Saturday, August 18, 2018

Over the fence



This post is a little bit explanation, a bit reflection and a small bit an advertisement/plea/community service announcement…


It has been a fair while since the last post.  Most of my intervening hours have been allocated to a flurry of home renovations as we prepare to sell our house in Hurlstone Park. Its meant a lot of backyard time, which is usually a good thing as we share a fence with the Metropolitan Goods Line. Unfortunately, I have tended to have a hammer or a spade in hand, rather than a camera. 

When we bought here I thought I would never leave… it has always been a dream of mine to camp out beside the Metro Goods Line and this is what I have been happily doing. It has taken 5 years but I now possess skills every train hunter should have – like being able to tell an approaching Helga just by its whine (don’t get me started on QBXs!). But for a whole bunch of reasons (the compelling one is that we have bought a farm we couldn’t afford), it is now time to leave.

But its been an interesting 5 years. We arrived only months after the last of the 44s were withdrawn, so I moped for a couple of years until they made a return in 2017.  They still wander past, but very occasionally.


The more modern Alcos seem to be increasing their presence along the line, after a pretty lean period.  Their heyday was 2015, when 80/80 or 442/80 combos were seen regularly.



Darling, there is an Alco at the bottom of our garden.


The days of regular quad C classes rumbling the entire suburb appear over, with their removal from the 1491/4190 container service.  Here’s close the last time that triple Cs worked that service, taken from my ‘around the corner’ go-to photography spot – the Melford Street overpass.


While not as rumblingly authoritarian as the C class, even as recently as this week the locals could not help but be impressed by a solitary G.  I fluffed the shot so here is an earlier one from September 2016.



Five years is a pretty short period, but even in that time some interlopers have arrived and left.  Aurizon, for one.


Then there are the regulars… working from home over the last year has meant that my day is timed by the Fletchers train (8148) around breakfast, a Helga at 10:30, Carrot and Spud on the Crawfords service by 2pm and an 81 on a cementy around dusk. And lots of others in between of course (usually about 20 in daylight hours).  But here’s a few shots of my regular friends…





Its not the worst way to live a life! One I am particularly fond of runs most days, in the afternoon.  It is of course the littlest Alco in the village off to deposit or collect an XPT car or two.


At the risk of sounding too much like a sell-job, one of the nicest things about this area is that someone who shares our interest also worked on the local council.  As a result of his/her intervention, there is a lovely park at the end of our street where I can sit on a bench overlooking the Foord Avenue underpass (technically doing, ahem, work). Here’s a couple of recent shots of this location.



Anyway, you have heard enough of my extolling the virtues of my locale. It will be a big wrench to leave when we have to, and now the renovations are over there will be more sitting in the garden/park or at the local bridge, snapping the local wildlife.

If you are still reading this and know of anyone who appreciates the sound of an Alco in the morning, information about our house sale is available from this link, or just drop me a note in the comments under this post. 

I am serious – I am just plain sick of my real estate agent telling me there are people in this world who think that living next to the Metro Goods Line is a detraction. I would very much like to prove him wrong by selling this home to someone who appreciates rail traffic as much as we all do (should!). Let’s show him and all these uninformed people that sharing a back fence with the NSW Railways is a joy! In fact, even if you don’t want to buy the house, please just ring him anyway and let him know just how mistaken he is!

Who doesn’t want a chance to wave to the driver on 8037?


Cheers, Don

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