Not a Bad Year, That 2012

There were new unit trains -- grain and oil -- and MEAY, as needed, got thrown into the alphabet soup. Fink 2.0 seemed to strengthen its position, making Fink 1.0 seem a too-long anomaly. While some track projects, such as the Great Athol Undercutting, seemed to take to infinity and beyond, to go all Galaxy Quest, at least things actually were happening on both D-1 and the Conn River. The start of site work for the Wachusett Extension hints that the promised reanimation of the Dead Track east to 341 hopefully won't be that far in the future. Work to the west and the semi-resident status of some black and white power could be an indication that the Pony's nose has gotten and will continue to get further into the tent.
There was the Hallowe'en mess at 445, but that got cleaned up quickly and hopefully serves as incentive to keep all that crude on the iron and inside the tanks.
(Dag! This make me seem almost optimistic!)

2012 was, from a D1 standpoint, unbelievable! Choosing just 4 pictures to summarize the year was tough. Who'd have thought, a year ago, that I could stand at Leeds Junction and shoot a BNSF meet. I got just that chance on September 14 as westbound lite power met 5414 with loads. The oil business has been a major addition to the bottom line and has allowed all sorts of reinvestment projects. The huge tie project, where they swapped out at least 40,000 ties from Mattawamkeag towards Newport. Something unseen in decades as a tamper gets lowered onto the tracks at Keag.
The unexpected was balanced nicely by the special. ST77 made a late year reappearance to D1, working WA-2 and recently the SAPPI local, Its been great to see it again, oil streaks and all! The OCS was also out quite a few times, especially early fall for Downeaster celebrations and dedications.

2012 brought huge changes to the old Maine Central, and with BNSF power running to the Keag and maybe beyond, ties staged for further trackwork and rumors of more heritage units 2013 should be a great year too!

Thanks for the retrospective reports, gents!

Here here. Looking forward to what the new year brings. It's good time for railroads, especially ours it seems.

I was never a fan of this railroad since the Guiford takeover,but with all the changes going on it almost feels like the old Boston & Maine-Maine Central days again.

Happy New Year to you all! Im excited about the changes, i never would have imagined that changes like this would happen. I had always thought that one day GRS/PAR was going to give up on the track between Bangor and Mattawamkeag. Boy was i wrong! Im looking forward to seeing what 2013 has in store for D1 and the rest of the system.

I still wonder if Intermodal out of Waterville/Saint John could happen this year?

Pushed back to April for lack of crews.

CN9634 wrote:Pushed back to April for lack of crews.

No kidding....!

Interesting to see what happens capacity wise when PAR initiates service.

It's probably worth mentioning the Downeaster extension as well, and the accompanying 5 mile double track project set to be built this year north of Portland.

Through the usual combination of good fortune and good real estate PAR was the beneficiary of $30 million in government funded trackwork that substantially improved the condition of their freight main lines to Royal Junction and beyond. PAR would have been hard pressed to institute such improvements themselves. These improvements, constructed on one of their most congested corridors, will be critical in supporting further freight services coming online over the next year.

Also throw in the Business Train Open House!

[quote="gokeefe"]It's probably worth mentioning the Downeaster extension as well, and the accompanying 5 mile double track project set to be built this year north of Portland.

I missed this one.Where are they building this double track?

pnolette wrote:

gokeefe wrote:It's probably worth mentioning the Downeaster extension as well, and the accompanying 5 mile double track project set to be built this year north of Portland.

I missed this one.Where are they building this double track?

Between Royal Junction and Portland. They have some additional funds that weren't used for the extension that they're going to use to improve track capacity in that area.

For PAR it can't come fast enough.

gokeefe wrote:

pnolette wrote:

gokeefe wrote:It's probably worth mentioning the Downeaster extension as well, and the accompanying 5 mile double track project set to be built this year north of Portland.

I missed this one.Where are they building this double track?

Between Royal Junction and Portland. They have some additional funds that weren't used for the extension that they're going to use to improve track capacity in that area.

For PAR it can't come fast enough.

Thanks gokeefe.

They definitely are going to need this with more traffic coming.

pnolette wrote:

gokeefe wrote:

pnolette wrote:

gokeefe wrote:It's probably worth mentioning the Downeaster extension as well, and the accompanying 5 mile double track project set to be built this year north of Portland.

I missed this one.Where are they building this double track?

Between Royal Junction and Portland. They have some additional funds that weren't used for the extension that they're going to use to improve track capacity in that area.

For PAR it can't come fast enough.

Thanks gokeefe.

They definitely are going to need this with more traffic coming.

Indeed. In an apparent acknowledgment of this fact PAR converted the switches in New Gloucester to power from hand throws on the Back Road.