The gang gathers for the morning discussion. While Hillsdale -like most yards -works around the clock, most of the action takes place during the day. Most of the night freights simply pass through town; only occasionally do they stop to pick up/set out cars. Local runs at night are even rarer since many of the local customers shut down at night; however the night crew does work the yard to get things set up for the morning runs.
The big white cars are cryogenic reefers, destined for the food processor in Dale City. The big tank cars in the middle tracks are for carrying LPG (Liquid Petroleum Gas), the smaller ones in the back are corn syrup cars for the soda plant, also in Dale City. The boxcars are probably carrying scrap paper bales to the paper mill for recycling, and the gondola in front of them is loaded with scrap metal for Wilson Steel Works (yet another customer in Dale City!).
Here, a string of empty wood chip cars sit, waiting for a west-bound to take them back to the saw mill to be re-loaded.
These two shots of the same auto-rack show some of the graffiti that seems to show up on these cars. Unfortunately, this is the mild stuff as far as graffiti goes- hence the use of fully-enclosed auto-carriers to transport brand-new vehicles in.
The gang gathers for the morning discussion. While Hillsdale -like most yards -works around the clock, most of the action takes place during the day. Most of the night freights simply pass through town; only occasionally do they stop to pick up/set out cars. Local runs at night are even rarer since many of the local customers shut down at night; however the night crew does work the yard to get things set up for the morning runs.
The big white cars are cryogenic reefers, destined for the food processor in Dale City. The big tank cars in the middle tracks are for carrying LPG (Liquid Petroleum Gas), the smaller ones in the back are corn syrup cars for the soda plant, also in Dale City. The boxcars are probably carrying scrap paper bales to the paper mill for recycling, and the gondola in front of them is loaded with scrap metal for Wilson Steel Works (yet another customer in Dale City!).
Here, a string of empty wood chip cars sit, waiting for a west-bound to take them back to the saw mill to be re-loaded. 
These two shots of the same auto-rack show some of the graffiti that seems to show up on these cars. Unfortunately, this is the mild stuff as far as graffiti goes- hence the use of fully-enclosed auto-carriers to transport brand-new vehicles in.
