Little Patuxent River - 4/24/12

MARC 418, originally uploaded by T-3 Photography.

With the gorgeous weather yesterday, I decided to go out and photograph the Northeast Corridor for a bit. I mainly went with the intention of shooting film (hopefully I'll have those shots soon), but I did shoot a bit of digital as well. There was one spot in particular that I had been wanting to get a shot from for awhile. This was the bridge that spans the Little Patuxent River just south of Odenton.

My original thought was to shoot from the road bridge. The problem with that is power lines hang right in front of the road bridge and I don't have a lens that will get me far enough past them. So I decided I would hike down into the woods to get a shot from the river bank. The problem with that is from where I started to where I could get a good vantage point was separated by a small creek. I tried to look for an area of the creek that I could step across rocks or jump across it, but I could not find one. Not wanting to miss the next northbound MARC train I finally decided to just get my feet wet and cross the rather chilly creek.

It was definitely worth it to catch MARC 418 heading northbound over the river, lead by MP36PH-3C #30.

Thanks for looking!

Baltimore Streetcar Museum - 4/22/12

It rained quite a bit this past Sunday. Normally that is the kind of weather that tends to keep people in. Normal people that is, which my family is definitely not an example of. Not wanting my daughter to be stuck in the house all day, I decided that we would make a rainy day adventure and head up to the Baltimore Streetcar Museum on the north side of the city. I have to say right up front that this place is awesome! The price was great for an afternoon's worth of activity with admission costing $7 for adults and $5 for children (under 4 are free). Admission gets you access to the museum itself as well as unlimited rides on the streetcars. The museum itself is sort of small with a few artifacts and some great old photos of the days when streetcars regularly ran on Baltimore streets. The real attraction of this place though is the many working streetcars that are run. Each ride is approximately 10-15 minutes (the car is stopped at the distant end of the line and a brief history of the car will be given), but there are generally at least 3 different cars running each with their own unique features. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves...

Three of the many streetcars run by museum.

They are from left to right:

- 7047, a PCC streetcar built by the Pullman-Standard Company in 1944 is the youngest car in the museum's collection.
- 264, built by the J.G. Brill Company is one of the oldest pieces at 112 years old.
- 6119, a Peter Witt streetcar built by the J.G. Brill Company is approximately 87 years old.

The control stand in trolley 264.


Katrina is ready for her first ride of the afternoon.


After our first ride was over, we were given a tour of the car shops. It was a treasure trove of vintage streetcars and other neat items.






After our tour of the shops, it was time for another ride. This time we were on 6119.






Our final ride of the day was on car 7407, the youngster of the bunch.


Our motorman waiting for the clear to proceed.


Katrina had a blast on this last ride as the motorman let her help operate the streetcar on our trip back to the station. She couldn't stop talking about it for the rest of the day.


All in all it was a great time and I definitely plan on going back again. If you'd like to see the rest of the pics from the trip, they can be found here. Thanks for looking!

Victoria, VA - 4/12/12

I'm not sure how I forgot to post this last week. While I was in Virginia two weeks ago, I found this restored Virginian gondola resting on the remnants of a former roundhouse in Victoria, VA.



I've been to Victoria many times over the last 2 decades, and while I knew that the Virginian mainline between Roanoke and Norfolk ran through here, I had no idea there used to be a roundhouse and turntable here. It was defintely a pleasant surprise. Here is an aerial shot from 1954 showing the roundhouse and the yard. The site of the roundhouse is now a park.

Thanks for looking!

Baltimore Odds & Ends - 4/19/12

After my friend and I finished our chase of the Maryland Midland yesterday, we decided to see what was going on back in Baltimore (where he lives). Our first stop was the Baltimore Streetcar Museum. It looks like a really neat place and I'm going to take my ladies back there soon when they are open.
A shot looking down the tracks towards the museum.

The main museum building along with a track maintenance car.

My friend taking a break from taking photos.

A pair of maintenance railcars.

A close up of the number on a track maintenance car.

After poking around the museum for a bit, we decided to head east over to Canton to see if the railroad of the same name was running at all. We did find SW1500 #1501 (ex-SP 2455) switching boxcars. It was a crappy place to shoot from and we were shooting into the sun, but I don't often see this railroad running and beggars can't be choosers.

After Canton we attempted to chase an NS train heading north to Bayview Yard. We missed the train before it made it to the yard, but I ws able to get a shot of this pair of GP38-2s awaiting assignment.

After Bayview, I dropped my friend off and decided to take a quick peak at the CSX tracks over by the Ravens' stadium. After waiting a few minutes, I was treated to a local headed for Riverside Yard. It was powered by a slug-mate set consisting of former GP30 #2285 and GP40-2 #6920. GP38-2 #


Thanks for looking!

Maryland Midland Railroad - 4/19/20

Well, it is about time to blow the dust off of this blog again. With a lot going on through the month of March, not the least of which was having shoulder surgery, I haven't had much time or inclination to railfan. That changed yesterday when I finally got out with a flickr friend of mine to go follow around the Maryland Midland for a little while. It ended up being a gorgeous day out for chasing trains.
We started out in Union Bridge where the railroad is headquartered out of. Here we caught the eastbound cement train pulling out of the yard led by GP38AC #302.

Here the train passes through fields just east of New Windsor. Power is provided by GP38AC #302, GP38-3AC #305 and GP38AC #300.

Our next stop was the town of Westminster where we snapped some shots of the train heading through town.

One of many two bay cement hoppers owned by Lehigh Cement (reporting marks LEHX) and marked for the Maryland Midland.

After Westminster we ended up on a bunch of narrow, winding backroads trying to get a head of the train. We just barely did this at the tiny hamlet of Patapsco.

From Patapsco we were able to get ahead of the train and it met us at the CSX interchange at Glyndon.

Shoving the loaded cement cars back onto a siding for CSX.

Thanks for looking!

Maryland & Delaware Railroad - 2/3/12

I took a day of leave yesterday to enjoy the beautiful weather and chased the Maryland & Delaware (MDDE), based out of Federalsburg, MD (there are also two other separated branches in operation). My friend and I arrived around 0730, and after signing our release forms we were given a tour of the engine shed and discussed operations with the train crew before they departed to begin their day.

Running a little behind at 0830, the crew eased RS3M #1203 out of the shed track onto the main eastbound towards the industrial park in Federalsburg. 1203 started life as Lackawanna RS3 #914.


After picking up a feed hopper and two propane tanks in the industrial park, we caught the train heading westbound over Marshy Hope Creek towards Hurlock, MD.


In Hurlock, the train passes by a beautifully restored depot. The train left the propane cars on a siding while taking the feed hopper down to the Perdue feed mill.


The train heading back east for a gas transfer facility and ultimately Seaford, DE.


Spotting propane tankers at the transfer facility.


Running light passed a feed elevator just outside of Seaford, DE.


Once 1203 arrived in Seaford, it was time to sit and wait while Norfolk Southern took their sweet time in bringing a train down to interchange from their siding just to the north of town. While waiting for something to happen, I nabbed a quick shot of my friend snapping pictures of a neat looking Ashley, Drew & Northern boxcar.


We got a little bit of a humor show watching these two feed mill workers, manually move a hopper down the siding to the mill.


After talking with the MDDE crew, and finding out that it would still be a little while we decided to go grab lunch. After taking our time with that, we made our way back down to the yard to find NS local H57 bring a cut of cars to spot at the MDDE interchange.






After NS finished spotting, MDDE #1203 eased it's way into the small yard to pick up 7 boxcars bound for Federalsburg.




As the train readied to depart we left ahead of it to catch it along the way to Federalsburg. Here it is seen crossing Guard Rd. in Oak Grove, MD.


After arriving back in Federalsburg, 1203 ran around the train on an industrial siding in order to shove the boxcars into the Solo Cup plant.


The train pulling an empty from Solo Cup.


All in all it was a good day. I'll definitely be going back to the MDDE again. I'm also looking forward to checking out their other branches in the future.

Thanks for looking!