Just train pictures and train stories

I threw away all my paper maps considering now we have GPS, phone, and online sources.
 
MangaReader said:
Why need paper map when you have online nowadays? I threw away all my paper maps considering now we have GPS, phone, and online sources.
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I haven't been able to find one online that is not cluttered up with pins & markers for businesses. I am wanting to point out where certain whole cities of relative small size are in relation to each other and Chicago.
 
Griswold signals:

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[yt]REHWwz5h8bk[/yt]

According to Wiki:

Rotating stop sign
The 1930s saw the invention of yet another signal. This was a unique combination of highway flasher and rotating stop sign. An approaching train would trigger not just the requisite red flashing lights and bells, but a mechanism that rotated a yellow stop sign ninety degrees to face traffic as well. (The signs eventually changed to red.)[1] This type of signal was relatively common throughout the midwestern United States; few made their way out west.

Surviving signals

Today, only three rotating stop sign signals remain in active use in the West. Two guard a crossing in Tacoma, Washington and a single Griswold guards a Union Pacific spur line on Bayshore Highway in San Jose, California; its mate was knocked down by a car in October, 2002 and was replaced by a standard flasher and electronic bell. One remaining pair guards a grade crossing on a spur in Northeast Minneapolis, Minnesota and is still in complete working order with rotating stop sign. Several remain in use in the Twin Cities area on low train traffic lines, but with only the flashers in working order- the unique rotating stop signs have been removed and disabled.
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Griswold Signal Company
 
Jane B. said:
ChicagoBlue2
Do you have a paper map that shows the whole state of Illinois?
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No, I don't. Who needs them these days? People grow up memorizing landmarks and stuff, therefore pretty much making paper maps useless in today's world. Also, I am a veteran traveler, and know where I'm going without the aid of a map--hence my experience.
 
I still buy the paper road atlas, also get them free from AAA to travel.
Guess some people have been everywhere ? Tell them to get lost and they start crying because they cant since they know their way EVERYWHERE.
 
sonocativo said:
I still buy the paper road atlas, also get them free from AAA to travel.
Guess some people have been everywhere ? Tell them to get lost and they start crying because they cant since they know their way EVERYWHERE.
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I do not need to know my way everywhere, okay? If I'm going somewhere new, then of course I would do my homework. Still do not need a map, as my memory is quite good.
 
The never ending story about trains in the past.

The neverending story continues :

June 14, 1964:
CN inaugurates "The Champlain" between Montreal and Quebec City. The train set consisted of five rebuilt stainless steel cars originally built in 1937 for the Reading Railroad "Crusader" that ran between Philadelphia and Jersey City. In 1968, the train set began operating between Toronto and Sarnia as the "Huron." By the mid-1970s, the five cars were broken up and were seen in GTA commuter trains, in various southwestern Ontario consists, and in Toronto-North Bay service. All were withdrawn from service by 1981.

June 14, 1993:
Canada Post issues a series of five stamps commemorating historic Canadian Pacific hotels: the Algonquin in St. Andrew, New Brunswick; the Chateau Frontenac in Quebec City; Toronto's Royal York; Victoria's Empress and the Banff Springs Hotel. The latter stamp also featured a CP passenger train, presumably The Canadian, although it was no longer a CP train at this point, nor did it run through Banff.

June 14, 2003:
CPR 4-6-4 Hudson steam locomotive No. 2816, normally based in Calgary, hauls an excursion from Toronto to Guelph Junction. Most of the excursionists rode in a GO train coupled behind the CP train set, which was occupied by invited guests. This was the first occasion that a mainline steam locomotive operated out of Union Station since CN retired Mountain No. 6060 in 1980. No. 2816 returned for another excursion in 2004, as mentioned in the June 12 posting.

June 14, 2007:
At the Willowbrook maintenance facility, GO Transit unveils to the media a prototype of its new MP40 locomotives. This was the first of 27 units ordered from Motive Power Industries of Boise, Idaho at a cost of $5 million each. The 4,000 horsepower engines can haul 12 bi-level coaches, increasing the capacity of each train by 300 passengers. The new units are necessary to replace GO's fleet of aging and increasingly unreliable General Motors FP59s, the newest of which was built in 1994. The MP40s entered revenue service in February 2008.

June 14, 2007:
On the same day that GO was showing off its new locomotives, the Toronto Transit Commission held a press conference at the Ontario Science Centre at which it displayed a new generation Bombardier streetcar. This was also an effort to promote the TTC's Transit City plan, which would have added 120 kilometers of new streetcar lines by 2021 at a cost of $6 billion. During the last week of June, the car was displayed in four locations throughout Toronto. With the election of a new mayor, the Transit City plan is now in disarray.
June 15, 1897:
As a consequence of the new agreement with the Grand Trunk and the Toronto, Hamilton & Buffalo, Canadian Pacific offers special excursion rates of one-way fare plus a third for a return trip between Toronto and the racetrack in Fort Erie, across the Niagara River from Buffalo, New York.

 
Trainman, if you remove the "s" from https:// it will display youtube video on your post.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=STftBsifDPs[/ame]
 
Around the lake

No cc

But good pictures .

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mtth-wu0hcA]Donner Lake from California Zephyr ambling by in the Sierra Nevada Mountains - YouTube[/ame]
 
ChicagoBlue2 said:
This is Millenium Street Station. This station is the only one that is underground, and there's a reason for that. You see, the Metra Electric and South Shore Line run on cable wires with high voltage, and those wires are on lower ground, and not anywhere dangerous. I visited this station only once-- in 2009, and I must say-- it was neat.
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1500 volts DC is not especially high voltage in terms of railway electrification (amps and current are needed to make voltages dangerous) nor is it difficult to build an underground station with wires - most of the Tokyo subway system uses 1500v DC overhead electrification. Sometimes they use a thin rail in place of the wire because it's easier to keep it in place for the trolley/panto.

This is Toronto's Union Station:
Union_Station_Toronto_(1).jpg


This is the grand hall inside, it is always empty:
union-station.jpg


This is the lower concourse, which is always busy because it's where actual access to the platforms is:
union-station-1-1024.jpg


Here's one of the actual platforms with a GO Train arriving:
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVDsNfzS2cU]13:43 Lakeshore West GO Train at Toronto Union Station - YouTube[/ame]
 
This is one of the many events Chicago Union Station's Great Hall holds yearly.

union-station-chicago-wedding.jpg
 
These are the stairs leading to the Great Hall, and to the Metra and Amtrak:

Stairs_leading_out_of_main_hall,_Chicago_Union_Station.jpg


These stairs are STEEP.
 
I'd hate for a baby carriage to roll away from me near those stairs... ;)

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwM7NgPE5lw[/ame]
 
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