Wild At Art Creates A Great Week For The Heritage Park

WILD AT ART CREATES A GREAT WEEK FOR THE HERITAGE PARK

It was a week of everything all rolled into one—the Wild at Art community festival for 10 days, Spring Break week with the children out of school, and Easter Weekend at the end of the stint. It all made for a very busy week at the West Coast Railway Heritage Park, but it also allowed us to show off our very best to good crowds with a myriad of activities to the 5,000 guests that visited during the ten day period.

Friday, March 14—the Carshop at the Heritage Park opens as Wild at Art’s main gallery for the ten days of the festival, Where Wild Things Art it is headlined. A opening reception is

attended by the Squamish Nation, MP Blair Wilson, MLA Joan McIntyre, and Councillor Mike Jensen on behalf of Mayor Sutherland. Speaking on behalf of the festival was Carolyn Grass, and on behalf of WCRA President Don Evans said words of welcome. More than 40 artists exhibited in the gallery, and there was live entertainment on the main stage in the building throughout the week. As for the carshop, it looked great as an art gallery! (photo)

Saturday, March 15—the first full day of the festival gets good weather, and several main attractions at the Heritage Park. The most noticeable is the operation of the Royal Hudson, which operates for both Saturday and Sunday, the sounds of its whistle echoing around the Squamish Valley for the first time since 2007. The train departs hourly from 1100 through 1500, and patronage is good at $10 a ride. Consist is #2860 and tender, coach WCXX 5596 Paul D Roy, and open observation car WCXX 598 Henry Pickering. Departure is from the north end of the Heritage Park, and the train proceeds out of the park, across Government Road and down Track 7 to the south end of the Squamish yard. The ride allows the Hudson to open up once clear of the switches and

gives a ride that passengers are very happy with.

Cab rides are also popular—even at $75 per person for this experience. All who went were delighted with their first hand steam experience, thanks to the fine work of engineer Mark Liggins and fireman Andy Faris. Thanks guys!

Adding to the day was a great beef barbecue put on by the Rotary Club of Squamish. The huge roasts of beef were over the fire by 0700 on both Saturday and Sunday, and the resulting beef sandwiches were delicious. The huge fire pit was set up just north of the Howard Lyttle Park, and the serving and fixings were handled on the patio of The Beanery. Sales were good and the resulting proceeds benefitted both the Rotary Club and the Heritage Park. Thanks Rotary!

Mini Rail was also busy throughout the week, and typically operated with two trains in service. Our stalwarts on Mini Rail operations were all there, led by Darcy Nelson and his team. The Garden Railway group with Galen Olsen, Chris Forget and the gang, was also busy all week, and the garden railway was enjoyed from the vantage points of both the mini rail and the Royal Hudson train!

Monday, March 17—Things settled in for the week, crowds were still good as many came to see the gallery and ride the mini rail. An new attraction on Monday, Wednesday and Friday were speeder rides, on the mainline, thanks to Craig McDowall and his motorcar.

Saturday, March 22—The final weekend gets underway. It has been a great week, but lots remains and the crowds on the final weekend are strong. The rail headline for today are Budd Car rides to downtown Squamish and back. The train will make four round trips, departing the Heritage Park at 1100, 1300, 1430 and 1530 with return trips from Squamish 30 minutes later.

The train consist is RDC-3 BC 33 and RDC-1 BC 21, with the 33 headed north. This is the first operation of a train onto the Downtown spur and into Squamish since 2006, but is a great illustration of how the Heritage Park can connect sites during a community festival. Today, a block of Cleveland Avenue is closed as a live festival venue and the tracks along Loggers Lane are right there.

Crewing the train are Owen Simpson and John Holliday (qualified CN train crew) and along for the first couple of trips is CN Trainmaster Emanuel Crump III. With CN Clearance in place, the first train departs on time and heads out of the Heritage Park, down track seven of the yard, and onto CN’s Pass Track towards downtown. Here we switch onto the downtown spur and curve across Cleveland Avenue, then follow Loggers lane to Winnipeg Street where the festival is operating. Here our passengers disembark (see cover photo) and others board.

The trip operates without too much trouble—we discover one new road sign erected that is too close to the tracks so it has to be moved by the crew a bit. On board crew of Don Evans and Jett Lee keep the passengers happy, and Tomo’o Oshikawa is along for maintenance (thankfully as he is needed!)

The trips are well patronized at $5.00 each way, and the heaviest load is on trip 2 where more than 70 passengers are aboard the two cars. However, problems with BC 33 emerge on the second return trip when a fuel filter leaks in the Auxiliary Power Unit and it has a driveshaft issue, so it is cut out on arrival back at the Heritage Park and BC 21 handles the last two runs alone.

Back at the Heritage Park things are going full out again, food this weekend is provided by the Squamish Lions Club and the hamburgers and hot dogs are well enjoyed on both Saturday and Sunday. On Sunday night it all comes to a close, and things are done except for the taking down of all the set up.

Thanks to Wild at Art for choosing the Heritage Park as its gallery venue, thanks to all the volunteers who chipped in to help with this community event. Thanks to Sherry Elchuk, Susan Steen and all the heritage park staff who did a great job with an exciting and busy week. Thanks to CN for working with us to provide the Budd Cars on March 22., and thanks to both the Rotary Club of Squamish and the Squamish Lions Club for their provision of great food both weekends.