Freight customers in Wells, Maine

[MEC407]

Discussion in the Portsmouth Activity thread reminded me of some questions I'd been meaning to ask.

One time we checked out Rockingham Jct in Newfields and there was a lengthy line stored there which had numerous insulated boxes (mr, hs, lnac from what I recall) in the consist, which I assumed were canned goods destined for the Shaw's distribution center in Wells.

Speaking of Shaws at Wells Beach, do they still get cars? I also heard someone may have moved into the Spencer Press building at Wells too.

So I'll echo roberttosh's question: does Shaw's Supermarkets Distribution Center in Wells still receive or ship anything by rail? Even in the '90s and early 2000s when there were several customers in Wells, I recall that Shaw's was a somewhat infrequent/sporadic user of rail.

Spencer Press usually saw rail activity at least once a week. They're long gone now. Village Candle now occupies part of the old Spencer space, but I haven't heard anything about them using rail.

I don't think the propane dealer, Eastern Propane, has used rail in several years, even though their web site still indicates rail access at their Wells location.

[Bulkheadflat]

We did a quick drive thru the industrial park a few months ago, and the Shaws siding did appear sadly lifeless. Not certain about the former Spencer Press siding, which is now an enclosed dock so we can't tell if there are cars or not. Though I've seen some of the Portsmouth switchers returning to Rigby with what appeared to be empty foreign paper cars in the consist now and then, double door Tbox's and such, which I assumed were from that customer, not sure.

[rb]

Is this the Spencer siding? Bing actually captured a boxcar in the building:

http://tinyurl.com/669pyq2

[MEC407]

Yes, that is it, but I think those images are at least a couple of years old. For instance, the old Wells Beach station has a shingle roof according to those images, even though it was replaced with a metal roof a couple years ago.

[Bulkheadflat]

While going by Portsmouth last weekend we noticed a double door TBOX set at the lumberyard below the interstate, so I'm guessing that's where they've been going all along, always thought they were paper. Back to square one with Wells, maybe it's completely silent, sadly. With the price of fuel being so much higher for the past 5 or 6 years, one would think that Shaw's would be utilizing rail more, not less.

[MEC407]

One would think so, but maybe they had "service issues" with the railroad in the past. Hannaford Bros., Shaw's main competitor, has a distribution center right next to Rigby Yard and I don't think they use rail either.

[Tim Mullins]

LOOOOOONNNNNGGGG Time ago, Hannaford got cars but because of poor service, they stopped using rail.

[Bulkheadflat]

Yeah, sadly and unbelievably, the siding into the large Hannafords distribution center is dormant, they move a massive amount of food. Though, up into the early 2000's they were getting insulated carloads of canned goods into the Fore River warehousing center near outer Forest Ave, and then having it shuttled to South Portland I'm assuming. Used to see a steady amount of BN, BNSF, SLSF, GVSR and other assorted insulated boxes showing up on the extended concrete dock in there. Up until the mid-late 90's, one of the warehouses right along Rigby yard was actually receiving a lot of insulated ATSF's and such loaded with canned goods, I'm assuming that was stored for Hannafords as well. Haven't seen any cars at those sidings in many years.

[MEC407]

It's been several years since there's been any rail activity in the Wells Industrial Park, but recently the rails into the old Spencer Press building (now Village Candle) were polished by MEC 519, which was participating in a mass casualty drill with the Wells Police, Fire, and EMS departments, Pan Am Railways, and other emergency responders.

Photo gallery at the York County Coast Star web site:

http://www.seacoastonline.com/photogall ... _2328_2502" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;