Milwaukee Road 261 Rolls Through Wauwatosa Village 8/17/08

[ltlman692]

@RamFett

Where is Milwaukee road 261 going!

[RamFett]

@ltlman692 It's on an excursion to the Twin Cities in MN.

[TspesVladD]

Nice video. Great shot of it approaching. You should check out my train videos.

[RamFett]

I wouldn't say WI sucks for railfanning. It just depends where you are. But sadly, a lot of the diversity in rail traffic is gone, along with the industries that it served. I've been seeing a lot of spurs and industrial sidings torn up, paved over or abandoned in the past few years, not to mention how much has disappeared from the Menomonee valley. It really sucks to see it happening.

[RamFett]

I grew up doing the same thing with my Dad. Apart from the 261, there was a lot more to see back then. You used to be able to catch units that were CNW, ex MILW, WC, SOO, BN and all kinds of leased power. We used to see Milwaukee Road engines and burro cranes with scrap metal gondolas parked on the now-gone siding on the other side of the tracks from where I filmed this. Now the mainline power is mostly boring Canadian Pacific GE Widecabs.

[soccerking1710]

i saw this train leave the Dells. it was pretty cool watching the train go over the bridge from the river.

[JerryMopar]

When I was 8 I got to go in the cab of the 261 when it came in FDL. Our family friend Jeff (who was also an engineer for the WC)knew some the crew on it. Oh, I remember that eerie-cool sound of the steam whistle at night!! Thanks so much John for posting this!!

[RamFett]

Thanks, Jerry. It's been a while since the 261 ran through Fondy, hasn't it? I miss the Wisconsin Central. They would occasionally run trains through town on the Soo (CP) mainline. I always thought their burgundy and yellow diesels had some of the sharpest paint shchemes around. Every now and then I still see one of those beasts in original paint on the CN main in Waukesha. Sadly they're becoming a rare sight.

[CoolBalla15]

Nice video. That train looks cool.

[Siren1000T1]

Nice steam engine train John.

[RamFett]

Thanks. I'm not too happy with my camera work, but this was the best I could do without a tripod. I was also only able to use my Powershot A530, which is sort of a lame camera.

[Siren1000T1]

lol. The kind of camcorder I use is a Panasonic SDR-H18. It has 32X Optical Zoom. It uses HDD and SD Card.

[CoolBalla15]

And I have a Canon ZR950 MiniDV Camcorder. It has a 48x zoom and a 2000x digtal zoom. You should get that. You'll love it. :)