I’m taking a leap forward in this extra post for 29 February 2024.
The Irish Leap Card is a transit fare storage card roughly equivalent to the London Oyster Card.
This gives you a nominal fare discount and allows for an easier way to pay for transit fare on buses/trams/sububan trains in Dublin and on local trains and buses in Cork.
I bought my first Leap Card back in 2014. I have a collection of these now. When we arrived at Dublin Airport, I checked the balance on two of my cards and found that I had more than 25 Euro stored there.
Since today was Leap Day, Kris and I leaped on Irish Rail’s Cork-Cobh service, which puts this post ahead of many of the earlier posts that will follow over the coming days.
To set the record straight, tomorrow, I’ll resume with a more-or-less chronological review of our Irish-UK adventures.
We took a brief journey on the Elizabeth Line, London’s newest suburban service, which made its debut less than two years ago.
Key to the Elizabeth Line is the newly constructed underground Cross Rail link. This connects the Great Western route with the Great Eastern route via central London.
We traveled a short section of the Cross Rail section.
The subway section is very clean and looks new.
A safety feature are platform doors that line up with train doors. This makes photography of the train underground challenging.
The route was named for Queen Elizabeth II and color chosen for the Elizabeth line is a royal purple.
A week ago, Kris and I traveled from Dublin to London on British Airways. From Heathrow Terminal 5, we traveled on the Heathrow Express to Paddington.
There are a variety of rail options from Heathrow. We chose Heathrow Express largely because of convenience. Between us we had three checked bags and two carry on and the prospect of navigating the tube with so much luggage made the tube/Elizabeth Line options unappealing.
Upon arrival at Paddington we made a few photos then took a taxi to our hotel.
One minor difficulty was a signalling fault on the Great Western Railway route that resulted in a minor delay to our train, and subsequently caused the cancellation of some subsequent Heathrow Express trains. We were lucky that we arrived when we did!
Dublin’s LUAS tram system opened twenty years ago.
I recall photographing the original construction of both Green and Red Lines.
The Red Line extension through the Docklands to the Point opened in 2009, which makes this route 15 years old.
Last week, Kris and I stayed near Georges Dock (on the Docklands extension), and made several trips on the LUAS around the city.
The original 3001-series trams are beginning show their age. It’s fascinating for me to have witnessed the maturing of the trams and the growth of the system. I’ve been photographing LUAS trams since before the system opened, with some of my eariest images dating back to 2002, when the trams were were stored without numbers at the Red Cow depot.
Kris and I traveled on the DART from Dublin Connolly Station to the northern extent of the DART service at Malahide where we spent the afternoon wandering around.
We returned via a 22K series Intercity Railcar (ICR).
I made a series of photos of the station, its trains and environment. The station facilities include a classic former Great Northern Railway (of Ireland) station building. This is constructed of yellow brick and retains its traditional Victorian era canopy.
LX3 photo.Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.
Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.
Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.
Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.
Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.
Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.
Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.
Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.
Nikon Z7-11 with 24-70mm lens.
LX3 photo.
Photos exposed using Lumix LX3 and Nikon Z7-II digital cameras. All images were exposed as RAW files and processed using Adobe Lightroom.
Dublin Area Rapid Transit is an electrified suburban service focused on Dublin’s Connolly Station. This shares routes with diesel powered trains and provides a regular interval passenger service.
The oldest of its cars are the German built 8100, 8300 series units that date to beginning of the service in the early 1980s. I first photographed the DART in 1998.
I made these photos on Satruday using a Lumix LX3. Kris and I were on our way to Malahide, which is the northern extremity of the DART service.
Following its recent re-introduction to my camera arsenal, I’m continuing to experiment with a Lumix LX3, after nearly a decade since my original LX3 failed following more than 65,000 exposures. The LX3 was my first digital camera.
Last week, Kris and I traveled from Lancaster, Pa., to Dublin, Ireland for the first stage in an epic trip.
This is our first overseas journey since moving to Lancaster. We explored a variety of airline options, and ultimately setted on a rarely traveled path.
American Airlines operates a connecting bus from the Lancaster Airport to Philadelphia. So we booked a through round trip ticket from Lancaster to Dublin. My railroad acquaintances may wonder why we didn’t opt to take Amtrak to Philadelphia and then SEPTA Airport train to th airport.
We considered Amtrak, but the connecting bus offered a variety of practical advantages:
1) Since it was a through ticket, we could check our baggage in Lancaster and collect it in Dublin, thus saving the luggage schlep between trains at 30th Street in Philadelphia. This also cut out a train change, which would be especially problematic on the return leg.
2) The bus is operated by American Airlines, so if anything went wrong with the connection, it was on the airline to make it right. With the rail connection we were at the risk of the railroad’s not performing as planned.
3) The bus only carried a few passengers so we had plenty of space.
4) Bus connection passengers are afforded a special security option at Philadelphia that was much less taxing than having to deal with the main queue of people at security.
Although we didn’t travel by train, we did see a SEPTA Silverliner V at the airport.
We traveled on Boeing 787 Dreamliner, which was a very comfortable way to cross the big pond.
Photos were made with a Lumix LX7.
American Airlines airport connection bus at Lancaster Airport.
American Airlines airport connection bus at Lancaster Airport.
American Airlines airport connection bus at Lancaster Airport.
Not my finest Silverliner V photo, but at least we saw a train during the trip.
Not my finest Silverliner V photo, but at least we saw a train during the trip.
Not my finest Silverliner V photo, but at least we saw a train during the trip.
Forty-two years ago I regularly listened to the radio program Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy adapted from the books by Douglas Adams and presented by BBC.
My father had bought a Grundig portable radio that received shortwave among other frequencies. In the wee-hours, this allowed me to tune in this exotic program from across the pond.
One of the themes of Hitchhikers was the number 42, which was the answer to the ultimate question of the Life, the universe, and everything.
During this same time, I took a photography class at the Wilbraham & Monson Academy taught by Mark Bistline. Among other things, Mark introduced me to Ilford HP5 black & white film. Until that time, I’d largely only used Kodak films.
My father drove me to the Central Vermont Railway yard in Palmer, Massachusetts. I exposed my roll of HP5 with my Leica 3A rangefinder, making a series of images of CV’s Alco RS-11 number #3614 that was idling there.
I also made a recording of the locomotive. I don’t know what became of the recording, but the HP5 negatives still remain in my collection 42 years later.
Parkesburg, Pennsylvania was once an important interlocking where the Enola Low Grade cutoff (Atglen & Susquehanna Branch) joined the Main Line (now Amtrak’s Harrisburg Line) via a grade separated junction.
Today, a vestige of the old low grade survives to serve local industries, but the remants of the interlocking, the town and Amtrak’s former Pennsylvania Railroad station seem like shadows of another era.
This remains a station for Amtrak’s Keystone service, but the station facilities are minimalistic and a contrast to most stations on Amtrak’s Northeast electrified routes.
Last week, Kris and I timed our arrival at Parkesburg to coincide with the late-running Pennsylvanian. This is the through train that connects Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and New York City.
It typically runs with a diesel between Harrisburg and Philadelphia, but on this day diesel power was swaped for an electric at Harrisburg.
I made this sequence of images using my Nikon Z mirror-less digital cameras.
For my birthday, my father had given me a roll of Fujichrome Provia 100F.
More than 40 years earlier, he would often provide a roll of Kodachrome (with Kodak mailer) on my special day. I still have many of those slides in my collection, most of subjects long since gone.
While visiting Cape Cod, I finished the Ektachrome that had been in my Nikon for months and loaded up the lone roll of Fujichrome Provia.
Among the film photos I made on the trip was this view of Mass-Coastal’s ‘Energy Train’ passing the harbor at Buzzards Bay on its return from Rochester, Massachusetts.
I received this processed film back from the lab last week. I was delighted! Almost every color slide was a winner!
Fujichrome Provia 100F color slide exposed at Buzzards Bay, Massachusetts on Novemeber 24, 2023. Processed in February 2024 and scanned a few days ago for presentation here.
Fujichrome Provia 100F color slide exposed at Buzzards Bay, Massachusetts on Novemeber 24, 2023. Processed in February 2024 and scanned a few days ago for presentation here.
Fujichrome Provia 100F color slide exposed at Buzzards Bay, Massachusetts on Novemeber 24, 2023. Processed in February 2024 and scanned a few days ago for presentation here.
Back on November 17, 2023, Kris and I had paused at Reading & Northern’s Pittston Junction yard.
It had been months since the last time I exposed a color slide.
I had my Nikon F3 with me because we were on our way to Cape Cod, and I anticipated wanting to make a few slides of our trip.
So after making a variety of photos with my digital cameras, I dusted off the F3 and made two Ektachrome slides of Reading & Northern 2535, in what appeared as a classic railroad scene.
Why just two slides? Well, this was because after I exposed the second photo the battery in the camera died. That is one of the dangers of infrequent camera use.
When we final got to the Cape, I replaced the battery and finished off my roll of film.
Exposed on Kodak Ektachrome 100 using a Nikon F3 with 35-70mm Nikkor zoom. Slide scanned using a Nikon LS5000 slide scanner.
The high cost of the film and processing, combined with the burden of carrying extra camera equipment, has limited my film usage to just a few rolls per year.
Last week, I received several processed rolls back from the lab, which accounted for the majority of the film photos I made during 2023.
Among these were a few photos I made on January 24, 2023 during a trip with Conway Scenic’s Snow Plow Extra that cleared to Mountain Junction and then east on the Redstone Branch in North Conway, New Hampshire.
These were exposed on Kodak Ektachrome 100 using a Nikon F3.
Conway Scenic crews clear the switch at Mountain Junction on January 24, 2023.
Conway Scenic crews clear the switch at Mountain Junction on January 24, 2023.
Conway Scenic crews clear the switch at Mountain Junction on January 24, 2023.
Plow Extras are very rare on the Redstone Branch. I wanted to make sure this was recorded for posterity, so I made a few color slides of the move. I’d traveled on the train as far as Mechanic Street, then walked along the North-South road in North Conway to get this image. Until 2022, I lived around the corner from this location.
Plow Extras are very rare on the Redstone Branch. I wanted to make sure this was recorded for posterity, so I made a few color slides of the move. I’d traveled on the train as far as Mechanic Street, then walked along the North-South road in North Conway to get this image. Until 2022, I lived around the corner from this location.
Plow Extras are very rare on the Redstone Branch. I wanted to make sure this was recorded for posterity, so I made a few color slides of the move. I’d traveled on the train as far as Mechanic Street, then walked along the North-South road in North Conway to get this image. Until 2022, I lived around the corner from this location.
At 11:35am on August 18, 1988, I photographed Conrail C32-8 6616 leading MBSE (Middleboro to Selkirk, otherwise known as ‘The Queen’) across the former Boston & Albany bridge over the Connecticut River.
The C32-8s were among the GE’s known as ‘Camels’ because of their humpback appearance.
These were called ‘Classics’ by the folks at GE to distinguish them from the more Spartan DASH-8s produced later.
I’d parked my Dodge Dart in the riverside lot off Route 5, and made my way down to water level, where I exposed this Professional Kodachrome 25 slides.
However, in trying to get as close to the water as possible (without falling in), I managed to lose my sense of level, and the resulting image was several degrees off-axis.
For many years this slide was relegated to binder of my ‘seconds’.
The other night I scanned the slide, corrected the level and improved the color balance. (Professional Kodachrome had a tendency to shift toward the red).
As Norfolk Southern’s unit coal train 632 rolled through Sunbury, Pa., on the former Pennsylvania Railroad Northern Central route, Kris and I chased along on the parallel Rt 147.
On the way north we’d spotted several open locations right off the road. By the time we reached the south side of Sunbury, we were already a couple of minutes ahead of the train, so we pulled off the road near mile post 260.
While I was surprised to catch a coal train on the move, and delighted to have stumbled into NS’s one-of-a-kind Conrail heritage unit No. 8098, I didn’t realise how infrequently Clearfield-originated coal trains are these days.
At milepost 260, I aimed to make some representative photos of the locomotive in nice light. At our next location about 17 miles further down the line, I hoped to make the most of the sweeping curve that Kris and I spotted on our drive northward earlier in the day.
We timed the exercise well and had time to make nice sequences at both locations. Special thanks to Dan Cupper for operational details on the coal train!
Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Classic 3/4 view. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Classic 3/4 view. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Classic 3/4 view. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens near milepost 260, Sunbury, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm lens near Dalmatia, Pennsylvania, February 2024. This is an old school coal train. Check out the steel hoppers with uneven loads. It was like stepping back a quarter century!
Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm lens near Dalmatia, Pennsylvania, February 2024. This is an old school coal train. Check out the steel hoppers with uneven loads. It was like stepping back a quarter century!
Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm lens near Dalmatia, Pennsylvania, February 2024. This is an old school coal train. Check out the steel hoppers with uneven loads. It was like stepping back a quarter century!
Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm lens, NS 632 crossing Mahantango Creek near Dalmatia, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm lens, NS 632 crossing Mahantango Creek near Dalmatia, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm lens, NS 632 crossing Mahantango Creek near Dalmatia, Pennsylvania, February 2024.
The tracks of the former Reading Company’s Lancaster & Columbia line through Lititz, Pa, were trimmed back a few blocks in recent months.
The rails were lifted where they crossed North Water Street, near the Appalachian Brewing Company.
I made these photos while experiementing with a vintage-2008 Lumix LX3. A decade ago, I’d made a lot of great photos with this compact camera model.
While I ultimately replaced my original LX3 with the more versatile LX7, I again have an LX3 in my repertoire of photographic equipment. This camera’s f2.8 Leica Vario-Summicron lens yields excellent results.
I was surprised to hear a whistle to the west, when we were exploring the Shikellamy State Park along the Susquehanna River near Sunbury, Pa.
Then when the train came into view on the far side of the river, I had vivid sense of Conrail-blue deja vu.
The last time, I’d visited this bridge, photographer Mike Gardner and I had caught the eastward Norfolk Southern freight symbol 13W led by a former Conrail GE C40-8 still in the classic Conrail paint, and then a little while later, we photographed the westward NS 41T with Canadian National locomotives. But that was back in November 2001!
From my slide archives: Norfolk Southern 13W led by a former Conrail DASH8-40C. November 2, 2001.From my slide archives: A photo from my earlier visit to the Shikellamy State Park back on November 2, 2001 (Exposed on Fujichrome film). NS 41T with CN diesels.
From my slide archives: A photo from my earlier visit to the Shikellamy State Park back on November 2, 2001 (Exposed on Fujichrome film). NS 41T with CN diesels.
From my slide archives: A photo from my earlier visit to the Shikellamy State Park back on November 2, 2001 (Exposed on Fujichrome film). NS 41T with CN diesels.
Fast forward: Conrail’s days as an independant Class I carrier are now a quarter century behind us, so what was this modern GE in blue paint Kris and I saw last week?
As the unit coal train (NS 632) rolled across the multiple-span truss bridge, I realized what I was looking at:
Norfolk Southern’s specially painted Conrail heritage locomotive! This is a General Electric ES44AC, engine number 8098, an Evolution-series 4,400 hp low-emissions diesel-electric.
Conrail never owned anything quite so advanced.
I made my photos and then Kris and I decided to follow the train back down NS’s Buffalo Line. This was a rare find! It was our lucky day! Lucky!
I had a couple of prime locations in mind, if we could only stay ahead of the train!
Norfolk Southern 632 crossing the Susquehanna River between Northumberland and Sunbury, PA—February, 2024. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom.
Norfolk Southern 632 crossing the Susquehanna River between Northumberland and Sunbury, PA—February, 2024. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom.
Norfolk Southern 632 crossing the Susquehanna River between Northumberland and Sunbury, PA—February, 2024. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom.
Norfolk Southern 632 crossing the Susquehanna River between Northumberland and Sunbury, PA—February, 2024. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom.
Norfolk Southern 632 crossing the Susquehanna River between Northumberland and Sunbury, PA—February, 2024. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom.
Norfolk Southern 632 crossing the Susquehanna River between Northumberland and Sunbury, PA—February, 2024. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom.
Norfolk Southern 632 crossing the Susquehanna River between Northumberland and Sunbury, PA—February, 2024. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom. Look what’s trailing! Another EMD diesel number 1127.
Norfolk Southern 632 crossing the Susquehanna River between Northumberland and Sunbury, PA—February, 2024. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom. Look what’s trailing! Another EMD diesel number 1127.
Norfolk Southern 632 crossing the Susquehanna River between Northumberland and Sunbury, PA—February, 2024. Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom. Look what’s trailing! Another EMD diesel number 1127.
My first digital camera was a Panasonic Lumix LX3. I bought it on the recommendation of Eric Rosenthal in October 2009.
I made tens of thousands of photographs with that wee camera. It finally gave up the ghost in June 2014. I replaced it with my first Lumix LX7.
By that time I had bought a Canon EOS-7D, which I was relying upon for much of my heavy photography. However, I carried the Lumix with me everywhere. As I’ve explained previously, the camera you use is the one in your hand. So, while I often have with me a BIG camera, a Lumix is typically at the ready in my pocket.
I later bought a Fuji XT1, which largely supplanted the Canon. In 2020, I bought my first Nikon Z, which largely supplanted the XT1. By that stage, I was on my third Lumix LX7. In 2022, our friend Bill Keay gave Kris and me a brand new Lumix LX3. Still in the box, this camera had been his father’s and he wanted us to have it.
Although I’ve been using an LX7 for almost 10 years, on reflection I’ve often felt that I had made better photos with the old LX3, despite the more modern camera (LX7) with its faster lens, longer zoom range, and better operating software.
The other day I finally unboxed the 2008-vintage LX3, charged its battery and set it up to shoot JPG and RAW at its highest resolution.
Kris and I drove over to the Railroad Museum of Pennsylania, where I made a series of comparison views. The files below are all RAW and unaltered in post processing except for scaling. Each is identified by the camera used.
My first photo with the ‘New’ LX3. RAW file unaltered in post-processing.
My first photo with the ‘New’ LX3. RAW file unaltered in post-processing.
My first photo with the ‘New’ LX3. RAW file unaltered in post-processing.
The former Pennsylvania Railroad’s Northern Central route north of Harrisburg toward Northumberland, Pa., (and beyond) is operated by Norfolk Southern as its Buffalo Line.
In the late-1990s, toward the end of the Conrail-era, photographer Mike Gardner and I began exploring this route, and continued our photography along the line ifor several years after Norfolk Southern assumed operations. However, it had been more than twenty years since I had taken a serious look of the railroad north of the Harrisburg area.
A few days ago, we had a rare sunny day, so Kris and I made an adventure of following the east bank of the Susquehanna River compass north toward Sunbury.
A Millersburg, PA, we stopped to inspect the old Northern Central Railway freight house that has been repurposed and maintained in good condition.
A Millersburg, PA, we stopped to inspect the old Northern Central Railway freight house that has been repurposed and maintained in good condition.
A Millersburg, PA, we stopped to inspect the old Northern Central Railway freight house that has been repurposed and maintained in good condition.
Kris and I spotted this sweeping curve near Dalmatia, Pa., commenting that it would make a neat place to catch a train. I wondered how I’d missed this spot in the Conrail era. I suspect there may have been more brush/trees in the scene 25 years ago.
Kris and I spotted this sweeping curve near Dalmatia, Pa., commenting that it would make a neat place to catch a train. I wondered how I’d missed this spot in the Conrail era. I suspect there may have been more brush/trees in the scene 25 years ago.
Kris and I spotted this sweeping curve near Dalmatia, Pa., commenting that it would make a neat place to catch a train. I wondered how I’d missed this spot in the Conrail era. I suspect there may have been more brush/trees in the scene 25 years ago.
We stopped at few locations. At Sunbury, I was curious get re-acquaited with the railroad and its connections. On the north side of town, we visited the Shikellamy State Park, where Mike and I had caught NS freight 41T back in November 2001. At that time NS was still operating the line as a through freight route all the way to Buffalo, NY.
Classic Chrome: In November 2001, I made this Fujichrome color slide with my (then new!) Contax G2 rangefinder of Norfolk Southern’s 41T crossing the Susquehanna River bridges at the Shikellamy State Park located on an island between Sunbury and Northumberland, Pa.
Classic Chrome: In November 2001, I made this Fujichrome color slide with my (then new!) Contax G2 rangefinder of Norfolk Southern’s 41T crossing the Susquehanna River bridges at the Shikellamy State Park located on an island between Sunbury and Northumberland, Pa.
Classic Chrome: In November 2001, I made this Fujichrome color slide with my (then new!) Contax G2 rangefinder of Norfolk Southern’s 41T crossing the Susquehanna River bridges at the Shikellamy State Park located on an island between Sunbury and Northumberland, Pa.
Here’s a similar view of the same bridge bridges made on our recent visit. More than 22 years separate the two photos. Notice that a trail has been constructed during the interval. Looks like the bridge could use a coat of paint too. Nikon Z7-11 photo.
Here’s a similar view of the same bridge bridges made on our recent visit. More than 22 years separate the two photos. Notice that a trail has been constructed during the interval. Looks like the bridge could use a coat of paint too. Nikon Z7-11 photo.
Here’s a similar view of the same bridge bridges made on our recent visit. More than 22 years separate the two photos. Notice that a trail has been constructed during the interval. Looks like the bridge could use a coat of paint too. Nikon Z7-11 photo.
Here’s another contemporary view of the Susquehanna River bridges at the Shikellamy State Park located on an island between Sunbury and Northumberland, Pa.
As I was photographing the bridges from the park, I heard a whistle to the west . . .
Among my black & white negatives from years gone by, is a sheet of 16 frames of 120 Kodak Tri-X that I exposed using my father’s old Rolleiflex Model-T in August of 1986.
I’d spent a week in Maine visiting with my friend Robert A. Buck, proprietor of Tucker’s Hobbies in Warren, Massachusetts.
Among his other guests was photographer Brandon Delaney. During our visit, Brandon and I spent several days exploring Maine railways, including Bangor & Aroostook, Belfast & Moosehead Lake, Canadian Pacific and Maine Central.
On a visit to Searsport, I made this photo of the freight that ran four or five days a week from Northern Maine Junction (near Bangor) to Searsport. The locomotives were working trackage that served the Searsport Pier.
Film was precious. I only brought a few rolls of 35mm Kodachrome and several 120 rolls of black & white.
This scene was back-lit, but I felt it was sufficiently worthy to invest one frame. I scanned it the other day and made a few improvements to contrast, eliminated some spots and scaled the output for presentation here.
A lot has changed since August 1986. I wonder when the last train used the Searsport Pier?
The weather was mild and the light was dull when I crossed Willow Road and spotted the headlight of Norfolk Southern’s New Holland Branch freight.
I zipped down the line to Creek Hill Road in Leola, Pa., where I opted for a slightly different angle than the one I posted from this location on Tracking the Light a few days ago.
In these views, I composed photos to include the road.
Also, where in my previous encounters with the New Holland Branch local, locomotives were working back to back on the train. On this day, sequentially numbered GP38-2s were ‘topped and tailed’ (to use a British descriptive phrase). In other words, there were locomotives positioned at both ends of the train.
Over the last few months, I’ve exposed photographs of Pennsylvania’s Strasburg Rail Road from a similar angle at Carpenters Cemetery near Blackhorse Road.
I find it fascinating to see how the light and environment changes with the seasons.
Subtle changes in the growth in the surrounding fields, the relative height of the sun in the sky, combined with changes in color temperature owing to humidity, clouds, and dust in the atmosphere are evident is this sequence of photos.
Early autumn 2023.Late Autumn 2023.Mid-January, 2024
Here’s another example of tying the threads together.
A few days ago, Wayne Duffett sent me a photo of a bridge on the Buffalo & Pittsburgh that he’d inspected some years back. In his story about the bridge (that was involved in a fire) he made mention of B&P GP9 number 207 that later was sold to the Finger Lakes Railroad, becoming its 1751.
About a dozen years ago, Conway Scenic traded a pair of second-hand GE diesels to the Finger Lakes for 1751 and has been making good use of the locomotive ever since.
While I’d become very familar with 1751 on Conway Scenic, photographing it working a great variety of trains and featuring it in magazine and billboard advertising, I wondered if I’d ever seen it before.
The other night, I was sorting through a collection of my slides that I’d separated from the main collection about 30 years ago. This was labled as “Misc Roster” and consisted of several hundred locomotive photographs organized by railroad.
Among these photos was a pair of Kodachrome 25 slides exposed on May 18, 1989 of Buffalo & Pittsburgh GP9 number 207 at Rochester & Southern’s Brooks Avenue Yard in Rochester, NY.
At the time the B&P was a relatively recent addition to the Genesee & Wyoming family, and 207 was among the few locomotives that was in B&P’s version of the G&W corporate colors. I think it was the first such B&P locomotive I’d photographed in G&W orange yellow & black paint. B&P 207 was a bit unusual in that it had come from the Chessie System, while most of B&P’s GP9s were former Norfolk & Western units.
I’d completely forgotten that I’d made this image, although once I saw it, I recall walking the tracks at Brooks Avenue one early evening to photograph the engine.
I wonder if somewhere I have a photo of this locomotive in Chessie System paint? If so, that will be a discovery for another day.
Brooks Avenue Yard, Rochester, NY, May 18, 1989. Kodachrome 25 slide exposed with a Leica M2 with 35mm Summicron lens.
Brooks Avenue Yard, Rochester, NY, May 18, 1989. Kodachrome 25 slide exposed with a Leica M2 with 35mm Summicron lens.
Brooks Avenue Yard, Rochester, NY, May 18, 1989. Kodachrome 25 slide exposed with a Leica M2 with 35mm Summicron lens.
Wayne Duffett of TEC Associates included my 2007 photo of Middletown & Hummelstown 2-6-0 number 91 crossing Swatara Creek on the cover of the railroad’s 2023 Bridge Inspection Report. Wayne dedicated the report to the memory of railroad’s Wendell Dillinger who passed away in late 2023.
I made the photo on a visit to the M&H with railroad historian Kurt Bell. At the time I was researching for my book Railroads of Pennsylvania, published in 2008 by Voyageur Press.
I exposed the original image on Fujichrome slide film using my Canon EOS-3 with a 28mm lens. It was windless on the morning of September 27, 2007, allowing for a mirror-like surface of the Swatara.
Last month, during the brief spell of frost and snow, Kris and I rolled by Amtrak Keystone 615 at Bird-in-Hand.
It was so bright, it was hard to keep my eyes open.
The train was running lefthand (on the close track rather than far track) with a 600-series Siemens ‘Cities Sprinter’ high-horsepower electric at each end.
ACS-64 610 leads Keystone 615 west at Bird-in-Hand, PA. Nikon Z7-II f4.0 1/3200th second, ISO 200
ACS-64 610 leads Keystone 615 west at Bird-in-Hand, PA. Nikon Z7-II f4.0 1/3200th second, ISO 200
ACS-64 610 leads Keystone 615 west at Bird-in-Hand, PA. Nikon Z7-II f4.0 1/3200th second, ISO 200
Nikon Z7-II f4.0 1/3200th second, ISO 200
Nikon Z7-II f4.0 1/3200th second, ISO 200
Nikon Z7-II f4.0 1/3200th second, ISO 200
Trailing view at Bird-in-Hand, PA. Nikon Z7-II f4.0 1/3200th second, ISO 200.
Trailing view at Bird-in-Hand, PA. Nikon Z7-II f4.0 1/3200th second, ISO 200.
Trailing view at Bird-in-Hand, PA. Nikon Z7-II f4.0 1/3200th second, ISO 200.
Among my thousands of black & white negatives is a three-ring binder that is largely filled with film exposed for class projects and related photographic studies when I was a student at the Rochester Institute of Technology.
The other night I located a processed, sleeved and completely unlabled roll of Kodak Plus-X. Most of the film was of Conrail trains on the former Erie Railroad in the vicinity of Hornell, NY.
In the late 1980s, I regularly frequented New York’s Southern Tier to make photos. Over the course of about five years I made dozens of trips.
I have detailed photo notes from many of these trips, so while scanning the negatives with my Epson V600 scanner, I started to solve the mystery.
I recalled the day in question, but couldn’t remember exactly when it was. The sky was gray and the landscape bare, so I surmised it was early 1989. The challenge was figuring out which day, since between November 1988 and early May 1989, I made more than a dozen trips through this area.
Key to the mystery were the trains. I typically logged passing trains by leading locomotive and train symbol, while keeping track of film type, exposure notes, the time, along with other relevant details.
Conrail SD50 6746 was a clue. This was leading a westward freight. Another clue were the semaphores at milepost 337, located just west of the village of Arkport, NY. Conrail 3171 led an eastward freight and these details helped me locate the correct log sheet.
My notes from January 14, 1989 put most of the remaining pieces together and I labled both the original negative sheet with date and locations, while scanning and labeling the negatives.
Although it wasn’t noted, I recall that the black & white photos on that day were made with my father’s Leica double-stroke M3 rangefinder. I used my own Leica M2 to expose color slides.
Conrail GP40 3171 leading BUOI (Buffalo to Oak Island) passing the signals at milepost 337. Coincidentally, I logged the time of the image at 3:37pm on January 14, 1989. Plus-X f4.5 1/125.
Conrail GP40 3171 leading BUOI (Buffalo to Oak Island) passing the signals at milepost 337. Coincidentally, I logged the time of the image at 3:37pm on January 14, 1989. Plus-X f4.5 1/125.
Conrail GP40 3171 leading BUOI (Buffalo to Oak Island) passing the signals at milepost 337. Coincidentally, I logged the time of the image at 3:37pm on January 14, 1989. Plus-X f4.5 1/125.
Conrail SD50 6746 leads OIBU (Oak Island to Buffalo) at the signals at mp 337 (measured from Jersey City) west of Arkport, NY, at 3:40pm on January 14, 1989. Kodak Plus X, processed in D-76 developer.
Conrail SD50 6746 leads OIBU (Oak Island to Buffalo) at the signals at mp 337 (measured from Jersey City) west of Arkport, NY, at 3:40pm on January 14, 1989. Kodak Plus X, processed in D-76 developer.
Conrail SD50 6746 leads OIBU (Oak Island to Buffalo) at the signals at mp 337 (measured from Jersey City) west of Arkport, NY, at 3:40pm on January 14, 1989. Kodak Plus X, processed in D-76 developer.
