Bay City , Midland, Saginaw and Flint

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chapmaja
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Bay City , Midland, Saginaw and Flint

Unread post by chapmaja »

I had to work in Midland this weekend and stayed in Bay City. The work schedule gave me some time to drive around and look at the railroad sites in those areas.

On Saturday afternoon I was able to drive around Bay City.

The HESR yard was pretty well loaded with cars. Most of the yard tracks at the north end were filled with cars. Tank cars, hoppers and some gons made up the majority of what filled the yard. The engine area had the following locomotives that I could see.

Rail America scheme HESR 3865 were both individual units on separate tracks. were G&W schemed 3414 and 3038, although 3038 was barely visible due to storage tanks it was parked behind as well as Black HESR 3036.

After looking at this facility I headed east to see the Lake State Yard. Not wanting to significantly tresspass, I stayed on the roadway. There is some sort of activity at the north end of the yard with a new fence up and construction going on within the yard property. There were some cars parked in the lot, but not a lot. Looking from the south end of the yard, there appeared to be a Lake State endcab switcher on house track. The back end was facing south. I couldn't get a number off the unit. I thought these engines were in Port Huron working the Dunn Paper branch.

The spur that heads east out of the yard was filled with covered hoppers including AEX 23054, as well as some tank cars and scrap loaded scrap gons. I followed the road as far as I could but the no trespassing signs and gates indicating Dow property stop my following this section of track.

The area of Foss Yard was largely devoid of anything. A couple cars at a customer along the south side of the river was about all I saw. nothing visible on the passing sidings to the power plant either.


Today I managed to follow the line from Midland (Dow) east through Auburn (HESR correct?) Dow looks like they had a bunch of tank cars in their yard on the east end of the complex. Auburn has several cuts of individual hopper cars at and west of the facilities. No units train sized cuts though. Nothing else visible on the line.

I decided to stop at Wendy's in Saginaw then head by the yard. Looking at the yard from the pedestrian bridge on the south end I saw a full yard. All three branches of the yard appeared pretty full. A full hopper train was on the west to south side of the yard. Other tracks were mostly full as well. A lot of tank cars on the south to east portion of the yard.

There was some power at the engine house. It appeared to be three sets of two units of power. Too far to get numbers though.

I didn't plan to run through Flint on the way, but when I-75 was stopping SB just beyond the I-475 exit I decided to run through Flint. Standing on the concrete slabs just beyond the guardrail on old Coldwater I was able to look into the yard from the north end. One single LSRC unit was sitting near the yard office, while a LSRC blue unit and what appeared to be a gray unit were getting a train ready in the yard.

Moving south to road that intersects the yards I witnessed a decent number of cars in the south yard. There was one engine on the far west side of the yard, possible an engine for StoneCo? Looked to be a red unit. What engine do they have in Flint?

Decided to head to the area of the Longwood connector before following the CN tracks towards I-75. No trains on CN and the plant tracks by the yard contained a large number of autoracks.

Holly Sub through Fenton had a green signal for the westbound trains as witnessed from US-23. CSX tracks in Brighton were cleared of storage cars and signals were red-red for WB movements at Chalis Rd.

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NS3322
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Re: Bay City , Midland, Saginaw and Flint

Unread post by NS3322 »

chapmaja wrote:The HESR yard was pretty well loaded with cars. Most of the yard tracks at the north end were filled with cars. Tank cars, hoppers and some gons made up the majority of what filled the yard. The engine area had the following locomotives that I could see.
Did you see the old GTW transfer caboose (CMGN #1)?
chapmaja wrote:Moving south to road that intersects the yards I witnessed a decent number of cars in the south yard. There was one engine on the far west side of the yard, possible an engine for StoneCo? Looked to be a red unit. What engine do they have in Flint?
They should have both GLLX 4428 and an ex-NS B32-8.

GTW6401
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Re: Bay City , Midland, Saginaw and Flint

Unread post by GTW6401 »

Lake State has two MP15ACs, 1501 and 1502.

The LSRC 1501 at Bay City. The 1502 is in Port Huron.

RailroadingFan
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Re: Bay City , Midland, Saginaw and Flint

Unread post by RailroadingFan »

NS3322 wrote:
chapmaja wrote:The HESR yard was pretty well loaded with cars. Most of the yard tracks at the north end were filled with cars. Tank cars, hoppers and some gons made up the majority of what filled the yard. The engine area had the following locomotives that I could see.
Did you see the old GTW transfer caboose (CMGN #1)?
chapmaja wrote:Moving south to road that intersects the yards I witnessed a decent number of cars in the south yard. There was one engine on the far west side of the yard, possible an engine for StoneCo? Looked to be a red unit. What engine do they have in Flint?
They should have both GLLX 4428 and an ex-NS B32-8.
Are talking about HESR or LSRC?

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