I have always loved trains, and this fascination has continued into my adult years. As I grew up, my interest has expanded from simply watching trains, to learning more about operations, maintenance, and history.
2011 was the year I began documenting train operations by way of videos. As I moved on to better cameras, I also began to take a bigger interest in still photography. In the past five years, my location has shifted from Waterloo Region, to the GTA, to London. Despite this, my interest has never wavered, and I have continued to take train pictures and videos at all of these locations, and will continue to do so regardless of what location my future takes me.
This website documents my railway photography, and has been categorized by region. While many of these pictures document Class I railways, there are also examples of shortline and tourist railways, including the Goderich-Exeter Railway, and the Waterloo Central Railway.
Most of these photos were taken from railfanning on my own time. It is my favorite pastime for the days off I get. Some photos were taken while involved as a labourer with the Waterloo Central Railway. I have also included a section on the railway history of my hometown of Lindsay, Ontario. In this section, I have posted photos taken of rail operations in the town side by side with my own photos in modern time. This is my current historical project, and I hope to use this to help display to others some of the history that helped to build and define my hometown. A lot of this information has been lost, and is not known by younger generations.
I will continue to take and add photos from my railfanning sessions. I am also hoping to make a similar historical side by side project for the Southwestern Ontario city of Stratford. I hope you enjoy my posts, and I will continue to update this site as the pictures come!
Railfandan's Train Observations 
the lindsay pics , from Keith Hansen, then your recent pics are unbelievable
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Thanks!
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Just saw the photos of the Lindsay area railway of then and now. Great!
I live in Haliburton and had not seen some of the “then” photos of the northern Victoria rail line.
Yesterday, we cycled part of the Victoria Railway Trail, from Lindsay northwards, and noted the high cement trestles near Thunder Bridge Road. Do you know the history of these trestles? What line crossed over the Victoria line at this point and where was it going? Thanks for any info.
Bob Heyes
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Hello!
Sorry for the late reply! I assume you mean the pillars just north of Lindsay Street North between Thunder Bridge Road and the Scugog River north of Lindsay? From what I understand, those pillars carried the rails of the Georgian Bay & Seaboard Railway over the Victoria Line (Haliburton Sub) and then over the Scugog.
East of the river, they curved south near where the Lindsay Super Jail is now, and followed the river into Lindsay. Here, they met the rails of the Lindsay, Bobcaygeon, and Pontypool Railway, and shared tracks through Lindsay until branching off at a junction just southeast of the town.
West of the pillars, the rails ran north west to Port McNicoll via Orillia. According to a source I looked up on Google Earth, these rails were referred to as the Port McNicoll Subdivision.
Eventually the GB&S became part of the CPR, as did the LP&B, and the two subdivisions served as CPR’s version of CNR’s Midland Subdivision, seeing grain trains run between Port McNicoll on Georgian Bay to a connection with a CPR mainline at Dranoel (Bethany) While once very prosperous, it was hit hard by the depression, and the rails between Port McNicoll and Lindsay were removed in 1937.
Some of my photos covered portions of the former GB&S trackage (later called the Bobcaygeon Subdivision), and one was taken at the approximate location of the GB&S and LP&B junction.
A long response, but I hope this helps answer your question! The source that inspired this post, Last Trains From Lindsay, primarily focused on the trackage between Dranoel and Bobcaygeon, so I did not focus on the Port McNicoll trackage too much. I’m sure other sources exist that do!
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