Trolley Stop Motel

Sometimes a wide-angle works better.

SEPTA’s Media trolley is seen working east on State Street.

Years ago I’d made photos at this location. I like it because it features the Trolley Stop Motel.

Often when an establishment makes an allustion to a trolley, the trolley and its tracks are but a distant memory.

Such is not the case in Media, Pennsylvania!

Nikkor 24-70mm Z-series lens set to 36mm. Note the position of the streetcar in the frame relative to the motel.

Tracking the Light Posts Daily!

In Time—Just.

Back in January, Kris and I enjoyed lunch at the Fox Meadows Creamery in Leola before heading over to Greenfield in Lancaster, Pa.

When I saw the signal was lit green, I knew I was in luck.

I had just enough time to compose my photo before Amtrak’s inspection train raced by westbound. My goal was to catch cars 10002 and 10005 passing the classic signal.

Car 10002, the Corridor Clipper, is a track inspection car, while car 10005, is a former Pennsyvlania Railroad Metroliner multiple unit that has been equipped to perform catenary measurement.

Thanks Amtrak!

Exposed with a Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm telephoto zoom lens. File adjusted using Adobe Lightroom to lighten shadows, control contrast, and adjust saturation and color balance.

Eastward Intermodal at Cove.

There’s a nice curve on the old Main Line near Cove, Pennsylvania, just east of Norfolk Southern’s timetable location SIP116 (near milepost 116).

We pulled in expecting to catch a westward freight, and saw that an eastward train was approaching slowly.

We had ample time to jump out of the car and get cameras ready. I didn’t want to over complicate things, so I restricted my photographic efforts to just four cameras: Two Nikon digital, plus my Fuji XT1, and a Nikon F3 loaded with Ektachrome. Kris thought this was excessive, but hey! the sun was out and the railroad was alive!

I made this view using my Nikon Z6 70-200mm lens.

Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm set at 200mm, f5.6 1/640 second, ISO 100.

More images coming soon!

Tracking the Light Posts Daily!

More Media

Photographing streetcars (trams) with a long telephoto presents a visual quandary.

The compression effect offered by the lens can be used to help separate the car from other traffic, while presenting an interesting background. However, the same effect will also compress the streetcar, making an already short vehicle appear even shorter.

Working with my f2.8 70-200mm Nikkor Z-series telephoto zoom, I made these photos of a SEPTA light rail car working east on State Street in Media. This car was on its return run toward 69th Street in Upper Darby. Less than 20 minutes earlier, I’d photographed this car on its outward run, and that image was featured on Tracking the Light a few days ago.

By using a wide aperture, I was afforded shallow depth of field which helps the viewer separate the car from its environment.

200mm f2.8 1/5000th of a second.
200mm f2.8 1/4000th of a second.

Tracking the Ligth Posts Daily!

Clear Morning at Rockville Bridge

Last Saturday was clear and bright, so Kris and I headed over to the famed Rockville Bridge over the Susquehanna River north of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

When we arrived there was a set of Norfolk Southern locomotives sitting on the bridge and it appeared that scene was set for some action.

We made some photos of the bridge and a few pictures of each other with the iconic spans before heading up river to catch trains on the move. Nice sunlight was a good start, and on this day Norfolk Southern didn’t disappoint . . .

More photos coming soon!

Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens. Nikon NEF RAW adjusted with Lightroom.
Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens. Nikon NEF RAW adjusted with Lightroom.

Tracking the Light Posts Daily!

Irish Rail Transition

The mid-2000s saw a rapid transformation of Irish Rail.

Older equipment, some of which had served the railway for decades, was withdrawn as newer trains entered service. Stations were revamped, modified and improved with modern access and longer platforms. A series of new paint liveries were introduced and discontinued in rapid succession. In just a few years most of the trains were transformed from variations of Irish Rail’s orange liveries to schemes featuring two-tone greens and silver with dashes of safety yellow.

On 28 April 2007, I made this view of Irish Rail’s Class 201 diesel wearing the orange with safety yellow front scheme (introduced in 2005) leading Mark II carriages at Portarlington. A new handicapped access foot bridge has supplanted the traditional lattice bridge that connected the up and down platforms, while some work around the station and platforms had already begun. More changes to the station were soon to follow, which included easing the track curvature through the station-area to allow for higher running speed.

This photo is not a work of art, but rather a straight narrative image aimed at documenting the scene as it appeared on 28April2007.

There was a comparatively short window in time where it was possible to make transitory photos like this one. Soon all changed.

Media 101-on the street.

This is not a class. It’s a streetcar!

My first visit to Media, Pa., was more than 45 years ago. On that trip, my family rode from the 69th Street Terminal in Upper Darby on a December evening in a vintage Brilliner trolley car. At the time the car was more than 40 years old. I’d made an underexposed Kodachrome slide of the car in the inky darkness

Kris and I made a Media visit in January. On this adventure I caught one of SEPTA’s early 1980s-vintage Kawasaki Cars working the single track line on State Street in midday sun.

SEPTA has plans to retire these relics in another few years, and I was happy to make a few digital photo of this car.

More Media photos will follow over the coming days.

Tracking the Light Posts Daily!

MBTA 2008

The HSP-46 is a diesel-electric unique to the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority.

Last November, we paused briefly on the former New Haven Railroad Shoreline Route at Mansfield, Massachusetts, where I made this photograph of an outbound commuter train led by HSP-46 2008.

The railroad was built in the early 1830s as the Boston & Providence, which was among the first lines in North America to employ locomotives in main line service. This was several years before the development of practical commercial photography.

I wonder what it would have been like to watch one of the B&P’s early steam locomotives working the line and if I had a camera, what sort of photograph I might have made of that locomotive.

Exposed with a Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Nikkor Z-series zoom.

Norfolk Connections

The morning of 15 September 2006 was clear and bright. It was the third attempt we made to catch Irish Rail’s Ballina-Dublin Norfolk liner from a vantage point in this field near Ballyvary, Co. Mayo.

On this day, many of the containers carried by the train were actually Norfolk Line boxes. While this may seem unremarkable, in practice it was relatively unusual, and on many days the train carried an assortment of 20 and 40 foot containers.

Norfolk Line was a component of the Maersk Group. Years later, this train became the IWT Liner, which years ago was a regular feature on Tracking the Light, as I often photograph it on my extended visits to Ireland.

I have a variety of connections with name Norfolk. My wife Kris grew up in the town of Norfolk, Massachusetts, and in recent years we have paid several visits to Norfolk, thus the photographs of MBTA near the Norfolk Station.

These days, American Class I carrier Norfolk Southern is among my regular subjects, including its local freights on the New Holland and Lititz Secondaries and on former Pennsylvania Railroad main lines.

A decade before I was born, my father paid visits to the Norfolk & Western to photograph their magnificent steam locomotives at work. I have often featured these images in my books, as well as N&W photos from other photographers, including the late John E. Pickett and Jim Shaughnessy.

Ten years ago, fellow photographer Pat Yough and I traveled to Norfolk, Virginia where we visited the Norfolk Southern Museum (that displayed one of my photos on the wall) and traveled on Norfolk’s The Tide lightrail system.

Exposed on Fujichrome using a Contax G2 rangefinder with 45mm Zeiss lens.

Tracking the Light Tracks Norfolk!