through traffic between Prince George and Vancouver away from this route.
The real crime here is the manner in which BC Rail was sold to CN (officially it’s a very long te
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Cannot freight service to Ottawa be maintained by CN and/or CP using VIA-owned trackage? Like P&W, NS, and CSX on Amtrak?
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Ottawa without rail freight service? Well, Annapolis, Capitol of Maryland, home of the USA Naval Academy, parallel, without freight or passenger service.
That is P&W, NS, and CSX on Amtrak’s NEC.
Also maintained or restored freight service to Ottawa.
Freight service to Annapolis, MD, was via the Baltimore and Annapolis, earlierl the Baltimore Washington and Annapolis. 1948 photo in Annapolis:
CN gets to the Ottawa area from Montreal with running rights on the VIA-owned Alexandria Sub (which VIA bought after CN tried to abandon it some years ago). The lines up for abandonment only see freight, and not much if the carloading numbers are to be believed.
It is actually fairly substantial, and a shortline could easily do well in Ottawa. What surprises me is that the Hawkesbury spur is being abandoned, as the Ivaco mill is not only quite large, but also could easily be serviced from Coteau. In addition, Nylene Canada in Arnprior owns and maintains the track from Ottawa to their plant because they would not be able to bring caprolactam to their plant any other way. If there is no freight railroad in Ottawa, they could be forced to shut down.
The question I have, is if CN wants to end operations in the city, why haven’t they filed a formal notice of discontinuance and stopped running 589? If they don’t want the business in Ottawa and the lines are reclassified to discontinue, why keep running there for nearly 2 years? Why have they not picked up their ball and gone home?
Here’s a pretty good Canadian rail map:
https://rac.jmaponline.net/canadianrailatlas/
From ‘flying over’ the route on Google Earth it appears that Nylene is the only rail customer left west of Maxville (save for occasional equipment moves to Ottawa Transit and the National Research Council), unless there is transloading going on at Walkley Yard. That’s a long, long way to go for just one customer, even if VIA and the customer own and maintain the track such a run would require a dedicated crew.
The fact that CN is still operating here means that Nylene will be getting charged an arm and a leg for this service, and as long as they continue to be fine with paying the rate this operation should continue.
I suspect CN may put some of these lines on the list simply to hedge their bets around future declines in traffic, to squeeze customers for higher rates, or to try and ‘encourage’ local municipalities to buying them.
You’ll notice that the Foothills and Mountain Park Subdivisions are also on the list, this is the Alberta Coal Branch. Despite the planned shutdown of one of the two coal mines this year those lines will still host a healthy amount of unit train traffic for decades to come. I’m sure CN has no real intention of abandoning them, and yet they are on the list.
Ottawa is a large city with minimal industry but a substantial consumer market just the same. A population of a million plus does consume alot… not sure why CN or CP couldn’t tap into the substantial inbound freight volumes. Trucking to Ottawa is expensive due to the lack of outbound volumes… rates have to include a bounce to a better freight area… and that ain’t Montreal. I move loads out of the GTA to Ottawa occasionally… and I always quote it round trip. Sometimes… rarely enough… I do get something out of there and it works out well, but most of the time I’m glad just to get an empty truck back out.
Sometimes operational cuts are self perpetuating… i.e if Ottawa had a robust rail presence with robust backoffice sales support there likely would be alot of freight at least moving into the City. Build it and they will come? Maybe keep it… build it up and hire good freight sales people to sell sell sell…
Just to be clear…all tracks are NOT being removed through Ottawa. VIA owns most of the 230km route now from near Coteau on CN’s Montreal<>Toronto mainline…through Ottawa…onto Smith’s Falls then down the former CP line to return to the CN mainline again at Brockville. VIA has extensively rebuilt this route and is only going to see a continuing increase in service.
The Ottawa Station was relocated back in 1966 to a then suburban location about 2 miles from downtown and now is one of VIA’s easiest to reach from all parts of the city. It’s located on the new LRT line and before that was on the Bus Rapid Transit system. It also has it’s own freeway interchange and lots of parking.
