DAR Port Williams

[Paul Charland]

Hi All,

Port Williams was small by any standard, a double ended passing siding that served three customers and a back track that served a train to truck grain elevator and a team track. On Sunday evenings the double ended siding doubled as a passing track when inferior daily Train 3 met superior Sunday only Train 6.

Southbound Train 3 pulls into the Port Williams siding to wait for Train 6.



The headlights of Train 6 can be seen in the distance.



Train 6 crosses highway 358 as it heads for Halifax.



Train 6 passes Port Williams larges customer, the Atlantic Co-op, as it approaches Train 3.



Trains 6 and 3 meet at the north end of the Port Williams siding.



After Train 6 is clear Train 3 backs out onto the mainline, then heads south again. Port Williams is about a mile west of the highway 358 crossing, there is no station, so passengers are picked up and let off at the crossing.



Paul

[Tedsgrandson]

Hi Paul:

Thanks again for posting these pictures! I'm not set up with Train Sim, but I'm certainly enjoying these pictures. Very realistic!

Jim

[Paul Charland]

Hi Jim,

Thanks, I'm having fun putting the route together.

Keep an eye out for MS Train Sim, I've heard of people picking it up for as low as $10. Everything else you would need for the DAR route is free, just the time it takes to download things off the net.

Scenery right now is complete from Coldbrook to Cherry Lane just at the south end of Wolfville.

Paul

[DARMIDLAND]

Hi All,

This is the very spot VIA train 154 had a meet with VIA train 153 on Jan 14,1990. This was the last pass between two regularly scheduled passenger trains on the Dominion Atlantic. Train 153 was in the siding with 154 late heading for Halifax due to all the extra passengers taking the train for the last time. There was standing room only from Yarmouth to Digby that Sunday afternoon. I believe for a time that night that train 153 was held up at Wolfville as protesters sat in front of the train until police removed them.This was my first and last round trip between HALIFAX and YARMOUTH on the DAR.Only memories.

[Paul Charland]

Hi Andrew,

I was sort of surprised to see the meet in the 1973 employees timetable and only guessed that this is how it might have worked... glad to hear I guessed correctly!

I took these as simple screen shots, just set up each shot, to the picture, then went to the editor, moved stuff around and to the next shot. Last night I actually ran this as an activity in MSTS, having Train 6 as AI traffic. I was running Train 3 and got into the clear about ten seconds before I saw Train 6's headlight come around the corner, stop at the crossing to let out a passenger, then pass me... was pretty cool how it worked out.

Paul

[Dan Conlin]

Isn't there an oil dealership (West Nova Fuels) with some tanks here? (Or is that a more recent arrival?) I like the Irving station up on the hill - many a tank have I filled there. There was a very long fruit warehouse (until it burned recently) on the northwest corner of the level crossing.

Dan Conlin

[Paul Charland]

Hi Dan,

West Nova Fuels doesn't turn up in the 1974 phone book, white or yellow pages. Well, no oil distributor shows up for Port Williams. The current terminal is located about 4 or 500 feet from the tracks and is included in my route but to be honest I couldn't figure out what it was from the fuzzy Google Earth shot and thought it looked like someone was scrapping cars there, so didn't spend too much time on it as it's partially obscured by trees from the trackside views.

Here's a couple of shots the Ric Hamilton took for me back in 2005 that I worked from.

The first is an overall view from the crossing looking north that covers most of the buildings:



The second looking west across the crossing to the former New Holland dealership housed in what has to be a former fruit warehouse.



Ric took several winter shots and then in the spring went back and took a few more from up one of those grain towers... great stuff to work from!

Not having shots from the early '70s means I can never get this stuff exactly right, about the only thing I can do it try getting it reasonably right.

Paul

[downeastrailfan]

Hey Paul,

I'm thinking the place you saw on Google maps with scrapped cars is a paint shop on the North side of the tracks. West Nova Fuels is to the South of the tracks. I don't think tracks ever ran to West Nova, but some old aerial shots and topo maps would determine that.

[Paul Charland]

Hi Matt,

That makes sense, looked like a garage with a lot of cars and the odd truck sitting around the parking lot.

I never found West Nova Fuels in the phone book but when I was going through the white pages for Wolfville this morning I did find a listing for a fuel dealer in Port Williams that might have been the previous owner... should have written the name down!

Paul