Cote St Luc Road at Adalbert Looking East across CPR to North ends of West Broadway and O'Bryan.
Note 101 Autobus sign.
Used to be sign saying '4 have been killed here by trains, will you be next?'
'Dayliners' were fast, silent and deadly.
We lived just South of here after moving from Saranac in '51.
Could see trains out window of house and hear the whistles, bells and chuffing of heavy freights climbing up from LaSalle and Westminster to West/Right.
Rumour has it that the CIA has put out feelers to recruit me as a forensic investigator, but they'll have to catch me first. ;-)
But, really, this photo was not difficult to identify because of the bus stop and railway tracks, which could intersect at Cote St. Luc Road, Cavendish, or Westminster. Finally, the nearby housing gave it away.
To MP&I, it was a piece of cake, of course, as he grew up in the neighbourhood.
(Do you know where I can buy a 1200 series Montreal Tramways streetcar for my den? S.V.P.)
No, but I can give you a great deal on the Champlain Bridge. The scrap metal will be worth a fortune. PayPal accepted. ;-)
By the way, I remember that CSL level-crossing sign when the fatality rate was indicated around 35 or so. I wonder what the final tally was? CSL City Hall would surely know.
Such level-crossings in the Montreal area were often places of horrific, vehicular deaths and thus the routine targets of critical newspaper articles for decades until, one by one, they were eventually dealt with.
Oddly enough, the one on St. Ambroise just west of the Atwater Market and the other on de Courcelle have been remarkably free of such controversy.(Bite my tongue! :-)
Too much upkeep, the thumping of the vehicles crossing the expansion joints would keep me up all night, I would have to wear a hard hat against spalling concrete or other ejecta, and dripping road salt water would ruin the carpet.
The 1200 would be nicer. I could wear my MTCo Motorman's hat from Scully and purchased from eBay, ring the bell, call out the street names in both languages and swear, once again in both languages, at Taxi drivers cutting me off, whilst operating the trap door in the fare box to annoy the passengers who were napping.
The compressor cycling on and off might be an issue, and run up the power bill, tho'.
Thank You for clarifying the wording on the CSL crossing sign.
The sign went up c. 1961-62 just after steam engines left.
We were at home this one day and a schduled 'Dayliner' came along and started blowing it's horn in rapid succession, then emergency stopped.
The CPR still ran several passenger trains a day over the CSL crossing. Trains with locomotives and, often, 'Canadian' stainless equipments and A-B-B passenger power up front, usually one of the E8s to Quebec. Dayliners to Mont Laurier and Ottawa via Lachute on the North Shore and a Diesel commuter train to Ste. Therese.
( By then, there was a wood sign on the CPR down between North and South Junctions below Westminster to the South of the steel overhead bridge carrying the double-track from Montreal West Station thru Sortin to Dorval and West.
All those telegraph wires shown in the recent greenhouses on Minto photo at Coolopolis Junctioned in a great wooden box car red Junction Box between two telegraph poles nearby and we were awed, knowing that most messages by wire ex Windsor Station, Headquarters, would arrive and depart thru the box to all points East, West, North and South.
Wonder if it was guarded during the War??
Vancouver and Victoria, Kettle Valley and the Barge Routes to Rosebery and Nakusp, Spillimacheen, Medicine Hat, Saskatoon, Fort William and all the places in the Maritimes, Dominion Atlantic and the International of Maine.
Quite an important location before Step by Step, Cross Bar, 12-button dials, Texting and Cell phones.
The box was there the last time we walked up to Robbie Burns Taverne for a draft thru the gate by Consumers Glass, aeons ago. )
The sign said 'City Limits' and was to advise Engineers coming upgrade from LaSalle and the Canal to NOT blow the whistle inside City Limits as per Ordnance other than for emergency purposes.
The sign and the Ordnance is/was in the Employee Time Tables.
Anyway, the 'Dayliner' whistling was unusual and for a sustained length time.
Apparently someone had walked across the tracks at the crossing and got hit, and killed.
Shortly after the sign was put up.
In 1964? they started the underpass at Adalbert and that ended that.
Vehicles crossed the track on a temporary crossing at Robert Burns across to Connaught West of the Patricia Building in the Interim.
Back in 1956? we could hear this Chuff Ka Bang, Chuff Ka Bang down the street, this all still open land, and we went down to find this stationary boiler, a crane and a steam pile driver hammering in foundation for the Patricia Building.
This one is similar, but, smaller hammer and has boiler in crane house rather than freestanding with a crawler crane adjacent suspending the hammer and guides.
Several entries ago we discussed a service station at Rockfield on the road betwixt VSP and Lachine on the old GT/CNR with the Tramways having a stop at the same location.
In later years, a bridge with a sinuous approach each side was constructed for vehicles to cross the CNR and the Tramways.
To most Westenders, this structure was known as 'The S Bridge'.
The curved CPR track behind later Earle off of Adalbert was not contracted until 1950 in conjunction with the CPR's then-new St. Luc Yard at the top end of Westminster.
Adalbert and Earle were constructed in 1959?
We used to ride out bikes up the abandoned farm to the West of the CPR Crossing past the old farm house with many derelict bulldozers and other equipments outside.
To the rear of the farm house was a gravel oval-shaped race track and we would ride up the West side to the gate over the CPR from Ballantyne to St. Luc Jct. at the North end of Rosedale to watch steam locomotives and their trains depart for Outremont, Angus Shops, and Hochelaga Yard down by the harbour.
In the top right of the photo can be seen a spur curving Right/North which had a concrete loading platform on one side, these rails being lifted in 1960.
The culvert where the creek Z-shapes under the CPR at the top was built in 1916, a smaller corrugated pipe installed in 1954.
When the CSL Shopping centre was constructed we then had to travel North on Silverson Avenue to where the parkette is on the corner, then cross the track.
There was another watercourse under the CPR btwn Ballantyne and St. Luc Jct., once again 1916, and when it was dry, we would walk our bikes thru it.
Up East of Kildare around where Einstein crosses, there was a creek in which we built rafts and polled them up and downstream.
When that got old, we would go further North and watch the CPR service locomotives at the Roundhouse and climb on the steam engines lined up waiting to to to Angus Shops for scrapping.
Steam engines lined up for scrap, St. Luc. Looking East. Hump in distance.
We almost always came home covered in mud and grease and snarled with burrs, and hair with cinders from the burnt coal from hard-working locomotives on passing trains.
Very interesting indeed! Doomed steam locos lined up for the slaughter! End of an era. :-(
Regarding that vehicular bridge near where the Lachine Rockfield station was located: there is a photo of that bridge in Canadian Rail Magazine which I referred to earlier in this blog.
In the Sixties, New York Central still came into Montreal via Adirondack Junction just to the South of the CPR bridge over the St. Lawrence at Highland/La Salle.
Love to get comments! Please, please, please speak your mind ! Links welcome - please google "how to embed a link" it'll make your comment much more fun and clickable.
Cote St. Luc Rd., facing east September 1958.
Cote St. Luc Road facing east, prior to the railway underpass being built.
ReplyDeleteBungalow still there today.
See:
http://maps.google.ca/maps?hl=en&ll=45.464224,-73.654575&spn=0.00003,0.01929&t=m&z=16&layer=c&cbll=45.464367,-73.654556&panoid=Sd36r2AJhnxBHKd-zj3afg&cbp=12,71.69,,0,9.52
Cote St Luc Road at Adalbert Looking East across CPR to North ends of West Broadway and O'Bryan.
ReplyDeleteNote 101 Autobus sign.
Used to be sign saying '4 have been killed here by trains, will you be next?'
'Dayliners' were fast, silent and deadly.
We lived just South of here after moving from Saranac in '51.
Could see trains out window of house and hear the whistles, bells and chuffing of heavy freights climbing up from LaSalle and Westminster to West/Right.
Thank You.
Wow you guys are freaken omniscient. It's truly scary.
ReplyDeleteI agree.
ReplyDeleteExperts, they are.
Rumour has it that the CIA has put out feelers to recruit me as a forensic investigator, but they'll have to catch me first. ;-)
ReplyDeleteBut, really, this photo was not difficult to identify because of the bus stop and railway tracks, which could intersect at Cote St. Luc Road, Cavendish, or Westminster. Finally, the nearby housing gave it away.
To MP&I, it was a piece of cake, of course, as he grew up in the neighbourhood.
BOO!!!
ReplyDelete* * *
Speaking of "Dayliners", the "Ocean" that came in this morning had a RDC on it's tail, behind the "Park" car...
* * *
"We did not live on the wrong side of the tracks, but we could hear the whistle real loud!"
- Richard Mulhous Nixon
Hmmm. The one specialist said I was not fit for the CIA, but had fits and OCD.
ReplyDeleteThank You.
( Do you know where I can buy a 1200 series Montreal Tramways streetcar for my den? S.V.P.)
MP&! said:
ReplyDelete(Do you know where I can buy a 1200 series Montreal Tramways streetcar for my den? S.V.P.)
No, but I can give you a great deal on the Champlain Bridge. The scrap metal will be worth a fortune. PayPal accepted. ;-)
By the way, I remember that CSL level-crossing sign when the fatality rate was indicated around 35 or so. I wonder what the final tally was? CSL City Hall would surely know.
Such level-crossings in the Montreal area were often places of horrific, vehicular deaths and thus the routine targets of critical newspaper articles for decades until, one by one, they were eventually dealt with.
Oddly enough, the one on St. Ambroise just west of the Atwater Market and the other on de Courcelle have been remarkably free of such controversy.(Bite my tongue! :-)
I'll pass on the Champlain Bridge, Thank You.
ReplyDeleteToo much upkeep, the thumping of the vehicles crossing the expansion joints would keep me up all night, I would have to wear a hard hat against spalling concrete or other ejecta, and dripping road salt water would ruin the carpet.
The 1200 would be nicer. I could wear my MTCo Motorman's hat from Scully and purchased from eBay, ring the bell, call out the street names in both languages and swear, once again in both languages, at Taxi drivers cutting me off, whilst operating the trap door in the fare box to annoy the passengers who were napping.
The compressor cycling on and off might be an issue, and run up the power bill, tho'.
Thank You.
The text of the sign at the CSL/CP crossing was:
ReplyDelete4 have died at this crossing.
Will you be next?
Do not cross when lights are flashing.
H.B.
ReplyDeleteThank You for clarifying the wording on the CSL crossing sign.
The sign went up c. 1961-62 just after steam engines left.
We were at home this one day and a schduled 'Dayliner' came along and started blowing it's horn in rapid succession, then emergency stopped.
The CPR still ran several passenger trains a day over the CSL crossing. Trains with locomotives and, often, 'Canadian' stainless equipments and A-B-B passenger power up front, usually one of the E8s to Quebec. Dayliners to Mont Laurier and Ottawa via Lachute on the North Shore and a Diesel commuter train to Ste. Therese.
( By then, there was a wood sign on the CPR down between North and South Junctions below Westminster to the South of the steel overhead bridge carrying the double-track from Montreal West Station thru Sortin to Dorval and West.
All those telegraph wires shown in the recent greenhouses on Minto photo at Coolopolis Junctioned in a great wooden box car red Junction Box between two telegraph poles nearby and we were awed, knowing that most messages by wire ex Windsor Station, Headquarters, would arrive and depart thru the box to all points East, West, North and South.
Wonder if it was guarded during the War??
Vancouver and Victoria, Kettle Valley and the Barge Routes to Rosebery and Nakusp, Spillimacheen, Medicine Hat, Saskatoon, Fort William and all the places in the Maritimes, Dominion Atlantic and the International of Maine.
Quite an important location before Step by Step, Cross Bar, 12-button dials, Texting and Cell phones.
The box was there the last time we walked up to Robbie Burns Taverne for a draft thru the gate by Consumers Glass, aeons ago. )
The sign said 'City Limits' and was to advise Engineers coming upgrade from LaSalle and the Canal to NOT blow the whistle inside City Limits as per Ordnance other than for emergency purposes.
The sign and the Ordnance is/was in the Employee Time Tables.
Anyway, the 'Dayliner' whistling was unusual and for a sustained length time.
Apparently someone had walked across the tracks at the crossing and got hit, and killed.
Shortly after the sign was put up.
In 1964? they started the underpass at Adalbert and that ended that.
Vehicles crossed the track on a temporary crossing at Robert Burns across to Connaught West of the Patricia Building in the Interim.
Back in 1956? we could hear this Chuff Ka Bang, Chuff Ka Bang down the street, this all still open land, and we went down to find this stationary boiler, a crane and a steam pile driver hammering in foundation for the Patricia Building.
This one is similar, but, smaller hammer and has boiler in crane house rather than freestanding with a crawler crane adjacent suspending the hammer and guides.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqaLvnTmE30
Rambling again, and nary a streetcar in sight.
Thank You.
Another link for Mr. Urban Legend.
ReplyDeleteSeveral entries ago we discussed a service station at Rockfield on the road betwixt VSP and Lachine on the old GT/CNR with the Tramways having a stop at the same location.
In later years, a bridge with a sinuous approach each side was constructed for vehicles to cross the CNR and the Tramways.
To most Westenders, this structure was known as 'The S Bridge'.
Here is a link showing the S Bridge from above.
http://archivesdemontreal.com/greffe/vues-aeriennes-archives/jpeg/VM97-3_7P12-06.jpg
Travelling east on the Tramways in the Photo, the Wye at the Tramways Substation can be seen along with the corner of the still-extant substation.
The Bascule Bridge over the lachine Canal would be just out of frame below.
This is an aerial view of the Cote St. Luc level crossing. Westminster is to the left.
ReplyDeletehttp://archivesdemontreal.com/greffe/vues-aeriennes-archives/jpeg/VM97-3_7P14-12.jpg
The curved CPR track behind later Earle off of Adalbert was not contracted until 1950 in conjunction with the CPR's then-new St. Luc Yard at the top end of Westminster.
Adalbert and Earle were constructed in 1959?
We used to ride out bikes up the abandoned farm to the West of the CPR Crossing past the old farm house with many derelict bulldozers and other equipments outside.
To the rear of the farm house was a gravel oval-shaped race track and we would ride up the West side to the gate over the CPR from Ballantyne to St. Luc Jct. at the North end of Rosedale to watch steam locomotives and their trains depart for Outremont, Angus Shops, and Hochelaga Yard down by the harbour.
In the top right of the photo can be seen a spur curving Right/North which had a concrete loading platform on one side, these rails being lifted in 1960.
The culvert where the creek Z-shapes under the CPR at the top was built in 1916, a smaller corrugated pipe installed in 1954.
When the CSL Shopping centre was constructed we then had to travel North on Silverson Avenue to where the parkette is on the corner, then cross the track.
There was another watercourse under the CPR btwn Ballantyne and St. Luc Jct., once again 1916, and when it was dry, we would walk our bikes thru it.
Up East of Kildare around where Einstein crosses, there was a creek in which we built rafts and polled them up and downstream.
When that got old, we would go further North and watch the CPR service locomotives at the Roundhouse and climb on the steam engines lined up waiting to to to Angus Shops for scrapping.
Steam engines lined up for scrap, St. Luc. Looking East. Hump in distance.
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2569477
Fifty years ago.
We almost always came home covered in mud and grease and snarled with burrs, and hair with cinders from the burnt coal from hard-working locomotives on passing trains.
Thank You.
Very interesting indeed! Doomed steam locos lined up for the slaughter! End of an era. :-(
ReplyDeleteRegarding that vehicular bridge near where the Lachine Rockfield station was located: there is a photo of that bridge in Canadian Rail Magazine which I referred to earlier in this blog.
A view from Westminster.
ReplyDeleteIn the Sixties, New York Central still came into Montreal via Adirondack Junction just to the South of the CPR bridge over the St. Lawrence at Highland/La Salle.
http://www.canadianrailwayobservations.com/2008/westminster.jpg
For the record, NYC once went to Ottawa via a bridge at Cornwall.
More modern view, same location.
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7241/7216866004_f69268594f_z.jpg
Thank You.