crs1026
Superstar
You can measure the wye at Mimico (I'm not aware of any other one's relevant for the Canadian) on Google Earth, but IIRC it's barely long enough for one locomotive with 6 cars. I believe they wyed at Bayview Jct. (between Hamilton and Aldershot) until that extra mileage (must be something like 60 kilometers per move) became too much to justify...
Edit: Does anyone know when the connection in the southeastern quadrant of Snider Junction got removed (thus necessitating the backing process over the connection in the northwestern quadrant)?
There was never a connecting track in the SE quadrant. The trains have always had to make that back up move.
What some may remember is how the ON trains used to do a 'loop' through Toronto by coming one way on the Bala Sub and going the other up the Newmarket through Barrie and Orillia to Washago. That ended when the Washago- Barrie section was torn up (a truly shortsighted abandonment, IMHO). The old Dutch TEE trains that ONR bought were short enough to wye, but this routing saved time. Originally, they ran all the way from Timmins/Cochrane to Toronto and back up to North Bay each day, so the time saved was needed.
Wyeing the Canadian at Bayview was never a daily ocurrence, rather it was mostly on an exception basis.
- Paul