Welcome to the Month of June everyone. Once again business was brisk throughout last month even though the weather has been improving at a steady clip for most of us. The girls have had a bonsor month in the tip department so let’s continue to help keep a smile on their faces through June, shall we?
In case you haven’t guessed it yet by the above photo, this month we will be focusing on commuter trains as suggested by our friend, Paul (South_Bank_Terminal)
Anything from any era on rails, used to move the working class to and from the daily grind. We may see some really oddball stuff and/or things we have not seen before. We may get glimpses of cities and town’s from around the world through photos and videos ranging from decades past to modern day automated systems.
First round is on the house. Did someone mention rum?
Thanks for the Diner move, Brent! Smooth as silk as usual! Itook the liberty of changing the category from General to Model Railroader General Discussion
My favorite ‘locally grown’ commuter train was the Erie Lackawanna run from Cleveland to Youngstown, Ohio that ran even a few months into the Conrail era!
During ‘my’ years it ran with an E8 and four smooth-side coaches:
Good morning, diners. Just coffee, Flo – it’s donut day!
May went quickly for me. Old age?
One of the great pleasures of living in New Orleans was the streetcar system. Even though it is a shadow of it’s former self, the city has built new lines in recent years.
This system is not one you ride if you are in a hurry. The Big Easy doesn’t believe speed is necessary.
This is a photo of a streetcar on the original line, the St. Charles streetcar. It travels the length of St. Charles and turns onto Carrolton Ave, where it reverses and make the trip back downtown. (In New Orleans, uptown is up river and downtown is downriver.)
Sadly, there are no streetcars in the French Quarter. The Desire Streetcar line on Bourbon and Royal Streets was gone by the time I began school there.
Hi Brent, thankyou for starting the Diner off for June, with the theme of Suburban Trains.
Here is the ‘Last Interurban’, the fabulous, one and only “South Shore Line”.
This railroad was my first ever catch of street-running by full size Trains and I was spell-bound by it.
The South Shore has undergone dramatic changes more recently, but this was always one of my favourite views, running past the red-brick church with the green roof - all gone now.
Evening Flo, I’ve just recently had my tea, please could I have a bottle of Pilsner Urquell, thank you.
I managed some decent Model Railroad time today, working on Layout modifications around the two corners given over to South Bank Station and the theme Pub.
Here’s a photo of the Tyne and Wear Metro near Wallsend Station, North Tyneside, which is 4 miles east of Newcastle-upon-Tyne and also the eastern end of Hadrian’s Wall.
It was once the site of the Roman fort ‘Segedunum’, which protected the Wall.
The Metro was conceived in the early 1970s. Construction began in 1974 and officially opened on August 11, 1980.
Since then, it has expanded, including extensions to Newcastle Airport in 1991 and Sunderland in 2002.
The Metro, incorporated existing railway infrastructure wherever possible. When it was first developed, several disused railway lines were repurposed to form part of the network.
The proposed Metro extension to Washington aims to utilize parts of the ‘Leamside Line’, which has been out of use for decades.
And just for fun, have a good evening, everyone. Paul.
Ended up seeing a few friends this weekend and even exploring an abandoned rail line that leads to the Recently completed MBTA South Coast Rail extension. This weekend I also ended up getting a Bachmann Spectrum D8-40C, that had been dropped on it’s chassis and split apart about a year ago - Fully back up and running! The next time i’m messing with this is a DCC install at this point LOL. I also traded w/ my friend for 2 Bachmann Megadomes and some Walther’s Budd Cars for my OCS Train. However, The Dash 8 did come at a cost. A Bachmann F40PH I got was thee victim of a terrible DCC attempt, one that basically wrote off the unit. One side of it’s also my screw holder. I also created a camera car for my GoPro using an Athearn Blue Box dome car. ended up returning to 3D modelling as well. I nearly crashed tinkercad with 220 ties (With plates) About 5100 seperate shapes!
On the topic of Commuter trains…
My grandfather as a kid would commonly see U-Boats and earlier engines hustling EL Commuter trains. I also have a long history with the MBTA. I think the first time I saw one was at… 3? I think… Memory’s blanking. But there’s an image of young me next to an F40PH-2C with my grandfather. I have fond memories of standing with him at a local restaurant that used to be a station, under 10 feet from the roughly 60mph line! Thinking about it I think I was always destined to like trains. LOL.
Our town’s depot, built by the A&GW RR in 1875, had its 150th birthday yesterday. Since 1880 everyone has called it the Erie depot. Our local historical society bought the building from Conrail before they could turn it into a parking lot and completely renovated it; the main part has been a restaurant since 1980.
It’s difficult to exaggerate this iconic building’s importance to our town; its restoration/renovation was the catalyst for the re-building of the downtown. Millions of dollars have been invested in new buildings.
Yesterday over 600 people showed up to celebrate. The high school band was there playing music of the 1870’s, a special coloring book made for the occasion was given to children, there were 3 enormous cakes that were devoured, the ABC Ry. (a W&LE subsidiary) parked a locomotive and display train next to the depot, there were some people in period costumes, a special plaque was dedicated in the lobby, a few short speeches were made, and a Councilman read a fine resolution from the City proclaiming yesterday to be Erie Depot Day in Kent. All in all, it was a brilliant event.Yes, this is still a town that is proud of its railroads (the ABC, which uses the former Erie’s tracks), CSX and the W&LE. I’m glad to say my first book Railroad Town: Kent and the Erie Railroad (2011) sold like hotcakes. There were any number of old rails and railfans present.
The b/w photo shows the depot about 1955 with school kids going to Akron for the day. Notice the locomotive number–833, the famous E8, still in existence and now back in its original colors, after serving on the Cleveland - Youngstown trains and then as 4022, the locomotive that hauled Conrail’s business train.
Good morning, everyone. I’ll have bacon, eggs, bacon, coffee, and bacon please.
When I worked in New Orleans, our school was facing Canal Street. It was a great situation because when the students had a trip to the symphony or to the museums, we just took the classes out the front door of the school to catch the system to the French Quarter.
The red streetcars you see on Canal Street can be either Canal ending at the cemeteries, or City Park ending at the art museum in City Park. These lines are more than just tourists – surprisingly there are actually people catching these who work downtown.
A neat (and cheap) way to take a tour of the city:
Good morning y’all. I’ll have a coffee and an orange scone this morning.
Haven’t been very active in the last couple of weeks as I just got married! We went to Eureka Springs for our honeymoon. The missus and I had a great time! It’s a very cute town and the history over there is rather interesting. If any of you are ever in the area, I highly recommend doing the lunch or dinner train on the ES&NA. The food is quite good and the dinner view is incredible! Once I get caught back up with work and chores, I’m hoping to do some layout work, namely getting DCC sound installed in a Proto2000 GP9.
@NimbusRI Congratulations on your marriage, wishing you all the best!
Should there be mmr time today, it will be spent making more trees. I did get the latest batch planted yesterday, and the forrested mountainside is coming along quite well, I think.
TF
