A frustrating line to try to catch....BNSF :)
Trying to catch rail activity on this line most often or not I do not find anything but I do get lucky from time to time. If a friend tips me off and I have gas I'll go follow the line until i come acrossed it then film it in various spots. Once in a while I can also hear trains from the power plant south of my apartment and get lucky to see them hauling empty hoppers back heading towards Lewistown. If I hear a horn and have time and gas as well as a functioning vehicle I will drop what i'm doing and go do that. Who are we kidding i'm a house wife ( a bored one at that) chores can wait as if the dishes and the broom and mop aren't going to be waiting for me when i return. Okay sorry just had to throw in a little weird humor. Ninety percent of the time I do not see anything at all. I have heard they run atleast twice a week and last June someone said it was Tuesdays and Wenesdays in the evening but I have also caught them in mid afternoon and very early evening so it seems to vary. My mother who lives in Lewistown has said she hears them once in a while but the times vary. KJRY up in Canton atleast is more predictable even if they too have varied latley but I live three or four blocks from the tracks so I atleast get a heads up hearing them coming from Rawalts and sometimes a friend will tip me off. I normally listen for them Mondays and Thursdays but latley they have run west on Tuesdays and Wenesdays here. So times for both lines vary as well as days.
This line was inactive for a time around 2012 and before that and i thought for sure it was probably abandoned. I guess for a brief time KJRY delivered coal to the plant off their line and that crossing over route 9 east of Canton. In 2012 my mother n law and I ended up waiting on a coal train at Bryant after visiting a cemetery where one of my great great grandparents is buried. We sort of cracked jokes about how long it was but I also stated I haven't seen anything on this line for quite sometime. I really do wish I'd catch more here and more often. BNSF is actually one of my favorite railroads behind KJRY and followed by Canadian National and Union Pacific. After my mother n law caught that train there in 2012 read a blog by another railfan from the Peoria area called the Peoria Station which had a piece on it and found out what the deal was as well as KJRY having a contract for a short time. I also remember a newspaper article about it so I was relieved the line wasn't abandoned. I have one memory of the line when I was twelve or thirteen down in Lewistown. My father set up on the Spoon River Drive in 1994 where the old CB&Q depot is. I remember one time someone had a model train display inside of it on the drive also. Anyways Dad had his stand up and let me do whatever i wanted so as a kid I just explored and some kids and I around my age ended up climbing all over what appeared to be an old loading dock at the depot. Anyways a train went by while I was on top of it. The engineer waved and I remember it being a Green locomotive (Old BN) colors. The merger hadn't taken place yet so it was still Burlington Northern. Another instance of rail activity on the line was two locomotives coming off the TP&W line in Canton in 1994 and heading south. I had no clue on the history or where it was going but I followed it all the way to the south end of town racing it on my bike. I swiped an apple from someones tree and ate it after watching it head further south before going about what i was doing. I also remember in the early 1980s an image of Dad sort of racing a train on the north part of Canton running along side of it so I can see. I think this was around Chestnut on fourth avenue. He wasn't trying to beat it just went that route so I can see the train. I was told I was pressed up against the window. I do remember the engiene was green ( BN) and the engineer waved but that is all I remember. It's the only time I ever remember anything traveling north of the Diamond and that part of Canton. The Harvester closing and the coal mines shutting down doomed that stretch plus Canton has been economically dead for quite sometime... atleast forty some years to be exact.
Some of these videos and pictures I took I was given a heads up in advance but a few I caught by luck. I really do hope to catch more in the future and everytime I go visit my mom I take a camera with me just in case. The best thing about it when they do come is they are slow so it gives me time to make turns and go find a suitable place to park. In the 1800s ( 1860's ?) CB&Q built this line from Yates City to Vermont onto a mainline. They built it to provide freight and passenger train service to many communities. They also served alot of coal mines for decades. Passenger service came to an end in 1961 as more and more people relied on the automobile to get from place to place. Freight train service continued onward. In 1970 CB&Q merged with Burlington Northern. In the 1970s and 1980's coal mines and manufacturing facilities starting shutting down and rail activity on the line from Yates City down to Dunfermline ceased to very little to none altogether. Burlington Northern later Burlington Northern Santa Fe ( after a merger with AT&SF in 1995) continued to serve the Power plant which was built in 1976 east of Dunfermline. They also used a section of line north of Dunfermline for storeage. For a time they were using track around Farminton to Yates City for storeage as well. The last i remember seeing was around 2001 or 2002. In 2017 the stretch from just south of Canton up to Farmington was torn out. This rail sub really needs a history blog post of it's own considering I did one on the Fulton County Narrow Gaugue. There is actually quite a bit of local history behind it. These are just active trains I photographed or filmed.
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