CNR 1942 Smoke at Turcot; 1956 Smoke Committee Visits Montreal

In the mid-1960s there was a refinery fire in eastern Montreal and an AM radio host commented that it looked like the area had 'received a megaton', i.e. the massive cloud of black smoke suggested a nuclear attack. 

Formal awareness of "pollution" in school began circa 1970 in a Grade 7 Science class and water pollution in the Great Lakes was our first focus.

Each era has its own priorities and zeitgeist. The Second World War had cast its own shadow over the future existence of its schoolchildren, too.

I found this transcript of an Ontario legislative committee during a routine search on the GTR/CNR's "Turcot Yard" - my own lost world of wonderful pre-school childhood memories. 

I was surprised to see the term 'Air Pollution' used before the 1960s. Probably, professional civil servants on the cutting edge of industrial hygiene were already looking at the broader environment and how we were altering it.

... Certainly, the longstanding nuisance of finding soot particulates on laundry hung out to dry (see Page 3568, search: "clothes" or "fallout" [!] ) had been a longstanding problem caused by smoke. 

While I am emphasizing only the railway-related testimony, other industrial operations are also considered. As we know from historical hindsight, 1956 was very late in the Canadian history of railway steam locomotives to be worried about their smoke.

The excerpts I have reproduced below came from an excursion taken by this Ontario committee to Montreal. In the course of their sessions, they discuss current operations at Turcot and explore the projections of change from dieselization. 

Accessible by a URL at the end of this post, the CPR President's testimony accurately predicts the end of steam - about five years in the future. 

The entire document (633 pages):

https://archive.org/details/31761114665508/page/n6/mode/1up

*  *  *

Turcot Yard roundhouse, circa 1942.
Photo by LC Gagnon.

Some time around 1942, student LC Gagnon was avoiding being too obtrusive behind the late summer grass as he photographed a transportation asset which was among the many things which were not to be photographed during the war. 

There was a war to be won: With competition from local shipping and trans-Atlantic convoys for coal, and with shortages of spare parts and skilled labour, Turcot roundhouse was creating great clouds of coal smoke. 

Over on the Ready Track beside the heated water tank (with the globe high on the mast indicating it is full of water), the white plume of steam from a raised safety valve can be seen.

After each run, most engines required maintenance, or at least an inspection, in the roundhouse. A trip to the ashpit (beyond the right margin) was also necessary. After servicing, in preparation for the next trip, fresh coal would be thrown into the firebox of an engine. The resulting inefficient combustion of the developing fire caused unburned flammable gases to escape out of the smokestack, along with small particles of soot.

... With railways playing the most important land-based role in the transportation of troops, military equipment, food, civilian workers, and commodities ... the idea of reducing air pollution for the sake of the environment, or even for the sake of human health, was not a factor which would be considered. 

The vantage point is Upper Lachine Road and the St Lawrence River exists somewhere in the distance.

Coincidentally, the community newspaper of my father's childhood home put this piece of corporate boiler plate into the public record to fill out its usual column-inches of text. It provides a nice contemporary overview of the operations pictured above. The Axis spies don't read the local papers, so don't worry.

from: Westmount Examiner; 11 December 1941; BANQ.

*  *  *

Back to 1956 and ...

Proceedings of the Select Committee appointed by the Ontario Legislature 

to enquire into certain matters and legislation 

regarding smoke control and air pollution in Ontario.

The whole section discussing Turcot and local industries starts here:

https://archive.org/details/31761114665508/page/3556/mode/1up?q=%22Turcot+Yard%22

end of first selection

*  *  *

Turcot in 1908

from: Montreal Daily Witness; 15 October 1908; BANQ.

From another archival source, comes this nice newspaper space-filler from 1908. At this point, Turcot roundhouse was a modern wonder in Canada. The yard was planned and the roundhouse was built circa 1903 to 1905. The air is almost smokeless. 

The archived scanned image was almost black - very dark. In this lightened version, above, you'll notice the relatively small size of the locomotives. Their tenders bear the large Grand Trunk numbers. 

*  *  *

If you have been following Eric's ongoing chronicle of today's CNR lawyers dealing with VIA's implementation of the new Venture equipment, you will recognize the style of some of the practices used to protect the railway's operating preferences:

VIA Ventures in Service, Part 5

*  *  *

In this second section of 1956 testimony, below, my favourite railway lawyer response to a smoke complaint is:

"They would not admit that the locomotive was operating."

The attempts to reject the Ringelmann Chart (today, it is all over the internet) perhaps suggests buying time through feigned ignorance of 'the industrial standard'.  

Pertaining to the Ringelmann Chart 'document' used in measuring smoke darkness ...

(Everyone works from Upper Lachine Road!)

*  *  *

If you've ever wondered what CPR President Norris R 'Buck' Crump (1904-1989) was like, 

the Committee questions him at Toronto, starting at the link below.

https://archive.org/details/31761114665508/page/3489/mode/1up?q=Crump

He talks about: 

Dieselization at length, mentioning the 'DCs' (I assume Rail Diesel Cars: CPR 'Dayliners'), 

Pool Trains, Lambton roundhouse smoke, his personal experiences as a railroader, 

the smoke he sees from the 16th storey of the Royal York, 

and he also discusses other railway systems he has visited. 

In the record, he is referred to as The Witness or 'A.' (answer).

Later, the Commission took him out to lunch.

*  *  *

end

LCG 1940s Westmount and Glen Yard

In the 1940s, LC Gagnon lived half a mile from the CPR Westmount station and Glen Yard. In a previous post, some aspects of the Glen Yard operations were explored as they would have appeared to a young observer. The piece also looks at official descriptions of Glen Yard and Westmount station as they appeared in publications preserved at archive.org .

CPR Glen Yard in Archived Journals 1906-1967

from: Canadian Engineer 1915 (reprint) 
https://archive.org/details/someimportanteng00cana/page/3/mode/1up?q=%22Glen+Yard%22

Briefly, Glen Yard was the coach yard and locomotive shop which supported most of the CPR's Montreal passenger train business. On the map, above, you can see its layout. In addition to storage tracks for passenger equipment, it provided a turning loop (actually two loop tracks) to orient the inbound equipment for its next outbound trip. You can also see the semi-circle of its roundhouse - with its central turntable for positioning the locomotives into the various stalls when they were at the shop for regular service.

A key attraction of Glen Yard for a young observer was that, like a large airport of today, some piece of railway rolling stock would always be in motion there. Such was the pace of yard and passenger operations. In 1950, even as personal automobiles were becoming more common, the timetable below shows that there was still a great deal of railway passenger traffic. 

... Typically, passenger equipment would reverse into Windsor Station before an outbound departure. 

... After its return to Windsor, after discharging passengers, the empty equipment would be reversed back up the hill to the Glen for its post-trip inspection, servicing, cleaning and restocking of supplies.

from: Canadian Engineer 1915 (reprint) 
https://archive.org/details/someimportanteng00cana/page/3/mode/1up?q=%22Glen+Yard%22

The map above shows the Glen Yard to Windsor Station (CPR Headquarters) track segment in its context within the track network of CPR on Montreal Island. At Montreal West, you can see the CPR lines coming from Windsor Station splitting into three routes to connect with all parts of Canada and including routes to the US. 

The lines of the Grand Trunk and Canadian Northern railways (shown above) eventually merged with other companies to form the Canadian National Railways crown corporation. 

*  *  *

Below, are the pages from a CPR employee timetable from 1950. They show the magnitude of the CPR passenger business in the Montreal area. To people interested in railway history and technical operations data, they provide a great deal of information about how these railway lines were to be operated. 

Among other documents (such as the 'Rulebook'), this publication was to be in the possession of every operating employee whenever they were on duty. Railways were quasi-military in the style of their operations. Procedural errors while moving trains could result in the destruction of expensive property, and injuries and loss of life for employees and members of the general public. 

Train movements are usually presented as East/West or North/South on the individual railway subdivision tables shown in employee timetables. 

The Montreal Terminals Division of the railway is almost unique because its trains are Inbound or Outbound. Because the tracks from Montreal West radiate in all directions, the binary choice of Inbound or Outbound is necessary for clarity. 

The gaps in the timetable columns below may seem confusing. 

Once trains reach Montreal West, there are three routing options ...

1. They continue west through to Grovehill (before leaving the lines covered by this timetable) ... or ...

2. They continue north via North Junction to Breslay (ditto) ... or ...

3. They continue south via South Junction to Adirondack Junction (ditto).

This section of the timetable includes a lot of boilerplate text which would be common across the CPR system. Between major formal updates of the 'Rulebook' this section included instructions on how new operating technology was to be used, for example new signal and signal/track (interlocking) technologies.

However, for people who are really interested in this type of thing ... many historical details about how the Montreal terminals were operated are sprinkled through this text. That is why it is included here.

*  *  *

Photos by LC Gagnon of trains at Westmount/Glen Yard.

These photos may have been taken in 1946. An inbound (for Windsor) train stops at Westmount. Just in front of the pilot, what looks like a maintenance of way gang is at work on the tracks. The locomotive fireman observes the photographer.

One of the heads of motive power for the Delaware and Hudson was a fan of British locomotive styling. LC Gagnon liked the distinctive look of D&H engines. Here the train for New York pauses at Westmount. LC Gagnon took this train on occasion to visit his father at Columbia University as he completed his M.A. degree during their summer sessions.

Above and below are CNR locomotives outbound at Westmount circa 1942. They are heading Pool Trains - an operations compromise between the CNR and CPR to avoid ruinous competition on key routes - for example between Montreal and Toronto. This arrangement was established during the Great Depression and lasted into the 1960s. 

These trains have consists which include passenger cars from both railways. Starting at Windsor Station on the CPR, the Pool Trains for Toronto crossed over to the more direct CNR for the rest of their journeys to Toronto. 

In the photo above, the engineer (in white) is looking back, eager to get the 'highball' to proceed from his conductor.

Taken circa 1942, LC Gagnon noted this might be the train for Sherbrooke. A wagon of express waits to be loaded onto this train, or a train to follow.

With his left hand on the throttle as he observes out the cab window, a engineer working on the yard switcher shoves ahead on a draft of coaches. Circa 1942

LC Gagnon's sister Rosemary poses with an outbound train at Westmount. 

This was thought to be the train for Ottawa or Quebec City.

Included in this group of photos is this image with LC Gagnon's typically-efficient grouping of subjects.

I believe the Number 3 streetcar ran the length of St Catherine Street.

On the wet side street, a milk wagon stands. The milkman is boarding his vehicle. For many years, iceboxes were the only means of urban food refrigeration. Milk was delivered to homes in heavy glass bottles. Strips of cardboard milk tickets were purchased from the milkman, usually by ... 'the housewife'. Carrying a wire metal basket designed to hold the bottles, the milkman picked up the returning glass bottles with the appropriate number of milk tickets for that day's order tucked into the bottle neck of one of the empties ... and deposited glass bottles full of fresh milk on the doorstep. 

The urban availability of fresh milk was a major advance in childhood nutrition. Milk wagon horses were noted for their ability to 'automatically' stop at each point of the daily route.

The milk trucks of competing dairies provided this service in suburban Lachine into the 1960s. 

On the corner of the street, under the three light globes, is a fire alarm box. A passerby could pull down a lever to report a fire. Before the widespread availability of home telephones, this type of infrastructure was necessary to prevent disastrous urban fires. Montreal had an extensive system of 'telegraphic' fire alarm boxes which registered incoming alarms by the location of the box to a central control room. 

*  *  *

These colour images are taken from Ektachrome slides which have deteriorated over the years. They were taken by LC Gagnon in February 1961.

Westmount station looking inbound toward Windsor Station.

You can see the long black and white arrivals/departures board with a stepladder to assist the agent in updating the arrival times of long distance trains with chalk. These boards were mandated by federal regulation.

Standing under the 'umbrella shelters' at the east end of the platform, a better view of the interlocking tower is seen - at the left. Here, an operator controlled local movements by throwing levers connected to multiple track switches ... which locked in sequence to align a train for a particular movement. Once the route had been properly lined and locked, automatic electric signals indicated to the train crew that they could proceed.

For years, I was certain that I saw a steam locomotive just to the right of the interlocking tower - but this was in the year after steam locomotives were taken out of service across Canada. Years later, an account published in a rail enthusiast historical publication indicated that out-of-service steam locomotives were employed in Montreal to supplement steam heat systems in some situations. 

A switch engine moves a CNR sleeping car at Glen Yard.

This car will be included in one of the Pool Trains.

Just in front of the distant locomotive, you can see a standpipe for filling steam locomotive tenders with water.

Looking south, the coachyard and shops can be seen. Notice the presence of extensive electricity and steam networks. Underground steam lines were attached to standing equipment to keep the coaches heated. The heat was also necessary to keep their water systems from freezing. The tallest structure is the concrete coaling tower which filled steam locomotive tenders with fuel. 

*  *  *

My spouse and I revisited some of my Montreal childhood memories in May 1981 ...

The camera vantage point changed, but the two photos, above, almost fit together to show some of the massive Glen Yard facility. The vertical cylinder of the engine sanding tower fixes the point where the photos should meet. A wide variety of passenger equipment can be seen. 

The coaling tower endures 20 years after the end of steam because these extremely sturdy structures were engineered to last far into the future. Proven and reliable steam power on the railways was also expected to work long into the future by many railway employees and fan-photographers. The revolutionary cost-effectiveness and flexibility of diesel-electric power brought about steam's quick demise, surprising many.

It is my guess that the low, wide roundhouse building can be seen immediately to the right of the coaling tower.

The umbrella shelters have gone, but the view down the platform toward Windsor is much the same 20 years later.

*  *  *

Older photos from Westmount, etc.

Date/photographer unknown. Collection of D Gagnon. 

There are a number of details in this photo which might help someone with a better historical knowledge establish the date it was taken. 

The umbrella shelters over the platforms were built in 1923 and they endured into the 1960s.

This image may be from the 1914-1923 period.

 

Photographer unknown. Collection of D Gagnon.

The ornate lightning rod on the nearby hydro pole is an interesting detail. This photo is labelled as being from May 1914 and it shows some of the operations of the nearby Glen Yard to the south. Comparing this photo with the one above, this original building was symmetrical. Whereas other photos show an addition on the Windsor Station side of the building.

Photographer unknown. Collection of D Gagnon.

In the late summer of 1911, the afternoon Ottawa Express is running between Westmount and Montreal Junction (later: Montreal West).