The Drive To (and from) the Rental Place and the Trains

Hi! Today me, my dad, and little brother went to RentalMax West of St. Charles. As you can imagine, I kept a close eye on the St. Charles short line, but I had little hope of seeing anything, as the line has very little traffic. When I looked at the Kirk road crossing from Route 64, I was very excited to see a small engine switching cars into a nearby siding! Tse funny part was that the train had to stop and reverse right on the crossing, snarling traffic! I only got a glimpse, but at the Rental Place I was equally excited to see a UP track truck! I looked it over before going inside. Inside were to men in orange that had come to rent a small Kubota back-hoe. They said they were with UP. When we left with our stump grinder, they were hitching to a trailer. On the way back, I also looked torward the tracks. The trains go about .00001 MPH there, so I thought it still might be around. When I was on route 64, I was excited to see the train on a bridge over another street! When I crossed the bridge over the Fox River, I looked left to the RR bridge! I couldn't believe what I saw! I have lived in the area for 5 years and have never seen a train on that bridge. I have a friend who lived in walking distance of it and siad he had only seen 2 for the whole time he lived there. Sure enough, however, there was the train pushing to boxcars over the bridge! Believe me, I was excited! It was an odd sight, as I have never seen a train going over it and it was like a train going over the Golden Gate Bride-you would never think of it!Thanks!
METRAUP

The "Metra Man" David Kuntz, 14 year old Simmist
Formerly DavidPagesWeb Until Virus. METRAUP until Forum Forgot Me. Add 350 Posts to my number

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RE: The Drive To (and from) the Rental Place and the Tr, CGW409, Apr-15-03, 05:56 PM, (1) RE: The Drive To (and from) the Rental Place and the Tr, metraup, Apr-15-03, 07:32 PM, (2) RE: The Drive To (and from) the Rental Place and the Tr, CGW409, Apr-16-03, 07:01 PM, (3) RE: The Drive To (and from) the Rental Place and the Tr, mdeming, Apr-17-03, 09:20 AM, (4) RE: The Drive To (and from) the Rental Place and the Tr, CGW409, Apr-17-03, 05:48 PM, (5) RE: The Drive To (and from) the Rental Place and the Tr, sniper297, Apr-17-03, 07:29 PM, (6) RE: The Drive To (and from) the Rental Place and the Tr, mdeming, Apr-18-03, 03:32 PM, (7) RE: The Drive To (and from) the Rental Place and the Tr, mdeming, Apr-18-03, 06:26 PM, (8)

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David
Count yourself very lucky as the last major industy (the General Mills plant)on the last surviving section of Chicago Great Western in the Chicago burbs called it quits last September and the crews may very well be removing stored cars in preperation of scrapping ops
I envy you as I've never seen anything on that bridge outside of photos(though the locos in said pics were red or maroon with a lucky strike logo)and would have loved to have been there even if the trains move over it at a much slower pace than in the bridge's glory daysGary S

"Some say this country's just out for a fight. After 9/11 man I'd have to say thats right"
"Have You Forgotten"
Darryl Worley

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Ooh! I never new there was such a history! Where did you learn this? What is that lines past?Thanks!
METRAUP

The "Metra Man" David Kuntz, 14 year old Simmist
Formerly DavidPagesWeb Until Virus. METRAUP until Forum Forgot Me. Add 350 Posts to my number

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David
I'm a big fan of the ol CGW,That little "industrial spur" was once the CGW's Chicago to Oelwein Iowa main line.
The CGW was merged into the C&NW July 1 1968 but remained relitivly intact til about 1972 when the C&NW ripped up the line from Portage Il(just south of Dubuque) to (IIRC) Byron Il and cut the connection with the Soo/B&OCT juntion at Forest Park IL to west of the Desplaines river, the remaining track remained in sevice till the early 80's when the track was scrapped from Byron(though leaving a small section as a spur off the ex Milw for servicing the nuke plant)to the current west end of track in St. Charles over the following couple of years the tracks contracted west from the Desplaines river til all that remained was a section from just west of Prince Crossing Rd to current EOT that remained til about 90/91 when that was scrapped after the C&NW pulled out all rolling stock stored there save for one old 40' boxcar that was pushed over, the rails and ties pulled from under it and cut up and scrapped on the spot. when the airport expanded a few years later a new connetion was built from the West Chicago yard to pick up the old track west of the airport.
There are several websites based on the CGW as well as several books but if you want a good idea of what the Great Weedy was all about check out
Chicago Great Western In Color by Llyod E. Stagner published by Morning Sun BooksGary S

"Some say this country's just out for a fight. After 9/11 man I'd have to say thats right"
"Have You Forgotten"
Darryl Worley

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The CGW from Chicago to Oelwein Iowa, which will include St Charles, is complete and should be uploaded in May. I am moving May 9th so it will be a bit after that.
Mike Deming

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LAST EDITED ON Apr-17-03 AT 05:50 PM (EDT)

David
Here's a pic off the C&NWHS site of the bridge in her glory days.
This is shot from the east bank of the Fox River on the south side of the bridge,in the distance you can make out the bridge over IL Rt 31.
BTW Mike make sure you email me your new addy so I can mail you the CA&EGary S

"Some say this country's just out for a fight. After 9/11 man I'd have to say thats right"
"Have You Forgotten"
Darryl Worley

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http://www.trainweb.org/cgw/Might be some in these too, C&NW took over CGW, then UP took over C&NW, so it ends up fallen flag within fallen flag.http://www.cnwhs.org/
http://chicago.railfan.net/cgi/photos.pl/?page=index

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Another CGW Page
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Acres/6306/index.htmalso
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cgw/the yahoo address is a discussion group about the cgw, there are groups about other railroads. A good place for info.
Mike

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This is a Texas Type Steam engine #850 heading West over the Fox River Bridge. If you want to see another picture of this type of engine, At the Charlestowne mall in Kohls, there is an escalator going from the second floor to the first by the mens section, as your decending there are a bunch of pictures there and another shot of this is one of them.
Mike

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