When the "Expo Express" for Montreal's 1967 world exhibition made its first test runs this summer, it had in fact already logged some 1,000 miles, under tow behind a Canadian Pacific freight train.

Built by Canadian Car Division of Hawker Siddeley Canada Limited at Fort William, Ontario, the rapid-transit system will be the major link between Montreal and Expo 67.

The unusual movements, eight in all, each involving one six-car Expo train unit, from the Lakehead to Montreal climaxed almost a year's planning by the builders and Canadian Pacific.

Shipping lightweight rapid-transit cars wasn't new to the railway, which had earlier moved 164 new subway cars from Canadian Car to Toronto. What was unique was moving them on their own wheels on CPR tracks, as part of a freight train. The Toronto cars, which used a non-standard rail gauge, were transported one at a time on flat cars.

When Canadian Car first asked if Canadian Pacific would move the cars to Montreal on their own wheels, considerable research was needed by the builder and the railway to determine if it could be done. Before the project got the green light, dozens of engineering details, ranging from coupler strength and running gear of the Expo units to curves, grades, and roadbed of the CP main line, had to be considered.

Having no past experience with a shipment of this kind, "we pretty well had to plan it out right from scratch", comments Roger Pinsonnault of the Company's department of Motive Power and Rolling Stock. He worked closely on the technical aspects of the project with W.H. (Bill) Johnson, district manager, freight traffic in Fort William, and Canadian Car officials.

To ensure careful handling, the movement was limited to 35 mph and a road foreman of engines and an assistant superintendent rode in the locomotive cab and caboose respectively. In addition, on the first trip Mr. Pinsonnault and Canadian Car representatives were in the Expo cars, keeping watch over impact and ride recording instruments. Two-way radio contact was maintained between locomotive and caboose.

With a flat car at each end, the six-car Expo units were handled at the rear of the train, ahead of the caboose. One end of each flat car was fitted with a specially-designed drawbar connecting it to one end of the Expo train. This modification was required because the units, with a control cabin at each end, only have couplers between cars.

Between 10 and 20 loaded freight cars were up ahead to provide the necessary braking power. The Expo trains, which will draw electric power from a third rail, were not under power during the trip and thus their braking system was not in operation. To operate brakes on the rear flat car and the caboose, a long bypass air hose was run through the six Expo cars from the forward flat car.

Unique as it was, the movement of the eight Expo trains to Montreal was just a further demonstration of the "can do" attitude to unusual freight shipments. Special movements such as this are becoming less and less the exception as shippers present the railway with new problems in transportation which call for the combined talents of traffic men, engineers, transportation and rail operations personnel. Δ