Grassroots Railroad Sports?

You can't go to Vermont and not see a covered bridge, and so I got a photo of my Spyder with the Bartonsville Covered Bridge. Sadly, this is not an original covered bridge. There was one here of this design that dated back to 1870, but unfortunately that one washed off the abutments when Tropical Storm Irene passed through in 2011 and wrecked that one. This one is a recreation that was built a year later.

Originally I was going to go for the shot of it passing by the end of the bridge, but then decided that will probably be a photo opp tomorrow, so instead I went for a shot taken from the bridge of the train running along the Williams River.

This was the end of my chase. I went into Bellows Falls, hoping to get them crossing the causeway and coming into the yard, but they never materialized. After doing some reading, I learned that they don't often run all the way into Bellows Falls. A lot of the time they service Riverside Reload, just north of the causeway, and turn around there. I went back to try and find them, to hopefully catch them headed back with that SD70M-2 leading, but I couldn't seem to find them. I'm not sure if they got way out ahead of me, or if they tied down at Riverside for a while, but I decided just to head back to Rutland, find my hotel and get dinner.

So, today's trip with Rutland #405 was, uh, interesting. No, wait, I meant infuriating. Beware, there will be some ranting within. So, I reported to the Amtrak station in Rutland ahead of time because they wanted to be out of town at 8am. There's this sculpture (pile of welded junk?) that is supposed to resemble a steam locomotive in the parking lot. It's strange.

The #405, and her three ex-CNJ coaches, one combine, one table car, and one coach that was converted to an open-platform observation car.

There was already an air of things going wrong when I arrived. I happened to listen in on the VTR's photographer talking to the head end crew and mentioning that the one woman from the magazine was wanting to push departure back an hour, and was saying "We are technically working for Trains this weekend, so whatever they say, no matter how wrong, goes." The one brakeman asked if he had met this woman, to which the reply was "Nope, she hasn't shown her face yet." I also overheard them mentioning that Sunday's trip would be shorted to Middlebury, VT. Hmmm.

The #405 then shoved back to move over a track and get ready for departure.

The Rutland yard switch job, with one of those GMTX leasers, passing by the Rutland station. That's the VTR assistant manager on the track, waving to the crew as they go by.

So, everyone got aboard and the trip headed out of Rutland. Not long after, the other Trains Magazine rep got on the PA and mentioned that there was an issue with Sunday's trip. Originally slated to go to Burlington, they had learned that the #405 is restricted to 25mph max, due to it's age and some missing features of modern locomotives (I believe they said it is because the #405 lacks an alerter). They have to get to Middlebury to go into a siding and wait for Amtrak's Ethan Allen Express, which uses the VTR from Burlington to Whitehall, NY, to go by. They cannot be late or hold up Amtrak, and so they said we potentially have to wait in a siding for 2 hours. With the #405 stuck at 25mph and the wait at Middlebury, they would then have to scratch all photo runbys on north and south runs, and even then they'd be cutting it close on the crew's time. So, the plan was changed to instead run from Rutland to Middlebury and offer photo runbys in both directions. Cue an outrage from a number of passengers; some "daisypickers" were saying "We don't care about runbys, lets just go to Burlington and back", and another person I heard was saying "The trip was advertised as Rutland-Burlington, Middlebury is barely even halfway." Honestly, I was okay with turning at Middlebury, because I have to drive home tomorrow night and I was worried about getting back to Rutland at like 9pm. But when I went back to sign my waiver, the female rep was saying to the other magazine rep that they needed to put it to a vote. 

I then overheard one guy, who actually runs a photograph page that I follow, saying "I suggested that they should have VTR get another unrestricted locomotive and have that lead one way, and then we run all the way, get photos in one direction, and get back on a single crew's time and they blew me off." He also mentioned that he wasn't sure if we were going into the Bellows Falls yard, because "New England Central was possibly dropping off cars and they couldn't have people in the yard if NECR was coming in." As he vented "The yardmaster can't pick up a phone and call NECR, and then press the button for the remote derail in the yard?" I was starting to get a bad feeling about things at this point.

So this photo was taken from that huge bridge over Route 103. We stopped here, but strictly for the railroad photographer to launch his drone and get his own photos, and then we were off.

Our first stop for a photo runby was at East Wallingford, VT. We disembarked at the VT-140 grade crossing, and set up. There was this old Rutland section gang house on the adjoining property, and you can see this is marked "Section 14". Usually your railroads back in the day were split up into sections, and you had these tool shacks (and I guarantee that small door was for a speeder) and usually a residence where your section gang lived, and frequently a separate residence for the gang boss and his wife. As railroads moved from established section gangs to roaming MoW teams, these buildings fell by the wayside and were typically repurposed.

The #405, before reversing down for the runby. I'm sure that those cars on the left were not happy waiting for us all the disembark. Very New England shot, with the cool old barn with a cupola on the left and the farm stand on the left. There was an old tractor stopped on the left as well, and we were hoping he would hang around for the runby, but he chugged off as soon as the #405 got out of the way.

And performing the runby.

And backing down past the section gang shed to let us board.

I had hoped we would stop at that location along Route 103 that I had gotten the 263 at yesterday, but we motored right past that. And then we slowed down and stopped and everyone thought that we were stopping for another runby. We sat there for 10-15 minutes, with no word what was going on, and then motored off. The gentleman from the magazine got on the PA and said that we had stopped to talk to the assistant general manager from VTR and he had arranged to have another VTR locomotive on hand for Sunday. It would be hooked to the south end of the train Sunday morning and would allow us to do 59mph in one direction, giving us a trip to Burlington and photo runbys. 

We made no photo stops along the way, and this was from the high bridge arriving into Ludlow.

We got two runbys at Ludlow, with two photo lines. One was behind the depot, to get a shot with the depot, and the other was on the other side of the depot with more foliage in the photo. We were split up into two groups and then swapped after the first runby.

This was from the far side of the depot on the second runby. I started to see an issue on this photo runby, which was that a bunch of the "daisypickers" got off and were wandering out in front of people, talking while people were trying to get video and getting repeatedly spoken to. Another railfan and I were set up and this elderly guy, no camera and didn't even have his phone out, walked and stood out in front of the photo line and when we politely asked if he could stand behind us. He got all huffy over it.

Taken through the vestibule of the lead car.

We stopped north of Chester, where the railroad crosses Thompson Road (essentially a private driveway) twice in quick succession. They did two runbys here, and they had the ears pinned back on the #405 when they passed by.

If you look to the right, you can see a sign next to the whistle post with a black angled portion. Those are for crews operating Jordan spreaders and warn of a close clearance or structure or object on the corresponding side. They are there to warn the spreader crew to raise the wing plow on that side to avoid damaging the equipment or the object the sign warns of.

Headed away from Thompson Road, we passed some very nice scenery. This really is a very scenic line, and it's too bad that VTR doesn't offer a ton of excursions. It had to have been something to see back when Steamtown regularly ran G5 Pacifics up this route, or even farther back when the Rutland still operated their steam locomotives. I figured we would stop at the Chester station, but we motored right past that. 

While we passed the Chester station, we did not pass the Bartonsville covered bridge, which I had figured would definitely be a runby location. Due to traffic and lack of real estate for a photo line, the decision was made to do a static shot. They would unload us, back up to allow traffic by for a couple minutes, then pull forward and people could rotate through and get their shots.

Moving back into place after clearing the crossing guard circuit to let traffic by.

And posed with the bridge. Rutland #405 and covered bridges, Vermont institutions.

Heading south into Rockingham

So, this is where things started to fall apart. There had been a lot of hope that we were going to go into Bellows Falls, and even across the river into the turntable and roundhouse at North Walpole. As the one guy was pointing out there was a great, and exclusive, photo opp of the train crossing the girder bridge  into the Bellows Falls yard. I was also hoping that we would maybe get a static photo shoot of the train posed out on the causeway headed into Bellows Falls. Why did I use the term exclusive? Well, so far every photo runby we had gotten was at public crossings and those chasing the train were getting photos and videos there as well, as well as shots everywhere else where we didn't stop. Didn't seem like great value for us.

We rolled into Rockingham, just north of the causeway, and the train slowed to a stop. Then they cut the #405 off and ran down and switched over to go to the other side. Hmm, doesn't look like we're going into Bellows Falls, which had been suspected because of the remark earlier that "NECR may be dropping off cars." I still hoped that maybe we would get out and they would shove back onto the causeway for us to take photos, but they hooked onto the other end, did an air test and we started heading back north.

I was riding in the rear vestibule of the now-rear car with a bunch of other railfans, and this started a discussion about how we had some concerns about the fact that we hadn't gotten any exclusive runbys, we didn't get to go Bellows Falls (the mailed itinerary even mentioned one hour layover at Bellows Falls), and the trip just felt kind of lazy. No real unique stops and they blew past some interesting photo stops. The one Trains guy had already said "I don't know this railroad", which kind of seems like it should have been his job to do some research and have stuff prepared, or to listen to VTR's official photographer who was aboard. There were also concerns about Sunday's trip itinerary, and everyone was baffled why it seemed like the organizers were blindsided by the #405's 25mph restriction and having to be to Middlebury at a specific time to let Amtrak by. It's not like those were new or unexpected developments, like, say, there was a washout or construction that forced Amtrak to detour over VTR.

We headed north and we were rolling off the miles, and there was no talk over the the PA about upcoming photo stops. The guy with the photography site, Dave, was gesturing at spots going "Great afternoon sunlight, we could have stopped there" or "That could have been a cool static shot there". Finally, they get on the PA, as we're well past Chester, and go "We're running late, so we're scratching all northbound photo stops." Well, the woman from the magazine happened to come back to where we were, and one of the guys I had been talking to immediately decides to bend her ear, and said "Hey, this is a railfan charter, how come we aren't getting southbound photo stops? We haven't had any issues and we didn't even go to Bellows Falls, and somehow we're behind schedule."

She then replied that "The event was billed as a 'railfan weekend' and not a 'photo charter' and so you aren't guaranteed photo runbys on both legs of the trip. And we have people aboard who aren't interested in getting photos and are complaining the trip was taking too long and just want to get back to Rutland, so that's why we aren't making anymore photo stops."

That answer left everyone kind of irritated, because it basically seemed like the decision had been made to pander to "daisypickers" instead of railfans, despite the event being billed as a "Railfan Weekend". Shortly before Ludlow, we had to make a stop because the #405 sprung a fuel leak, and we had to wait while the crew fixed it, so I wandered up to my seat to grab my bottle of water and on the way back, the woman from the magazine grabbed me and asked me to explain to an elderly couple about what was so interesting about the locomotive. I explained that it was 73 years old, from a defunct manufacturer, and had operated over these same rails in the same paint scheme and number for the past 73 years.

The lady goes "Well, if it broke down maybe they shouldn't use it anymore." I politely explain that with anything mechanical, the chance of failure regardless of age is non-zero. The husband then goes "I hope it's broke so that they can't use it permanently." Followed by his wife going "Yeah, maybe then people won't want photos tomorrow." I bit my tongue and just walked away, but was left thinking Wait, so you bought two tickets at $375 a person for an event that stated it would be using vintage equipment and making stops for photos, and you're mad that they're using vintage equipment and making stops for photos. Why the berkeley are you here? So, I know for a fact that those old windbags were part of the reason we didn't go to Bellows Falls or get photos on the northbound trip.

The #405 was fixed shortly and we were off again, but at that point, the two Trains magazine people, and the railroad's photographer held a pow-wow in the baggage compartment of the combine, which adjoined the vestibule we were in. I overheard the conversation, in which the woman from the magazine told the photographer that she wanted the train to leave at 6am, and he had to explain that the crew can't even go on-duty until 6am, and they still have to report to the office and do pre-departure checks, so 6:30 departure was the earliest feasible departure. She justified her desire for an earlier departure because "then we have more time before a crew change", at which he had to explain how a crew only has a set amount of time, regardless of when they go on duty, so if they start earlier, they just outlaw earlier, you don't get more hours out of them. She also kept stressing that we can't keep Amtrak waiting and remarking about the #405 having the fuel leak that delayed the trip. 

By the time we got back to Rutland, the mood was pretty dark. I know there are a few people who are saying that they aren't going to ride tomorrow and are going to chase instead, since that way they know they'll get photos, whereas if they ride they'll definitely get less photos and the daisypickers might get them scratched entirely again. Others were theorizing that, with the #405 having the mechanical issue, the magazine folks, particularly the woman, will insist it not be used so that it doesn't make them late for the meet at Middlebury and hold up Amtrak. I'm also still not entirely sure of the plan, it almost sounded like the #405 will lead north all the way to Burlington, if it's used, with no stops, and then it'll make a 60mph run south with unrestricted VTR equipment and that we'll get runbys on the south trip, but the issue then is that you'll really be getting photos of whatever red VTR power is attached. I know at least one railfan really bent the magazine staff's ear about how they felt that despite the event being billed as "Railfan Weekend", railfans were really getting the short end of the stick.

A bunch of us got photos of the #405 at the Rutland station, and heading onto the wye to turn for tomorrow, since this was our only real photo chance on the northbound trip.