Wisconsin & Southern HM/MH

Wisconsin & Southern Railroad runs its HM train between Horicon and Milwaukee daily, Monday through Friday, and returns to Horicon as the MH.  Normally, the HM doesn't make it all the way to North Milwaukee, instead dropping cars off for the ML (Milwaukee Local) and Union Pacific's Granville Job at Granville, beneath the Brown Deer Road bridge just west of 107th Street in the northwest corner of Milwaukee.  When traffic is heavier, however, the train does go all the way to the North Milwauke yard.

I've had the opportunity to chase the HM and MH a few times, which are pictured on this page.  Use the links below to jump to the sections of this page, or just scroll down the page to view all the thumbnails...

HM11 (02/11/05) • MH19 (08/19/05)
HM19 (10/19/05) • HM19 (12/19/05)
MH26 (12/26/07) • HM14 (03/14/08)
Advisory Board Special (04/20/08) • TRB Special (08/21/08)
Randolph-Milwaukee Special (11/17/08)

... or, click here to start viewing the album!  (Press F11 to toggle full-screen view in most browsers.)

WSOR HM11
February 11, 2005

In my wandering around Milwaukeeland one cold February morning, I came to Donges Bay Road and spotted a train heading my way.  I pulled out the camera and got a few shots, and decided to chase the train, getting a few more shots in the northeast corner of Menomonee Falls before catching up with the train at Granville.  After watching the exchange of cars at Granville, I once again went to the Menomonee Falls triangle for a parting shot before saying goodbye to the MH11.

WSOR MH19
August 19, 2005

On August 19, 2005, after getting pictures of UP 1988, I chased WSOR's MH up to Menomonee Falls and Germantown.

WSOR HM19
October 19, 2005

On October 19, I found the HM at Ackerville and chased it as far as Germantown!  This outing proved to be a learning experience, as I tried out a few settings on my camera that I didn't know about before!  Some of my photos from this trip turned out especially well, and I really like the picture at Richfield!

WSOR HM19
December 19, 2005

As a result of my previous two successful HM/MH chases on the 19th, I planned on again chasing the HM on December 19, and I made the offer for anyone to join me.  One brave soul, Paul, took me up on the offer, and after breakfast at The Sawmill in Richfield, we headed north to try to find the train, which we did at Hartford.  It was a very cold day, and we both needed the heat of our refuge, the car, to keep fingers and toes from freezing.  The crew could have used a little more refuge, too, since the frigid Wisconsin conditions resulted in several losses of the brake air, as well as some problems with the power switches across the CN/WC at Slinger.  Paul finally gave up the chase after we waited at Slinger for a while, but I picked up again at Ackerville, this time getting a different vantage point, a crew change (making the HM an HMR), and a CN/WC train that snuck up on me.  I finally gave up the chase in Germantown, where it appeared that the train had again dumped the air, but all in all it was a worthwhile day.