Goose Island Odds and Ends

This view looks southeast at the intersection of Cherry, North Branch, and the ironically named Bliss Streets in Chicago on Goose Island. It's anything but bliss for fans of the Milwaukee Road/CP Rail on Goose Island as a stop sign is now bolted across the inactive tracks. Naz-Dar still sees a boxcar or two behind us [edit: 10 Jan 2005. Naz-Dar does not receive rail shipments.] , and Big Bay Lumber gets several flatcars a week, but it's not like the old days. Compare this photo with the action shots at the same spot in the late 1980s.
This picture captures a boxcar parked outside Naz-Dar on Chicago's Goose Island on a muggy Sunday morning. Naz-Dar is a printing supplies company so a presumption is made that the boxcar contains something related to printing. [edit: 10 Jan 2005. This is actually for Big Bay Lumber. Naz-Dar does not receive rail shipments.] The runaround track on the other side was built during street reconstruction of Cherry Street in 1991 for switching cars intended for International Salt further south.
Looks like someone had trouble deciding whether to turn onto Cherry Street or continue on North Branch Street across Goose Island the previous night, and drove head-on into the posts at the intersection. Maybe the sight of a boxcar parked in the middle of Cherry Street threw the driver off, as you can see in the background. Airbags deployed, this car was awaiting a tow early on Sunday morning, July 7, 2003.