by Aaron Hockley on January 22, 2012
Hi all… Aaron here, the founder of Dogcaught.com. Over the past couple of years the amount of time I’ve spent creating and sharing railroad-related images has declined as my photographic hobby and business have focused on other subjects. While I still enjoy railfanning and a good train picture, I haven’t produced much of that on my own lately. In the meantime, my friend Steve Eshom has been sharing more of his work here on Dogcaught, and he continues to produce a bunch of great material with interesting stories behind the scenes.
In the last couple of days, Steve and I have made some changes and he’s now assuming control of Dogcaught.com. I felt it made sense to hand the reins over to Steve since he’s been producing most of the content lately and I trust that he’ll keep the site online and full of interesting railroad imagery. I may still post the occasional photo, but as of today, Steve Eshom runs Dogcaught.
-Aaron
by Steve Eshom on January 18, 2012
Aaron and I will be making some behind the scenes changes to dogcaught.com over the next week. The result is you may experience some outages or unusual responses. Don’t worry everything will be as it was and we’ll get back to our normal content.
As a teaser here’s a photo I took on Monday while I visited the Columbia River Gorge. We received a bit of snow down to the river level on Sunday so I ran out Monday to take advantage. This image is the DPU of a west bound grain train crossing Cascade Dr. in North Bonneville, Wa.
by Steve Eshom on November 23, 2011
Yes indeed it is again time to eat some turkey! I’m looking forward to a few days off from work to throttle back, relax, and enjoy my family. Oh ya and eat some turkey (did I say that already?)!
This year like most I am thankful for the fact that I can enjoy my hobbies like I do. I quite frankly am lucky to have everything I do. My family supports me, my friends tolerate me, and I’m healthy. What else can a guy ask for?
Photographically, I’m thankful for the moments of great light I’ve had this year. Without those moments, however brief or long lived, the photos I’ve taken wouldn’t be what they are. Light and shadow you are my friends and thanks for sticking with me.
Train wise, I suppose all the right trains came at the right time. I’m sure I could look back and say if only a train was X minutes earlier or Y minutes later it would be perfect. Can’t do that though so I’m thankful for the trains that arrived when they did. Without them I wouldn’t have the photos I do.
Today’s photo is an image of UP’s M-HKRO cresting the summit of the Blue Mountains at Kamela, Or. On the 11th day of December 2008 fog from the moist snow hangs in the trees around the summit. If you were to visit the Blues on Thanksgiving 2011 it would look pretty similar to this photo though I’m quite certain an SD40-2 wouldn’t be in the consist.
Again, have a great thanksgiving!
by Steve Eshom on October 12, 2011
In college at Washington State University I took a course called “The Built Environment”. It was a course which satisfied one of my non-major requirements and focused on how the design of our environment impacts humans and human behavior. The case studies were fascinating to say the least and I certainly walked away with a greater understanding of architectural design.
A few weeks ago Aaron, another friend, and I participated in a photowalk in downtown Seattle. Prior to the formal event the three of us wandered around the Seattle waterfront and visited Kerry Park. During the waterfront portion we hiked the boardwalk southbound from pier 66 and under the Alaskan Way viaduct back north. We found all sorts of interesting things in and around the viaduct including the remnants of an industrial spur. This area was of course first an industrial area with individual car load service to many of the piers and warehouses.
Walking north along the viaduct I came to a realization. I realized the viaduct literally divides part of downtown from the waterfront. Even though it is a raised structure, which for all intents and purposes makes it invisible to pedestrians, it still acts as a barrier. On the waterfront side businesses thrive, people are prevalent, and it is generally an enjoyable place to be. On the city side there are no pedestrian oriented business and people are not found unless going to or from their parked cars. Honestly it can be an intimidating place to be since it is dark and very noisy. There is evidence all along the east side of the structure that business have tried to cater to people but were not successful. Many were boarded up and abandoned or converted into some other form. Nothing pedestrian or tourist oriented seemed to survive over there (yes, there were a few exceptions near the north end). The design of the viaduct did matter.
Up until now I’d been torn about whether Seattle should take the step to take down the viaduct. I certainly believed in the technical reasons why it should be removed (earthquake and seawall issues) but after Saturday I have to believe there will be yet another benefit to Seattle. I believe they will see a resurgence in business on the east side of where the viaduct is now. If they convert that area to a people friendly place (see Portland’s Tom McCall waterfront) the businesses will flow in and people will once again filter from the waterfront into downtown and vise-versa. Sure I’d love to see trains run here again but with extensive, modern port facilities south of town car load business won’t return to this area. I say focus on this area’s strengths and that is its attractiveness to visitors, residence, and downtown employees.
Go for it Seattle, tear down that viaduct! While you are at it think very carefully what this area means to the city and make it special.
by Aaron Hockley on September 12, 2011
I hadn’t visited Railroad.net in a few years, but I was recently contacted about the fact that it has re-launched. The site launched in 1996, over the years it has been a highly popular railroad forum. With over 11,000 members, the forum has been a place for users to ask and answer questions, and comment on railroad related issues. Today, in addition to the forum, the site will now be a hub for railroad industry news. It appears they’re featuring a variety of railroad-related news including Class 1s, Amtrak, shortlines, and more. I see the new design has a nice clean interface. Check it out!
