Interesting train movement at Framingham, MA today

While Q436 from Selkirk was yarding its train at Nevins Yd in Framingham, I heard on the scanner that Q437, which originates in Framingham to go west to Selkirk, was approaching CP22. It turns out that Q437 was pulling a train of ~ 50 general freight from the C&P autorack unloading yard. Given that the C&P yard is a stub-end yard that only handles autoracks, I am puzzled why this train was down there. Ordinarily, Q437 doubles its train out of Nevins yd. Did the Framingham yardmaster run out of room in Nevins/N. Framingham yards and had to temporarily stow this train in the autorack yard?

Q437 leader was one of those new SD70ACe locomotives, #4838, which from the front, resembles an ugly sibling to an chop-nosed Alco RS11.

The CP Yard has been used for the past few months as extra space for freight, ever since East Brookfield opened up. The reason why Q437 probably had to pick-up the empty auto racks is because E. Brookfield has very little room for holding onto extra cars during a pick-up.

The East Brookfield auto facility takes priority over the CP Yard now as far as pick-up's of empty auto racks, although the East Brookfield & Spencer RR (non-union, wanna-be railroad) acnnot keep up with all of the traffic.

Supposedly Nissan was told that they had to move out ofthe CP Yard, because the CP Yard is scheduled to be closed Jan 1st, which is when E.Brookfield is slated to be at full speed, but unfortunately I don't see that happening.

Given the lack of capacity at E. Brookfield, what is the motivation of CSX to stop servicing the CP autorack yard in Framingham? Where would they send the 25-40 daily loads that Framingham gets? Would CSX revive multilevel service to the Westboro unloading facility to close Framingham?

And if and when they stop delivering multilevels to the CP yard, will the yard be closed or will it be used for general freight?

I understand if you can't comment on these questions.

East Brookfield is a huge mess, in the opinion of T&E employees, train dispacthers and even some management. I mean every day it seems like they EBSR has anywhere bewteen 20 to 120 loaded racks on the controlled siding between CP60 & CP64. What this mean is that if you are picking up heading west-bouind you have to go all the way into the back of E.Brookfield to where they store the empties................they are supposed to leave the empties out on the controlled siding, on air, and ready to go. And only abouth 45 racks and 2 engines will fit between CP64 and the switch into the facility, so if you have a lot of cars to make, you sometimes have to wait for an hour or two to get the sgnal @ CP64 for headroom.

As far as Westborough, I beleive they still wat to make it into a van site.

The CP Yard was rumored to become a flexi-flo site at one time, but haven't heard much on that lately.

Oh, and to answer your quetion aout the racks that currently continue to Framingham, they will eventually go to East Brookfield.

is there a lot of foreign power ever in the Framingham yards? I am supposidly going up to this yard over christmas break and i am hoping to see some interesting things the only CSX engine i have ever seen in person is a GP40-2 and i would like to see SD70's and stuff

Occasionally foreign power might come in on Q264, but sometimes it is turned around and sent right back out on Q437.

The new SD70ACE's have become a pretty common fixture on the B&A. Of course they have their pro's and con's. They are good on the B&A because they were built to pull and seem to get over the mountain everytime, although very slowly, no matter what size train. I haven't heard of anybody stalling with a pair of these bad boys yet. Also they are still pretty clean in the cabs, and very quiet compared to the other wide bodies.

On the downside, they are hard to get up to track speed, because they load slowly and as I mentioned before, they are buil for pulling, not speed. Also, the hand-rails are kind of awkard when climbing stairs on and off the engine.

Another reason for them being on the B&A other than pulling is they are also cab signal equipped

Some of the new 4800's have also been on the B&A, but I haven't had one of those yet.

do you have a schedule of what train come through Framingham in one day, like a monday, tuesday or wednesday? How many CSX frieghts go thorugh a day, what are their symbols?

Its unpredictable for the most part.

Q168 and Q174 usually drop their trains in Worcester and go engine lite to Boston...........usually sometime between 900am and noon. Q437 is on duty Monday through Saturday @ 1000am, and they get their power in Nevins yard, usually. Nevins is 1/4 mile west of the commuter rail station.

ok thanks