Tuesday, October 21, 2014

Railfanning Murray Bay Subdivision in 1994



Jérôme recently dug out this old photograph taken on August 22th, 1994 in Saint-Irénée, QC. Unfortunately, it's impossible to find out who was the photographer.


A train, a river, a beach, some rip rap, old houses on the cliff, forested mountains… This picture is the perfect illustration of a typical Murray Bay Subdivision scene in Charlevoix. In fact, this picture was taken just a few weeks before the line was sold and operated by Chemin de fer Charlevoix (Société des chemins de fer du Québec) in Fall 1994. To me, this train consist is the epitome of railroading as I knew it as a kid: a pair of CN Zebra locomotives, string of brown boxcars and a PSC caboose. Nothing more, nothing less...


I must admit I’m curious to know why the caboose was located mid-train. I personally never saw this happen, but I didn’t live next to the track and only saw the train very infrequently.


Note how most elements in themselves are rather plain, ordinary and not prize-winning, but when combined together, they shape a striking landscape.

This is the look we want to get all over the peninsula. It also gives some idea for Clermont, which, at this point, will probably be a little bit more proto-freelanced than accurate. Space limitation is imposing its rule and we must go for typical over cute.

The houses are the same style I’ll try to reproduce in Clermont: old heavily modified homes still in good shape and with plain color scheme.

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