Not much railroad activity in Vermont. I did see the Green Mountain line. There was a spectacular trestle at Ludlow, Vt, but there were no trains. Montpelier offered the Amtrak service, but motivation wasnt strong enough to pull me to the depot at 10am.
At Barre there was an old Balwin locomotive on display, but not much else. Nor were there any trains on the mountaintop we stayed at (with hippies).
Today we moved from Vermont to Portland, Me and passed thru Crawfords Notch, NH.
Wow. What a pass for the B&M back in the day. At Bartlet, NH, I was fortunate to see a Conway Scenic passenger train heading up to the Notch. It looked pretty good with old GP and several passenger cars with a dome car.
Obviously there is no freight service on that line these days. Who can provide a little info on Crawfords Notch and the operations there in the past?
It was Maine Central through the Notch. But, if you are in Maine and don’t visit any of the three or all three narrow gauge operations, shame on you. One, right there on the waterfront in Portland. Two up above Wiscassett, the WW&F. and three up at Phillips on the Sandy River. The one in downtown Portland is was not a narrow gauge but a standard gauge with the rails brought together…but their museum is excellent and their equipment real. Sandy River and Rangley Lakes RR at Phillips is out of the way but so seminal it has to be ridden especially to the shops for a complete tour. And the WW&F is the most extensive and developed of the three with a great ride and fantastic equipment and operating shops. If you’ve never liked narrow gauge, you are in for a surprise. If you’ve ever liked narrow gauge, you will love it.
Some of the basics: It’s on the ex-MC line from Portland to St. Johnsbury, where it connects to the CP, and at one time to the SJ&LC. Bartlett was the helper base for the Notch. A little bit north of the Notch, it famously crossed the B&M at Whitefield, NH, at a crossing protected by the last active ball signal. In classic passenger days, B&M and MC ran a joint train from Boston, that B&M handed off to MC near North Conway. Last I heard, most of the ex-MC track is still in place. I rode the Conway Scenic notch train about 10 years ago when it was headed by a matching pair of F units.
Yes. Crawford Notch. MEC line is intact to St. J. but not in use beyond Whitefield crossing. The tracks around Whitefield used by a local railroad whose name escapes me but I believe the B&M track is gone at least south of Whitefield. The ball signals at Whitefield are intact and preserved but not in use at this time as the MEC line toward St. J is used for storage rather than operations.
Thanks for info. It is an amazing piece of railroading. We pulled off of US302 a couple of times for photos and I am not sure that riding the rails up there on the ledge would have been my idea of an enjoyable ride.
Maybe next time out here I will look into the ball signals.
Yes, I should have said MEC. I live in Michigan, and I guess I had MC (the old Michigan Central) on my mind.
I thought the line thru the notch was called the Mountain Division, and a quick check of wiki confirmed that. They also note that MaineDOT owns the line in Maine, which is railbanked. I remember seeing on a previous trip, that the rails had been pulled just east of the Conrail Scenic connection, however, a check of Google shows that the rails are in place and even look freshly ballasted. Beyond that the rails don’t look at all brush overgrown, like you might expect after 30 years out of service.
I have a blog post that includes chasing a train up Crawford Notch in 1978. I posted it Feb 2012. There are pix and some info there - mostly of the railfan variety.
If I remember right, the MEC crew actually overnighted in the caboose at the end of the run before taking the next day’s train back down. The line north of Crawford Notch was controlled by a log book - one train at a time. The crew hopped off at the station, signed in and then would sign out the next day on the way back.
I just noticed this morning that the “TRACKSIDE” column on page 64 of the July 2014 issue of Trains (the one with the modern streetcar cover and lead article) is about New Hampshire excursion railroads - “Great Granite State Getaways” by Justin Franz (1 page).
The crew was probably signing the register book. I worked train order and timetable territory 30+ years ago. At stations designated in the timetable, the conductor was required to check the register book to see if all superior trains had passed. He was also required to sign the register book, recording the train and locomotive number, date and time and his name (maybe the hogheads name, too. Can’t remember.).
I think these books were also at manned agencies for when the operator was not on duty. I bet Balt ACD can give you the whole story!
