I was in Toronto for work a few weeks ago. After that was done, I spent the weekend with my son and his wife. I took the line 1 subway from downtown up to Vaughan to meet him when he was done work on Friday.
Nick suggested that we stop by CN’s MacMillan yard on our way out of the city, and I heartily agreed.
As I mentioned in my Mac Yard From the Air post, highway 407 and highway 7 cross the south end of the yard. We parked off highway 7 and walked onto the overpass to see the yard.
My first impressions were: wow, this is big, and wow, there are a lot of poles and wires.
We spent a few minutes just taking it all in. From this (south) end, we were viewing the local yard in the middle, with bypass tracks on both sides.
Off in the distance to the east, we spotted CN’s “famous” heritage Geeps, CN 7600 and slug CN 600. My phone’s zoom wasn’t great but you can definitely see the two units on the left.
CN 7600 used to be GP38-2 CN 4728 before it was rebuilt at Progress Rail in Tacoma, WA as a GP40-3 in 2020. You can see a much better photo of the pair here.
On the far “left” (southwest) there is some kind of CN transload facility. An old CN switcher was shuffling cars in and out of the facility, occasionally making smoke.
It was one of CN’s SW1200RM locomotives, maybe 7311? Nick had a much better camera than my phone, so he will have the number.
A good zoom lens, on a better camera than my phone, would come in handy here.
In the foreground, a long general freight train pulled “south” with a variety of steel-related cars like coil cars, and these MHF Services containers on flatcars containing some kind of aluminum dross / manufacturing byproduct.
I saw very similar cars (and loads) in Winnipeg in 2020.
Nick and I spotted the same coil cars in Kitchener over the weekend.
After a bit, I decided to take a walk to the “other” (east) end of the overpass. Here several tracks go under and the view is a lot more open. I saw a pair of locomotives running light toward the overpass, and waited until they cleared the wires to take a shot. The 5:30 PM sun looked nice.
CN 5784 and CN 2501 are both getting a little long in the tooth, and might be heading for a rebuild soon into AC units. Get your SD75I shots while you can.
Eventually CN 7253 with slug CN 207 came rolling around a curve, with a long string of freight cars in tow. These units are remotely controlled, and in fact no crew was visible on this end.
That was an enjoyable way to spend a half hour or so. Next time I’m in Toronto, I’ll have to figure out a place to go to see the hump end in operation – if that’s possible.
By the way, Eric Gagnon stood here in late 2018 and froze his butt off to bring you this post. Go read it!
The Rutherford Road bridge at the north end of the yard overlooks the hump pullback tracks. York Region Transit operates several routes in the vicinity of the yard, including Viva Orange connecting with Vaughan Metropolitan Centre subway station, and 85 Rutherford connecting with the Rutherford GO station (Barrie Line). All of YRT, TTC, and GO accept Presto cards.
Thanks, Mark, that’s great information! I’ll keep that in mind for my next visit and this will be helpful for anyone else who wants to railfan Mac Yard.
I love that shot of the old SW1200 in the distance. It’s been years since I’ve seen one of those in CN paint.