I will be in Plover on next Tuesday 3/9/10 and may have a few hours to train watch/ visit local hobby shops. Is there anything worth seeing up there? Any info would be helpful.
According to an Official Guide Plover Wisconsin was once served by the Green Bay Western and I think that trackage is long gone. However, you might try a place called Junction City which is on US 10;11 miles west of Stevens Point. The line was once Soo Line,later Wisconsin Central,now CN. I haven’t been in the area for a while. When I was there in 1994,WC was using leased Santa Fe power. I hope that this might help you out.
Plover still has active railroad, all now served by the CN. The former GBW is severed east of town I believe, but is still serviced from the west (Wisconsin Rapids), and I think there is a job that’s actually based out of Plover. The line from Plover up to Stevens Point is also in service. I haven’t railfanned this area in a long time, however, so I couldn’t tell you the schedule. Hopefully somebody else will know better here.
I do know however that train frequency is low, at most 1-2 trains in this area. Going up to Stevens Point or over to Junction City will definitely net you a lot more trains as it’s on the CN’s “main line” from Canada to Chicago. Wisconsin Rapids can also be busy at times, though not as busy as the other two locations.
There’s a few people on the forums who can provide you with a lot more information than I can - hopefully they’ll see this topic.
Noah
If you can get up to Stevens Point there is a small railroad park with a Soo Line steam engine on display at the southeast corner of Church Street (Bus. 51) and Monroe Street. The park is adjacent to the CN right of way at the west end of the Stevens Point yard and provides a wide open view of the railroad. A small parking lot lets you park off the street.
I have stopped at the spot but never stayed for very long and don’t have any sense of train frequency from personal observation. Those who more closely follow CN operations in Wisconsin might have more info on frequency.
If you get the job working at Plover it has had EJ&E power at times lately. I actually just shot EJ&E 665 there last December. Like everyone else said, Stevens Point is practically right next door to Plover and is worth a visit.
It’s probably not a bad idea to familiarize yourself with a current rail map of Wisconsin. Here is one:
http://www.dot.wisconsin.gov/localgov/docs/railmap.pdf
Note that not far from Plover is Stevens Point, Wisconsin Rapids, Junction City, and Wausau WI. The railroad history of this area is perhaps more compelling than the current reality but if you have a taste for old structures well preserved all those areas are worth a visit.
Plover is a very old community with some interesting local history, mostly to be found on this website by a Wisconsin historian (who wrote an interesting but sometimes unreliable history of Wisconsin railroads)
http://www.pchswi.org/archives/communities/plover/plovermain.html
The old depot is well-preserved and is certainly worth taking pictures of, at the Plover Heritage park. Indeed a railfan who is also a model railroader could spend a useful day there taking pictures and measurements of all of these preserved old buildings – take a good long tape measure and a sketchpad in addition to your camera. Unfortunately I suspect the buildings will not be open for interior viewing this early in the season unless someone just happens to be there.
http://www.pchswi.org/museums/hpark/Heritagepark.html
Stevens Point is just up the road. The former Soo Line/Wisconsin Central Ltd yard used to be a great place to photograph trains but th
When you go to Plover in regards to train watching there are a couple of things to see while you’re there. In town driving down Business 51/Hwy 54 will get you to the east side of the ex-GBW yard in town, which is where the L591 local is based out of. As of this week it had EJE 666 for power (which replaced the EJE 665)- this train switches the Del Monte cannery on the east side of town and paper mills in Whiting starting out in the morning, by mid-afternoon they are finished and tie up next to the old GBW yard office. In addition to that the CN will also run a job down from Stevens Point that delivers cars to the Plover yard and switches the industries on the ex-GBW main west of Plover. Recently the CN’s Stevens Point-Wisconsin Rapids train L501 has also occasionaly been traversing this way.
Yeah the CP in the Portage/Dells area might be a good place to consider too, they’ve been running some interesting and unusual stuff on that line recently.