Firstly some background. As my name suggests I am an Englishman exiled in the USA due to my wife's job. My main railway interest is industrial railways and by extension shortlines and preserved railways. We live in Nashua and can (just about) see the Hillsborough branch from our apartment. When I first saw the line (around Main St in Nashua) I thought it must be abandoned as I couldn't believe that trains could operate over it due to the condition of the track. About six months ago I hear the unmistakeable sound of a loco horn about 2 in the morning, I looked out the window and there was a train going up teh branch towards Milford. Since then I have seen a few more trains but always at night. Yesterday a train went up the branch at 1030 in the morning so I took myself over to Mlford to have a look (thanks to my visa I can't work).
I found the train swapping wagons at Hendrix Cable & Wire. I spoke to the driver and asked him when he was heading back to Nashua and he said about an hour. This gave me time to drive up to Greenfield to photograph the SW9, apparently ex B&M 1228, which is dumped? next to the depot there. Does anyone have idea who actually owns this loco and what its doing there? I drove back to Wilton and got there just as the train got there to run round. I took some photos of this and then went to the crossing over the 101a between Wilton and Milford to take some shots of it on the bridge over the Souhegan river.
I then drove to Granite State Concrete to look at the SW900 owned by the Milford-Bennington Railroad. That situation has been discussed at length on here, I will just add that it all seems madness but there you go. Incidentally does anyone know what the works number of the loco is as I don't seem to be able to find it anywhere. I then "chased" the train back to Nashua although I think it could hardly be described as a chase as I have never come across a train that moves so slowly (and I spent six months travelling by train in India). I can't believe that a train that takes four hours to travel 16 miles with a crew of three with just four wagons can be economical. However it does make for good photos so I shouldn't complain too much. One final oddity was that when the train got back to Nashua, the wagons were left just before the crossing at Temple St and not taken to the yard - why was that?
Hopefully, you will find a selection of photos here
http://tinyurl.com/6lcrngt
Any comments are welcome.
Cheers
Simon Darvill
I