For years I’ve been looking for the opportunity to make an image like this one in Conneaut. Last Saturday, that opportunity presented itself.
One of my long-standing goals in railfanning the former Bessemer & Lake Erie has been to get an over and under shot with Norfolk Southern and Canadian National trains.
I’ve actually done that a few times, but in each case the CN train was going into the Conneaut yard and was passing beneath the middle of the NS train, not its head end.
What I really wanted was a train coming out of the yard with motive power beneath the motive power of an NS train.
It’s a tough image to get due to the paucity of traffic on the former B&LE, which is now operated by CN.
CN has, maybe, two trains per day max. NS has more traffic, but not that much more traffic. You can go for hours and not see a train on the former Nickel Plate Road route between Cleveland and Buffalo, New York.
Like so many items on my railfan “wish list,” this would be one of those that would just have to happen. You have to be in the right place at the right time.
As it turned out, last Saturday would be one of those times. When it was over I would have bagged not just the motive power over and under shot, but a B&LE train below two other NS trains.
Now that is what I call getting lucky, really lucky.
As my friend Adam Barr and I arrived in Conneaut we suspected something was about to happen on the former Bessemer because a CN truck was sitting next to the tracks just south of the Old Main Road crossing.
Shortly after 8 a.m., the gates started going down and we sprang out of the car and ran toward the crossing.
Into town came a train with CN 5422 on the lead, IC 1034 trailing it and B&LE 905 trailing that.
The train stopped, the conductor got off and then the train pulled down a bit further before stopping again.
As all of this was unfolding, NS train 205 was headed west and I got the first over and under shot, although neither train truly was over or under the other. It was more like above and below but you could still see both trains at the same time.
The conductor cut the B&LE train and it took a cut of loaded coal hoppers to the upper yard.
The truck took the conductor to the yard and the rest of the train sat on the mainline.
I had a hunch that proved to be right that the road power would be back to pick up the rest of the cars after completing its work in the upper yard.
I suggested that we wait by the crossing because the B&LE 905 would be leading when the motive power came back out to pick up the rest of the train.
We heard someone on the radio say “B&LE 905 radio check.” It was almost showtime.
A few minutes later, NS train 145 called the signal at Woodard Road east of the trestle over the B&LE and Conneaut Creek.
About the same time I saw through the trees the headlight of B&LE 905. To quote the late famed baseball announcer Harry Caray, “it may be, it could be, it is . . .”
Of course, Caray was calling a home run, not an over and under meet between two trains.
I would have liked for the B&LE 905 to have been closer to my position and for there to have been sunny rather than cloudy skies.
But this was the opportunity I’d waited a long time to get and I wasn’t going to pass it up.
The CN crew picked up the rest of its train and took it into the yard. After taking a break, they went about making up another train to haul south.
The B&LE 905 would be on the point so there would be another chance to photograph a train on the former Bessemer with a B&LE locomotive leading. It has been well more than a year since I’ve seen that happen.
Yet another NS westbound, the 287, rumbled into Conneaut. Not long after its head end cleared the trestle, the 905 came out from the yard.
The sun popped out through a sucker hole in the clouds, providing nice illumination. Yeah, it was auto rack cars above the 905, but they still looked nice.
Eventually, it was time for the 905 and its train to leave town.
We got shots of the 905 along Conneaut Creek, stopped near the Old Main Road crossing, from the U.S. 20 overpass, and then at Pond Road.
We couldn’t chase the train farther south because we both needed to be back home by early afternoon.
We returned to Conneaut hoping to see NS train 23K, which had the Conrail heritage unit in its motive power consist.
We never saw the 23K, but we did catch something else unexpected on the ex-Bessemer. But that is a story for another day.
Article and Photographs by Craig Sanders
The day began as it usually does in Conneaut on the Bessemer with the inbound train arriving from the south.
The first of three “meets” between a CN train and an NS train. The last cars of westbound NS 205 are passing above the ex-B&LE tracks.
A cut of tank cars on NS 145 rolls over Conneaut Creek as the 905 continues toward the rest of its train. The fishing must have been good on this morning because a lot of anglers were casting lines in the creek.
Passing beneath auto rack cars on NS train 287 as the sun makes a short appearance. The autumn foliage here was not as advanced as I had hoped that it would be.
Zooming in on the 905 and its train as it works the yard in Conneaut.
Another chance to get a B&LE locomotive alongside Conneaut Creek.
Waiting for the conductor to arrive just north of Old Main Road.
As we got into place on the U.S. 20 bridge, hail started to fall. It was the first time I’ve ever photographed in a hail storm.
The view from the U.S. 20 bridge as B&LE and its train begin the trek out of town.
The conductor waves at Adam and I. Considering how high up we were, he must have been looking for us.
In the rain at Pond Road, our last look on this day of B&LE 905 and its train.
akronrrclub.wordpress.com 