Dawn at Bound Brook, NJ

On my last morning in New Jersey, the sun was to be shining brightly according to the weather forecasts. So despite the howling wind, and rather cold temperatures, I decided to go out and shoot a little before I had to head to the office for the day. So I left the hotel before dawn and set my sights on Bound Brook – about 15 minutes east of the hotel.

I got there a bit after dawn, so the sun was shining brightly on the station area. I grabbed my camera, some extra CF cards, and two lenses and headed through the tunnel under the tracks to the center platform. Being the morning, the bulk of the trains would be on the southernmost track.

As I was walking to the tunnel, an eastbound train pulled into the station. I got out of the tunnel in time to catch it heading off into the sunlight.

[cpg_imagefixthumb:6407]

OK, off to a decent start. So I started looking around to see what other options I had. Looking down the Conrail Lehigh Line, through CP-BOUNDBROOK, I couldn’t see any headlights heading this way. And all the signals on the station side of the interlocking were all red. So nothing was coming this way. Next I checked out the NJT schedule to see when the next train was due. The next one that was going to stop here was a good 40 minutes out, but there was one other about 15 minutes away that would just blast through the station without stopping. OK, that was my next target – then it would be time to head to the office.

So in the meantime, I got a shot of the signals silhouetted by the rising sun.

[cpg_imagefixthumb:6406]

And all the while, still no activity on the Conrail lines.

A little while later, I could hear horns to the west – it was that commuter run. So it was time to get ready – he’d be coming through at track speed.

As it came into view, I got a long shot of it heading for the station

[cpg_imagefixthumb:6405]

And a vertical of them approaching the platform

[cpg_imagefixthumb:6404]

Then I turned around as it approached, adjusted the camera’s settings for the into the sun shot, and got a shot of the train blasting past the signal, blowing leaves and debris in its wake.

[cpg_imagefixthumb:6403]

Pretty cool!

As the train rolled off into the sunlight, I headed back down through the tunnel, into my car, and off to the office, about a half hour north.

Thanks for looking!
Tom