Upper left: looking west toward Hopedale St bridge and Hopedale Yard from church parking lot; Upper right: opposite direction toward the Green St grade crossing that is about a half mile away around the bend (track does not yet reach Green St). The "new" welded rail is comprised of 1950's era 115lb relay rail from Bethlehem Steel's Steelton and Lackawanna plants. I'm guessing it might have come from MBTA commuter rail lines. The ties being installed appear to be fair quality ties formerly used by MBTA transit lines. The ties had rail clip tie plates installed years ago (and rusted quite nicely) upon which G&U placed the CWR. Note that the ties are of uneven length and drill holes are visible where selected ties had mounts for 3rd rail as used in the Red, Orange, and Blue lines. Obviously this newly installed track has yet to have new stone dropped, regulated, and tamped. Lower left: stone and ties are being staged along the future RoW at Milford east of Vernon St that G&U will use to connect to the moribund CSX branch line at Depot St. Lower right: G&U must have recently acquired an 89 foot flat car (seen here at Hopedale) from the Ringling Bros estate (?) #84715 that was apparently built by Bethlehem Steel in 1964 as an open Tri-level autorack. RBBX acquired the car in 1996 and cut it down to a single level car to haul their equipment trailers. No idea what G&U will use this for - MoW equipment hauling?

Photographed by John Barlow, April 12, 2020.
Added to the photo archive by John Barlow, April 13, 2020.
Railroad: Grafton & Upton.

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