Winter on the Water Level Route in Lake County

An eastbound CSX manifest freight near Bowhall Road east of Painesville.

Most of the time, trees are not a photographer’s friend. They cast shadows and diminish the amount of open space with work with next to the tracks.

But when coated with snow, trees can create for some striking winter photographs. And so it was on a recent Sunday when we found ourselves looking for trees next to the tracks.

Shown is a selection of CSX trains on the Water Level Route of the former New York Central east of Cleveland. It was an odd day from an operating standpoint.

Traffic was fairly steady, but from the time we got trackside around 11 until nearly 3:30 p.m. all of the trains were headed east. Where were the westbounds?

A fleet of them began reaching Lake County in late afternoon. The images shown here were taken at various locations including the crossings of Bowhall Road, Park Road and Davis Road. We also photographed near the ex-NYC Painesville passenger station.

One of our primary goals was to catch one or both of the Canadian Pacific intermodal trains that began running on CSX between Chicago and Buffalo late last year.

But we struck out on that objective. As reported in an earlier post, we did get four trains with BNSF power in the lead. The last train that we caught had Union Pacific power.

Aside from a few flurries early in our outing, there was no snowfall. Skies were cloudy all day, but the beauty of the snow clinging to the trees and everything else made for some nice winter scenes.

There also was enough snow on the right of way to create those clouds of misty snow that add drama to the sight of a fast oncoming train.

When we called it a day just past 5 p.m., we had photographed 18 trains. And we were pleased to have photographed all of them.

Article and Photographs by Craig Sanders

If only there were trains on Sunday on the NS Fairport, Painesville & Eastern branch.

We’re Not in North Dakota Anymore Toto

The first of the three tank car trains on CSX that featured BNSF motive power kicks up a swirl of snow as it approaches Park Road.

Last Sunday I spent the day railfanning with fellow Akron Railroad Club members Marty Surdyk and Edward Ribinskas in Lake County along the Cleveland-Buffalo lines of CSX (ex-New York Central) and Norfolk Southern (ex-Nickel Plate Road). It had rained on Saturday but a fresh snowfall overnight created a nice winter scene as though everything had been sprayed with snow.
During our day out, we spotted three tanker trains on CSX, all of which were led by BNSF motive power.

In the interests of accuracy, I was too busy thinking about the photographs I wanted to make to pay attention to the placards on the cars. Therefore, not all of these trains were necessarily crude oil trains from North Dakota. There could have been ethanol trains from Iowa mixed in.
Anyhow, the orange of those BNSF locomotives sure looked good against all of that white.

Article and Photographs by Craig Sanders

The second of the tanker trains. This motive power consist featured all BNSF power.

There was no buffer car on the end of the second of the three tanker trains.

A cut of tank cars brought up the rear of this eastbound CSX manifest freight at Park Road.

Tanker train No. 3 on the day featured yet another all BNSF motive power consist. This eastbound train is coming in Perry.

The cold oil inside the tank cars hitting the humid and slightly warmer air resulted in a sheen of white frost on the outside of the black tank cars.

Snow is building up on the rear of the buffer car on tanker train No. 3 at Perry.

NS eastbound train 14T featured a BNSF locomotive on the head end. It was nice to see BNSF power leading four trains on this Sunday.

NS 14T splits the signals at Davis Road, which is the east end of the Perry siding.

Trestle Trek in Painesville

Norfolk Southern train No. 206 rattles the trestle over the Grand River in Painesville on Sunday. The view is from the north side of the bridge.

It rained in Northeast Ohio for a good part of Saturday, which washed away a lot of the snow cover.

I had plans to spend Super Bowl Sunday railfanning with fellow Akron Railroad Club members Ed Ribinskas and Marty Surdyk in Lake County

It’s an early tradition with us and for the past two years we’e done it on the day of the NFL’s biggest event.

Last year we had created some good winter images during a lake effect snowfall. But this year’s weather didn’t look promising.

The forecast was for mostly cloudy skies with snow showers before 9 a.m. We wouldn’t get trackside until late morning.

So imagine how pleased we were to wake up Sunday morning and see a nice, fresh blanket of snow coating everything.

We decided to go to the trestle carrying Norfolk Southern’s Cleveland-Buffalo line (ex-Nickel Plate Road) over the Grand River in Painesville. The plan was to do some static shots along East Walnut Street (Ohio Route 84) that passes beneath the trestle on the east side. There is not an abundance of train traffic on this NS line. You can wait for hours to see a train.

We photographed a train on CSX and then headed for the trestle. We noticed that the intermediate signal on NS at Madison Avenue was lined for an eastbound move. Maybe the 206. We had seen the 22K earlier, but had not been in position to photograph it.

We parked next to the road and waited. Because of the cloud cover, we would be able to shoot from the north side of the trestle, something that might be tough to do on a sunny day. Finally, we heard the 206 on the radio and it was show time.

A few hours later the NS 145 was coming west. Why not try to capture that train at the west end of the trestle at track level?

We had to walk through some deep snow in a former industrial area to get a view, but the images we got made it work the trek.

Later this week I’ll have images we took elsewhere during our day out.

Article and Photographs by Craig Sanders

Not Quite What it Seems to Be

Something doesn’t seem right about this signal. The indication is advance approach for an eastbound train, but there’s a west bound train in the distance in the block. How can that be?

But looks can be deceiving. Note the westbound doesn’t have its headlight on. It is waiting in a siding to meet an eastbound at Perry on a Sunday afternoon.

The angle of the photo combined with the snow covering the siding help add to the deception.

4 NS Trains in an Hour in Snowy, Snowy Perry

NS train 22K splits the signals at Perry to begin the sequence of four trains that would pass through in an hour’s time on early Sunday afternoon.

Located 34 miles east of Cleveland on the Cleveland-Buffalo, N.Y., routes of CSX (ex-New York Central) and Norfolk Southern (ex-Nickel Plate Road), the village of Perry lies in the heart of the Lake Erie snow belt. It had snowed there all day Saturday and lake effect snow was still falling when the four of us arrived there about 11 a.m. on Sunday.

I was joined by fellow Akron Railroad Club members Marty Surdyk, Ed Ribinskas and Jeff Troutman. It was our annual winter outing to railfan in this town of 1,600 and to putz around with the model railroad layout in the basement of Ed’s house.

We were pleased to see the snow falling. We had come here hoping to get some good snow images. We would not be disappointed as snow was flying on both railroads.

CSX has by far the most traffic through Perry. NS runs in the range of 20 or fewer trains a day so you can spend hours in Perry and see little to no traffic on NS. But luck was with us on this day. NS sent four trains through Perry in an hour’s time starting just after 1 p.m.

Three of the trains were eastbounds and two of those met the lone westbound at Perry. It was the first time I can recall seeing a train use the Perry siding.

We had heard the Youngstown Line dispatcher tell NS train 310 that it would be following the 206 east from UD (Euclid). The 206 was, at the time, at Cloggsville in Cleveland.

Not long after that, we heard the NS detector just east of Painesville go off. It was too soon for the 206 to have arrived. But maybe he was making better progress than we expected.

We got into position by the NS tracks and along came the 22K.

Not long after its passage, the dispatcher came back on to tell the 22K that it would meet the 287 at Unionville. That got us to wondering. She did not say anything about meeting the 206 and the 310. It turned out that the 287 would meet both of those trains at Perry.

The 206 quickly gained speed as its head end passed the head end of the 287. The 310 would come along shortly and unlike the 206 blasted through town at track speed, creating yet another white out in the misty snow.

We relocated to the Maple Street crossing to observe and photograph the 310 and then the 287 leaving town. The 310 surprised us by having an all Canadian Pacific lash-up. That was nice.

The Youngstown Line dispatcher told a track car that he would have a good sized window of opportunity after the 287 cleared. NS would be silent the rest of the afternoon while we were out.

I’ll post the CSX snow photographs later this week.

Article and Photographs by Craig Sanders

A wide angle view of the 22K about to cross Main Street.

Snow swirls as the fast-moving 22K leans into a curve on the east edge of Perry.

The 287 ambles along at 10 mph on the siding at Perry. Yes, there is a track ahead of it and a part of the rail peeks through the snow to the right.

The 287 is stopped and the sun has found a crease in the clouds.

The 206 splits the signals at Perry. For some reason the 206 came into town at restricted speed.

The first two units of the 206 meet the head end of the 287. Something about this photograph suggests to me “powerful diesel locomotives.”

The first container of the 206 adds a bright spot of color to an otherwise scene of gray, black and white.

I’ve always liked to photograph long strings of double-stacked containers. The nearly all white containers on the 206 seem appropriate for the winter scene.

The 310 surprised us by having a motive power consist of all Canadian Pacific power.

The 310 is about to cross Maple Street.

The 287 is on the move. The Perry siding continues westward to Fairport Harbor. The track is the former Fairport, Painesville & Eastern.

The head end of the 287 has entered the crossover to regain the main line.

Coming by the signals at the west end of the interlocking. The signal to the left governs movements on the ex-FP&E.

It’s a straight shot out of Perry for a few miles until the track curves to the right east of Painsville.

The auto racks rumble through the crossover.

The rear of the last NS train we would see on this day. The edge of the ballast creates the illusion of being something of a “third rail.”