The High Line in 2008

Here are some updates for those of you curious about New York City’s beloved restored elevated train line, The High Line.

Newsletter here.

And here is a recent shot of a section of  The High Line in winter. “Judging by the effect of last Friday’s snow on the High Line, we’re eager to see the High Line join the likes of Central Park, Radio City Music Hall and the Empire State Building in the ranks of New York City landmarks that are altered spectacularly in the winter to become memorable and historic parts of the New York City landscape.” Story here.

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Turcot Yards 1956

Big thanks to striderv over at Flickr for posting an amazing set of pictures from his grandfather’s collection. Seems there was an open house at the roundhouse that day (and there is more to come  as these people seem to have toured the Glen roundhouse and yards as well). Enjoy!

You can catch the whole set here.

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Doney Spur (7)

And so the journey ends. This last leg has no track but it’s quite easy to follow where it went. This whole adventure was a lot of fun, though it was waaay too hot on a few days. It makes a lot of sense to reuse the Doney as part of a commuter rail system, but you see developers have their hands in every niche and corner on the island. If you make a movie about a developer who simply builds the project, despite some local protest, you have something that will satisfy no one. If you make a movie about those locals stopping the developer, well, now you are going towards what is often called inspirational. Too bad most of us choose to let the developer have his way in real life.

And here is a map of the last leg.

Coming up to Alston.

The space between industrial and residential zones on the west island.

Nature always reclaims.

Trailer in the middle of the way.

Balance? or the battlefield?

Looking back.

For Sale?

Looking back from the west side of Stillview.

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Movement

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Doney Spur (6)

The last leg with Avrom Shtern and Andrew Dawson. Glenn Garner of The Green Coalition joined us for half this walk.

We started out at Sources and  went as far as Stillview where the Doney Spur right of way finally ends. The tracks actually stop before the Home Depot on the east side of Saint Jean.

Andrew and Glenn starting out.

We no sooner started when this unit came up behind us. Stopped and went back. We are not sure why it wanted to cross Sources. May have been checking the crossing….

Moving on.

It’s Everywhere.

The buildings at Saint Jean just gradually get bigger.

Cool hangout.

Old equipment.

Lone car in this siding.

Looking back we see a loading dock. Probably fairly busy here at one time.

Came across this which seemed odd. A field where the grass is cut and there are three fire hydrants but no access to them.

I was taking a few shots in this spot…

When I noticed this fox staring at me.

Wished I had a zoom lens at the moment. He just stood there for about 30 seconds and when I was turning to try to signal Andrew and Avrom,  he turned and ran into the bush.

The Home Depot coming up only opened last December but it does create some issues for reviving the Doney.

Avrom and Andrew coming to the end of the rail.

On the other side of Saint Jean, straight ahead, is the Doney right of way, which still exists even if Pointe Claire’s Mayor does not seem to think so. I will post the photos from here to Stillview later this week.

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The Doney Spur (5)

Continuing the journey with Avrom Shtern and Andrew Dawson.  We started at rue Douglas -B- Floreani and went to Toupin. Not a real long walk but we did a lot of side trips, particularly  around the area where the Doney was rerouted by Autoroute 13.

We found this old trailer near the start.

Here you can see the road where the Doney originally went before Autoroute 13 was built.

Looking around south of above. You can still see where the rail came up along this old loading dock.

Nature slowly reclaiming.

On the north side there is a horticultural company.

Bois de Liesse Park is just over to the right.

Hydro towers looking towards the 13.

The 13 just doesn’t look too imposing from ground level here.

It is also at this point that the Doney and the Lake Of Two Mountains line converge.

Getting closer to “civilization”.

The final straight stretch.

Mile zero for the Doney Spur.

I wonder if they can tap in?

Westbound right on schedule.

Red thing is a cyclist.

We went up this last spur.

To end up in someone’s back yard.

And then it was on to Noel Parc Nord and  Toupin boulevard (and also where I changed rolls, the final shots to be developed:P).

More to come.

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The Doney Spur (4)

Continuing the journey with Avrom Shtern and Andrew Dawson.

Here is a map of this leg. We started at Sources and went east.

As far as I know the La Belle Province on the left is the only open 24 hours place on the entire West Island.

Trains used to go right up to that door. (right in?).

Avrom and Andrew checking out one of the countless sidings, wyes, and backtracks that have been pulled up but attest to how busy the Doney was in it’s day.

They used to load up here but the doors are bricked up.

Avenue Andre.

Had to follow this one.

There was all kinds of these on the tracks. Maybe they like the warmth? This was a very hot day. It’s usually about 3-5 degrees warmer on the tracks as the steel gets hot, but the ballast also holds it in like a good old brick oven!

It s astonishing how much rust the rails can take and still be usable ( at very slow speeds I would guess).

Start of the Saint Francois Spur.

Here it splits. That is Golf Dorval (what’s left of it) due south.

I don’t think you will see a diamond crossing with a switch going into a building like that too often.

Back on the Doney, still active over in there.

Approaching the bridge that crosses the 40 otherwise known as the Trans Canada Highway.

Looking west.

Looking east. This was a Sunday afternoon. Traffic, what traffic?

And we called it a day up ahead at rue Douglas -B- Floreani.

We had taken the 215 bus from Cote Vertu Metro to get out to Sources and took the 215 back to Cote Vertu. While I am often critical of our (lack of) public transportation, I am quite willing to offer praise when it works so damn well as that!  Cars, on the other hand, are not very good for this kind of trekking as you have to walk all the way back to where the car is parked. Was a good one.

More to come.

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Doney Spur Revisited

Been doing some hikes along the Doney Spur recently with Avrom Shtern and Andrew Dawson, who are rail fans and transportation activists. We started at the east end at Bois Franc train station and  explored the yard and various things along the way to Toupin boulevard. More to come in the next few weeks.

Old Equipment.

Not sure why this is needed right there.

Apparently there is still one small freight train that travels the Doney daily. We were fortunate enough to have it go by the Sunday we did this hike.

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Glen Yards 1971

some amazing shots from Factotum.

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Competitions And Knowing Your Developer

The High Line is probably one of the best known urban reclamation projects in the world and it does have the advantage of cool art/concert projects produced in it’s behalf. It even has a portrait project and, shudder, a Facebook group. It is also a good model for seeing how large scale urban planning projects may be done.

It was one thing to assimilate the old elevated rail line into the Manhattan fabric but one huge question was what would happen to the Rail Yards, a large quasi abandoned space in lower Manhatten where the High Line trains turned around?

Development of the yards was an open competition and 5, count ‘em, 5 projects were selected to compete. And the High Line blog made sure people got an in depth look at what each company offered and what they were all about. Wouldn’t that just seem sooo luxurious in Montreal?

In fact Friends of The High Line ran a design competition in 2003 to publicize their cause and received 720 entries from 36 countries. Publicity can, indeed, be a good thing.

Of course none of this is perfect and developers have met the challenge of public process by submitting outrageous renderings designed to seduce all naysayers (Can you say Devimco?). This New York Times article takes a look at this trend.

There has been some cool art projects for school kids to get involved with such as “Chalk Shoes To The High Line”.

So it s not a perfect process and not everyone will be ecstatic but here in Montreal we are truly bush league (remember the Expos?) as our small town officials make back room agreements and then tell the public what’s good for them after all the principles have agreed.

Sad.

The High Line/ Rail Yards blog.

And in Arizona they hold design competitions for suburban strip malls.

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Terrain A Vendre

Or Land For Sale. Former 2M Ressources glass recycling plant land. Not sure who would want to buy that especially if they know that they will be surrounded by a construction zone for 6 years or more as the Projet Turcot is happening.

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Grain

This reminds me of when I worked on the railroad at Albert Canyon, B.C. in the late 70′s. One winter there was a derailment of about 8 grain cars near a switch and tons of grain spilled. In the spring grass started growing and the area began to smell bad. This seems like such a nice little organized pile compared to that, like a deposit of some kind, dropped off as a reminder of the railroad’s glory days, when people looked at the tracks and tried to imagine how the grain came from thousands of miles away.

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CNR Black

Saw this train on the branch line that runs south west of Dead Dog Tunnel last week. There was only about 4 cars on it as it had dropped some empties off.

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Nude

(the image that was here was removed as Photobucket claimed it violated their terms of service, if you can believe that! It was no more revealing than what you see here, so off in search of another host I go over the weekend {smile}.)

(Monday update: Hosting at TinyPic )

You can catch the full set here at monnommotown’s Flickr page. (The image second from the left, bottom row, is the offending image).

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Two Killed At Turcot, Big Storm, February 3, 1908

From the Gazette 100 years ago article here.

“It is years since the city streets have been so thoroughly blocked by snow,” The Gazette said, “and it will take weeks of hard work to get rid of it, unless a thaw comes – a fate which everyone hopes to escape.”

The Montreal Street Railway Co. did a remarkable job keeping most of its tram routes open. Even though the snow drifted “in many places higher than the tops of the cars,” only a couple of lines, on the Côte des Neiges hill and in Westmount, had to be shut down – and at that only for a few hours.

The railroads were not so lucky. For 48 hours Montreal and Quebec City were cut off from one another. Trains on routes west of Montreal were better off, running just three and four hours late. Even so, the engineer and fireman of an Ottawa-bound passenger train were killed when their train ploughed into a pair of halted switching locomotives in the Turcot Yard. The men had no idea the two switchers were there: The fierce wind had blown out a warning lantern’s red light.”

It s fascinating to read about how they simply pushed snow to the sides of the streets and let horse drawn sleds pat down the roads which could end up being a metre higher than street level by the end of winter. Just try to picture how much more space there is in the city with hardly any cars at all, except, perhaps, in winter.

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