went railfanning in dale today on the CN Neenah sub.
well where i watch from is in a town park & its public property well i was walkin throguh the parking lot to the rd to look up the tracks signal lights & it showed green so that ment one was comming. well i was standing about 9 ft away from the tracks & a CN truck pulls up & the guy gets out & comes up to me & ask " what are you doing here" & i said i was railfanning & then the guy was starting to get all pissy & rude at me & he says well i saw ya earlier screwin around in this parking lot ( i wasnt screwin around) & then he started goin that i was on rr property & i said well im fine where im standi ng & he siad no your no cuase the only place you will be standing is behind this pole. so then he left so i did. i stood on the bike path the whole time i was their. this was a MOW guy too. last week when i was here the same thing happened but a different guy & it was in the same spot. ya last week i talked to some other mow guys & they were nice & knew that i was here to watch trains. this is the first time its ever happened to me & both the guys were older guys too that yelled at me. after the guy left i could hear him talkin on his phone so i wasnt sure about what but no one came by later. just more MOw guys & thank god not the same guy.
ya i think cn has camers around their somwhere but i havent seen any. but i mean i was on town property so i wasnt in their property. next time i should stand in the creek their & if they come up i should say this isnt your creek so what can you do? i just got pissed off cause it happened twice at the only spot i can afford to go to at the time.
In my hometown one young man has died and another seriously injured by hanging around the tracks and playing “chicken”. This seems to be happening fairly regularly.
I hear the dispatcher/crew conversations in which they discuss people hanging around the tracks…I think everyone is a bit sensitive right now. They have a job to do and want to make sure everyone is safe when the day is done.
My solution is a BIG zoom lens and pick a spot somewhere else to intercept that train in the wild away from populated areas. I try to avoid shooting if I see strangers or others around line of sight.
I even buried the camcorder inside a bush a few feet from the track and use a remote to actuate it from a parking lot inside my car. Fat lot of good that did… too much “Blast”.
Another stragety was to go to a friendly location like a railroad museum, pay em a few dollars admission and shoot trains from their property all the day. Or another place that has a friendly owner willing to allow such activity without railroad oversight.
They are getting sensitive to this activity and they should. I remember long ago I would shoot from the back deck of my tractor out west while the engineer kindly held the train steady for a few moments. I got some good shots despite a pathetic 35 mm disposible.
BTW, 9 feet is WAAAAAAY too close to the tracks. Back up some. You do not want to be hit by a piece of hanging banding, or a piece of wood hanging off a flatcar, among other things.
Even if you were on public property - that is still too close to the tracks if a train is near.
I was approached by the CN yardmaster in Williams Lake last month and was very politely told where I could and could not stand. He was very nice and quite helpful, no issues from me.
Part of my work is safety around heavy equipment (logging) and I know the dangers. I also know to respect the property rights of others. In Canada, the railway r/w is way more than 9 feet from the track, is this not so in the US as well? And as mentioned, 9’ is waaaayyyy too close for safety, it would freak the crew out for sure.
The Metra station in Mundelein has the majority of the platform within 9 feet of tracks and a decent amount of freight traffic. Something hanging off even 8 feet would clean out most of the people standing behind the yellow, just like they ask. I’m not saying that people should hang out close to the tracks, but how often does something hang out 9 feet off the track?
I wouldn’t want to be the one who finds out. Even at those stations it may be a good idea to step back. All you would need is a banding strap off a lumber car.
I’m not saying that people should hang out close to the tracks, but how often does something hang out 9 feet off the track?
Tell this to someone who got hit by something from a train, I am sure he would love to hear that in all probability nothing was going to hit him. [swg]
This as an argument, is like the skunk and bulldog fight. [:-^]
My advice to B.Erdmann is to watch trains from a sideroad just on the west edge of Dale (right across from the Dale Gas Co.) I go to Dale quite often and watch from that road, it is a dead end and has a guard rail at the end of the road that is close (more than 9’) and gives a good view of the mainline and siding. You are not on RR property and not interfering with any other vehicles or people. Plus from there you can see the south/east bound signal. It is a good spot. [2c]
If someone continues to hassle you after you have tried to explain you are only railfanning my advice is to back off, move on and find another spot to do your train watching. They may easily have confused you with one of the many vandals who hang around railroads these days and get their kicks from damaging railroad property and equipment. On the other hand they may simply be having a bad hair day and and are venting their frustations on you. A long time ago I was told by someone I considered very wise “that everyone gets wet in a p–sing contest” so don’t engage in one.
Agreed. Once while sitting trackside, a good distance back, I saw three or four lumber cars come up with straps flyin’ all over the place and bouncing off the road bed. I have always kept my distance for others sake as well as my own! I sure don’t want one those things catching my side. Even if you are on “Public Property”, you still have to use commonsense…
As kids we almost lived on the tracks, we would sit on double bridges as steam locomotives roared by, not more than 5 feet away , one instance a fast freight hauling rail had some break loose and were dragging along the R/W when they hit the bridge (opposite us) they came loose and slid down the tracks snapping off the rail connectors but not the spikes, we reported it right away and not as much as a thank you from the railway.
ROW (Right Of Way) Safety Training, in the Boston Area, dictates a “Foul Zone” 15 feet from the outside track. Anyone entering the Zone (“Fouling the Right of Way”) must have Hard Hat, Safety Shoes, and Vest. If working, Flagman and Radios. When crossing near a Standing Train you must maintain 10 foot clearence.
Out here in the wide open spaces the railroad right-of-way extends 50 feet on either side except when in a major metropolitan area such as Tucson, Arizona. The railroad has fenced their property lines to keep livestock and other large animals off the track, and there are cattle guards in locations where paved or heavily traveled roads cross the tracks.
Wow, that’s for sure. I once was watching trains from the Amtrak station platform in Rochester NY when a fast-moving freight blasted through. Sure enough, a lumber car had a broken metal strap dragging alongside and seeing / hearing it coming, I got far back from the tracks. The platform is lined with old RR ties and this strap took out HUGE chunks of wood as it went flying by…
It also seems to me that I can see the train a whole lot better if I am back distance. Maybe it is just my eyesight that makes a difference. [:D] [sigh]
I hear reports all the time on my police scanner about kids playing chicken. The police are always being calledon this. My son is an officer and he said some kids started gangs and you have to play chicken with a freight train to ghet into the gang. One night they caught six kids in the middle of a 1300ft trestle over ariver. It was single track with no stepoffs. They would all have been killed if a train came through .
In my years of railfanning, I have only had one instance where I was asked to leave. I was railfanning the IC in Centralia. I was on public prperty, and a CN/IC maintenance man approached me and asked me to leave because there was a major gas leak in the yard and he was concerned with my safety.
He appologized at length. I was astonished at how polite he was–as I would have just left if he asked me to with out giving an excuse.
He even told me that, if I hurry, I can catch Amtrak backing up for a few miles to that the Edgewood cutoff and bypass the gas leak. He said the Edgewood cutoff would be a good hotspot because of the necessary reroutings.
I miss the good old days when you could walk on the right of way, approach trains in siddings, and get rides from a friendly engineer. But, I can’t say for a minute that someone from the railroad has ever been inappropriate.
When we are railfanning at Eola, we generally stay a very respectable distance from the tracks…say about thirty to fifty feet…that way we don’t invite trouble or danger and the BNSF employees don’t ever hassle us (they know most of us for years and actually are very nice to us and wave and from time to time we have altered them to trouble on trains or in the yard which they appreciate).