Trains and Mountains: The Crowsnest Pass

UP freight in Crowsnest Pass.

   

The southernmost route through the mountains between Alberta and B.C. is the Crowsnest Pass.

The CPR built the line in 1897 to reach rich coal fields in the area and, not incidentally, to keep American railways—which were reaching north into Canada—out.

CPR consist at Cranbrook. 

In 1916 the line was completed to the Pacific Ocean, becoming the CPR’s second mainline to the coast. It was closed in 1959 due to washouts.

Today what remains of the line is still busy, mostly due to coal traffic out of the region, and to interchange traffic with the Union Pacific, which has run-through trains to Alberta from the border crossing at Eastport, Idaho/Kingsgate, B.C.

During a recent trip through the Crowsnest Pass, I got a few photos of UP and CPR trains.

UP train at Cranbrook.

A ballast train enters the yard.

And passes by.

Paint the Track!

Brown paint makes the rails look more realistic.

I recently visited a model railroad that was, by most any estimate, a pretty good layout—good looking scenery, interesting track plan, nice and varied scenes. Obviously, a lot of thought had gone into it.

Except in one crucial area: The track. It was silver. Although the owners had gone to some length to create a believable and credible model, they had failed to paint the track.

The result? No matter how good the overall impression, the layout looked toy-like. After all, everyone knows track isn’t silver!

Maybe I’m being too picky, but I don’t think so. And it’s not like my standards are so high—you won’t find any fine-scale models on my layout (and I still run Athearn blue box locomotives). But in this area I am pretty uncompromising.

For me, nothing detracts from a scene like unpainted track.

I don't claim to be an expert track painter. All I did was use brown and black latex paints, applied with a brush. I didn't worry about matching the exact shade of brown or grey as the prototype. All I wanted to do was to hide the silver sides.

Even Code 100 looks smaller when painted.

That said, I did try to match a bit of the prototype by using a lighter brown for yard or little-used tracks, and a darker brown, or almost black, for the mainline.

To paint the track, I simply put some brown and black paint on a piece of cardboard, then randomly mixed it together. A stiff modeller’s brush was used to apply the paint; after doing a few feet, I wiped the excess paint off the top of the rails.

I also added the brown-black mixture to the tops of the ties, to take off the uniform black plastic sheen.

Even though my track is all Code 100—much larger than on the prototype—I found that by painting the track it looked smaller (especially from three feet away).

Some might worry that painting the track makes flex-track harder to re-use if you ever have to pull it up. I didn’t find that to be the case, although you have to clean the ends if you clip a piece of painted track in mid-track to fit another space (to establish good electrical contact for the rail joiner).

Painting flex-track also stiffens it; you have to bend it a few times to break the paint so it will once again be able to curve.

But those are small things to consider when weighed against how good track looks when it is painted—and how bad it looks when it isn’t.

In my opinion, at least.

Private Owner's Train II

Modelling inspiration comes from various places. One source of inspiration for me came in 1992, during a visit to Cranbrook, B.C.

While there, I was lucky enough to catch a private owner's train in the yard. That chance encounter resulted in one of the more enjoyable aspects of model railroading for me--modelling a private owner's train on my layout.

I recently came across a couple of photos I took during that visit. I scanned them and have posted them above and below.

I don't know anything about that train--how it came to be there, or who owned the cars. All I know is that it set me on an enjoyable modelling path as I have collected colourful passengere cars from various railroads across North America to assemble my own private owner's train.

For more about my private owner's train, see Private Owner's Train on the CP Rail M & M Sub.

A Great Canadian Model Railroad: York Railway Modellers

Another great Canadian model railroad I had the pleasure of helping to get published is York Railway Modellers.

The club, which is located in Toronto, started in 1992. The HO scale layout combines CNR and CPR mainline and wayfreight operation in southern Ontario between 1953-57.

The layout is over 1,600 square feet in area and has around 11 scale miles of mainline track. It features two major yards and eight towns. Each yard has three industrial areas plus a roundhouse, turntable and engine facilities.

The single track mainline runs from is set up to run end-to-end from the CPR Lambton Yard (West Toronto) to the CNR London Yard. A total of 25 people are required to operate it properly.

Today the club has finished all the trackwork and 95 percent of the wiring; work on scenery is a continuing project.

York Railway Modellers was featured in Canadian Railway Modeller Train 7 Track 4. Photos from the club’s website and Scott Reid. Click here to visit their website. A few more photos are below.

Whitcomb in Wenatchee, Washington

While wandering the waterfront in Wenatchee, WA during my recent trains and mountains tour, I came across this interesting unit—a Whitcomb 65-tonner that had formerly belonged to the U.S. Army Transportation Corps.

According to a sign on the unit, the locomotive—a 65-D.E.-19-A—was built in 1944 and worked in North Africa as U.S. Army 8450. It was part of a large number of Whitcomb locomotives sent overseas as part of the war effort; the units also worked in Great Britain, Italy, Belgium, Germany and The Netherlands.

Information plate on the unit.

 

In a helpful overview about these units on a web page (about Lehigh & New England #601 and Wanamaker,Kempton & Southern #602) by Jeff. Z., R.H. Piligian notes that the Army specification called for a locomotive to be able to run on any European main line, have a top speed of at least 45 mph, and be able to operate with similar locomotives.

Piligian goes on to note that locomotives from Whitcomb were used to pull the first train into Rome after it was taken from the Germans; the first train across the Rhine River; and the first train into Paris after it was liberated by the Allies.

After the war in Europe ended, the Army shipped 118 of the units back to the U.S. for use in the war against Japan. When the war against that country, the units were no longer needed; they were sold to various shortlines beginning in 1947.

At some point in its life, the 8450 became American Silicon Technologies (ASTX) 11. I have not been able to learn how it came to be displayed in Wenatchee.

Learn more about the Whitcomb Locomotive Compnay here and here (with lots of photos).