Midnights at Irvin

Late-night railfans (L to R) Tom Campbell, John, myself and James.  Another cohort from that era was Steve Davis, who probably took this picture using my camera.  May 1st, 1985

I admit it, I’d never heard of Irvin either, at least not before that Friday evening in 1983.

The phone rang in our home, I was the first to pick up, and it was for me.  The voice on the other end said, “Tom?  This is Jim.  Want to go out tonight and watch Amtrak at Irvin?”  At first, this confused me.  The only Jim among my friends was not the least bit interested in railroads, so I thought he was pranking me.  After a little bit of back and forth, I realized that “Jim” was actually James Bradley, who I knew was definitely interested in railroads, and crazy enough to want to watch trains at night.

OK, that made more sense, but where was this “Irvin” place of which he spoke?  He clarified that it was where the Burlington Northern mainline east of Spokane crossed Pines Rd.  Railroads have a habit of giving locations names that the general populace never uses.  Apparently, Irvin was the name the first railroad through there, the Northern Pacific, had given that particular spot.  Now I had a better idea what he was talking about, and was curious enough to bite on his offer.  This would be the first of many visits, totaling perhaps hundreds of hours spent on weekend nights over the next few years, watching trains at or near Irvin.

After checking with my folks that it would be OK to head out this late, and getting a curfew time from them, I hopped in James’ yellow “POS” Chevette when he pulled up.  I really didn’t know James that well at this time – he was a year behind me in school, and although we’d first met in junior high, I hadn’t seen him at all in high school until the current year.  I learned later that his folks had divorced and he’d been living with his mom in France up until his recent arrival at North Central High School.

One more piece of background:  James’ dad, Jim Bradley, was a hard-core railfan who had inspired his only son to an equal level of railroad enthusiasm.  Jim had been the original proprietor of the Sunset Junction hobby shop, and coincidentally had given me a substantial nudge into the hobby by a generous gesture in his shop several years earlier.  Since the divorce, he’d moved down to Texas and remarried, but James remained committed to their shared interest in trains – maybe also because he knew it annoyed his mom.

A westbound local, returning to Parkwater yard, approaches the Pines Rd. grade crossing at Irvin, WA

So, as James and I drove north on Pines Rd. toward the railroad crossing, he was much more familiar with the spot that I, having been first introduced to it by his dad.  Just before reaching the tracks, he made a hard left onto the railroad’s maintenance road, nosed a few feet forward almost even with the double-headed east-facing signal mast, and then backed the car 90 degrees around to park with the back bumper nearly touching the fence of the next-door property.  From this vantage, we could see the tracks in either direction, and more importantly, we could clearly see the color of the signals when lit.

Up until then, my understanding of railroad signals amounted to “green means go, red means stop”.  James was better versed in signaling, and I learned a lot more about the subject from him upon repeated visits to Irvin.  Because the signals were “approach lit”, they remained dark until a train occupied the tracks two or more “blocks” away in either direction.  If the east-facing signals both lit up as red, it most likely meant an eastbound train was leaving Parkwater yard and would soon be upon us.  The glow of a locomotive’s headlight to the west usually confirmed this signal indication within minutes.

If either signal lit up as yellow or green, it meant a westbound train would soon round the curve a mile or so east of us.  A green signal meant the train had been cleared by the dispatcher for passage through the block at full speed.  Yellow meant that the train would need to slow to a “restricted” speed as it approached the next signal.  Green signals were rare and usually only appeared on the uppermost signal head, because this was the one that controlled the mainline track.  Trains that the dispatcher switched onto the parallel siding (which reached all the way to the yard), were told so by the lower signal head, and it displayed yellow because of the need to slow for the diverging track.  Using this knowledge, we were able to have a clear picture what trains were running on our little part of the railroad at any given time.

An eastbound freight with two leased Milwaukee Road SD-40-2s, holds the main while a westbound takes the siding.  The eastbound mainline signal head at Irvin is visible above the westbound's locomotives.

The main reason James preferred to spend time at Irvin after dark was his particular interest in passenger trains.  In our part of the country, that meant one thing:  Amtrak.  Spokane was (and still is) one of the more interesting spots in the country to view Amtrak trains, a) because the eastbound and westbound sections of Amtrak’s Empire Builder train passed (and still pass) each other just to the east of Spokane (when both were/are running on time), and that could mean two trains for the price of one, and b) because Spokane was (is) where the Seattle and Portland sections of the Builder converge to form the full eastbound train, and where the westbound is split into its two component trains.

This whole orchestration began when the Portland section would arrive at Spokane’s downtown station shortly before midnight, where it was soon joined by its Seattle counterpart.  The trains would spend several minutes at the depot as they were switched into one train and the passengers originating at Spokane would board.  Once on its way, the eastbound saw clear signals all the way out of town, and would pass Irvin before 1 a.m.  If time permitted and (again) things were running on time, another half-hour wait would bring the westbound Builder past us, where the same process would be followed in reverse.  James preferred to watch the action from this end of the process, and this far away from Parkwater yard, so the trains would be moving at full speed (79 mph was the maximum authorized speed) as they passed us.

On a few occasions, we managed to see all six trains enter or leave town by parking west of the depot to catch the Portland and Seattle sections arriving, driving east to Irvin to watch the combined eastbound depart, waiting for the arriving westbound Builder, and then driving west again to catch the two smaller sections as they departed.  The catch, of course, was the late hour.  James had fewer restrictions for when he needed to be home (or he ignored his restrictions).  My parents had stricter expectations (that are more understandable to me now as a parent than they were at the time), and usually, 1:30 a.m. was about as late as they could handle.  If the trains were on time, I still couldn’t meet this curfew and see all the trains we wanted.  More than a few times I had to find a pay phone to call a few minutes before my curfew and negotiate more time if trains were running late.

The fact that we were parked by the railroad tracks in the middle of the night was a factor in most of the humorous/exciting/harrowing things that happened on our many visits to Irvin.  Although the darkness hid us from most of the passing drivers on Pines, or on Trent Avenue that paralleled the tracks from Parkwater all the way to Rathdrum, ID, when we did get noticed, it was usually by Sheriff’s deputies (because we were outside city limits).  Although this took place long before 9/11 and fears of domestic terrorism, there were lots of other reasons law enforcement officers could imagine why a car might be parked in a dark, secluded spot, and very few of them were legal.  So, we had several conversations with deputies on different occasions.

Of course, just our presence on railroad property was violating the laws against trespassing, but back then, the deputies did not seem to care about that.  They did want to know what we were up to, and most times accepted our story at face value.  Probably our most notable incident happened when we brought another friend along with us.

This deputy seemed more curious than usual and asked us for ID.  Both James and I presented our licenses, but our friend claimed he didn’t have ID with him, and when the deputy asked his name and birthdate, he replied with a phony name and made-up birth date.  While the deputy was running our information, we asked our friend what was going on, and he said he had an outstanding warrant for second-degree burglary.  Both James and I had an “Oh crap!” moment, and I pictured myself being jailed for harboring a fugitive or something like that.

The deputy called us back, handed us our licenses (the deputy remarked on James’ large number of speeding tickets, and my record was clean, of course).  He told our friend he couldn’t find any problems with his record, but my heart leapt into my throat when the deputy next asked us to repeat our names and birthdates for his notes.  I knew our friend would probably remember the fake name he’d provided, but there was no way he was going to remember what fake birthdate he’d given.  And, the deputy certainly would remember it.  When they did not match, I knew he’d be in trouble and I was afraid it would impact me.  However, just as the deputy got ready to ask our friend for his name and birthdate, a call came in on the radio that he had to respond to right away, and off he drove.  Needless to say, that was the last time we took that particular friend along.

Our adventures usually began earlier in the evenings, often as early as 8 p.m., so we could catch the “opening act”: whatever freight trains might be running.  This portion of the railroad was known as “The Funnel” by many railfans and real railroaders.  The Funnel was formed when Burlington Northern consolidated its two separate routes between Sandpoint, ID and Spokane onto the former Northern Pacific tracks, while downgrading the ex-GN line to an alternate mainline before tearing it up between Dean and Newport about 1985.  So two parallel routes, ex-GN and ex-NP, entered Sandpoint from the east, were funneled into one line, and then split into two again at Spokane.

An unusual power combination, even for 1983, leads a westbound at Irvin.  The lead locomotive is a "straight" SD-40 of CB&Q heritage, and it is followed by an SD-45 and an SD-9.

This meant every BN train between Chicago and Seattle or Portland had to pass Irvin; as many as 50 trains per day as I recall.  So, even (or particularly) late at night there were plenty of freight trains to see while waiting for Amtrak.  The bulk of these were led by multiple-unit “lashups” of EMD SD-40-2 locomotives, which BN had selected as its standard locomotive model for a lot of good reasons.  No matter how practical and efficient those “Dash-2’s” may have been, we got really tired of them really quickly.  Of course, it was dark, so the few other SD types and “2nd Generation” GP types didn’t stand out too much against the background of all those SD-40-2s.  What really got our blood pumping were the few times a full string of high-hood “1st Generation” GP units lead a train past us!

James was (and still is, I’m sure) a very confident and bold guy, and he’d learned from his dad, who had railroaded before opening the hobby shop, not to be afraid of asking questions and favors from the railroad employees.  I, on the other hand, did not want to get in their way so that my privileges of being on railroad property would not be lost.  So, whenever James would barge into the yard office and start asking which trains were running when, and so forth, I felt very uncomfortable and tended to hang back.  But, by riding on James’ coattails, I managed to experience a lot of cool things.

One experience came when James dragged me into the BN offices in the downtown Amtrak depot, and we visited with the dispatcher not too long before that office was closed and its functions moved to Seattle (and later to Ft. Worth).  Another time, we visited with the operator in the tower where the UP tracks crossed the ex-NP tracks at grade.

Probably the most significant of these episodes came when James negotiated a ride for us on an Amtrak F-40PH locomotive!   Because of the way Amtrak split and joined the Builder in Spokane, it was a convenient location to provide servicing for their locomotives.  Three F-40s typically led the westbound Builder into town, and three left again, one on the Portland section and two on the Seattle, and likewise in reverse on the eastbound leg.  But, there was a spare F-40 that spent each day at Parkwater for servicing and was then cycled into the mix as the train was split apart and joined together again.  The one engine that then got cycled out ran back to Parkwater for fuel, sand and supplies, and to wait until it was cycled back into service the next night.

So, one night James bluffed a little and told the hostler we’d already spoken with the yardmaster about a cab ride from the Parkwater shops to the depot and back again, about 4 to 5 miles each way.  The hostler probably didn’t fall for James’ bluff, but was not against giving two young railfans a thrill and let us up into the cab.  I don’t remember as much detail about this trip as I would like, partly because, again, I didn’t want to cause trouble and did not converse with the crew as much as James.

We threaded our way through the yard and out onto the mainline with frequent, but brief, stops for signals and such.  It wasn’t long before we approached the depot, and the engineer suggested we get off about 100 yards east of the depot, so that no one in an official position would question our presence in the cab.  We watched the shuffling of locomotives from alongside the tracks, and after the various sections of the Builder had departed, the lone F-40 headed back to the yard with a stop to let us back on.  The hostler gave James a shot at the throttle for part of the run, and he offered me a turn too, but I was still too scared to chance it and declined (a decision I have regretted many times since, so don’t rub it in).  The final thrill of the evening was getting to ride the Parkwater turntable while in the cab, so the engine would be facing the correct direction for the next night.

One evening on maybe my second or third nighttime visit to Irvin, James took me to the door of the house we parked alongside.  That corner of the railroad crossing was mostly occupied by Trent Elementary school, but right at the corner there stood a private residence where Jake and Elsie lived. They were an older retired couple, whom James had befriended sometime before.  They welcomed us in, and were more than happy to chat with us.  They even showed us photos from a family vacation they’d taken to Durango, Colorado where they’d ridden the narrow gauge railroad there.  Nice folks.

A definite drawback to late-night railfanning was our inability to take photos of all the action.  So, anything that served to delay the trains more than 8 hours was a cause for excitement.  The poor passengers were certainly not happy about trains running that late, but for us it presented a rare chance to shoot action photos of Amtrak trains at Spokane.

On Dec 23rd, 1983, the phone rang about 10 pm at home, and no surprise, it was James calling.  He’d found out that winter weather in Montana had significantly delayed the westbound Builder, and it would not arrive in Spokane until well after daybreak!  Mom and Dad were OK with the idea of me not being around the house much of Christmas Eve, so sometime in the morning James picked me up and we headed for Irvin.  Our plan was to set up on the opposite side of Pines, a little closer to the substantial bridge the railroad used to cross the Spokane River.  We found a suitable spot, and waited for the train to arrive.  And waited.  And waited.  And waited.

An extremely late westbound Empire Builder crosses the Spokane River at Irvin, about a quarter mile east of Pines Rd.  This photo is a little blurry due to low light and speed, but was well worth the wait.

Again, in the era prior to smart phones, we had virtually no way to know what progress, if any, the train was making toward our location.  It seems at one point we even drove back to downtown to see if someone at the depot could inform us.  The train had barely left Sandpoint, so we had time to return to Irvin and our original plan.  Eventually, the signals illuminated and the sound of a five-chime air horn sounded from the east.  It was mid-afternoon by this time, and the sky was heavily overcast, so the light was less than optimal.  I got my desired shot of the train on the bridge, but the camera’s shutter speed was necessarily low and the image turned out a little fuzzy.  We scampered back toward town, and managed another shot of the train at UP Tower, and then we found a spot to shoot the train’s Portland section as it departed town.  But, by the time that train was ready to depart, darkness had nearly settled in, and a call home indicated my folks were antsy to have me there for Christmas Eve dinner, so we called off the rest of the chase.

James gets his shot of the Empire Builder about to "hit the diamonds" at UP Tower, where the Union Pacific tracks cross the BN mainline.

Our visits to Irvin lasted through the summer of 1984 before I headed off to college.  The visits resumed again the following April when school let out and I’d returned home, but in my absence, James had recruited others of his friends to join him for midnight train watching at Irvin.  Only one of these guys had any seeming interest in railroads, and I don’t think his enthusiasm for them lasted much beyond his teenage years.  Upon my return from college my grandfather had passed away, and with various funeral arrangements and such, I’d had little time for chasing trains.  But May 1st was almost upon us, and being Amtrak’s 14th “birthday”, this called for a little celebration!

Celebration was an overstatement, but still, we managed to accumulate several friends at Irvin that night.  I made up a poster wishing Amtrak a happy birthday that might have been large enough for the engineer, and any passengers awake enough, to notice.  Lack of light was the problem, of course, but it just so happened one of our friends had driven his off-road dune buggy to the meet, and it held a large array of lights on its roll bar.  So, with the dune buggy facing in the train’s direction of travel (we only greeted the eastbound), the lights pretty well illuminated our poster and the group of us waving at the train.  The engineer may have given us a little extra greeting with the horn, but otherwise there was no acknowledgement of our well wishes from anyone other than ourselves.

Irvin still exists as the easternmost extent of the Spokane terminal for today’s BNSF Railway.  An extensive mid-nineties track rebuild project pushed the east-facing signal mast several yards farther east, but its indications can still be seen by drivers as they cross the tracks.  Trespassing is much more strictly policed, so I would never dream today of parking alongside the tracks in our old spot out of concern both for the law and for safety.  Jake and Elsie’s home was demolished (or moved?) many years ago.

But, Amtrak still regales Irvin with its 5-chime chorus twice each night – or more correctly, twice early each morning.  And, for those who stay up late enough to witness its passage, the thrill is still there.
 

Lunchtimes at Sunset Jct. – An Appendix

James and I did not limit our high school aged railfan adventures to late night Amtrak watching.  Another likely time to find us trackside was lunchtime on school days.

North Central High School was considered an open campus at the time, so there was no limit on where we could go for lunch.  While most other students ranged as far afield as the nearby 7-11 at lunch, James and I decided the lunch period gave us enough time to hustle down to Sunset Junction (the actual railroad location in Spokane, not the hobby shop once owned by James’ dad), and perhaps catch a passing train or two while eating our sack lunches.  There really wasn’t enough time for it, but we often managed to see a train or two, and usually made it back in time.  Usually.

We probably only made these excursions three or four times during the spring of 1984.  I was a senior and James a junior, and we both had a lot of other things going on, so our opportunities were limited.  One time, just as we’d crossed the Monroe St. Bridge – following the quickest route to Sunset Jct. – we had to stop for a light.  I looked to our left, and realized that my dad sat right next to us in traffic.  I think I said, “Oh crap, it’s my dad!” and we sped away from there as soon as the light turned green.  Glancing back, I could see that Dad had recognized us, and I felt certain I’d receive a lecture when I got home.  But then, I realized we weren’t doing anything wrong and felt a little sheepish I’d behaved so guiltily.  And, when I did get home, Dad only said he would’ve bought us hamburgers for lunch if we hadn’t zipped away before he could offer.  Oops.

One other trip, we didn’t get back to school quite on time.  No one in the hallways tried to stop us, so we hurried back to our respective classrooms.  I tried to slip into 4th period French as quietly as I could, but Madame Scrimshire inquired (in French, of course), where I had been.  I stumbled through, “J’étais avec Jacques.”  James, with a French mother and having lived there with her for a year, was enrolled in a different period of Madame’s classes, where he was known as Jacques.  Madame was well acquainted with Jacques’ near-maniacal love of trains, and his penchant for odd behavior.

The caboose of an eastbound UP freight crosses under the westbound signal tower at Sunset Jct.  This photo was taken in 1985, after I had graduated, but is typical of what James and I saw on our lunchtime railfan excursions.

She thought for a moment about marking me as tardy, then asked, “Avez-vous sortez a regarder les trains?”  I replied, “Oui.”

Madame just smiled, rolled her eyes, threw her hands up and replied “D’accord!”  And then, she continued with class.