Getting caught up, finally. This one took place this past Monday. I was able to take advantage of the nice weather on Monday and get out to shoot Providence & Worcester train NR-2 in Ledyard, Groton and New London. Also, I nabbed Amtrak 171 crossing the river ahead of NR-2, along with some of the recent progress on the Thames River drawbridge replacement project – including some new views of the new lift span.
Well, the timing again afforded me a quick stop at Mill Cove to catch NR-2 rolling south. I got there a couple minutes before they hit MP5 to the north, so I got right into position at the south end of the cove.
Deja vu again – more sand cars on the train, with a blowing tail alongside.
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Pulling back out to get the wider view
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A side note – I noticed the flowers in the lower part of the frame after the train had passed by. Stay tuned for yesterday’s trip to the cove, where I used the flowers to my advantage…
Last shot at the cove was with the train’s power rolling over the inlet to the cove, along with a small pickup truck and a boat on a trailer.
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From there I made my way south to hopefully get them crossing the Thames.
But a quick stop first. I decided to pull into the Streeter boat launch under the Gold Star bridge to see what the new lift span looked like. Looks like it’s nearly complete – and just in time. Next weekend (June 13-16) it’ll be replacing the existing span.
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With that shot in the bag, I headed for my usual overlook south of the drawbridge.
Not long after I got there, Amtrak train 171 hit the Midway detector. A couple minutes later, they came rolling across the drawbridge with a pair of HHP-8s on the head end.
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Not long after that, the Amtrak Shore Line dispatcher let NR-2 out onto the corridor (which was single tracked from Groton interlocking through Shaw’s Cove due to bridge work) .
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As I was heading back to the office, something across the river caught my eye. Two sailboats were moored at the New London docks, so I figured it would make a nice foreground element for the passing train.
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While I was there, I got a shot of the entire train stretched out over the Shaw’s Cove swing bridge
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And one tight shot of the train coming off of the swing bridge, as Old Glory waved proudly above
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As NR-2 rolled out of sight, I headed back to the office.
But that’s not it! On the way home, I had a couple minutes and decided to swing by to check out the progress on the bridge. I headed for the boat launch, this time on the New London side of the Thames, to see what was up. First was a broadside shot of the new lift span.
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And then a wide shot of the entire drawbridge under some nice blue skies, and white, puffy, “Simpsons” clouds
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But something was up in the bridge on track 1. It was Amtrak’s Catenary Maintenance Vehicle.
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While the workers were doing whatever they were doing at catenary level, a crane was dropping something on the top of the west tower
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From there I headed over to the beer distributor to check out the span itself. Got a pretty good wide view of the span and ongoing work
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A couple detail shots of workers doing some electrical work
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And one final shot looking down the tracks
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Then it was off to the homefront…
Thanks for looking!
Tom
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